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You're listening to the Mind Over Murder podcast.
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My name is Bill Thomas. I'm a writer, consulting producer,
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and now podcaster. I am now trying to use my
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experience as the brother of a murder victim to help
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other victims of violent crime. I'm working on a book
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on the unsolved Colonial Parkway murders, and I'm the co-administrator
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of the Colonial Parkway Murders Facebook group, together with Kristen Dilley.
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My name is Kristen Dilley.
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I'm a writer, a researcher, a teacher, and a victim's advocate,
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as well as the social media manager and co-administrator for
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the Colonial Parkway Murders Facebook page with my partner in crime,
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Bill Thomas.
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Welcome to Mind Over Murder. I'm Kristen Dilley.
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And I'm Bill Thomas.
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We're joined today by our favorite prosecutor, Matt Murphy. Matt,
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you've joined us on three previous episodes. I want to
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talk about your memoir, The Book of Murder. one about
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the Menendez brothers re-sentencing, and one about the parole of
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the Chowchilla kidnappers. And today, we wanted to bring you
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on to educate us about some of the interesting legal
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maneuvers that we've seen played out in some high-profile cases recently.
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You feel like you're up for that today?
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Yeah, ready to go.
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So this is our way of getting free legal advice, Matt,
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if you think about it.
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Yeah. My specialties were sexual assault and homicide, so I
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think you're both going to be disappointed with my The
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services I have available. And as they say, you get
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what you pay for. This is true.
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Matt, we want to start with the case that apparently
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no one can get enough of, and that's the Lindsay
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Clancy trial, of course, which ended in a mistrial on
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September 4th after jurors deadlocked 1101 on whether she could
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be found not guilty by reason of insanity. Let's kind
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of start with the insanity plea. What does insanity actually
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mean in the legal sense?
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So it depends on what state we're talking about. In California,
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and as well as almost every other state, they use
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what's called the McNaughton rule. What does that mean? That
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basically means that if somebody who is suffering from mental
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illness is detached from reality, that they don't appreciate the
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nature and quality of their acts, they're not legally responsible
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or they're legally insane, we would call it in California.
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So what does that mean? That means the devil pops up,
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you got the devil on your shoulder. And it says, hey,
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mentally ill guy, run over there and stab that banana
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or stab that space alien and I won't blow up
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the world. And the person runs over there and stabs
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the banana. They don't understand as a human being that
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they're stabbing. Okay, so under those circumstances, and it makes
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a lot of sense, if they're so psychotic, they're so
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detached from reality, they think you're stabbing a banana, then
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they're not criminally responsible and they're found legally insane. If
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the devil pops up and says, hey, mentally ill guy,
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go over there and stab that person or I'm going
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to blow up the world. They still, despite their mental illness,
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they understand the nature and quality of their actions. They
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understand that they're going over there to kill a human being.
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But whatever their delusional reasons are, and the law says
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that if you're mentally ill, you still have the moral
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and legal responsibility to control your behavior. That is, the
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McNaughton rule is, I think, a couple of hundred years old.
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This is from centuries of human beings just like us
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trying to figure out what's fair and what's right, what's
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just when dealing with mental illness. Massachusetts uses a different rule.
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Massachusetts uses what's known as the McCool rule. It is
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a very high bar for the prosecution. They have removed
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the stigma of insanity, which personally I think is ridiculous
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because they're If you're going to kill somebody, it's not
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a stigma to say you're insane. It actually is an
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explanation for what you did, in my view. So they
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say you are not criminally responsible. So they've substituted the
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word insane for not criminally responsible. And the McCool rule
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basically says a person suffering from mental illness, that's the
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first prong, who either doesn't know the wrongfulness of their actions,
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which is essentially the McNaughton rule, or there's a third
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prong under the McCool rule, Or they know it's wrong,
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but they're unable to conform their conduct with the requirements
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of the law. That's the kicker in the state of Massachusetts.
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And another thing is, in pretty much every other state,
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certainly in California, you bifurcate murder trials. So you have
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the guilt phase, and then you have a whole sanity
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phase where the defense must prove that the person was
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legally insane at the time they acted. In Massachusetts, the
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prosecution bears the burden of proving beyond a reasonable doubt
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that the person had the capacity to control their conduct
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in conformity with the law. So it's a mouthful, and
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that's the standard for the Lindsay Clancy case.
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How often is the insanity defense used? And then, of course,
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second question, how often is it successful?
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So the statistics vary from state to state. I think
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it's far more rare in a federal, like a countrywide breakdown.
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But in short, it is increasingly rare. Juries do not
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like acquitting people because of insanity. Now, it certainly happens.
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And a lot of times those will boil down to
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battles of the experts, quote unquote. And look, I've seen
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some cases in California where juries came back and found
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people insane that, in my view, the jury got scammed.
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In other cases, look, it's like the old Supreme Court
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definition of pornography. I can't define it, but I know
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it when I see it, okay? And what I did
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is I worked in a homicide unit that was known
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as a vertical unit. So I had certain cities assigned
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to me. I did it for 17 years, and we
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would roll out to all of our own homicides. I've
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responded to far too many, especially with the homicide epidemic
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in Southern California. far too many murders where the person
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was truly insane. They were psychotic up the kazoo. And
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that's probably not a polite way of putting it, but there,
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you can tell, like, for example, one of them, I
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went and it was some poor guy who he was swatting,
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not the defendant. I had no sympathy for, sorry, but
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the poor victim. He was a caretaker for a sober
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living home that they had just refurbished and made it
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really nice. And this is one of those AA guys
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that's trying to give back because he'd been sober. He's
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getting his life on track. Really good guy who finds
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this crazy homeless guy who had taken up residence in
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one of the rooms. He tried to get him out
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and the guy attacked him and he bludgeoned him to
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death with a fire extinguisher, which, by the way, is
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incredibly brutal. When we went into the little residence, every
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reflective surface, every TV, every window had a drapery or
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a t-shirt hung over it. And that's because he was
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seeing people inside. And if he covered him, he didn't
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have to see the people staring back at him. That's
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somebody who is legally insane. Contrast that with what I think.
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And I don't know every detail, but like Nick Reiner, right?
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Nick Reiner drugged himself. I don't think he was suffering
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from any delusion like that. Now, I could be wrong.
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I have an open mind. But it's a different sort
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of thing. Spoiled rich kid who's mad at mommy and
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daddy versus this guy. And the spoiled rich kid mad
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at mommy and daddy is just like a case I
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did in Newport. It's one of my final homicide cases
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that I walked through where a guy who is genuinely
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organically mentally ill. He was mentally ill and his parents
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wanted to commit him. Family had a lot of money.
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And he was doing a ton of drugs, kind of
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like Nick Reiner. He was doing it to self-medicate. He
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was mentally ill. He was schizophrenic for reasons that were
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not his fault. Unlike a lot of the homeless people
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we see that have literally drugged themselves into methamphetamine-induced psychosis,
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or you can drug yourself insane, basically. But for me,
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there's a moral difference between some poor person who is
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organically mentally ill and struggles with that versus somebody who's not.
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But still, that guy went, his parents wanted to do
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an involuntary commitment, and they loved him very much, and
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he didn't want to go. So he waited an ambush,
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and he murdered Both of his parents, he stabbed them
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to death. And then he waited for four hours for
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the housekeeper to get in there because he was mad
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at her too. And he killed them all. He was
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found legally sane in the state of California because even
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though he was mentally ill, which is something a lot
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of people get confused by, mental illness and legal insanity
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are two totally different things. Everybody who's legally sane is
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certainly mentally ill. Every person who is mentally ill is
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absolutely not legally insane. You can make a pretty cogent
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argument that every single person who commits a murder is
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mentally ill in some way. There's some DSM diagnosis that
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you can give them. But the question is, do they
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understand the nature and quality of their actions? And the
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vast majority of them do. In Lizzie Clancy's case, that's
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part of the controversy because under the law, his state
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of Massachusetts is different. Even if she knew right from wrong,
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was she capable of conforming her conduct to the requirements
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of the law? Mark Geragos and I were talking about
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this on our podcast. That's so ambiguous. I couldn't wrap
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my head around it. And Mark's take on it, which
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I thought was actually really smart, was they wrote the
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law that way because they want to give the jury
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essentially a blank check to do what they think is right.
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I don't know about that in the state of Massachusetts.
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I don't know about that. That's a brief tutorial. That's
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about four months of law school for you. And we
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just saved money. Yeah, you don't have to go to
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law school.
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The case here in my hometown of Williamsburg, Virginia, that
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really hits home when I think about the insanity defense
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is John Hinckley, who tried to assassinate President Reagan and
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was committed to St. Elizabeth's Mental Hospital for many years.
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And there was a huge furor about 10, 15 years ago,
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when he was basically told, you're cured now, you can
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go home and live with your parents. Nobody wanted John Hinckley,
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presidential assassin, roaming the streets of Williamsburg.
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Which he was. Which he was.
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And he is still here. He is still local. He's
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tried to make a bit of a career for himself
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as a musician and as a writer. He wrote a
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book recently, but nobody here is really buying it because
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they remember.
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John Hinckley, assassin. Yeah, and look, guys, there's another thing
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that we see all the time. It's this thing, oh,
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but she's mentally ill or he's mentally ill. I can
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tell you from firsthand knowledge that some of the most gruesome,
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brutal murder cases I ever responded to were mentally ill people,
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like that fire signature case. Yeah. city, where some guy
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who had a genuine schizophrenic break, and he was a
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good guy, but he suffered from mental illness. Well, he
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ordered some, it looked like a medieval axe hammer thing,
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bought it on Amazon, gets delivered to his house, and
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he goes out on a psychotic break and attacks some
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poor guy just going to work. And it was, I
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won't describe it for the viewer because it's too gruesome,
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but he must have hit him, imagine like probably a
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four-pound hammer axe sort of thing. He probably hit him
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in the head a hundred times. Oh my God. Imagine
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what that looks like, just some poor guy going to work.
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Mentally ill people. They deserve our empathy. However, they are
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some of the most dangerous individuals out there. I'd much
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rather live next to a reformed bankrupt or even a
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gangster who gets out of jail. Some guy who ages
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out of his crimes free when he's 18 or 20
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and he's a gang member. A lot of those guys,
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their highest ambition is to sit at the end of
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a hard work day on a couch and watch a
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game like the rest of us. Maybe have a beer
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if their parole allows it. Those guys, in my view,
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are rarely dangerous because they're rational human beings. Might not
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be that smart, but a mentally ill person, we have
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no control over when they break. And look, when it
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comes to the brain and mental illness, as we all know,
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we are in the dark ages as far as medications.
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And there's, which on the Lindsay Clancy thing, look, I
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can really see arguments on both sides on that case.
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And I've tried to I've tried to adopt a position
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right down the middle, but fundamentally, mental health is based
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on self-reporting. There's no blood test we can take. There's
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no scan. And so proper treatment really does, to the
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greatest extent, require the cooperation of the person who is
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under treatment. And sometimes it works. Sometimes it doesn't work.
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In her case, it clearly didn't work. And there's... There's
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some interesting wrinkles in that trial. Her mother testifying that
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she said she was having what are called command hallucinations,
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or she was hearing this voice and was having ideation
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about hurting the children. Apparently, she didn't say that to
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any of these six, and it's not five. It's six
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mental health care professionals, every single one of them who
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was a woman. None of them indicated that she said
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that to any of them. There's some interesting questions there.
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Was that real? And she didn't report that to the people?
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Or was that bullshit? A mom coming in to try
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to help her kid? I don't know. I watched the
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testimony of the mother. She came off as a very
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nice lady. And I think a lot of moms, guys,
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moms will come in and testify to try to help
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their kids, which would kind of make her a good mom,
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but it'd make her a really shitty grandmother if she
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was being honest. I don't know one way or another.
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I don't know. There's a lot of really interesting issues
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in that case, especially when we take a step back
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and try to divorce ourselves from some of the emotions
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in it. I don't blame you for not wanting John
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Hinckley on the street. I don't think he should have
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been released. And having a president, people like that tend
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to be dangerous until the day they die, in my opinion.
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The Lindsay Clancy trial relied on a lot of expert testimony.
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And I think that there's a number of people who
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don't really know how the experts are picked for a trial.
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So can you kind of walk us through the process
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of both sides for picking experts for a trial? Like
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how are they found? How much time do they spend
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with the defendant?
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That sort of thing. I have to confess some bias
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here before we start. It's okay because you already indicated.
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Do it. All right. You got your asterisk. All right.
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I spent four years in sexual assault before moving into
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homicide where I spent 17 years. So for 21 years
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in California to even argue for probation for child sexual abuse,
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you have to get what's called a 288-1 report, which
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is this cottage industry of people weighing in and the
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intentions of the law were good. It's like where experts
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would evaluate a sex offender to determine whether or not
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they pose an ongoing risk. For 21 years, my job was,
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I'm sorry, I'm swearing so much. Okay. Yeah. My job
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was to read through these things and call bullshit on
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bogus experts. And they're real experts. They're credentialed, the psychiatrists,
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the psychologists. Some of the people out there are really
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good and they're intellectually honest. There's definitely some really good
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forensic psychiatrists. One, Clark Dietz, I have a tremendous amount
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of respect for him. There's another guy, I'll call him out,
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a guy named Mohandi in Los Angeles, who is a
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forensic psychologist, also very good. There's another woman named Jody
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Ward in Orange County. There's a bunch. But there's also
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a whole platoon of these people that come in that,
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in my view, are They want to get hired by
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the defense and they'll kind of cater their opinion to
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sort of help the defendant. Don't even get me started
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on death penalty cases where they can kind of intellectually
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justify their bullshit because they believe that death penalty is barbaric.
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When it comes to experts, there's really good ones out
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there and there's really bad ones out there. A lot
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of times, not to sound too cynical, but I did
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this for a long time. A lot of times, if
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it's real and the defense expert is credible, and somebody
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really has genuine, driving, pervasive mental health issues, a lot
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of those cases are dealt prior to the trial. A
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lot of times, if you have a rational prosecutor, they
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will sit down with the defense lawyer, and they will
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have their own expert who will evaluate it. And if
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it's legit, you'll have two experts, one for the defense,
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or maybe even more than two. But if they use
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a respectable one, As a prosecutor, you're like, okay, this
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guy's genuinely mentally ill. Let's try to work something out
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so we simultaneously protect the community and treat them fairly
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at the same time. The ones that go to trial
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oftentimes are the ones that don't settle because the prosecutor
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doesn't believe the defense expert. It was my job to
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cross-examine defense experts. And I have a new book coming
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out next summer on serial killers, where I do a
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deep dive onto that. Like what actually goes on behind
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the scenes. And I'll give you a little trade secret here.
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What you do as a prosecutor to prepare for defense
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experts is oftentimes I did a case involving fetal alcohol once,
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and it was for a serial killer case. Okay. So
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the defense was arguing that he was suffering from fetal
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alcohol and then that, therefore that mitigated. Fetal alcohol is
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a real thing. It's a horrible affliction. It's basically, it's
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kind of obvious. It is what it sounds like. It's
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a woman who drinks heavily or sometimes not even that
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heavily during pregnancy. It causes developmental problems, specifically brain damage.
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And there are often, it's a huge problem in Russia,
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not surprisingly, but it's a problem everywhere. It just wasn't
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true in this case. So what you do to prep
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that is you learn. So this is a new subject
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matter for me. I'd been in homicide a long time,
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but hadn't encountered that little niche before. I learn it from,
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and they called, they had five different experts in the
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defense side, they called four, and I learned the subject
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matter from their experts. And the way it works is
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if they're legitimate experts and they're properly credentialed and they
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actually do it, they will have published. And if they
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publish something, that means it's been peer-reviewed. If they publish
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something that's been peer-reviewed, it will tend to make sense.
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If you've done your job as a prosecutor and you've
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charged the right person in the right way and you've
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evaluated the case properly, automatically, therefore, what happens at trial,
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they should be full of crap. Typically, what you do
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as a prosecutor in dealing with that is you cross-examine
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them with their own previous articles that were peer-reviewed that
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make sense. You learn the subject matter from them. You
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study it from their articles and then they'll come in
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and say something that contradicts themselves. So that's kind of
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the tactic. It doesn't really answer your question. So what
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I would do, the way I would select my counter
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or the experts that I would bring in, and by
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the way, I was very, I didn't like relying on experts.
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I liked cross-examining their experts and showing the jury why
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they were full of crap and why they made no sense.
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And then maybe I'd call an expert for half an
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hour to back clean up for me. And so I
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would call in an honest expert, whether that's a neurologist,
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whether that's a psychiatrist or a forensic psychologist. And there
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were some that were really good. And this would have
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been somebody I would have consulted with who honestly evaluated
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the case and came back and said, this guy was
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perfectly capable of controlling his conduct, or yes, he was
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mentally ill, but he wasn't suffering from delusions at the
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time that would separate him from reality. Like I said,
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every murder, whether it's at the neighbor over the fence
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or a spouse in the kitchen after too many glasses
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of wine, There's an argument to be made that every
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killer is mentally ill in some way. Okay. So the
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question is, are they legally responsible? The vast majority of
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the time they are, in my view, and the times
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that they're not, it's like the guy that covered the
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TV and you know that immediately and you treat that
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case differently.
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Can the idea of sending someone who's mentally ill into
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a mental hospital versus a prison Can that be structured
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in such a way so that it's required that this
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individual has to remain in a mental hospital for the
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rest of their life, just like they would if they
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were receiving a life sentence that sent them to prison?
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You would think so, right? The truth is it's a
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different system, right? So the purpose for prison is punishment, basically,
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and protection of the community. The purpose of a mental
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health facility is restoration of sanity and rehabilitation to become
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a functioning member of society again, right? So it's a
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different goal. And most states don't have that indefinite life sentence.
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So like in Massachusetts, for example, and I'm not licensed
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in Massachusetts, I'm no expert on Massachusetts law, but in
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my minimal research that I've done on it, The way
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it happens, if Lindsay Clancy, for example, is found not
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criminally responsible, she would go and get a 40-day diagnostic.
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And I believe in Massachusetts, they do a reevaluation every
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six months, and then it might shift to annuals. If
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she is deemed to no longer pose a threat to
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herself or others, then she's eligible for release. Now, what's
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00:19:43.970 --> 00:19:46.890
interesting about this case is that we keep hearing the
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term postpartum. That's a real thing, too, up to 20%.
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20% of women suffer from some form of postpartum after
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having a baby. And that's a really important thing for
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people to be aware of. It's very real, but that's depression.
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Postpartum psychosis is extremely rare. I think it's 0.02, and
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00:20:05.619 --> 00:20:07.740
my stats are probably wrong on this, but it's like
398
00:20:08.160 --> 00:20:10.829
it goes from 20% of all to 1 in 100,000
399
00:20:10.829 --> 00:20:15.430
that will suffer from that. And of those, this psychosis
400
00:20:15.730 --> 00:20:20.910
can be any form of voices or whatever. The psychosis
401
00:20:21.009 --> 00:20:23.660
manifesting in a desire to kill their own kids is
402
00:20:23.839 --> 00:20:27.609
even far more remote subset of the subset. So what
403
00:20:27.750 --> 00:20:30.950
I think, and postpartum is generally as bad as it
404
00:20:31.039 --> 00:20:36.319
is temporary, right? Unlike schizophrenia or bipolar disorder, that are
405
00:20:36.400 --> 00:20:40.279
organic mental illness, postpartum, for somebody that goes to a
406
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mental facility after killing their three kids or the neighbor
407
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or whoever it is, if it really is based in postpartum,
408
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she's going to be legally sane. She's probably legally sane now.
409
00:20:50.769 --> 00:20:52.529
Most of the time, people have to be legally sane
410
00:20:52.809 --> 00:20:55.329
for them to even embark on a trial. I've been
411
00:20:55.390 --> 00:20:58.059
calling this and I've had people... gnashing their teeth and
412
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tearing their clothes and sending me hate online. But I'll
413
00:21:00.980 --> 00:21:02.819
bet she's out in two years if that's what she gets.
414
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For a lot of people, I think, in America, that
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00:21:06.000 --> 00:21:07.660
they're going to have the John Hinckley effect, just like
416
00:21:07.680 --> 00:21:10.599
you described. They're going to be happy to see her out.
417
00:21:11.339 --> 00:21:13.759
In Lindsay's case, I'm assuming that the prosecutors are going
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to have to do a cost-benefit analysis and a retrial
419
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versus a plea. What are some of the conversations that
420
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are going to go on behind closed doors in the
421
00:21:22.220 --> 00:21:24.029
prosecutor's office regarding this case?
422
00:21:24.480 --> 00:21:26.900
I think that DA, I saw a press conference with him.
423
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I don't know him. I have a friend named Dave
424
00:21:28.849 --> 00:21:31.190
Ehrenberg who does home and says he's a great guy.
425
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He gave a press conference that was everything we didn't
426
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see during the trial. He was passionate. He would fart up.
