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Berdella_s Hidden Confession_ What the Files Finally Revealed- Part 1 · Luke's English Podcast

• 0:06
  Speaker 1: This story will stay with you because it's one of
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: the most bizarre cases I've ever come across.
• 0:11
  Speaker 2: And today we're going to do something unprecedented.
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: This is the story of Bob Burdella, or Bizarre Bob
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: as he came to be known. What makes Bob different
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: is not just what he did, it's how he recorded it.
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: In a series of murders, he documented everything with polaroids
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: and meticulous minute by minute journals, almost like an evil
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: doctor charting a patient's decline. This gives us something almost
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: unheard of, a complete psychological map of a serial killer
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: as he commits his crimes. But the strangest part came
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: after his arrest. Bob agreed to give a full confession
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: under one condition that his words never leave the District
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: Attorney's office. He would tell everything as long as no
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: one outside that room ever heard. Until now, we found
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: the entire transcript, hundreds of pages buried for decades in
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: the Kansas City Police Department cold storage. We also uncovered
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: hours of rare recordings of Bob's voice, and using AI
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: and tracking down the officers who are sitting in that room,
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: we have reconstructed the confession in full. Throughout this episode,
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: you will hear Bizarre Bob in his own words, telling
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: you his story.
• 1:30
  Speaker 3: And this wasn't a sit down and planned scientific experiment
• 1:34
  Speaker 3: by any means, but just to have some record or
• 1:39
  Speaker 3: reference to it in the future.
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: The story of a strange man who literally owned his
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: own store called Bob's Bizarre Bizarre.
• 1:48
  Speaker 3: In eighty four, I started allowing my dark fantasies to
• 1:51
  Speaker 3: come true.
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: A serial killer who prayed on his own customers, a
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: man who once killed while a taxi waited for him outside,
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: and another while his roommate was in the very next room.
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: I'm James Buddy Day This he's unmarked. We're going to
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: begin at the end, on the day of Bob's capture,
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: and like everything else involving.
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: Bob, it's bizarre.
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: It's April second, nineteen eighty eight. Police respond to a
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: nine to one to one call and a central Kansas
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: City neighborhood after a local meter man encounters something alarming.
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: It's a man.
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: Running for help, wearing a dog collar and nothing else.
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: He tells bystanders that he's just escaped from a kidnapper nearby.
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: This is reporter Tom Jackman, who covered the case as
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: it unfolded.
• 2:45
  Speaker 2: It's mind boggling.
• 2:47
  Speaker 4: There were people who saw this naked man with a
• 2:49
  Speaker 4: dog collar limping and didn't help him, but one person
• 2:53
  Speaker 4: did agree to call nine to one one.
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: The call goes out to kcpd's senior officer on Dude,
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: the sergeant Troy Cole, a sixteen year veteran. Months later,
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: he'll be one of only two officers who are in
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: the room for Bob's confession.
• 3:09
  Speaker 5: I got a call from the dispatcher At that time.
• 3:11
  Speaker 5: The victim, Chris Bryson, had told us that he had
• 3:14
  Speaker 5: been hitchhiking and had been picked up by a mail
• 3:17
  Speaker 5: The guy's name was Bob. They went to his house
• 3:21
  Speaker 5: to have a drink. While he was at the house,
• 3:24
  Speaker 5: he was struck in the head and woke up tied
• 3:28
  Speaker 5: to a bed.
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: Reporter Tom Jackman explains what Bryson told first responders.
• 3:33
  Speaker 4: He tells the police that he spent the next several
• 3:35
  Speaker 4: days being injected with things he doesn't know what. He
• 3:40
  Speaker 4: was gagged, his hands were beaten with the lead pipe,
• 3:46
  Speaker 4: and he was repeatedly sexually assaulted by this man, Bob,
• 3:51
  Speaker 4: who kept him tied to a bed. The man would
• 3:54
  Speaker 4: leave during the day come back at night.
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: By the third day of captivity, Bryce and sees his
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: chance to escape. The man he knows is Bob leaves
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: the room. Bryson hears footsteps moving down the stairs, the
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: front door opening, and the sound of Burdella's car pulling away.
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: He starts working at the restraints until one hand comes free,
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: then the other.
