472 - Give Me All My Words

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Learn more at chevy.com forward slash equinox. My favorite murder So we just got back from South by Southwest in Austin, Texas.
Thank you to iHeart for bringing us out there for the festivities and the iHeart Awards, which was so much freaking fun and awesome to see all these. Like, when do you see other podcasters? Never.
We're always in tiny rooms alone. We got to hang out extensively with Payne Lindsay.
Always a pleasure. Just one of the greats.
Such a cool, fun friend. Yes.
And Sabrina as well, of of course they're so fun to hang out with and sabrina's from two girls one ghost yes yes yeah which is so fun yeah um yeah that was awesome it was very nice and you may have heard already we actually won an award which i've told georgia this and many people since it happened we were genuinely so shocked that we were not prepared. None.
And every time people say that when they accept an award, I'm always so grossed out at like, of course you thought of something to say. No, and normally we do like, OK, real quick, if we're going to win, we're going to say, I think this person, think that person, blah, blah, blah.
Great. And then Joe Mangianello was up there for the first award.
Yeah. And it's our category.
And I was like, oh, no. What if we...
And then he announces our name. Yes.
And I just didn't know what to do. I had no idea what to do.
Georgia leans over to me and goes, you have to talk like that. And then grabs my hand and pulls me because I was still looking at the thing like, wait, what? It was just genuinely

surprising. Surreal and surprising.
Not sure what I said. You did great.
I just stood there in a daze and I'm so embarrassed and horrified by it. Me too.
Yeah. I mean, this is podcasting.
This is being perceived in podcasting. Yeah.
For sure. Yeah.
But it was a very, very lovely experience. And we met so many murderinos all across Austin.
Yeah. It was really lovely to be kind of out and about and get to talk to listeners.
Yeah, it really was. Like, I feel like it doesn't happen as much anymore in L.A.
because it's so L.A. and everyone's kind of over it.
Sure. Yeah.
Like, over running into people they, like, kind of know. But Austin, man, you guys are here for it.
And we appreciate you. Callan stopped us and said like the most like the thing that makes me feel so good about like the message I send and like legacy about this podcast.
She goes, because of you guys, you inspired me to get Botox and a nice husband. And I was like, well, fucking shit.
I'm done. Your work is done here.
That's all I wanted. Yeah.
And then we went to Chicken Shit Bingo at the Seaboy Bar, which is one of the coolest experiences and one of the best live bands I've genuinely ever seen. That was a fucking random four o'clock like banger.
That was like the most fun I've had in a long time. Chicken Shit Bingo.
I keep saying it's exactly what it sounds like. And then people are like, I don't know what it sounds like.
But it's really just a bingo board and a chicken and whatever number the chicken shits on your raffle ticket matches, you win the money. You win the pot of however much people paid for tickets that time.
You gotta love it. It's brilliant.
And we met Kelly there. Yes.
And Kelly hung out with us a little bit and we got to talk to her.

And at one point, this made me laugh the hardest she was telling us like when she lived in new york and she used to listen in new york yeah she was a listener her life and then she goes and then i kind of had to stop listening anyway now i live here and it was so hilarious because she wasn't saying it like yeah it wasn't she was not lodging aging a complaint in any way. It was kind of like, I don't need to listen to that anymore.
And we were like, good. It helped me.
I moved on. Yeah.
OK. It's been a while.
Yeah. You can do that.
Nine years. Yeah.
You're invited back in and back out anytime you want. Absolutely.
Yeah. So thanks, you guys, for coming up and saying hi and being nice to us.
It's really a lovely experience.

Yeah, so good.

Did I ever get to tell you, and I'm sorry to take up extra time, did you know that I met Kyle McLaughlin the night of the awards at that after party?

No.

Okay, I'll do this as fast as I can.

Oh, my God.

We get to the after party.

Yes.

We kind of have to fight to get in, which was hilarious.

Yes. I did yell the words, but we won at the doorman, which is kind of embarrassing in retrospect.
Humiliating. But we got it.
Yes. And lovely, amazing party.
But everybody in our group basically went and got in line for the bathroom because everyone had to go to the bathroom. Yeah.
Except for old KK took care of it before. So I was standing there and I was like, I need to put my coat and my purse down.
We had been at this location before. So I'm like, oh, I'm going to hide it behind that couch.
So I went over to this couch and there was a woman sitting there with long blonde hair and I shoved my stuff basically behind her where she was sitting on the couch. And I looked at her, I said, do not steal anything out of my purse.
I'll know it was you. And she starts laughing and talking to me.
I go, you can steal the coat because I bought it off TikTok and I shouldn't have even bought it in the first place. We start talking about stuff like that and not and basically not over consuming.
Yeah. Come to find out she's the producer of Kyle McLaughlin's podcast.
Oh, my God. I introduced myself.
Then she was like, I know. And I saw congratulations, whatever.
And then she says that I'm like, oh, my God. Georgia was so excited to meet him last year.
He let me take a selfie. Yes.
And she goes, well, wait here. He's going to be right back.
He would love to meet you guys. So I was like checking down that hallway to see who was coming out of the bathroom.
And I'm like, I'm going to stand here until you guys come back so that we can hang out with Kyle McLaughlin. He walks up, immediately just starts, hey, hi, how are you? Did you win? Blah, blah, blah.
Because he was there. And I got to talk to him and I got to tell Kyle McLaughlin that my friend who helped me, my brilliant friend, stylist, O'Kara Banks, who is the best, helped me find my leg dress for that night.
And I told Kyle MacLlaughlin that i told her my style icon is audrey horn i see it from twin peaks i totally as soon as you started to say that i was like oh yeah i see it i get to tell him that and it was like that man is the greatest yeah he's such a lovely man i'm honestly so glad you didn't find me because i had some drinks would Would you have maybe snuggled up into his neck a little bit? Yes, I would have definitely held him like a baby a little bit. Kind of eight plus weekend that we got to have.
Totally. Well, back to work.
Should we do this? Let's do it. Back to work.
Hey, we have a podcast network. It's called Exactly Right Media.
And hey, here are some highlights.

Okay. As you might have heard, but if you haven't, you need to know.
Last week, we sat down with Hannah Smith and Pasha Eaton, who are the hosts of our newest true crime podcast, The Knife. The Knife premieres next Thursday, March 27th, but you can follow them right now on Instagram and Blue Sky at The Knife Podcast.
Of course, please go over to The Knife on Apple Podcasts or the iHeartRadio app, wherever you listen, and go follow them and get ready because on March 27th, you're going to hear a brand new, incredible podcast from the makers and old host of The Opportunist. It's going to be huge.
I'm so excited about this. Yeah.
And then on Ghosted, Roz welcomes permanently stoned comedian Doug Benson, your old friend, to discuss all things paranormal. And hey, guess what? If you missed it last week, I, me, Georgia Hardstark, was the guest on the episode of Ghosted.
So please, you know, go back and listen to that if you feel like it. Yeah, please do.
This week on That's Messed Up, Lisa and Kara break down SVU season six, episode 15, which was entitled Hooked, and they dig into the mysterious murder of actor Bob Crane. That's a good one.
Also, we know you guys love treasure, and we found some gems in the exactly right warehouse. We have got Here's the Thing koozies.
We've got murderino sweatshirts. We have sweatshirts that tell you not only to stay out of the forest, but also to keep going.
We are bossy and we want you to get your merch while you can. Go to the exactlyrightstore.com.
And finally, we have some really exciting news. If you're a listener of this podcast, we're going to officially invite you to become a watcher of this podcast because My Favorite Murder is now officially on YouTube.
Yay! But yes, the Exactly Right Network has its own YouTube channel, so you can watch full episodes of My Favorite Murder. You can watch full episodes of I Said No Gifts, Ghosted with Roz Hernandez, all the Nick Terry MFM animated episodes.
There's all kinds of stuff over there. So head on over.
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So go to youtube.com slash exactly right. Please, please, please like and subscribe.
It really helps us out. We're just starting out and we need all the help we can get.
Yeah, support us. All right.
So I am first and I have a heavy hitter that I personally didn't really know about that. Everyone should know about this case.
It's fucking wild. It should be as notorious as ted bundy's horrific crime spree and in fact this story also takes place in florida around the time that ted bundy was active this is the story of a truly horrific serial killer slash spree killer it's kind of debated on what to call him he targeted models and young girls under the guise of scouting them for modeling work, which we've heard of before.
He ultimately led the FBI on a nationwide manhunt that lasted nine days and whose victim count is still being debated today. This is the story of the beauty queen killer.
You know what I'm talking about? I don't think so. This is so wild.
So I was watching this documentary. It's called The Beauty Queen Killer, Nine Days of Terror.
And the documentary is basically an interview with a survivor, a couple survivors of this killer and the story of it. And it just unfolds and it's unbelievable.
Wow. Okay.
And the other main sources for the story are reporting from the Miami Herald and the Oklahoman.

