The Blotter Presents

[txhorns79]

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@txhorns79 that one's in my to-read stack

I thought it was very well done.  It was sympathetic to Hearst to a point, but also didn't downplay how her victimhood turned into complicity.   

[panthergirl13]

Thanks be to GAWD that you mentioned Enrico Colantoni. I cast him in an off-off Broadway play I co-produced years ago (pertinent only that I've seen the guy a LOT and up close), and I was 100% sure it was him.

[Primetimer]

Kevin Smokler and Sarah D. Bunting on what some true-crime shows need women -- and murder victims -- to 'be.'

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[EAG46]

I thought Jodi Arias needed serious psychological help along with her prison term. And Nancy Grace should eat a hornet's nest.

[veronicamers]

Great episode!

I for sure think about Jodi Arias being of another era, hand in hand with Casey Anthony. Now that some time has passed, we are in a place where these crimes of the 00s are getting a re-treatment, if not the full prestige true crime treatment. Unlike the Scott Peterson property, it doesn't sound like this one is re-litigating the evidence. I barely followed this case and sort of side-eyed the amount of attention it got, but as we know, there are reasons certain crimes take hold.

The Gift of Fear! Yes, girl. You should do a Blotter Presents reading list (with all your free time). Karina Longworth did one recently for YMRT: http://www.youmustrememberthispodcast.com/book-club/

P.S. I just finished The Man from the Train (loved it) and was pleased to hear y'alls references to it (and Popular Crime).

[MCMLXXVII]

Are you planning to cover the Griselda Blanco Lifetime movie? 

http://www.mylifetime.com/movies/cocaine-godmother/cocaine-godmother-the-griselda-blanco-story-teaser

She’s also the subject of this documentary.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cocaine_Cowboys_2

[Dohknutty]

I watched the Robert Bardo murder trail on Court TV with the then unknown prosecutor (to me anyway) Marcia Clark. If I remember correctly, his fan letters started taking a disturbing turn when she appeared in something that he thought made her seem slutty. I've seen this kind of behavior on Twitter too. People go from being fans to verbal abuse and threats when their perceived "relationships" with a celeb don't go the way they want. It always makes me think of this case.

[Sarah D. Bunting]

Not at the moment, no -- but let me know if it's any good.

[Sarah D. Bunting]

I think it was Scenes From The Class Struggle In Beverly Hills. Insufficiently virginal for his tastes, I guess. 

 

Did he remind anyone else physically of the actor who plays the James Dean/poetry boho guy in Peggy Sue Got Married?

[Primetimer]

As the anniversary of the Mt. Carmel tragedy draws near, Toby Ball returns to discuss two takes on it, plus a vintage docu with scary parallels.

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[Portia]

Did I mis-hear, or was Sarah saying that certain actors might be too short to play Charles Manson.  Dude was 5'2".

Love the podcast! This is the first time I've visited the forums. I won't always come here to sharpshoot.  :-)

[Sarah D. Bunting]

I think you misheard. I don't remember precisely but I think my point was that the actor who did play Manson in Aquarius was too short to play Koresh? Anyway: welcome! And feel free to file corrections; I just "accused" Bill Kurtis of working in Prairie Home Companion in a recent Mini, which he does not do.

[veronicamers]

Fascinating to learn about Marjoe which I cannot believe has flown under my radar for so long.

I do think fringe/splinter religions qualify as true crime since so often (not always) there is at a minimum some grifting or criminal malfeasance going on.  I've got a whole Goodreads shelf dedicated to the topic of fringe religious sects, but I'm actually pretty ignorant about Waco. I look forward to tracking down the A&E doc. The Paramount show, I haven't delved into and don't plan on it. The pull of Riggins only goes so far.

[KlavdiaVavilova]

Thank you for bringing Marjoe to my attention, how bonkers. I can't believe it's not better known.  I read an interview with director Sarah Kernochan who said she didn't think they met one non-crooked preacher, she thought the Dallas preacher who was talking about Brazil might've been honest but ten years later he was arrested in some kind of car smuggling ring. 

[rwgrab]

Thank you for calling out what I call the Ann Rule-ification of the players in a true crime story.  I know it's not just an Ann Rule thing, but I started to notice it in some of her later stories.  For most of the victims, there seemed to be at least one sentence like :

Sure [victim] was [some undesirable quality or action], but it was only because [perfectly understandable reason]

Like the author is trying to head off any "but he/she deserved it" kind of arguments from the reader/viewer.  I don't think that's necessary because I think we are able to look critically at a situation and make a determination that victims don't "deserve" to be victims.   