427
00:21:36.890 --> 00:21:38.960
I don't know if you saw that, but it's like, okay,
428
00:21:39.220 --> 00:21:41.700
there's a frigging trial lawyer right there. That's what was
429
00:21:41.799 --> 00:21:43.650
missing in the whole case. So I think that what's
430
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happening behind the scenes is he's looking at an 11
431
00:21:46.170 --> 00:21:48.769
to 1 hanger. That's what we call them. And that
432
00:21:48.890 --> 00:21:51.930
forces you to reevaluate. I think behind the scenes right now,
433
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they're probably trying to hammer out some sort of deal
434
00:21:55.019 --> 00:21:59.079
with Kevin Reddington. Kevin Reddington, however, and who knows? I
435
00:21:59.420 --> 00:22:01.859
don't know what efforts were made to resolve the case
436
00:22:01.920 --> 00:22:04.140
before it went to trial. I can tell you this.
437
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I want to be fair to them. Those two prosecutors
438
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are not ready for prime time. They're very frustrated for
439
00:22:08.750 --> 00:22:12.009
me to watch that trial. They did a 42-minute closing argument, guys.
440
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On a triple homicide with mental health issues, I never
441
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did a murder case where I didn't spend at least
442
00:22:17.130 --> 00:22:20.049
an hour just explaining the law to my jury. You know,
443
00:22:20.069 --> 00:22:22.470
the case is complicated. I've done the majority of my
444
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murder cases. Closing arguments were at least two days long
445
00:22:25.839 --> 00:22:28.119
with me going and then the defense going and then
446
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me going. You mentioned the Menendez brothers. The first trial
447
00:22:31.740 --> 00:22:34.220
of Lyle and Eric Menendez, they were defended by a woman,
448
00:22:34.299 --> 00:22:38.299
Leslie Abramson. Her closing argument. was three days long.
449
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Wow.
450
00:22:39.880 --> 00:22:42.900
Regardless of how you feel about that case, look, that's
451
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a long one. But when you're talking about the liberty
452
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and interest of human being for life, when you're talking
453
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about lives that were taken, it merits a lot more
454
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than 42 frickin' minutes. And that was the best day
455
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for Florence I saw the prosecutors. Their opening was terrible.
456
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You never read your notes. Like, it drove me crazy
457
00:23:00.660 --> 00:23:03.240
watching it. And they've got a tough job. It's not
458
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for everybody. But either that DA needs to put in
459
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a gunslinger. You could even hire an outside special prosecutor
460
00:23:10.650 --> 00:23:13.740
to do it. But those two, Kevin Reddington will win
461
00:23:13.759 --> 00:23:15.680
the next time around. You need somebody that stands up
462
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with the moral authority of a prosecutor trying to hold
463
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somebody accountable for killing three children. And we never saw
464
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an inkling of that. We saw bows. We saw a
465
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lot of memes. But we did not see, in my view,
466
00:23:29.490 --> 00:23:33.170
talented prosecutors taking that case to the place it should
467
00:23:33.190 --> 00:23:33.509
have gone.
468
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Do you think the fact that the case hung 11
469
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to 1, and if I understood the media coverage correctly,
470
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those 11 people were predisposed to the insanity plea, isn't
471
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that a pretty strong indication of how the jury felt
472
00:23:52.410 --> 00:23:55.650
about the presentation by the prosecution? Sure.
473
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But I've seen cases at a very, very high level.
474
00:23:59.049 --> 00:24:01.029
My old boss, his name is Dave Brandt. He's a
475
00:24:01.250 --> 00:24:04.599
phenomenal trial lawyer. homicide for years as a line deputy,
476
00:24:04.619 --> 00:24:07.200
and then he became our supervisor. One of my favorite
477
00:24:07.220 --> 00:24:09.740
guys I've ever worked for, he did a death penalty
478
00:24:09.779 --> 00:24:12.410
case where he hung one 11 to 1, and it
479
00:24:12.569 --> 00:24:15.190
was 11 to 1 for life without possibility of parole.
480
00:24:15.930 --> 00:24:18.230
And he had strategies, he had ideas, and then a
481
00:24:18.769 --> 00:24:20.849
guy named Brian Brown came in and said, hey, let
482
00:24:20.869 --> 00:24:22.289
me take a crack at it, and he got a
483
00:24:22.410 --> 00:24:24.809
death penalty in the next one. You would need to
484
00:24:24.869 --> 00:24:27.059
revamp the entire presentation of the case. I have a
485
00:24:27.079 --> 00:24:29.400
list of about 100 things that I would change in
486
00:24:29.420 --> 00:24:31.900
the way they presented it, at least a If they
487
00:24:31.940 --> 00:24:34.660
totally revamped it, that's a case that has always been
488
00:24:34.740 --> 00:24:38.609
winnable in my view from the prosecution standpoint. Now, whether
489
00:24:38.650 --> 00:24:40.710
or not that's the right thing, I don't know. I
490
00:24:40.730 --> 00:24:43.029
have my thoughts, but again, I've tried to maintain kind
491
00:24:43.230 --> 00:24:44.789
of a really neutral view of it.
492
00:24:46.269 --> 00:24:48.910
You're listening to Mind Over Murder. We'll be right back
493
00:24:49.250 --> 00:24:56.500
after this word from our sponsors. We're back here at
494
00:24:56.519 --> 00:24:57.279
Mind Over Murder.
495
00:24:58.000 --> 00:25:01.539
Kevin Rennington, I thought was very effective in his opening statement. Yeah.
496
00:25:01.559 --> 00:25:03.910
That he really commanded the courtroom. I think from a
497
00:25:03.990 --> 00:25:06.809
completely mercenary point of view, I heaped a lot of
498
00:25:06.849 --> 00:25:09.640
praise on his tactics at the beginning. And we got
499
00:25:09.660 --> 00:25:13.069
to closing arguments. His closing sucks. He went after the
500
00:25:13.109 --> 00:25:14.930
police that he didn't need to do. He personalized it
501
00:25:14.950 --> 00:25:17.069
with the prosecutors that he didn't need to do. And
502
00:25:17.089 --> 00:25:18.609
then it was frustrating for me because they got the
503
00:25:18.650 --> 00:25:21.009
last word and they didn't hammer him on that. Like
504
00:25:21.029 --> 00:25:23.039
some of the guys that I worked with would still
505
00:25:23.099 --> 00:25:26.880
be in the rebuttal hammering him. These prosecutors stole my
506
00:25:26.940 --> 00:25:30.140
client's soul. Are you effing kidding me? Yes, it was.
507
00:25:30.359 --> 00:25:32.420
She got charged for the deaths of her three kids
508
00:25:32.480 --> 00:25:35.309
and that stole her soul. Like they did something wrong.
509
00:25:35.380 --> 00:25:37.609
I'm I was crawling through my computer screen at that.
510
00:25:37.829 --> 00:25:39.230
But we saw no counterpunches.
511
00:25:39.589 --> 00:25:39.890
No.
512
00:25:40.269 --> 00:25:43.349
We saw it was one-sided. And then look, I think
513
00:25:43.369 --> 00:25:45.170
that I was a fan of his. I don't know him.
514
00:25:45.349 --> 00:25:47.339
I thought he did really good work. But then when
515
00:25:47.380 --> 00:25:49.900
he's hanging at 11 to 1 and he calls a juror,
516
00:25:50.500 --> 00:25:53.049
calls him out and accuses him of committing perjury. That
517
00:25:53.069 --> 00:25:56.890
was an outrageous thing to do. I was pretty shocked. Guys,
518
00:25:56.930 --> 00:25:59.819
that was outrageous. And then we got these text messages
519
00:25:59.900 --> 00:26:02.099
that have surfaced. I don't know if they're real or
520
00:26:02.140 --> 00:26:05.099
not between him and a guy named Aiden Kearney, also
521
00:26:05.119 --> 00:26:05.920
known as Turtle Boy.
522
00:26:05.940 --> 00:26:06.660
Oh, yeah.
523
00:26:06.920 --> 00:26:10.049
If they're real, you have a defense lawyer who's talking
524
00:26:10.069 --> 00:26:14.029
to some frigging blogger And podcaster. Trying to invite him
525
00:26:14.250 --> 00:26:18.119
into the case. And that guy, Aiden Kearney is his name.
526
00:26:18.279 --> 00:26:20.619
Aiden Kearney was charged in the Karen Reid case.
527
00:26:20.799 --> 00:26:21.279
Yes, he was.
528
00:26:21.299 --> 00:26:24.589
And is pending charges for conspiracy to intimidate witnesses and
529
00:26:24.650 --> 00:26:27.190
is now also as a separate legal action from those
530
00:26:27.230 --> 00:26:31.750
same witnesses for defamation. And the idea that a defense
531
00:26:31.809 --> 00:26:34.619
lawyer is a member of the bar would invite that
532
00:26:34.960 --> 00:26:36.700
stinky animal into the tent.
533
00:26:36.980 --> 00:26:37.319
Yeah.
534
00:26:37.480 --> 00:26:39.779
And for the Turtle Boy fans out there, I've already,
535
00:26:39.819 --> 00:26:43.059
I've spoken about this already. I've gotten some hate from
536
00:26:43.099 --> 00:26:45.640
those people and you guys knocked yourselves out. I think
537
00:26:45.680 --> 00:26:48.140
it's funny, but I stand by everything I say. It's
538
00:26:48.160 --> 00:26:50.420
like that. And look, another thing to keep in mind
539
00:26:50.440 --> 00:26:52.650
about that is that Every once in a while, you've
540
00:26:52.670 --> 00:26:55.589
got somebody who they vote their conscience. A juror should
541
00:26:55.609 --> 00:26:57.650
be able to do that. And the vast majority of
542
00:26:57.670 --> 00:27:00.529
the time, they hold out for the defense. So it's
543
00:27:00.529 --> 00:27:04.279
11 prosecution jurors. What you do is you re-rack another panel,
544
00:27:04.640 --> 00:27:06.920
you accept that's a part of the process, and you
545
00:27:06.940 --> 00:27:09.359
do the trial again. That's what you do. And juries
546
00:27:09.380 --> 00:27:12.220
have been hanging, guys, for hundreds of years. That's why
547
00:27:12.299 --> 00:27:18.700
we need- And this whole idea, that guy, and nobody
548
00:27:18.779 --> 00:27:21.339
volunteers for jury duty unless you're on the grand jury.
549
00:27:21.680 --> 00:27:24.049
So for what's known as a petite jury or regular
550
00:27:24.089 --> 00:27:26.569
jury duty, we get drafted into that. We have to
551
00:27:26.609 --> 00:27:29.049
pay our taxes to do jury duty. And those are
552
00:27:29.069 --> 00:27:32.190
our only two civic duties in America. Okay. So he
553
00:27:32.210 --> 00:27:35.369
gets drafted out of the community. He votes his conscience
554
00:27:35.450 --> 00:27:38.420
at the end. Plenty of reason in that case why
555
00:27:38.440 --> 00:27:41.480
a juror could reasonably disagree with the defense. Just like
556
00:27:41.519 --> 00:27:45.190
there's plenty of arguments for the other way. But we're
557
00:27:45.299 --> 00:27:48.220
so used to this idea that we see a video
558
00:27:48.240 --> 00:27:49.779
on TikTok that we don't like. So I'm going to
559
00:27:49.839 --> 00:27:52.099
weigh in with my little keyboard, right? I'm going to
560
00:27:52.200 --> 00:27:56.599
ask you, that's ubiquitous in our society now, right? The
561
00:27:56.640 --> 00:27:59.269
problem is when you do that to a juror, in
562
00:27:59.289 --> 00:28:02.910
the state of Massachusetts, there is a criminal code section
563
00:28:03.329 --> 00:28:06.650
that makes it a felony to harass a juror because
564
00:28:06.670 --> 00:28:09.349
of their dirty duty. That if it is a regular case,
565
00:28:09.529 --> 00:28:11.970
it's 10 years in state prison, a maximum of 10 years.
566
00:28:12.299 --> 00:28:14.720
If it's a life case, which Lindsey Clancy's case was,
567
00:28:15.039 --> 00:28:17.539
it's up to 20 years in state prison. And there's
568
00:28:17.819 --> 00:28:21.220
all these provisions in the law that you either specifically
569
00:28:21.259 --> 00:28:24.579
intended or you act with reckless disregard for somebody else
570
00:28:24.619 --> 00:28:28.680
harassing them. Somebody that I guarantee behind the scenes right now, guys,
571
00:28:28.700 --> 00:28:31.920
there is a robust criminal investigation of that. Somebody is
572
00:28:31.940 --> 00:28:35.829
getting arrested for the harassment of that juror and personally
573
00:28:36.240 --> 00:28:40.289
can't happen soon enough because that is a sacrosanct part
574
00:28:40.369 --> 00:28:43.720
of the jury system. When social media meets that and
575
00:28:43.869 --> 00:28:47.190
somebody's life is ruined for getting drafted into jury duty,
576
00:28:47.230 --> 00:28:50.829
that is not okay. It fires me up regardless. That
577
00:28:50.869 --> 00:28:53.930
goes equally for people that are tracking down the pro-Lindsey
578
00:28:53.960 --> 00:28:58.039
jurors and harassing them. And that same, there's no defense there.
579
00:28:58.099 --> 00:29:01.000
That same section, especially for people domiciled in the state
580
00:29:01.019 --> 00:29:04.089
of Massachusetts. If you're doing that and you're using your
581
00:29:04.210 --> 00:29:06.400
social media to do it, You're going to get it.
582
00:29:06.410 --> 00:29:08.390
I wouldn't be surprised if you get a knock on
583
00:29:08.410 --> 00:29:10.569
the door. Serious crime in the state of Massachusetts.
584
00:29:10.630 --> 00:29:14.059
This is beyond forgetting about your manners. I've been shocked
585
00:29:14.190 --> 00:29:18.420
at the way people have lashed out at the jurors
586
00:29:18.500 --> 00:29:19.279
on both sides.
587
00:29:19.460 --> 00:29:20.220
Yeah, it's not right.
588
00:29:20.240 --> 00:29:22.859
People that were on the 11th side and the sole juror.
589
00:29:23.259 --> 00:29:26.829
There was plenty of criticism of him. People seem to
590
00:29:26.869 --> 00:29:28.869
have lost sight of the fact that we're not all
591
00:29:28.910 --> 00:29:32.109
supposed to personalize this to the point where you're out
592
00:29:32.430 --> 00:29:35.940
harassing this guy. Because of the way he voted on
593
00:29:35.980 --> 00:29:39.250
a jury after sitting through days or weeks of testimony.
594
00:29:39.490 --> 00:29:43.960
It's felony. It's felony conduct to do that. And Massachusetts better,
595
00:29:44.559 --> 00:29:46.319
as they say, you guys better get right with the
596
00:29:46.380 --> 00:29:50.450
Lord on this because every potential juror... in America is
597
00:29:50.619 --> 00:29:54.359
watching this and who'd want to do jury duty? Or
598
00:29:54.400 --> 00:29:56.640
you got to go along with the group. And even then,
599
00:29:56.680 --> 00:30:00.759
if the group, if the opinion is unpopular, you get doxed. Yeah.
600
00:30:00.960 --> 00:30:04.339
Somebody needs to be held accountable for that. And everybody
601
00:30:04.380 --> 00:30:07.400
needs to watch it. The state of Massachusetts needs to
602
00:30:07.420 --> 00:30:10.339
take care of business. And if they don't, if they don't,
603
00:30:10.599 --> 00:30:14.460
there are federal statutes that also protect people when the
604
00:30:14.519 --> 00:30:18.970
harassment is done online. There's federal cyber stalking. Love them
605
00:30:19.029 --> 00:30:21.799
or hate them, Trump's Justice Department, I would not be
606
00:30:21.839 --> 00:30:24.460
at all surprised if they came in and if the
607
00:30:24.539 --> 00:30:28.460
state doesn't do anything, if the feds do and somebody
608
00:30:28.519 --> 00:30:30.980
needs to. And that's not a political statement. That's a
609
00:30:31.059 --> 00:30:33.690
save the integrity of the jury system statement. This has
610
00:30:33.730 --> 00:30:36.750
been a train wreck to watch on so many different levels.
611
00:30:37.910 --> 00:30:38.769
One quick question.
612
00:30:39.269 --> 00:30:43.130
Explain doxing, if you will, because not everybody will understand
613
00:30:43.170 --> 00:30:43.740
the reference.
614
00:30:44.289 --> 00:30:47.509
Yeah, so doxing essentially is when somebody, so what happened
615
00:30:47.710 --> 00:30:50.089
on this one is, and I think their legal and
616
00:30:50.130 --> 00:30:52.789
standards department were out of their mind. There was a
617
00:30:52.970 --> 00:30:57.769
local station in Boston, an NBC station, an NBC affiliate
618
00:30:57.910 --> 00:31:00.589
that figured out who this guy was. And they didn't
619
00:31:00.609 --> 00:31:05.950
release his name or his city, but they showed previous
620
00:31:06.069 --> 00:31:09.349
legal documents with case numbers on it because they couldn't
621
00:31:09.609 --> 00:31:12.470
think to redact those. From those case numbers, somebody was
622
00:31:12.509 --> 00:31:15.039
able to go, apparently, And figure out the name of
623
00:31:15.079 --> 00:31:18.039
this guy. And then it went to this Aiden Kearney
624
00:31:18.059 --> 00:31:21.640
guy who released a photo of him and his name
625
00:31:22.000 --> 00:31:25.079
and the city that he lived in. Then this deluge
626
00:31:25.099 --> 00:31:27.549
of harassment hit the guy. I even read that, I
627
00:31:27.549 --> 00:31:28.829
don't know if this is true or not, but I
628
00:31:28.910 --> 00:31:32.910
read that Governor DeSantis of Florida offered him sanctuary in
629
00:31:32.930 --> 00:31:37.130
the state of Florida. He actually did. Yeah, when governors
630
00:31:37.170 --> 00:31:39.809
of other states are saying, hey, come find safety in
631
00:31:39.849 --> 00:31:42.869
my state, we have officially lost the plot.
632
00:31:43.299 --> 00:31:46.680
Agreed. I want to switch over to another case that,
633
00:31:46.720 --> 00:31:49.440
of course, everybody has heard of unless they've been living
634
00:31:49.480 --> 00:31:52.250
under a rock, and that is the Brian Kohlberger case,
635
00:31:52.650 --> 00:31:56.009
who is the confessed killer in the Idaho 4 case.
636
00:31:56.130 --> 00:31:59.819
So he made a motion to have his guilty plea withdrawn.
637
00:32:00.319 --> 00:32:04.180
citing ineffective assistance of counsel. He claims his defense team
638
00:32:04.200 --> 00:32:09.119
withheld exculpatory evidence and that they misrepresented life on death row.
639
00:32:09.220 --> 00:32:10.460
I love that. What did you think that was going
640
00:32:10.480 --> 00:32:11.220
to be like, Brian?
641
00:32:11.259 --> 00:32:11.859
Yeah, really?
642
00:32:12.000 --> 00:32:15.099
He states that they made promises of employment, freedom of movement,
643
00:32:15.160 --> 00:32:18.259
and full contact visits with his family. Is I want
644
00:32:18.279 --> 00:32:21.660
to withdraw my plea a tactic that every convicted killer tries,
645
00:32:21.900 --> 00:32:26.809
or might Brian Koberger have actual grounds? Very skeptical of
646
00:32:26.849 --> 00:32:27.710
the actual grounds.
647
00:32:27.730 --> 00:32:29.470
I got kind of wordy in the last couple. The
648
00:32:29.490 --> 00:32:32.269
answer is no. Okay, it's not. First of all, lawyers
649
00:32:32.329 --> 00:32:35.309
don't make promises about what the CDC is going to
650
00:32:35.349 --> 00:32:37.319
do or not do. They may say, hey, hopefully they'll
651
00:32:37.339 --> 00:32:39.460
do this or hopefully they'll do that. A lawyer has
652
00:32:39.500 --> 00:32:42.660
no control over what the, sorry, CDC is the California
653
00:32:42.680 --> 00:32:47.170
Department of Corrections, whatever they call it in Idaho. So they're, A,
654
00:32:47.200 --> 00:32:50.289
they're not saying that. B, his attorneys pulled a frigging
655
00:32:50.369 --> 00:32:52.490
rabbit out of a hat on his behalf. Because I
656
00:32:52.910 --> 00:32:56.029
was publicly very critical of the prosecutor on this for
657
00:32:56.069 --> 00:32:58.670
coming off the death penalty. And I, again, stand by
658
00:32:58.710 --> 00:33:02.000
everything I said. I thought that was incredibly weak and
659
00:33:02.079 --> 00:33:03.799
they should have gone for death. And that was they've
660
00:33:03.819 --> 00:33:07.079
got a great judge. What the law requires in Idaho
661
00:33:07.380 --> 00:33:10.890
is what's known as manifest injustice. So what is manifest
662
00:33:10.930 --> 00:33:14.519
injustice for withdrawing a plea? Manifest injustice is somebody pops
663
00:33:14.579 --> 00:33:17.289
up with a video that shows you drinking a pina
664
00:33:17.309 --> 00:33:20.730
colada in Las Vegas at the Tiki Bar next to
665
00:33:20.750 --> 00:33:23.130
an Elvis impersonator at the time of the crime. That's
666
00:33:23.170 --> 00:33:27.210
manifest injustice after a plea. Brian Koberger not liking his
667
00:33:27.250 --> 00:33:32.779
accommodations is not a manifest injustice. Yeah, really? I personally
668
00:33:32.819 --> 00:33:36.579
hope he doesn't like it. They already did the penalty hearing. So, yeah, he's,
669
00:33:37.119 --> 00:33:39.180
by filing this, he filed it himself, by the way,
670
00:33:39.200 --> 00:33:43.970
and apparently some lawyers that have come in It's going nowhere.