And the rest of the sources can be found in the show notes. So it's April 11th, 1984.
And we're at the South Lake Mall in Maryville, Indiana. A 16-year-old girl named Dawn is filling out an application in the store for a job.
And she's approached by a girl, a teenage girl who's around her same age. This blonde-haired, blue eyed teen asked Dawn if she would like to model in an upcoming fashion show at the mall.
And I think a big thing to know and understand, especially for our younger listeners, is how central the mall was to our lives back then. Yes.
Like there was no, like TV was live. If you didn't watch it or you weren't rich and had a fucking VCR, you didn't see it.
You went to the mall and that's where you socialized. That's where you got a job.
That's where you shopped. That's where you spent all of your free time with your friends.
That's right. And also, just 1984, it's such a weird thing.
But in the San Francisco area, the brand Esprit would put out catalogs and use local girls as models. Right.
And that was like this big thing that everyone knew about. This was a very strange time in America where like you were as a young girl supposed to try to be a model no matter how tall you were, what you looked like, what your background was, what your body type was.
And you could be scouted, you know, like it actually could happen that you can be in local fashion shows be like a model these things did happen back then and kind of it was an opportunity for a lot of young women an opportunity and kind of like the ultimate compliment as opposed to like one of many things you could be right things weren't really that wasn't the messaging so it's like it was like someone coming up and saying, I deem you a Disney princess. Yeah, you're the most beautiful.
You must. Yeah, it is a very time and place kind of a thing.
Yeah. So while Dawn is talking to this teenager who approached her, a man walks up to both the girls.
And it seems like he and this girl who approached Dawn seem to know each other. They friendly the man introduces himself as a photographer who knows about the upcoming fashion show it's like so it sounds kind of legit and there were a lot of fashion shows in malls at the time that were like sponsored by whatever big you know macy's or whatever their store was there or sometimes like you know fashion lines and magazines would actually have mall fashion shows and local girls would walk in them.
Right. So he says that he'd like to shoot some photos of Dawn now if she's available.
He says they just need to go to a nearby warehouse to get clothes for the shoot. And so Dawn is like, this is legit.
It's like other girls with him making it seem real. This guy does seem legit.
He does seem on the level. So the three of them head to the parking lot.
They go to Don's car and Don and the photographer get in the car and the other girl who had approached her gets in their old car and starts following them. But once they reach the car, the photographer pulls out a gun and points it at Don immediately.

He makes her get in the car and give him the keys while the other girl who had approached her gets into a different car and follows them. Dawn has just been abducted by a man who was wanted in multiple murders and abductions already across the country, who has come to be known by the media as the beauty queen killer.
So that was in April of 84.

We're going to go back to February 26th of 1984.

And we're in Miami.

Miami is the center of this very busy modeling scene at the time

with lots of girls with big hair and high cut bikinis.

They're shooting local commercials,

print ads. It is happening for a lot of these women.
And among the legions of very young and

beautiful women who call Miami home, there is 20-year-old former Miss Florida contestant

Rosario Gonzalez. Rosario had been born in Cuba and immigrated to the United States as a child

with her family. And on February 26th, Rosario has a gig as a spokesmodel at the Miami Grand Prix.
Her job is to hand out samples of aspirin to people attending the race on behalf of a pharmaceutical company. And like those are paid modeling gigs.
These are the kind of gigs that these girls are trying to get. You know, it is legit in some way.
She's been picking up as many jobs as she can because she's engaged and she and her fiance are saving up for furniture for the house they're going to move into. But Rosario still lives at home at the time and her parents expect her back sometime around 5 p.m.
She always calls if she's going to be late. And so when the evening wears on and they don't hear from her, the Gonzalez family knows something is wrong.
Shortly after they report her missing, Rosario's car is found near the racetrack, presumably where she parked it, having gone to the racetrack that day. On March 3rd, after Rosario has been missing for about a week, police release a composite sketch of a man that multiple witnesses say they saw walking with Rosario after the race.
He's about 5'8. He's white in his 30s.
He has a mustache. And then about a week after Rosario goes missing on March 5th, another aspiring model, a woman named Beth Kenyon, also disappears.
So Beth is 23 years old, and by all accounts, she's this amazing young woman.

She works at Coral Gables High School as a special ed teacher, and she coaches the cheerleading team.

She's beloved amazing young woman. She works at Coral Gables High School as a special ed teacher, and she coaches the cheerleading team.
She's beloved by her family and friends and everyone. The Kenyon family is immediately worried when Beth doesn't show up as she's a reliable person, and they quickly become frustrated with the police when they don't seem particularly motivated to find Beth.
Despite the fact that this is the second young model to disappear in Miami in a very short time span, but it doesn't seem like the two are linked in the minds of the police. And let's not forget that there's like a drug war going on in Miami at the time, and the police are more concerned with that than a missing young, beautiful woman.
Right. Yeah.
And there's also not a lot of communication between jurisdictions. There's like fax machines and phone calls and that's it.
So it's just kind of a shitty time and place. So the Kenyon family hire a private investigator named Ken Whitaker within a day or so of Beth disappearing.
They had the means to do that and they immediately did. And here's the part that's going to make you angry and make us all want to rip our hair out.
By day three, this private investigator has figured out who took Beth. He knows.
He talks to her roommate and her co-workers. He finds out that Beth's car had been acting up and they all knew where she planned to take it to get serviced.
So the private investigator goes to the service station. The people there say that Beth had been there that day, the day she disappeared, and that she had been with a man.
And the private investigator, Ken, brings a photo album of Beth to the service station, asks everyone to look through it. And everyone zeroes in on a guy in a photograph in her photo album.
That was the guy she was with the day she disappeared. It's a picture of Beth at a racetrack, and they point to the man standing next to her in the picture and remember remember the racetrack thing.
Yes. So this man is 39-year-old Christopher Wilder and the private investigator is alarmed when he finds an extensive criminal record of violent sexual assaults dating back many years.
I'm just already getting mad and assuming that they... I'm just going to demand you tell me the things you're about to tell me, but you're going to tell me anyway.
So I'll just listen. I mean, there isn't a, well, you'll see.
Let's talk a little bit about this awful man, Christopher Wilder. He's born on March 13th, 1945 in Sydney, Australia.
He's the oldest child of an American naval officer and an Australian native. He grew up in Australia from his teenage years on.
I kind of can't tell exactly what's going on, but he has, sometimes he has an Australian accent, sometimes he doesn't. It kind of seems like he can turn it on and off.
I mean, this is just, it's classic. In his early adolescence, he begins peeking through windows.
And then by the age of 17, he's arrested for the rape of a girl on a Sydney beach. He pleads guilty to the offense and receives a year of probation with counseling and electroshock therapy.
In 1969, now in his 20s, Christopher Wilder left Australia and heads to Florida after avoiding some charges for sexual deviant accusations. So he splits.
He's just fleeing his record, essentially. Exactly.
So he gets to Florida and, you know, this is the late 60s, early 70s. He works as a contractor, also an amateur photographer and a race car driver as well.
So he's not particularly handsome, but he dresses really well. Maybe that Australian accent comes into play sometimes and gives him an air of respectability that maybe he didn't deserve.
But he looks like a typical 80s dude, like someone my mom would have dated back then for sure. Yeah.
And he hangs out with the right crowd that lends him legitimacy that actually tricks these women into trusting him as a modeling scout because he does have access to the modeling world because of his photography yes and he had been hired by the miss florida usa pageant to take photos of the models so when he comes up to them after the photo shoot and is like here's my card i could really like i would love to take photos of you i could make you famous i could be your manager there's no reason for them It's not some rando. It's this guy who has been hired to do this.

By basically a modeling machine of a beauty pageant.

Right.

And they don't vet those photographers.

No.

They don't. God.

So when I decided to do this, Alejandra and Ali, my researcher, let me know that some of these stories sound really similar to the one that I told in our book that happened to me, where I was like 18 or 19 and trusted a regular at the cafe I worked at and got in his car and went with him to take. He said he was a photographer.
He was a photographer. He showed me his work.
It was gorgeous. He took me to a secluded location and I realized that I needed to do what he told me at the time.
And so, you know, I complied with what he demanded. And so I just want to make sure we're making it clear that this is so common and this is so I don't know what to say but just that I understand yes and it's kind of a setup it's a setup in a way where what you're being asked as a young woman is can you please meet these cultural requirements of beauty and then people are going to come around you and be like hey I officially I officially deem that you did that.
And therefore, let's capture that and show it to other people. And since that is a drive that depending on, you know, how you were raised or what you are around, like that's a huge accomplishment, especially in Southern California, where it's just like, yeah, you made it like this is this is really something nobody's sitting there going, hold on, I need to figure out why I'm not going to do this.
You're going, oh my God, my dream's coming true. I get the ultimate like reward here.
And it's not, like my sister's a photographer and she took photos of me all through high school. It wasn't weird to me to be like, oh, I'll model for you.
And then suddenly you find yourself in a situation that you realize you've made a big mistake and you don't know how to get out of. And I honestly think that this person who took me out to take photographs of me at the time had nefarious intentions and somehow I was able to get away.
Yeah. You know, not unscathed, but so I just I get it.
I get this in a weird way. And it like does trigger some old things of like the shame.
But then when I read about these girls, I don't blame them in any fucking way whatsoever. So why should I feel shame about it as well? You know, it's like something you did when you were young and not.
Well, also, don't punish yourself for being trustful of people who tell you to trust them.

Right.

