The Death of Cork Miller: Accident or Murder

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Speaker 1 Hey, weirdos, I'm Elena. I'm Ash.
And this is Morbid.

Speaker 1 It's morbid in the evening. It's spooky and gloomy.
It is spooky and gloomy. I like it though.
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But maybe it's too Moody Judy right now. It's like, yeah, I just don't like it.
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Speaker 1 Is it affecting your Moody Judy-ness?

Speaker 1 We figured it out. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Back to the show. I needed regular color lights.
I didn't feel super Gen Z today. We need some like warm, warm colored lights.
Yeah, like Nancy Meyers movie, warm. There you go.
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You don't want to be the only witchy sister at the block at the apothecary table reading tarot cards with the not morbid tarot deck. You don't want to be that.

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And then I like fell off of it and I need to get back into it.

Speaker 1 I've been doing these little like romanticize your life things because it's good for you. It is.
And I would like, especially,

Speaker 1 I think we've said like we were going through a lot with like mom being in the hospital and like being sick and then just like life in general. Things are so much better now.

Speaker 1 But during that little period, I was pulling tarot cards for myself and then journaling about what tarot cards I got and like why I got them. And

Speaker 1 it would just make me feel like cozy and nice. Yeah.
You know, so that's a fun thing to do. Yeah, it's a great way to romanticize your day, which I think you absolutely should.

Speaker 1 I think everybody should romanticize shit. I think you should romanticize as much as you possibly can.
This is just like life advice. Life advice, and tis the season to romanticize.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 November feels so romantic. It does.
I mean, I got married in November, so that's probably why. Pretty romantic.
That's about as romantic as it can get. Marriage, yeah.
You know, marriage. Marriage.

Speaker 1 Exactly. I did an emphasis on that one.
You did the marriage

Speaker 1 in November. And I do.
I think, I just think like, why not? Yeah. Why not romanticize every little thing? I think you should.
It makes you appreciate all kinds of things that you don't appreciate.

Speaker 1 It does. That you never knew you could appreciate.
Yeah. Like, I don't drink, but at night, when I have a little, like, um, like wine glass with like my, my poppy or my ollie in it, yeah.

Speaker 1 It feels romanticized-y. That is romanticized.
What do you do to romanticize your life? I, you know, I have my very fancy coffee that I make in the morning now. You do have very fancy coffee.

Speaker 1 I'm not doing any like, you know, I'm not running to Starbucks. No.
You know, I'm, I'm, I'm making my own fancy coffee. We love to hear it.
I'm doing my thing. And it's not that that hard to do.

Speaker 1 And I feel like I love my, I really love my cup of coffee. And now I'm like obsessive about it where like no other coffee tastes good.
I just want my special cup of coffee. I feel that way too.

Speaker 1 I was making, I got the, the fucking sugar cookie creamers. Oh, yes.
The frosted sugar cookie.

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Yeah. They have them at like so many different places.
I bought, I bought two because in my mind, there was a limit to how many you could buy.

Speaker 1 I like limited myself in that moment. I really didn't.
Self-limitations. But I'd like to go purchase six of them.
You're through accepting limits because someone says they're so. Thank you so much.

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Unlimited.

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You don't even have to pay us.

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Please. Please.

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We all are. Oh, it's so good.
So then I make my own sugar cookie latte and I even have the sprinkler. I have the red and green sprinkles.

Speaker 1 Because you saw that this morning. He said, you're back.
It's true, though.

Speaker 1 Honestly, I feel this way. I feel like you should romanticize whatever you can.
Yeah. I feel like don't, you know, this is just more life advice of what I'm doing.

Speaker 1 That's making with an elder. It's true.
I'm an ancient.

Speaker 1 So, and I think don't be so hard on yourself. I feel like this time of year, everybody's really hard on yourself.

Speaker 1 Deep into my soul. Don't be so hard on yourself.

Speaker 1 Habit stack. Habit stack.
Don't feel like you have to attack a million different things that you want to add to your routine right away. I am very guilty of that all the time.

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Yes. Write it down.
Yeah. Write it down.

Speaker 1 Say, this is the one thing that no matter how messy my fucking life gets today and no matter how much shenanigans happens, I'm going to get that thing done. And it can be something very tiny.

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No matter what is happening, I'm getting, because you know what?

Speaker 1 When you do that thing, first step, you say, productivity. Productivity.
And it needs more productivity. Exactly.

Speaker 1 I was very productive today because I got the one thing I said I was going to get done done. And then everything after that is cake.
So do that. Do it.

Speaker 1 Also, I think we talked about a while ago, I was saying how like I just, I hope everybody just starts commenting nice things on videos and posts like. instead of just being complete dickheads.

Speaker 1 Not ours, I mean on

Speaker 1 the internet. Because I've just seen so many, like the internet's so gross.
And it's like

Speaker 1 after you said that though, I don't know if it's just like a placebo effect, but I've seen so much more positivity.

Speaker 1 I have seen a lot and I'm not saying it's me I'm saying I actually I did it I did it I'm saying I got that notion because I started seeing more people doing that and I was like let's keep that ball rolling but um

Speaker 1 Bailey from the uh frightful fandom podcast that's a great name for she's also jiggy saw girl on tick tock jiggy saw girl she she recently like shouted us out like shouted my book out oh yeah you played that for me and she was saying that she had heard that episode and also wanted to do that

Speaker 1 So throwing it back again, go listen to Bailey.

Speaker 1 Bailey's podcast is great. She goes through horror movies.
A lot of them, you're, a lot of them I had never heard of, and I like listening to her talk about them, and then I'll go watch them.

Speaker 1 Oh, that's fun. Her TikTok is awesome.
Jiggy Saw Girl. That's a great TikTok handle.
Yeah, it's like her and Sydney from Horror Chronicles. I'm just, I love them both.
And

Speaker 1 I feel like we're best friends. It's one of those things where people will say that to us when we meet in person.
They'll be like, I feel like we're best friends. And I'm like, I get that.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 Cause I too feel like I'm best friends with Bailey and Sydney and we've never met in real life.

Speaker 1 I just, it's a different way of life like now because consuming content and like relating to somebody else's content, like it does make you feel

Speaker 1 friendly. And I'm like, I want to hang with you.
So like, I get it. Go listen to their stuff.
They're really great. The guys that shouted us out that you were showing me, Dude, it's entertainment.

Speaker 1 Obsessed. I got, it's this podcast.
It's literally dude, it's entertainment. Yep.
It's three guys. And let me tell you, it is entertainment.

Speaker 1 They're really funny, and they, I only, I saw it because they had tagged us in something because I think they had just mentioned one of our episodes, and then they had this whole conversation where they were like, This is kind of a one-sided relationship or thing, like we're shouting you out.

Speaker 1 Like, they're like, Hello, where you at? And I was like, Oh shit, and I thought it was so funny. It kind of like just it like made it was a funny little moment that I was like, That was fun.

Speaker 1 Thank you for tagging me in that. So, like, we wanted to shout them out because that was really funny.
Yeah, we're all about, you know, just shouting everybody out.

Speaker 1 Let's just everybody, you know, we're feeling nice to each other. We're feeling so kumbaya.
It's so much nicer to be nice. You feel better.
Oh, it's just really do.

Speaker 1 Speaking of being nice, Mikey just looked at me and he said, do you want another fridge cigarette? And I said, yeah, I do, please.

Speaker 1 And he just hand-delivered me a fridge cigarette, which if you're confused, is the diet coke. I was just going to say, because that will confuse a lot of people.
No, you know what? Not a lot.

Speaker 1 I feel like a lot of people may be confused. It's just like a niche amount of people will be like, yeah.
Ah, whatever.

Speaker 1 Either way, I have a fridge cigarette and I'm happy about it. That was really kind of Mikey.
It was. Yeah.

Speaker 1 And then one last thing before we get into it, we're going to be taking next Monday and Thursday off. I'm sure you can't imagine why.
What is going on? Thanksgiving. Yeah.

