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Hitman Reveals Bank Executive's Plot To Kill Estranged Wife · Murder Files Unsealed

0:00
Speaker 1: Imagine for a second that you are, well, you're navigating
0:04
Speaker 1: the already treacherous, emotionally exhausting waters of a messy divorce.
0:09
Speaker 2: Oh, the worst.
0:10
Speaker 1: Right. You're spending your days sorting through shared assets, fighting
0:13
Speaker 1: over custody arrangements, and just trying to keep your head
0:16
Speaker 1: above water.
0:17
Speaker 2: Yeah. It's a nightmare scenario for anyone.
0:19
Speaker 1: Exactly. And then, right in the middle of all that chaos,
0:24
Speaker 1: you find out that your spouse is Shiny new assistant,
0:27
Speaker 1: the one with the posh British accent who answers the
0:29
Speaker 1: office phone, is actually a former exotic dancer.
0:33
Speaker 2: Wow. Yeah.
0:34
Speaker 1: And she isn't just taking messages. She is actively plotting
0:39
Speaker 1: your assassination with a hired hit squad.
0:41
Speaker 2: That is just wild. It is.
0:43
Speaker 1: But now, completely shift gears for a second and imagine
0:46
Speaker 1: a totally different scenario.
0:48
Speaker 2: Okay, I'm with you.
0:49
Speaker 1: You are living in this tight-knit, working-class neighborhood... You wave
0:52
Speaker 1: to the friendly, smiling garbage man every Tuesday morning.
0:55
Speaker 2: Sure, just a normal guy. Right.
0:57
Speaker 1: He is the guy who fixes the neighborhood kids' bicycles
0:59
Speaker 1: when the chains pop off.
1:00
Speaker 2: Yeah.
1:00
Speaker 1: He is this recognized pillar of the community.
1:03
Speaker 2: Everyone knows him.
1:04
Speaker 1: But behind his locked garage door, tucked away among the
1:07
Speaker 1: tools and the junk, he is secretly curating a horrific,
1:11
Speaker 1: decades-long trophy room of victims.
1:14
Speaker 2: When you lay those scenarios out side by side like that,
1:17
Speaker 2: I mean, they sound exactly like the plots of paperback
1:19
Speaker 2: thrillers you'd pick up at an airport bookstore.
1:21
Speaker 1: They really do. It feels like a movie.
1:23
Speaker 2: Right. They feel entirely too extreme, too theatrical to be
1:27
Speaker 2: real life. Because, you know, we are conditioned to believe
1:29
Speaker 2: that reality operates on a much more mundane, predictable frequency.
1:34
Speaker 1: Yeah. Like, things like that just don't happen in the
1:36
Speaker 1: real world.
1:37
Speaker 2: Exactly. But when we start to examine the space where
1:40
Speaker 2: those extremes actually happen, the meticulously plotted corporate hit, or
1:43
Speaker 2: the predator hiding in plain sight, we get a raw,
1:47
Speaker 2: unfiltered look at the true anatomy of a crime.
1:50
Speaker 1: And that is exactly what we are doing today. Because
1:53
Speaker 1: we want to believe that criminal masterminds are these brilliant tacticians.
1:56
Speaker 2: Oh, for sure. Playing three-dimensional chess against the authorities. Yes.
1:59
Speaker 1: But looking at this fascinating stack of true crime reports
2:02
Speaker 1: from Crime Watch Daily that we have in front of
2:04
Speaker 1: us today, the reality is entirely different.
2:07
Speaker 2: It's almost the exact opposite.
2:09
Speaker 1: It really is. The line between getting away with murder
2:12
Speaker 1: and spending the rest of your life in a federal
2:14
Speaker 1: penitentiary usually comes down to, like, a misplaced piece of
2:18
Speaker 1: pizza crust.
2:18
Speaker 2: Or an overly detailed spreadsheet.
2:21
Speaker 1: Exactly. So today in this deep dive, we are exploring
2:25
Speaker 1: how the most elaborate, supposedly foolproof crimes unravel today. because
2:30
Speaker 1: of shockingly mundane mistakes.
2:32
Speaker 2: It is a fascinating dynamic to unpack. I mean, we
2:35
Speaker 2: are going to look at the sheer hubris of a
2:37
Speaker 2: white-collar murder-for-hire plot.
2:39
Speaker 1: Which is just bonkers.
2:40
Speaker 2: Totally. We will examine the terrifying systemic blind spots that
2:45
Speaker 2: allowed a serial killer to hunt without interruption for decades.
2:49
Speaker 1: Decades.
2:49
Speaker 2: Yeah. And finally, we will look at how society attempts
2:53
Speaker 2: to process all of this overwhelming darkness through the lens
2:56
Speaker 2: of best-selling crime fiction.
2:58
Speaker 1: I love that.
2:58
Speaker 2: But I do want to set a ground rule for
3:00
Speaker 2: us right off the bat.
3:01
Speaker 1: Okay, lay it on me.
3:02
Speaker 2: While the details of these cases do get incredibly grim,
3:05
Speaker 2: our goal is not to just wallow in the macabre.
3:08
Speaker 2: We are digging for insight.
3:10
Speaker 1: Right, no trauma voyeurism here.
3:12
Speaker 2: Exactly. We want to extract the underlying mechanisms of criminal investigation,
3:16
Speaker 2: the complexities of human nature, and the societal vulnerabilities that
3:20
Speaker 2: make these crimes possible.
3:22
Speaker 1: I am so glad you set that rule because this material,
3:25
Speaker 1: it gets dark fast.
3:27
Speaker 2: It really does.
3:27
Speaker 1: But whether you are a hardened true crime aficionado or
3:31
Speaker 1: just someone fascinated by how the human brain justifies terrible things,
3:35
Speaker 1: there is so much to learn here.
3:37
Speaker 2: Absolutely.
3:38
Speaker 1: Think about the digital footprint you leave in a single workday.
3:41
Speaker 1: Your emails, your map searches, your text messages.
3:44
Speaker 2: It's massive.
3:44
Speaker 1: Now imagine trying to scrub all of that while planning
3:47
Speaker 1: a felony.
3:47
Speaker 2: Fairly impossible.
3:48
Speaker 1: Right. So let's jump straight into this first source from
3:51
Speaker 1: Crime Watch Daily, the Latham case. To give you the context,
3:55
Speaker 1: we are looking at the wealthy... picturesque, highly manicured circles
4:00
Speaker 1: of Charleston, South Carolina.
4:01
Speaker 2: Oh, beautiful area.
4:02
Speaker 1: Stunning. We are talking grand, historic houses, high society galas,
4:08
Speaker 1: and pristine public reputations.
4:10
Speaker 2: Well, and it is an environment built entirely on optics.
4:13
Speaker 1: Yes, exactly.
4:14
Speaker 2: In those specific high society circles, social currency and reputation
4:18
Speaker 2: are guarded just as fiercely as the actual money in
4:21
Speaker 2: the bank.
4:22
Speaker 1: And sitting right at the center of that social scene
4:24
Speaker 1: are Chris and Nancy Latham.
4:26
Speaker 2: Yeah.
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Speaker 1: They've been married for 24 years.
4:28
Speaker 2: A long time.
4:29
Speaker 1: Yeah. And they have two teenage daughters, Emily and Madison.
4:33
Speaker 1: Nancy is this well-known socialite, deeply involved in the community.
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Speaker 2: We are visible.
4:37
Speaker 1: And Chris is a top-tier bank executive. He pulls down
4:42
Speaker 1: a massive high six-figure salary. He wears the three-piece suits
4:46
Speaker 1: from the outside. You know, the facade is bulletproof.
4:49
Speaker 2: But as is usually the case behind closed doors, it's
4:52
Speaker 2: a different story.
4:53
Speaker 1: A completely different story. The marriage is completely disintegrated. They
4:57
Speaker 1: are going through a vicious, messy divorce.
4:59
Speaker 2: Right.
5:00
Speaker 1: And the source material notes that Chris is actively claiming
5:02
Speaker 1: Nancy was having an affair and was actually plotting to
5:04
Speaker 1: kill him.
5:04
Speaker 2: Which is a bold claim.
5:06
Speaker 1: Very bold. Meanwhile, Nancy had filed for divorce based on
5:10
Speaker 1: a mountain of evidence that Chris was carrying on multiple
5:13
Speaker 1: affairs at work.
5:14
Speaker 2: Okay, I want to pause on Chris's accusation for a
5:16
Speaker 2: second because psychologically, that is a massive tell.
5:20
Speaker 1: Oh, really? How so?
5:22
Speaker 2: Chris preemptively accusing his wife of trying to assassinate him
5:25
Speaker 2: is a textbook example of psychological projection.
5:28
Speaker 1: Wait, break that down for me. Is he just lying
5:31
Speaker 1: to make her look bad in divorce court, or is
5:32
Speaker 1: there something deeper happening there?
5:34
Speaker 2: It is often much deeper than a simple lie. Projection
5:38
Speaker 2: is a defense mechanism where a person, usually subconsciously, attributes
5:43
Speaker 2: their own unacceptable thoughts, motives, or actions onto someone else.
5:48
Speaker 1: Oh, wow. So he's putting his own darkness on her.
5:51
Speaker 2: Exactly. In the context of a messy divorce, especially with
5:54
Speaker 2: a highly narcissistic personality, they will accuse their opponent of
5:58
Speaker 2: the exact crime they are currently committing.
6:00
Speaker 1: That is so twisted.