That's that kind of thing of like, we all have to learn lessons like that as we grow up.

And everyone learns them the hard way.

And it's. of people who tell you to trust them.
That's that kind of thing of like, we all have to learn lessons like that as we grow up.

Everyone learns them the hard way

and it's at best disappointing.

Yeah.

And that kind of risk,

that's just growing up a woman in our culture

and all other women understand that.

And I think there was a time

where it was used against us

or our own shame was kind of like weaponized. We would use it against each other.
Well, yeah, wait until the end of the story because it fucking comes into play. And I just have the hardest time.
I have the hardest time with the ending of the story because it's just so ugly. So he's gotten his papers from the Miss Florida beauty contest.
Hey, you can trust this guy. Don't worry about this official photographer.
Exactly. And he's very suave.
He's manipulative. He owns a Porsche and a speedboat and a nice house where he hosts fancy parties where everyone goes to them.
You know, it's like that false sense of I know you. You're part of my pack and you're safe.
Yeah. That's just luring and it's just grooming.
It's what predators do. Also, if you have money, I think there was for a long time the belief of like, if you had money and a good job, that meant you would never do something like that.
Totally. Which is insane.
Totally. Later, many women will come forward with stories of photo shoots that became non-consensual and led to sexual assault.
And in fact, after one sexual assault charge by a teenage girl, a psychiatrist said that Wilder should be forced to undergo supervised treatment, but the Florida jury acquitted him in that case. It's maddening.
There are multiple opportunities to punish this person and for this to have gone a different way. But God forbid that his career be affected.
Yeah. Right.
He's a man of fucking the community. Yeah.
So back to this private investigator.

When he tells Beth's family about this man, they already know him because it turns out Beth had met him when she competed in that Miss Florida USA pageant two years prior. And they had, it's hard to tell.
They kind of started dating or maybe he was more interested than she was. So at the same time as this is going on, as Beth is missing, her family hears a news report about another missing model, Rosario Gonzalez, from earlier, who also had competed in that same pageant as Beth two years earlier.
And they're like, this is too coincidental that two models from the area are missing. And the private investigator speaks to Christopher Wilder twice, once it is home and once at work.
And so the private investigator gives Christopher Wilder's name to the Miami police at some point. It's unclear exactly how long the police wait to go to Christopher's house to question him.
But by the time they do, it seems a little like they dragged their feet on it. By the time they do, the story of the two missing models becomes linked in the media and Christopher's name is eventually brought into the story.
And so it seems like he realized the jig was up and fled, knowing that they were after him. I also wonder, sorry, just to make this side comment, that if the first missing woman was Cuban, then there's obviously a racist issue.
Sure. Rosario Gonzalez, she's not looked for.
And the news isn't as... They're not going to be as reactive as white model.
Right. The media cares less.
And so this alerting him to the fact that they're all on to him, his realization that he's going to get caught seems to set him off on an absolutely horrific spree that I don't know how we haven't heard of this nine day spree that's going to blow your fucking mind. And I try to get a hold of my mom to talk about it because comes all the way to L.A.
Oh, my God. But I don't know if she knows anything about it.
Anyways, so surprisingly, and like maybe showing how cocky he was that he wouldn't get caught, Wilder stays in Florida at first. He doesn't leave the state, even though he knows the authorities are after him.
On March 15th, three days after Ken, the private investigator last makes contact with Christopher, he ends up in Daytona, Florida. And we know that a 15-year-old girl named Colleen Osborne disappears at Daytona Beach that same day.

Christopher has never been officially linked to Colleen's disappearance, but friends who were with her say a man at the beach offered her $100 to photograph her. And Colleen's body is found about three weeks later.
three days later on march 18th christopher abducts a 21 year old woman named theresa

ferguson who goes by terry from a mall on Merritt Island, which is just south of Daytona. So he actually backtracks closer to Miami, like this guy has no fear.
While Colleen's murder is only suspected to be linked to Christopher Wilder as well, investigators are sure that he's responsible for Teresa's murder. her body is found five days later in a swamp not too far from tampa on the opposite coast from

where she was abducted, and her body is found with a rope tied to her neck and feet. But before her body was found, Christopher Wilder abducts another young woman.
This is on March 20th, two days after Teresa's abduction, and it's in Tallahassee, the capital city and where Florida State University is. So this young woman is named Linda Grover.
She's a 19-year-old student at Florida State. And we know everything that happens to her and what she goes through because Linda survives.
Linda is in a department store shopping for an anniversary gift for her boyfriend when Wilder approaches her multiple times and is like bugging her and doing his normal spiel of like you should be a model let me take photographs of you i have connections he's wearing a suit like a three-piece suit he's well-groomed he's a gold watch and a diamond pinky ring which is kind of his signature uh he has his camera on him you know which is like so creepy that you're like look i'm a photographer walking around anyone could put a fucking camera on it's like dj headphones it's like that doesn't mean you're a fucking dj right and well but it's just such an innocent time like you totally it's just like that is only a professional photographer would be walking around with such a nice camera right and this is also the time and place where like adam walsh as a five-year-old was kicked out of a mall for loitering and got kidnapped and disappeared. Like that's just what happened then.
People did not know what was it was the beginning of this era of awareness. You'd still hope that Ted Bundy had at least because I think in 79 is when his spree in Tallahassee, right, happened.
So you'd think that they would be a little more on edge and aware that these young college girls are going missing and are being found murdered. but I mean like again like you're saying that means people would have to be connected, communicating

but Linda Grover

is like nah dude

she politely declines his offer

a couple times and they part ways. She's not interested.
Then at about 3.30 that afternoon, she's out walking to her car, and she realizes that Christopher's following her out. It turns out he parked right next to her because he had watched her enter the mall from the parking lot.
So he was orchestrating this from the beginning. He asked her one more time to look at some covers that he shot, kind of to show that he's legitimate.
He opens his trunk, takes out a briefcase. And then when he opens the briefcase, Linda sees an Australian passport.
And then suddenly Christopher punches her multiple times and throws her in the backseat of the car. Oh, my God.
I know.

He gags her.

He covers her eyes, ties her up, and puts her in the trunk. He then drives about four or five hours to a motel in Bainbridge, Georgia, which is close to the state line.
Essentially, I'm not going to get too into the details, but if you watch the documentary, they tell you more. He tortures and sexually assaults her.
And at one point he even attempted to superglue her

eyes shut, but she was able to keep her eyes open and it didn't work. And then this fucking

badass breaks away from him, runs into the motel bathroom in the same room, locks herself in and

starts banging on the walls and screaming to get the attention from the people who were in the