Speaker 1 But eat some turkey. Eat some turkey.
I can't wait to eat your turkey. Oh my God.
And the, and everything in the, are you going to make the pesto bread? Of course I'm going to make the pesto bread.

Speaker 1 Are you going to make the sweet potato thing? Of course I'm going to make the sweet potato. So tell us what you're going to make really quick.
And then I'll make it.

Speaker 1 I'm gonna make some mac and cheese. I'm gonna make the sweet potato strussel.
Do you know what I'm gonna make my special stuffing? Oh, with the sausage in it. With the sausage in it.

Speaker 1 One with sausage, one without. She makes two stuffings.
Why do I make two stuffings?

Speaker 1 I don't even like this, but oh my God, wait.

Speaker 1 We're gonna get to the episode at some point, I promise, but I've been watching the holiday baking championship, which you should start watching because it's back. There's been two episodes.

Speaker 1 And I forgot the baker's name. He's adorable and I love him.
I think he's like a yoga teacher. He made a cheesecake that had little like meringue pumpkins on it.
Oh my god.

Speaker 1 And it made it look like it was like a pumpkin patch. And I don't even like cheesecake, but I want to make it for everybody.
I'm going to make a cheesecake, so I'm for that.

Speaker 1 Okay, I'm going to figure out how to make meringues. Yeah.

Speaker 1 But yeah, all that to say that we are going to be off next week, but it won't even seem like it because for this month, obviously we take off like the week of Thanksgiving.

Speaker 1 So I picked two episodes that we're going to re-air. So you'll find out what those are.
We'll surprise you.

Speaker 1 There's like one funny one and one kind of serious one a very serious one and then in december elena gets to pick her two favorite episodes when we take the week of christmas off yeah because it's her birth month my birth month remember that you were almost named noelle yeah that's crazy i do remember that you're so not a noelle it's pretty nice

Speaker 1 and you're a pretty person

Speaker 1 but it's not your name everyone says that yeah john said that he was like no i was supposed to be named ruby yeah you're not i'm not a ruby can you ruby kell doesn't flow we have ruby We have Ruby.

Speaker 1 In our room with us. I guess I would have had to be Rube Kell, which could get confusing because then people would think it's Rubkel.
That's true. Upsetting.

Speaker 1 Good thing I'm Ash Kel. Yeah.
All right, so I think that's everything. I think we had all the things.
My fridge Siggy's hidden.

Speaker 1 It's starting to hit. All right, so let's get into it.
We're going to be talking about the death of Cork Miller today. This is like a little bit of an oldie.
I don't know this one.

Speaker 1 Well, it's in the 60s. Okay.
And it's hotly debated whether this was an accident or murder. Oh.
But I have my own little opinions. Interesting.

Speaker 1 Just at the top, I do want to give like a trigger warning. There's going to be a lot of mention of suicide in this.
So just know that going into it. So let's start on the night of October 8th, 1964.

Speaker 1 Lucille Miller was home. She had just put her three kids to bed, was about to get settled on the couch with her husband to just watch some TV, a night we can probably all relate to.

Speaker 1 That afternoon, her husband, Dr. Gordon Cork Miller, had started to feel a headache coming on though.
And by the time the kids went to bed, it was a full-blown migraine. Oh, yeah.
That's the worst.

Speaker 1 Unfortunately for Cork, migraines really weren't anything new for him. He had been dealing with them for years.

Speaker 1 And actually in recent months, he seemed to be getting them with like increasing frequency.

Speaker 1 So when Lucille asked if there was anything she could do to help, he asked if she would make him some hot chocolate. Oh, which I just think is adorable.
I love that.

Speaker 1 So she heads to the kitchen, she pulls down a mug, she goes to the fridge to get the milk. And she realizes when she gets to the fridge, fuck, they're out of milk.

Speaker 1 And she was a real one who wasn't going to make, well, in this moment, she was a real one who wasn't going to make water, hot chocolate, because that's disgusting.

Speaker 1 And the other thing was that also meant that there wasn't going to be any milk for breakfast with the kids in the morning. So it would have been a mess.

Speaker 1 It was late, but she kind of had to run out and get milk before the morning. So she, you know, yelled into Cork that she was going to head out to do that.
And he was like, oh, I'll come with you.

Speaker 1 So before they left the house, Lucille checked in on her daughter, 14-year-old Debbie, to let her know that they were running out and they would be back as soon as they could be.

Speaker 1 At that time, San Bernardino, where they were living, was just starting to attract younger families looking for like a slower, quieter life outside of LA. So at this point, it was still really rural.

Speaker 1 Later, Debbie remembered, my mother came in to tell me they were going down the hill to get milk, but to go and get anything was like a five or 10 mile trip. So it was going to take a minute.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 Now, Cork usually would have been the one to drive, but because he had this migraine, obviously he's not going to be operating machinery.

Speaker 1 So he slipped into the passenger seat, just still wrapped up in the blanket that he had on the couch.

Speaker 1 Later, Lucille would explain that because Cork was leaning against the door, she was concerned it could have opened while they were driving.

Speaker 1 So before she started the car, she reached over and locked the passenger side door. Okay.
It's the 60s. Yeah.

Speaker 1 So according to Lucille, by the time they reached the nearest grocery store, it was closed down for the night. So they had to drive to the 24-hour store on the other side side of town.
Okay.

Speaker 1 Cork waited in the car while she ran in to get the milk.

Speaker 1 She came back out about 10 minutes later with two half-gallon cartons of milk, and she placed those on the floor behind the passenger seat and then headed off to go back home.

Speaker 1 It was a little after midnight when she pulled the car onto Banyon Street, which was just a few miles from their house, and she started having trouble steering the car.

Speaker 1 Later, she said that the car pulled to one side, then it jerked hard, and she ended up driving off the road. Whoa, yeah, shit got real.

Speaker 1 When the car finally came to a stop in a field off the side of the road, Lucille noticed that something had caught fire. Whoa.
She later would tell a jury. It was like a movie.

Speaker 1 There was an orange-red flame behind me. I was panicked.
Hmm. So she jumps out of the driver's side door.
And she ran around the passenger side to try to pull Cork out of the car. Yeah.

Speaker 1 But when she got there, she remembered that the door was locked and realized it at that moment. And he was unconscious at this point.
So she's panicking.

Speaker 1 She searched around for a rock that she could use to break the window, but when she reached for the door, like to see what she could do, the entire door was already too hot to the touch. Oh, yeah.

Speaker 1 So she wasn't even going to be able to drag him out of there that way.

Speaker 1 And he was still wrapped up in the blanket, which by then had caught fire. Oh, geez.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 So not knowing what else to do, she ran back to the road, hoping maybe she could flag down a car for help, anything like that.

Speaker 1 But this road was so isolated that it was highly unlikely anybody was going to pass her. Damn.

Speaker 1 So a minute later, she said she ran back to the car, just trying to figure out anything she can do in that moment. But by the time she got back to Cork, she said it was definitely too late.

Speaker 1 She said, he was just, just black. That's when I saw the gasoline can.

Speaker 1 Oh,

Speaker 1 that's when I saw the gasoline can. Oh my God.
According to Lucille, she had always been very forgetful, especially when it came to the car and things that had to do with it.

Speaker 1 And within the last few months alone, she had run out of gas five or six times.

Speaker 1 So after the last time, a few weeks earlier, Cork insisted that she go out to the service station and buy a gas can with a few gallons of gas to keep in the car just in case. Not a great plan.

Speaker 1 I mean, yeah. You don't really want to do that.
One might say bad.

Speaker 1 One might say the worst. A very bad plan.
So in all the chaos of driving off the road and the car catching fire, she had forgotten all about the gas can that she kept in the back of the car.

Speaker 1 And it wasn't until she ran back to the car and she saw the can laying on its side in the back when she realized that it had spilled out all over the floor.

Speaker 1 And that's why the car had engulfed in flames. I mean, yeah.
So she's like, it's too late to do anything to help Cork. Like, she can't get him out of there.
Yeah. The door is locked.