6:02
Speaker 2: It is, but it serves two purposes. It muddies the
6:04
Speaker 2: waters for anyone investigating, and it internally justifies their own
6:08
Speaker 2: terrible behavior.
6:09
Speaker 1: I see.
6:09
Speaker 2: In Chris's mind, if Nancy is trying to kill him...
6:12
Speaker 2: then whatever he does to her is just self-defense.
6:14
Speaker 1: That makes total sense, and it perfectly frames what happens next.
6:18
Speaker 1: Because one of these workplace affairs Nancy discovered is with
6:22
Speaker 1: a woman named Wendy Moore.
6:23
Speaker 2: Right, Wendy.
6:24
Speaker 1: And Wendy's official title is Chris's personal assistant.
6:28
Speaker 2: Heavy air quotes on personal assistants.
6:30
Speaker 1: Heavy air quotes. So Nancy had actually called Chris's office
6:35
Speaker 1: voicemail at one point and heard this very posh, upscale
6:39
Speaker 1: British woman's voice. Okay. And when she confronted Chris about it,
6:43
Speaker 1: he just brushed it off. He told her, oh, that's
6:46
Speaker 1: just my new assistant, Wendy. I had her fake a
6:48
Speaker 1: British accent because it sounds more upscale for the bank clients.
6:52
Speaker 2: Just to be kidding me. Which, again, ties directly back
6:54
Speaker 2: to that obsession with optics and performance.
6:56
Speaker 1: Everything is a show.
6:57
Speaker 2: Chris is curating reality to fit his preferred narrative. He
7:01
Speaker 2: wants to look like the hotshot executive with the British assistant.
7:04
Speaker 1: But the reality of Wendy Moore is completely unhinged from
7:07
Speaker 1: that curated performance. She is not an upscale British administrative professional.
7:13
Speaker 2: Not even close. No.
7:15
Speaker 1: She is a former exotic dancer. And not only that,
7:18
Speaker 1: the source material notes she previously ran what essentially amounted
7:21
Speaker 1: to a live sex studio out of her house with
7:24
Speaker 1: her ex-husband, a man named Sammy Yenawan.
7:27
Speaker 2: That is quite the resume. Right.
7:29
Speaker 1: They were hosting clients, doing live sexual presentations, running online
7:34
Speaker 1: adult entertainment. I mean, it's a completely different universe from
7:37
Speaker 1: Chris Haas's stuffy banking world.
7:39
Speaker 2: And that collision of worlds is the catalyst for the
7:42
Speaker 2: entire crime.
7:43
Speaker 1: What do you mean?
7:44
Speaker 2: Well, you have Chris Latham's environment of boardrooms, quarterly earnings,
7:49
Speaker 2: and risk management violently intersecting with Wendy's world.
7:52
Speaker 1: Which is much grittier.
7:53
Speaker 2: Exactly. And Wendy's world involves Sammy Enoen, a man with
7:57
Speaker 2: a documented, deeply criminal past who had previously been accused
8:00
Speaker 2: of murder. Oh, wow.
8:01
Speaker 1: So he's the real deal.
8:02
Speaker 2: Yeah. It creates a toxic alchemy. Chris provides the funding
8:06
Speaker 2: and the grievance, and Wendy provides the logistical connections to
8:09
Speaker 2: the criminal underworld.
8:10
Speaker 1: And I'm looking at the documents here, and this logistical
8:13
Speaker 1: connection culminates in Wendy literally delivering a package to a
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Speaker 1: hotel in Charleston to hire her ex-husband, Sammy, along with
8:22
Speaker 1: a small-time crook from Kentucky named Aaron Wilkinson.
8:25
Speaker 2: To murder Nancy.
8:26
Speaker 1: To murder Nancy. And the package contains $ 20, 000 in cash,
8:29
Speaker 1: which is crazy enough. But it also contains something the
8:35
Speaker 1: investigators call a hit packet.
8:37
Speaker 2: Ah, the hit packet.
8:38
Speaker 1: What exactly is a hit packet? Because that sounds like
8:41
Speaker 1: something out of a spy movie.
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Speaker 2: That is arguably the most staggering detail in this entire
8:46
Speaker 2: case because it exposes the bizarre psychology of the white-collar criminal.
8:50
Speaker 1: Okay, I'm listening.
8:51
Speaker 2: When you or I think of a contract killing, we
8:54
Speaker 2: picture the Hollywood version. We imagine a whispered conversation in
8:58
Speaker 2: a dark parking garage, maybe an address scribbled on a
9:00
Speaker 2: napkin that gets burned immediately.
9:02
Speaker 1: Right, no paper trail. Keep it quiet.
9:04
Speaker 2: But Chris Latham is a bank executive. He has spent
9:07
Speaker 2: his entire adult life operating in one specific corporate paradigm.
9:11
Speaker 1: He lives in spreadsheets.
9:12
Speaker 2: Exactly. So his version of a contract killing is a
9:15
Speaker 2: meticulously organized administrative dossier.
9:18
Speaker 1: You're kidding.
9:19
Speaker 2: I wish I was. The hit packet contained incredibly detailed
9:22
Speaker 2: biographical information on Nancy. It featured color-printed Google Maps.
9:27
Speaker 1: Color-printed?
9:28
Speaker 2: And not just basic maps. These were annotated... color-coded routes
9:33
Speaker 2: highlighting access points to her neighborhood.
9:35
Speaker 1: That is insane.
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Speaker 2: It gets worse. It included a typed word document detailing
9:40
Speaker 2: the exact make, model, and license plate of Nancy's car
9:44
Speaker 2: alongside a full inventory of every single person who resided
9:48
Speaker 2: in her house.
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Speaker 1: It's like trying to execute a mafia hit using an
9:51
Speaker 1: intern's quarterly pitch deck.
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Speaker 2: That's a perfect way to describe it.
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Speaker 1: I just, I have to think he believed this documentation
9:58
Speaker 1: actually protected him somehow. Like maybe he thought organizing it
10:01
Speaker 1: formally gave him deniability or ensured he got his money's worth.
10:04
Speaker 2: It is the ultimate manifestation of corporate hubris. He treated
10:08
Speaker 2: a murder like it was a morbid business transaction, a
10:10
Speaker 2: specific deliverable for the third quarter.
10:13
Speaker 1: Wow. A deliverable.
10:14
Speaker 2: Yes. The arrogance required to put that dense of a
10:17
Speaker 2: paper trail into the hands of petty street criminals is
10:20
Speaker 2: hard to fathom.
10:21
Speaker 1: It really is.
10:22
Speaker 2: But it gets darker. That Word document actually outlined multiple
10:27
Speaker 2: scenarios for how to execute the hit.
10:29
Speaker 1: Like contingency plans.
10:30
Speaker 2: Basically. They suggested staging it to look like a botched
10:34
Speaker 2: home invasion or random carjacking. And the $ 20, 000 fee wasn't
10:39
Speaker 2: a flat rate.
10:40
Speaker 1: What do you mean?
10:41
Speaker 2: There were essentially performance bonuses built into the contract.
10:44
Speaker 1: No way.
10:45
Speaker 2: Yeah, if the hitmen managed to make it look like
10:47
Speaker 2: a total unforeseeable accident, they would be paid a higher premium.
10:51
Speaker 1: And we haven't even touched on the darkest part of
10:53
Speaker 1: this corporate document. There was a collateral damage clause.
10:57
Speaker 2: Oh, right.
10:57
Speaker 1: Aaron Wilkinson, the hired gun from Kentucky, specifically asked Sammy Enoen,
11:02
Speaker 1: what do I do if someone else is in the house?
11:04
Speaker 1: What if the teenage daughters are there when we do this?
11:07
Speaker 2: A horrifying question.
11:09
Speaker 1: And Sammy Enoen's response, dictated by the terms of the packet, was, well,
11:13
Speaker 1: it'll make it look better, so go ahead and kill
11:14
Speaker 1: them too.
11:15
Speaker 2: That detail really forces you to look at the sociopathic
11:18
Speaker 2: detachment required to operate at that level of corporate criminality.
11:22
Speaker 1: It's chilling.
11:23
Speaker 2: Yeah.
11:23
Speaker 1: His own kids.
11:24
Speaker 2: Chris Latham was a man entirely accustomed to delegating uncomfortable tasks.
11:29
Speaker 2: In his cognitive framework, he wasn't personally committing a murder.
11:33
Speaker 1: He was just outsourcing a problem. Exactly.
11:36
Speaker 2: He was outsourcing a logistical problem. He viewed his wife
11:40
Speaker 2: of 24 years as a liability on a balance sheet
11:43
Speaker 2: that needed to be liquidated.
11:44
Speaker 1: God, that's bleak.
11:46
Speaker 2: And he viewed his own children, his own teenage daughters,
11:49
Speaker 2: as acceptable write-offs if their deaths helped improve the overall
11:53
Speaker 2: optics of the transaction.
11:55
Speaker 1: Okay, I have to push back here for a second.
11:56
Speaker 2: Go for it.
11:57
Speaker 1: Is it just hubris or is it actual stupidity? I mean,
12:00
Speaker 1: does this kind of meticulous spreadsheet-driven planning exist? actually make
12:06
Speaker 1: criminals more vulnerable to getting caught?
12:08
Speaker 2: Oh, without a doubt.