motel room next door, which is just brilliant. Yes're panicked, you're being tortured, and you have the wherewithal to do such a thing.
It's incredible. And this scares Christopher enough to flee.
And so Linda is able to run to the front desk and the police are called and she's able to give the police a detailed description. And by this point, authorities realize they're looking for this one man because she's able to describe him, that pinky ring, the photographer, the mall, all of that stuff.
The passport. The passport, the Australian passport.
She's able to give them enough information that now the FBI are called in. Thank God.
Yeah. Well, not yet.
Okay. But amazing job, Linda.
Amazing job, Linda. She also identifies him from a photo.
Like, wow. The FBI are finally called in and a nationwide manhunt for Christopher Wilder is on.
But unfortunately, they're just following in his footsteps. They are trying to track him down and he's one step ahead of them the whole way.
Christopher drives along the Gulf Coast all the way to Beaumont, Texas. And on March 21st, just one day after abducting Linda, just one day later, he approaches a 23-year-old mother and nursing student at Lamar University in Beaumont, Texas named Terry Walden about modeling.
She turns him down, but Christopher stalks her and abducts her two days later. Like he fucking stalks her from where he had tried to get her to come with him.
And so that's on March 23rd. Terry's body is found three days later.
She had been raped and stabbed to death. And that same day, March 23rd, is when the FBI publicly announces that they have mounted a manhunt for Christopher.
But over the next few days, this news appears mostly in Florida newspapers, not nationwide. So Chris steals Terry's car and drives to Oklahoma City.
And there he abducts a 21-year-old named Suzanne Logan on March 25th, just two days after Terry's abduction. This guy is on a berserker spree.
Yeah. It's the long, slow build to now.
This is the end. Yeah.
And he knows it. So Suzanne's husband and parents report her missing to the police, but the police tell them she's probably just decided to take off.
Despite the fact that there's really no reason to think this and the FBI is already engaged in an active manhunt for this man. And Suzanne has also disappeared from a shopping mall.
So it's unclear if the police in Oklahoma City are unaware of all of this, which is totally likely for the time, or if they just failed to make the connection. But by this point, the story is in the newspapers all around the country.
So who knows why? So Wilder drives Suzanne almost 200 miles away to Newton, Kansas, keeps her alive overnight in a motel room and into part of the next day. They eat breakfast in a restaurant together.
And this is how like cunning he is that he's able to take these women into public places and still control them. Yeah.
I mean, he must have been terrifying. Horrifying person.
Exactly. Yeah.
Christopher then drives her 90 miles farther north into an area near Junction City, Kansas, and there he stabs her to death, and her body is found about 10 days later. So then on March 29th, Christopher abducts an 18-year-old named Cheryl Bonaventura from a mall near Grand Junction, Colorado.
Over the next two days, the two are seen multiple times together. It looks like they're on this crazy drive.
And then Christopher checks into a motel in Page, Arizona. And Christopher kills Cheryl around March 31st, and her body is found near the Arizona-Utah border in May.
So then Christopher heads to Las Vegas. I mean, this guy's going across the fucking country the fucking country yeah which also if i'm very curious now how those timelines overlap because that is what ted did in the other direction i wonder if he knew that of just like just keep crossing those right state lines and they won't be able to track you as well he definitely later they realized studied some serial killers for sure so possibly and probably and so he he heads to Las Vegas and unbelievably, despite the manhunt being wildly reported, okay, fucking wait for this.
He attends a modeling contest at a mall being held by 17 Magazine as a photographer, as a model photographer. And that's on April 1st.
It's a competition. And he targets a 17-year-old named Michelle Korfman and ultimately kills her.
And her body is found on May 11th at a highway rest area in Southern California. But she's not identified until about a month later.
But there's a photo of him at the mall watching the models. It's him.
He's not disguised maybe he has a thicker beard or something but like i wonder if that the gall it's the but it's also that kind of thing of like they think it's a manhunt where they're like we need to check the motels on the highway type of thing who what idiot would go to exactly the place where everyone would think he would be. Absolutely.
Okay. So now the next abduction leads the spree in a whole different direction.
And this is a direction that will baffle the media and the public, who, of course, at the time had no issues with victim blaming and had it in their heads how a perfect victim would and should act. And when the victim doesn't, they go for her.
So on April 4th, three days after Michelle's abduction in Las Vegas and almost a month before her body was discovered, a popular friendly teenager, 16-year-old Tina Rizico from Torrance, California, is at a local mall called the Del Amo Fashion Center. So Tina's filling out a job application at the Hickory Farm store.
When Christopher approaches her with the same story, he's given all the other girls. And Tina is beautiful too.
So it's not out of the question that she'd be approached near Los Angeles to model. He says he's a photographer and that he thinks she has potential to be a model and that he'd like to photograph her to show to his contacts at a modeling agency that she recognizes the name of the modeling agency as well.
He doesn't have to fucking be with them. He can even make cards that say that he's from that modeling agency, you know? And he's like, we could do the shoot right now.
So Tina, pretty blonde, who is mature for her age. She's 16, but kind of world wary.
After having had a chaotic childhood, she's flattered, but she feels a little uneasy. But she pushes down that uneasy feeling and they walk out of the mall together and get in Christopher's car.
And this is the person who is most centrally interviewed in the documentary, The Beauty Queen Killer. And it's just, it's so moving.
I highly recommend it because she's just the survivor that had to do what she had to do and is still coming to terms with it in a way that we can feel empathy for her in a way that I don't think she could feel for herself in some ways. And it's really heartbreaking.
Tina says later, quote, this is the one point that I regret every second of my life every day. I got in the car with this perfect stranger when all the bells and whistles were going off in my head.
Why didn't I listen to my instincts? Why didn't I listen to the voice in my head? Don't get in a car with a stranger. Because we are taught as women to constantly question ourselves and doubt ourselves.
And how dare you stand up for yourself? And that's ugly. And don't be rude.
Don't be rude and be pretty and feminine and quiet and do what men want you to do. That's what you're, that's what, how we're all raised to this fucking day, fucking day especially back then yeah and then it says tina notices that the car smells weird and in our book i wrote about getting in his car and suddenly going oh fuck because there was a rip in the ceiling of the car it was messy and nasty and i suddenly was like oh i don't know this person at all.
And immediately as we're driving away from the cafe, just all my alarm bells were going off. And I was like, you have to get through this.
You fucked up. Yeah.
You know, so. You didn't fuck up, though.
No, I didn't. You didn't.
Okay, you're right. Yeah.
And that's, that's so important, I think, is that like, it was a time and place then, but it happened to me as well. Not that long ago, 20 years ago, I guess.
So she is uneasy, but she still pushes through that feeling. He drives her up into the mountains, into a wooded area, like same Santa Monica Falcon Mountains is where he took me.
he starts photographing Tina and posing her in different ways and he has her turn his her back

to him to kind of pose. And when she turns back around, he's pointing a gun at her.
In the moment, Tina wonders if she should run or scream, but she doesn't think anyone would hear her. So she decides that her best shot is to go along with everything he makes her do.
He makes her take her clothes off and takes more photographs. He then rapes her and then has her get back in his car.
And when they get back in the car, Christopher tapes her eyes shut and puts sunglasses over the tape. He starts driving Tina across the country, stopping at motels along the way.
At each motel, Christopher, he basically takes the cord from the lamp and peels it apart and uses it to give her electric shocks.

Oh, my God.

So he tortures her and rapes her at various motels. He threatens her with a knife.
He has a gun, as I said, as well. And he has her sleep handcuffed.
And they actually go into restaurants. And she says the entire time she's sitting next to him, he has a gun under his coat pointing at her.
And he is like, I will shoot you if you try to do anything. The entire time they're in the car driving, he has his hand on the gun pointed at her.
Like, there's no escape. And that's like part of it is like, why didn't you jump and roll? And why didn't you start screaming? And it's like like who knows how much this guy told her about what he's already done probably at least enough to scare her to know that he will do anything and he's capable of anything you know also the coercion part of this is the is what everyone should be talking about yeah not why why didn't you do this and that why are men allowed over and over again to do things like this and get probation to get off to get acquitted to all these.
The questions are the wrong fucking question. Totally.
They're the easiest questions to ask. And it's questions that have answers that no one's listening to when the answers come.
Right. And they're the wrong questions.
Absolutely. So Tina says that throughout this ordeal, when they're together, she maintains an affectless demeanor.
She doesn't react. She doesn't show any emotion.
Even when he's hurting her, she complies. So by April 10th, Christopher and Tina are in Merrillville, Indiana, near Gary, Indiana.
And this is where the story started when the teenager approached the pretty girl at the mall. Remember? Yep.
And at this point, Christopher has had Tina at gunpoint and torturing and raping her for a week. So she's under his command.
And this is a 16-year-old girl. At the mall in Maryville, Christopher and Tina go in together.
He points out Don and tells Tina what to say. Tina says that she tries to think of some way to warn Don, but she is so scared and broken down at this point that she can't even figure out a way to do that without getting killed.
She thinks the moment she starts screaming or says anything, he's going to shoot her. And he probably would when you hear the rest of the story.
Okay. So Dawn agrees to go with them.
Dawn gets into her car with Chris driving it. And Tina, the girl who had been abducted, gets into the other car.
And even then she doesn't try to escape. She knows that he's a race car driver.
Remember that? And she thinks that if she tries to get away from him, he will be able to stop her, run her road he'll shoot her she doesn't think she can get away i mean she is she's a child she's brainwashed at this point she's a brainwashed tortured child right and victim entirely it's awful and it's terrible and i feel so much for dawn the other victim and she's interviewed in this documentary as well to this day she's still understandablyably can't wrap her head around it and it seems like can't forgive. And I totally understand that.
But it's bigger than anything that we can wrap our heads around ever because we've never been through it. We probably never will.
Fucking knock on wood. So we can't judge.
you know I mean well and also also the idea that somehow the point is supposed to be forgiveness among the victims. Oh, yeah.
You don't have to. Everyone is on their own trajectory.
They have to get to the place they need to be however they want to. And again, let's focus on animals that need to be in cages and walk around the planet while everyone else makes excuses.

Yeah. So eventually the three of them, they ditch one of the cars and they end up at a motel that

evening. And both of the girls are raped and tortured with the electric shocks.
It's monstrous.

The next day, Christopher turns on the TV in the motel and he sees himself on the news. And the two

kidnapped teenagers see as well that people are looking for them. And it seems like this freaks

Thank you. turns on the TV in the motel and he sees himself on the news and the two kidnapped teenagers see as well that people are looking for them.
And it seems like this freaks him out. And this is a turning point in his spree.
Like he has no control at this point. He fucking knows it's kind of over.
Yeah. So he gets everyone to the car and he drives the teenage victims to Western New York into a remote area.
It's just all over the country. There's like no rhyme or reason to it, which is probably why it was so hard to fucking track him.
Because meanwhile, the cops in Torrance in Southern California, everyone thinks he's still in Southern California. They're looking for him there.
Those FBI bulletins, he's on the FBI Most Wanted list at this point. Those are all happening in Southern California.
Meanwhile, he's in like upstate New York. Yeah.
Okay. And this is just horrific.
So he drives him to a remote area in Western New York. He leaves Tina from Torrance, a 16 year old in the car.
He takes the keys and he takes Dawn into the woods off the road. So Tina's alone in the car.
This is the point where people are like, why didn't you take off? Why didn't you run? Why run why didn't you yeah exactly it just stop asking fucking questions like that where it's like unless you have been tortured for two weeks straight as a 16 year old yeah you why are you pretending this is a normal situation it's a remote area where would she fucking run to she was like there's no coverage there's nowhere i can go so he takes dawn off into the woods and he tries to kill her by suffocating her, but Dawn fights back. And so he stabs her twice in the chest and then flees back to the car.
And he and Tina drive away. Tina later says in this documentary that she is sure that he had just killed Dawn and that his demeanor had changed.
He was clearly like freaking out. And she's like, I'm next.
Yeah, this is about to end. He's going to kill me.
Just like he had just killed Don. Don is alive.
Don survives the stabbing. She's laying there having been stabbed twice.
She thinks about her family and tells herself she just needs to at least try to get to safety for them. She ties her jeans around the stab wounds on her chest and somehow is able to make it to a road and flags down a passing truck driver.
The driver takes Dawn to the hospital. She's seriously injured.
She had been stabbed in the lungs. He had tried to stab her in the heart, but stabbed her in the lungs.
And she was still able to get herself up and go get fucking help for herself. Which is crazy because Christopher tries to come back around.
He was worried she wasn't dead. He comes back to try to kill her 20 minutes later.
So if she hadn't gotten herself up and moving, he would have come back and killed her. Jesus Christ.
I know. I know.