Speaker 1 It's too hot to touch. She can't break the window.
Just way too much working against her. So she took off running towards a far off house in the distance.

Speaker 1 It was the only light that she could see for miles. When she finally reached the farmhouse, she started banging on the door until a woman answered and welcomed her inside to use the phone.

Speaker 1 But rather than call the sheriff or the fire department or any kind of first responder, she called her lawyer, who arrived a short time later and called the fire department.

Speaker 1 Universally, that's going to sound extraordinarily suspicious. Suspic.
Suspicious. Suspicious, suspicious, suspicious.
I myself

Speaker 1 can say with 100% certainty that I would not do that. One.
I would be calling 911. One is 1,000% certainty.
In cases where I will say, well, I can't say because I haven't been through that.

Speaker 1 I can say with 100% honesty that the first person I would not call. is my lawyer.
I love our lawyer. I love our lawyer.
But I would not call him. I would not call him.
In the first instance.

Speaker 1 Yeah. So when they finally arrived to the scene, sheriff's deputies and firefighters found that the car was still in flames.

Speaker 1 They were able to extinguish what remained of the fire, but the metal frame was still way too hot to even touch.

Speaker 1 So first responders had to wait several more hours before they could even remove his body and inspect the wreckage.

Speaker 1 There's no way to take a door, like to.

Speaker 1 Everything's too it well, so they extinguished everything and the only thing that was left was like the husk of the car. Yeah, exactly.
And everything was still too hot. Damn.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 That's still weird, though. I wondered, I'm like, isn't there a way to do that? Probably now.
Yeah. But in 1964, I don't know.
Yeah, that's true.

Speaker 1 So when they initially looked at the scene, everything did seem to corroborate Lucille's account of the accident. In the back of the car, they found the two half-gallon containers of milk.

Speaker 1 And on the floor in front of the passenger seat, they found the large rock that she said she used to smash the window. On the ground just outside the car, they found the large branch

Speaker 1 burned on one end that she said she used to try to push her husband out the driver's side door. Like she was trying a lot, it sounds like.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 And most crucially, they did find a nail embedded in the right front tire, which they presumed was what had caused the car to go off the road in the first place.

Speaker 1 And there were skid marks on the road and tire tracks in the dirt indicating exactly where the car had gone off the road. So everything looks, you know, looks like what you're saying.

Speaker 1 Now, there was one thing, though, that sheriff's deputies found suspicious. On the floor behind the driver's seat was the can of gasoline.

Speaker 1 Now, at that time, it actually wasn't that uncommon for people to carry a small amount of gasoline in car, especially in rural areas like this.

Speaker 1 But what struck investigators was that the can had tipped over on its side, and they wondered how that was possible that that can had tipped over when the car went off the road, but the two half gallon containers of milk right beside it remained upright.

Speaker 1 Huh. Like those are, so the and those are half gallons, so those are tall and thin.
Exactly. So they have a, you know, the point of the center of gravity.
Exactly.

Speaker 1 So those were behind the passenger seat, and the gas can was behind the driver's seat, just to give you a visual. Yeah.
So that one tipped over, the gas can tipped over, but the milk didn't.

Speaker 1 Interesting. You would think they would tip in the front.
Yeah, you would think they would.

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Speaker 1 So, a little past 6 a.m., a sheriff's deputy drove Lucille home. And from her bedroom window, Debbie, her daughter, could see a patrol car and immediately started to panic.

Speaker 1 She said, at the top of our driveway, a police car was parked where our black VW bugs should have been.

Speaker 1 So she ran out to the living room, but with the exception of her two brothers asleep in their bedrooms, the house was completely empty.

Speaker 1 She walked quietly down the hall until she got to her parents' bedroom. And she said the door was open just a crack, and she could see that her mom was inside.

Speaker 1 Under normal circumstances, she actually wasn't allowed to go inside of her parents' bedroom.

Speaker 1 But when Lucille noticed Debbie sitting outside the door or standing outside the door, she beckoned her to come in. Yeah.

Speaker 1 She was curled up in a fetal position on the bed, wearing her nightgown, and Debbie could tell that she'd been crying. And Lucille had to explain to Debbie what happened.
Oh, that's awful.

Speaker 1 And given how emotional Lucille was at the time, Debbie also realized that it was going to be her job to tell her brothers, 11-year-old Guy and nine-year-old Ronnie, Ronnie, what had happened.

Speaker 1 So she got them from their bedrooms, brought them into the parents' bedroom, and they all just sat there crying while she explained what happened.

Speaker 1 It's horrible.

Speaker 1 So that afternoon, three detectives from the San Bernardino Sheriff's Office came to the house to keep questioning Lucille about the accident.

Speaker 1 She repeated the same story that she had told investigators at the scene earlier. pretty similarly to the how she told it the first time.

Speaker 1 And she also informed the detective that it had been a particularly difficult year for them as a family.

Speaker 1 About six months earlier, Lucille's best friend, Elaine Hayton, died at a really young age, and she left behind a husband and young children.

Speaker 1 And then just a couple months later, Lucille and Debbie had actually been in a bad car accident on Banion Street, not far from where the car had just caught fire.

Speaker 1 So that's like two accidents on the same street.

Speaker 1 She was driving when another car didn't stop at a stop sign and plowed into them. Debbie was thrown into the windshield.

Speaker 1 Lucille's head slammed into the steering wheel and she ended up with a fractured jaw. Damn.
And Debbie said, I was bleeding profusely. My mother thought I lost my eye because it sliced my eyelid.

Speaker 1 Holy shit. She almost did lose her eye, but they were actually, doctors were able to repair the damage and she ended up with 50 stitches

Speaker 1 around her eye. Holy shit.
Isn't that gnarly? That is gnarly. So in addition to obviously the physical pain and the excessive cost of medical care, the accident basically gave Debbie like a PTSD

Speaker 1 effect. And she became hyper-fixated on car accidents.
Yeah. I mean, I get it.
It's so sad. And this is awful.

Speaker 1 She remembered, she said, weeks after the accident, I asked Daddy what the odds were that our family would ever have an accident on that street again. And he said that would be almost impossible.
Oh.

Speaker 1 And then two weeks later, this is what happened, what we're talking about today.

Speaker 1 Maybe he was correct. Yeah.

Speaker 1 That's so sad. It's so sad.
I feel awful for these kids for a lot of reasons. So now back at the accident scene, things were starting to look more suspicious.

Speaker 1 Not only had the gasoline can been tipped over in the backseat of the car, but from what the arson investigator could tell, it seemed like it had been poured around the back of the car

Speaker 1 rather than just like tipped over and leaked out.

Speaker 1 And then there were the skid marks on the road. In an accident like the one that Lucille described, investigators expected to see swerving tire tracks, which makes sense.

Speaker 1 You're trying to, you know, fight from your car going off the road. Of course.
But these skid marks that were left by Lucille's car were in a straight line.

Speaker 1 Like it was almost like she had intentionally driven off the road.

Speaker 1 So finally, and most significantly, the car's gas tank appeared to be fully intact, meaning that the car had somehow burst into flames and the gas tank of the car hadn't.

Speaker 1 which just like doesn't yeah like what how does that work right exactly

Speaker 1 so sheriff's investigators started to suspect that maybe this wasn't an accident at all and maybe lucille had intentionally murdered her husband for one reason or another damn and remember when she ran to the nearest house for help she called her attorney before calling for actual help that throws me for a loop.

Speaker 1 Well, it threw everyone for a loop. It does.

Speaker 1 Everybody kept once they started seeing these things at the scene, it was obviously, you know, making them question everything. Yeah.

Speaker 1 And then putting, pairing that with the fact that she didn't call first responders there. It's like, I mean,

Speaker 1 did she want a longer time to happen to make sure that he was really gone? And that's speculation, but I don't know.

Speaker 1 So the evidence they felt seemed to indicate that Lucille had rendered her husband unconscious and attempted to push the car over the embankment to make it look like an accident.

