Rewind with Karen & Georgia - 47: Live at the Bell House
It's time to Rewind with Karen & Georgia!
This week, K & G recap Episode 47: Live at the Bell House. Karen talked about New York's Torso Killer and Georgia covered the murder of Imette St. Guillen. They’re joined by comedian Jamie Lee who shared the murder of Dee Dee Blanchard.
Whether you've listened a thousand times or you're new to the show, join the conversation as we look back on our old episodes and discuss the life lessons we’ve learned along the way. Head to social media to share your favorite moments from this episode!
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My Favorite Murder is a true crime comedy podcast hosted by Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark. Each week, Karen and Georgia share compelling true crimes and hometown stories from friends and listeners. Since MFM launched in January 2016, Karen and Georgia have shared their lifelong interest in true crime and have covered stories of infamous serial killers like the Night Stalker, mysterious cold cases, captivating cults, incredible survivor stories, and important events from history like the Tulsa race massacre of 1921.
The Exactly Right podcast network provides a platform for bold, creative voices to bring to life provocative, entertaining and relatable stories for audiences everywhere. The Exactly Right roster of podcasts covers a variety of topics, including true crime, comedy, science, pop culture and more. Podcasts on the network include Buried Bones with Kate Winkler Dawson and Paul Holes, That's Messed Up: An SVU Podcast, This Podcast Will Kill You, Bananas and more.
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Hello
and welcome to Rewind with Karen in Georgia.
It's Wednesday, which can only mean one thing.
We're We're recapping our old shows with all new commentary, updates, and insights.
And today, we're recapping episode 47, which we named at the time live at the Bellhouse.
Can you guess where we were and what was happening at this moment?
I bet you can't guess.
This episode came out on December 15th, 2016.
Of course, the fifth anniversary of Impractical Jokers premiere.
You know that we were forever changed.
All right, so let's listen to the intro of episode 47, where we are live at the Bellhouse.
This is our conference
about global warming.
It's not the problem you think it is.
No.
We're going to tell you.
Don't worry about the ice sheet disappearing.
No, no, no.
It's going to be better.
You're going to die so much sooner than that happens.
Okay.
The fastest dying.
Dying.
Oh, my God.
The bell house.
Finally.
Fuck off.
We're finally, like, we've been planning this.
We've been thinking about it.
We've been talking about it.
We've been talking to each other and to Andrew here at the Bell House about it.
And here we are.
We booked this gig ourselves.
Thank you.
We didn't know.
And so we did it.
Yeah, we were like, it doesn't matter.
We should do probably a small intimate video.
We're really excited about this.
We have a guest, a murderino story.
I think next time we should ask for like wireless Janet Jackson mics so we can just really roam the stage as we clearly want yeah do some black cat before we actually sit down
anything I would just want to show everybody I don't know if you know but we were at Sephora earlier
Hence all the makeup on my face.
I have
so much lipstick on right now.
This is the closest I could get to the crown Elizabeth lip color.
Thank you very much.
Thank you
oh my god I'm not gonna tell you
wow I fucking hate that
it's mine
the fucking audacity I'm kidding you're sweet I love you are you be onkers or what that's my friend Millie saying beaters hi Millie
We actually were in Sephora, a very crowded Brooklyn Sephora.
Yeah.
And I was squatted down putting every color of lip and eye thing I could on my face.
I thought.
And Georgia had immediately broken off from me and begun to get a makeover.
And
at one point, I crossed an aisle and there was just a woman doing this and Georgia's just standing there getting her face brushed.
I actually kind of hated it because I was like, what color matches me?
I mean, I want you to hand it to me.
I don't want you to use your fucking fucking brushes that you've used on every fucking person in the world for the past fucking 24 hours.
And like, maybe put some alcohol on it.
And then, like, I just was like, I'm breaking out.
Yeah.
Ask, please speak.
You pulled it off well.
I thought you were really enjoying yourself.
I just didn't want to hurt her feelings, but I wanted to be like, don't fucking touch me without.
Don't touch it.
Don't wash.
Well, yeah, it's Sephora.
There's going to be, there's going to be a germ issue for sure.
But also, you know what I don't like is like they ask if they can help you, and I do want a very specific kind of help.
Yeah.
But I don't want,
they always try to get you to let them do your fit.
It's like, no, I just want to know the exact number of the taupe lip line.
Don't know that's what I'm talking about.
I wanted that too.
She was like, Well, first take your makeup off and then come over here.
No, fuck.
Get out of here.
I know, I know.
I was like, just put it on top, dude.
Like, that's what I'm gonna do.
Anyway.
So, you broke off to have that happen to you.
I was off by myself, squatting
like a fucking weirdo.
And then I hear, you know, like when you're in a public place, I don't know if you're like me.
In a public place, if I hear someone go, like, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, I never think it's tweeny.
And she turned and gave me the, she did one of these of like, don't fucking, you know, like, she didn't know I was talking about her.
No, I just don't, I don't like shouting.
And the girl goes, oh, she just gave us a dirty look.
The girl who had been like, I'm a huge fan of the podcast.
And I was like, fuck you.
I'm looking at eyeshadow right now.
But I just thought it was a teen shouting in a public place, and I wanted to show them that that's not allowed.
And
instead, it was a girl who worked at Sephora.
Even better, a girl who worked at Sephora who liked our podcast.
And I'm like, how do you know who we are in person?
Because of our lip colors.
She knows our shit.
It's crap.
It was super fun after I stopped being super bitchy to her.
I was just at dinner
down the street, and these two sweet girls at a table, like they weren't even obnoxious.
They were like, hey, we're going to go see your show in a minute.
I was like, thank you.
Is that you?
Now they're fucking obnoxious.
Everyone's here.
Everyone's watching.
It's because I sugared them up because I bought them fucking chocolate cake.
And I'm watching.
He's like, what the fuck is wrong with you?
I was like, send them some cake.
Like, do you know them?
That's so Hollywood of you.
Big timing.
I'll send you cake.
I can afford $8 cake.
Yeah.
Don't eat it
eat that cake
eat the cake eat it that's not a mic that's a beer eat her cake
eat the cake she sends to you
guys anyhow anyhow we gotta go
live show corner oh Karen it's fine it's fine
you have a lifesaver I have the this is just a mint in case I get worried later on that's weird gotta have that shit with you we should have asked for some kind of a a
breakpoint up there.
Like what?
I was just gonna say,
a private shelf sneeze area they couldn't see through
so we could have all our secrets.
What if we have a fucking frame photo of Steven and the cats up there?
Is that weird?
Could you imagine how great this Christmas would be?
Sorry.
He actually is babysitting the cats.
I feel like every time we do a live show and he's babysitting the cats, it's like how it should be.
That's right.
Him away and us here.
Yeah.
We drinking and all the glory and him doing the work like Cinderella.
Yeah.
Yes.
Yeah.
Yes, Damon.
I'm going to start calling him Steve from now on.
Steve.
Because he's so, he's such a like, if there's anywhere in the world he belongs, it's like Brooklyn.
He's got the like, he's got the like uneven hair and a tiny borderline Hitler mustache where I'm like, that could be problematic if you lived anywhere else.
He's such a Steven.
So calling him Steve would be such a fucking insult.
Bro, it's like, Steve,
Jean jacket much, Steve.
Pick me up in your dad's truck, Steve.
Oh, an angel.
Oh, anyway.
It started snowing in New York.
That's...
Thanks, you guys.
I had better hair earlier, but then the snow came.
I have really cute coats that don't do anything.
Georgia, when I met Georgia today,
this is the first time we met.
We met, and we really get along.
I met her on the street corner, and she is wearing the thinnest, I think it's a coat that Jane Fonda wore in Clute.
Like, it's just, it's just a very thin body-shaping, uh, taupe-colored coat.
It's like, where in the world is Karma San Diego coat?
Right?
Yes,
with a smaller lapel.
Yeah.
And I was like, are you dying in that coat?
What are you doing?
No.
She doesn't give a fuck, you guys.
No, I do give a fuck.
I just act like I don't.
Oh, that's the secret to not giving a fuck.
Oh, okay.
You do you just feel it deep down inside?
Yeah.
What if we were already getting the light?
End it now.
You guys, all right.
You guys end on a high note.
That's kind of low.
Bye.
We just kind of updated you on our date.
Bye.
And then we're going to leave.
Oh, oh, I went to a bar on Friday night called the Vince.
Where's Vince?
What's it called?
He's not even fucking good.
He He left your own show.
I fucking
get divorced.
What?