12:09
Speaker 1: Because printing a color-coded hit packet on a computer leaves
12:12
Speaker 1: a massive physical and digital footprint. Did Chris and Wendy
12:16
Speaker 1: genuinely think this was the smart, professional way to handle
12:19
Speaker 1: an assassination?
12:20
Speaker 2: They almost certainly thought they were being highly professional. But
12:23
Speaker 2: you are entirely correct. It makes them infinitely more vulnerable.
12:26
Speaker 1: It has to.
12:27
Speaker 2: The flaw in their logic is the assumption that corporate
12:30
Speaker 2: intelligence naturally translates to criminal intelligence. Right. It absolutely does not.
12:36
Speaker 2: The skill set required to navigate a bank merger is
12:39
Speaker 2: entirely different from the skill set required to commit a
12:42
Speaker 2: major felony and evade law enforcement.
12:44
Speaker 1: They are two different worlds.
12:46
Speaker 2: They really are. They left a trail of evidence that
12:48
Speaker 2: a rookie investigator could follow blindfolded.
12:51
Speaker 1: Oh, I bet.
12:52
Speaker 2: The authorities were able to trace those printed documents directly
12:56
Speaker 2: back to Chris Latham's specific office computer and printer.
13:00
Speaker 1: Because printers have hidden tracking codes. Right. Yes.
13:03
Speaker 2: And beyond that, they found a torn family photograph of
13:06
Speaker 2: Nancy and their daughter Madison that Chris had physically supplied
13:10
Speaker 2: to the hitman.
13:10
Speaker 1: A physical photo.
13:11
Speaker 2: Yeah. And they even recovered a photograph of Nancy's car
13:14
Speaker 2: that forensic data proved was taken by Chris's personal cell phone.
13:18
Speaker 1: So he took the recon photo himself.
13:20
Speaker 2: He did. They essentially documented their own conspiracy at every
13:25
Speaker 2: single step.
13:26
Speaker 1: But here is the wild part. It isn't some brilliant
13:29
Speaker 1: forensic accounting or cyber sleuthing that cracks the case wide
13:33
Speaker 1: open initially.
13:34
Speaker 2: No, not at all.
13:36
Speaker 1: All of that digital evidence is found after the fact.
13:39
Speaker 1: The entire highly funded plot falls apart because of sheer
13:43
Speaker 1: dumb luck.
13:44
Speaker 2: The best kind of luck.
13:45
Speaker 1: Right. Aaron Wilkinson, the hitman from Kentucky, is driving around,
13:50
Speaker 1: And he gets pulled over by a local police officer
13:52
Speaker 1: for a basic routine traffic violation.
13:55
Speaker 2: Which perfectly illustrates the fragility of these elaborate criminal conspiracies.
14:00
Speaker 1: Yes.
14:00
Speaker 2: A chain is only as strong as its weakest link.
14:03
Speaker 1: Exactly. A local cop pulls him over. It's a routine stop.
14:07
Speaker 1: The officer is probably just going to write a standard ticket.
14:09
Speaker 1: But Wilkinson starts acting incredibly nervous.
14:13
Speaker 2: Just sweating it out.
14:14
Speaker 1: Sweating it out. The officer notices, gets suspicious, searches the vehicle,
14:18
Speaker 1: and finds a gun. Wilkinson is arrested, and the moment
14:21
Speaker 1: he is in custody, he instantly folds.
14:23
Speaker 2: Like a cheap suit.
14:24
Speaker 1: Just immediately. He doesn't ask for a lawyer. He doesn't
14:27
Speaker 1: try to play tough. He just spills his guts to
14:29
Speaker 1: the local police.
14:30
Speaker 2: He tells them everything.
14:31
Speaker 1: He tells them about the plot, the hit packet, the $ 20, 000, Sammy, Wendy, Chris,
14:35
Speaker 1: the whole nine yards.
14:37
Speaker 2: See, Chris Latham assumed he was hiring elite operatives because
14:40
Speaker 2: he was paying elite money. Right. But he hired a
14:43
Speaker 2: guy who couldn't even manage to keep his heart rate
14:45
Speaker 2: down during a minor traffic stop.
14:47
Speaker 1: A total amateur.
14:48
Speaker 2: And this is a crucial dynamic in criminal investigations. Criminals
14:52
Speaker 2: who operate at the absolute bottom of the food chain,
14:54
Speaker 2: like Wilkinson, have absolutely zero loyalty to the wealthy executives
14:59
Speaker 2: at the top.
15:00
Speaker 1: Why would they?
15:01
Speaker 2: Exactly. The moment Wilkinson faced a serious weapons charge, he
15:05
Speaker 2: did the math. He traded Chris Latham and Wendy Moore
15:09
Speaker 2: for a lighter sentence without a second thought.
15:11
Speaker 1: And because this involves a murder-for-hire plot crossing state lines...
15:16
Speaker 1: with Wilkinson traveling from Kentucky to South Carolina, it immediately
15:20
Speaker 1: becomes a federal issue.
15:21
Speaker 2: The feds don't mess around.
15:23
Speaker 1: No, they don't. The ATF, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms,
15:26
Speaker 1: and Explosives, gets involved. The feds swoop in and rush
15:30
Speaker 1: Nancy and her daughters to a secure safe house.
15:32
Speaker 2: I can't imagine how terrifying that must have been for her.
15:35
Speaker 1: The source material actually includes a quote from Nancy about
15:38
Speaker 1: this exact moment, and it is devastating. She talks about
15:42
Speaker 1: the pure psychological horror of realizing she was targeted by
15:46
Speaker 1: the man she spent two decades with.
15:49
Speaker 2: Her husband of 24 years.
15:51
Speaker 1: Yeah. She said her worst fear wasn't dying instantly. Her
15:55
Speaker 1: worst fear was waking up in the middle of the
15:56
Speaker 1: night to the hitmen shooting her daughter Madison first and
15:59
Speaker 1: being completely helpless to stop it.
16:01
Speaker 2: That is just gut-wrenching.
16:03
Speaker 1: It is chilling.
16:03
Speaker 2: Yeah.
16:04
Speaker 1: But while Nancy is in the safe house, the feds
16:06
Speaker 1: still have to locate Chris Latham because he realizes the
16:10
Speaker 1: plan has gone sideways and he goes into hiding.
16:12
Speaker 2: And this is where the arrogance of Chris Latham comes
16:14
Speaker 2: full circle.
16:15
Speaker 1: How so?
16:16
Speaker 2: Well, he spent weeks plotting how to erase his wife
16:18
Speaker 2: from existence, treating her like she was a complete non-entity,
16:22
Speaker 2: a line item on a spreadsheet. Right. He underestimated her entirely.
16:26
Speaker 1: Which proves to be his complete undoing. The federal agents
16:29
Speaker 1: are trying to track him down, and they finally just
16:31
Speaker 1: look at Nancy and ask, do you have any idea
16:33
Speaker 1: where he might go? Does he have a secondary location?
16:36
Speaker 2: A bolt hole.
16:37
Speaker 1: Exactly. Nancy sits down. thinks about his habits for a
16:40
Speaker 1: few minutes, makes a couple of quick phone calls to
16:43
Speaker 1: area real estate agents, and turns to the federal agents
16:46
Speaker 1: with an exact address. She tells them he is hiding
16:49
Speaker 1: out at a specific family vacation spot five hours away.
16:53
Speaker 2: 24 years of marriage leaves you with an intimate, encyclopedic
16:58
Speaker 2: knowledge of the person's habits, their safe spaces, and their
17:01
Speaker 2: predictable patterns.
17:02
Speaker 1: You just know them inside and out. You do.
17:04
Speaker 2: Chris thought he was outsmarting her, but her intuition led
17:07
Speaker 2: federal agents right to his front door.
17:09
Speaker 1: They arrest him in his car with a federal agent,
17:12
Speaker 1: completely caught off guard. So let's look at the fallout
17:15
Speaker 1: of all this.
17:15
Speaker 2: Let's do it.
17:16
Speaker 1: Sammy Yenowin, the ex-husband who helped organize the hit, hangs
17:20
Speaker 1: himself in his jail cell before he can face trial. Oh. Yeah.
17:24
Speaker 1: And he leaves this highly dramatic suicide note to Wendy saying,
17:29
Speaker 1: I'm finally freed. Satan is killing me with memories of us.
17:32
Speaker 2: That is incredibly dark.
17:34
Speaker 1: Very. Wendy Moore goes to trial, is found guilty, and
17:38
Speaker 1: is sentenced to 15 years in prison. Chris Latham, the
17:41
Speaker 1: so-called mastermind, gets 10 years in federal prison, and to
17:45
Speaker 1: this day, he maintains he is 100% innocent and was framed.
17:49
Speaker 2: Classic narcissist to the very end.
17:51
Speaker 1: Right. And Aaron Wilkinson, the hitman who got pulled over
17:54
Speaker 1: and stilled the beans, he gets a severely reduced sentence
17:57
Speaker 1: of four years. Wow.
17:59
Speaker 2: Just four years.
18:00
Speaker 1: And Nancy actually goes on record crediting him with saving
18:03
Speaker 1: her life by being such a terrible criminal.
18:05
Speaker 2: The Latham case is really a masterclass in how insulated,
18:09
Speaker 2: wealthy individuals completely misunderstand the mechanics of crime.
18:13
Speaker 1: They think they can just buy their way out of anything.
18:15
Speaker 2: They do. Chris Latham's downfall was his absolute reliance on amateurs,
18:19
Speaker 2: compounded by his absurdly detailed paper trail.