671
00:33:44.190 --> 00:33:45.930
The judge is going to deny it. He'll give him
672
00:33:45.970 --> 00:33:49.490
his due process, give him a hearing. But also, what
673
00:33:49.529 --> 00:33:55.019
a weenie, right? What a frigging weenie. Those lawyers did
674
00:33:55.519 --> 00:33:58.140
great work for him to the point that a lot
675
00:33:58.180 --> 00:34:00.720
of us were pulling our hair out when the prosecutor
676
00:34:01.000 --> 00:34:04.390
basically blinked. They did wonderful work. And by the way,
677
00:34:04.410 --> 00:34:08.230
his remedy is he gets a retrial. And for the
678
00:34:08.289 --> 00:34:10.960
state of Idaho, if that prosecutor doesn't have the frigging
679
00:34:11.199 --> 00:34:13.260
guts to do it, tap me in, guys. I would
680
00:34:13.300 --> 00:34:15.559
love to prosecute a Brian Kovrig case. And I will
681
00:34:15.599 --> 00:34:17.400
get the death penalty in the state of... I got
682
00:34:17.420 --> 00:34:19.260
to go pro hoc vice to do it. I'm not
683
00:34:19.320 --> 00:34:21.360
licensed in the state of Idaho. But if you don't
684
00:34:21.380 --> 00:34:23.300
have the balls to do it, I can think of
685
00:34:23.320 --> 00:34:26.110
about 100 people I know that have retired from the
686
00:34:26.150 --> 00:34:28.590
world of prosecution who would happily step in there and
687
00:34:28.650 --> 00:34:31.130
see to it that Brian Kovrig gets a death sentence.
688
00:34:31.650 --> 00:34:34.449
And that's not being bloodthirsty. That is a horrible frigging crime.
689
00:34:35.130 --> 00:34:37.969
And I believe that the aggravating circumstances, first of all,
690
00:34:38.309 --> 00:34:40.880
the evidence is overwhelming in that. And all the pro
691
00:34:40.909 --> 00:34:44.059
burgers and all those loonies online that think he didn't
692
00:34:44.079 --> 00:34:47.039
do it. Yeah, he did it. He pled guilty to it.
693
00:34:47.079 --> 00:34:50.059
The evidence is absolutely overwhelming that he did it. And
694
00:34:50.079 --> 00:34:52.400
if they don't have the, if it gets reversed, I'll
695
00:34:52.440 --> 00:34:54.639
raise my hand to volunteer to be the next prosecutor
696
00:34:54.659 --> 00:34:55.000
in line.
697
00:34:55.239 --> 00:34:57.199
Does that mean you'll move to Idaho for a couple
698
00:34:57.239 --> 00:34:57.610
of months?
699
00:34:57.809 --> 00:35:00.530
We get a cool hotel stay at, I'd buy a
700
00:35:00.570 --> 00:35:03.159
flat rod and probably really enjoy it.
701
00:35:03.449 --> 00:35:05.769
What is that change of plea hearing actually going to
702
00:35:05.829 --> 00:35:07.550
look like? Is it five minutes in court?
703
00:35:08.170 --> 00:35:09.570
I think that a lot of it will be done
704
00:35:09.889 --> 00:35:13.409
on written motions. It's possible that they'll do what's known
705
00:35:13.469 --> 00:35:16.300
as a de novo hearing. Well, the court will take evidence,
706
00:35:16.340 --> 00:35:20.699
but that's problematic because you're talking about attorney-client. You're talking
707
00:35:20.739 --> 00:35:24.119
about communications between an attorney and their client. And that's
708
00:35:24.280 --> 00:35:26.539
an area that most judges are going to be very
709
00:35:26.619 --> 00:35:29.849
reluctant to do. I just don't see it going anywhere.
710
00:35:30.110 --> 00:35:34.030
When you're talking about potential death penalties, sometimes there are
711
00:35:34.489 --> 00:35:37.690
some lawyers are so zealous in their opposition to the
712
00:35:37.730 --> 00:35:41.269
death penalty that they might come in and potentially do
713
00:35:41.289 --> 00:35:44.110
what they can to help somebody like Koberger. This is
714
00:35:44.150 --> 00:35:46.769
the opposite. He's allowed to withdraw his plea. That guy's
715
00:35:46.789 --> 00:35:49.869
going to get the death sentence because he will. And
716
00:35:49.969 --> 00:35:53.409
so they need to, if they ever are called and
717
00:35:53.489 --> 00:35:56.880
somehow the court, Koberger waves his attorney client, and they
718
00:35:56.920 --> 00:35:59.539
want to try to help him, they will probably be
719
00:35:59.800 --> 00:36:03.079
really pro-plea at that point, I would imagine. They did
720
00:36:03.159 --> 00:36:05.199
fantastic work for him. And I was not a fan
721
00:36:05.500 --> 00:36:08.300
of those lawyers, but the results speak for themselves. They
722
00:36:08.340 --> 00:36:10.559
got the brass ring. They got a life sentence instead
723
00:36:10.619 --> 00:36:13.980
of the death penalty, which remember, California, the death penalty
724
00:36:14.019 --> 00:36:17.559
is symbolic. Idaho is the 10th circuit. That's a whole
725
00:36:17.579 --> 00:36:21.070
different ballgame when it comes to the appellate review. He
726
00:36:21.179 --> 00:36:23.750
could actually be executed one day. Yeah.
727
00:36:23.909 --> 00:36:26.639
In Idaho, if you're sentenced to death, there's a good
728
00:36:26.719 --> 00:36:29.320
chance actually that you will ultimately be put to death.
729
00:36:29.480 --> 00:36:31.559
Yeah. I think they have seven people on death row
730
00:36:31.719 --> 00:36:35.739
versus 450 in California. They have seven, I think seven
731
00:36:35.780 --> 00:36:37.800
or eight people on death row in the state of Idaho.
732
00:36:38.380 --> 00:36:40.320
So yeah, I don't see it. I just don't see it.
733
00:36:40.519 --> 00:36:42.610
The judge isn't going to grant. That's a great judge too,
734
00:36:42.769 --> 00:36:44.989
by the way. If it lands in front of the
735
00:36:45.010 --> 00:36:47.869
same judge that we saw, man, that's everything a judge
736
00:36:47.929 --> 00:36:49.849
is supposed to be. So he'll deny it.
737
00:36:50.559 --> 00:36:52.300
So our last question, we're going to have to tee
738
00:36:52.340 --> 00:36:54.750
it up for a second, though, here. So let me
739
00:36:54.769 --> 00:36:58.869
give you some context. So this question regards our own case,
740
00:36:58.929 --> 00:37:01.969
the Colonial Parkway murders, and it happened very recently. So
741
00:37:02.090 --> 00:37:06.619
on this past Friday, September 18th, the FBI called for
742
00:37:06.639 --> 00:37:08.900
a meeting with the family members of Keith Kahl and
743
00:37:08.920 --> 00:37:12.179
Cassandra Haley. They are two young adults who disappeared in
744
00:37:12.320 --> 00:37:16.110
April 1988 and were presumed murdered. Their bodies were never recovered.
745
00:37:16.869 --> 00:37:19.809
The prime suspect in their case was Alan Wade Wilmer Sr.,
746
00:37:19.769 --> 00:37:22.829
a waterman from Lancaster County who, it was discovered two
747
00:37:22.869 --> 00:37:26.090
years ago, was a serial killer. He was responsible for
748
00:37:26.110 --> 00:37:30.550
the 1986 murders of Bill's sister Kathy and her girlfriend Rebecca,
749
00:37:30.989 --> 00:37:34.130
the 87 murders of Robin Edwards, David Knobling, and Lorraine Powell,
750
00:37:34.570 --> 00:37:37.449
the 89 murder of Terry Howell, and now the two
751
00:37:37.449 --> 00:37:40.530
1988 disappearances and murders of Keith and Cassandra.
752
00:37:41.679 --> 00:37:42.880
Good so far? Yep.
753
00:37:43.539 --> 00:37:46.800
Okay, the FBI told the families on Friday that they
754
00:37:46.840 --> 00:37:50.179
were officially linking Keith and Cassandra's deaths to Wilmer based
755
00:37:50.360 --> 00:37:55.710
on the totality of circumstances, highlighting significant similarities between the
756
00:37:55.750 --> 00:37:59.869
disappearances of Colin Haley and other regional killings connected to Wilmer.
757
00:38:00.710 --> 00:38:03.969
This includes matching patterns in timing, location, and manner in
758
00:38:03.989 --> 00:38:07.340
which the victims disappeared. While direct forensic evidence from the
759
00:38:07.400 --> 00:38:11.579
scene remains unavailable, the evidence establishes that the circumstances match
760
00:38:11.699 --> 00:38:14.539
Wilmer Sr. 's known pattern of offending, and that's per
761
00:38:14.559 --> 00:38:17.739
the FBI's press release. They also went on to say
762
00:38:18.019 --> 00:38:21.090
that the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of
763
00:38:21.119 --> 00:38:24.389
Virginia confirmed that had Wilmer Sr. been alive today, the
764
00:38:24.510 --> 00:38:28.369
evidence developed through this investigation would have supported federal prosecution.
765
00:38:29.269 --> 00:38:31.449
We want to take a few minutes and run through
766
00:38:31.469 --> 00:38:35.210
that statement with you. So our question is, can a
767
00:38:35.250 --> 00:38:39.079
case that is largely circumstantial, based on the factors listed
768
00:38:39.119 --> 00:38:42.139
in the FBI statement and with no corroborating forensic evidence,
769
00:38:42.719 --> 00:38:44.920
be considered enough for prosecution?
770
00:38:45.559 --> 00:38:49.840
Yes, circumstantial evidence cases get prosecuted all the time. Whether
771
00:38:49.860 --> 00:38:53.389
or not that case, whether some Fed would have had
772
00:38:53.670 --> 00:38:57.289
the backbone to charge it as an independent case, case
773
00:38:57.570 --> 00:39:00.440
i don't know enough about the forensics if there are
774
00:39:00.519 --> 00:39:03.039
any i know that the bodies weren't recovered and i
775
00:39:03.159 --> 00:39:04.519
believe and you guys have to help me out on
776
00:39:04.559 --> 00:39:07.239
this i tried to i did a little research on
777
00:39:07.280 --> 00:39:09.719
this but a lot of it was before he was
778
00:39:09.780 --> 00:39:12.340
identified so it's a lot of the stuff out there
779
00:39:12.389 --> 00:39:15.130
is like and it's a mystery yeah but look there's
780
00:39:15.309 --> 00:39:19.110
also when it comes to serial killers oftentimes there can
781
00:39:19.130 --> 00:39:21.769
be overlap between different serial killers and a lot of
782
00:39:21.809 --> 00:39:26.090
times things like m.o. can match. And there are in
783
00:39:26.150 --> 00:39:29.340
Southern California in the late 1970s, for example, we had
784
00:39:30.019 --> 00:39:32.619
Rodney Alcala, an in-game killer who was not a mind.
785
00:39:33.099 --> 00:39:36.699
He was active at the same time as Kenneth Bianchi
786
00:39:37.000 --> 00:39:41.309
and Angelo Bono, collectively known as the Hillside Strangler. And
787
00:39:41.429 --> 00:39:44.739
they had virtually identical MOs where they were They would
788
00:39:44.780 --> 00:39:48.110
kidnap young women and sexually assault them, strangle them, and
789
00:39:48.210 --> 00:39:50.050
dump them on the side of the road. And there
790
00:39:50.070 --> 00:39:53.949
was Jill Parenteau, I'm sorry, Jill Barkham was found on
791
00:39:53.969 --> 00:39:57.889
a fire road above Hollywood. And they did this, an
792
00:39:58.010 --> 00:40:01.590
FBI task force interviewed Rodney Alcala as one of the
793
00:40:02.030 --> 00:40:05.320
Hillside Strangler suspects. So they're talking about a bunch of
794
00:40:05.380 --> 00:40:08.739
other bodies that were dumped. Meanwhile, they believed that Jill
795
00:40:08.760 --> 00:40:12.199
Barkham was drunk. a victim of the Hillside Strangler. So
796
00:40:12.219 --> 00:40:16.409
they were accidentally right, minus one, as they're interviewing the
797
00:40:16.469 --> 00:40:18.789
right guy about one murder, but he was the wrong
798
00:40:18.829 --> 00:40:20.769
guy about nine other murders.
799
00:40:21.010 --> 00:40:21.190
Wow.
800
00:40:21.230 --> 00:40:23.690
And he was able to prove that he wasn't responsible
801
00:40:23.710 --> 00:40:26.769
for these other ones. And so they, and that's the,
802
00:40:26.929 --> 00:40:29.849
that's the nature of the beast when you're talking about M.O.
803
00:40:30.230 --> 00:40:33.110
There was, at the same time, because we're talking about
804
00:40:33.289 --> 00:40:36.269
late 70s, early 80s, which, by the way, in Southern California,
805
00:40:36.329 --> 00:40:39.949
during that period of time, there were 21 murders active
806
00:40:40.010 --> 00:40:43.289
known serial killers operating in Southern California at the same time. Wow.
807
00:40:43.309 --> 00:40:45.349
There was a guy during the same period of time,
808
00:40:45.550 --> 00:40:48.849
there was a guy known as the Freeway Killer, and
809
00:40:48.869 --> 00:40:51.909
there was also Randy Kraft. And they were doing the
810
00:40:51.949 --> 00:40:54.070
exact same thing. They were picking up young men who
811
00:40:54.110 --> 00:40:58.530
were hitchhiking, sexually assaulting them, murdering them, and dumping them
812
00:40:58.590 --> 00:41:00.860
on the sides of roads. And so we had, there
813
00:41:00.889 --> 00:41:03.840
was two active serial killers doing that, doing the exact
814
00:41:03.860 --> 00:41:07.039
same thing at the exact same time for an investigator,
815
00:41:07.079 --> 00:41:11.659
especially without DNA, it's very difficult to distinguish between those two,
816
00:41:11.739 --> 00:41:14.699
just like it was difficult to distinguish between the Hellside Strangler. Now,
817
00:41:14.760 --> 00:41:17.340
my dealings with the FBI have always been really good
818
00:41:17.510 --> 00:41:20.329
on an investigative level. There's a former FBI agent who's
819
00:41:20.369 --> 00:41:23.969
involved in that, and I'm blanking on her name, Maureen O'Connell,
820
00:41:24.050 --> 00:41:24.469
I think, maybe?
821
00:41:24.489 --> 00:41:25.690
Yeah, Maureen's a friend of ours.
822
00:41:25.730 --> 00:41:28.550
Yeah, Maureen. She's wonderful. She's wonderful. I've been on a
823
00:41:28.570 --> 00:41:31.070
couple of panels with her. She weighed in on some
824
00:41:31.090 --> 00:41:34.280
of this, and I really like her. I think she's smart.
825
00:41:34.599 --> 00:41:36.820
So when you have a, when you have a gumshoe
826
00:41:37.059 --> 00:41:39.469
FBI agent or better yet, a group of them who
827
00:41:39.530 --> 00:41:42.349
are convinced enough, I would personally put a lot of
828
00:41:42.369 --> 00:41:45.389
weight into that. But I have seen these, these mistakes.
829
00:41:45.409 --> 00:41:47.230
And then we got another kind of weird thing about
830
00:41:47.269 --> 00:41:51.369
serial killers. There's a guy named Henry Lee Lucas in Texas.
831
00:41:51.809 --> 00:41:53.889
He committed, he was confessing the murders he did not
832
00:41:53.929 --> 00:41:57.579
commit all across the country. including one in Orange County
833
00:41:57.599 --> 00:41:59.960
that's prosecuted by a buddy of mine named Larry Yellen,
834
00:41:59.980 --> 00:42:02.260
who's now a Superior Court judge. He confessed to that,
835
00:42:02.300 --> 00:42:03.559
and that was a part of it. We had to
836
00:42:03.599 --> 00:42:06.480
disprove that this guy was doing that. And that's kind
837
00:42:06.500 --> 00:42:08.880
of the psychopath mindset, right? I'm in jail. I can't
838
00:42:09.039 --> 00:42:10.619
do this, but I can sure screw with a lot
839
00:42:10.639 --> 00:42:12.769
of people by confessing to a lot of things I
840
00:42:12.789 --> 00:42:15.070
didn't do. And then there's a synth, I'll call a,
841
00:42:15.150 --> 00:42:17.730
there's overlap with a case that our friend Paul Holes
842
00:42:17.769 --> 00:42:19.630
has been working on out of San Francisco.
843
00:42:19.650 --> 00:42:19.730
Yeah.
844
00:42:20.179 --> 00:42:22.639
That got cleared to all call of, but Paul really
845
00:42:22.679 --> 00:42:25.699
thinks it's another serial killer. I hope it's him. It's
846
00:42:26.119 --> 00:42:30.210
these guys. And he was particularly interesting based on my,
847
00:42:30.269 --> 00:42:32.150
and I don't pretend to be an expert on this case.
848
00:42:32.210 --> 00:42:34.389
I know it's deeply personal to you, Bill, and for
849
00:42:34.510 --> 00:42:37.400
obvious reasons. One of the things that's unique about this
850
00:42:37.780 --> 00:42:41.809
is that so oftentimes people, There's a sexual assault component
851
00:42:41.829 --> 00:42:44.489
when serial killers are active. And for this guy, it
852
00:42:44.530 --> 00:42:47.199
appears that a lot of them were, there was no
853
00:42:47.239 --> 00:42:50.820
sexual assault fight. Some there was and some there wasn't, right?
854
00:42:50.980 --> 00:42:54.280
And the problem is too, that we have situations where
855
00:42:54.300 --> 00:42:58.840
there's no body, another situation, another couple where their bodies
856
00:42:58.880 --> 00:43:02.360
were so badly decomposed that they weren't able.
857
00:43:02.199 --> 00:43:03.219
To get any.
858
00:43:03.900 --> 00:43:07.710
It does appear that Wilmer did sexually assault a number
859
00:43:07.750 --> 00:43:10.219
of his victims and But we might not be able
860
00:43:10.280 --> 00:43:11.199
to prove that.
861
00:43:11.239 --> 00:43:11.739
Prove all of it.
862
00:43:11.989 --> 00:43:16.150
Yeah. Forensically. Yeah. But if you've got, like, that's like
863
00:43:16.210 --> 00:43:18.809
Alcala with Robin Samson, who's 12 years old, right?
864
00:43:18.829 --> 00:43:19.190
Yeah.
865
00:43:19.230 --> 00:43:21.150
Dumped her in the chaparral. And by the time she
866
00:43:21.190 --> 00:43:23.530
was found, she was just a skeleton. So there's no
867
00:43:23.570 --> 00:43:25.869
way you can tell. But I know she was to
868
00:43:25.869 --> 00:43:30.179
100% certainty. And the jury convicted him of that properly. So, yeah, it's,
869
00:43:30.559 --> 00:43:33.250
I hope so. A lot of the FBI agents, like
870
00:43:33.289 --> 00:43:35.429
I said, that get involved in that are very good.
871
00:43:35.909 --> 00:43:39.579
And if they're satisfied, I would put a lot of
872
00:43:39.619 --> 00:43:40.199
stock into that.
873
00:43:40.760 --> 00:43:44.340
The families were profoundly disappointed. This is the call on
874
00:43:44.400 --> 00:43:48.199
Haley families. And we actually held a press conference immediately
875
00:43:48.539 --> 00:43:52.360
after the FBI met with the families because the FBI
876
00:43:52.519 --> 00:43:58.199
continually refuses to hold press conferences in the Colonial Parkway murders. Interestingly,
877
00:43:58.400 --> 00:44:01.440
their partner agency, the Virginia State Police, has held two
878
00:44:01.480 --> 00:44:03.920
press conferences in the last two and a half years
879
00:44:04.059 --> 00:44:08.719
as additional cases have been linked to Wilmer. But the FBI,
880
00:44:09.000 --> 00:44:14.059
because this case is considered so badly botched by the FBI, sadly,
881
00:44:14.780 --> 00:44:16.539
they continually.
882
00:44:15.980 --> 00:44:17.889
Refuse to hold press conferences.
883
00:44:18.340 --> 00:44:21.050
So we, the families, and Kristen and I did this,
884
00:44:21.309 --> 00:44:24.449
we set up our own press conference. The families are
885
00:44:24.570 --> 00:44:29.800
profoundly disappointed because the FBI didn't present any new information.
886
00:44:30.539 --> 00:44:34.369
The whole thing felt very self-serving. As one of the
887
00:44:34.409 --> 00:44:38.050
family members said at the press conference, this wasn't about
888
00:44:38.110 --> 00:44:42.840
providing closure to the families. This was about presenting closure
889
00:44:43.059 --> 00:44:47.360
for the FBI because this case is terrible and has
890
00:44:47.400 --> 00:44:49.260
been handled very badly.