Madera's.
Thank you.
I don't know.
Thank you.
He was not her husband.
So I was at this.
I was at this bar.
I think it was like, it was like in Cobble Hill.
And
it was like a kind of a dive-y bar called Madera's.
And we ended up sitting, like, talking to locals, which is like the only thing you do in Brooklyn.
It was like the coolest people.
And like the fucking old-timer, like alcoholic dude who's so cool, was into fucking serial killers.
And then this couple comes in, and you can tell that they've been there a lot, but they're like cool and young.
And he was a fucking criminal defense attorney.
What?
Cute little baby with like dimples.
And his fucking girlfriend, who's like so cute, like this cute little hipster, was a fucking, um, she was a forensic.
A what?
A forensic auditor.
She's fucking she audits shit and then she like does taxes for dead people?
What?
No, she knows.
And then she's like, you're going to jail, you fucking bad man.
No.
Like, so a company is like, this guy's doing something wrong.
And she comes in there and like does the books.
And I'm like, badass, like chicks are good at math.
Fuck you.
We're not.
But like, fuck you.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
No, I mean, you know what I mean?
Fuck you.
What are Roman numerals?
I don't know.
No one knows.
So we just like, it was just like the best.
And they were, they were so cool.
What is forensic about auditing, though?
Well, forensic just means it's
law.
So it's, it's one, like, I know.
I wanted there to be like a bone in a file or something.
It's like, what?
Is this part of a spine?
One heart plus one lung and six tab wounds equals eight things.
You're going to jail, motherfucker.
No, it's just like, I mean, I felt bad for her.
She just has to sit in a room and do, do, do, do, do, do you know, like,
like with her, like, calculator.
That seems funny.
I feel bad for her.
They were, but it was just like, it was such a fucking, it was so great.
You just got to have a real human experience.
Yeah, with people who are obsessed with fucking deathy things.
God bless.
I know.
I mean, that's us, right, everybody?
Yeah.
And you, and you, and you.
We have murders here.
And then we have a third person to present a murder, so we should bring her out now.
She is.
Our very good friend.
You may have seen her on Girl Code.
You may have seen her stand up all over the nation.
You may have our...
We pre-ordered her book.
Oh, that's right.
Called Wedalicious.
An unfiltered guide to beating a bride.
I've done that.
Have you guys been a bride?
It's fucking terrifying and awful.
What?
I was just thinking about when I was, and I failed miserably soon after.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Hey, you guys.
Why is that sad?
Here's Jamie Lee.
Jamie Lee, everybody.
Love you.
Love you too.
Love you too.
Oh my God.
So phony, let's sit down.
This is getting weird.
Oh my God.
Hi.
I got, am I not supposed to be in the middle?
Is this
aggressive, this microphone?
Okay.
I'm going to angle that on down.
It's a little bit in our faces.
Let me go ahead and
bopped mine and it didn't move because that's not how mics work.
Does this feel kind of like we're at South by Southwest?
On a panel.
Giving a panel about how CDs don't exist anymore.
Guys, I brought you a gift.
What?
Yeah.
Stop it.
This is for both of you.
What is it?
You'll see.
It's a kitten.
What is a kitten?
That's actually not far off.
So because Elvis, he can't travel, he's at home because cats don't travel well,
I got you an Elvis understudy to bring with with you on the road.
Let's see it.
It's Patsy the Podcast Alpaca.
Isn't she fluffy?
Isn't she an alpaca?
Alpaca.
Patsy.
You know why?
Do you know why she's named Patsy?
No, why?
Because Patsy.
Patsy, Jean Benet Ramsey?
Fuck yeah.
Or Mom Benet Ramsey.
Mom Benet Ramsey.
Mom Benet Ramsey.
So you pack her with you and she'll bring you lots of luck and also get fur all over your back.
Let's pack her in our suitcase.
Yeah.
Over we go.
Oh my God.
Sorry.
Sorry.
I just like.
In her fur, it's just like dashing the lights.
It's like the snow outside.
I'd just like to tell a quick anecdote about when,
so Jamie Lee and I sometimes take our dogs to the same dog park in Los Angeles, and we ran into each other there.
And
she was asking me about this date, and this was a couple months ago.
Yes.
And said, because she was going to be in New York at the same time.
And she was like, what, when is it?
Because I don't want to go to that show.
And I go, why don't you be the guest?
And she goes, oh my God.
It's like that.
I like, I wish I could explain.
Sorry, that was really hard.
But I wish I could explain her fucking one-direction reaction when I asked her to be the guest.
It was the sweetest thing of all time.
But then you texted me and you were like, Hey, is it cool if Jamie's the guest?
I know.
I already told her she's the guest.
And I was like, Of course.
No, no, no.
You were like, Hey, how about Jamie Lee is the guest?
I'm like, Yes.
Like, good, because I already told her she's the guest guest.
Yeah, I already
asked her.
Yeah, it was, thank fucking God.
What if I was like, no?
And here you are.
Is this right?
I don't know.
I think super high.
Oh, this feels good.
Super high
down like this.
Should we go ahead?
Should we?
Let's get underneath it.
That's very Tom-Tomb.
Yes.
I don't know what.
I don't know how we, and what do we even
Everyone listen?
Oh, yeah, I like it up there.
We're like the reckoning at home.
It's like, what is happening right now?
Listeners at playbase.
You're missing nothing.
There's a lot of mic work going on.
Yeah.
So
who goes first in this situation?
Let's make the guest go first.
No, not fucking me.
You go first.
I don't know what I'm doing.
Go first.
Really?
I told you.
They're so nice.
Like, right?
Are you.
Nah, I went.
Okay, guys.
Are you going to be mad?
Am I going to be?
Are you mad right now?
I'm like, no.
And then afterwards, I'm like, Karen, can I talk to you?
Can I come in?
I'm going to do you in that really small bathroom Should we do one of us and then Jamie and then the other one?
I would love that.
Okay.
Yeah, clearly.
I would love that.
Just to get in the zone, you know?
Got to warm up.
Can you use rock, paper, scissors?
Yeah, I don't know who goes first.
Are you fucking super...
I'll go first.
No, no, no.
I was just trying to think of who went first last time.
Does anyone know who went first?
I was like...
Thank you.
Thank you.
My God.
Okay.
Can we get the notes?
Last week's notes, please.
Who's the secretary of this club?
Could you read the minutes back, please?
Because that's what I meant.
We're not paying attention.
This is something that we could have figured out while we were at Sephora.
Why would we do that?
No.
Any other time that we've been here for the past 20 hours?
How charming was that, though?
When we just like didn't know, because we don't even think about it.
The torso killer.
Anyone?
Move the alpaca.
Move the alpaca.
I don't give a fuck what you can see.
Shut your mouth.
Oh, no.
Really?
Do you not know how to be in public?
You don't get to talk.
No talking.
And now when I meet you afterwards, I'm going to get in your fucking face.
There's no...
Oh, no.
Patsy fell over.
Patsy died.
When Karen is angry, it's Patsy.
Patsy falls over.
Wait, I need you to stop fucking talking.
Ask Patsy if she wants a cookie.
It's going to be so disappointing, and I'm going to get scared.
No, no,
she'll say something.
Just ask her, yeah.
Patsy, you want a cookie?
Yes.
No, she's a lot more eloquent than your cat.
I'm sorry.
Super.
That's my cheat day.
I'm not doing carbs right now, but I'll make an exception for you, girls.
Thanks, Patsy's really high class.
She's a little emo, but we're working through it.
And we're back.
Hi, I love Patsy the alpaca.
That's just...
I mean, it's always great to bring some props.
Yeah.
And it's classy to bring a gift to the hosts.
Always.
Jamie Lee, classy lady.
We also, I think it's really funny.
I'm still talking about the lipstick from the crown.
I know.
It won't go away.
I didn't realize how much of a theme there was until we started doing these.
Or do I have some sort of obsessive-compulsive disorder?
I mean, what in the hell?
And then I just pull out my makeup drawer and there's 1,000 lipsticks inside.
Or it's like, when you do that, we're like, I love this color.
You get home and you have three of them already.
I can't stop.
Oh my God.
Especially now that we're on video.
It's like,
well, where is the lipstick that's going to bring it all home for me?
Totally.
Like, this is the one that's going to be like, and like, should I try orange lipstick?
Like, I know it's old-fashioned, but like the old grandmas who had orange, like straight up orange lipstick, I've been kind of like, oh yeah, get into that.
Should I?
They're rocking out coral
feel.