Speaker 1 But when she found that the car was too heavy to push by herself, she changed her plan. She poured gasoline in the back and then used the large branch to set the blaze from a distance.
Holy shit.

Speaker 1 Because remember, they found that large branch and they were like, what's this? Because Because it was charred on the end.

Speaker 1 And she said she tried to use it to push cork out of the car, but they were like, did she use it to do that or did she use it to set a blaze? Oh my God.

Speaker 1 Yeah. What the fuck's going on here? Yeah.

Speaker 1 And they said she even drove out to Banion Street, which she knew from experience was a remote location and it would have taken rescue vehicles a much longer time to reach than your typical street.

Speaker 1 And she was correct because it took nearly an hour and a half from when the car caught fire to when firefighters actually arrived at the city. Wow, which is like a wild amount of time, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 And remember, it's also because she called her lawyer first. Damn.

Speaker 1 So, while detectives considered the evidence, Chief Deputy Coroner Arnold McCann rushed to get the autopsy finished as fast as he could.

Speaker 1 According to the autopsy, Cork's cause of death was smoke inhalation, and the evidence indicated that he was alive when the car burst into fire. Yeah, he was breathing in his own body on fire.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 Oh, shit. Yeah.
It's horrible.

Speaker 1 The coroner also noted that Cork had multiple broken ribs, but he believed that the fractures were caused by the intense heat of the fire, not the accident, which is like, just to think about that is gnarly.

Speaker 1 Oh, it's awful. So the new theory was relayed to the detective who was already at the Miller house, who then had to confront Lucille with all these new discoveries.
And he did.

Speaker 1 But she stuck to her story. She insisted, no, this is a terrible accident.
I did not orchestrate this in any way.

Speaker 1 And when they pressed her further, she, quote, declined to elaborate on the advice of her attorney, Harold Lance.

Speaker 1 And she eventually became so over-emotional that she was placed under sedation by her doctor.

Speaker 1 Now, based on the evidence collected at the scene, though, and her inability to account for the inconsistencies and discrepancies in her story, she was placed under arrest that afternoon, just 12 hours after his death.

Speaker 1 Makes sense.

Speaker 1 So with Lucille being held on suspicion of murder and refusing to speak with any detectives, investigators started kind of interviewing the Miller's friends and neighbors, digging into the personal lives, looking for a motive.

Speaker 1 They're like,

Speaker 1 why did this happen?

Speaker 1 So from the outside, Lucille and Cork Miller had what appeared to be the perfect American life. Cork made a really good living as a dentist.
He had a thriving local practice. Lucille was a homemaker.

Speaker 1 She was very active in her kids' lives. Her son, Ron, said she wanted to do well and be part of the community.

Speaker 1 But just like we've heard a million times before in cases like this, things weren't weren't what they seemed.

Speaker 1 UCLA lecturer Verlin Klinkenborg, I so hope I said that correctly, said, Lucille suffers from something that I think of as being a particularly California affliction. This is antipathy to the old.

Speaker 1 You can't just have a different house. You can't just buy another house.
It has to be a new house that nobody's ever lived in before where all the appliances are untouched.

Speaker 1 She wants the best of the best and the newest of the new. Oh boy.

Speaker 1 And it was those big dreams of success and desire to project that appearance of wealth that had driven them to build the big house that they lived in in San Bernardino County in the first place.

Speaker 1 Before they moved out there, they actually lived in Oregon. And when they moved to San Bernardino, that was their third move in three years.
Holy shit. Which is a lot.
That's a lot.

Speaker 1 For three children, too. Oh, yeah.
Debbie said, that's their oldest daughter. She said, our new house was twice as big as our old one.

Speaker 1 I had the impression the whole point of building it was so that for the first time, my parents' bedroom could be at one end of the house and the kids' rooms at the other.

Speaker 1 Just like, that's the entire point of building your house. Like,

Speaker 1 I get wanting more space for like a myriad of reasons, but having kids at one

Speaker 1 reason. Like, that's strange.
Yeah. So the house seemed to move Lucille.

Speaker 1 To teach their own to me that this doesn't.

Speaker 1 It doesn't jive. I'm not a mom, but when I am, I would like to have my children as close as

Speaker 1 possible. Like

Speaker 1 in case of emergency or

Speaker 1 anything. I don't know.
So the house seemed to move Lucille one step closer to attaining that wealth and success that she was craving. But the interior was a very different story.

Speaker 1 Debbie said, it had taken everything we had and then some to build. The living room was bare except for a green coffee table with gold legs.
And the windows in the kids' rooms remained curtainless.

Speaker 1 Which is like...

Speaker 1 So symbolic of how things were going for this family. The outside of this house is this gorgeous giant home that they've poured all this money into.

Speaker 1 And then you take a deeper look inside, and everything is bare and there's no

Speaker 1 curtains on the kids. Like, that's a lot, yeah, that's a lot, very much.
That's very uh, image-focused, image-obsessed, image-obsessed for sure.

Speaker 1 So, as investigators dug into the couple's finances, too, they discovered that even though he was making a really nice salary at the time, he's a dentist, Cork Miller had roughly $65,000 in debt at that time, which in today's money is $700,000 of debt.

Speaker 1 Holy shit. Say that one more time.
$700,000 in debt. Holy

Speaker 1 shit. Like I got debt, but I don't got that kind of debt.
Not that kind of debt. $700,000.

Speaker 1 Damn.

Speaker 1 That would send me into a

Speaker 1 spiral. And you are.
All the time. You had to have been in like some kind of debt before you start building that house.
Cause like

Speaker 1 still take on that project and then like accumulate even more and you get to the you get to the 700s 700

Speaker 1 that's a lot yeah

Speaker 1 it also turned out that debt and financial stress weren't the only things affecting the miller's relationship at the time for years and this is really sad cork had also been struggling with profound anxiety and depression and it was like debilitating for him at times this is just really sad one night after debbie overheard a really bad fight between her parents she said her mom came into her room to talk about what she'd heard because she knew that she heard them and And she just told her flat out, daddy wants to die.

Speaker 1 That's what the fight's about.

Speaker 1 That is so fucked up. It's horrible.
That's like wildly fucked up. Truly horrible.

Speaker 1 Oh.

Speaker 1 And remember, she was like, oh my God, I was like, that's horrifying. She was 14 when her father died.
And so this was like shortly before that.

Speaker 1 It's like, that's way too young to be made aware of that situation between a married couple. And to say it like that.
Yeah. Just so,

Speaker 1 so blunt like that. And to, that's such like a betrayal of your partner.
Yeah. Like to, for them to, instead of working, like, you know, I don't, that just, it is a betrayal.

Speaker 1 It's like, just like say it to someone like that. It's like a lack of respect.
It's a lack of care. To put that kind of shit on your kid.
Yeah. Stop putting shit on your kids.

Speaker 1 They're kids. Yeah, let them be kids.
Deal with your shit yourself. Let them be kids.

Speaker 1 Because remember, not only did she put that on her, what I just said, it was also up to Debbie to let her little brothers know what had happened to their dad that he wasn't coming home.

Speaker 1 Was put on Debbie.

Speaker 1 Now, Debbie's brother, Ron, had similar memories of his father's depression, including one occasion where Cork told his two sons that no matter what happened to him, he knew they would all be together again in heaven.

Speaker 1 Debbie said, that's how I learned that my daddy wanted to take his own life, but loved us so much that he wanted to do it in his car. So it would look like an accident and we would get the insurance.

Speaker 1 Oh my God. This is so sad.
To be 14 and be aware of that. Oh, that's awful.

Speaker 1 Horrible. So that's what was going on inside.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 Inside of that beautiful outside of the house, the beautiful facade. Exactly.
It is such a facade.

Speaker 1 So during their interviews with detectives, friends and acquaintances pretty much corroborated what they had learned.

Speaker 1 Cork Miller was very depressed, very overwhelmed, and lately he was doing his best to manage his symptoms with drugs and alcohol.