So Don is able to give the FBI a lot of critical information.

They know all these cases are linked.

They know that's the same man that they've been looking for.

But as I said, they've been still focusing their search around Southern California.

And so now they know he had crossed the country.

She tells them that Tina from Torrance is still alive and that he's using her to get other victims. And she tells them that he said he's heading for Canada.
So now they kind of have an area of where he might be. So Christopher hears on the radio that Don has survived and the FBI are closing in on him.
And this ultimately precipitates his next and final murder. It's just so heartbreaking.
So it's April 12th. Christopher abducts a 33-year-old woman named Beth Dodge in the parking lot of a mall.
We're still in Western New York. At this point, he's like frantic and has given up the modeling pretense.
He simply needs a car, a new car, because he knows they're looking for him. Beth had a gold Pontiac Firebird, which is crazy that he picked such a distinctive car, dude.
Pick a fucking Corolla. He's out of his mind.
Right. He approaches Beth.
He pulls out his gun and makes her get into the car and drives it away with Tina following. And it's like, why couldn't he have just left her there and taken the car? This guy is a monster, that's why.
He takes Beth to a remote area, again with Tina following in the car. And as she's watching, Tina's watching from the other car, he has Beth get out of the car and shoots Beth in the back, killing her.
And Beth leaves behind her husband and a four-year-old daughter who as an adult adult, is interviewed in this documentary as well. Oh, my God.
All right. What next? This is just inexplicable.
Christopher then drives Tina, who he had kidnapped from Torrance and raped and tortured across the country. He drives her to Logan International Airport in Boston.
He walks her up to the ticket counter, buys her a ticket to Los Angeles, gives her like $1,000 in cash, and then leaves her at the airport. Yeah.
So the idea in his mind is, now you can go home, and I'll pay for it. And then just what? And here's some extra cash for the...
I don't even think he said anything like that. He was just like, here's some extra cash for the for the ride and did he think she would continue to be kind of under his spell the way she'd been feel like her compliance for survival must have told him something else about her you know like that yeah she would have been complicit I guess you have to imagine where her brain is because she's like this is is a trick.
This isn't going to happen. She's sure he's about to come back.
She gets on the plane. She takes the overnight flight, sleeps on the plane.
There's multiple stops. She doesn't say anything to anyone.
She gets off the plane in LA in the morning and gets into a cab. And she also was saying at the time, like, I didn't think they were really looking for me.
I wasn't totally sure. Her mom was unstable.
She was like, she might not have even like said I was missing. And she's been in a living hell.
So all of normal life is gone for her. And she's just adapting to this weird hellish world.
The morning before she saw him shoot an innocent woman. In the back.
Point blank in in the back like the disassociation going on there is fucking real and it's a powerful tool and it was working for her and she kept going with it and also she just like get home just get on the plane get home stay within yourself yeah yeah and the next thing that she does is totally scrutinized by the media and i'll never be able to explain it because I'll never be in a situation exactly like this. She is in the cab in LA and she's like, I haven't

changed my clothes in over a week. So she asked the cab driver to take her to a lingerie store

so she can buy new underwear and change. We have to assume that this girl is going on

fumes. She's not thinking this through.
Or if you had been through something that

Thank you. we have to assume that this girl is going on fumes she's not thinking this through or if you had been through something that horrible and raped repeatedly you would want those underwear off of you and you're not going to a lingerie store right you are not making it that choice you're saying new underwear there and i need to go get them totally the end so she got a framework of that is disgusting it's so creepy too because she goes there and it seems like she tells the store clerks who she is and because everyone was looking for her at that point like she was a missing person it was like all over the news they recognized her and there's like footage from that time in the documentary where they're like, yeah, she was here and then she took off.

And I think it's an important thing to point out and for us to know about Tina is that she did not have a very stable home life.

In fact, as I said, it was chaotic.

She had experienced childhood sexual abuse.

Her mother had been a drug user.

She had seen her mother overdose.

Her mother hung out with a bad motorcycle crowd all through her childhood.

I'm going to say, her mother had been a drug user she had seen her mother overdose her mother hung out with bad motorcycle crowd all through her childhood and so she will later say that she basically learned how to survive horrific things as a child and she thinks this is what ultimately kept her alive because chris's mo is that he likes scaring women and having them beg for their lives and when Tina didn't do that because she already knew kind of how to disassociate and comply.

He must. is that he likes scaring women and having them beg for their lives.
And when Tina didn't do that because she already knew kind of how to disassociate and comply, he must have seen her differently than other victims somehow. So her trauma saved her in a really twisted way and informed how to react to these situations, which is so sad.
But also it's as sad as it is hopeful, I think. Yeah.
Because the things that happen to you, no one wants bad things to happen. But there are skills and coping mechanisms that come from those bad things that absolutely benefit your life later on.
Yeah, they really do. Yeah.
So after the lingerie store, Tina then goes to her boyfriend's house and which is really telling that she doesn't go to her home because her boyfriend's family were kind of more of a steady presence in her life than her own family were at the time. They know who she's kidnapped by.
They think she's dead. She gets out of the cab and they're all like, what? They're shocked.
And of course, elated to see her and she takes a shower and then they convince her to go to the police i think she's just like going forward in her mind and they're okay here we go so in the weeks following tina's return and when her story and dawn's survival story becomes known tina will sometimes be referred to as an accomplice and the media really wants to pin this on her and and make it seem like was complicit in the whole thing. And she was a willing accomplice, a 16-year-old girl.
The patriarchy was super strong back then. They were doing it.
And once again, just that idea of like, of that whole story. Yeah.
That's who you're fucking talking about. Totally.
The lead character in the story is not her. Yeah.
It's him. Yeah.
And that's what happens every time. Yeah.
And through this whole ordeal, what the media and the public put her through is so ugly. Hopefully it wouldn't happen today.
Her full name is made public. There's all sorts of speculation over her behavior before and after the kidnapping.
It's all scrutinized on the news. Reporters are hounding her and her family.
But the 16-year-old girl who has been held captive and abused repeatedly for 10 days, thankfully, the Torrance police, and this is unexpected and kudos for them, they make a hard stance that Tina is a victim and nothing more. And they have press conferences saying she is a victim.

That is, you know, she has nothing.

They were really on her side.

And I honestly am like, was amazed by that.

And I shouldn't be moved that they're on her side.

But I was.

I mean, it's not.

It wasn't common at all. It certainly isn't expected from a police force.

Like, that's pretty mind blowing.

Back to the same day Tina had come home on April 13th, after Christopher dropped her off at the airport, he makes his way all the way up to a town called Colbrook, New Hampshire, a small town. It's about a 15-minute drive from the Canadian border where he's headed.
He stops at a gas station to ask directions to the border. And just so happens that two state troopers are driving by the gas station at the moment.
And he has a fucking gold Thunderbird, remember? And everyone's looking for him at this point, of course. The troopers see him, they see the car and they get out and confront him.
There's a brief struggle and Christopher lunges into the car for his gun. And there he uses it to shoot himself.
The bullet also injures one of the troopers. And Chris is able to shoot himself one more time.
And he dies by suicide. The trooper ultimately recovers.
And in the weeks and years following Christopher Wilder's death, he is linked as a suspect to multiple other disappearances. And many other women come forward saying he sexually assaulted them.
And I, of course, went to our Gmail, my favorite murder Gmail, and looked up his name and everything. And there are just pages of murderinos telling their own story about having met him or been approached by him.
Murderinos telling their mom's story, their grandma's story, like multiple emails. I couldn't even pick one because they were all the same.
It's kind of a thing. And I have never.
I know. I think when you started talking about Tina's story and the part that was happening in Southern California.
Yeah. I was remembering like maybe a forensic file.
Yes. But it told it in this kind of opposite way.
Totally. It's like a vague like I know some of the circumstances, but the spree, like, I don't remember hearing that at all.

No.

Okay, this is a part that, of course, that I'm fascinated by

because it's about a cold case.

It comes out that right before this spree happened,

Wilder had gone back to Australia to visit his parents,

and while there, he had abducted two teenage girls from a beach

by telling them he was a modeling scout,

and then he had sexually assaulted them

and forced them to take photos with their clothes off.

They went to the police.