18:23
Speaker 1: The hit packet.
18:23
Speaker 2: The hit packet.
18:24
Speaker 1: Yeah.
18:24
Speaker 2: He genuinely believed his wealth, his status, and his corporate
18:27
Speaker 2: strategies provided an invisible shield against consequences.
18:31
Speaker 1: But it didn't.
18:32
Speaker 2: No. All of that was undone by a traffic cop
18:34
Speaker 2: just doing their job on a random afternoon.
18:36
Speaker 1: The Latham case really proves that trying to apply corporate
18:39
Speaker 1: logic to a crime leaves a massive, brightly lit trail
18:44
Speaker 1: straight back to the perpetrator.
18:45
Speaker 2: A neon sign.
18:47
Speaker 1: But that assumes the killer thinks like a CEO. Yeah.
18:50
Speaker 1: What happens when you strip away the spreadsheets, the identifiable motives,
18:54
Speaker 1: and the financial transactions?
18:55
Speaker 2: Gets much scarier.
18:56
Speaker 1: It does. What happens when you are left with base,
19:00
Speaker 1: chaotic predation? What happens when a killer leaves zero paper trail,
19:04
Speaker 1: operates entirely in the shadows, and specifically targets the people
19:08
Speaker 1: that society has historically ignored.
19:11
Speaker 2: That question brings us to one of the most disturbing
19:13
Speaker 2: and long-running serial killer cases in modern American history.
19:16
Speaker 1: We are shifting drastically now.
19:18
Speaker 2: We are. We're moving from the pristine, manicured lawns of
19:21
Speaker 2: Charleston to the devastating, chaotic reality of South Los Angeles
19:25
Speaker 2: during the 1980s.
19:26
Speaker 1: We really need to establish the context of this environment
19:29
Speaker 1: because the setting isn't just a backdrop. It is a
19:32
Speaker 1: crucial mechanism that allowed this killer to operate.
19:34
Speaker 2: The setting is almost an accomplice.
19:37
Speaker 1: Exactly. It is the 1980s in South L.A. The crack
19:41
Speaker 1: cocaine epidemic has absolutely ravaged the community. The crime rate
19:45
Speaker 1: is astronomical.
19:46
Speaker 2: The highest it had been in decades. Right.
19:49
Speaker 1: The police are dealing with rival gang wars, cartel violence,
19:53
Speaker 1: and drug-related homicides on a daily basis. The violence is
19:56
Speaker 1: so prevalent, it has become a terrible kind of background noise.
20:00
Speaker 2: Just an everyday occurrence.
20:01
Speaker 1: And stepping into that specific chaos is a monster.
20:05
Speaker 2: The environment provided the perfect camouflage for him.
20:08
Speaker 1: How so?
20:09
Speaker 2: Well, Jill Stewart, the former managing editor of the LA Weekly,
20:12
Speaker 2: was deeply involved in covering this case.
20:14
Speaker 1: Okay.
20:15
Speaker 2: And she pointed out that the sheer volume of rampant
20:17
Speaker 2: violence allowed a serial killer to operate in complete silence.
20:21
Speaker 1: Because there were so many bodies anyway.
20:23
Speaker 2: Exactly. The local police departments and, frankly, the broader public
20:27
Speaker 2: were so overwhelmed by the body count of the crack
20:30
Speaker 2: wars that they were writing off these horrific targeted deaths
20:34
Speaker 2: as just more random drug-related collateral damage.
20:37
Speaker 1: And we are talking about a string of victims over years.
20:40
Speaker 1: Women like Deborah Jackson, Henrietta Wright, Barbara Ware, Bernita Sparks, Marilow,
20:46
Speaker 1: Lucretia Jefferson, and Monique Alexander.
20:50
Speaker 2: Important to say their names.
20:51
Speaker 1: Very important. These are all young black women. many of
20:54
Speaker 1: whom were struggling with addiction or poverty.
20:57
Speaker 2: A highly vulnerable population.
20:58
Speaker 1: And the killer's M.O., his modus operandi, the specific pattern
21:03
Speaker 1: he followed, was terrifyingly consistent. They were all found shot
21:07
Speaker 1: dead with a small. 25 caliber handgun.
21:10
Speaker 2: A very specific weapon.
21:12
Speaker 1: Yes, and the trajectory of the bullet was always identical.
21:14
Speaker 1: Left to right, downward angle. And after they were killed,
21:17
Speaker 1: their bodies were just discarded like refuse.
21:19
Speaker 2: That's so disrespectful.
21:20
Speaker 1: It really is. They were dumped in dark alleyways, hidden
21:23
Speaker 1: under old mattresses, stuffed into dumpsters, or concealed under abandoned
21:27
Speaker 1: car engines.
21:28
Speaker 2: Let's break down the forensics of that MO because it
21:31
Speaker 2: tells investigators a massive amount about how this killer operated.
21:34
Speaker 1: I would love to hear that. A.
21:35
Speaker 2: 25 caliber handgun is a very small, low-powered weapon.
21:39
Speaker 1: Basically a pocket pistol, right? Yes.
21:42
Speaker 2: It is easily concealable, but it lacks stopping power from
21:46
Speaker 2: a distance. You have to be close.
21:48
Speaker 1: Okay.
21:49
Speaker 2: And the ballistics detail, that left-to-right, downward angle of the
21:53
Speaker 2: bullet trajectory, paints a highly specific, chilling picture.
21:58
Speaker 1: What does it tell them?
21:59
Speaker 2: It tells law enforcement that the victims were sitting in
22:01
Speaker 2: the front passenger seat of a vehicle, and the driver
22:04
Speaker 2: turned toward them, raised the small weapon, and fired at
22:08
Speaker 2: point-blank range into their chest.
22:10
Speaker 1: Oh my god.
22:11
Speaker 2: It is an incredibly intimate, confined space for a murderer.
22:15
Speaker 2: You cannot escape a car moving at speed while someone
22:18
Speaker 2: holds a gun on you.
22:18
Speaker 1: You're just trapped.
22:19
Speaker 2: Completely trapped. And the fact that the killer was repeatedly
22:22
Speaker 2: dumping bodies in alleyways under discarded trash showed that he
22:26
Speaker 2: never left his comfort zone.
22:28
Speaker 1: He knew those streets.
22:29
Speaker 2: He intimately knew the geography of those specific alleys. He
22:32
Speaker 2: knew the habits of the people who lived there. And
22:34
Speaker 2: most importantly, he understood the systemic blind spots of the
22:38
Speaker 2: city services.
22:39
Speaker 1: So most of the victims had cocaine in their systems
22:41
Speaker 1: when the autopsies were performed. So the working theory is
22:44
Speaker 1: that he was weaponizing their addiction.
22:46
Speaker 2: That's the tragic part.
22:47
Speaker 1: He was luring these vulnerable women into his car with
22:50
Speaker 1: the promise of drugs, getting them comfortable in that passenger
22:53
Speaker 1: seat and then executing them.
22:55
Speaker 2: He had a flawless system.
22:57
Speaker 1: He really did. But he made one critical mistake. He
23:00
Speaker 1: left a woman alive.
23:03
Speaker 2: Anitria Washington. Yes. Her survival is a testament to sheer
23:07
Speaker 2: human resilience and instinct. And from an investigative standpoint... Her
23:11
Speaker 2: story provides the only window we have into the terrifying
23:14
Speaker 2: final moments of these women's lives.
23:16
Speaker 1: Anitria's story is incredible. She accepted a ride to a
23:20
Speaker 1: party from a seemingly friendly man who was driving a
23:22
Speaker 1: souped-up orange Ford Pinto.
23:24
Speaker 2: An orange Pinto stands out.
23:26
Speaker 1: It definitely does. She actually went on record saying her
23:28
Speaker 1: gut told her not to get in the car.
23:30
Speaker 2: Yeah.
23:31
Speaker 1: Her intuition was screaming at her, but she got in anyway.
23:33
Speaker 2: It's so hard to listen to that voice sometimes.
23:35
Speaker 1: It is. And she said that once she was inside
23:37
Speaker 1: the Pinto... the atmosphere changed completely. It got eerie, incredibly quiet.
23:43
Speaker 2: The shift in his demeanor.
23:44
Speaker 1: Yes. The man didn't take her to the party. Instead,
23:47
Speaker 1: he pulled out that same. 25 caliber handgun and shot
23:51
Speaker 1: her point blank in the chest.
23:52
Speaker 2: Unbelievable.
23:53
Speaker 1: And while she was bleeding out of the passenger seat,
23:56
Speaker 1: drifting in and out of consciousness... He sexually assaulted her.
23:59
Speaker 2: Which is just horrific.
24:01
Speaker 1: And then he just continued driving her around the dark
24:03
Speaker 1: streets of the city.
24:04
Speaker 2: The depravity required to casually drive around while a woman
24:07
Speaker 2: bleeds out next to you is hard to comprehend.
24:10
Speaker 1: He must have thought she was already gone.
24:11
Speaker 2: He clearly believed she was going to die in that
24:14
Speaker 2: seat or that she was already dead. And he was
24:16
Speaker 2: just casually waiting to find a suitable alley to dispose
24:19
Speaker 2: of her body.
24:20
Speaker 1: But Anitri made an incredible life or death calculation. Despite
24:24
Speaker 1: the trauma and the blood loss... She realized that if
24:27
Speaker 1: she stayed in that car, she was going to end
24:30
Speaker 1: up exactly like the others, in an alley under a
24:33
Speaker 1: dirty mattress.