[Primetimer]

Eve Batey returns to look at Showtime's documentary miniseries on the opioid crisis, plus Mythbusters and Secrets Of The Dead recreate the escape from Alcatraz.

View the full article

[veronicamers]

Here's a pretty good list of true crime stories that have previously gotten the tv treatment that might be ripe for a re-do, miniseries style a la American Crime Story. A few of these have been covered in cold case segments on The Blotter Presents. 

https://www.avclub.com/attention-ryan-murphy-14-more-true-life-tv-movies-to-1822553802?utm_content=Main&utm_campaign=SF&utm_source=Facebook&utm_medium=SocialMarketing

The McMartin trial would be especially interesting. I'm a big fan of the miniseries Cruel Doubt (based on the McGinnis book of the same name) that stars both Gwyneth and Blythe Danner. And the Jaclyn Dowliby case, still unsolved, makes my heart ache. 

[txhorns79]

I love Karina's podcast!  Her Dead Blondes series was excellent.  

I'll have to check out the Deadliest Decade show.  It sounds a little cheesy, but also serviceable. 

Edited February 9, 2018 by txhorns79

[Sarah D. Bunting]

It is, like mild Cracker Barrel, serviceable cheese.

[MCMLXXVII]

21 hours ago, txhorns79 said:

I love Karina's podcast!  Her Dead Blondes series was excellent.  

Agreed. It was ironic because I attended the memorial service of a blonde high school classmate two weeks ago, and some of the themes were relevant.

I’m now on the “Charlie Manson’s Hollywood” series which is also excellent. 

[Sarah D. Bunting]

^ That one is my favorite. So much cool, dry shade about Manson's rock-star aspirations. 

[KlavdiaVavilova]

EAR/ONS/GSK is one of my "pet cases" I like to think waaaay too much about and 2018 is a bountiful year for ~content~ what with Michelle McNamara's book, podcasts and FBI and Sacramento police dribbling out new tidbits.   So I'm looking forward to this five part docuseries in March, assuming I can find some way to acquire it down here in Australia ....  

http://cnnpressroom.blogs.cnn.com/2018/02/13/hln-renews-search-for-golden-state-killer-in-unmasking-a-killer-premiering-march-18/

Edited February 14, 2018 by KlavdiaVavilova

[Sarah D. Bunting]

That's an interesting one; pity the series is on HLN ("the Nancy Grace network") but I'll see if I can get screeners...

[Primetimer]

Updates on two cases from the early 1980s, Natalie Wood and Joyce McLain, as Dan Patrick Brady returns to the podcast.

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[pigs-in-space]

Psst, I think your link is incorrect.

I definitely want to check out the PBS Alcatraz ep after listening to this! I listened to both Alcatraz episodes of Casefile, and I was surprised at how interesting I found them (I didn't know much about it, and assumed I wouldn't like it...boy was I wrong). Would definitely recommend if people are interested in learning all about the nitty-gritty of both the escape and the battle of Alcatraz as well.

[Sarah D. Bunting]

It's not just wrong; it's as wrong as it could possibly be. Hee. 

Correct link: http://previously.tv/the-blotter-presents/the-trade-and-alcatraz-revisited/

[txhorns79]

The Natalie Wood 48 Hours was just a waste.  I think the police have labeled Wagner a "person of interest" more as a tactic to try to pressure him into giving an interview out of the hope that something new might be learned.  Otherwise, there's nothing there.  I think Sarah's idea that perhaps Wagner and Wood had a fight and she  jumped overboard to be dramatic seems plausible.  I never thought he killed her, but I can see him leaving her to own devices and regretting that choice.

I'll also say I sympathized with Wagner that he didn't want to go to the morgue to see Wood's body.  For example, my grandmother passed away following an illness that left her not looking like she normally did.  My father refused to see her before she was placed in a closed casket.  He said he wanted to remember her as she was, not how she looked now. 

Edited February 15, 2018 by txhorns79

[rwgrab]

As a diehard Unsolved Mysteries fan, I definitely enjoyed the rewatch!  And Dan makes a good point about the very small amount of information that we get for each segment.  I think that's what keeps us guessing about these stories this many years after they originally aired.  There are an infinite number of blanks we can fill in from each 10 minute presentation of the case.