Here we go. had abducted two teenage girls from a beach by telling them he was a modeling scout and then he had sexually assaulted them and forced them to take photos with their clothes off.
They went to the police. He was arrested, but he was bailed out by his parents.
And it was like a $350,000 bail. So clearly they were putting the money up for him.
And he was allowed to return to Florida to wait for his trial, which was repeatedly postponed. Now, if that case sounds familiar, it's because it's eerily similar to the infamous Australian Wanda Beach murders, which I just mentioned recently, in which two 15-year-old Sydney girls were killed in 1965.
And there are reports that they were last seen with a teenage boy, which would have lined up with Christopher's age and his time in sydney and it's never been solved and it's one of the most notorious cases in australia it's the first episode of the podcast case file so like oh my god yeah the remains of rosario gonzalez and beth kenyon the first two women to be reported missing in Florida, have never been found. And that is the story of the beauty queen killer, the women whose lives he cut short, and the women who survived him.
Unbelievable. I mean, it blew my mind researching the story.
Yeah. I was just...
I can't believe it. I know.
Wow. Great job.
Thank

you. Amazing.
Thank you. And amazing honesty.
I know that was probably very hard and very triggering as you read this. Yeah.
Thank you. I mean, it's important for other people to hear that, you know, and like know that everyone, especially when you're a teenager, makes the kinds of mistakes that you thoroughly regret in all kinds of ways.

And if you've already gone through pain about the mistake itself, torturing yourself about making a mistake is what my therapist likes to call the second arrow. And it is that's the kind of thing you have to watch out for because you already suffered.
You already suffer. You don't need to suffer more because you're a human being it's not fair yeah thank you I tried looking up this photographer like while I was doing it because somewhere out there there's unconsenting topless photos of me yeah he's out there somewhere and I couldn't find anything it's just it's chilling get me ripping all my nail polish off I know that's what I do when i'm stressed out i've literally twisted this paper clip into this i'm feeling gel nail polish off like that is that's not this was intense unbelievably but also really good job georgia you may love the finer things in life like soft cashmere and effortlessly chic fashion.
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Goodbye. All right.
Well, it's going to be tough to follow that. Sorry.
No, I mean, that's huge. But the theme of this episode is moniker killers.
Yeah. And I think when we learned we were going to do this theme, we were like, oh, how are there any that we don't know? Yeah.
And we both learned that there are. And this one, Maren found.
And again, it happened in Northern California. So I'm like, what kind of job am I doing as a supposed true crime enthusiast if I don't know this story? So it begins in the mid-80s in Redding, California, a town in central Northern California, about 150 miles northeast of San Francisco and 120 miles south of the Oregon border.
Have you been to Redding? No. Redding is like far away Sacramento.
It's like if you're in Sacramento, you drive three, maybe four hours up the five-ish. It's rural.
It's way up there and out there. Wow.
Okay. So, but a lovely little kind of community.
Yeah. Probably you hate it if you're a teenager, but then love it later.
You would move back later. Yeah.
So it's May of 1985, and a 48-year-old woman named Averill Whedon. My husband's last name.
It's your husband's last name. That's weird.
Averill's reported missing by her mother, Eula. Eula desperately tries to track her daughter down, but weeks pass.
No one hears from Averill. This is completely out of character for her and, of course, very concerning for her family and her friends.

Then three months later on August 8th, a woman named Shirley Landreth is fielding calls for Shasta County's Secret Witness Program, which is a local tip line where people can call in anonymously and report information they might have on active investigations, kind of like the local Reading version of Crime Stoppers. That's cool.
Yeah. So Shirley Landreth is a single mom in her 50s who has run this answering service for this tip line for 12 years.
It's a job that means a lot to her. Shirley suffered the tragic loss of her child in a house fire.
So she began to channel her grief into doing what she could to better her community. So beautiful.
So for 12 years, Shirley's been answering calls to the Shasta County secret witness tip line. But on this August day, when the phone rings and she picks it up, something is off.
The caller tells Shirley that he knows where Averill Wheaton is. But before he's willing to share those details, he wants to know more about the secret witness's reward for that information.
But for Shirley, there's something very unsettling about this exchange because she's certain she's heard this man's voice before when he has called in with a different tip also about Averill's case. And so what begins as a missing persons investigation is about to unravel into something much darker.
And this tip line will be at the very center of it all. This is the heroic story of tip line operator Shirley Landreth and the hunt for a northern california serial killer the main source used today is illegal filing from the supreme court of california and the rest of the sources are in our show notes as i said the theme of the show is moniker killers but i'm holding it because of the story got it so it's august 8th 1985 my sister's 17th birthday holy shit uh and shirley landreth is on the phone with a man she believes has called into the secret witness tip line before phone records will later reveal that this man who will refer to now as the tipster did reach out to the tip line two months prior on june 19th my mother's birthday.
How fucking weird is that? That's so creepy. And in the beginning, they were like, and this all begins in May.
So I was like, it's May 11th, but it wasn't. So it isn't just the caller's voice or the rushed way he speaks that's familiar to Shirley.
Because in that first call, he also asked about the amount of money he would be receiving for information on Averill's case. Only when that dollar amount was confirmed, which was $250, did he give what he claimed were directions to Averill's body.
Shirley passed that information along to the police, but it didn't result in anything. They didn't find anything when they followed those directions.
So the tipster did not get a reward. So now on the second call, he is not holding back.
The tipster wants to make one thing clear to Shirley up front. He knows for a fact that Averill's dead, but he says he is not responsible.
He then gives Shirley exact directions to the location of Averill's body, and Shirley makes a particular note that the man gives these directions in meters, not feet.

So then before he signs off, the tipster tells Shirley that he's willing to give more information about Averill's case, as well as six other unsolved murder cases in Shasta County.

What?

As long as the tip line comes through with his reward money quickly then he hangs up shirley is unsettled by this call she immediately reports the tip to police but this time when investigators follow the tipsters directions they do lead directly to avril whedon's body exactly where the tip said she would be. An autopsy will later reveal that Averill had been beaten and strangled to death.
And because this information did lead officers to finding her body, Shirley arranges for a prompt and discreet drop-off of the tipster's $250. Can we do a little investigation first, please? I mean, this is how it worked, where it's like, you're not going to get anonymous tips on active cases if you start, you know, turning it back on people.
Sure, but okay. So police have been investigating Averill's missing case for months.
And her mother, Eula, reported that since she had gone missing on May 23rd, Eula had called Averill's house several times, hoping to find her daughter there. But every time, the only person that was home was a 27-year-old man named Robert Maury, who goes by Bob.
And Maury was Averill's tenant who had been renting one of her spare rooms. He had recently been dishonorably discharged from the army for smoking pot, and now he worked sometimes as a landscaper and sometimes as a flower arranger.
He also became increasingly annoyed at Eula every time she called, completely bizarre and inappropriate, at one point telling her, quote, how the hell am I supposed to know where Averill is? So when Eula reported her daughter missing to the police, a detective named Dave Mundy was put on the case. So Mundy began interviewing everyone close to Averill, including a male friend that last saw her on the back of Bob's motorcycle.
So Bob seems to corroborate this. He can't remember the exact date of this motorcycle ride, but he tells detectives that he dropped Averill off at a local telephone booth while he drove to a different location to buy weed.
Bob claims he didn't want Averill to come to a drug deal with him, but he says that after he made that deal, he went back to the phone booth, picked her up, and they went home. And that's the last time he saw her.
So now it's August 12th, just days after police recovered Averill's body. At the secret witness tip line, the phone rings again.
When Shirley answers, she hears the same voice. It's the tipster.
He tells Shirley that he's ready to share more information on Averill's case in exchange for more reward money. When Shirley tells the tipster that he could speak directly with Detective Dave Mundy, he refuses.
Instead, he announces that he'll call Shirley back and answer the detective's questions through her. Playing detective is far beyond the scope of Shirley's job, but she agrees to this arrangement.
She just wants to keep him talking. So the two settle on a reward amount for the tipster's participation, and the call ends.
Shirley immediately calls Detective Mundy and tells him what is happening. Three days later on August 15th, the tipster calls back into the tip line, as promised, and Shirley asks him questions on behalf of Detective Mundy.
And in response to these questions, the tipster basically tells Shirley that Averill had been murdered over a drug-related dispute.

He claims she was killed with a nylon clothesline before being dragged into the woods, where her killer then hit her with a rock to make sure she was dead.

Before ending the call, the tipster gives Shirley specific directions, once again using meters, where police can find the rock that was used to strike Averill. He also shares that he has even more information, but he's only going to call back after he receives the reward money for this newest tip.
Shirley sends this new tip over to the police and once again arranges for the tipster to pick up his reward at a designated drop-off point. So meanwhile, Detective Mundy is zeroing in on Bob Maury.
He's the prime suspect in this homicide, but Mundy doesn't have much physical evidence to go on. Bob is admittedly the last person to see Averill alive, and he's also acting very, very strangely.
And then three months later, in November of 1985, this is six months after Averill first went missing, Maury calls the Redding Police Department and hints that he knows more than he's letting on. But he's not willing to share his information unless he gets something in exchange.
Specifically, Bob tells an officer that he wants legal protections not just in this murder case, but in an unrelated investigation involving stolen property.