24:34
Speaker 2: She knew she had to act.
24:36
Speaker 1: So while the car was moving, she grabbed the door
24:38
Speaker 1: handle and threw herself out onto the street.
24:41
Speaker 2: That is so brave.
24:43
Speaker 1: She figured it was better to risk being run over
24:45
Speaker 1: or left to die on the pavement than to stay
24:48
Speaker 1: in that enclosed space with him.
24:49
Speaker 2: Wow.
24:50
Speaker 1: And against all odds, she survived. The emergency room doctors
24:54
Speaker 1: managed to pull that. 25 caliber bullet out of her chest.
24:58
Speaker 2: And that bullet was the key.
25:00
Speaker 1: Yes. When ballistics ran the tests, it was an exact
25:03
Speaker 1: match to the seven other murdered women.
25:06
Speaker 2: By surviving, Anitria provided law enforcement with a gold mine
25:10
Speaker 2: of actionable evidence.
25:11
Speaker 1: They must have been thrilled.
25:12
Speaker 2: Oh, absolutely. She survived long enough to give a detailed
25:15
Speaker 2: physical description to a police sketch artist.
25:18
Speaker 1: Okay.
25:19
Speaker 2: She provided the exact make model and distinct color of
25:23
Speaker 2: the killer's car, the orange Ford Pinto.
25:25
Speaker 1: Which is huge.
25:26
Speaker 2: Massive. And she remembered one bizarre, highly specific sensory detail
25:31
Speaker 2: from the assault.
25:32
Speaker 1: What was it?
25:33
Speaker 2: She recalled a bright light flashing in her face inside
25:36
Speaker 2: the dark car. She was convinced it was a camera flash.
25:39
Speaker 1: Okay, so let's look at what the LAPD has at
25:41
Speaker 1: this exact moment. They have a physical sketch of the suspect.
25:44
Speaker 2: Yep.
25:45
Speaker 1: They have the specific car he drives. They have the
25:47
Speaker 1: bullet casing.
25:48
Speaker 2: Yep.
25:48
Speaker 1: They have DNA swabs taken from the victims.
25:50
Speaker 2: Yep.
25:51
Speaker 1: And they have a living, breathing survivor who can testify.
25:54
Speaker 2: A mountain of evidence.
25:55
Speaker 1: They have the blueprint to catch him. Logically, this is
25:58
Speaker 1: the moment you call a massive press conference. You plaster
26:02
Speaker 1: the sketch on every television screen. You warn the women
26:05
Speaker 1: of South L.A. to avoid an orange Pinto. And you
26:08
Speaker 1: lock the city down until he is caught.
26:10
Speaker 2: Which brings us to one of the most controversial, heavily
26:13
Speaker 2: debated systemic decisions in the history of the LAPD.
26:17
Speaker 1: I still can't believe this part.
26:18
Speaker 2: Despite having all of that evidence and knowing a serial
26:21
Speaker 2: killer was actively hunting in a specific geographic area, the
26:25
Speaker 2: police made the deliberate, calculated decision to keep the serial
26:29
Speaker 2: killer theory a total secret from the public.
26:31
Speaker 1: I cannot wrap my head around that. How can any
26:34
Speaker 1: department justify knowing a predator is hunting young women in
26:37
Speaker 1: a neighborhood and actively choose not to tell the neighborhood?
26:41
Speaker 2: The internal justification, and this is a tactical decision rooted
26:44
Speaker 2: purely in investigative mechanics, is that they didn't want to
26:47
Speaker 2: spook the suspect.
26:48
Speaker 1: Spook him? Yes.
26:49
Speaker 2: The investigators believed that if they released the sketch, the
26:52
Speaker 2: description of the Pinto, and the ballistics connection to the media,
26:56
Speaker 2: the killer would instantly realize they were closing in.
26:58
Speaker 1: And then what? He runs.
27:00
Speaker 2: Exactly. He might destroy the gun, scrap the car, flee
27:04
Speaker 2: the state entirely, or drastically change his M.O., which would
27:08
Speaker 2: make him significantly harder to track.
27:10
Speaker 1: I guess I see the logic, but.
27:12
Speaker 2: From a cold analytical standpoint... Keeping the investigation covert preserves
27:16
Speaker 2: the integrity of the evidence.
27:18
Speaker 1: But the human cost of that analytical decision is staggering.
27:22
Speaker 1: By protecting the investigation, you are essentially leaving the women
27:27
Speaker 1: of South L.A. completely unprotected.
27:30
Speaker 2: That's the flip side.
27:30
Speaker 1: You are treating the community as bait, hoping he strikes
27:33
Speaker 1: again so you can catch him in the act.
27:35
Speaker 2: It highlights a very real tension in law enforcement. The
27:39
Speaker 2: valuation of an ongoing investigation versus immediate public safety.
27:42
Speaker 1: Right.
27:43
Speaker 2: And it is impossible to ignore the context of who
27:46
Speaker 2: the victims were. We're talking about poor, marginalized black women
27:50
Speaker 2: during the crack epidemic.
27:52
Speaker 1: It's heartbreaking.
27:53
Speaker 2: If this killer had been targeting wealthy individuals in affluent neighborhoods,
27:56
Speaker 2: the likelihood of the police keeping his existence a secret
27:59
Speaker 2: for practical reasons drops to near zero.
28:01
Speaker 1: There would be an uproar.
28:02
Speaker 2: Exactly. The failure to issue a public warning allowed this
28:06
Speaker 2: man to continue his hunting routine with absolute impunity.
28:10
Speaker 1: And he did continue. He killed more women. But then...
28:13
Speaker 1: the timeline gets really strange.
28:15
Speaker 2: It does.
28:16
Speaker 1: He just stops. The motor suddenly ceases. There's a massive
28:19
Speaker 1: 13-year pause where no bodies matching his specific MO are found.
28:24
Speaker 2: A huge gap.
28:25
Speaker 1: The case goes so completely cold that years later, the
28:28
Speaker 1: LA Weekly gives him the moniker, the Grim Sleeper, because
28:32
Speaker 1: he had seemingly gone into a deep hibernation.
28:34
Speaker 2: Great, the sleeper.
28:35
Speaker 1: He holds the terrifying title of being the longest-running serial
28:38
Speaker 1: killer west of the Mississippi, and then he just vanishes.
28:40
Speaker 1: I want to ask you about this, because it defies
28:43
Speaker 1: the Hollywood trope of the unstoppable killer. Why does someone
28:47
Speaker 1: with that level of compulsion just stop for over a decade?
28:50
Speaker 2: It is a massive subject of debate within criminal psychology.
28:54
Speaker 1: I bet.
28:54
Speaker 2: We know that serial killers are generally driven by deep-seated compulsion,
28:58
Speaker 2: a primal psychological urge that is incredibly difficult for them
29:02
Speaker 2: to suppress over long periods.
29:04
Speaker 1: Like an addiction.
29:05
Speaker 2: Exactly. When a killer abruptly stops, experts usually look for
29:10
Speaker 2: external forced pauses.
29:12
Speaker 1: Like what?
29:13
Speaker 2: Did he go to prison for an unrelated crime? Was
29:15
Speaker 2: he institutionalized? Did he move out of the country?
29:18
Speaker 1: Oh, right. Because they can't physically commit the murders.
29:21
Speaker 2: Right. But if none of those apply, psychologists theorize he
29:25
Speaker 2: may have experienced a major shift in his personal life
29:28
Speaker 2: that required all of his psychological energy.
29:30
Speaker 1: Like getting married or having kids.
29:32
Speaker 2: Yeah, a severe illness, a demanding new job, or a
29:35
Speaker 2: complex family dynamic that forced him to exert immense control
29:40
Speaker 2: over his urges.
29:41
Speaker 1: But there is another theory, right? Did he actually stop
29:44
Speaker 1: at all?
29:45
Speaker 2: Ah, yes.
29:46
Speaker 1: Because Beth Silverman, the deputy district attorney who eventually handled
29:49
Speaker 1: the case, has a much more practical and frankly much
29:51
Speaker 1: more terrifying alternative theory.
29:53
Speaker 2: She certainly does.
29:54
Speaker 1: We learn later that this killer was employed as a
29:57
Speaker 1: city garbage man. Silverman theorizes that he never actually stopped
30:00
Speaker 1: killing during those 13 years. He just got exponentially better
30:04
Speaker 1: at disposing of the evidence.
30:05
Speaker 2: It makes a twisted kind of sense.
30:07
Speaker 1: She believes he used his knowledge of the city's waste
30:10
Speaker 1: management system to dump victims directly into the massive Los
30:15
Speaker 1: Angeles landfills along his garbage routes, making the bodies completely unrecoverable.
30:20
Speaker 2: Which is a chillingly logical explanation. The moniker, the Grim Sleeper,
30:24
Speaker 2: implies a period of dormancy, but it might simply be
30:27
Speaker 2: a reflection of law enforcement's inability to find his victims.
30:30
Speaker 1: Right.
30:31
Speaker 2: He didn't go to sleep. He just optimized his disposal method.
30:34
Speaker 1: But eventually he does make a mistake and the bodies
30:36
Speaker 1: start appearing again. The hibernation ends.
30:39
Speaker 2: It gets sloppy.
30:40
Speaker 1: He murders a 15-year-old runaway named Princess Bartholomew and another
30:43
Speaker 1: woman named Valerie McCorvey. Interestingly, he changes his M.O. slightly
30:49
Speaker 1: for these. He strangles them instead of shooting them.