Very Florida in the 60s.
All right.
I'll try it.
Just for anybody that gets upset or worried, that heckler that I yelled at was totally fine.
We laughed about it after.
We took pictures.
It was all good.
I think that's like the beginning of the Karen.
I hope Karen yells at me from the audience, period.
Like, I think that made people want, like, I know they do.
They want you to yell at them.
That's like their dream in the audience.
Well, here's the thing.
When you are at a live show and somebody else decides, this is, I'm in this too, the rest of the audience hates it, but they can't do anything about it.
So at least it stands up long enough to know that if you just kind of take it in hand and are mean, then everyone else is like, Great, we'll all do that then, right?
And
we'll all not do that, right?
But over the years, we learned it's like you have to do it in a nicer way.
Yeah, it was just like my thing was podcast audiences were so weird compared to what I was used to in stand-up because we didn't know we were doing like as an audience member.
It was totally new, kind of totally new, unless you were totally new.
You know, you went to fucking Ira Glass's like beautiful,
you know, an NPR thing that was fancy.
And so there probably were no hecklers.
I would love it if there were hecklers in an NPR iraglass.
He's interviewing someone about something really sensitive.
Wait, wait, don't tell me.
And someone just keeps yelling the answers.
Yeah, exactly.
Oh, what?
Paula Poundstone, I saw you do stand-ups.
Oh, sorry.
I'm used to my favorite murder live shows.
I didn't know what this was.
I thought this was like a stream of consciousness shouting match that we all agreed to pay for.
But no, I guess I'm wrong.
I thought I was the main character, but it turns out no.
Another thing to remember, not just criticizing the audience for being new,
but this was the show where I was the tour agent.
So
I booked, I called the bell house, was like, said, okay, we have a podcast.
Can we come and do it there?
They're like, sure.
They're expecting 80 to 100 people to come.
Yeah.
Then when we announce it, they start getting calls and they sell out in three minutes.
And it was the beginning of us starting to understand what was actually happening in reality as opposed to what was happening in George's apartment.
Right.
And the people at the bell house were like, what did you do?
What is this?
Like, we are overrun.
And we were just like, oh my God, I'm so sorry.
Yeah, that was wild.
I think after this, we finally let our tour agent book shows from then on because it was.
Our touring agent came to us and was like, heard about the bell house.
Please, yeah.
Yeah.
Please let me know.
I've actually got a plan.
I was like, no, I'll be the touring agent.
Karen's got it.
She knows someone at the Bell House.
Okay.
Karen's going to go back to all the places where she bombed doing stand-up comedy and see if they remember her name.
And then that will be our tour.
Sounds great, Karen.
I didn't know any better.
Like, you know, when have I booked a fucking show before?
Who knows?
I mean, it was a fun idea.
We were like, hey, we should do this live since.
Since it's going well, that was the energy behind it.
All right, let's get into this story because this is a big one and this is just crazy awful.
And there are multiple updates which I want to hear about.
So let's listen to Karen's story about the torso killer.
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Can I please talk about the torso killer?
He's your fucking killer.
And I want to tell you about him.
So there's a name, a man named Richard Francis Cottingham, and he did a little work in the 80s here in the New York City metropolitan area that I don't know if anybody knows about.
I actually had never heard of him.
And someone else, like in passing, a friend of mine was like, have you ever heard of the torso killer?
And I got all up in their face, like, that's Cleveland, that's not gonna help me.
And then they're like, No, no, no, New York City had their own torso killer.
And I was like, Well, God bless America.
And this took place primarily in 1980.
And so I
looked up on a website what was happening in 1980 that was different than 2016.
And so I'll just
list a couple things just to paint the picture, just to set it up for you.
Georgia was born
in 1980 oh girl you look good
oh am i not supposed to
um thank you no that was a straight compliment okay thank you
let's see is using patsy as a um
music stand i mean patsy patsy was used for years and years by john ramsey
yeah
i don't know that's right i don't know anything can happen at the bell house
Could you imagine if John Ramsey walked on stage?
That's our surprise guest is fucking John Ramsey.
John Ramsey is here to tell his side of the story.
Fucking flip the table.
Fuck, dude.
The torso killer.
In 1980,
in New York, but also everywhere else, did you know there was no answering machines?
Like, they had invented them, and corporate corporations would use them, and like rich people had them, but they weren't actually mass marketed until 1984.
Isn't that precious?
So cute.
So if you wanted to call somebody and they weren't home, the phone would just ring and ring and ring.
All right.
Also,
there were pay phones everywhere, and they weren't as dirty as they are now.
Here in New York, this subway was insanely scary.
Oh, yeah.
They used tokens, and everybody had a knife.
I believe Studio 54 was peaking.
It was about to close, but it was like peaking just to the point where it was like all the people who still thought cocaine was good for you were having a great time.
And then, like, New Year's Eve, it was like January 1st, 81, and they were just like, everybody's going to die.
Yeah.
You could smoke anywhere.
You could smoke inside of an operating room.
It was the best.
There were a shit ton of mimes.
Oh, man.
All right, we're good.
That mime was just so pissed off that he fucking.
That mime threw down his drink and fucking stormed out.
But silently, he didn't yell.
He was just like, drink.
How dare you talk about
the quantity of mimes?
Now there's just me.
And of course, there was graffiti everywhere, and and there was litter everywhere and also there was a ton of murder.
Just a shit ton.
Yes, congratulations.
So there was a man named Richard Francis Cottingham and he was 31 years old at this time.
He was a computer operator and a valued employee of the Blue Cross Blue Shield in New York.
It's not a plug.
We're getting paid a shit ton of money by Blue Cross.
To not talk about that.
Blue Shield.
He was married married with three children, and he also raped, sodomized, killed, and mutilated six sex workers in New York and New Jersey.
Congratulations.
What a fun guy.
Yeah.
That was great story.
That was a sassy good time.
So I read this article by a guy named Peter Vronsky, and it seemed like he was a writer, but when he tells it, I mean, like,
he is, it's a great article.
So obviously he's a talented writer, but he was talking about at the time he used to run film from Montreal, get it developed in New York City, and then take it back.
And you can't just like send, they don't ever ship like movie film like that.
You have to have a guy do it so that nothing happens to the film.
So, he would come down with the film and he would get a stipend to get a hotel room for the night and then go back.
But, of course, he was like a young punk, so he didn't want to spend his money on a hotel room.
So, he would save the money and like eat, he would go to art openings and eat eat cheese and drink wine
and then and then get a hotel room in a really, really seedy hotel.
And so, this one time he did it, the film took longer than they expected.
So, he ended up getting kind of stuck in Hell's Kitchen.
And it was back then?
No.
Yeah, right?
No, thanks.
It was a hotel on 10th Avenue
in Hell's Kitchen.
And
he was standing at the elevator one day, and the it was taking forever and he was getting kind of irritated when it finally opened there was just like this super bland guy who came out of the elevator holding a bag and the
why then because something's gonna happen
I can tell something's gonna happen got it got it
he comes out of the elevator and his bag
touches Peter Vronsky on the leg and then but then the guy moves on he said he looked a little bit sweaty like he'd just been doing something
But then, but he, other than that, he was kind of vague, and then he left.
So, Peter Vronsky goes up to the floor where his hotel room is going to be to check out just how horrible his stay is going to be, because he knows it's going to be bad.
And when he gets up there, there are little pieces of like burned material in the air, and he can smell smoke.
It smells like someone burnt hair or something.
So, right?
Yeah.
So,
as he's walking down the hallway to get to his room,
he now starts to see smoke in the hallway, and the smell is starting to get really bad.
And you start to realize it's the smell of death.
This is not just a normal fire.
There's a dead body somewhere.
And then, right then, the fire alarms go off.
And
what happened?
I just looked at the badge.
I just feel like, oh, I just got chills.
I'm just very invested.
Keep going.
He goes back downstairs, and a room was on fire.
And when the firemen went in, they found two bodies, one on each of the single beds.
And when one of the firemen picked the body up and pulled it out into the hallway
to do CPR on it,
no head, no hands.
What did you think was going to happen?
Oh, my God.
Oh, my God.
Oh, no.
Wait, sorry, did you say no head, no hands?
Is that what you said?
Yes, no head, no hands.
No fucking dental records, no fucking fingerprints.
That's right.
So he,
a couple years later, when Richard Cottingham gets caught and his picture is on the news, Peter Vronsky sees his picture and goes, That's the guy that passed me when he came out of the elevator.
With a bag?
With a bag with heads in it.
And hands.