891
00:44:49.280 --> 00:44:54.639
Yeah, so that's another thing that you do see sometimes
892
00:44:54.659 --> 00:44:57.039
when you have a detective. I haven't seen it at
893
00:44:57.079 --> 00:44:58.639
the federal level, but I have seen it at the
894
00:44:58.679 --> 00:45:02.389
local level. Like when you have a serial killer and... Look,
895
00:45:02.670 --> 00:45:05.309
every frigging serial killer has victims that we don't know about.
896
00:45:05.329 --> 00:45:09.579
Every single one of them. The cases where we suspect,
897
00:45:09.679 --> 00:45:12.219
but we can't say for sure. And there is, if
898
00:45:12.260 --> 00:45:15.179
you're a detective and you've got 20 cases on your
899
00:45:15.199 --> 00:45:18.039
caseload and you're trying to clear cases and you got
900
00:45:18.099 --> 00:45:21.800
somebody that has a similar MO and gets convicted, it's
901
00:45:21.880 --> 00:45:25.469
great for them. And I mean, it allows them to
902
00:45:25.550 --> 00:45:28.070
focus on other cases. There's no malice to it for
903
00:45:28.090 --> 00:45:31.090
most of them. It's great for them if they can
904
00:45:31.150 --> 00:45:34.090
clear that case by linking it to a known suspect
905
00:45:34.849 --> 00:45:37.840
that has already been convicted or is already dead, because
906
00:45:37.880 --> 00:45:40.019
then the case is officially closed and they get to
907
00:45:40.059 --> 00:45:43.380
move on to the next one. So that can be
908
00:45:43.400 --> 00:45:46.820
a factor. I'd be really disappointed if the FBI did
909
00:45:46.840 --> 00:45:49.969
that because the FBI is the one agency with unlimited resources.
910
00:45:50.590 --> 00:45:55.469
And I don't know, forensic technology continues to advance though, right?
911
00:45:55.530 --> 00:45:57.610
And it keeps getting better and better. And we started
912
00:45:57.630 --> 00:46:00.460
out with just fingerprints and then we got we now
913
00:46:00.480 --> 00:46:04.079
we got we had serology which is blood typing and
914
00:46:04.119 --> 00:46:06.019
now and then we got dna then we got better
915
00:46:06.039 --> 00:46:09.260
dna we got co-filer and profiler plus kits and now
916
00:46:09.300 --> 00:46:12.250
we're doing then we had familial dna which is relatives
917
00:46:12.269 --> 00:46:14.389
that are in jail then we got into genetic genealogy
918
00:46:14.409 --> 00:46:17.230
which is bringing awesome and i've had i've worked on
919
00:46:17.269 --> 00:46:20.929
cases involving every one of those right and it keeps
920
00:46:20.969 --> 00:46:23.150
getting better and keeps solving things so even if they
921
00:46:23.250 --> 00:46:27.119
close it That doesn't mean that we won't, at some
922
00:46:27.159 --> 00:46:30.530
point in the future, get some new form. And in
923
00:46:30.570 --> 00:46:34.110
the Gilgo Beach case with Rex Heuermann, that judge, who
924
00:46:34.190 --> 00:46:37.289
I loved watching that guy, I'm blanking on his name,
925
00:46:37.309 --> 00:46:39.369
but everything that I would want a judge to be
926
00:46:39.389 --> 00:46:42.210
as a citizen, right? He was going to allow in
927
00:46:42.409 --> 00:46:46.269
a complete genetic profile for mitochondrial DNA. That went under
928
00:46:46.289 --> 00:46:49.869
the radar for everybody but nerds like me or friends.
929
00:46:50.389 --> 00:46:53.800
That was a big deal. Yeah. That's based on hair
930
00:46:53.940 --> 00:46:58.059
and teeth. And so it keeps getting better very quietly.
931
00:46:58.139 --> 00:47:00.550
So for those families, I would encourage them not to
932
00:47:00.570 --> 00:47:04.530
give up hope, even if the FBI is. Because forensic technology,
933
00:47:04.710 --> 00:47:07.469
I can't tell you how many murders I successfully prosecuted
934
00:47:07.530 --> 00:47:10.349
where the science caught up to the bad guy. And
935
00:47:10.409 --> 00:47:12.090
we were able to prove cases that we couldn't have
936
00:47:12.110 --> 00:47:15.800
proven before. And sometimes it includes cases that were false.
937
00:47:16.250 --> 00:47:19.949
already closed and attributed to somebody else. That happens. And
938
00:47:20.050 --> 00:47:22.250
so hopefully this case is one of those if somebody
939
00:47:22.309 --> 00:47:24.730
else did it. I hope the FBI is right. And
940
00:47:24.769 --> 00:47:28.989
like I said, my experience with agents has been universally positive.
941
00:47:29.010 --> 00:47:30.980
I've worked on a number of task forces with them.
942
00:47:32.019 --> 00:47:34.179
We brought them in on a bunch of our murders,
943
00:47:34.420 --> 00:47:37.320
and I've had good experiences. I've had less positive experiences
944
00:47:37.360 --> 00:47:40.119
with the admin in the FBI, which is probably a
945
00:47:40.139 --> 00:47:44.139
story for another podcast. Us too, actually. I was ready
946
00:47:44.159 --> 00:47:46.300
to commit murders of my own when I was in
947
00:47:46.340 --> 00:47:47.739
the middle of a trial.
948
00:47:48.059 --> 00:47:52.650
Our experience as family members, and it'll be 40 years
949
00:47:52.789 --> 00:47:56.250
for my family next month, the case agents have been
950
00:47:56.869 --> 00:47:58.550
universally outstanding.
951
00:47:59.269 --> 00:47:59.690
That's good to hear.
952
00:47:59.710 --> 00:48:03.510
Dealing with the bureaucracy and the higher-ups at the FBI
953
00:48:04.760 --> 00:48:07.300
has been, and we try not to swear on mind
954
00:48:07.340 --> 00:48:10.610
over murder, but And I won't hear either, but it's
955
00:48:10.670 --> 00:48:11.469
been a nightmare.
956
00:48:12.809 --> 00:48:14.769
I got to share a story with you then, Bill. Okay.
957
00:48:15.550 --> 00:48:17.989
Not to steal your thunder, but... No, go right ahead.
958
00:48:18.010 --> 00:48:20.070
I had a case once. So they have a thing
959
00:48:20.110 --> 00:48:24.869
called RCFL, which is a regional combination of resources for
960
00:48:24.989 --> 00:48:27.710
cell phones and computers in combination with the FBI. So
961
00:48:27.769 --> 00:48:30.110
it's this facility they set up in Orange County. And
962
00:48:30.150 --> 00:48:33.309
most of these police departments, especially these following ones, will contract.
963
00:48:33.590 --> 00:48:35.690
So anytime they're investigating a case with a cell phone
964
00:48:35.730 --> 00:48:38.320
or a computer, You send it to RCFL, and either
965
00:48:38.360 --> 00:48:40.780
it gets one of the local detectives or an FBI
966
00:48:40.820 --> 00:48:43.409
agent that does a data dump. For reasons I won't
967
00:48:43.449 --> 00:48:45.750
get into, in the middle of a trial, trials are
968
00:48:45.789 --> 00:48:49.610
all controlled train wrecks anyway, we needed to introduce evidence
969
00:48:49.690 --> 00:48:53.030
from a cell phone dump in a double homicide case
970
00:48:53.050 --> 00:48:55.670
that I was prosecuting. When you talk about a really
971
00:48:55.710 --> 00:48:58.929
brutal murder of innocent people, which this case was, it's
972
00:48:59.070 --> 00:49:01.300
usually not a big deal at all. You just call
973
00:49:01.320 --> 00:49:03.800
the detective, hey, your tech guy, I need him in
974
00:49:03.840 --> 00:49:07.309
this afternoon, and everybody cooperates. In this case, I had
975
00:49:07.429 --> 00:49:09.849
some frigging person at the FBI. We had meetings over
976
00:49:09.869 --> 00:49:14.300
this and I'm still pissed about it. I'm literally driving in.
977
00:49:14.380 --> 00:49:16.260
I'm going to be standing in a podium in 30
978
00:49:16.260 --> 00:49:20.000
minutes and my investigator calls and says they won't avail...
979
00:49:19.760 --> 00:49:23.239
the FBI agent because you do not follow. And here's
980
00:49:23.260 --> 00:49:26.460
a word that you probably heard before, Bill. Protocol, which
981
00:49:26.699 --> 00:49:30.019
is fed for, I have no rational reason to deny this,
982
00:49:30.059 --> 00:49:33.159
but I'm going to tell you no. And I went apeshit, guys.
983
00:49:33.360 --> 00:49:35.760
And I was, I lit things on fire. And we,
984
00:49:35.820 --> 00:49:37.820
I needed the, and the FIA agent was super cool.
985
00:49:38.099 --> 00:49:39.659
He said, I'll be there anytime, but you got to
986
00:49:39.739 --> 00:49:42.059
fill out the, this form and trip click. It's like,
987
00:49:42.539 --> 00:49:45.159
I'm on my way to court right now. And they
988
00:49:45.179 --> 00:49:47.289
were like, and the person I talked to, like, don't
989
00:49:47.309 --> 00:49:49.409
know what to tell you. So I wanted to crawl
990
00:49:49.429 --> 00:49:51.190
through my phone and counter that and.
991
00:49:51.150 --> 00:49:51.650
Deal with the feds.
992
00:49:51.670 --> 00:49:54.230
Oh my gosh. That person, whoever they are, ought to
993
00:49:54.250 --> 00:49:57.289
be frigging fired. And it wasn't an agent. It was
994
00:49:57.389 --> 00:50:00.269
some administrator. And I complained all the way up the
995
00:50:00.289 --> 00:50:02.070
chain and I got some satisfaction at the end. I
996
00:50:02.070 --> 00:50:05.269
had meetings afterwards and I won my case, but I
997
00:50:05.309 --> 00:50:10.090
had some low-level bureaucrat making me jump through bullshit hoops
998
00:50:10.130 --> 00:50:12.510
in the middle of a double murder case. And I
999
00:50:12.570 --> 00:50:14.880
assume they kept their job just because, but I was,
1000
00:50:15.239 --> 00:50:17.679
and I never called for anybody to get fired. That
1001
00:50:17.719 --> 00:50:19.760
was when somebody ought to, I should have gotten fired.
1002
00:50:20.099 --> 00:50:22.099
And if we lost, they definitely should have gotten fired.
1003
00:50:22.400 --> 00:50:24.099
And it was like, oh, protocol, you didn't fill out
1004
00:50:24.139 --> 00:50:26.159
the right form at the right time. Oh, no. So,
1005
00:50:26.820 --> 00:50:32.650
I'm with you, Bill. Thank you for my one-person therapy session.
1006
00:50:32.869 --> 00:50:34.210
I'm still traumatized.
1007
00:50:34.730 --> 00:50:37.119
See, I thought you were going to be providing legal
1008
00:50:37.159 --> 00:50:38.880
advice at no charge to us.
1009
00:50:38.940 --> 00:50:41.550
And here I am helping you. You're helping me sort
1010
00:50:41.590 --> 00:50:42.949
out some of my many issues.
1011
00:50:45.619 --> 00:50:48.219
Matt, you did say you have a book coming out soon.
1012
00:50:48.239 --> 00:50:50.219
Tell us just a little bit about the book because
1013
00:50:50.639 --> 00:50:52.389
I am raring to read it.
1014
00:50:52.800 --> 00:50:54.679
Okay. Thank you. Thank you. So I did the book
1015
00:50:54.699 --> 00:50:57.449
of murder, which is, that's like a taxonomy of murder
1016
00:50:57.489 --> 00:50:59.550
cases that I did in homicide. And it's kind of
1017
00:50:59.570 --> 00:51:02.730
an overview of how the law of homicide works and
1018
00:51:02.909 --> 00:51:05.090
some of the basics. And then I did an example
1019
00:51:05.110 --> 00:51:07.650
of domestic violence murder or murder for money. And I
1020
00:51:07.710 --> 00:51:10.340
kind of gave an overview. The next one, not too
1021
00:51:10.380 --> 00:51:12.969
creatively named, the working title right now is The Book
1022
00:51:12.989 --> 00:51:16.190
of Serial Killers, Prosecuting the Monsters Among Us. I prosecuted
1023
00:51:16.190 --> 00:51:19.309
14 different serial killers, including the Golden State Killer. And
1024
00:51:19.409 --> 00:51:21.590
I'm sharing a lot of, it's a little deeper, it's
1025
00:51:21.630 --> 00:51:23.900
a little darker than my first book. And I get
1026
00:51:23.920 --> 00:51:27.639
into my background, like what steered me into the DA's office.
1027
00:51:27.820 --> 00:51:29.719
And part of that story, by the way, is I
1028
00:51:29.739 --> 00:51:32.500
was interviewing with the FBI. They came to my law school.
1029
00:51:32.599 --> 00:51:34.969
I was kind of getting recruited with a lowercase r,
1030
00:51:34.980 --> 00:51:38.050
which I thought was super cool, but I'm a I
1031
00:51:38.090 --> 00:51:40.590
like to surf still. And back then they, it meant
1032
00:51:40.670 --> 00:51:42.150
that if I joined the FBI, I wasn't going to
1033
00:51:42.170 --> 00:51:43.809
be a, I couldn't surf because they were going to
1034
00:51:43.829 --> 00:51:46.550
send you, they didn't assign you where you, any place
1035
00:51:46.570 --> 00:51:48.760
you grew up or went to school, which took out
1036
00:51:48.860 --> 00:51:51.699
Santa Barbara, LA and San Diego for me, which is
1037
00:51:51.719 --> 00:51:54.179
the only place I really wanted to live at the time. Yeah.
1038
00:51:54.199 --> 00:51:56.820
Became a DA instead. So it's all in there. Hopefully
1039
00:51:56.900 --> 00:51:59.679
it will be out. It's Hyperion, which is Disney. They gave,
1040
00:51:59.820 --> 00:52:02.199
they thankfully decided to do another book with me. First
1041
00:52:02.219 --> 00:52:05.989
book is still doing great. And this one was a
1042
00:52:06.010 --> 00:52:08.679
lot of fun to write and I hope you like it. Oh,
1043
00:52:08.739 --> 00:52:09.320
I can't wait.
1044
00:52:09.969 --> 00:52:11.619
Yeah, I actually, there was a student of mine who
1045
00:52:11.639 --> 00:52:13.440
was reading your book the other day and I was like,
1046
00:52:13.500 --> 00:52:14.079
I know that guy.
1047
00:52:14.119 --> 00:52:17.460
And they were like, why? The paperback just came out
1048
00:52:17.539 --> 00:52:22.940
in September. There you go. So thank you for the plug. Yeah.
1049
00:52:22.960 --> 00:52:26.239
She was so thrilled. She was like, really? Is he cool?
1050
00:52:26.280 --> 00:52:28.809
I'm like, he's so cool. Yes, he actually is cool.
1051
00:52:28.849 --> 00:52:30.650
So not cool. So not cool.
1052
00:52:33.320 --> 00:52:35.099
Oh, Matt, thank you so much for joining us. We
1053
00:52:35.139 --> 00:52:36.139
really appreciate it.
1054
00:52:36.300 --> 00:52:38.530
Anytime, guys. You know, I love the pod. Have me
1055
00:52:38.570 --> 00:52:39.230
back anytime.
1056
00:52:39.769 --> 00:52:42.090
Thank you so much. That is going to do it
1057
00:52:42.170 --> 00:52:44.730
for this episode of Mind Over Murder. Thank you so
1058
00:52:44.769 --> 00:52:47.010
much for listening. We'll see you next time.
1059
00:52:56.739 --> 00:53:00.320
Mind Over Murder is a production of Absolute Zero and
1060
00:53:00.389 --> 00:53:01.710
Another Dog Productions.
1061
00:53:02.389 --> 00:53:05.670
Our executive producers are Bill Thomas and Kristen Dilley.
1062
00:53:06.050 --> 00:53:08.489
Our logo art is by Pamela Arnois.
1063
00:53:09.130 --> 00:53:11.110
Our theme music is by Kevin MacLeod.
1064
00:53:11.690 --> 00:53:15.610
Mind Over Murder is distributed in partnership with Crawl Space Media.
1065
00:53:16.369 --> 00:53:19.469
You can follow us on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram.
1066
00:53:19.710 --> 00:53:22.300
You can also follow our page on the Colonial Parkway
1067
00:53:22.340 --> 00:53:23.570
Murders on Facebook.
1068
00:53:24.019 --> 00:53:28.619
And finally, you can follow Bill Thomas on Twitter at BillThomas56.
1069
00:53:29.159 --> 00:53:32.059
Thank you for listening to Mind Over Murder.
1070
00:53:46.750 --> 00:53:47.030
Thank you.
1
00:00:01.139 --> 00:00:04.240
You're listening to the Mind Over Murder podcast.
2
00:00:06.080 --> 00:00:09.660
My name is Bill Thomas. I'm a writer, consulting producer,
3
00:00:09.759 --> 00:00:12.839
and now podcaster. I am now trying to use my
4
00:00:12.900 --> 00:00:15.800
experience as the brother of a murder victim to help
5
00:00:15.900 --> 00:00:18.550
other victims of violent crime. I'm working on a book
6
00:00:18.750 --> 00:00:22.170
on the unsolved Colonial Parkway murders, and I'm the co-administrator
7
00:00:22.309 --> 00:00:25.410
of the Colonial Parkway Murders Facebook group, together with Kristen Dilley.
8
00:00:26.170 --> 00:00:27.269
My name is Kristen Dilley.
9
00:00:27.289 --> 00:00:31.190
I'm a writer, a researcher, a teacher, and a victim's advocate,
10
00:00:31.429 --> 00:00:34.969
as well as the social media manager and co-administrator for
11
00:00:34.990 --> 00:00:38.189
the Colonial Parkway Murders Facebook page with my partner in crime,
12
00:00:38.429 --> 00:00:38.969
Bill Thomas.
13
00:00:40.909 --> 00:00:43.270
Welcome to Mind Over Murder. I'm Kristen Dilley.
14
00:00:43.509 --> 00:00:44.350
And I'm Bill Thomas.
15
00:00:44.950 --> 00:00:47.899
We're joined today by our favorite prosecutor, Matt Murphy. Matt,
16
00:00:49.119 --> 00:00:51.439
you've joined us on three previous episodes. I want to
17
00:00:51.479 --> 00:00:54.359
talk about your memoir, The Book of Murder. one about
18
00:00:54.380 --> 00:00:56.909
the Menendez brothers re-sentencing, and one about the parole of
19
00:00:56.920 --> 00:01:00.409
the Chowchilla kidnappers. And today, we wanted to bring you
20
00:01:00.549 --> 00:01:03.429
on to educate us about some of the interesting legal
21
00:01:03.469 --> 00:01:07.349
maneuvers that we've seen played out in some high-profile cases recently.
22
00:01:07.530 --> 00:01:08.609
You feel like you're up for that today?
23
00:01:08.629 --> 00:01:09.969
Yeah, ready to go.
24
00:01:10.799 --> 00:01:13.760
So this is our way of getting free legal advice, Matt,
25
00:01:14.019 --> 00:01:14.859
if you think about it.
26
00:01:16.319 --> 00:01:19.420
Yeah. My specialties were sexual assault and homicide, so I
27
00:01:19.459 --> 00:01:21.680
think you're both going to be disappointed with my The
28
00:01:21.719 --> 00:01:24.879
services I have available. And as they say, you get
29
00:01:24.920 --> 00:01:26.340
what you pay for. This is true.
30
00:01:27.640 --> 00:01:29.829
Matt, we want to start with the case that apparently
31
00:01:29.909 --> 00:01:32.030
no one can get enough of, and that's the Lindsay
32
00:01:32.069 --> 00:01:35.290
Clancy trial, of course, which ended in a mistrial on
33
00:01:35.329 --> 00:01:38.670
September 4th after jurors deadlocked 1101 on whether she could
34
00:01:38.689 --> 00:01:42.650
be found not guilty by reason of insanity. Let's kind
35
00:01:42.689 --> 00:01:45.819
of start with the insanity plea. What does insanity actually
36
00:01:45.859 --> 00:01:47.420
mean in the legal sense?
37
00:01:48.560 --> 00:01:51.969
So it depends on what state we're talking about. In California,
38
00:01:52.269 --> 00:01:54.049
and as well as almost every other state, they use
39
00:01:54.069 --> 00:01:56.590
what's called the McNaughton rule. What does that mean? That
40
00:01:56.629 --> 00:01:59.909
basically means that if somebody who is suffering from mental
41
00:01:59.969 --> 00:02:02.879
illness is detached from reality, that they don't appreciate the
42
00:02:02.920 --> 00:02:06.260
nature and quality of their acts, they're not legally responsible
43
00:02:06.500 --> 00:02:09.599
or they're legally insane, we would call it in California.