30:51
Speaker 2: Testing a method, maybe.
30:53
Speaker 1: But then he reverts right back to his old habits.
30:55
Speaker 1: He uses the. 25 caliber gun to shoot a woman
30:58
Speaker 1: named Jananisha Peters, a young mother of a four-year-old. Awful.
31:02
Speaker 1: And he stuffs her body into a garbage bag, which
31:04
Speaker 1: he seals shut with a plastic zip tie.
31:06
Speaker 2: And that standard, inexpensive plastic zip tie becomes the turning
31:10
Speaker 2: point of a decades-long investigation.
31:13
Speaker 1: It really does.
31:13
Speaker 2: Because during that 13-year gap, forensic technology had undergone a
31:18
Speaker 2: massive revolution. DNA. Exactly. The LAPD forensic team processes that
31:23
Speaker 2: zip tie, and they manage to extract a viable DNA
31:26
Speaker 2: profile from the person who sealed it.
31:29
Speaker 1: They finally got something concrete.
31:30
Speaker 2: They finally have the killer's genetic fingerprint. But when they
31:34
Speaker 2: run it through CODIS, the National DNA Database, they hit
31:37
Speaker 2: a brick wall.
31:38
Speaker 1: Oh, no.
31:39
Speaker 2: The killer's DNA is not in the system.
31:42
Speaker 1: How is that possible?
31:43
Speaker 2: He had managed to avoid the types of felony convictions
31:46
Speaker 2: that would have legally required him to submit a DNA sample.
31:50
Speaker 2: From a traditional investigative standpoint, it is a dead end.
31:53
Speaker 1: But this is where the investigation takes a leap into
31:55
Speaker 1: what feels like science fiction. They decide to use something
31:58
Speaker 1: called familial DNA searching.
32:00
Speaker 2: A game changer.
32:01
Speaker 1: Now stop right there because I hear that term thrown
32:03
Speaker 1: around on crime shows all the time. What does it
32:05
Speaker 1: actually mean mechanically? How is a familial search different from
32:09
Speaker 1: a standard DNA test?
32:11
Speaker 2: It is a brilliant, though legally complex, workaround. In a
32:14
Speaker 2: standard DNA database search, the computer is looking for a
32:18
Speaker 2: one-to-one mirror image.
32:19
Speaker 1: An exact match.
32:20
Speaker 2: Yes. It compares the crime scene sample to the millions
32:25
Speaker 2: of samples in the database, looking for a 100% exact match.
32:30
Speaker 2: If the killer isn't in the database, the search comes
32:33
Speaker 2: back blank.
32:34
Speaker 1: Right. So what does familial do?
32:36
Speaker 2: Familial DNA searching changes the parameters. Instead of looking for
32:40
Speaker 2: an exact match, The computer algorithm is instructed to look
32:43
Speaker 2: for a partial match.
32:44
Speaker 1: Oh, I see.
32:45
Speaker 2: It scans the database for anyone who shares a statistically
32:48
Speaker 2: significant percentage of genetic markers with the crime scene sample.
32:53
Speaker 1: It's like they couldn't find the killer's exact fingerprint. So instead,
32:56
Speaker 1: they ran a search for anyone who had the exact
32:58
Speaker 1: same palm shape and hand structure.
33:00
Speaker 2: That is a great way to visualize it. They aren't
33:02
Speaker 2: looking for the killer directly. They are looking for his relatives.
33:05
Speaker 1: To narrow it down.
33:06
Speaker 2: They are trying to find a branch on a family
33:08
Speaker 2: tree so they can trace it down to the trunk.
33:10
Speaker 1: And they run this familial search, and they get a hit.
33:13
Speaker 2: A huge break.
33:14
Speaker 1: A young man named Chris Franklin had recently been incarcerated,
33:18
Speaker 1: and as a result, his DNA profile was entered into
33:21
Speaker 1: the state database. The algorithm flags Chris Franklin's DNA because
33:25
Speaker 1: it shares a massive amount of genetic markers with the
33:28
Speaker 1: zip tie sample.
33:29
Speaker 2: The son.
33:30
Speaker 1: Yes. The police look at Chris Franklin's family tree, they
33:32
Speaker 1: trace it back, and they focus entirely on his father,
33:36
Speaker 1: a man named Lonnie Franklin Jr.
33:38
Speaker 2: And when investigators look into Lonnie Franklin Jr., they find
33:41
Speaker 2: a man who perfectly embodies the concept of the banality
33:45
Speaker 2: of evil.
33:46
Speaker 1: Just a normal guy, right?
33:47
Speaker 2: He was living in a modest mint green home right
33:50
Speaker 2: in the heart of South L.A., the exact epicenter of
33:53
Speaker 2: the murders. He was a retired city garbage man securing
33:56
Speaker 2: a city pension. To his neighbors, he was just a friendly,
34:00
Speaker 2: helpful older guy. He fixed cars in his driveway. He
34:03
Speaker 2: chatted with people on the street. He was entirely unremarkable.
34:07
Speaker 1: But the police still have a legal hurdle. They have
34:09
Speaker 1: a strong statistical probability pointing to Lonnie, but they need
34:12
Speaker 1: a direct one-to-one DNA sample from him to legally prove
34:16
Speaker 1: he is the Grim Sleeper and secure an arrest warrant.
34:19
Speaker 2: They need his actual DNA.
34:21
Speaker 1: Right. And they can't just knock on his front door
34:23
Speaker 1: and ask for a cheek swab. If he refuses, he
34:26
Speaker 1: instantly knows the police are on to him and he
34:28
Speaker 1: could destroy evidence or flee.
34:29
Speaker 2: So they have to get creative.
34:31
Speaker 1: Extremely creative. The LAPD sets up an elaborate undercover sting operation...
34:36
Speaker 1: that almost sounds comedic in its execution. They put surveillance
34:40
Speaker 1: on Lonnie and follow him to a local pizzeria.
34:43
Speaker 2: This is my favorite part of the investigation.
34:45
Speaker 1: It's wild. An undercover police officer dresses up as a
34:49
Speaker 1: busboy and works the floor of the restaurant.
34:51
Speaker 2: Full costume.
34:52
Speaker 1: Yes. Lonnie comes in, eats his meal, pays his bill,
34:56
Speaker 1: and walks out. The moment he leaves the table, the
34:59
Speaker 1: undercover busboy swoops in, grabs Lonnie's discarded pizza crust, seals
35:03
Speaker 1: it in an evidence bag, and rushes it to the
35:06
Speaker 1: crime lab.
35:07
Speaker 2: An incredibly mundane piece of trash, a half-eaten pizza crust,
35:10
Speaker 2: brings down one of the most prolific killers in California history.
35:14
Speaker 1: It's poetic.
35:15
Speaker 2: The lab technicians extract the saliva from the crust, build
35:18
Speaker 2: a complete DNA profile, and it is a 100% flawless
35:22
Speaker 2: match to the DNA found on the victims, including that
35:24
Speaker 2: crucial zip tie on Janisha Peters' garbage bag.
35:27
Speaker 1: They finally have him.
35:28
Speaker 2: They do.
35:30
Speaker 1: They execute a search warrant and raid his mint greenhouse.
35:33
Speaker 1: And what they find inside is straight out of a
35:36
Speaker 1: psychological horror film.
35:37
Speaker 2: It's truly disturbing.
35:38
Speaker 1: His garage is described as a pack rat's paradise, overflowing
35:42
Speaker 1: with junk and tools. But hidden within that clutter, they
35:46
Speaker 1: discover his morbid trophy room.
35:49
Speaker 2: The extent of it is shocking.
35:51
Speaker 1: They find the firearms. They find over 160 photographs of
35:54
Speaker 1: different women, many of whom appear to be unconscious, asleep,
35:57
Speaker 1: or possibly dead.
35:58
Speaker 2: Just a horrific collection.
36:00
Speaker 1: And they find homemade pornographic VHS tapes. The source material
36:04
Speaker 1: highlights this deeply disturbing detail. Lottie would take professional pornographic
36:08
Speaker 1: tapes and physically splice in home footage of himself assaulting
36:12
Speaker 1: his victims, creating these hybrid tapes.
36:15
Speaker 2: The splicing of those tapes is a profound psychological insight
36:18
Speaker 2: into his mind.
36:19
Speaker 1: How do you mean?
36:20
Speaker 2: It demonstrates a desperate desire to insert himself into a
36:23
Speaker 2: grander narrative, to blur the lines between his own horrific,
36:26
Speaker 2: pathetic reality and mass-produced gratification.
36:30
Speaker 1: Like he's trying to make himself a star in his
36:31
Speaker 1: own sick movie.
36:32
Speaker 2: He was quite literally constructing his own alternate universe inside
36:36
Speaker 2: that cluttered garage where he was the powerful center of attention.
36:40
Speaker 1: And amidst all that horror, they find one specific piece
36:44
Speaker 1: of evidence that ties a decades-old thread together.
36:47
Speaker 2: The Polaroid.
36:48
Speaker 1: Yes. Hidden out of sight, wedged between two pieces of
36:52
Speaker 1: plywood in the garage, they find a single Polaroid picture.
36:56
Speaker 1: It is a photograph of Anitria Washington, the survivor.
36:59
Speaker 2: Which confirms the bizarre details she reported to the police
37:02
Speaker 2: decades earlier.