Anyway, Merry Christmas.
Was it a nice bag?
Was it to me?
Was it large?
What's the large brown bag?
What's the large brown bag?
From Bloomingdale.
Bloomingdale.
Oh, yeah.
Big brown bag.
Big brown bag.
Was it La Sports sack?
Oh, is it Goodwill?
Guys,
I'm about to talk about the dead bodies.
Okay, sorry.
Those missing parts were never found.
But their clothes, there was two sex workers whose clothes were found neatly folded and put into the bathtub along with their fancy boots.
And there was
very little blood on the beds.
So they don't understand, and there was very little blood in the room.
So they don't understand, they don't understand the method at that point of what happened, where it happened, because it didn't seem possible that he could have gotten all of that taken care of in the room.
Also, how did he kill one person?
And the other person doesn't make enough noise that somebody knows what's going on.
Again, they're in hell's kitchen.
So, through x-rays, they identify Dita Gadzari, who is a 23-year-old sex worker from New Jersey, who's the mother of a four-month-old baby.
And the other victim was in her late teens, and she has never been identified to this day.
Oh my god!
So,
so fuck with that look.
So, six months later,
six months later at the Seville Hotel on 29th Street near Madison,
he kills a 25-year-old named Gene Raynor.
And it was the same exact thing where they go in, they find the dead body, and this time, it's going to be bad.
He cut off her breasts and put them on the headboard
before he lit the room on fire.
So now we're going to cut to the has broke heights quality in.
You guys have been there.
The irony of quality in.
Anytime the word quality is in the title, it's stark opposite.
Good enough in.
Yeah.
It's called bed bugs.
Yeah.
So the maid is vacuuming, as they are wont to do, and when she goes to vacuum under the bed,
it hits something.
And when she lifts up the mattress,
it is the disfigured corpse of 19-year-old Valerie Street,
who's also a sex worker.
Yeah.
So essentially,
our boy, Richard Coddington,
what he would do is pick up sex workers.
And he would, oftentimes, he would give them a date rape drug.
And
they would wake up in the hotel with the tape on their mouth and he and
handcuffed with their hands behind their back and
and then basically he would torture them for hours at a time and they were at these horrible hotels where people would be screaming and no one was doing anything that's the that's the craziest thing is that is crazy well I mean he until he put the tape over their mouths but he must have like the planning the planning of it must have been that they drugged them long enough and then covered it.
You mind your business in those fucking hotels, right?
That's exactly right.
You don't want to point fingers when the three are pointing back at you.
Do you remember the movie Big when Tom Hanks becomes big and he goes and stays in the hotel for the first time?
And it's like a sad thing.
And he gets like super scared and sad.
It was like Times Square.
Oh, yes.
I think it's totally Times Square.
You're 12 and crying.
And you're 12.
But you're also a man.
But you're a man boy.
Okay.
So
his next victim was a, not a prostitute, a sex worker.
Sorry, I keep saying prostitute in this article.
It was a 26 year old radiologist named marianne carr and um they think that he knew her in real life in his in his weird other life in new jersey um
and she had basically died the same way and she was found like up against a chain link fence so it was it was all kind of the same thing but it turns out she was she was just a a nurse and a regular person in the middle of the how would he know how would he have found her and known her if he didn't already know her right right yes And you.
Shut up.
He wouldn't have, is what I'm saying.
So then basically, the way he gets caught.
Sorry, I
should have left Sephora earlier and organized this part better.
I find the thing.
Oh, it's on this.
The way he gets caught is
he takes a girl back to the same Quality Inn in Hasburg Heights where the body was found under the bed.
But this time,
there were reports of a woman screaming.
Finally, someone was paying attention.
Get in together.
And
when the cops come in, there's a man trying to calmly walk out as if he doesn't.
Yeah, look, I'm just here at the Quality Inn, chilling.
She's on vacay.
The Quality Inn.
I just like to come over here and just get my thoughts together at the QI.
They have free Wi-Fi.
Wi-Fi's not a thing yet.
What are you talking about?
It's not a thing.
So basically, the cops get him, and then when they go into the room, they find a girl handcuffed, hysterical, and she's been tortured for a long time.
But there's finally a survivor that can tell everybody: this fucking motherfucker that you think is some normal guy that works at Blue Shield Blue Cross is actually this insane serial killer.
So when they search Cottingham's home, they find a trophy room containing personal effects from several of the murdered sex workers.
And
he had actually been arrested twice in the early 70s.
Nobody knew about that.
That would never come up.
And so, yeah, he had personal things that connected him.
There was no way it couldn't have been him.
We'll cut to the chase.
In May of 1981, he was convicted on 15 felony counts related to the murder of Valerie Street.
And he drew a sentence of 173 to 197 years in prison.
And then a year later, he was convicted on second-degree murder charges for Marianne Carr.
And that added another 20 years to his life.
And
that is how sentencing is fucking done.
Yeah.
Sorry, I was just reading the last paragraph.
Yep, it sure is.
It totally, oh, there was just this list of
this: what he was indicted on.
This is what the person read in court: kidnapping, attempted murder, aggravated assault, aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, aggravated sexual assault while armed, aggravated sexual assault while armed.
Oh, the first one was rape, the second was sodomy, aggravated a sexual assault while armed.
That was fellatio, possession of a weapon, possession of controlled dangerous substances, seco barbitol and ammobarbitol or tuanol and possession of controlled dangerous substance diazepam or valium in other words he was the total package
wow that's richard cottington cottingham the seared neck torso killer
Okay, we're back.
Karen.
We are back.
Want to give us some updates?
Such a horrible, I mean, obviously, it's just redundant.
This is a true crime podcast.
When you describe one story as being horrible and violent, then you just have another story that's horrible and violent.
Unless you're taking a left turn on our podcast.
How many times have we said, this is one of the worst?
Like,
how many times?
One of the worst can there be?
A lot.
Every time.
It's always like these stories have extreme violence.
It's like, yeah, it's a true crime podcast.
But this serial killer in particular, it is so cold and calculated and repetitive and insanely violent.
It's just like.
Yeah, and the victims are so young and just vulnerable.
And yeah.
So Richard Cottingham, the torso killer, remains in prison and he continues to confess to his crimes.
So in 2022, he confessed to an additional five murders.
Those victims were Diane Kusick, 23, Mary Beth Hines, 21.
Laverne Moy, 23.
Sheila Hyman, 33.
Emerita Rosato Nievez, who was 18.
And those are just more horrible murders.
So he's been found guilty of 17 murders, but he claims to have killed at least 100 women.
It's just, he's an animal.
It's insanity.
That's one of those ones where like some of them, those killers were brag and like inflate their numbers.
But if he's continuing to confess and has like five that he can be confirmed to, it's kind of seems believable.
Yes.
You know, completely.
I mean, there's no reason not to believe.
Totally.
It's not the Ottawa Tool situation where they're just doing it to get out of jail.
Totally.
Okay.
Now we're going to get into Georgia's story about Emmette St.
Guillen.
Jamie, do you want to go?
I would feel weird going last.
Do you want to go last?
Sure.
Okay.
Is that okay?
Cause I don't want to like.
I don't want to like wrap it up.
Like, cause, and then Georgia goes.
So let's have Jamie go last.
Okay.
Is that cool?
Do it.
Yeah.
Regal?
Okay.
Totally.
Okay.
All right.
And so, okay.
I really, I really, this murder is really fucked up, but I got really scared that someone in here knows the victim.
So I apologize.
I just apologize constantly.
It's basically what I do.
Okay.
So Emmett Saint Guan.
Anyone?
Anyone?
Anyone?
No?
Okay, good.
Like they're going to say.
I mean, yeah.
Oh, yeah, that's my aunt.
Okay, so
Emmett was born in Boston, and in 2003, she enrolled in the John Jay
College of Criminal Justice, which is a
SUNY college in Manhattan.
They couldn't come up with anything more than John Jay
Criminal Justice College.
I don't know who he is.
John Jay Criminal Justice College.
His name is not nobody's name.
Let's name a college.
So she was going to pursue, basically she's one of us.
She was going to pursue a master's degree in criminal justice So like immediately we won't have a drink with her and fucking hang out with her right
She was one of the top five percent of her class and she was supposed to graduate in May 2006 and so in February 2006 she goes to celebrate her birthday with her friend Claire they go out they're at a nightclub tell it's always a friend Claire yeah Claire
Claire.
Oh gosh.
I'm not saying her last name on purpose because I feel fucking bad for this girl.