Speaker 1 And they also learned, investigators, that at least some of his feelings of despair and defeat came from the fact that he really felt an immense pressure to live up to other people's expectations, which is clear in his marriage alone.

Speaker 1 But when he was younger, he dreamed of training to become an airline pilot. Like that was the number one thing he wanted to do.

Speaker 1 But his father said it was unreasonable and was like, no, you should just become a dentist.

Speaker 1 And similarly, Cork usually felt pressured by Debbie, his wife, who always seemed to have expectations that were much higher than he could achieve.

Speaker 1 And he was like grinding his last gears to achieve them, these $700,000 in debt.

Speaker 1 So that depression only seemed to make the tension between him and Lucille even worse.

Speaker 1 When they were first married, things between them were good, but over time, their differences and personalities became more of a problem than probably either of them had ever expected.

Speaker 1 He was quiet, he was reserved, he was socially shy. Debbie, she was or sorry, Lucille, she was outgoing, she was incredibly social.
She wanted to be in the mix. Yeah.

Speaker 1 And to Debbie, it always seemed like her father had married her mother to make up for things that he lacked socially. Yeah, that makes sense.

Speaker 1 So by the time kids came along, their marriage really started to lose its luster.

Speaker 1 But rather than take their anger out on each other, Cork kind of just retreated into himself and probably further into depression. And Lucille directed her frustration at the children.

Speaker 1 Debbie said, This is really rough and it's a trigger warning for child abuse, guys.

Speaker 1 Debbie said, I was afraid of my parents. More than once, my mother slapped me so hard and so many times across my mouth that my my teeth slipped my lips.

Speaker 1 Beatings with belts hard enough to leave my bottom completely black and blue and my legs covered in welts were not uncommon.

Speaker 1 That's fucked up. Yeah.

Speaker 1 That's just fucked up. Yeah, that's child abuse.

Speaker 1 I don't give a shit. I don't care what time period it is.
I don't care if it's not. Don't care.
It's 300 years ago, 50 years ago. It's child abuse.
Yeah,

Speaker 1 was that the way people did things back then? Absolutely. Was it right? Fuck no, it wasn't.
Also, it's like, this was a very extreme version of the way that people are.

Speaker 1 This is, that's funny. Because I know, like, obviously, like, spankings and that kind of thing.
Like, oh, yeah, and the belt was like a thing.

Speaker 1 The belt was a thing, but like slapping your child so hard across their face that their teeth cut their lips open. I honestly

Speaker 1 think, was that that common? No, no, I don't think that. I think

Speaker 1 to be able to do that to a child, you have to have something wrong with it.

Speaker 1 You're scary to me. Like, that's a scary person to be able to look at their child

Speaker 1 and hurt them. It's just, I've always thought that.

Speaker 1 If you can look at your child and physically or emotionally purposely hurt them, I think there's something that needs to be taken care of. 100%.
You shouldn't hurt children.

Speaker 1 That is a scary thing to me. It's the same as people who can hurt animals.

Speaker 1 I just can't, I don't get it. Children are inherently innocent.
Animals are inherently innocent.

Speaker 1 And being able to rob somebody like their innocence like that and inflict pain on them, you're diabolical. Yeah, there's just something, I don't get it.
That's fucked up. And it's like really sad.

Speaker 1 She knew, Debbie knew that it was because her mom was so frustrated in like her marriage and she was taking it out on her children. Like that's fucked up.
Another level. That's fucked up.

Speaker 1 It's like there's no other way to say it. No, there's no, there's no way this would ever be okay.
But it wasn't even like this was like disciplinary.

Speaker 1 It was, it was her own shit that she was putting it. I'm frustrated and you're a helpless little being in my house.
So I'm just going to inflict the pain on you because you won't hit me back. Exactly.

Speaker 1 And it's like, that's so diabolically evil. I can't get over that.
She's a bad mom. Yeah.
I was just going to say, I mean, let's just say that. We don't say, we don't say that it is.
She's a bad mom.

Speaker 1 That's a bad mom, in my opinion. Yeah.
Me coming from somebody with a bad mom, she's a bad mom.

Speaker 1 So when Lucille stopped getting the attention that she craved at home, she started looking for it elsewhere, of course, because she's just fucking miserable. She's a miserable individual.

Speaker 1 During their interview with Cork's office manager at the dental practice, they learned that about a year earlier, Lucille started having an affair with a man named Arthwell Hayton. Wow.

Speaker 1 I don't know if that last name sounds familiar to you. It does.
Yeah, that's her best friend, Elaine's husband,

Speaker 1 who had died. I was a little worried about that.
But they were carrying on their affair while she was still alive. Oh.
Before she died.

Speaker 1 Oh.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 So when investigators speak. Wow, it's just getting better and better.

Speaker 1 Better and better. Yeah.

Speaker 1 So when investigators spoke to Arthwell Hayton, he admitted to the affair, but he told them it had been over for about six months and there was nothing between him and Lucille.

Speaker 1 He's also a piece of shit, in my opinion. It's my opinion.
It's my opinion. So the deeper investigators dug into Miller's finances, the more obvious the affair became.

Speaker 1 There were receipts for lunches between Lucille and Hayton. There were motel receipts.
There was tons of evidence of their infidelity.

Speaker 1 And they also learned that Cork had actually moved out of the house for a period of time about six months earlier.

Speaker 1 And just four months before his death, Lucille had actually filed for divorce on the grounds of cruelty. These poor children.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 The things they went through

Speaker 1 is really breaking my heart. I hate what they went through.
They deserved so much better. Yeah, what like an upended childhood.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 And to move so many times and to, you move into like this bigger and better house and there's nothing inside. And you're terrified of your parents.
Fighting with each other.

Speaker 1 You're hearing that your father wants to die and your mom's the the one telling you she's hitting you between the face so many times that your lip is slit and you have welts all over your body like didn't have a childhood

Speaker 1 they didn't have any

Speaker 1 it doesn't sound like these kids had any moment where they were ever carefree no and like that's not childhood that's awful so when lucille was confronted with all this new information that investigators had dug up she did admit that yes she had an affair with arthwell earlier that year uh she said after his wife died but she said they had ended things several months earlier the timeline is very strange.

Speaker 1 Yeah. It seems like they were having an affair before she died, but Lucille didn't want to admit that.
No.

Speaker 1 She said, yes, it was true that Cork had moved out and that she had filed for divorce in July.

Speaker 1 But she said since then they went to a couples counselor and they decided that they were going to work on their marriage. And in fact, they even decided to have a fourth child.
And to the surprise of

Speaker 1 oh, honey, to the surprise of everybody, she revealed in that moment that she was pregnant.

Speaker 1 Oh boy. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Why? You're already kicking the shit out of the ones you have because you're frustrated. And also, a baby is not going to fix your marriage and your existing problems.
It will only exacerbate them.

Speaker 1 And also, you're having money problems. Kids cost so much fucking money to work.
And they're pretty expensive. And you're stressed out.
Kids are stressful.

Speaker 1 Like, in no way is that going to solve your problems. No.
But she dropped that bombshell. Damn.

Speaker 1 So in less than a week, investigators had gathered a whole bunch of information about Cork and Lucille Miller. But rather than confirm their suspicions, it only seemed to complicate things.

Speaker 1 Everything that they learned, it was like, okay, this could go this way or it could go that way.

Speaker 1 Because on one hand, Lucille seemed to be an extremely materialistic person who, when she was no longer satisfied at home, decided to get rid of her husband and maybe collect insurance money to start over with a new man.

Speaker 1 But at the same time, they were like, if that's the case, why did she halt the divorce proceedings and also agree to have a baby? Yeah.

Speaker 1 Especially since by all accounts, Arthwald Hayton had broken things off with her in like no uncertain terms. Yeah.
Like, what the fuck?

Speaker 1 So it seemed like the affair had happened, but it was very much over. Yeah.
And things were being worked on at home. So why would she suddenly kill her husband?