37:03
Speaker 1: The camera flash.
37:05
Speaker 2: Exactly. The flash of light she saw in the dark, Pinto,
37:08
Speaker 2: wasn't a hallucination from blood loss. He had taken her
37:11
Speaker 2: picture while she was bleeding in the passenger seat, and
37:13
Speaker 2: he had kept it hidden between two pieces of wood
37:15
Speaker 2: for over 20 years.
37:17
Speaker 1: It is the ultimate, undeniable validation for Anitria, and the
37:21
Speaker 1: final nail in the coffin for Lonnie Franklin Jr.
37:23
Speaker 2: It really is.
37:24
Speaker 1: So they bring him into the interrogation room. And this
37:26
Speaker 1: is the moment I really want to dissect. Because it
37:28
Speaker 1: shatters every single cultural myth we hold about serial killers
37:32
Speaker 1: being these dark, brooding, sophisticated geniuses.
37:35
Speaker 2: It completely destroys that myth.
37:37
Speaker 1: The detectives sit him down at the table. They have
37:39
Speaker 1: the DNA. They have the gun. They have the photos.
37:41
Speaker 1: They slide the photographs of his victims across the metal table,
37:45
Speaker 1: including the Polaroid of Anitria. They look him in the
37:48
Speaker 1: eye and say, only you have the DNA makeup found
37:50
Speaker 1: on these ladies.
37:51
Speaker 2: The absolute checkmate moment.
37:53
Speaker 1: And how does the mastermind respond? Does he give a
37:55
Speaker 1: chilling philosophical monologue about his motives? Does he try to
37:59
Speaker 1: intellectually spar with the detectives?
38:01
Speaker 2: Not at all.
38:02
Speaker 1: No. He looks at the photos of the women he slaughtered,
38:05
Speaker 1: shakes his head, and says, I don't know her. But ugly.
38:09
Speaker 1: I don't know what. But ugly.
38:11
Speaker 2: It is remarkably pathetic.
38:13
Speaker 1: But ugly. That's his defense.
38:14
Speaker 2: When he is finally cornered, presented with undeniable scientific proof
38:19
Speaker 2: of his atrocities, he doesn't have a grand manifesto. He
38:22
Speaker 2: resorts to the defense mechanism of an insecure middle schooler.
38:26
Speaker 1: It's so juvenile.
38:27
Speaker 2: He uses petty adolescent insults. He calls his victims ugly.
38:31
Speaker 2: It strips away all the mystique and terror we assign
38:33
Speaker 2: to these figures.
38:34
Speaker 1: It really does.
38:35
Speaker 2: It reveals the true hollow core of a serial killer's mind.
38:40
Speaker 2: There is no dark intellect to unpack. When you remove
38:45
Speaker 2: the camouflage of the 1980s crack epidemic and the systemic
38:48
Speaker 2: failures of the police department, You were just left with
38:51
Speaker 2: a cruel, deeply inadequate man sitting in an interrogation room
38:56
Speaker 2: making juvenile insults.
38:58
Speaker 1: Lonnie Franklin Jr. was eventually convicted of murdering nine women
39:01
Speaker 1: and one teenager. And the attempted murder of Anitria Washington,
39:04
Speaker 1: he was sentenced to death.
39:06
Speaker 2: A long time coming.
39:07
Speaker 1: But despite the conviction, there is a massive lingering shadow
39:11
Speaker 1: over this case. The police released the photos of the
39:14
Speaker 1: other women found in his garage to the public, hoping
39:16
Speaker 1: to identify them.
39:17
Speaker 2: 160 photos. Yeah.
39:19
Speaker 1: The harsh, devastating reality of the Dream Sleeper case is
39:22
Speaker 1: that the families of many of those women will never
39:24
Speaker 1: get closure. Never. The real world of true crime is messy, chaotic,
39:28
Speaker 1: and deeply depressing. sense of the senseless.
39:49
Speaker 2: When we spend time looking at a case like the
39:51
Speaker 2: Grim Sleeper, where the municipal system failed, where a predator
39:54
Speaker 2: operated with impunity for decades, and where dozens of victims
39:58
Speaker 2: may never even be given their names back, it creates
40:01
Speaker 2: a deep sense of existential dread.
40:03
Speaker 1: It makes you feel unsafe.
40:04
Speaker 2: You cannot tolerate that level of chaotic, unresolved violence in
40:08
Speaker 2: our daily lives. So to cope with it, we turn
40:12
Speaker 2: to stories where the pieces always inevitably fit together perfectly.
40:17
Speaker 1: That perfectly sets the stage for our final source for
40:19
Speaker 1: this deep dive.
40:20
Speaker 2: Let's do it.
40:21
Speaker 1: We are moving from the messy reality of unresolved trauma
40:24
Speaker 1: to the world of a man who has made a
40:26
Speaker 1: staggering global career out of organizing murder into neat, consumable packages.
40:32
Speaker 1: We are talking about Harlan Coben.
40:34
Speaker 2: The master of the modern thriller.
40:36
Speaker 1: To give you an idea of his scale, Harlan Coben
40:38
Speaker 1: is a New York Times number one bestselling author. He
40:40
Speaker 1: has sold over 70 million books. translated into 43 different languages.
40:44
Speaker 2: $ 70 million is hard to even picture.
40:46
Speaker 1: He is the creator of the wildly popular Myron Bolotar
40:49
Speaker 1: series set in New York, and he is the mind
40:52
Speaker 1: behind massive television adaptations like The Five and Fool Me Once.
40:57
Speaker 1: The source material notes he was even developing projects directly
41:00
Speaker 1: with Julia Roberts.
41:02
Speaker 2: If Lonnie Franklin Jr. represents the chaotic, senseless reality of murder,
41:07
Speaker 2: Harlan Coben represents the architecture of murder as pure entertainment.
41:11
Speaker 1: The perfect contrast.
41:12
Speaker 2: This creative process is fascinating to analyze because he operates
41:16
Speaker 2: as an architect of logic.
41:17
Speaker 1: I found his process incredibly intense. He talks about needing
41:21
Speaker 1: to get into the zone where he will write for
41:24
Speaker 1: 48 hours straight, barely sleeping.
41:26
Speaker 2: Just a total marathon.
41:27
Speaker 1: His overarching philosophy is that as a writer, you can't
41:30
Speaker 1: wait for the mood to arrive. You just have to
41:32
Speaker 1: sit in the chair and do the work.
41:33
Speaker 2: Which is very practical.
41:34
Speaker 1: But there is one specific detail about his method that
41:37
Speaker 1: honestly shocked me. Despite writing some of the most intricate,
41:40
Speaker 1: popular crime fiction on the planet, he deliberately avoids doing heavy,
41:45
Speaker 1: real-world research.
41:46
Speaker 2: He refuses to do it.
41:48
Speaker 1: He refuses to go on police ride-alongs or spend days
41:51
Speaker 1: shadowing homicide detectives. His reasoning is that writers often use
41:55
Speaker 1: research as a subconscious excuse to procrastinate actually writing the book.
42:00
Speaker 2: I can see that happening.
42:02
Speaker 1: Honestly, I think that is a bit of a cop-out.
42:04
Speaker 1: Isn't it just lazy to avoid real-world research? I mean,
42:08
Speaker 1: aren't you essentially admitting that you are scared the reality
42:12
Speaker 1: of police work will ruin your shiny entertainment product?
42:15
Speaker 2: I wouldn't call it lazy. I would call it a
42:17
Speaker 2: highly calculated boundary.
42:18
Speaker 1: Ah, so.
42:19
Speaker 2: Coben understands the fundamental difference between reality and entertainment. In
42:23
Speaker 2: a Harlan Coben novel, people die in incredibly elaborate, convoluted ways.
42:28
Speaker 1: A total box of mysteries.
42:29
Speaker 2: They are the victims of complex, multilayered conspiracies. They die
42:33
Speaker 2: in fatal accidents that are later revealed to be sophisticated
42:36
Speaker 2: murders orchestrated by masterminds playing three-dimensional chess. Right. But in reality,
42:41
Speaker 2: in reality, a woman is shot by a retired garbage
42:44
Speaker 2: man in a Ford Pinto for absolutely no logical reason.
42:48
Speaker 2: Or a wealthy bank executive hires a bumbling crook who
42:51
Speaker 2: gets caught because he couldn't use his turn signal properly.
42:55
Speaker 1: Like Chris Latham.
42:56
Speaker 2: Exactly. Fiction requires a strict adherence to logic. Reality is
43:01
Speaker 2: terrifyingly illogical. If Coben spent his days doing ride-alongs and
43:06
Speaker 2: staring at the senseless violence of the real world, it
43:09
Speaker 2: would infect his ability to write the intricate puzzles his
43:13
Speaker 2: audience demands.
43:14
Speaker 1: Okay, that makes sense. But it's not like Coben grew
43:17
Speaker 1: up completely sheltered from the criminal element. His understanding of
43:21
Speaker 1: how criminals operate is rooted in his childhood, just in
43:24
Speaker 1: a very different way.
43:26
Speaker 2: Right, his old neighborhood.
43:27
Speaker 1: He grew up in Livingston, New Jersey. Fun fact, he
43:30
Speaker 1: actually grew up in the same neighborhood as future Governor
43:33
Speaker 1: Chris Christie and Dan Brown, the author of The Da
43:36
Speaker 1: Vinci Code.
43:36
Speaker 2: There must be something in the water there.