I really
tried to fucking tried.
So 3.30, which, by the way, this fucking 4 a.m.
shit, like, you can stay out till 4 a.m.
in New York.
Fuck no.
What the fuck?
That is a terrible idea.
It is kind of around the witching hour.
You got to be careful.
Like, stay as far away from dawn as possible.
You know what I mean?
Party till 11.45 and go home.
Great, great.
But you know, she's a baby.
So
they go to a nightclub to celebrate her birthday.
And then the Claire's like, let's get the fuck out of of here.
I called a cab, and then Emmett's like, I'm staying out.
And they are like, I'm gonna burp, hold on.
Excuse me.
Then Emmett,
no, no.
Those are loyal fans.
They're like, let it out, Georgia.
Do you?
It's terrible.
I don't want this to be me.
It also sounded like a cart, kind of like a cart, if somebody wrote out a cartoon burp, or it's like,
yeah.
Like Tim the Toolman Taylor.
It's me.
So like fucking Claire is like, get in the fucking cab.
And Emmett's like, nope, bitch, I'm staying out.
And like, we've all done it.
We've all done it.
You always listen to Claire.
And at 3.50, Claire calls her and is like, are you okay?
And
Emmett's like,
I am going to this bar called The Falls.
It's at 4 a.m.
You did know this?
I heard.
That was a good stage whisper.
Okay.
So the next evening, they're like, where the fuck is Emmett?
Like, she's fucking missing a shit.
And so someone, an anonymous caller calls the Brooklyn police and is like, I saw a fucking dead woman's body.
Yeah.
Does anyone know where Fountain Street and Spring Creek Park is?
Nope.
No, that was a vague whoop.
And it turns out that it's fucking Ahmet St.
Guillaume.
Guillain.
Okay, you guys, this sucks.
She's nude and wrapped in a comforter.
Her fucking fingernails are broken, showing that she fought as fuck, which, like, get a girl.
No.
Hands and feet tied.
Oh, sock in her fucking mouth.
Like, hair has been cut off.
Yeah.
Yes.
Beaten, sexually assault.
How dare?
She's like, what kind of cut?
The Rachel?
In that whole list, she's upset about the hair.
Can I go on about how she was fucking murdered?
I know, I know.
Stop.
I know.
This is the whole problem.
And she died of asphyxiation, and I don't even want to tell you about the fact that she had, it was because she had packing tape wrapped around her poor sweet face.
According to the forensic psychologist,
the forensic psychologist said that the killer tried to dehumanize her completely.
When you hide someone's face, it means that you don't want to see them as a human being.
You want to pretend they're just an object.
And hair cutting, too, I think is part of that, right?
Where it's like, it's something aggressively male to cut a woman's hair, which sounds so stupid, but like, I think when you're a fucking murderer, it's true.
Yes?
No?
Yeah.
Thoughts?
Feelings?
Well, it's also a weird thing because it's like, he's like, I want to murder humans, but I don't want to murder a human.
It's like, what?
Make your mind.
Yeah.
Fucking shifty weird.
I want to murder humans, but I also like to cut hair.
Okay, so the last time that Emmett had been seen, she was with one of the bouncers at this bar called The Falls.
And this bartender had been asked to escort her out of this bar before closing.
And then
another bouncer saw her talking to her in front of the bar.
So the dude, the fucking bouncer, was an ex-con, had spent more than 12 years in prison for drug possession and robbery.
And he was on parole, which means he shouldn't have gotten a fucking job, but they didn't do any background checks on him.
He wasn't a licensed security guard.
Staying out past curfew was a parole violation.
Like he shouldn't have fucking been hired.
Okay, but the dude who owned the fucking bar, whose name was Dorian, he
didn't want, he said that he had never, he didn't see her, he didn't know who she was, and later admitted that he knew who she was.
And he said he didn't want to get involved because
years earlier, His father's bar had suffered poor publicity in lawsuits after a patron was murdered.
A different bar.
Guess what fucking bar it is?
Guess what fucking murder is?
The one
with the upper east side of the burning.
The preppy
murders.
The fucking preppy murders.
But
what the fuck are the chances?
Sorry.
The guy that owns the falls,
you're a longer owned Dorian's.
Red hand, right?
Red hand.
Dorian's red hand, right?
Which we've kind of...
You're just yelling all kinds of stuff.
If you've listened to this for a little while.
have you really?
I have.
I was very sad there.
I said, Preppy guys don't hit on me.
Anyways, it's my own struggle.
Let's go back to the girl who died.
I'm glad about not getting hit on at that fucking bar.
Okay, so the owner is the fucking same dude.
Yeah, crazy, right?
So the dude, the fucking
bouncer, whose name now, okay, I'm going to say his name is Daryl Littlejohn.
His basement apartment is searched in Queens,
and
carpet fibers are found that match her on the adhesive tape blood and skin matching little John's DNA are found on the plastic ties
and
also from a snowbrush found next to the body so like I don't know how he bled I heard something about like a nosebleed but I'm like Why would you get a fucking nosebleed?
Like, I don't understand how that happens.
Yeah, you're like a murderer, but you're also like kind of a geek.
You're like, yeah.
Well, we know.
Cokehead.
She scratched the shit out of your face.
Oh, cokehead actually makes sense.
Oh, yeah.
Cokehead makes sense.
If you're a bouncer, I'm so sorry, bouncers, but especially like in 2006, you're a fucking cokehead.
Careful, careful.
Hey!
Okay, so, whoa, whoa, whoa, da, da, da, da, a bunch of old shits found on the DNA.
It fucking matches as fuck.
And then
additional evidence, and they like ping the fucking towers, which is like the new DNA, I feel like.
You know what I'm saying?
And then traces of GHB were found in her system, which is not a punk band.
It's a date rape drug.
So the fucking bar owner says, like, I don't know, I didn't see her.
And then
he later says he didn't want to get involved.
But a bunch of people were like, he has ties.
His family has ties to Rudy Giuliani.
So a lot of people are like, this is actually the killer.
But he's got it covered up.
And he was being framed.
And the other dude was being framed to protect Rudy Giuliani's family who was like running for shit at the time.
Okay, so
don't say what it makes me feel like I'm fucking up.
Don't say what.
Okay, so now we can hear every word.
Okay, all right.
They had gotten poor publicity after the fucking Dorian's red hand.
And then
okay, so he,
okay, so finally Dorian admits what he saw that night.
And here, ready for a fucking piece of shit?
Okay.
He says, there was a young lady sitting at the bar who didn't want to leave.
I told her it was time to leave.
And she said, I'll leave when I'm finished with my drink.
Says fucking a man, which is like, yes, girl.
And then he says, either finish it or I'm going to pour it out.
And so she finishes it.
Then
he says, she was just getting up to leave.
And I told little John, Daryl Little John, to escort her out.
Which is like call a fucking cab.
You've never done any fucking background check on this dude.
Like, you don't know who this person is, and you're sending her out in the fucking world as a drunk person.
Well, it's the bouncer, though.
So, then they're just like, send him out with a bouncer.
Yeah.
I mean, I would trust a bouncer.
I wouldn't.
I would ask a bouncer.
You know, my trust bouncers.
Yes.
That's what sucks about it.
They're not, they're not drinking.
They're fucking big and nice.
They're the overall shoulders.
They're very cool.
Trustworthy shoulders.
Yeah.
Fucking low-key individuals that sit on stools.
Yeah, just like they don't want to be there.
They're
like
a bunch of dudes.
You're going to go in.
Dig heads that they should fucking do.
Like,
Yes, I get it.
So the other bouncer named Tim said that Ahmet was slurring her words and that she had been slumped over at the bar, but then he was just like, bye, and like walked in the other direction.
Like he just left them.
And then Dorian said that he saw them.
He saw Emet
and Little John fighting outside.
Okay, so.
He gets arrested.
He gets fucking charged with all this shit.
And then his defense attorney says that Dorian, the fucking bar owner, might have been the real killer and that maybe little John was fucking bringing women back to the club to like as a thing, but it's like clearly not.
Oh, so they like float a conspiracy to okay.
Yeah.
So that doesn't seem unlikely.
The other things I've heard about Dorian's red hand.
Yeah, but he also said he told police that he had been banged up after a quarrel with his girlfriend a couple days after her body was found.
It's like,
why are you beat up?
Right?
That's like the first thing you look for.
Yeah.
Okay, so
they never investigated him.
Okay, so the bar closes, it loses liquor license, and little John is sentenced to 25 years to life in prison.