I'm not sure what the rules are about posting links to other message boards, so I can edit this if necessary.  The folks over at sitcomsonline have cataloged all the segments for the Amazon Prime episodes if you're looking for a specific segment:

Seasons 1 and 2

Seasons 3-12

[Sarah D. Bunting]

Dan just can't remember many details, except that he's a detective (i.e., not in uniform). That IS super-helpful, though!

[rwgrab]

2 hours ago, Sarah D. Bunting said:

Dan just can't remember many details, except that he's a detective (i.e., not in uniform). That IS super-helpful, though!

Haha, well that at least eliminates all the "OMG, this hotel/car/refrigerator is haunted because something fell off a shelf in the same zip code one time" segments

[Sarah D. Bunting]

hee, totally. I am trying to watch them all and just skip ghosty/alien stuff that he won't be in, but no luck yet!

[txhorns79]

Quote

hee, totally. I am trying to watch them all and just skip ghosty/alien stuff that he won't be in, but no luck yet!

In the later seasons, they do seem to double down on the new age-y episodes, and maybe a little bit too much time is dedicated to police psychics.  One thing that did strike me was when they would do a segment about a missing person, generally someone who had vanished years before, but the family would claim either to have heard from a person or that someone had seen them alive, there would be an update at end of the segment stating the person had been found dead, not too far from where they vanished.  It was very sad. 

[Primetimer]

Occupants of a non-plural marriage Sarah D. Bunting and Dan Patrick Brady on A&E's latest cult investigation, and other Mormon-related crime properties.

View the full article

[Sarah D. Bunting]

NB: The sound is a little jenky on this one; we really apologize! We're working on a fix for next time. Thanks for hanging in there with us.

[Stowaway]

Mark Hofmann's forgeries shook my father's faith in Mormonism so much, they were probably the main reason I got away with leaving the Church as a teenager without getting thrown out of the house.

Regarding LDS-adjacent true crime, the really "good" stuff comes from the early days of the Church, especially the 13 months when Utah Territory was in open revolt against the US government. The Mountain Meadows Massacre is possibly the most famous atrocity of that era. It had Mormons dressing up like Paiute Indians in order to divert blame when they attacked convoys of settlers on their way to California. The Mormons slaughtered anyone older than eight (the LDS "age of accountability"), but the younger children they took home and raised themselves. 120 emigrants were killed. There have been books and movies about it, but there's yet to be a good one.

I get fatigued by stories about polygamists. It's always the same narrative, writ in different scales: a malignant narcissist uses religion as an excuse to abuse either a few children or a lot of them, repeat decade after decade.

(Side note: the Outlaw Prophet link is currently going to the Vanity Fair article about Natalie Wood.)

[veronicamers]

Great episode! And since I have a Goodreads shelf dedicated to books on true crime and "fringe" religions, I have some recommendations!

I haven't read Salamander, but two other Mark Hoffman themed books are A Gathering of Saints by Robert Lindsay (very detailed account of the saga) and The Poet and the Murderer by Simon Worrall (Hoffman forged lots of other alleged historically significant documents, including lost Emily Dickinson poems/journals).

On the "controlling LDS husbands killing their wives" tip, If I Can't Have You by Gregg Olson does a good job covering the Susan Powell disappearance. And The Stranger She Loved by Shanna Hogan takes on the bonkers case of Dr. Martin MacNeill, an LDS dude who killed his wife after forcing her to have plastic surgery. 

Edited February 22, 2018 by veronicamers

[veronicamers]

Man oh man, I love Unsolved Mysteries. For me and my crime obsessed mom, it was appointment television. My mom was always annoyed by the title though since isn't every mystery unsolved? 

I do have a personal connection to a case featured on the show. Season 2, episode 15 features a hit and run case in North Carolina, still unsolved. I think I may have mentioned it on the board before. A car full of African American young men was run off the interstate in what seems to be a racially motivated incident. My childhood best friend's sister's boyfriend was killed. Very tragic. 

[WInterfalls]

Brent Jeff’s Lost Boy does a good job of explaining some of the machinations that led to Warren being his father’s favorite. Brent’s Dad was Rulon’s first son and the only one to serve in Vietnam. Warren was the first son of Rulon’s favorite wife. Also Warren raped his older brother as well and he eventually killed himself. He came forward after that because he didn’t want to end up the same way. 