43:38
Speaker 1: Seriously. But more importantly for our discussion, he grew up
43:42
Speaker 1: just down the street from a real-life, legitimate mobster known
43:46
Speaker 1: as Richie the Boot.
43:47
Speaker 2: Richie the Boot is a fascinating historical figure and exactly
43:51
Speaker 2: the kind of criminal that influences a young writer's mind.
43:54
Speaker 1: Because he was so over the top.
43:55
Speaker 2: He was a brazen, theatrical type of criminal.
43:59
Speaker 1: Completely theatrical. Coben described how Richie the Boots' house had
44:03
Speaker 1: these two massive, intimidating lion heads mounted on the front gate.
44:08
Speaker 2: Very subtle.
44:09
Speaker 1: The neighborhood rumor was that if you stepped foot on
44:11
Speaker 1: his property uninvited, you risked getting shot on sight. And
44:15
Speaker 1: there were even darker rumors that he had a massive
44:17
Speaker 1: furnace in the back of the property where he disposed
44:20
Speaker 1: of bodies.
44:20
Speaker 2: The fact that Coben grew up adjacent to this larger-than-life,
44:24
Speaker 2: almost cinematic villain clearly influenced his writing.
44:28
Speaker 1: It had to.
44:29
Speaker 2: Richie the Boot feels like a character from a Martin
44:32
Speaker 2: Scorsese movie. He doesn't feel like the guy who quietly
44:34
Speaker 2: collects your trash on Tuesday mornings.
44:36
Speaker 1: No, not at all.
44:37
Speaker 2: And that proximity to theatrical structured crime informs exactly why
44:43
Speaker 2: millions of people consume Coben's fiction so voraciously. It all
44:46
Speaker 2: comes back to the concept of control.
44:48
Speaker 1: We want to feel in control.
44:50
Speaker 2: We read a Harlan Coben thriller because the author makes
44:52
Speaker 2: a subconscious pact with the reader. No matter how dark
44:55
Speaker 2: the story gets, no matter how convoluted the conspiracy seems,
44:58
Speaker 2: There will be a resolution.
45:00
Speaker 1: The puzzle gets solved.
45:01
Speaker 2: The bad guy will be unmasked in the final chapter.
45:03
Speaker 2: The motive will be clearly explained and moral order will
45:06
Speaker 2: be restored to the universe.
45:08
Speaker 1: Which we absolutely do not get in the real world.
45:10
Speaker 2: Never.
45:11
Speaker 1: We don't get that clean resolution for the 30 unidentified
45:14
Speaker 1: women in Lonnie Franklin Jr. 's photographs.
45:17
Speaker 2: Exactly. So by avoiding the police ride-alongs, Cobin is actively
45:21
Speaker 2: protecting the purity of his narrative.
45:24
Speaker 1: May it be clean.
45:25
Speaker 2: If he spent a week standing inside the Grim Sleepers
45:28
Speaker 2: pack rat garage, smelling the decay, looking at the mundane,
45:33
Speaker 2: senseless horror of those spliced VHS tapes, it would ruin
45:37
Speaker 2: his formula.
45:38
Speaker 1: It would undoubtedly ruin the formula. Real crime is profoundly depressing.
45:42
Speaker 1: When you strip it down, it is almost always characterized
45:45
Speaker 1: by poverty, untreated mental illness, massive systemic failures. and pathetic,
45:51
Speaker 1: hollow motivations.
45:52
Speaker 2: Like Chris Latham not wanting to split his bank assets
45:54
Speaker 2: in a divorce.
45:55
Speaker 1: Or Lonnie Franklin Jr. 's deep-seated misogyny. If Coben injected
45:59
Speaker 1: that level of bleak, senseless reality into his novels, they
46:03
Speaker 1: would cease to be entertainment.
46:04
Speaker 2: They would become heavy, depressing tragedies.
46:07
Speaker 1: His readers are looking for the adrenaline spike of the
46:09
Speaker 1: chase and the intellectual satisfaction of solving the puzzle. They
46:13
Speaker 1: are not looking to bear the crushing weight of systemic
46:16
Speaker 1: institutional failure on their daily commute.
46:19
Speaker 2: And clearly, whatever boundary he has set up is working
46:22
Speaker 2: flawlessly on a massive global scale.
46:24
Speaker 1: Oh, Hollywood absolutely loves him. In the source material, he
46:27
Speaker 1: tells this incredible story about the momentum of his career.
46:30
Speaker 2: The Julia Roberts story. Yes.
46:32
Speaker 1: His novel Fool Me Once had just been published. A
46:35
Speaker 1: few days later, his literary agents called him in a
46:38
Speaker 1: panic to say, Julia Roberts is reading the book right now.
46:41
Speaker 2: That's a good call to get.
46:43
Speaker 1: Literally an hour after that phone call, Julia Roberts herself
46:46
Speaker 1: is on the phone with him, pitching these incredibly insightful
46:49
Speaker 1: angles on his characters that he hadn't even fully considered
46:52
Speaker 1: while writing them.
46:53
Speaker 2: He has taken the darkest, most terrifying human taboo murder
46:57
Speaker 2: and managed to spin it into a global entertainment industry
47:00
Speaker 2: where A-list celebrities are lining up to play his characters?
47:03
Speaker 1: It's wild. He even jokes about his success, saying he
47:07
Speaker 1: is totally willing to do Hitchcock-style cameo appearances in his
47:11
Speaker 1: television adaptations. as long as he doesn't have to do
47:14
Speaker 1: any nude scenes.
47:15
Speaker 2: It really is the ultimate transmutation of darkness into light,
47:19
Speaker 2: or at the very least, the transmutation of human darkness
47:21
Speaker 2: into commerce and consumable entertainment.
47:23
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a good way to put it.
47:25
Speaker 2: He takes our deepest fears and packages them into something
47:28
Speaker 2: we can safely enjoy before bed.
47:30
Speaker 1: Okay, let's try to synthesize this incredible journey we've been
47:34
Speaker 1: on today.
47:34
Speaker 2: We've covered a lot of ground.
47:36
Speaker 1: We started by looking at the arrogant, Highly documented, spreadsheet-driven
47:40
Speaker 1: bungling of a wealthy banker's hit squad in South Carolina.
47:44
Speaker 2: The Hit Packet.
47:45
Speaker 1: From there, we move to the devastating, decades-long systemic failure
47:50
Speaker 1: that allowed a garbage man to operate as a serial
47:52
Speaker 1: killer in the shadows of Los Angeles.
47:54
Speaker 2: The Grim Sleeper.
47:56
Speaker 1: And we ended with a marathon 48-hour writing sessions of
47:59
Speaker 1: an author who turns the concept of murder into global
48:03
Speaker 1: puzzle box entertainment.
48:05
Speaker 2: When you lay it all out like that, the thread
48:07
Speaker 2: that connects all three of these incredibly different sources is
48:11
Speaker 2: the messy, unpredictable human element.
48:13
Speaker 1: It's never as clean as the movies.
48:15
Speaker 2: As much as we love the fiction, real crime is
48:17
Speaker 2: rarely a stroke of genius. It is almost never the
48:21
Speaker 2: work of a brilliant mastermind playing a high stakes game
48:24
Speaker 2: of chess with the authority.
48:25
Speaker 1: Not even close.
48:26
Speaker 2: When you look closely at the reality of it, horrific
48:29
Speaker 2: crimes are usually stopped by the most mundane, everyday things imaginable.
48:35
Speaker 2: A local traffic cop deciding to search a car for
48:37
Speaker 2: a minor violation.
48:38
Speaker 1: An undercover busboy bagging a leftover piece of pizza crust.
48:42
Speaker 2: Or a survivor, like Anitria Washington, relying on pure intuition
48:46
Speaker 2: and making a split-second decision to throw herself out of
48:49
Speaker 2: a moving car simply because she refused to become a statistic.
48:52
Speaker 1: So the next time you sit down to watch a
48:55
Speaker 1: slick Hollywood thriller or you crack open a mystery novel
48:58
Speaker 1: on a flight, enjoy the puzzle.
49:00
Speaker 2: Definitely enjoy it.
49:01
Speaker 1: But remember that real-world justice doesn't usually come from a
49:04
Speaker 1: brilliant detective delivering a flawless monologue in a drawing room.
49:08
Speaker 1: It comes from the painstakingly slow collection of discarded plastic
49:11
Speaker 1: zip ties, the intuitive knowledge gained from 24 years of marriage,
49:16
Speaker 1: and a whole lot of sheer dumb luck.
49:19
Speaker 2: Which leaves you with one... one final provocative question to
49:22
Speaker 2: mull over long after we wrap up today.
49:24
Speaker 1: That's right.
49:25
Speaker 2: We consume millions of fictional crime stories every single year.
49:30
Speaker 2: We are actively trained by authors and screenwriters to constantly
49:33
Speaker 2: look for the brilliant mastermind, the complex global conspiracy, the
49:37
Speaker 2: intricate web of deceit. Right. But based on the stark
49:40
Speaker 2: realities we've examined today, does our cultural obsession with fictional
49:44
Speaker 2: masterminds actually blind us to the real threats? Are we
49:46
Speaker 2: so busy looking for the evil genius that we completely
49:50
Speaker 2: miss the incredibly mundane, sloppy, and opportunistic evils hiding in
49:53
Speaker 2: plain sight? Perhaps the smiling garbage man driving down your
49:57
Speaker 2: street or the polished assistant answering the phones at your office?