Okay, so,
okay, so the judge says not one of these people spared a thought to the wisdom of sending an intoxicated young woman out into the deserted streets of Manhattan at 4 a.m.
If only one of them had the common decency to call a cab taxi, we might not have, we might not be there here in this courtroom, which is like so fucking true, right?
Like
you're responsible at that point.
It is true.
It's super true.
It's very, very true.
True, true, true.
If you're going to own a bar and not take responsibility for a fucking alone woman slumped at a bar and just send her out.
Well, and the other thing is that it's that thing of like being overserved or did you you drink too much?
Like if you go to a bar, you have to be careful.
And I think, I mean, it's just that thing of like, you can't just trust the bouncer.
You can't just trust that other people will take care of you.
It'd be nice, but it might not happen.
And whether or not the bouncer just walks her out and lets her leave, like he might not be a murderer, but he also...
The bar owner, the bartender should be aware of that she's being at least somewhat taken care of.
And yeah, she could be fucking drugged.
And we don't know that.
Like, it's so easy these days.
watch your drinks you guys you know also the funny thing is like and these days then you're super drunk and they watch you get into an uber which is a car that a stranger is driving
like who knows who that fucking guy is it's just organized hitchhiking
Oh, that was great.
It's true.
Where is this female only Uber we've been promised?
I keep hearing about it and I fucking want it.
Did you make that up?
No, it's a thing.
There's like a new, it's supposed to be like women driving women only.
And like, or like if you're a woman and you're with a dude, it's okay, but you have to be a woman.
Like, and it's women drivers, good night.
Huh.
Okay.
I'm not on.
I need to get on that email just.
Well, you don't need to be because it's not, I've heard about it for two years and it's not happening.
Oh, okay.
It should be.
All right.
So let that dream go.
Let it go.
Let it go.
You're going to get, we're going to get, okay.
So then while he's being fucking arrested and tried, another woman comes forward because she sees his fucking face on TV and is like, that's the dude dude who fucking dressed like a police officer handcuffed me and fucking sexually assaulted me they linked the DNA it was him he was a fucking repeat sex assault serial rapist yep there you go
thank you yeah um another fucking woman's like that dude fucking did that to me and then
and she said that this other woman said that he wrapped her face up almost exactly like he did to this poor fucking baby girl Emmett.
Okay, so the good news
is that in 2007, New York enacted a law requiring security cameras at the entrances and exits of all the 200
nightclubs.
that held a cabaret license, which is so charming.
Just like jazz hands.
If you're doing jazz hands, you got to get that camera.
Using a stool as a prop.
It almost makes you think like that they have clean bathrooms and you fucking know they don't.
You know like you can't call it a cabaret and it's like graffiti bathrooms with no fucking thing.
My parents owned a rock club and they had something in Dallas, Texas where I grew up and
they had a thing called a dance hall license and I always thought it was so funny to call it a dance hall because it's like you a fucking guar,
you know, like literally like spraying like fake semen and blood on the audience and it's like, we've got a dance hall.
It's like, no.
Come on, CB with dance hole.
It's a CBD man with a dance mode.
And then
sorry to say semen hang out.
No, we have to say it once every episode, or they, they just, it doesn't happen.
So they have to, they have to have
fucking videos, and the club owners agree to have voluntary guidelines.
So they scan all of the identifications so like they know who comes in and out, and they have to screen them for fucking weapons, which has never happened to me in my life.
Has that happened to you?
I mean, I get patted down all the time.
Yeah.
I really do.
And they also have to provide more care in dealing with intoxicated female patrons who are alone, which is great.
So, and then Boston did the same thing.
And then also John Jay College of Criminal Justice.
They started an Ahmet Saint Guillain scholarship for second-year students at the college.
And
yeah,
and then they've also created a Spirit of Emet Foundation intended to support education for underprivileged children.
And then that motherfucker, Daryl Little John, is in jail forever.
Thank fuck.
Prison forever.
Thank fucking God.
That was nice.
That was a good ending.
Thank you.
That was a real up ending.
Just a shitty little John, not the fun one that says, yeah.
Yeah.
Little John.
You know what he does?
Am I going to, is that right?
Yeah.
It's not that one.
It's not that one.
Okay.
We're back, Georgia.
Are there updates to this case?
This case just really hits you because we've all been in situations like that.
I think every woman who was in the bellhouse that night has experienced a similar situation where,
you know, I'm really glad they changed a lot to be like, you need to look out for drunk women and like can't just kick them out of your bar.
Right.
That's just not how you do it.
So there are no case updates.
However, just a little note that rapper Lil John has continued to thrive since 2016.
That's right.
Don't worry about Lil John.
He's fine.
Right.
And then this is a three-story episode.
How exciting is that?
And also, how ill-planned.
What were we doing?
Why would we?
Yeah, everybody bring a story and we'll have a three-hour show.
And then Jamie totally divides us by just saying, I'm not doing a New York murder.
Goodbye.
She's like, I'm doing my favorite.
The end.
Yeah.
Okay.
So now it's time for our guest, Jamie Lee's story about Dee Dee Blanchard.
Okay, guys.
All right.
Man, here we go.
I know.
Chat here, guys.
I really appreciate the support.
It's a lot of press, you know?
It's a lot of press.
Got these two experts.
If it sounded sarcastic, it was 100% not.
You both told me that I should do, you're like, oh, we're doing a show in New York, so maybe do a New York murder.
And I didn't.
I just straight up was like, no.
I do what I want.
I do, Jamie Lee, because
i thought about the title of the podcast is my favorite murder and i was like oh i'm gonna be on it so i want to do what is legitimately right now my very favorite murder so um uh without further ado this is the murder of dlanchard yeah yeah
okay
so good uh oh man it gets so good okay so on june 14th 2015 in springfield missouri 48 year old d
was found dead in her home, covered in stab wounds.
Why?
How?
Who would do such a thing?
I will let you know very shortly.
Okay, so here's the deal.
Dee Dee Blanchard,
she was described as a quote-unquote large, affable-looking person,
which she reinforced by dressing in bright, cheerful colors.
She had, this is a real fun detail.
She had to think, sorry, but just think about, I think my greatest fear is to find out how people describe me
i never ever want to know i don't
know but god forbid god for fucking bid large affable bright cheery colors i mean
i would if i heard that about myself i'd be like oh please just murder me because i don't want to know that detail i once someone once told me in junior high like what some who's like they said i had mousy brown hair
and it changed my fucking hair right
yeah hence the fucking bob you can't have mousy hair
I don't understand that descriptor.
What does that even mean?
Well, the bitch who told me that someone said that
clearly was a fucking cunt.
Is what that means.
That's what it means.
That's what it means.
Here's another horrifying detail.
She had curly brown hair she liked to hold back with ribbons.
Oh,
like a cheer squad.
Yeah, like she's at the Ren Fair.
She's at every day.
Woven throughout her braid crown.
Eating a turkey leg.
Okay.
So Dee Dee could make friends quickly and inspire deep devotion in people.
She did not have a job, but instead served as a full-time caretaker for her daughter, Gypsy Rose, who was her
disabled teenage daughter.
So she didn't have a job.
She was just a caretaker for Gypsy Rose.
Busy.
That's what she said.
I would just like to say that when I was little, my grandmother, who apparently was a flapper,
used to, if we was kind of a nudist when I was young, so I'd like get out of the bathtub and I would just run around the house.
I thought it was really funny, and it would like everyone would yell and chase me, and it was a good way to get attention.
And my grandmother, anytime I did something like that, my grandmother would go, Look at you, it's Gypsy Rose Lee, because she was a famous stripper.
Yes,
she was a 1920s vaudeville star turned stripper, and she was also the inspiration for the Broadway show Gypsy.
Fun fact.
Dee Dee didn't even know that.
She just liked the name Gypsy Rose.
No.
She didn't even know that she's like, oh, my stripper daughter.
No, she didn't even know.
She didn't even know.
She just was like, those words go together well.
So that's like naming your daughter like Tawney on the Pole.
I mean, like, that's it.
That's a stripper.
I just think on the pole is a a really beautiful that is a gorgeous little name.
On the pole.
On the pole.
Okay so that's Dee Dee Blanchard our murder victim.
Her daughter Gypsy Rose, let me tell you a little bit about her.
She was small, frail, and pale for a 19-year-old.
She wore big glasses, was
confined to a wheelchair, had a feeding tube, no hair, was missing several teeth, and spoke with a childlike voice.
Okay, I know.
Hold on.
So, if you asked Dee Dee what was wrong with her daughter, she would list off lots of ailments.