44
00:02:10.120 --> 00:02:11.990
So what does that mean? That means the devil pops up,
45
00:02:12.090 --> 00:02:14.810
you got the devil on your shoulder. And it says, hey,
46
00:02:14.870 --> 00:02:18.469
mentally ill guy, run over there and stab that banana
47
00:02:18.849 --> 00:02:21.530
or stab that space alien and I won't blow up
48
00:02:21.569 --> 00:02:23.750
the world. And the person runs over there and stabs
49
00:02:23.770 --> 00:02:26.599
the banana. They don't understand as a human being that
50
00:02:26.620 --> 00:02:30.060
they're stabbing. Okay, so under those circumstances, and it makes
51
00:02:30.080 --> 00:02:32.500
a lot of sense, if they're so psychotic, they're so
52
00:02:32.520 --> 00:02:35.240
detached from reality, they think you're stabbing a banana, then
53
00:02:35.259 --> 00:02:39.879
they're not criminally responsible and they're found legally insane. If
54
00:02:39.939 --> 00:02:41.930
the devil pops up and says, hey, mentally ill guy,
55
00:02:42.409 --> 00:02:44.789
go over there and stab that person or I'm going
56
00:02:44.889 --> 00:02:48.969
to blow up the world. They still, despite their mental illness,
57
00:02:48.990 --> 00:02:51.310
they understand the nature and quality of their actions. They
58
00:02:51.330 --> 00:02:54.370
understand that they're going over there to kill a human being.
59
00:02:55.069 --> 00:02:57.830
But whatever their delusional reasons are, and the law says
60
00:02:58.469 --> 00:03:00.830
that if you're mentally ill, you still have the moral
61
00:03:00.870 --> 00:03:04.069
and legal responsibility to control your behavior. That is, the
62
00:03:04.530 --> 00:03:07.250
McNaughton rule is, I think, a couple of hundred years old.
63
00:03:07.430 --> 00:03:10.110
This is from centuries of human beings just like us
64
00:03:10.129 --> 00:03:13.030
trying to figure out what's fair and what's right, what's
65
00:03:13.099 --> 00:03:17.430
just when dealing with mental illness. Massachusetts uses a different rule.
66
00:03:17.509 --> 00:03:21.090
Massachusetts uses what's known as the McCool rule. It is
67
00:03:21.189 --> 00:03:24.780
a very high bar for the prosecution. They have removed
68
00:03:24.919 --> 00:03:29.120
the stigma of insanity, which personally I think is ridiculous
69
00:03:29.219 --> 00:03:31.629
because they're If you're going to kill somebody, it's not
70
00:03:31.669 --> 00:03:34.050
a stigma to say you're insane. It actually is an
71
00:03:34.090 --> 00:03:37.030
explanation for what you did, in my view. So they
72
00:03:37.090 --> 00:03:40.439
say you are not criminally responsible. So they've substituted the
73
00:03:40.469 --> 00:03:44.379
word insane for not criminally responsible. And the McCool rule
74
00:03:44.400 --> 00:03:47.099
basically says a person suffering from mental illness, that's the
75
00:03:47.139 --> 00:03:51.800
first prong, who either doesn't know the wrongfulness of their actions,
76
00:03:51.919 --> 00:03:56.219
which is essentially the McNaughton rule, or there's a third
77
00:03:56.300 --> 00:03:59.889
prong under the McCool rule, Or they know it's wrong,
78
00:04:00.150 --> 00:04:02.879
but they're unable to conform their conduct with the requirements
79
00:04:02.919 --> 00:04:06.110
of the law. That's the kicker in the state of Massachusetts.
80
00:04:06.150 --> 00:04:08.270
And another thing is, in pretty much every other state,
81
00:04:08.289 --> 00:04:11.169
certainly in California, you bifurcate murder trials. So you have
82
00:04:11.189 --> 00:04:13.409
the guilt phase, and then you have a whole sanity
83
00:04:13.449 --> 00:04:17.500
phase where the defense must prove that the person was
84
00:04:17.819 --> 00:04:21.439
legally insane at the time they acted. In Massachusetts, the
85
00:04:21.480 --> 00:04:25.040
prosecution bears the burden of proving beyond a reasonable doubt
86
00:04:25.139 --> 00:04:28.089
that the person had the capacity to control their conduct
87
00:04:28.149 --> 00:04:30.670
in conformity with the law. So it's a mouthful, and
88
00:04:30.750 --> 00:04:33.610
that's the standard for the Lindsay Clancy case.
89
00:04:34.370 --> 00:04:38.600
How often is the insanity defense used? And then, of course,
90
00:04:39.000 --> 00:04:41.300
second question, how often is it successful?
91
00:04:42.060 --> 00:04:45.240
So the statistics vary from state to state. I think
92
00:04:45.259 --> 00:04:48.579
it's far more rare in a federal, like a countrywide breakdown.
93
00:04:48.620 --> 00:04:53.379
But in short, it is increasingly rare. Juries do not
94
00:04:53.439 --> 00:04:57.180
like acquitting people because of insanity. Now, it certainly happens.
95
00:04:57.620 --> 00:04:59.649
And a lot of times those will boil down to
96
00:05:00.000 --> 00:05:03.189
battles of the experts, quote unquote. And look, I've seen
97
00:05:03.209 --> 00:05:06.490
some cases in California where juries came back and found
98
00:05:06.550 --> 00:05:10.370
people insane that, in my view, the jury got scammed.
99
00:05:11.060 --> 00:05:14.620
In other cases, look, it's like the old Supreme Court
100
00:05:14.920 --> 00:05:17.920
definition of pornography. I can't define it, but I know
101
00:05:17.959 --> 00:05:20.360
it when I see it, okay? And what I did
102
00:05:20.379 --> 00:05:22.360
is I worked in a homicide unit that was known
103
00:05:22.399 --> 00:05:24.899
as a vertical unit. So I had certain cities assigned
104
00:05:24.920 --> 00:05:26.699
to me. I did it for 17 years, and we
105
00:05:26.720 --> 00:05:29.509
would roll out to all of our own homicides. I've
106
00:05:29.629 --> 00:05:33.230
responded to far too many, especially with the homicide epidemic
107
00:05:33.269 --> 00:05:36.879
in Southern California. far too many murders where the person
108
00:05:37.000 --> 00:05:41.579
was truly insane. They were psychotic up the kazoo. And
109
00:05:41.610 --> 00:05:43.529
that's probably not a polite way of putting it, but there,
110
00:05:44.509 --> 00:05:46.629
you can tell, like, for example, one of them, I
111
00:05:46.670 --> 00:05:50.209
went and it was some poor guy who he was swatting,
112
00:05:50.350 --> 00:05:53.129
not the defendant. I had no sympathy for, sorry, but
113
00:05:53.170 --> 00:05:56.410
the poor victim. He was a caretaker for a sober
114
00:05:56.449 --> 00:05:58.629
living home that they had just refurbished and made it
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really nice. And this is one of those AA guys
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that's trying to give back because he'd been sober. He's
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getting his life on track. Really good guy who finds
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this crazy homeless guy who had taken up residence in
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one of the rooms. He tried to get him out
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and the guy attacked him and he bludgeoned him to
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death with a fire extinguisher, which, by the way, is
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incredibly brutal. When we went into the little residence, every
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reflective surface, every TV, every window had a drapery or
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a t-shirt hung over it. And that's because he was
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seeing people inside. And if he covered him, he didn't
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have to see the people staring back at him. That's
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somebody who is legally insane. Contrast that with what I think.
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And I don't know every detail, but like Nick Reiner, right?
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Nick Reiner drugged himself. I don't think he was suffering
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from any delusion like that. Now, I could be wrong.
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I have an open mind. But it's a different sort
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of thing. Spoiled rich kid who's mad at mommy and
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daddy versus this guy. And the spoiled rich kid mad
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at mommy and daddy is just like a case I
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did in Newport. It's one of my final homicide cases
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that I walked through where a guy who is genuinely
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organically mentally ill. He was mentally ill and his parents
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wanted to commit him. Family had a lot of money.
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And he was doing a ton of drugs, kind of
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like Nick Reiner. He was doing it to self-medicate. He
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was mentally ill. He was schizophrenic for reasons that were
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not his fault. Unlike a lot of the homeless people
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we see that have literally drugged themselves into methamphetamine-induced psychosis,
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or you can drug yourself insane, basically. But for me,
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there's a moral difference between some poor person who is
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organically mentally ill and struggles with that versus somebody who's not.
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But still, that guy went, his parents wanted to do
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an involuntary commitment, and they loved him very much, and
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he didn't want to go. So he waited an ambush,
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and he murdered Both of his parents, he stabbed them
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to death. And then he waited for four hours for
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the housekeeper to get in there because he was mad
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at her too. And he killed them all. He was
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found legally sane in the state of California because even
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though he was mentally ill, which is something a lot
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of people get confused by, mental illness and legal insanity
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are two totally different things. Everybody who's legally sane is
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certainly mentally ill. Every person who is mentally ill is
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absolutely not legally insane. You can make a pretty cogent
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argument that every single person who commits a murder is
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mentally ill in some way. There's some DSM diagnosis that
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you can give them. But the question is, do they
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understand the nature and quality of their actions? And the
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vast majority of them do. In Lizzie Clancy's case, that's
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part of the controversy because under the law, his state
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of Massachusetts is different. Even if she knew right from wrong,
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was she capable of conforming her conduct to the requirements
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of the law? Mark Geragos and I were talking about
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this on our podcast. That's so ambiguous. I couldn't wrap
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my head around it. And Mark's take on it, which
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I thought was actually really smart, was they wrote the
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law that way because they want to give the jury
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essentially a blank check to do what they think is right.
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I don't know about that in the state of Massachusetts.
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I don't know about that. That's a brief tutorial. That's
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about four months of law school for you. And we
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just saved money. Yeah, you don't have to go to
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law school.
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The case here in my hometown of Williamsburg, Virginia, that
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really hits home when I think about the insanity defense
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is John Hinckley, who tried to assassinate President Reagan and
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was committed to St. Elizabeth's Mental Hospital for many years.
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And there was a huge furor about 10, 15 years ago,
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when he was basically told, you're cured now, you can
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go home and live with your parents. Nobody wanted John Hinckley,
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presidential assassin, roaming the streets of Williamsburg.
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Which he was. Which he was.
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And he is still here. He is still local. He's
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tried to make a bit of a career for himself
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as a musician and as a writer. He wrote a
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book recently, but nobody here is really buying it because
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they remember.
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John Hinckley, assassin. Yeah, and look, guys, there's another thing
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that we see all the time. It's this thing, oh,
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but she's mentally ill or he's mentally ill. I can
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tell you from firsthand knowledge that some of the most gruesome,
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brutal murder cases I ever responded to were mentally ill people,
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like that fire signature case. Yeah. city, where some guy
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who had a genuine schizophrenic break, and he was a
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good guy, but he suffered from mental illness. Well, he
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ordered some, it looked like a medieval axe hammer thing,
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bought it on Amazon, gets delivered to his house, and
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he goes out on a psychotic break and attacks some
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poor guy just going to work. And it was, I
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won't describe it for the viewer because it's too gruesome,
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but he must have hit him, imagine like probably a
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four-pound hammer axe sort of thing. He probably hit him
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in the head a hundred times. Oh my God. Imagine
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what that looks like, just some poor guy going to work.
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Mentally ill people. They deserve our empathy. However, they are
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some of the most dangerous individuals out there. I'd much
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rather live next to a reformed bankrupt or even a
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gangster who gets out of jail. Some guy who ages
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out of his crimes free when he's 18 or 20
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and he's a gang member. A lot of those guys,
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their highest ambition is to sit at the end of
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a hard work day on a couch and watch a
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game like the rest of us. Maybe have a beer
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if their parole allows it. Those guys, in my view,
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are rarely dangerous because they're rational human beings. Might not
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be that smart, but a mentally ill person, we have
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no control over when they break. And look, when it
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comes to the brain and mental illness, as we all know,
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we are in the dark ages as far as medications.
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And there's, which on the Lindsay Clancy thing, look, I
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can really see arguments on both sides on that case.
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And I've tried to I've tried to adopt a position
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right down the middle, but fundamentally, mental health is based
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on self-reporting. There's no blood test we can take. There's
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no scan. And so proper treatment really does, to the
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greatest extent, require the cooperation of the person who is
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under treatment. And sometimes it works. Sometimes it doesn't work.
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In her case, it clearly didn't work. And there's... There's
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some interesting wrinkles in that trial. Her mother testifying that
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she said she was having what are called command hallucinations,
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or she was hearing this voice and was having ideation
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about hurting the children. Apparently, she didn't say that to
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any of these six, and it's not five. It's six
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mental health care professionals, every single one of them who
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was a woman. None of them indicated that she said
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that to any of them. There's some interesting questions there.
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Was that real? And she didn't report that to the people?
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Or was that bullshit? A mom coming in to try
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to help her kid? I don't know. I watched the
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testimony of the mother. She came off as a very
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nice lady. And I think a lot of moms, guys,
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moms will come in and testify to try to help
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their kids, which would kind of make her a good mom,
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but it'd make her a really shitty grandmother if she
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was being honest. I don't know one way or another.
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I don't know. There's a lot of really interesting issues
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in that case, especially when we take a step back
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and try to divorce ourselves from some of the emotions
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in it. I don't blame you for not wanting John
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Hinckley on the street. I don't think he should have
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been released. And having a president, people like that tend
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to be dangerous until the day they die, in my opinion.
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The Lindsay Clancy trial relied on a lot of expert testimony.
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And I think that there's a number of people who
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don't really know how the experts are picked for a trial.
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So can you kind of walk us through the process
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of both sides for picking experts for a trial? Like
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how are they found? How much time do they spend
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with the defendant?
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That sort of thing. I have to confess some bias
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here before we start. It's okay because you already indicated.
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Do it. All right. You got your asterisk. All right.
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I spent four years in sexual assault before moving into
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homicide where I spent 17 years. So for 21 years
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in California to even argue for probation for child sexual abuse,
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you have to get what's called a 288-1 report, which
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is this cottage industry of people weighing in and the
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intentions of the law were good. It's like where experts
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would evaluate a sex offender to determine whether or not
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they pose an ongoing risk. For 21 years, my job was,
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I'm sorry, I'm swearing so much. Okay. Yeah. My job
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was to read through these things and call bullshit on
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bogus experts. And they're real experts. They're credentialed, the psychiatrists,
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the psychologists. Some of the people out there are really
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good and they're intellectually honest. There's definitely some really good
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forensic psychiatrists. One, Clark Dietz, I have a tremendous amount
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of respect for him. There's another guy, I'll call him out,
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a guy named Mohandi in Los Angeles, who is a
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forensic psychologist, also very good. There's another woman named Jody
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Ward in Orange County. There's a bunch. But there's also
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a whole platoon of these people that come in that,
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in my view, are They want to get hired by
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the defense and they'll kind of cater their opinion to
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sort of help the defendant. Don't even get me started
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on death penalty cases where they can kind of intellectually
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justify their bullshit because they believe that death penalty is barbaric.
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When it comes to experts, there's really good ones out
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there and there's really bad ones out there. A lot
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of times, not to sound too cynical, but I did
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this for a long time. A lot of times, if
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it's real and the defense expert is credible, and somebody
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really has genuine, driving, pervasive mental health issues, a lot
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of those cases are dealt prior to the trial. A
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lot of times, if you have a rational prosecutor, they
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will sit down with the defense lawyer, and they will
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have their own expert who will evaluate it. And if
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it's legit, you'll have two experts, one for the defense,
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or maybe even more than two. But if they use
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a respectable one, As a prosecutor, you're like, okay, this
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guy's genuinely mentally ill. Let's try to work something out
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so we simultaneously protect the community and treat them fairly
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at the same time. The ones that go to trial
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oftentimes are the ones that don't settle because the prosecutor
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doesn't believe the defense expert. It was my job to
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cross-examine defense experts. And I have a new book coming
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out next summer on serial killers, where I do a
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deep dive onto that. Like what actually goes on behind
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the scenes. And I'll give you a little trade secret here.
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What you do as a prosecutor to prepare for defense
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experts is oftentimes I did a case involving fetal alcohol once,
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and it was for a serial killer case. Okay. So
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the defense was arguing that he was suffering from fetal
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alcohol and then that, therefore that mitigated. Fetal alcohol is
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a real thing. It's a horrible affliction. It's basically, it's
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kind of obvious. It is what it sounds like. It's
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a woman who drinks heavily or sometimes not even that
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heavily during pregnancy. It causes developmental problems, specifically brain damage.
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And there are often, it's a huge problem in Russia,
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not surprisingly, but it's a problem everywhere. It just wasn't
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true in this case. So what you do to prep
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that is you learn. So this is a new subject
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matter for me. I'd been in homicide a long time,
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but hadn't encountered that little niche before. I learn it from,
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and they called, they had five different experts in the
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defense side, they called four, and I learned the subject
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matter from their experts. And the way it works is
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if they're legitimate experts and they're properly credentialed and they
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actually do it, they will have published. And if they
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publish something, that means it's been peer-reviewed. If they publish
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something that's been peer-reviewed, it will tend to make sense.
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If you've done your job as a prosecutor and you've
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charged the right person in the right way and you've
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evaluated the case properly, automatically, therefore, what happens at trial,
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they should be full of crap. Typically, what you do
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as a prosecutor in dealing with that is you cross-examine
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them with their own previous articles that were peer-reviewed that
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make sense. You learn the subject matter from them. You
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study it from their articles and then they'll come in
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and say something that contradicts themselves. So that's kind of
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the tactic. It doesn't really answer your question. So what
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I would do, the way I would select my counter
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or the experts that I would bring in, and by
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the way, I was very, I didn't like relying on experts.
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I liked cross-examining their experts and showing the jury why
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they were full of crap and why they made no sense.
351
00:17:36.450 --> 00:17:39.859
And then maybe I'd call an expert for half an
352
00:17:39.890 --> 00:17:42.220
hour to back clean up for me. And so I
353
00:17:42.259 --> 00:17:45.759
would call in an honest expert, whether that's a neurologist,
354
00:17:45.799 --> 00:17:49.140
whether that's a psychiatrist or a forensic psychologist. And there
355
00:17:49.319 --> 00:17:50.900
were some that were really good. And this would have
356
00:17:50.920 --> 00:17:54.069
been somebody I would have consulted with who honestly evaluated
357
00:17:54.109 --> 00:17:55.769
the case and came back and said, this guy was
358
00:17:56.289 --> 00:17:58.609
perfectly capable of controlling his conduct, or yes, he was
359
00:17:58.650 --> 00:18:01.859
mentally ill, but he wasn't suffering from delusions at the
360
00:18:01.890 --> 00:18:05.240
time that would separate him from reality. Like I said,
361
00:18:05.779 --> 00:18:08.359
every murder, whether it's at the neighbor over the fence
362
00:18:08.980 --> 00:18:11.500
or a spouse in the kitchen after too many glasses
363
00:18:11.579 --> 00:18:13.630
of wine, There's an argument to be made that every
364
00:18:13.670 --> 00:18:16.210
killer is mentally ill in some way. Okay. So the
365
00:18:16.259 --> 00:18:18.920
question is, are they legally responsible? The vast majority of
366
00:18:18.940 --> 00:18:21.859
the time they are, in my view, and the times
367
00:18:21.900 --> 00:18:24.359
that they're not, it's like the guy that covered the
368
00:18:24.400 --> 00:18:28.309
TV and you know that immediately and you treat that
369
00:18:28.349 --> 00:18:29.069
case differently.
370
00:18:29.750 --> 00:18:33.890
Can the idea of sending someone who's mentally ill into
371
00:18:33.910 --> 00:18:38.750
a mental hospital versus a prison Can that be structured
372
00:18:38.809 --> 00:18:41.690
in such a way so that it's required that this
373
00:18:41.750 --> 00:18:44.970
individual has to remain in a mental hospital for the
374
00:18:45.029 --> 00:18:47.319
rest of their life, just like they would if they
375
00:18:47.380 --> 00:18:50.099
were receiving a life sentence that sent them to prison?
376
00:18:50.980 --> 00:18:54.200
You would think so, right? The truth is it's a
377
00:18:54.339 --> 00:18:59.940
different system, right? So the purpose for prison is punishment, basically,
378
00:19:00.460 --> 00:19:03.210
and protection of the community. The purpose of a mental
379
00:19:03.250 --> 00:19:07.940
health facility is restoration of sanity and rehabilitation to become
380
00:19:07.960 --> 00:19:10.859
a functioning member of society again, right? So it's a
381
00:19:11.059 --> 00:19:15.049
different goal. And most states don't have that indefinite life sentence.
382
00:19:15.069 --> 00:19:17.609
So like in Massachusetts, for example, and I'm not licensed
383
00:19:17.670 --> 00:19:20.170
in Massachusetts, I'm no expert on Massachusetts law, but in
384
00:19:20.210 --> 00:19:22.890
my minimal research that I've done on it, The way
385
00:19:22.910 --> 00:19:26.130
it happens, if Lindsay Clancy, for example, is found not
386
00:19:26.250 --> 00:19:29.670
criminally responsible, she would go and get a 40-day diagnostic.
387
00:19:30.180 --> 00:19:33.720
And I believe in Massachusetts, they do a reevaluation every
388
00:19:33.819 --> 00:19:37.960
six months, and then it might shift to annuals. If
389
00:19:38.180 --> 00:19:40.400
she is deemed to no longer pose a threat to
390
00:19:40.440 --> 00:19:43.890
herself or others, then she's eligible for release. Now, what's
391
00:19:43.970 --> 00:19:46.890
interesting about this case is that we keep hearing the
392
00:19:46.930 --> 00:19:49.750
term postpartum. That's a real thing, too, up to 20%.