So without promising anything, the officer tells Maury that he'll see what he can do. And then, of course, the next day, Detective Mundy follows up on that.
He calls Bob back and Bob tells the detective that a friend of Averill's, coincidentally the same man who had last seen Averill on Bob's motorcycle, is the one who strangled her to death with the rope. Oh, God.
Bob claims that he actually witnessed this friend carrying out the attack and that he'd been forced to help dispose of Averill's body at gunpoint. so a month later and so that all makes sense of like the anonymous tipster aspect of it is because the people who know real details and real crimes can be associated.
Right. So a month later on December 10th, Bob and Detective Mundy have another conversation.
This time, Bob tweaks a few key details. He now adds that Averill's friend had forced him to hit Averill with the rock, suggesting Bob himself dealt the fatal blow in her murder, but under duress.
But as Bob speaks with Mundy, the detective notices something odd. Bob always relays the distances in meters, not feet.
So they're basically putting together that this is the same person, the tipster and Bob Mundy. So now it's the fall of 1986.
More than a year has passed since Averill's body was first discovered. The detectives are no closer to bringing charges against anyone in connection with this murder.
There is no evidence against Bob Moray. Everything is not coincidental.
Circumstantial. Thank you, Circumst.
But they are chasing leads they've gotten from statements the people in Averill's life have given, like her parents, neighbors, and Bob Maury himself. And while police are convinced Bob is withholding information and might even be involved, they simply don't have the evidence needed to secure a conviction.
Then on September 11th, 1986, the phone at the secret witness tip line begins to ring. Shirley answers once again, and she immediately recognizes the voice on the other end.
It's the tipster. Shirley hasn't heard from him in about a year, but his voice is unmistakable.
And this time the tipster's focus is not a murder. Instead, he claims to have information about a local burglary.
Shirley processes the tip and the caller hangs up. But a couple weeks later, the tipster calls back.
And this time he tells Shirley that he wants immunity in Averill's case. It's unclear what he thinks Shirley can do here.
We don't know exactly how Shirley responds to him on the phone, but the call ends and months pass with no new correspondence.

So now it's August of 1987. Two years have passed since the tipster first called into the tip line, and a year has passed since Shirley last heard from him.
Meanwhile, the police are still trying to figure out who killed Averill. then on august 8th so to the day, my sister's birthday, the tipster calls into secret witness once again.
This time he tells Shirley that he can reveal the location of a missing woman that he identifies as Gretchen Olsten. But before he does, he wants to know how much the reward money will be.
Shirley wants to keep him talking, so she reassures him that he will get money as long as his information helps investigators solve an active case. The phone call ends.
And then days later, on August 17th, the tipster calls back. This time, he shares much more information.
He says Gretchen was killed over a month ago, and then he gives the exact directions to her body.

During this call, the tipster makes it clear that he wants his reward money handed over before an autopsy is conducted.

What? He also tells Shirley that once he picks up his reward, he will leave an envelope behind for investigators, and inside it, he will leave a piece of paper with Gretchen's killer's identity written on it so almost every call with the tipster so far has unsettled Shirley he speaks in a very pushy specific kind of harsh tone he's like very rushed sounds very panicked she knows his voice, you know, like the back of her hand at this point. But because his information has always proven to be valuable, Shirley is becoming convinced she's talking to someone who is directly involved in these murders.
And she wants to keep him talking. She does something that she would normally never do as the operator of an anonymous tip line.
She decides she needs to record a few seconds of her next phone call with the tipster in case it's needed in a future trial, essentially. Very smart.
Very smart. And Shirley doesn't have to wait long because within hours of their conversation about Gretchen Olsen, the tipster calls back asking whether the police have found her body yet.
As Shirley explains, they haven't found anything yet. She manages to get a couple of sentences of this conversation recorded.
And now the tipster's voice is captured for the record. And as we were just saying during your story, but in a much smaller, dumber way, recording a phone call in the mid-80s is difficult to say the least yeah like what are you using one of these guys from school like a it's separate machines completely holding up this to do this yeah everything is manual everything is yeah clunky not easy to do but she did it what shir Shirley didn't know was while she was capturing this man's voice on the phone,

that same day, based on the tipster's information, officers do find a woman's body.

And it's clear that she has been murdered.

What is not clear is her identity.

Detectives soon conclude that the name the tipster gave, Gretchen Olsten, is a fake name.

An autopsy will later reveal that this unidentified woman was sexually assaulted before being bludgeoned to death. And as promised, the $500 reward is placed in an envelope and left at a designated spot for the tipster to anonymously pick up.
And as he promised, the tipster picks up the reward and leaves his own envelope behind for police. But the police take that envelope and open it up they find that it is empty there is no reveal from the tipster but the envelope is kept and collected as evidence so it's around this time that a woman comes forward to report that two months earlier in june of that year she had been raped and she names Bob Maury as her rapist.
The woman says Bob picked her up on his motorcycle under the pretense that he was taking her to a party, but then he pulled into a remote wooded area and sexually assaulted her as he tried to strangle her. She was so sure that Bob was going to kill her, but then he didn't.
He just took her home. She was so terrified, she didn't immediately report the attack.
When telling investigators about the location of her assault, the woman describes the exact same area where police found the body of basically Jane Doe, not Gretchen Olsen, but the Jane Doe that they found based on the tipster's information. Here's an infuriating sentence.
It is unclear why, but Bob Maury is not taken into custody after the survivor of his violent sexual assault comes forward and names him. Jesus Christ.
So now it's September. I mean, this is just kind of, we'll just...
The theme. The theme is time and place.
Sure. The time and place is the 80s.
Yeah. Not a pretty time.
No. So now it's September 15th, 1987.
Shirley's still at work at the tip line. The phone rings.
She picks it up. Once again, it's the tipster.
This time he asks about reward money in the case of a missing 20-year-old local woman named Dawn Berryhill.

Dawn was last seen on June 22, 1987 on the back of an unidentified man's motorcycle. Multiple people, including Dawn's mother, saw her with this man, but they don't know who he is.
Police learned that Dawn had told a neighbor she was going to buy some pot with a guy named Bob. I mean...

So, Shirley confirms that the reward amount for this case is $500, but the tipster now tries to play hardball over that amount. He hangs up, he calls back repeatedly, he's trying to negotiate with her.
Shirley has real reason to believe the tipster will have information that will lead to police finding yet another body so to keep him talking she actually gets secret witnesses permission like the association that put this tip line together she gets permission to bump up the reward to twelve hundred and fifty dollars jesus and with that the tipster starts talking he tells shirley where they'll find's body, again relaying distances and meters. Then he denies any involvement in her death.
At one point, the tipster seems paranoid, so Shirley calmly reaffirms to him that the line is anonymous. And that, quote, she could not recognize a person's voice since she talked to so many people every day.
Good for her. End quote.
And then I just wrote, you're allowed to lie to liars. That's the rule.
And murderers. So using the tipster's information, police are able to locate the remains of Dawn Berryhill.
She's found in the same area where both the body of the Jane Doe was recovered and where the survivor of Bob Maury's sexual assault reported being attacked. Investigators are now convinced that Bob Maury is responsible for the murders of at least three women, Avril Whedon, Don Berryhill, and their Jane Doe, as well as the rape of one survivor.
But before they charge him with any of these crimes, they want to confirm their suspicion that Bob Maury is the tipster. So for this, detectives turn to Shirley Landreth, who's just set up yet another discreet drop off for the tipster's reward money.
But she's very ethical as the operator of an anonymous tip line. She very much believes in the importance of the integrity of it.
Okay. So she doesn't try to find his name.
But someone at the secret witness tip line, we don't know who, shares the drop-off point for the tipster's latest reward. You get him on a, what's that called? Yeah, technicality.
Technicality, thank you. Can you give me all my words on this episode, please?

Soon, Detective Mundy, who is already actively tailing Bob Maury, watches as Bob arrives at and then exits the designated building where the reward money has been left for the tipster. Sure.
And with that, it's confirmed that Bob Maury is the tipster. But when officers confront him about picking up the tip money,

he admits to knowing, quote,

all kinds of girls, end quote,

who have gone missing,

but denies ever murdering anyone.

Can you imagine?

Yeah, I know all kinds.

What are you fucking talking about, dude?

What are you talking about, Bob?