Speaker 1 They were just going back and forth between everything.

Speaker 1 And then there was also the matter of Cork's profound depression and his desire to end his life, which was a running theme throughout all of this.

Speaker 1 You know, mental illness was not usually talked about openly back then. Oh, yeah, no.
But it seemed like Cork really didn't make any attempt to hide his symptoms.

Speaker 1 And he really didn't make any attempt to hide the fact that he wanted to end his life at all. Like it came up in a lot of conversations.

Speaker 1 His mental health was so bad that even the kids knew what his mental state was.

Speaker 1 And on multiple occasions, Lucille had actually instructed them personally, if she was gone, to keep an eye on him, their father, to make sure that he didn't attempt to do anything to himself.

Speaker 1 Oh my God.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 So, given that, investigators had to wonder whether their initial impressions had been wrong.

Speaker 1 Was it possible that rather than a murder for profit with the whole insurance of it all, maybe Lucille had actually just simply agreed to help end her husband's suffering in a way that would guarantee twice the insurance payout by triggering the accident double indemnity clause of their policy?

Speaker 1 Oh, this is so messy. It's so

Speaker 1 twisted. So messy.
And remember, Debbie had been made aware at a certain point that he did want to die in a car accident so that he wasn't leaving his family with nothing. Yep.

Speaker 1 So since her arrest. Which can also lead to a little bit of suspicion that it's like, well, he's made that known.
So this wouldn't come as a shock if this was the case. Exactly.

Speaker 1 That's the problem is it's like... There's a lot of, but like, this could go a million different ways.

Speaker 1 And I,

Speaker 1 I don't, I, I said at the beginning of this that I have my own opinions, but I think as I'm presenting it, my opinion has changed for like the third time even reading it.

Speaker 1 Because it's like him being wrapped up in a blanket and like just going along to buy some milk when he had like a blistering migraine

Speaker 1 is sus.

Speaker 1 You have migraines, so you can speak. So that

Speaker 1 part immediately caught me as same. I might have even been quiet during that because in my head, I was trying to suss out

Speaker 1 how I would ever do that or or why I would ever do that. Because when you have a migraine, you literally, like, some people can't even open their eyes or hear sound.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 I need to be, when my migraine really hits, I have to go in a dark, soundless room. Yeah.
It has to be cool. And I have to have something vice gripping my head.

Speaker 1 And a lot of, I know people who get migraines and they say very similar circumstances that they need to do. And I by no means want to go anywhere.
Or like in a car, especially? No.

Speaker 1 And wrapped in a blanket. I'm not going.
Why, why am I doing that? Why just gonna be wrapped in a blanket at home in a dark room? That's what I want to do.

Speaker 1 Yeah, but then on the same side of things, it's like, did she want him to come with her because she was afraid all the kids were asleep and he might do something? Which she left again, which is valid.

Speaker 1 Yeah,

Speaker 1 it's all very tough. Yeah, I don't know.
And investigators are probably a tough time with it.

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Speaker 1 Since her arrest the day of Cork's death, they were fairly convinced that she had killed her husband, but they just weren't sure if it was for money or to pursue another relationship or because she was helping Cork.

Speaker 1 There's a lot of possibilities. I mean, yeah, there really is.
I think she killed him, but why? Yeah.

Speaker 1 But after learning about Cork's long history of crippling depression and anxiety, it was starting to seem possible that their initial theories could all be very wrong.

Speaker 1 And it was very much the latter that was the situation.

Speaker 1 And now there was also the matter of the baby to consider because she's pregnant. Oh, yeah.

Speaker 1 Would a woman who really seemed to be open and trying to reconcile with her husband and grow their family really change her mind all of a sudden and turn to murder?

Speaker 1 I don't know. It's possible.
I mean, I don't know. Maybe she wanted to do it on her own.
Yeah, you don't know. I mean, I can't really imagine that she would want to do it on her own back then because

Speaker 1 I can't imagine anything to do with this to be like,

Speaker 1 she's a homemaker. Like she doesn't have,

Speaker 1 like, she's not out in the workfield, you know, and then she's about to have a new baby. So she's going to have to be at home with the baby.
She's going to have no income, but then at the same time,

Speaker 1 that makes that insurance policy even shinier i don't know yeah so the problem wasn't so much that they couldn't settle on one theory over another that's just our problem over here it was that the evidence didn't support any of their theories at least not beyond a reasonable doubt to prove in court before the week was out lucille had had been charged with first-degree murder and the case was sent to the grand jury Assistant District Attorney Don Turner told a reporter, this defendant is either guilty of a heinous premeditated murder or nothing.

Speaker 1 We feel the evidence is ample to indicate that the defendant is guilty of first-degree murder. It couldn't be anything else but first-degree murder.
Like, well, you just said yourself literally

Speaker 1 nothing.

Speaker 1 But okay. Oh, okay.
Okey-dokie done. So, a week later, when the case was sent to a grand jury, they agreed with the district attorney and they returned an indictment for murder.
Damn.

Speaker 1 Among the more compelling evidence presented to the jury was the coroner's report, which not only listed the cause of death as murder, but also indicated that at the time of his death, Cork had, quote, evidence of some sort of barbituates in his stomach.

Speaker 1 Oh.

Speaker 1 So that seems fishy on first glance, but just on the other side of things, he was known to have abused barbituits regularly to manage the symptoms of his migraines and

Speaker 1 probably his depression and anxiety. Yeah.

Speaker 1 So, but that could go either way. It absolutely could.
You can see both sides of that. Because sure,

Speaker 1 maybe he does struggle with addiction to these things, but then it's also super easy for somebody to pop that in a drink if they want to get rid of him. Absolutely.

Speaker 1 Or, you know, give him a double dose without his knowledge because maybe he's already not in his right state of mind. Yeah, for sure.
So that's the thing.

Speaker 1 The presence of a sedative in Cork's system wasn't the only compelling evidence presented to the grand jury. There was also extensive testimony given by W.A.
Snare, which is an awesome name.

Speaker 1 That is a great name. He was an automobile arson expert at the time who was called by the prosecution.

Speaker 1 And according to Snare, the fire was set of incendiary origin, meaning that it had been deliberately set with the aid of an accelerant, in this case, gasoline, rather than an explosion like one might expect in a car accident.

Speaker 1 Yep. So that's a big fucking deal.
That's a huge fucking deal.

Speaker 1 And remember, they have that charred branch, which she says she used to poke him, but then investigators wondered, did she, you know, like set that on fire and then put it in the car, knowing that the gasoline was in there already?

Speaker 1 Which it's like, that does seem like it could be what happened. Because it's a little weird.

Speaker 1 But again,

Speaker 1 you can see both sides. So you can see both sides.

Speaker 1 I personally, it's my opinion, feel that I can see one side a little bit more than the other because I will admit I don't know how big a man Cork was.

Speaker 1 I would never think that I could use a branch to poke Drew out of a burning vehicle. That was one of my like biggest things with that argument that I was thinking as well is like

Speaker 1 but then I then my brain was like, because I'm trying to like devil's advocate, I guess. Like you're desperate.
Like I'm sitting there and I'm like, okay, but would I just do anything to try to?

Speaker 1 I'm sure you would do anything, but like, if she smashed the window and you're trying to like pull him out that way and that's not working, why would like if your full body weight isn't being able to.

Speaker 1 pull him out, then why wouldn't you be able to crush him with a branch? Yeah. That's the thing.
And that's like, I don't know if you're thinking logically like that. I don't know.

Speaker 1 And I'm thinking, obviously, I'm thinking of it as a real accident that nothing was intended by this and that you are genuinely trying to save your husband.

Speaker 1 I don't know. It's tough.
It's a tough case because I'm sitting here being like, I feel like I would do anything to get him out of there. But I'm like,

Speaker 1 but then you also have to add on the fact that she's pregnant. She's pregnant.
She has to be like super careful. And she knows she knew at that time that she was pregnant.
That's a tough one.

Speaker 1 It's tough. This case, it's a tough case.