Chromosomal, chromosomal, that is a word.
Chromosomal defects, muscular,
muscular,
I don't know what that means, but okay.
Chromosomal defects, muscular dystrophy, epilepsy, eye problems, and also Gypsy had leukemia as a toddler.
Okay, so
Dee Dee said that Gypsy had, quote unquote, the mind of a seven-year-old, and that's why she was homeschooled for her whole life, because she would not thrive in a normal public school setting.
I mean, that's all of us.
Am I wrong?
Yeah.
I know, I'm like, who's well-adjusted?
Who thrives?
Public school.
No one.
So they were in Springfield, Missouri, and like everyone else around them in the neighborhood, Dee Dee and Gypsy's house had been built by Habitat for Humanity.
It had amenities for Gypsy, such as a ramp up to the door, a jacuzzi tub to help with Gypsy's muscles.
And this is a weird detail.
Since Gypsy was too sick to ever go out, Dee Dee would project movies on the side of the house for other people in the neighborhood to come and see.
And then she would charge a small fee
because she was like, it's cheaper than a multiplex.
And
then those, that, that, the proceeds would go to Gypsy's treatments.
She charged a small fee for the movie, but the popcorn was still $14.
She's like, it's still $5 Dasani.
I hope that's okay.
It's very worth it.
It's very delicious.
Can I pay for that jacuzzi?
Because that sounds fucking nice.
I know.
So,
okay, so Dee Dee had told one of the neighbors, a woman named Amy, Amy, I don't, sorry, guys, I'm like, can't speak.
Okay, a woman named Amy Pinneger that she and Gypsy moved from Louisiana to Springfield, Missouri, because back in Louisiana, Gypsy's grandfather would put cigarettes out on her,
and that Gypsy's dad was no longer in the picture because he was an alcoholic disaster.
So all of the neighbors felt terrible for them, totally sympathized, empathized, loved them, and thought they were like the sweetest people they had ever met and wanted to do anything they could to help the family.
Which is why
on June 14th, 2015, it was such a shock when a post went up under Dee D Dee and Gypsy's shared Facebook account.
What?
What do we do?
What do we do?
We're sharing Facebook.
Fuck no.
Disgusting.
Get your own.
Red flags of
problems.
Serious ones.
Okay, so a post went up on the Facebook that was very alarming.
It said, the bitch is dead in all caps.
Okay.
Okay, so then friends.
Okay, friends began to comment.
Obviously, they were like, we've never heard you talk like that, gypsy.
I guess they just assumed it's gypsy.
They're like, we've never heard you talk like that.
Oh my god, you must have been hacked.
Maybe we should call the police.
As comments flooded the page, another post went up.
Okay, it said, and I quote, I fucking slashed that fat pig and raped her sweet, innocent daughter.
Her scream was so fucking loud, L-O-L.
Anyway, so the police got a search warrant and they went in the house and they found Dee Dee Blanchard face down on her bed, covered in stab wounds, and concluded that she had been dead for several days.
And Gypsy was missing.
Okay.
And all of the neighbors thought Gypsy was likely dead too, because without the care of her mother, how could she even function?
Like she's so dependent on her mother's care.
There's no way that she could survive on her own.
Okay.
But then, remember our friend Amy Pinnegar, the daughter, the neighbor?
Well, her daughter Aaliyah had some info.
She was like a big sister to Gypsy, but unfortunately, they were rarely alone together as Gypsy's mother was always by her side and very overprotective.
So when Gypsy wanted to have real talk and confide in Aaliyah, it was through a secret Facebook account under the name Emma Rose.
And Aaliyah told the cops that Gypsy had met a guy named Nicholas Godejohn on a Christian single site.
Quality men.
I'm kidding.
You probably are.
There's so many things I want to talk about.
Oh, I know.
This case is so loaded.
This is an insanely problematic episode.
Just every direction is problematic.
Okay, so she met Nicholas Godejohn on a crystal crystal.
I'm sorry, guys.
On a crystal site.
I had like half a Red Bull vodka and I'm like, woo!
Okay,
on a Christian single site, she had been communicating with him for two years and was totally in love with him.
Okay, so the police put a trace on those Facebook posts and the IP address linked to Nicholas Go to John's house in Wisconsin.
The police went there and it was a quick surrender.
Nicholas came out of the house and Gypsy walked out after him.
Not wheeled out, but walked out.
It's a miracle.
What the fuck?
Christmas miracle.
It's a Christian dating side miracle.
Christmas miracle.
It's plenty of fish.
But those fish don't have feet because evolution ain't real.
Real.
Okay.
All right, so it turned out, guys, that in fact Gypsy hadn't used a wheelchair from the moment she left her house a few days earlier.
She didn't need a fucking wheelchair.
She could walk just fine.
There was nothing wrong with her muscles, and she had no medication or oxygen tank.
She's fine.
Her head had simply been shaved all of her life to make her appear ill.
It was all a fraud, she told the police.
All of it.
Every last bit, her mother had made her do it.
Didi Blanchard had Munchhausen by proxy.
Oh, everyone's favorite thing.
A classic, classic designer.
Just how Munchausen
I wrote here, Munchausen by Proxy is the cheaper clothing line by designer Proxy.
Proxy is at Barney's.
Munchhausen is at Cole's.
Jamie's cracking up at her own hilarious joke.
This is why she was like, Can we have Jamie Liam?
And I was like, Fuck yeah, we have Jamie Liam as a guest.
You put on the shirt, and you're like, I don't know, I feel kind of sick.
The shirt is poisoning you.
I feel like I don't want to hurt my baby when I wear this.
This shirt is making me feel crazy.
Does anyone know what Munch hasn't by proxy?
No.
Okay.
For anyone who is listening, just a quick sentence.
MBP is a mental health problem in which a caregiver makes up or causes illness in a person under his or her care.
And it is a form of child abuse.
Oh, God, I'm so sorry.
Child abuse or elder abuse.
Okay, so the couple posted to Facebook because Gypsy felt guilty and she wanted the police to find her mother's body sooner.
Gypsy was in the closet while Nicholas was stabbing her.
And Gypsy also reportedly tried to clean up some of the blood with baby wipes after the killing.
The cleanupping of the blood is what I was going to say.
Yes.
It's such a weird, like you're going to kill someone.
Why would you, like, cleaning it up is such a personal thing, right?
Yeah.
Like, that means you're...
you're caretaking.
Yes, and also with baby wipes.
That's just
so inefficient.
And also, it's stupid.
I mean, it's a stupid.
It's stupid idiot.
Stupid idiot.
I mean, come on.
We all know Bronnie is the quicker parent.
She believes she'll be at the stress factory in October.
I don't know why that makes me laugh.
Okay.
Right.
So.
Okay.
So sentencing.
Nick Goda-John is still awaiting a trial, but Gypsy pled guilty to second-degree murder as Nick is the one who did the stabbing.
Did he admit to that?
Do we know if he's admitted?
Yeah, he did.
No, he did.
He admitted to it.
Yeah.
And she is eligible for parole in seven years.
And here she
rolls out, then stands up.
Oh, my God.
My favorite munch house.
Oh, my God.
Oh, my God.
She's like Gene Wilder and Willy Wonka.
She just like does a flip.
She's like, just fucking with you.
Sing, I have a chocolate fountain.
So, okay, so just to clue you guys in,
Gypsy had been texting with Nicholas for years.
They had been communicating through this like secret account.
And the crazy thing is, Nick had no history of violence.
The only thing he did have on his record was he was caught masturbating in McDonald's in 2013.
We all do.
It's no big deal.
I get it.
Those fries make me horny, too.
He's never been caught.
It's definitely only different.
Sorry, you know what?
When the McRib comes back.
Oh, wait, go ahead.
Go ahead.
It's a reason to celebrate the McRib.
Actually, I just want to say, I don't know if he was masturbating, but he was definitely watching porn at McDonald's.
Sorry, what's this?
It's very different.
That was worse.
Yeah.
You're not
kicking off.
You're just like, this is my chosen entertainment.
It's like, finish the job, Nick.
Anyways,
so how did Dee Dee scam everybody for so long?
It's pretty interesting.
People are stupid.
Yeah.
I mean, seriously, Dee Dee did work for a little bit as a nurse's aide, so she had a knack for remembering medical terminology and spitting it back.
Not only did she fool doctors, though, she also fooled charities.
They got free flights from a volunteer.
Volunteer.
Fuck.
Violent.
What is happening to my mouth and my brain?