393
00:19:50.380 --> 00:19:53.240
20% of women suffer from some form of postpartum after
394
00:19:53.259 --> 00:19:56.160
having a baby. And that's a really important thing for
395
00:19:56.200 --> 00:19:58.980
people to be aware of. It's very real, but that's depression.
396
00:19:59.180 --> 00:20:05.079
Postpartum psychosis is extremely rare. I think it's 0.02, and
397
00:20:05.619 --> 00:20:07.740
my stats are probably wrong on this, but it's like
398
00:20:08.160 --> 00:20:10.829
it goes from 20% of all to 1 in 100,000
399
00:20:10.829 --> 00:20:15.430
that will suffer from that. And of those, this psychosis
400
00:20:15.730 --> 00:20:20.910
can be any form of voices or whatever. The psychosis
401
00:20:21.009 --> 00:20:23.660
manifesting in a desire to kill their own kids is
402
00:20:23.839 --> 00:20:27.609
even far more remote subset of the subset. So what
403
00:20:27.750 --> 00:20:30.950
I think, and postpartum is generally as bad as it
404
00:20:31.039 --> 00:20:36.319
is temporary, right? Unlike schizophrenia or bipolar disorder, that are
405
00:20:36.400 --> 00:20:40.279
organic mental illness, postpartum, for somebody that goes to a
406
00:20:40.460 --> 00:20:44.019
mental facility after killing their three kids or the neighbor
407
00:20:44.039 --> 00:20:46.920
or whoever it is, if it really is based in postpartum,
408
00:20:47.369 --> 00:20:50.609
she's going to be legally sane. She's probably legally sane now.
409
00:20:50.769 --> 00:20:52.529
Most of the time, people have to be legally sane
410
00:20:52.809 --> 00:20:55.329
for them to even embark on a trial. I've been
411
00:20:55.390 --> 00:20:58.059
calling this and I've had people... gnashing their teeth and
412
00:20:58.079 --> 00:21:00.960
tearing their clothes and sending me hate online. But I'll
413
00:21:00.980 --> 00:21:02.819
bet she's out in two years if that's what she gets.
414
00:21:03.339 --> 00:21:05.720
For a lot of people, I think, in America, that
415
00:21:06.000 --> 00:21:07.660
they're going to have the John Hinckley effect, just like
416
00:21:07.680 --> 00:21:10.599
you described. They're going to be happy to see her out.
417
00:21:11.339 --> 00:21:13.759
In Lindsay's case, I'm assuming that the prosecutors are going
418
00:21:13.779 --> 00:21:16.500
to have to do a cost-benefit analysis and a retrial
419
00:21:16.559 --> 00:21:19.960
versus a plea. What are some of the conversations that
420
00:21:19.980 --> 00:21:22.180
are going to go on behind closed doors in the
421
00:21:22.220 --> 00:21:24.029
prosecutor's office regarding this case?
422
00:21:24.480 --> 00:21:26.900
I think that DA, I saw a press conference with him.
423
00:21:27.019 --> 00:21:28.769
I don't know him. I have a friend named Dave
424
00:21:28.849 --> 00:21:31.190
Ehrenberg who does home and says he's a great guy.
425
00:21:31.269 --> 00:21:34.369
He gave a press conference that was everything we didn't
426
00:21:34.430 --> 00:21:36.890
see during the trial. He was passionate. He would fart up.
427
00:21:36.890 --> 00:21:38.960
I don't know if you saw that, but it's like, okay,
428
00:21:39.220 --> 00:21:41.700
there's a frigging trial lawyer right there. That's what was
429
00:21:41.799 --> 00:21:43.650
missing in the whole case. So I think that what's
430
00:21:43.670 --> 00:21:46.170
happening behind the scenes is he's looking at an 11
431
00:21:46.170 --> 00:21:48.769
to 1 hanger. That's what we call them. And that
432
00:21:48.890 --> 00:21:51.930
forces you to reevaluate. I think behind the scenes right now,
433
00:21:51.970 --> 00:21:54.980
they're probably trying to hammer out some sort of deal
434
00:21:55.019 --> 00:21:59.079
with Kevin Reddington. Kevin Reddington, however, and who knows? I
435
00:21:59.420 --> 00:22:01.859
don't know what efforts were made to resolve the case
436
00:22:01.920 --> 00:22:04.140
before it went to trial. I can tell you this.
437
00:22:04.259 --> 00:22:06.160
I want to be fair to them. Those two prosecutors
438
00:22:06.200 --> 00:22:08.730
are not ready for prime time. They're very frustrated for
439
00:22:08.750 --> 00:22:12.009
me to watch that trial. They did a 42-minute closing argument, guys.
440
00:22:12.420 --> 00:22:14.890
On a triple homicide with mental health issues, I never
441
00:22:14.930 --> 00:22:16.930
did a murder case where I didn't spend at least
442
00:22:17.130 --> 00:22:20.049
an hour just explaining the law to my jury. You know,
443
00:22:20.069 --> 00:22:22.470
the case is complicated. I've done the majority of my
444
00:22:22.490 --> 00:22:25.519
murder cases. Closing arguments were at least two days long
445
00:22:25.839 --> 00:22:28.119
with me going and then the defense going and then
446
00:22:28.160 --> 00:22:31.660
me going. You mentioned the Menendez brothers. The first trial
447
00:22:31.740 --> 00:22:34.220
of Lyle and Eric Menendez, they were defended by a woman,
448
00:22:34.299 --> 00:22:38.299
Leslie Abramson. Her closing argument. was three days long.
449
00:22:39.380 --> 00:22:39.819
Wow.
450
00:22:39.880 --> 00:22:42.900
Regardless of how you feel about that case, look, that's
451
00:22:42.940 --> 00:22:45.140
a long one. But when you're talking about the liberty
452
00:22:45.160 --> 00:22:47.210
and interest of human being for life, when you're talking
453
00:22:47.230 --> 00:22:51.569
about lives that were taken, it merits a lot more
454
00:22:51.609 --> 00:22:54.930
than 42 frickin' minutes. And that was the best day
455
00:22:54.970 --> 00:22:57.380
for Florence I saw the prosecutors. Their opening was terrible.
456
00:22:57.670 --> 00:23:00.619
You never read your notes. Like, it drove me crazy
457
00:23:00.660 --> 00:23:03.240
watching it. And they've got a tough job. It's not
458
00:23:03.279 --> 00:23:06.829
for everybody. But either that DA needs to put in
459
00:23:06.869 --> 00:23:10.630
a gunslinger. You could even hire an outside special prosecutor
460
00:23:10.650 --> 00:23:13.740
to do it. But those two, Kevin Reddington will win
461
00:23:13.759 --> 00:23:15.680
the next time around. You need somebody that stands up
462
00:23:15.700 --> 00:23:18.440
with the moral authority of a prosecutor trying to hold
463
00:23:18.460 --> 00:23:22.339
somebody accountable for killing three children. And we never saw
464
00:23:22.359 --> 00:23:25.369
an inkling of that. We saw bows. We saw a
465
00:23:25.369 --> 00:23:28.910
lot of memes. But we did not see, in my view,
466
00:23:29.490 --> 00:23:33.170
talented prosecutors taking that case to the place it should
467
00:23:33.190 --> 00:23:33.509
have gone.
468
00:23:34.259 --> 00:23:38.099
Do you think the fact that the case hung 11
469
00:23:38.099 --> 00:23:42.200
to 1, and if I understood the media coverage correctly,
470
00:23:42.440 --> 00:23:48.430
those 11 people were predisposed to the insanity plea, isn't
471
00:23:48.470 --> 00:23:52.309
that a pretty strong indication of how the jury felt
472
00:23:52.410 --> 00:23:55.650
about the presentation by the prosecution? Sure.
473
00:23:55.829 --> 00:23:59.029
But I've seen cases at a very, very high level.
474
00:23:59.049 --> 00:24:01.029
My old boss, his name is Dave Brandt. He's a
475
00:24:01.250 --> 00:24:04.599
phenomenal trial lawyer. homicide for years as a line deputy,
476
00:24:04.619 --> 00:24:07.200
and then he became our supervisor. One of my favorite
477
00:24:07.220 --> 00:24:09.740
guys I've ever worked for, he did a death penalty
478
00:24:09.779 --> 00:24:12.410
case where he hung one 11 to 1, and it
479
00:24:12.569 --> 00:24:15.190
was 11 to 1 for life without possibility of parole.
480
00:24:15.930 --> 00:24:18.230
And he had strategies, he had ideas, and then a
481
00:24:18.769 --> 00:24:20.849
guy named Brian Brown came in and said, hey, let
482
00:24:20.869 --> 00:24:22.289
me take a crack at it, and he got a
483
00:24:22.410 --> 00:24:24.809
death penalty in the next one. You would need to
484
00:24:24.869 --> 00:24:27.059
revamp the entire presentation of the case. I have a
485
00:24:27.079 --> 00:24:29.400
list of about 100 things that I would change in
486
00:24:29.420 --> 00:24:31.900
the way they presented it, at least a If they
487
00:24:31.940 --> 00:24:34.660
totally revamped it, that's a case that has always been
488
00:24:34.740 --> 00:24:38.609
winnable in my view from the prosecution standpoint. Now, whether
489
00:24:38.650 --> 00:24:40.710
or not that's the right thing, I don't know. I
490
00:24:40.730 --> 00:24:43.029
have my thoughts, but again, I've tried to maintain kind
491
00:24:43.230 --> 00:24:44.789
of a really neutral view of it.
492
00:24:46.269 --> 00:24:48.910
You're listening to Mind Over Murder. We'll be right back
493
00:24:49.250 --> 00:24:56.500
after this word from our sponsors. We're back here at
494
00:24:56.519 --> 00:24:57.279
Mind Over Murder.
495
00:24:58.000 --> 00:25:01.539
Kevin Rennington, I thought was very effective in his opening statement. Yeah.
496
00:25:01.559 --> 00:25:03.910
That he really commanded the courtroom. I think from a
497
00:25:03.990 --> 00:25:06.809
completely mercenary point of view, I heaped a lot of
498
00:25:06.849 --> 00:25:09.640
praise on his tactics at the beginning. And we got
499
00:25:09.660 --> 00:25:13.069
to closing arguments. His closing sucks. He went after the
500
00:25:13.109 --> 00:25:14.930
police that he didn't need to do. He personalized it
501
00:25:14.950 --> 00:25:17.069
with the prosecutors that he didn't need to do. And
502
00:25:17.089 --> 00:25:18.609
then it was frustrating for me because they got the
503
00:25:18.650 --> 00:25:21.009
last word and they didn't hammer him on that. Like
504
00:25:21.029 --> 00:25:23.039
some of the guys that I worked with would still
505
00:25:23.099 --> 00:25:26.880
be in the rebuttal hammering him. These prosecutors stole my
506
00:25:26.940 --> 00:25:30.140
client's soul. Are you effing kidding me? Yes, it was.
507
00:25:30.359 --> 00:25:32.420
She got charged for the deaths of her three kids
508
00:25:32.480 --> 00:25:35.309
and that stole her soul. Like they did something wrong.
509
00:25:35.380 --> 00:25:37.609
I'm I was crawling through my computer screen at that.
510
00:25:37.829 --> 00:25:39.230
But we saw no counterpunches.
511
00:25:39.589 --> 00:25:39.890
No.
512
00:25:40.269 --> 00:25:43.349
We saw it was one-sided. And then look, I think
513
00:25:43.369 --> 00:25:45.170
that I was a fan of his. I don't know him.
514
00:25:45.349 --> 00:25:47.339
I thought he did really good work. But then when
515
00:25:47.380 --> 00:25:49.900
he's hanging at 11 to 1 and he calls a juror,
516
00:25:50.500 --> 00:25:53.049
calls him out and accuses him of committing perjury. That
517
00:25:53.069 --> 00:25:56.890
was an outrageous thing to do. I was pretty shocked. Guys,
518
00:25:56.930 --> 00:25:59.819
that was outrageous. And then we got these text messages
519
00:25:59.900 --> 00:26:02.099
that have surfaced. I don't know if they're real or
520
00:26:02.140 --> 00:26:05.099
not between him and a guy named Aiden Kearney, also
521
00:26:05.119 --> 00:26:05.920
known as Turtle Boy.
522
00:26:05.940 --> 00:26:06.660
Oh, yeah.
523
00:26:06.920 --> 00:26:10.049
If they're real, you have a defense lawyer who's talking
524
00:26:10.069 --> 00:26:14.029
to some frigging blogger And podcaster. Trying to invite him
525
00:26:14.250 --> 00:26:18.119
into the case. And that guy, Aiden Kearney is his name.
526
00:26:18.279 --> 00:26:20.619
Aiden Kearney was charged in the Karen Reid case.
527
00:26:20.799 --> 00:26:21.279
Yes, he was.
528
00:26:21.299 --> 00:26:24.589
And is pending charges for conspiracy to intimidate witnesses and
529
00:26:24.650 --> 00:26:27.190
is now also as a separate legal action from those
530
00:26:27.230 --> 00:26:31.750
same witnesses for defamation. And the idea that a defense
531
00:26:31.809 --> 00:26:34.619
lawyer is a member of the bar would invite that
532
00:26:34.960 --> 00:26:36.700
stinky animal into the tent.
533
00:26:36.980 --> 00:26:37.319
Yeah.
534
00:26:37.480 --> 00:26:39.779
And for the Turtle Boy fans out there, I've already,
535
00:26:39.819 --> 00:26:43.059
I've spoken about this already. I've gotten some hate from
536
00:26:43.099 --> 00:26:45.640
those people and you guys knocked yourselves out. I think
537
00:26:45.680 --> 00:26:48.140
it's funny, but I stand by everything I say. It's
538
00:26:48.160 --> 00:26:50.420
like that. And look, another thing to keep in mind
539
00:26:50.440 --> 00:26:52.650
about that is that Every once in a while, you've
540
00:26:52.670 --> 00:26:55.589
got somebody who they vote their conscience. A juror should
541
00:26:55.609 --> 00:26:57.650
be able to do that. And the vast majority of
542
00:26:57.670 --> 00:27:00.529
the time, they hold out for the defense. So it's
543
00:27:00.529 --> 00:27:04.279
11 prosecution jurors. What you do is you re-rack another panel,
544
00:27:04.640 --> 00:27:06.920
you accept that's a part of the process, and you
545
00:27:06.940 --> 00:27:09.359
do the trial again. That's what you do. And juries
546
00:27:09.380 --> 00:27:12.220
have been hanging, guys, for hundreds of years. That's why
547
00:27:12.299 --> 00:27:18.700
we need- And this whole idea, that guy, and nobody
548
00:27:18.779 --> 00:27:21.339
volunteers for jury duty unless you're on the grand jury.
549
00:27:21.680 --> 00:27:24.049
So for what's known as a petite jury or regular
550
00:27:24.089 --> 00:27:26.569
jury duty, we get drafted into that. We have to
551
00:27:26.609 --> 00:27:29.049
pay our taxes to do jury duty. And those are
552
00:27:29.069 --> 00:27:32.190
our only two civic duties in America. Okay. So he
553
00:27:32.210 --> 00:27:35.369
gets drafted out of the community. He votes his conscience
554
00:27:35.450 --> 00:27:38.420
at the end. Plenty of reason in that case why
555
00:27:38.440 --> 00:27:41.480
a juror could reasonably disagree with the defense. Just like
556
00:27:41.519 --> 00:27:45.190
there's plenty of arguments for the other way. But we're
557
00:27:45.299 --> 00:27:48.220
so used to this idea that we see a video
558
00:27:48.240 --> 00:27:49.779
on TikTok that we don't like. So I'm going to
559
00:27:49.839 --> 00:27:52.099
weigh in with my little keyboard, right? I'm going to
560
00:27:52.200 --> 00:27:56.599
ask you, that's ubiquitous in our society now, right? The
561
00:27:56.640 --> 00:27:59.269
problem is when you do that to a juror, in
562
00:27:59.289 --> 00:28:02.910
the state of Massachusetts, there is a criminal code section
563
00:28:03.329 --> 00:28:06.650
that makes it a felony to harass a juror because
564
00:28:06.670 --> 00:28:09.349
of their dirty duty. That if it is a regular case,
565
00:28:09.529 --> 00:28:11.970
it's 10 years in state prison, a maximum of 10 years.
566
00:28:12.299 --> 00:28:14.720
If it's a life case, which Lindsey Clancy's case was,
567
00:28:15.039 --> 00:28:17.539
it's up to 20 years in state prison. And there's
568
00:28:17.819 --> 00:28:21.220
all these provisions in the law that you either specifically
569
00:28:21.259 --> 00:28:24.579
intended or you act with reckless disregard for somebody else
570
00:28:24.619 --> 00:28:28.680
harassing them. Somebody that I guarantee behind the scenes right now, guys,
571
00:28:28.700 --> 00:28:31.920
there is a robust criminal investigation of that. Somebody is
572
00:28:31.940 --> 00:28:35.829
getting arrested for the harassment of that juror and personally
573
00:28:36.240 --> 00:28:40.289
can't happen soon enough because that is a sacrosanct part
574
00:28:40.369 --> 00:28:43.720
of the jury system. When social media meets that and
575
00:28:43.869 --> 00:28:47.190
somebody's life is ruined for getting drafted into jury duty,
576
00:28:47.230 --> 00:28:50.829
that is not okay. It fires me up regardless. That
577
00:28:50.869 --> 00:28:53.930
goes equally for people that are tracking down the pro-Lindsey
578
00:28:53.960 --> 00:28:58.039
jurors and harassing them. And that same, there's no defense there.
579
00:28:58.099 --> 00:29:01.000
That same section, especially for people domiciled in the state
580
00:29:01.019 --> 00:29:04.089
of Massachusetts. If you're doing that and you're using your
581
00:29:04.210 --> 00:29:06.400
social media to do it, You're going to get it.
582
00:29:06.410 --> 00:29:08.390
I wouldn't be surprised if you get a knock on
583
00:29:08.410 --> 00:29:10.569
the door. Serious crime in the state of Massachusetts.
584
00:29:10.630 --> 00:29:14.059
This is beyond forgetting about your manners. I've been shocked
585
00:29:14.190 --> 00:29:18.420
at the way people have lashed out at the jurors
586
00:29:18.500 --> 00:29:19.279
on both sides.
587
00:29:19.460 --> 00:29:20.220
Yeah, it's not right.
588
00:29:20.240 --> 00:29:22.859
People that were on the 11th side and the sole juror.
589
00:29:23.259 --> 00:29:26.829
There was plenty of criticism of him. People seem to
590
00:29:26.869 --> 00:29:28.869
have lost sight of the fact that we're not all
591
00:29:28.910 --> 00:29:32.109
supposed to personalize this to the point where you're out
592
00:29:32.430 --> 00:29:35.940
harassing this guy. Because of the way he voted on
593
00:29:35.980 --> 00:29:39.250
a jury after sitting through days or weeks of testimony.
594
00:29:39.490 --> 00:29:43.960
It's felony. It's felony conduct to do that. And Massachusetts better,
595
00:29:44.559 --> 00:29:46.319
as they say, you guys better get right with the
596
00:29:46.380 --> 00:29:50.450
Lord on this because every potential juror... in America is
597
00:29:50.619 --> 00:29:54.359
watching this and who'd want to do jury duty? Or
598
00:29:54.400 --> 00:29:56.640
you got to go along with the group. And even then,
599
00:29:56.680 --> 00:30:00.759
if the group, if the opinion is unpopular, you get doxed. Yeah.
600
00:30:00.960 --> 00:30:04.339
Somebody needs to be held accountable for that. And everybody
601
00:30:04.380 --> 00:30:07.400
needs to watch it. The state of Massachusetts needs to
602
00:30:07.420 --> 00:30:10.339
take care of business. And if they don't, if they don't,
603
00:30:10.599 --> 00:30:14.460
there are federal statutes that also protect people when the
604
00:30:14.519 --> 00:30:18.970
harassment is done online. There's federal cyber stalking. Love them
605
00:30:19.029 --> 00:30:21.799
or hate them, Trump's Justice Department, I would not be
606
00:30:21.839 --> 00:30:24.460
at all surprised if they came in and if the
607
00:30:24.539 --> 00:30:28.460
state doesn't do anything, if the feds do and somebody
608
00:30:28.519 --> 00:30:30.980
needs to. And that's not a political statement. That's a
609
00:30:31.059 --> 00:30:33.690
save the integrity of the jury system statement. This has
610
00:30:33.730 --> 00:30:36.750
been a train wreck to watch on so many different levels.
611
00:30:37.910 --> 00:30:38.769
One quick question.
612
00:30:39.269 --> 00:30:43.130
Explain doxing, if you will, because not everybody will understand
613
00:30:43.170 --> 00:30:43.740
the reference.