Speaker 1 So

Speaker 1 that was, that was really big for the grand jury, though, hearing that this was a deliberately set fire. According to experts, yes,

Speaker 1 this fire was deliberately set. Cork had been sedated and his door was locked to prevent his escape.
That was the other thing.

Speaker 1 They said the motive was clear, especially to District Attorney Turner there.

Speaker 1 He said Lucille had been having an affair with Arthwell Hayden, and when he called it off, she was desperate to win him back. Add to the family's documented financial problems.

Speaker 1 As far as Turner was concerned, this entire thing resulted in first-degree murder. It had all the makings of it.
I mean, she's having an affair.

Speaker 1 Her husband, who was just killed in a fire that was deliberately set, has barbituates in

Speaker 1 his system.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 like, I mean,

Speaker 1 you lay it all out. It's like, it's, you could lay it all out with that argument.
And

Speaker 1 100%. That's the thing I was missing.
They're having financial problems. Yeah.
Like, that's insure. Whenever there's insurance payouts involved, it gets so scary.

Speaker 1 So here's the thing.

Speaker 1 Lucille's first trial began in early december but on december 8th there was a mistrial declared after several local newspapers published what the judge judge carl hilliard described as inflammatory and potentially influential articles about the case so a new trial date was set for january 11th when the new trial started in january the prosecution laid out their simple theory for the jury assistant district attorney don turner said in his opening statement evidence will show that dr miller made a lot of money the evidence will also show that that was not enough for Mrs.

Speaker 1 Miller. About a year ago, Mrs.
Miller began looking on Arthur Hayton as the type of man she wished her husband were, but there were a couple problems. She was married, he was married, la-dee-da.

Speaker 1 And he went on to tell the jury, I added the la-de-fer, you know, special effect, but he went on to tell the jury.

Speaker 1 about a lunch that Lucille and Arthwald Hayton had in April of 1964, where she proposed marriage. And not only did he flatly reject her, but that was when he ended the relationship.
Oh.

Speaker 1 Turner told the jury, the evidence will show that three or four days later, Mrs. Hayton died, and this removed one of the impediments to marriage.

Speaker 1 Oh.

Speaker 1 Yeah. So he's essentially trying to, I don't know what the circumstances are of the death because she, nothing ever came of it.
Like

Speaker 1 Lucille was not charged in any way for Ellen's death, but this

Speaker 1 prosecutor here is very clearly trying to make it seem like there's

Speaker 1 a connection here. Yeah.
That at least, at the very least,

Speaker 1 isn't it a coincidence that these people keep dying around her?

Speaker 1 Was removed. Yeah.
On both sides.

Speaker 1 Now.

Speaker 1 Oh,

Speaker 1 yikes. Yikes.

Speaker 1 So, according to the prosecution, Lucille Miller had not only murdered her husband for money, but also to remove what she believed was the only remaining obstacle to being with Arthwald Hayton.

Speaker 1 But the defense argued that she accepted their relationship was over and she was willing to repair things with Cork.

Speaker 1 In his statement, defense attorney Edward Foley agreed that, or sorry, he did not agree, he actually argued that it was not murder at all, but it may have, in fact, been an elaborate suicide arranged by Cork.

Speaker 1 Foley said she's innocent of this crime and the only case they have is poor circumstantial evidence.

Speaker 1 Like the investigators before him, the biggest problem for Don Turner, the district attorney, was that the evidence didn't point conclusively in any direction. It really was completely circumstantial.

Speaker 1 And when taken together, it only indicated that Lucille was there when Cork died.

Speaker 1 You know? Yeah. It was true that there were certain aspects of the situation that didn't look good for her.
We've gone over all of them.

Speaker 1 The gasoline can, for example, was found to have been purchased just a few days before Kirk's death. Oh.
But those things didn't

Speaker 1 exactly point to murder. Yeah, of course.

Speaker 1 So given that, he had to lean harder on the prosecution's belief that Lucille Miller was a greedy woman whose obsession with another man had led her to murder.

Speaker 1 That was going to be their best argument.

Speaker 1 So in his examination of several witnesses, from Lucille's doctor to her friends, even a lady who lived in their house at one time, like rented a room, Turner framed Lucille as a cheater who didn't care who got hurt as long as she got what she wanted.

Speaker 1 Now, during his testimony, Lucille's doctor, Dr. Edwin Ford, told Turner that Lucille threw herself at Hayton and bragged about her affair in front of others.

Speaker 1 Eventually, the testimony became so sensational and elicited such an excited response from the jury that the judge had to threaten to clear the courtroom on at least two occasions.

Speaker 1 Holy bitches was clutching their pearls. I was just going to say, oh, damn.
I can hear the, can't you just hear them like, oh, oh, oh, yep. Most are

Speaker 1 so Lucille's declarations of love for Hayton weren't just limited to the gossip between friends and acquaintances.

Speaker 1 At one point in the trial, Turner there presented the jury with a recording of a telephone call between Lucille and another one of her friends, Dr.

Speaker 1 Erwin Springle, where they discussed Hayton ending his relationship with Lucille.

Speaker 1 Among other things, Lucille can be heard to imply that she didn't accept that the relationship was over and that she wasn't above blackmailing him to get what she wanted. Holy shit.

Speaker 1 On the recording, she can be heard saying, I said, if you'd like the minister and everybody else up there to know what Elaine said the night she died and see a receipt from a motel and a few other things, little boy, you just keep this up.

Speaker 1 Wow.

Speaker 1 I'm like,

Speaker 1 what happened on the night that Elaine died? Like, what the fuck? Hello? That's what I'm wondering. Yeah.

Speaker 1 So when he was called to testify, Arthur Hayton acknowledged that, yes, he and Lucille had an affair. I can't imagine being him sitting up there.
Yeah. Like, nobody likes you, brother.
Nope.

Speaker 1 So he said, yes, we had an affair, but he said it ended about six months before Cork was killed. Damn.
And he didn't ever recall telling Lucille that he loved her.

Speaker 1 He said, I may have whispered sweet nothings in in her ear, but I never went so far as saying I loved her. Which, like, so I did just say, imagine being him in this moment.

Speaker 1 Now please imagine being her seal on the receiving end of that.

Speaker 1 She's down bad right now. Yeah, she is.
Like, fuck. She certainly is.
So Hayton claimed that he insisted Lucille not divorce her husband because there was no future between them.

Speaker 1 And when pressed further, he told the prosecutor that, yes, he was having a sexual relationship with Lucille, but he was, quote, not romantically inclined with Miss Miller and never intended that the relationship be anything more than physical.

Speaker 1 Oh, this, this sounds like a woman's scorn. Can you imagine sitting in the fucking courtroom while you're on trial for murder? And you're, what's like the, what's a male mistress?

Speaker 1 Mr.

Speaker 1 I'm googling. Yeah, maybe a mister.
It's got to be better than that. What? A paramore is, ooh, I like that.
What is a male mistress called?

Speaker 1 Oh, Paramore is among the top. Is it Paramore? Oh, Lava.
A lover.

Speaker 1 I love Paramore, but I love Lava. Yeah, so your Lava is just sitting across there saying he didn't love you.
Ooh, that hurts. Oof.
So she's sitting there, she's sitting there.

Speaker 1 She's listening to everybody talk shit about her and, you know, say they don't love her and that they just wanted to fook. Awesome.

Speaker 1 And then on February 16th, Lucille took the stand in her own defense, which is, you know, putting it nicely because she really didn't do herself any favors when it came to defending herself.

Speaker 1 Over the course of two days of testimony, she walked the jury through the night of Cork's death, basically like moment by moment.

Speaker 1 But on multiple occasions, the prosecution asked several questions that, if anything, only made things more confusing for the jury. Whoops.

Speaker 1 Like when Lucille described how she threw the rock through the window, Turner asked her, Well, if you threw it through the front window, wouldn't it just hit his head?

Speaker 1 Which is like pretty valid. I mean, yeah, it would.
It would. Probably.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 So, like,

Speaker 1 yeah.