That's normal.
A volunteer
pilots organization.
They also stayed at a lodge for cancer patients.
And I don't know what that is.
Ronald McDonald.
I don't don't know.
It's like a lodge.
And then also got free trips to Disney World.
Here's where it gets fucking real dark, guys.
The abuse that...
Gypsy incurred over her life, here are some of the things her mother made her do.
Her mother had her salivary glands injected with Botox, then removed them because her mother complained that she drooled too much.
She also had her eyes operated on because of quote-unquote weakness.
She had a feeding tube implanted.
And the reason that she was missing teeth was because her mother made her take seizure medication and it made her teeth ball that she didn't need.
She didn't need.
She didn't need anything.
She's perfectly healthy.
So there were two instances.
Well, there was probably more than two instances, but there were two that I researched of doctors being like, what's going on here?
But then nothing came to fruition, which is very sad.
In 2007, a pediatric neurologist named Dr.
Flasterstein asked Gypsy to stand up and she did with no problem and then he told Dee Dee like oh she should be walking but then he didn't report it as abuse but he was suspicious and now he's apparently like very mad at himself for never reporting it because he was kind of on damn you flashen he says every night yeah he can't look himself in the face he was flashed
um flustered flaster okay stop talking Jamie but keep talking
okay in 2009 someone made an anonymous call to the Springfield Police Department to do a quote-unquote wellness check on Gypsy where the police said, oh, so the police went to the house and they spoke to Dee Dee and they're like, why are there so many different names and addresses for you and Gypsy?
Because Dee Dee would frequently change her first name, her last name.
I think it was like, I read something where it was like, sometimes she'd be like Claudine and then she'd be like Dee and then she was Dee Dee.
Like she was always kind of making these small tweaks to her first and last name.
I feel like that call was coming from inside the house.
Yeah.
And Dee Dee said that the reason she did that was because she was trying to avoid an abusive ex-husband.
More on that in just a minute.
Didi changed her.
Oh, I already said that.
Okay, cool.
So this is what else is, this is fucking crazy.
So when Gypsy went to prison, she told the police she was only 19, but she was actually 23.
Yeah.
Okay.
So she didn't know her own age because of her mother's disgusting brainwashing.
Okay.
Also, Gypsy's father, his name's Rod.
Rod was not a
alcoholic deadbeat.
He always sent $1,200 a month in child support for Gypsy and visited on occasion.
He had his own family, and he still was like in touch with them and trying to help them.
I didn't write this down, so I just want to say for corrections corner, there might be some corrections.
But so Rod
impregnated Dee Dee when he was only, I believe, 17 years old and she was like 24.
So he was just like, I like don't love you.
I'm sorry.
And I'm sorry I got you pregnant.
And like, it was just kind of this mistake.
And then they ended up breaking up.
And then she ended up having the baby.
And like, he moved on and had his own family.
But he still was like paying for her.
Like, he wasn't not assuming responsibility.
I don't fully know the ins and outs of Rod and the relationship with the family, but I do know that financially he was paying what he needed to pay.
Wow.
Cool.
So
this is where it gets, this is actually how it kind of becomes.
there's a sort of a nice ending to this story.
Yeah, I mean,
relatively speaking,
don't cream your pants.
Hold on.
So Gypsy, I know, I've never said that out loud, and I just did now.
It's first time for everything.
So Gypsy in prison is actually, she claims that she is feeling freer than she ever did under her mother's care.
Dude, you're not fucking in a woman.
Yeah,
your mom's not standing behind you all the time.
Right.
So Michelle Dean is a journalist, and she wrote this really amazing article about this story for BuzzFeed.
And she went to visit Gypsy in prison and said that she speaks beautifully.
She is very eloquent.
She is not, quote unquote, slow in the least.
And this was a quote from...
Well, I guess Gypsy told this to Michelle.
Michelle said, she wants people to know that this wasn't a situation where a girl killed her mom to be with her boyfriend.
This was a situation of a girl trying to escape abuse.
In prison, she's hoping to join all sorts of programs and to help people.
She wants to write a book to help others in her situation.
And this orange is the new black.
Yeah.
And then this is the last quote from Gypsy.
I think she, referring to Dee Dee, her mom, I think she would have been the perfect mom for someone that was actually sick, but I'm not sick.
There's that big difference.
Believe it.
Can I just tell you one last thing?
Please do.
So I just started started looking.
I tried to find like YouTube clips of different neighbors and stuff being like outraged.
And one woman had like one of those like Nancy Grace level, like thick accents where she's like, oh my god.
She literally, because all the neighbors were so blindsided.
They were like, what, what's happening?
She's not sick.
I thought this girl was sick.
And then one of the girls goes, Her name is not Blanchard.
It's Blanchard.
She added the E.
She just wants her movie night money back, I feel.
Yeah, that's right.
That's a woman who paid too much for the neighborhood movie.
That's hilarious.
That was great, Jamie.
Awesome.
She nailed that shit.
One more time for Jamie Lee, everybody.
We love you.
I love you.
You guys, you know what we're going to say now, stay sexy.
Don't get murdered.
Thank you.
Okay, we're back.
And of course, you know this story well at this point.
We all do, yeah.
So here, we'll give updates together.
Gypsy Rose served eight years in prison.
She was released in December of 2023.
And then she went on a media tour sharing her experience with the world.
There's been backlash for her social media presence.
It's a whole conversation that, of course, everybody on every side of the true crime audience has an opinion about.
Gypsy ended up deleting her social media accounts at the recommendation of her parole officer, which I think is good for everyone.
If you could please listen to your parole officer and just get off the internet.
If you're going to listen to anyone, don't let it be the internet.
Let it be your parole officer, unless your parole officer is an influencer.
Oh, God.
Could you imagine?
No, my God.
I think we're all rooting for her to like live a nice, happy life, right?
That's That's kind of the consensus.
And she is living a much quieter life.
And on December 28th, 2024, which is the anniversary of her prison release, Gypsy welcomed her daughter, Aurora, her first child, with her boyfriend, Ken Urker.
So congratulations to her.
Nice.
Also, the writer who wrote the BuzzFeed article about Gypsy Rose is a woman named Michelle Dean.
And since that reporting, she became the co-creator, producer, and the writer of the first season of Who Lose the Act,
which is the the Patricia Arquette as Dee Dee Blanchard, Joey King as Gypsy Limited series.
So that's very cool.
So awesome.
We love to hear that.
That show was so good.
Patricia Arquette, are you fucking kidding me?
Like the greatest legend.
Congratulations.
Or great job, Michelle.
Yeah, great job.
You killed it.
And then let's see this episode.
Oh, so now we can talk about what we would name it if we could even think of a better name than Live at the Bellhouse.
I don't know.
I mean, it just says everything you need to know.
But if we were naming it today based on something from the episode, perhaps we'd call it, I think this is something that you have always loved, wireless Janet Jackson mics.
Obsessed.
It's your dream.
My favorite thing, you know, a lot of people have vision boards and they have like houses and, you know, France.
Not me.
I just have Janet Jackson from the control tour.
That's someday.
What if it is all 90s electronics?
And like, there's a fucking, there's a disc man and there's a fucking headphone.
And what else is there?
A mood ring for some reason.
Yep.
There's a really short black jean jacket.
We're doing this.
Oh, also, I say at the end, which is so perfect, it's like talking about that, the dawning awareness of what we're doing and how we're doing it.
Is I actually say at the end of the show, this show is so problematic, which is really funny.
You know, I think it's because we were slowly doing it in front of people and realizing that the reactions were so different than not having any in your or Steven in the apartment, you know?
Yes.
Or like there is, yeah, there's actually like, this sounds like something, you know, I talk about with my sister all the time.
It's like the way we grew up, especially me, the youngest in a 70s family where latchkey kids and no one was paying attention.
I just never thought I was being heard ever.
I never thought I was being listened to.
What I said didn't matter.
What I did didn't matter.
You could say whatever you wanted.
You can say, and who's, who's going to pay attention?
And then you get into who's paying attention.
They're like,
right, whatever, where you're like, oh, that's not what we're trying to do.
Maybe that's why you just started stand-up comedy.
So fucking, you could be under a spotlight and people would listen to you.
Finally, finally.
It worked.
You did it.
And we did it.
Yay.
Thank you.
We did it.
You did it too.
Thank you guys for listening to this episode of Rewind.
We appreciate you.
Yes, we do.
And stay sexy.
And don't get murdered.
Goodbye.
Goodbye.
Elvis, do you want a cookie?