Two weeks later, on October 14th, 1987,

Shirley receives a call

at the secret witness tip line. Once again, it's the tipster, but this time he's pissed.
He would like to speak with the tip line's higher ups to complain about this breach of anonymity. He wants to talk to the manager.
He would like to Karen it up with the manager about how he's been treated poorly. By reporting all these murdered women.
Being paid for the information that only he knows about murdered women i hate him yeah he even threatens to print 10 000 flyers shaming secret witness for failing to protect his identity uh i think everyone would be fine with that yeah flyer it up fool yeah shirley tells him that she'll see what she can do. She knows.
She's playing the game. She knows exactly how to play this man.
Then she contacts her colleagues at the tip line and the police, and they all together come up with a plan. They're going to pull in another secret witness employee who will meet Bob Maury to hear out his concerns while trying to get more information out of him, their ultimate goal being getting him to help them identify their Jane Doe.
At this meeting, Bob can't seem to help himself. After some light questioning, he reveals that he knows where to find the Jane Doe's purse, but that he wants money for that information.
He thinks he's smarter than everyone else, right? They always do. They really do.
They always do. And in this way where where it's just like you think you basically figured out a way to get paid for your drugs or whatever it else it is you're doing totally but also it's that part of i don't know if it's always psychopaths or but that they have to talk to police like it's part of the it's part of it yeah yes that they want to be, that they want to be known.
They want people to talk to them about it. It's what makes them special.
Totally. He wants money for the information about where Jane Doe's purse is.
He also wants help getting a few traffic tickets taken care of. Dude.
When the secret witness staffer tells Bob everything he wants to hear, Bob shares exact directions to the location of Jane Doe's purse. And police immediately find that purse and the driver's license inside, which identifies the Jane Doe as 30-year-old Belinda Jo Stark.
She was last seen in June around the same time Dawn was reported missing and when the survivor of Bob's sexual assault reported being attacked. Incredibly, Bob Mari, no longer an anonymous tipster and probably a serial rapist and killer.
Wow. things are and were and continue to be.
Fair enough. By this point, police have collected

some solid evidence. It's mostly thanks to Bob himself, who's arguably maybe the dumbest person

on the planet. But now the investigators have Bob's fingerprints that are all over Belinda

Jo's purse, as well as all over the envelope left by the tipster at the drop-off location.

They also show a blanket recovered near Belinda Jo's body to two of Bob's former roommates,

who confirmed that it looks identical to one he used to have at his home.

This is giving me, like, remember the movie River's Edge?

Yes.

It's, like, giving me, like, vibes of that.

Yeah.

You know?

Yes.

Kind of like scumbag that's doing stuff around town and people kind of might be aware of He's stupid, but he's getting away with him because it's the 80s. It's the 80s.
On November 6, 1987, investigators arrest Bob Maury and charge him with the murders of Averill Whedon, Belinda Jo Stark, and Dawn Berryhill. He is also charged with rape.
When this case goes to trial, witnesses testify to seeing Bob with these women before they disappeared, and some even tell the court that Bob admitted to murdering women. A former co-worker testifies that Bob Maury once told her, quote, listen, bitch, I have killed before and you'll be just one more.
I'm going to snuff you out. Oh, my God.
End quote.

So it's nice because these days you could turn around and report that as a co-worker of this person. But the key witness in this case is Shirley Landreth.
Over the past three or so years, Shirley has spoken on the phone with the tipster somewhere around 20 times. And she has processed his disturbing, ultra-specific tips that successfully lead to the recovery of three bodies and repeated reward payouts.
By this point, Shirley has revealed her recording of the tipster's voice to investigators. They've listened to it, compared it with Bob's own voice, and determined it is the same man.
It fits into the prosecution's narrative that Bob carried out these murders himself, which is how he had these tips in the first place. When Shirley takes the stand, she tells the court that she believes the tipster is Bob Maury, pointing out the similarities in their words, like meters instead of feet and the tone of voice.
She says, quote, the speed of the speech, the pushiness of it,

the way certain words are grouped together,

the abruptness of the way he terminates conversations.

How scary that the whole time, though,

she, like, goes home from work

and he could know who she is.

You know what I mean?

Like, I wouldn't sleep at night if I were her.

I'd be so scared.

It would be really scary.

Bob Maury never admits to any of the crimes he's charged with with and he brags that no jury would dare convict him but if there's one thing we know about bob maury he's dumb he is found guilty of rape and murder and to this day remains on death row at san quentin now known as the tipster killer he is thought to be responsible for other unsolved murders in Shasta County. Because Bob has never confessed, we do not know his motive, but it has been theorized that he liked playing games with the police through those tips.
Reports vary on how much Bob Maury collected from the secret witness tip line, but we do know it was somewhere around a

few thousand dollars, which would be around $8,000 in today's money. He used it to buy,

among other things, a new motorcycle. But thanks to Shirley Landreth and her work at the secret

witness tip line, she trusted her gut, she kept him talking, and she did that right up until his

arrest. A few years after the trial, a Reading newspaper features a story about Shirley Landreth

I'm going to go ahead and get it. trusted her gut, she kept him talking, and she did that right up until his arrest.
A few years after the trial, a Reading newspaper features a story about Shirley Landreth and her deep commitment to the community via her involvement in Bob Maury's case. But it also talks about her participation in local food drives, screening programs for sick children, and more.
In the article, she's quoted as simply saying, I like to help people. Shirley Landreth passes away in 1994 at the age of 62.
She had cancer. Today, the secret witness tip line of Shasta County still exists.
And just like Shirley Landreth, its current operators are committed to keeping callers anonymous. It takes very special circumstances, like a suspected serial killer repeatedly calling in for months for that to change.
As Detective Mundy once told reporters, quote, it's secret witness, not secret suspect. Damn.
And that's the story of a serial killer known as the tipster killer and Shirley Landreth, the tip line operator who helped take him down. I mean, can we get a made for TV movie immediately? Yeah.
That's incredible. Isn't that good? Yeah.
I had never heard of that. Yeah.
I hadn't either. That's just so sad.
I mean, and then he was getting money from it, which just feels so dirty. Yeah.
Ugh. Wow.
And this is exactly why we've decided to bring fucking hooray back. Because we want to end this on a cheery note, not just here.
So we're doing fucking hoorays again, you guys just send us what your fucking hooray is like the good thing happening for you this week, this month, this year, this life, the thing that you're excited about looking forward to or have had happened to you or happened to other people or just things you're happy about. And you can comment on our social media or email it to us or do whatever the fuck, you know, yell it in the sky.
You can hashtag it fucking hooray. The end.
That was so much information. Jesus.
That was a lot. Okay.
You have one? I do. Go ahead.
Okay. This one's called fucking hoorays.
Are we still doing these? Yeah. Hey, podcasters.
I'm not sure if we're still doing fucking hoorays, but maybe this is just for myself to have a record to look back on bad days. I turned 30 in five days, and although I dread the big 3-0, my high school self and even my 25-year-old self would be so proud of the person I have become and how far I've come from where I was and where I could have been, which I fucking hear you from growing up surrounded by drugs,

sus ass people, and not always loving home. I am making it in this world day after day and looking

back only a little other than the fond memories. I've beaten the statistics of a poverty stricken

drug using jailbird shell of a person like the people I grew up around. And for that, I say fucking hooray.
Stay sexy and listen to Joe Dirt when he says, keep on keeping on and life's a garden. Dig it because that mullet wearing dude is right.
Kelsey. Yeah.
Shout out to someone that means a lot to me that I grew up with and went through the same crazy shit.

Kelsey, we beat the statistics and grabbed life by the balls.

Two Kelsies?

But IE and EY.

Are you serious?

Yes, swear.

Oh, they're best friends for life.

I know.

Oh, Kelsey.

I love it.

I'm so proud of you guys.

And I heard this, like, you know, one of those fucking quotes on social media.

It's like, no one is cheering for you harder than your childhood self who's watching you from the sidelines now going that's right hell yeah you're doing it hell yeah you're doing it hell yeah okay amazing kelsey congratulations all right here's this one it says hey howdy hey ladies with a z after owning our house for not even a full year our basement flooded during a 24 hour long power outage caused by a tornado jesus picture me home alone with a bowl from the kitchen bailing water out of the basement like it was a sinking boat sadly it was all in vain and we ended up with a foot of flood water in our basement for roughly 18 hours everything was trashed. How is this a fucking hooray, you may ask? Because after fighting like hell against the water and having our basement look like an absolute war zone for four months, we finally got our drywall replaced.
The carpet and pad were a total loss, but it feels good to finally be taking our basement back. Fucking hooray for home ownership, even the really shitty parts.
Stay sexy and for the the love of god get a sump pump with a battery backup ashley with an eye oh my god like i need to listen to that because our basement has flooded multiple fucking times go get that i'm gonna that's good advice so scary so surviving that getting through it and still having a fucking hooray even though it's like yeah that's that's the way to live your life. And being grateful for what you have.
Yeah. Send us your fucking hoorays.
And stay sexy. And don't get murdered.
Goodbye. Elvis, do you want a cookie? This has been an Exactly Right production.
Our senior producers are Alejandra Keck and Molly Smith. Our editor is Aristotle Acevedo.
This episode was mixed by Liana Squalachi. Our researchers are Maren McGlashan and Allie Elkin.
Email your hometowns to myfavoritemurder at gmail.com. Follow the show on Instagram at myfavoritemurder.
Listen to My Favorite Murder on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And now you can watch us

on Exactly Right's YouTube page.

While you're there,

please like and subscribe.

Goodbye.

¿Te has dado cuenta

cómo ocultamos la sonrisa

en momentos incómodos?

En la fila del súper,

esperando tu café

o recogiendo a tu hijo en la escuela.

Todos se quedan en silencio y con la mirada baja. Pero, ¿qué pasaría si sonríes primero? Bueno,

Colgate te da la confianza para que puedas hacerlo. Una sonrisa puede romper la tensión

y abrir la puerta a una conexión real. Es un pequeño gesto con una gran recompensa.

Colgate te ayuda a mostrar al mundo tu seguridad en una sonrisa.