Speaker 1 Oh, this is. I can't.
I can't win this. It's tough.
I can't win this. I mean, so this is,

Speaker 1 this is one of the, the most like, I can, every argument makes sense. Yeah.
No, it's so true.

Speaker 1 And it's also like, okay, but like, even if it hit his head, like,

Speaker 1 at least I could still try to get him out of the car. Like, I,

Speaker 1 she was probably hoping that she didn't.

Speaker 1 If, if it is the case that she threw the rock through the, through the window to make sure that she could get him out, she probably was like aiming to not hit his head.

Speaker 1 She She could have thrown it at an angle, I guess. That's the thing.
I mean, like,

Speaker 1 that was kind of like a dick move question. Yeah, that's right.
But if you're sitting on a jury,

Speaker 1 you're like, it makes you think. You know, exactly.

Speaker 1 Being on a jury would be so difficult. It would.
It'd be so difficult.

Speaker 1 I don't think I could do it. I'm the most, I would literally just list Gemini as the reason that I could do it.

Speaker 1 Because I'm like, babe, I'm indecisive. Yeah.

Speaker 1 So the prosecution's a case against Lucille was based partially on evidence, but a lot of it relied on her own behavior, particularly, especially with the affair that she was carrying on.

Speaker 1 In 1964, people were also still struggling with the idea that a woman would even commit murder.

Speaker 1 So if assistant D.A. Turner there really wanted to convince them otherwise, he needed to make Lucille out to be not just unfaithful to her husband, but maliciously so.

Speaker 1 But his problem that he was facing was that the evidence also didn't exactly support that theory. And neither did the testimony from people who knew her.

Speaker 1 Like they were like, yeah, she cheats on her husband. You know, like she was, she's definitely a woman scorned, but I don't know if that was why she killed her husband.

Speaker 1 And I don't even know if she killed her husband. Yeah.

Speaker 1 So frustrated and worried that he might lose the case, the prosecutor's office planted a story in the local press that suggested, suggested, never explicitly stated, that Lucille had been with Elaine on the night of her death and very casually implicated that Lucille maybe was involved in Elaine Hayton's death.

Speaker 1 Holy shit. The prosecution's office.
Like, what? Planted this story. What, babe? What? So at the end of February,

Speaker 1 after about two months of testimony, the prosecution, after they were done planting stories,

Speaker 1 rested their case against Lucille Miller. In his closing statement, Don Turner told the jury, this woman is capable of anything.
She's a manipulator and a user of men to get what she wanted.

Speaker 1 Holy shit.

Speaker 1 Now, it's impossible to know how much the planted story influenced the jury, but on March 6th, after four days of deliberation, the members of the jury emerged to find Lucille Miller guilty of first-degree premeditated murder.

Speaker 1 Damn. When the verdict was announced, she lowered her head and quietly said, oh my God, no.
Because remember, she's going to prison pregnant. Holy shit.
And

Speaker 1 her children don't have anybody now. No.
Like, that's so fucked up. That's crazy.
Behind Lucille, among the spectators, her daughter Debbie burst into hysterical tears, of course.

Speaker 1 And when the jury exited the room into the hallway, they were rushed by a family friend who screamed at them that they were murderers. Oh, man.

Speaker 1 This whole case is just so sad. That's really sad.

Speaker 1 So a few weeks later, she returned, Lucille returned to the courtroom where the Superior Court judge, Edward Fogg, sentenced her to life in prison at the California Institution for Women.

Speaker 1 Now, with their father having been killed or, you know, died, whichever way you want to look at it, and their mother now in prison for his death, Lucille and Cork's three children were placed with a family friend, Joan Lance, and her husband, who Debbie had never met before.

Speaker 1 Oh, and the boys only knew this person by sight. Like they had seen her around.

Speaker 1 When Lucille's fourth child, Kimmy, was born in June of 1965, she was also placed with the Lancees, and eventually they became the legal guardians to all four of the children.

Speaker 1 Debbie said years later, they meant for us to be together. We were never grateful.

Speaker 1 So it doesn't sound like things were better. Oh my goodness.
In the years that followed, the Miller children all seemed to struggle in one way or another.

Speaker 1 Kimmy sadly died of lung cancer when she was just 25 years old and left behind two children. Debbie, Ron, and Guy all decided not to have children.

Speaker 1 And they did their best to maintain a connection with each other and their mom, but it wasn't always easy. This was a very...

Speaker 1 complicated family dynamic, to say the least. Now, a year after her verdict was announced, Lucille did appeal the conviction to the state Supreme Court, but they upheld the verdict.

Speaker 1 The next year, in October of 1967, she appealed her case to the Supreme Court of the U.S., arguing, among other things, that her lawyer hadn't had equal access to several of the state's witnesses, and that the sheriff had planted someone in her holding cell to try to get a confession from her, which was none of this was ever revealed during the trial.

Speaker 1 In their conclusion, the justices wrote, such deliberate police deception and subversion of a defendant's rights should not be condoned.

Speaker 1 But it was determined that the incident likely likely had no influence over the jury's decision in the case, and they upheld the verdict. Damn.

Speaker 1 So on May 10th, 1972, Lucille Miller was actually paroled after serving seven years, which was the minimum of her sentence. Wow.

Speaker 1 And during her time in prison, she worked as a secretary, and she got enough experience through that that she was able to find work when she was released.

Speaker 1 And after that, she really just kept a low, low profile. She declined interviews, didn't really like live in the public eye in any way.

Speaker 1 And on November 4th, 1986, she died after a short battle with breast cancer. And she died having always maintained her innocence.
Wow.

Speaker 1 So who

Speaker 1 knows?

Speaker 1 Don't know what the fuck happened here. I don't think at all

Speaker 1 about that case, except that it's awful. It's awful.

Speaker 1 It's just no matter what happened, even before it happened, it was such a dark, sad environment in that house. That was a thing.
And then after it happened, it was a million times worse, I'm sure.

Speaker 1 Oh, it's awful. And these kids just went to live with strangers.
And based on what Debbie said, it didn't sound like it was awesome. Oh, that's awful.

Speaker 1 Like they tried to keep us together, but we were never grateful. Oh my God.
That's so dark. It is.
That is so fucking bleak. It is.
It's so bleak.

Speaker 1 And it's just like, it adds to the bleakness of the entire story that it's a mystery. Wow.

Speaker 1 Nobody, like you, there are theories and we can all, you know, theorize, but nobody really knows what happened to him. And that's just really sad.

Speaker 1 Like, that's such a sad way to die where there's just no conclusions. No answers.

Speaker 1 Everyone can just theorize their own things and that nothing's conclusive. Yeah.
And those kids, like, with everything they had to deal with, and then also to not know. Yeah.
What happened? Mm-hmm.

Speaker 1 Fuck. It's sad.
It's really, really a tragic case. Wow.

Speaker 1 I'm going to, I'm going to need a palate cleanser. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Well, perfect that you should say, palette cleanser. We are releasing Listener Tales early for you guys.
Normally it would have come out on, I think, Thanksgiving or like right around then.

Speaker 1 So we decided to release it a week early for you people. Thank goodness.
I need it. Yeah.
And you guys need it too. You guys need it now.
I need it. We all need it.
After presenting this.

Speaker 1 We also have some really funny costumes. I cannot wait.
For this one. That is so exciting.
Mine is. More topical than I even imagined.
Oh, yeah. Yeah.
It is. And yours is just always topical.

Speaker 1 It's always on

Speaker 1 brand. Yeah.

Speaker 1 I cannot wait to see you in that costume. I also can't wait.
I cannot wait.

Speaker 1 So get ready for that. And with that being said, we hope you keep listening, honey.
And we hope you keep it weird.

Speaker 1 Don't keep it this weird or this dark or this sad. Keep it so weird that you romanticize your life.
Exactly. Do comment nice things on people's nice posts.
Do that. Thank you.
Come again.

Speaker 1 Bye.

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