614
00:30:44.289 --> 00:30:47.509
Yeah, so doxing essentially is when somebody, so what happened
615
00:30:47.710 --> 00:30:50.089
on this one is, and I think their legal and
616
00:30:50.130 --> 00:30:52.789
standards department were out of their mind. There was a
617
00:30:52.970 --> 00:30:57.769
local station in Boston, an NBC station, an NBC affiliate
618
00:30:57.910 --> 00:31:00.589
that figured out who this guy was. And they didn't
619
00:31:00.609 --> 00:31:05.950
release his name or his city, but they showed previous
620
00:31:06.069 --> 00:31:09.349
legal documents with case numbers on it because they couldn't
621
00:31:09.609 --> 00:31:12.470
think to redact those. From those case numbers, somebody was
622
00:31:12.509 --> 00:31:15.039
able to go, apparently, And figure out the name of
623
00:31:15.079 --> 00:31:18.039
this guy. And then it went to this Aiden Kearney
624
00:31:18.059 --> 00:31:21.640
guy who released a photo of him and his name
625
00:31:22.000 --> 00:31:25.079
and the city that he lived in. Then this deluge
626
00:31:25.099 --> 00:31:27.549
of harassment hit the guy. I even read that, I
627
00:31:27.549 --> 00:31:28.829
don't know if this is true or not, but I
628
00:31:28.910 --> 00:31:32.910
read that Governor DeSantis of Florida offered him sanctuary in
629
00:31:32.930 --> 00:31:37.130
the state of Florida. He actually did. Yeah, when governors
630
00:31:37.170 --> 00:31:39.809
of other states are saying, hey, come find safety in
631
00:31:39.849 --> 00:31:42.869
my state, we have officially lost the plot.
632
00:31:43.299 --> 00:31:46.680
Agreed. I want to switch over to another case that,
633
00:31:46.720 --> 00:31:49.440
of course, everybody has heard of unless they've been living
634
00:31:49.480 --> 00:31:52.250
under a rock, and that is the Brian Kohlberger case,
635
00:31:52.650 --> 00:31:56.009
who is the confessed killer in the Idaho 4 case.
636
00:31:56.130 --> 00:31:59.819
So he made a motion to have his guilty plea withdrawn.
637
00:32:00.319 --> 00:32:04.180
citing ineffective assistance of counsel. He claims his defense team
638
00:32:04.200 --> 00:32:09.119
withheld exculpatory evidence and that they misrepresented life on death row.
639
00:32:09.220 --> 00:32:10.460
I love that. What did you think that was going
640
00:32:10.480 --> 00:32:11.220
to be like, Brian?
641
00:32:11.259 --> 00:32:11.859
Yeah, really?
642
00:32:12.000 --> 00:32:15.099
He states that they made promises of employment, freedom of movement,
643
00:32:15.160 --> 00:32:18.259
and full contact visits with his family. Is I want
644
00:32:18.279 --> 00:32:21.660
to withdraw my plea a tactic that every convicted killer tries,
645
00:32:21.900 --> 00:32:26.809
or might Brian Koberger have actual grounds? Very skeptical of
646
00:32:26.849 --> 00:32:27.710
the actual grounds.
647
00:32:27.730 --> 00:32:29.470
I got kind of wordy in the last couple. The
648
00:32:29.490 --> 00:32:32.269
answer is no. Okay, it's not. First of all, lawyers
649
00:32:32.329 --> 00:32:35.309
don't make promises about what the CDC is going to
650
00:32:35.349 --> 00:32:37.319
do or not do. They may say, hey, hopefully they'll
651
00:32:37.339 --> 00:32:39.460
do this or hopefully they'll do that. A lawyer has
652
00:32:39.500 --> 00:32:42.660
no control over what the, sorry, CDC is the California
653
00:32:42.680 --> 00:32:47.170
Department of Corrections, whatever they call it in Idaho. So they're, A,
654
00:32:47.200 --> 00:32:50.289
they're not saying that. B, his attorneys pulled a frigging
655
00:32:50.369 --> 00:32:52.490
rabbit out of a hat on his behalf. Because I
656
00:32:52.910 --> 00:32:56.029
was publicly very critical of the prosecutor on this for
657
00:32:56.069 --> 00:32:58.670
coming off the death penalty. And I, again, stand by
658
00:32:58.710 --> 00:33:02.000
everything I said. I thought that was incredibly weak and
659
00:33:02.079 --> 00:33:03.799
they should have gone for death. And that was they've
660
00:33:03.819 --> 00:33:07.079
got a great judge. What the law requires in Idaho
661
00:33:07.380 --> 00:33:10.890
is what's known as manifest injustice. So what is manifest
662
00:33:10.930 --> 00:33:14.519
injustice for withdrawing a plea? Manifest injustice is somebody pops
663
00:33:14.579 --> 00:33:17.289
up with a video that shows you drinking a pina
664
00:33:17.309 --> 00:33:20.730
colada in Las Vegas at the Tiki Bar next to
665
00:33:20.750 --> 00:33:23.130
an Elvis impersonator at the time of the crime. That's
666
00:33:23.170 --> 00:33:27.210
manifest injustice after a plea. Brian Koberger not liking his
667
00:33:27.250 --> 00:33:32.779
accommodations is not a manifest injustice. Yeah, really? I personally
668
00:33:32.819 --> 00:33:36.579
hope he doesn't like it. They already did the penalty hearing. So, yeah, he's,
669
00:33:37.119 --> 00:33:39.180
by filing this, he filed it himself, by the way,
670
00:33:39.200 --> 00:33:43.970
and apparently some lawyers that have come in It's going nowhere.
671
00:33:44.190 --> 00:33:45.930
The judge is going to deny it. He'll give him
672
00:33:45.970 --> 00:33:49.490
his due process, give him a hearing. But also, what
673
00:33:49.529 --> 00:33:55.019
a weenie, right? What a frigging weenie. Those lawyers did
674
00:33:55.519 --> 00:33:58.140
great work for him to the point that a lot
675
00:33:58.180 --> 00:34:00.720
of us were pulling our hair out when the prosecutor
676
00:34:01.000 --> 00:34:04.390
basically blinked. They did wonderful work. And by the way,
677
00:34:04.410 --> 00:34:08.230
his remedy is he gets a retrial. And for the
678
00:34:08.289 --> 00:34:10.960
state of Idaho, if that prosecutor doesn't have the frigging
679
00:34:11.199 --> 00:34:13.260
guts to do it, tap me in, guys. I would
680
00:34:13.300 --> 00:34:15.559
love to prosecute a Brian Kovrig case. And I will
681
00:34:15.599 --> 00:34:17.400
get the death penalty in the state of... I got
682
00:34:17.420 --> 00:34:19.260
to go pro hoc vice to do it. I'm not
683
00:34:19.320 --> 00:34:21.360
licensed in the state of Idaho. But if you don't
684
00:34:21.380 --> 00:34:23.300
have the balls to do it, I can think of
685
00:34:23.320 --> 00:34:26.110
about 100 people I know that have retired from the
686
00:34:26.150 --> 00:34:28.590
world of prosecution who would happily step in there and
687
00:34:28.650 --> 00:34:31.130
see to it that Brian Kovrig gets a death sentence.
688
00:34:31.650 --> 00:34:34.449
And that's not being bloodthirsty. That is a horrible frigging crime.
689
00:34:35.130 --> 00:34:37.969
And I believe that the aggravating circumstances, first of all,
690
00:34:38.309 --> 00:34:40.880
the evidence is overwhelming in that. And all the pro
691
00:34:40.909 --> 00:34:44.059
burgers and all those loonies online that think he didn't
692
00:34:44.079 --> 00:34:47.039
do it. Yeah, he did it. He pled guilty to it.
693
00:34:47.079 --> 00:34:50.059
The evidence is absolutely overwhelming that he did it. And
694
00:34:50.079 --> 00:34:52.400
if they don't have the, if it gets reversed, I'll
695
00:34:52.440 --> 00:34:54.639
raise my hand to volunteer to be the next prosecutor
696
00:34:54.659 --> 00:34:55.000
in line.
697
00:34:55.239 --> 00:34:57.199
Does that mean you'll move to Idaho for a couple
698
00:34:57.239 --> 00:34:57.610
of months?
699
00:34:57.809 --> 00:35:00.530
We get a cool hotel stay at, I'd buy a
700
00:35:00.570 --> 00:35:03.159
flat rod and probably really enjoy it.
701
00:35:03.449 --> 00:35:05.769
What is that change of plea hearing actually going to
702
00:35:05.829 --> 00:35:07.550
look like? Is it five minutes in court?
703
00:35:08.170 --> 00:35:09.570
I think that a lot of it will be done
704
00:35:09.889 --> 00:35:13.409
on written motions. It's possible that they'll do what's known
705
00:35:13.469 --> 00:35:16.300
as a de novo hearing. Well, the court will take evidence,
706
00:35:16.340 --> 00:35:20.699
but that's problematic because you're talking about attorney-client. You're talking
707
00:35:20.739 --> 00:35:24.119
about communications between an attorney and their client. And that's
708
00:35:24.280 --> 00:35:26.539
an area that most judges are going to be very
709
00:35:26.619 --> 00:35:29.849
reluctant to do. I just don't see it going anywhere.
710
00:35:30.110 --> 00:35:34.030
When you're talking about potential death penalties, sometimes there are
711
00:35:34.489 --> 00:35:37.690
some lawyers are so zealous in their opposition to the
712
00:35:37.730 --> 00:35:41.269
death penalty that they might come in and potentially do
713
00:35:41.289 --> 00:35:44.110
what they can to help somebody like Koberger. This is
714
00:35:44.150 --> 00:35:46.769
the opposite. He's allowed to withdraw his plea. That guy's
715
00:35:46.789 --> 00:35:49.869
going to get the death sentence because he will. And
716
00:35:49.969 --> 00:35:53.409
so they need to, if they ever are called and
717
00:35:53.489 --> 00:35:56.880
somehow the court, Koberger waves his attorney client, and they
718
00:35:56.920 --> 00:35:59.539
want to try to help him, they will probably be
719
00:35:59.800 --> 00:36:03.079
really pro-plea at that point, I would imagine. They did
720
00:36:03.159 --> 00:36:05.199
fantastic work for him. And I was not a fan
721
00:36:05.500 --> 00:36:08.300
of those lawyers, but the results speak for themselves. They
722
00:36:08.340 --> 00:36:10.559
got the brass ring. They got a life sentence instead
723
00:36:10.619 --> 00:36:13.980
of the death penalty, which remember, California, the death penalty
724
00:36:14.019 --> 00:36:17.559
is symbolic. Idaho is the 10th circuit. That's a whole
725
00:36:17.579 --> 00:36:21.070
different ballgame when it comes to the appellate review. He
726
00:36:21.179 --> 00:36:23.750
could actually be executed one day. Yeah.
727
00:36:23.909 --> 00:36:26.639
In Idaho, if you're sentenced to death, there's a good
728
00:36:26.719 --> 00:36:29.320
chance actually that you will ultimately be put to death.
729
00:36:29.480 --> 00:36:31.559
Yeah. I think they have seven people on death row
730
00:36:31.719 --> 00:36:35.739
versus 450 in California. They have seven, I think seven
731
00:36:35.780 --> 00:36:37.800
or eight people on death row in the state of Idaho.
732
00:36:38.380 --> 00:36:40.320
So yeah, I don't see it. I just don't see it.
733
00:36:40.519 --> 00:36:42.610
The judge isn't going to grant. That's a great judge too,
734
00:36:42.769 --> 00:36:44.989
by the way. If it lands in front of the
735
00:36:45.010 --> 00:36:47.869
same judge that we saw, man, that's everything a judge
736
00:36:47.929 --> 00:36:49.849
is supposed to be. So he'll deny it.
737
00:36:50.559 --> 00:36:52.300
So our last question, we're going to have to tee
738
00:36:52.340 --> 00:36:54.750
it up for a second, though, here. So let me
739
00:36:54.769 --> 00:36:58.869
give you some context. So this question regards our own case,
740
00:36:58.929 --> 00:37:01.969
the Colonial Parkway murders, and it happened very recently. So
741
00:37:02.090 --> 00:37:06.619
on this past Friday, September 18th, the FBI called for
742
00:37:06.639 --> 00:37:08.900
a meeting with the family members of Keith Kahl and
743
00:37:08.920 --> 00:37:12.179
Cassandra Haley. They are two young adults who disappeared in
744
00:37:12.320 --> 00:37:16.110
April 1988 and were presumed murdered. Their bodies were never recovered.
745
00:37:16.869 --> 00:37:19.809
The prime suspect in their case was Alan Wade Wilmer Sr.,
746
00:37:19.769 --> 00:37:22.829
a waterman from Lancaster County who, it was discovered two
747
00:37:22.869 --> 00:37:26.090
years ago, was a serial killer. He was responsible for
748
00:37:26.110 --> 00:37:30.550
the 1986 murders of Bill's sister Kathy and her girlfriend Rebecca,
749
00:37:30.989 --> 00:37:34.130
the 87 murders of Robin Edwards, David Knobling, and Lorraine Powell,
750
00:37:34.570 --> 00:37:37.449
the 89 murder of Terry Howell, and now the two
751
00:37:37.449 --> 00:37:40.530
1988 disappearances and murders of Keith and Cassandra.
752
00:37:41.679 --> 00:37:42.880
Good so far? Yep.
753
00:37:43.539 --> 00:37:46.800
Okay, the FBI told the families on Friday that they
754
00:37:46.840 --> 00:37:50.179
were officially linking Keith and Cassandra's deaths to Wilmer based
755
00:37:50.360 --> 00:37:55.710
on the totality of circumstances, highlighting significant similarities between the
756
00:37:55.750 --> 00:37:59.869
disappearances of Colin Haley and other regional killings connected to Wilmer.
757
00:38:00.710 --> 00:38:03.969
This includes matching patterns in timing, location, and manner in
758
00:38:03.989 --> 00:38:07.340
which the victims disappeared. While direct forensic evidence from the
759
00:38:07.400 --> 00:38:11.579
scene remains unavailable, the evidence establishes that the circumstances match
760
00:38:11.699 --> 00:38:14.539
Wilmer Sr. 's known pattern of offending, and that's per
761
00:38:14.559 --> 00:38:17.739
the FBI's press release. They also went on to say
762
00:38:18.019 --> 00:38:21.090
that the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of
763
00:38:21.119 --> 00:38:24.389
Virginia confirmed that had Wilmer Sr. been alive today, the
764
00:38:24.510 --> 00:38:28.369
evidence developed through this investigation would have supported federal prosecution.
765
00:38:29.269 --> 00:38:31.449
We want to take a few minutes and run through
766
00:38:31.469 --> 00:38:35.210
that statement with you. So our question is, can a
767
00:38:35.250 --> 00:38:39.079
case that is largely circumstantial, based on the factors listed
768
00:38:39.119 --> 00:38:42.139
in the FBI statement and with no corroborating forensic evidence,
769
00:38:42.719 --> 00:38:44.920
be considered enough for prosecution?
770
00:38:45.559 --> 00:38:49.840
Yes, circumstantial evidence cases get prosecuted all the time. Whether
771
00:38:49.860 --> 00:38:53.389
or not that case, whether some Fed would have had
772
00:38:53.670 --> 00:38:57.289
the backbone to charge it as an independent case, case
773
00:38:57.570 --> 00:39:00.440
i don't know enough about the forensics if there are
774
00:39:00.519 --> 00:39:03.039
any i know that the bodies weren't recovered and i
775
00:39:03.159 --> 00:39:04.519
believe and you guys have to help me out on
776
00:39:04.559 --> 00:39:07.239
this i tried to i did a little research on
777
00:39:07.280 --> 00:39:09.719
this but a lot of it was before he was
778
00:39:09.780 --> 00:39:12.340
identified so it's a lot of the stuff out there
779
00:39:12.389 --> 00:39:15.130
is like and it's a mystery yeah but look there's
780
00:39:15.309 --> 00:39:19.110
also when it comes to serial killers oftentimes there can
781
00:39:19.130 --> 00:39:21.769
be overlap between different serial killers and a lot of
782
00:39:21.809 --> 00:39:26.090
times things like m.o. can match. And there are in
783
00:39:26.150 --> 00:39:29.340
Southern California in the late 1970s, for example, we had
784
00:39:30.019 --> 00:39:32.619
Rodney Alcala, an in-game killer who was not a mind.
785
00:39:33.099 --> 00:39:36.699
He was active at the same time as Kenneth Bianchi
786
00:39:37.000 --> 00:39:41.309
and Angelo Bono, collectively known as the Hillside Strangler. And
787
00:39:41.429 --> 00:39:44.739
they had virtually identical MOs where they were They would
788
00:39:44.780 --> 00:39:48.110
kidnap young women and sexually assault them, strangle them, and
789
00:39:48.210 --> 00:39:50.050
dump them on the side of the road. And there
790
00:39:50.070 --> 00:39:53.949
was Jill Parenteau, I'm sorry, Jill Barkham was found on
791
00:39:53.969 --> 00:39:57.889
a fire road above Hollywood. And they did this, an
792
00:39:58.010 --> 00:40:01.590
FBI task force interviewed Rodney Alcala as one of the
793
00:40:02.030 --> 00:40:05.320
Hillside Strangler suspects. So they're talking about a bunch of
794
00:40:05.380 --> 00:40:08.739
other bodies that were dumped. Meanwhile, they believed that Jill
795
00:40:08.760 --> 00:40:12.199
Barkham was drunk. a victim of the Hillside Strangler. So
796
00:40:12.219 --> 00:40:16.409
they were accidentally right, minus one, as they're interviewing the
797
00:40:16.469 --> 00:40:18.789
right guy about one murder, but he was the wrong
798
00:40:18.829 --> 00:40:20.769
guy about nine other murders.
799
00:40:21.010 --> 00:40:21.190
Wow.
800
00:40:21.230 --> 00:40:23.690
And he was able to prove that he wasn't responsible
801
00:40:23.710 --> 00:40:26.769
for these other ones. And so they, and that's the,
802
00:40:26.929 --> 00:40:29.849
that's the nature of the beast when you're talking about M.O.
803
00:40:30.230 --> 00:40:33.110
There was, at the same time, because we're talking about
804
00:40:33.289 --> 00:40:36.269
late 70s, early 80s, which, by the way, in Southern California,
805
00:40:36.329 --> 00:40:39.949
during that period of time, there were 21 murders active
806
00:40:40.010 --> 00:40:43.289
known serial killers operating in Southern California at the same time. Wow.
807
00:40:43.309 --> 00:40:45.349
There was a guy during the same period of time,
808
00:40:45.550 --> 00:40:48.849
there was a guy known as the Freeway Killer, and
809
00:40:48.869 --> 00:40:51.909
there was also Randy Kraft. And they were doing the
810
00:40:51.949 --> 00:40:54.070
exact same thing. They were picking up young men who
811
00:40:54.110 --> 00:40:58.530
were hitchhiking, sexually assaulting them, murdering them, and dumping them
812
00:40:58.590 --> 00:41:00.860
on the sides of roads. And so we had, there
813
00:41:00.889 --> 00:41:03.840
was two active serial killers doing that, doing the exact
814
00:41:03.860 --> 00:41:07.039
same thing at the exact same time for an investigator,
815
00:41:07.079 --> 00:41:11.659
especially without DNA, it's very difficult to distinguish between those two,
816
00:41:11.739 --> 00:41:14.699
just like it was difficult to distinguish between the Hellside Strangler. Now,
817
00:41:14.760 --> 00:41:17.340
my dealings with the FBI have always been really good
818
00:41:17.510 --> 00:41:20.329
on an investigative level. There's a former FBI agent who's
819
00:41:20.369 --> 00:41:23.969
involved in that, and I'm blanking on her name, Maureen O'Connell,
820
00:41:24.050 --> 00:41:24.469
I think, maybe?
821
00:41:24.489 --> 00:41:25.690
Yeah, Maureen's a friend of ours.
822
00:41:25.730 --> 00:41:28.550
Yeah, Maureen. She's wonderful. She's wonderful. I've been on a
823
00:41:28.570 --> 00:41:31.070
couple of panels with her. She weighed in on some
824
00:41:31.090 --> 00:41:34.280
of this, and I really like her. I think she's smart.
825
00:41:34.599 --> 00:41:36.820
So when you have a, when you have a gumshoe
826
00:41:37.059 --> 00:41:39.469
FBI agent or better yet, a group of them who
827
00:41:39.530 --> 00:41:42.349
are convinced enough, I would personally put a lot of
828
00:41:42.369 --> 00:41:45.389
weight into that. But I have seen these, these mistakes.
829
00:41:45.409 --> 00:41:47.230
And then we got another kind of weird thing about
830
00:41:47.269 --> 00:41:51.369
serial killers. There's a guy named Henry Lee Lucas in Texas.
831
00:41:51.809 --> 00:41:53.889
He committed, he was confessing the murders he did not
832
00:41:53.929 --> 00:41:57.579
commit all across the country. including one in Orange County
833
00:41:57.599 --> 00:41:59.960
that's prosecuted by a buddy of mine named Larry Yellen,
834
00:41:59.980 --> 00:42:02.260
who's now a Superior Court judge. He confessed to that,
835
00:42:02.300 --> 00:42:03.559
and that was a part of it. We had to
836
00:42:03.599 --> 00:42:06.480
disprove that this guy was doing that. And that's kind
837
00:42:06.500 --> 00:42:08.880
of the psychopath mindset, right? I'm in jail. I can't
838
00:42:09.039 --> 00:42:10.619
do this, but I can sure screw with a lot
839
00:42:10.639 --> 00:42:12.769
of people by confessing to a lot of things I
840
00:42:12.789 --> 00:42:15.070
didn't do. And then there's a synth, I'll call a,
841
00:42:15.150 --> 00:42:17.730
there's overlap with a case that our friend Paul Holes
842
00:42:17.769 --> 00:42:19.630
has been working on out of San Francisco.