 

The Witness Wore Red by Rebecca Musser is also really enlightening. She became Rulon’s 19th wife when he was 85 and she was 18. She talks about not just the marriage stuff but also how difficult it can be, as a child growing up, to have these other mothers that actively hate you as a child of another wife. She tells you how Warren systematically removed threats to his power and took control after Rulon’s stroke. She was with the Texas Rangers when they went to the compound. She wept when she saw that bed you talked about because she knew what it meant.   Another interesting thing Musser points out is that FLDS is basically a dooms day cult. Warren was the school principal and he had them watching the Waco footage over and over and talked about how the world would end soon. 

[Sarah D. Bunting]

I remember that segment!

[Sarah D. Bunting]

These are all great recs; thanks! And that link is fixed; you can also visit it here: http://previously.tv/television/feeling-the-god-in-outlaw-prophet-warren-jeffs/

[WInterfalls]

Going back to the Scientology thing for a minute. It doesn't seem from the outside that Scientology and FLDS would have that much in common but I think rises to power of both Jeffs and Miscavige have startling parallels. Both were able to get basically sole access to the previous leader and then was able to systematically remove any other possible successors.  They were both extremely ruthless in their pursuits of power. 

[Sarah D. Bunting]

Excellent point.

[MerisWetBar]

As a life-long resident of Utah (ex-mo) I can't even count how many people I know named Rulon, no shit. I work with one who is like 25 years old.

Mormon undertones book rec: "Doc" by Jack Olsen.

https://www.amazon.com/Doc-Rape-Lovell-Jack-Olsen/dp/1508628602

[MerisWetBar]

Mark Hofmann's forgeries shook my father's faith in Mormonism so much, they were probably the main reason I got away with leaving the Church as a teenager without getting thrown out of the house.

Regarding LDS-adjacent true crime, the really "good" stuff comes from the early days of the Church, especially the 13 months when Utah Territory was in open revolt against the US government. The Mountain Meadows Massacre is possibly the most famous atrocity of that era. It had Mormons dressing up like Paiute Indians in order to divert blame when they attacked convoys of settlers on their way to California. The Mormons slaughtered anyone older than eight (the LDS "age of accountability"), but the younger children they took home and raised themselves. 120 emigrants were killed. There have been books and movies about it, but there's yet to be a good one.

I get fatigued by stories about polygamists. It's always the same narrative, writ in different scales: a malignant narcissist uses religion as an excuse to abuse either a few children or a lot of them, repeat decade after decade.

(Side note: the Outlaw Prophet link is currently going to the Vanity Fair article about Natalie Wood.)

Hi, have you tried "Blood of the prophets" about Mountain Meadow Massacre? Maybe don't read it if you are still staunch LDS, it takes the hard line on Brigham Young.
https://www.amazon.com/Blood-Prophets-Brigham-Massacre-Mountain/dp/0806136391

[Stowaway]

32 minutes ago, I8A 4RE said:

Hi, have you tried "Blood of the prophets" about Mountain Meadow Massacre? Maybe don't read it if you are still staunch LDS, it takes the hard line on Brigham Young.
https://www.amazon.com/Blood-Prophets-Brigham-Massacre-Mountain/dp/0806136391

Do you recommend it? I read parts of it years back, when my brothers were talking about it. But I decided to give it a pass for admittedly superficial reasons (e.g. the author's offensively redface style choices).

[Sarah D. Bunting]

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the author's offensively redface style choices

Maybe someone has a rec for a different account with...not that in it?

[MCMLXXVII]

If anyone wants more 90s hip-hop true crime or is just a fan of the music, BET’s Death Row Chronicles is quite entertaining and from Suge Knight’s perspective.

 

https://www.bet.com/shows/death-row-chronicles.html

[Sarah D. Bunting]

I don't know why I thought that was a podcast? I'll check it out. Are you planning to watch USA's Unsolved?

[MCMLXXVII]

I’m a cord-cutter, so I’ll see if I can find it.

[joan selby]

I heard on NPR about a movie coming out soon based on the right wing nutcase in Norway, I think?, who killed all those kids at summer camp on an island. I remember seeing a documentary on it on a cable network--I believe it was subtitled ,and wonder if you can find it, and maybe put it on your list. I do not remember a whole lot of coverage about the attack. I would like to see that documentary again. I remember it as very disturbing. thanks