Criminal

Episode 131: Sunset Mesa

Debbie Schum waited a long time to receive the cremated ashes of her friend, LoraLee Johnson, from Sunset Mesa Funeral Directors in Montrose, Colorado. When she did, she felt relieved to finally take...

Jan 10, 2020

Episode 130: Who's There

Crime Blotter: “The Learning Center on Hanson Street reports a man across the way stands at his window for hours watching the center, making parents nervous. Police ID the subject as a cardboard cutou...

Dec 20, 2019

Phoebe, Judge Me

We are trying something different. Have a question for Phoebe? You can call into our voicemail at (919) 697-8231. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Dec 13, 2019

Episode 129: Panic Defense

In 1995, two men filmed an episode of the daytime talk show, The Jenny Jones Show. A few days later, one of the men was dead. The shooter later claimed he’d committed the murder “in a panic that he wa...

Dec 06, 2019

Episode 128: Deep Breath

World-class biathlete Kari Swenson was on an afternoon trail run in the mountains near Big Sky, Montana in July 1984 when two men blocked her path. They were Don and Dan Nichols, a father and son pair...

Nov 22, 2019

Episode 127: The Reverend

In 1977, a man named Robert Burns went to a funeral and shot someone, in the head, in front of 300 people. He didn’t deny it, and his lawyer, Tom Radney, didn’t deny it. Burns told a police officer: “...

Nov 08, 2019

Episode 126: A New Kind of Life

In 1930, a Cuban woman named Elena de Hoyos went to the hospital in Key West, Florida. She had a bad cough, and her family was afraid she had Tuberculosis. She met a German x-ray technician named Carl...

Oct 30, 2019

Episode 125: The Less People Know About Us

SPOILER WARNING: Please listen to Episode 51: Money Tree before you listen to this one. Three years ago, we spoke with Axton Betz-Hamilton about discovering that her identity had been stolen as a chil...

Oct 25, 2019

Episode 124: A Bucket, a Mop, and a Sledgehammer

After a crime occurs, or when someone dies, the police aren’t responsible for cleaning up. That’s not their job. The coroner takes the body, the police conduct their investigation, and then everyone l...

Oct 11, 2019

Episode 123: Mrs. Sherlock Holmes

In 1917, 18-year-old Ruth Cruger disappeared. She’d last been seen getting her ice skates sharpened in the motorcycle shop of a man named Alfredo Cocchi. Newspapers reported that she probably ran off...

Sep 27, 2019

Episode 122: Professor Quaalude

John Buettner-Janusch was one of the first Americans to study lemurs. He held prestigious faculty positions at Yale, Duke and NYU, before surprising everyone with a series of increasingly bizarre crim...

Sep 13, 2019

Episode 121: Off Leash

“I never did anything wrong. I never had a speeding ticket. I think I just saved all my stuff up for just one thing.” This week, we speak with Toby Dorr – better known as the Dog Lady of Lansing Priso...

Aug 30, 2019

Episode 120: The Tunnel

In the late 1800s, North Carolina was trying to build a railway system through the Western part of the state. In December of 1882, something went wrong. The Raleigh News and Observer called it “too ho...

Aug 02, 2019

Episode 119: He's Still Neutral

Dan Stevenson has lived in Oakland’s Eastlake neighborhood for 40 years. He says crime has been an issue for as long as he can remember, but he isn’t one to call the police. He’s a pretty “live and le...

Jul 19, 2019

Episode 118: Stowaway

One day in 1969, Paulette Cooper decided to see what she could get away with. Learn more about Paulette Cooper on her website. Here’s her 1969 Cosmopolitan piece about stowing away onboard the SS Leon...

Jul 05, 2019