843
00:42:19.650 --> 00:42:19.730
Yeah.
844
00:42:20.179 --> 00:42:22.639
That got cleared to all call of, but Paul really
845
00:42:22.679 --> 00:42:25.699
thinks it's another serial killer. I hope it's him. It's
846
00:42:26.119 --> 00:42:30.210
these guys. And he was particularly interesting based on my,
847
00:42:30.269 --> 00:42:32.150
and I don't pretend to be an expert on this case.
848
00:42:32.210 --> 00:42:34.389
I know it's deeply personal to you, Bill, and for
849
00:42:34.510 --> 00:42:37.400
obvious reasons. One of the things that's unique about this
850
00:42:37.780 --> 00:42:41.809
is that so oftentimes people, There's a sexual assault component
851
00:42:41.829 --> 00:42:44.489
when serial killers are active. And for this guy, it
852
00:42:44.530 --> 00:42:47.199
appears that a lot of them were, there was no
853
00:42:47.239 --> 00:42:50.820
sexual assault fight. Some there was and some there wasn't, right?
854
00:42:50.980 --> 00:42:54.280
And the problem is too, that we have situations where
855
00:42:54.300 --> 00:42:58.840
there's no body, another situation, another couple where their bodies
856
00:42:58.880 --> 00:43:02.360
were so badly decomposed that they weren't able.
857
00:43:02.199 --> 00:43:03.219
To get any.
858
00:43:03.900 --> 00:43:07.710
It does appear that Wilmer did sexually assault a number
859
00:43:07.750 --> 00:43:10.219
of his victims and But we might not be able
860
00:43:10.280 --> 00:43:11.199
to prove that.
861
00:43:11.239 --> 00:43:11.739
Prove all of it.
862
00:43:11.989 --> 00:43:16.150
Yeah. Forensically. Yeah. But if you've got, like, that's like
863
00:43:16.210 --> 00:43:18.809
Alcala with Robin Samson, who's 12 years old, right?
864
00:43:18.829 --> 00:43:19.190
Yeah.
865
00:43:19.230 --> 00:43:21.150
Dumped her in the chaparral. And by the time she
866
00:43:21.190 --> 00:43:23.530
was found, she was just a skeleton. So there's no
867
00:43:23.570 --> 00:43:25.869
way you can tell. But I know she was to
868
00:43:25.869 --> 00:43:30.179
100% certainty. And the jury convicted him of that properly. So, yeah, it's,
869
00:43:30.559 --> 00:43:33.250
I hope so. A lot of the FBI agents, like
870
00:43:33.289 --> 00:43:35.429
I said, that get involved in that are very good.
871
00:43:35.909 --> 00:43:39.579
And if they're satisfied, I would put a lot of
872
00:43:39.619 --> 00:43:40.199
stock into that.
873
00:43:40.760 --> 00:43:44.340
The families were profoundly disappointed. This is the call on
874
00:43:44.400 --> 00:43:48.199
Haley families. And we actually held a press conference immediately
875
00:43:48.539 --> 00:43:52.360
after the FBI met with the families because the FBI
876
00:43:52.519 --> 00:43:58.199
continually refuses to hold press conferences in the Colonial Parkway murders. Interestingly,
877
00:43:58.400 --> 00:44:01.440
their partner agency, the Virginia State Police, has held two
878
00:44:01.480 --> 00:44:03.920
press conferences in the last two and a half years
879
00:44:04.059 --> 00:44:08.719
as additional cases have been linked to Wilmer. But the FBI,
880
00:44:09.000 --> 00:44:14.059
because this case is considered so badly botched by the FBI, sadly,
881
00:44:14.780 --> 00:44:16.539
they continually.
882
00:44:15.980 --> 00:44:17.889
Refuse to hold press conferences.
883
00:44:18.340 --> 00:44:21.050
So we, the families, and Kristen and I did this,
884
00:44:21.309 --> 00:44:24.449
we set up our own press conference. The families are
885
00:44:24.570 --> 00:44:29.800
profoundly disappointed because the FBI didn't present any new information.
886
00:44:30.539 --> 00:44:34.369
The whole thing felt very self-serving. As one of the
887
00:44:34.409 --> 00:44:38.050
family members said at the press conference, this wasn't about
888
00:44:38.110 --> 00:44:42.840
providing closure to the families. This was about presenting closure
889
00:44:43.059 --> 00:44:47.360
for the FBI because this case is terrible and has
890
00:44:47.400 --> 00:44:49.260
been handled very badly.
891
00:44:49.280 --> 00:44:54.639
Yeah, so that's another thing that you do see sometimes
892
00:44:54.659 --> 00:44:57.039
when you have a detective. I haven't seen it at
893
00:44:57.079 --> 00:44:58.639
the federal level, but I have seen it at the
894
00:44:58.679 --> 00:45:02.389
local level. Like when you have a serial killer and... Look,
895
00:45:02.670 --> 00:45:05.309
every frigging serial killer has victims that we don't know about.
896
00:45:05.329 --> 00:45:09.579
Every single one of them. The cases where we suspect,
897
00:45:09.679 --> 00:45:12.219
but we can't say for sure. And there is, if
898
00:45:12.260 --> 00:45:15.179
you're a detective and you've got 20 cases on your
899
00:45:15.199 --> 00:45:18.039
caseload and you're trying to clear cases and you got
900
00:45:18.099 --> 00:45:21.800
somebody that has a similar MO and gets convicted, it's
901
00:45:21.880 --> 00:45:25.469
great for them. And I mean, it allows them to
902
00:45:25.550 --> 00:45:28.070
focus on other cases. There's no malice to it for
903
00:45:28.090 --> 00:45:31.090
most of them. It's great for them if they can
904
00:45:31.150 --> 00:45:34.090
clear that case by linking it to a known suspect
905
00:45:34.849 --> 00:45:37.840
that has already been convicted or is already dead, because
906
00:45:37.880 --> 00:45:40.019
then the case is officially closed and they get to
907
00:45:40.059 --> 00:45:43.380
move on to the next one. So that can be
908
00:45:43.400 --> 00:45:46.820
a factor. I'd be really disappointed if the FBI did
909
00:45:46.840 --> 00:45:49.969
that because the FBI is the one agency with unlimited resources.
910
00:45:50.590 --> 00:45:55.469
And I don't know, forensic technology continues to advance though, right?
911
00:45:55.530 --> 00:45:57.610
And it keeps getting better and better. And we started
912
00:45:57.630 --> 00:46:00.460
out with just fingerprints and then we got we now
913
00:46:00.480 --> 00:46:04.079
we got we had serology which is blood typing and
914
00:46:04.119 --> 00:46:06.019
now and then we got dna then we got better
915
00:46:06.039 --> 00:46:09.260
dna we got co-filer and profiler plus kits and now
916
00:46:09.300 --> 00:46:12.250
we're doing then we had familial dna which is relatives
917
00:46:12.269 --> 00:46:14.389
that are in jail then we got into genetic genealogy
918
00:46:14.409 --> 00:46:17.230
which is bringing awesome and i've had i've worked on
919
00:46:17.269 --> 00:46:20.929
cases involving every one of those right and it keeps
920
00:46:20.969 --> 00:46:23.150
getting better and keeps solving things so even if they
921
00:46:23.250 --> 00:46:27.119
close it That doesn't mean that we won't, at some
922
00:46:27.159 --> 00:46:30.530
point in the future, get some new form. And in
923
00:46:30.570 --> 00:46:34.110
the Gilgo Beach case with Rex Heuermann, that judge, who
924
00:46:34.190 --> 00:46:37.289
I loved watching that guy, I'm blanking on his name,
925
00:46:37.309 --> 00:46:39.369
but everything that I would want a judge to be
926
00:46:39.389 --> 00:46:42.210
as a citizen, right? He was going to allow in
927
00:46:42.409 --> 00:46:46.269
a complete genetic profile for mitochondrial DNA. That went under
928
00:46:46.289 --> 00:46:49.869
the radar for everybody but nerds like me or friends.
929
00:46:50.389 --> 00:46:53.800
That was a big deal. Yeah. That's based on hair
930
00:46:53.940 --> 00:46:58.059
and teeth. And so it keeps getting better very quietly.
931
00:46:58.139 --> 00:47:00.550
So for those families, I would encourage them not to
932
00:47:00.570 --> 00:47:04.530
give up hope, even if the FBI is. Because forensic technology,
933
00:47:04.710 --> 00:47:07.469
I can't tell you how many murders I successfully prosecuted
934
00:47:07.530 --> 00:47:10.349
where the science caught up to the bad guy. And
935
00:47:10.409 --> 00:47:12.090
we were able to prove cases that we couldn't have
936
00:47:12.110 --> 00:47:15.800
proven before. And sometimes it includes cases that were false.
937
00:47:16.250 --> 00:47:19.949
already closed and attributed to somebody else. That happens. And
938
00:47:20.050 --> 00:47:22.250
so hopefully this case is one of those if somebody
939
00:47:22.309 --> 00:47:24.730
else did it. I hope the FBI is right. And
940
00:47:24.769 --> 00:47:28.989
like I said, my experience with agents has been universally positive.
941
00:47:29.010 --> 00:47:30.980
I've worked on a number of task forces with them.
942
00:47:32.019 --> 00:47:34.179
We brought them in on a bunch of our murders,
943
00:47:34.420 --> 00:47:37.320
and I've had good experiences. I've had less positive experiences
944
00:47:37.360 --> 00:47:40.119
with the admin in the FBI, which is probably a
945
00:47:40.139 --> 00:47:44.139
story for another podcast. Us too, actually. I was ready
946
00:47:44.159 --> 00:47:46.300
to commit murders of my own when I was in
947
00:47:46.340 --> 00:47:47.739
the middle of a trial.
948
00:47:48.059 --> 00:47:52.650
Our experience as family members, and it'll be 40 years
949
00:47:52.789 --> 00:47:56.250
for my family next month, the case agents have been
950
00:47:56.869 --> 00:47:58.550
universally outstanding.
951
00:47:59.269 --> 00:47:59.690
That's good to hear.
952
00:47:59.710 --> 00:48:03.510
Dealing with the bureaucracy and the higher-ups at the FBI
953
00:48:04.760 --> 00:48:07.300
has been, and we try not to swear on mind
954
00:48:07.340 --> 00:48:10.610
over murder, but And I won't hear either, but it's
955
00:48:10.670 --> 00:48:11.469
been a nightmare.
956
00:48:12.809 --> 00:48:14.769
I got to share a story with you then, Bill. Okay.
957
00:48:15.550 --> 00:48:17.989
Not to steal your thunder, but... No, go right ahead.
958
00:48:18.010 --> 00:48:20.070
I had a case once. So they have a thing
959
00:48:20.110 --> 00:48:24.869
called RCFL, which is a regional combination of resources for
960
00:48:24.989 --> 00:48:27.710
cell phones and computers in combination with the FBI. So
961
00:48:27.769 --> 00:48:30.110
it's this facility they set up in Orange County. And
962
00:48:30.150 --> 00:48:33.309
most of these police departments, especially these following ones, will contract.
963
00:48:33.590 --> 00:48:35.690
So anytime they're investigating a case with a cell phone
964
00:48:35.730 --> 00:48:38.320
or a computer, You send it to RCFL, and either
965
00:48:38.360 --> 00:48:40.780
it gets one of the local detectives or an FBI
966
00:48:40.820 --> 00:48:43.409
agent that does a data dump. For reasons I won't
967
00:48:43.449 --> 00:48:45.750
get into, in the middle of a trial, trials are
968
00:48:45.789 --> 00:48:49.610
all controlled train wrecks anyway, we needed to introduce evidence
969
00:48:49.690 --> 00:48:53.030
from a cell phone dump in a double homicide case
970
00:48:53.050 --> 00:48:55.670
that I was prosecuting. When you talk about a really
971
00:48:55.710 --> 00:48:58.929
brutal murder of innocent people, which this case was, it's
972
00:48:59.070 --> 00:49:01.300
usually not a big deal at all. You just call
973
00:49:01.320 --> 00:49:03.800
the detective, hey, your tech guy, I need him in
974
00:49:03.840 --> 00:49:07.309
this afternoon, and everybody cooperates. In this case, I had
975
00:49:07.429 --> 00:49:09.849
some frigging person at the FBI. We had meetings over
976
00:49:09.869 --> 00:49:14.300
this and I'm still pissed about it. I'm literally driving in.
977
00:49:14.380 --> 00:49:16.260
I'm going to be standing in a podium in 30
978
00:49:16.260 --> 00:49:20.000
minutes and my investigator calls and says they won't avail...
979
00:49:19.760 --> 00:49:23.239
the FBI agent because you do not follow. And here's
980
00:49:23.260 --> 00:49:26.460
a word that you probably heard before, Bill. Protocol, which
981
00:49:26.699 --> 00:49:30.019
is fed for, I have no rational reason to deny this,
982
00:49:30.059 --> 00:49:33.159
but I'm going to tell you no. And I went apeshit, guys.
983
00:49:33.360 --> 00:49:35.760
And I was, I lit things on fire. And we,
984
00:49:35.820 --> 00:49:37.820
I needed the, and the FIA agent was super cool.
985
00:49:38.099 --> 00:49:39.659
He said, I'll be there anytime, but you got to
986
00:49:39.739 --> 00:49:42.059
fill out the, this form and trip click. It's like,
987
00:49:42.539 --> 00:49:45.159
I'm on my way to court right now. And they
988
00:49:45.179 --> 00:49:47.289
were like, and the person I talked to, like, don't
989
00:49:47.309 --> 00:49:49.409
know what to tell you. So I wanted to crawl
990
00:49:49.429 --> 00:49:51.190
through my phone and counter that and.
991
00:49:51.150 --> 00:49:51.650
Deal with the feds.
992
00:49:51.670 --> 00:49:54.230
Oh my gosh. That person, whoever they are, ought to
993
00:49:54.250 --> 00:49:57.289
be frigging fired. And it wasn't an agent. It was
994
00:49:57.389 --> 00:50:00.269
some administrator. And I complained all the way up the
995
00:50:00.289 --> 00:50:02.070
chain and I got some satisfaction at the end. I
996
00:50:02.070 --> 00:50:05.269
had meetings afterwards and I won my case, but I
997
00:50:05.309 --> 00:50:10.090
had some low-level bureaucrat making me jump through bullshit hoops
998
00:50:10.130 --> 00:50:12.510
in the middle of a double murder case. And I
999
00:50:12.570 --> 00:50:14.880
assume they kept their job just because, but I was,
1000
00:50:15.239 --> 00:50:17.679
and I never called for anybody to get fired. That
1001
00:50:17.719 --> 00:50:19.760
was when somebody ought to, I should have gotten fired.
1002
00:50:20.099 --> 00:50:22.099
And if we lost, they definitely should have gotten fired.
1003
00:50:22.400 --> 00:50:24.099
And it was like, oh, protocol, you didn't fill out
1004
00:50:24.139 --> 00:50:26.159
the right form at the right time. Oh, no. So,
1005
00:50:26.820 --> 00:50:32.650
I'm with you, Bill. Thank you for my one-person therapy session.
1006
00:50:32.869 --> 00:50:34.210
I'm still traumatized.
1007
00:50:34.730 --> 00:50:37.119
See, I thought you were going to be providing legal
1008
00:50:37.159 --> 00:50:38.880
advice at no charge to us.
1009
00:50:38.940 --> 00:50:41.550
And here I am helping you. You're helping me sort
1010
00:50:41.590 --> 00:50:42.949
out some of my many issues.
1011
00:50:45.619 --> 00:50:48.219
Matt, you did say you have a book coming out soon.
1012
00:50:48.239 --> 00:50:50.219
Tell us just a little bit about the book because
1013
00:50:50.639 --> 00:50:52.389
I am raring to read it.
1014
00:50:52.800 --> 00:50:54.679
Okay. Thank you. Thank you. So I did the book
1015
00:50:54.699 --> 00:50:57.449
of murder, which is, that's like a taxonomy of murder
1016
00:50:57.489 --> 00:50:59.550
cases that I did in homicide. And it's kind of
1017
00:50:59.570 --> 00:51:02.730
an overview of how the law of homicide works and
1018
00:51:02.909 --> 00:51:05.090
some of the basics. And then I did an example
1019
00:51:05.110 --> 00:51:07.650
of domestic violence murder or murder for money. And I
1020
00:51:07.710 --> 00:51:10.340
kind of gave an overview. The next one, not too
1021
00:51:10.380 --> 00:51:12.969
creatively named, the working title right now is The Book
1022
00:51:12.989 --> 00:51:16.190
of Serial Killers, Prosecuting the Monsters Among Us. I prosecuted
1023
00:51:16.190 --> 00:51:19.309
14 different serial killers, including the Golden State Killer. And
1024
00:51:19.409 --> 00:51:21.590
I'm sharing a lot of, it's a little deeper, it's
1025
00:51:21.630 --> 00:51:23.900
a little darker than my first book. And I get
1026
00:51:23.920 --> 00:51:27.639
into my background, like what steered me into the DA's office.
1027
00:51:27.820 --> 00:51:29.719
And part of that story, by the way, is I
1028
00:51:29.739 --> 00:51:32.500
was interviewing with the FBI. They came to my law school.
1029
00:51:32.599 --> 00:51:34.969
I was kind of getting recruited with a lowercase r,
1030
00:51:34.980 --> 00:51:38.050
which I thought was super cool, but I'm a I
1031
00:51:38.090 --> 00:51:40.590
like to surf still. And back then they, it meant
1032
00:51:40.670 --> 00:51:42.150
that if I joined the FBI, I wasn't going to
1033
00:51:42.170 --> 00:51:43.809
be a, I couldn't surf because they were going to
1034
00:51:43.829 --> 00:51:46.550
send you, they didn't assign you where you, any place
1035
00:51:46.570 --> 00:51:48.760
you grew up or went to school, which took out
1036
00:51:48.860 --> 00:51:51.699
Santa Barbara, LA and San Diego for me, which is
1037
00:51:51.719 --> 00:51:54.179
the only place I really wanted to live at the time. Yeah.
1038
00:51:54.199 --> 00:51:56.820
Became a DA instead. So it's all in there. Hopefully
1039
00:51:56.900 --> 00:51:59.679
it will be out. It's Hyperion, which is Disney. They gave,
1040
00:51:59.820 --> 00:52:02.199
they thankfully decided to do another book with me. First
1041
00:52:02.219 --> 00:52:05.989
book is still doing great. And this one was a
1042
00:52:06.010 --> 00:52:08.679
lot of fun to write and I hope you like it. Oh,
1043
00:52:08.739 --> 00:52:09.320
I can't wait.
1044
00:52:09.969 --> 00:52:11.619
Yeah, I actually, there was a student of mine who
1045
00:52:11.639 --> 00:52:13.440
was reading your book the other day and I was like,
1046
00:52:13.500 --> 00:52:14.079
I know that guy.
1047
00:52:14.119 --> 00:52:17.460
And they were like, why? The paperback just came out
1048
00:52:17.539 --> 00:52:22.940
in September. There you go. So thank you for the plug. Yeah.
1049
00:52:22.960 --> 00:52:26.239
She was so thrilled. She was like, really? Is he cool?
1050
00:52:26.280 --> 00:52:28.809
I'm like, he's so cool. Yes, he actually is cool.
1051
00:52:28.849 --> 00:52:30.650
So not cool. So not cool.
1052
00:52:33.320 --> 00:52:35.099
Oh, Matt, thank you so much for joining us. We
1053
00:52:35.139 --> 00:52:36.139
really appreciate it.
1054
00:52:36.300 --> 00:52:38.530
Anytime, guys. You know, I love the pod. Have me
1055
00:52:38.570 --> 00:52:39.230
back anytime.
1056
00:52:39.769 --> 00:52:42.090
Thank you so much. That is going to do it
1057
00:52:42.170 --> 00:52:44.730
for this episode of Mind Over Murder. Thank you so
1058
00:52:44.769 --> 00:52:47.010
much for listening. We'll see you next time.
1059
00:52:56.739 --> 00:53:00.320
Mind Over Murder is a production of Absolute Zero and
1060
00:53:00.389 --> 00:53:01.710
Another Dog Productions.
1061
00:53:02.389 --> 00:53:05.670
Our executive producers are Bill Thomas and Kristen Dilley.
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Our logo art is by Pamela Arnois.
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Our theme music is by Kevin MacLeod.
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Mind Over Murder is distributed in partnership with Crawl Space Media.
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You can follow us on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram.
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You can also follow our page on the Colonial Parkway
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Murders on Facebook.
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And finally, you can follow Bill Thomas on Twitter at BillThomas56.
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Thank you for listening to Mind Over Murder.
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Thank you.