• 4:17
  Speaker 4: He was on the second story of this three story
• 4:22
  Speaker 4: frame house, and so he opened the window, and he
• 4:26
  Speaker 4: fell down onto the concrete sidewalk and broke his leg,
• 4:31
  Speaker 4: but he was out.
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: He had escaped at that moment. Bob Burdella's at work
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: a short drive away. Bob runs a shop called Bob's
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: Bazaar Bizarre, where he sells odd collectibles and unusual items.
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: It's a reflection of his fascination with the macabre. While
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: at the store, a neighbor calls him, this is Bob
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: Ardella himself recounting the story to detectives as part of
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: his confession.
• 4:57
  Speaker 3: On Saturday morning, I got a at my shop saying
• 5:02
  Speaker 3: that the police were all over the house. I left
• 5:05
  Speaker 3: my shop and drove to the house, knowing that there
• 5:10
  Speaker 3: was probably only one reason for the police to be there.
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: When Bob arrives at the house, Sergeant Cole has already
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: ordered the premises secured. While waiting for a search, mor
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: Bob pulls up, calmly, exits his car and introduces himself
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: to police.
• 5:26
  Speaker 5: He was approximately six foot two, a little over two
• 5:30
  Speaker 5: hundred pounds on the pudgy side.
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: Burdella is unassuming at first glance, he blends in. He
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: has thick glasses, a bushy mustache, and long, dark hair
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: slicked back. He tells officers he lives alone, but he
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: often has roommates. Neighbors know him as friendly. He's active
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: in the community. He volunteers with PBS. He even helps
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: out in the neighborhood crime Watch.
• 5:56
  Speaker 5: He was very nervous, he was sweating. For usually he
• 6:03
  Speaker 5: was quiet, subdued. Didn't have much to say other than
• 6:07
  Speaker 5: I don't think I better talk. I better have my attorney.
• 6:10
  Speaker 5: So our conversation was very brief. I signed the authorization
• 6:15
  Speaker 5: and Ashley took him up and booked him.
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: When the warrant arrives, Sergeant Cole goes into the house
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: and he's faced with a scene of overwhelming neglect.
• 6:25
  Speaker 5: I've been in a lot of houses that were bad
• 6:29
  Speaker 5: over the course of my career, but that was the worst.
• 6:33
  Speaker 5: It was clutter. There was dog feces scattered throughout the house.
• 6:38
  Speaker 5: There was a turkey carcass that was rotted on the stove.
• 6:42
  Speaker 5: The smell was it was just putrid. I'm thinking, how
• 6:46
  Speaker 5: in the world are we going to go through all
• 6:47
  Speaker 5: this stuff to determine what could be and what could
• 6:52
  Speaker 5: not be evidence.
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: Police are overwhelmed with the amount of clutter. At first,
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: it's hard to determine if anything inside the home matches
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: Bryson's story. It's then that detectives discover a hidden lock
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: door on the second floor. Behind it is a room
• 7:09
  Speaker 1: exactly as Bryson had described what a task force will
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: later designate as quote the room. As the search continues,
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: police make more unsettling discoveries. In the master bedroom, where
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: Bob sleeps. Underneath the mattress, they recover a ziplock bag.
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: Inside is three hundred polaroid photographs. The images depict numerous
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: men in vulnerable or unconscious states. Some appear to be
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: in medical distress, others appear to be unresponsive.
• 7:43
  Speaker 4: Were all these people dead? Where are they? Where are
• 7:46
  Speaker 4: their bodies?
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: Then comes another discovery, a human skull in a hall
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: closet along with an envelope full of teeth. Soon, another
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: skull is recovered, buried in a bucket in the backyard. Finally,
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: detectives find sheets of disorganized shorthand notes, dated entries, timestamps,
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: fragmented phrases. These are Bob's coded diaries, and investigators determine
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: they are chronological records of actions taken against his victims.
• 8:21
  Speaker 4: They surmised this is Bob's shorthand for actual captured in progress.
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: The earliest journal entry begins on July fifth, nineteen eighty four.
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: Two days later, the final note reads quote d D.
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: Detectives interpret that to mean the victim has died. Another
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: entry ends on September twenty sixth, nineteen eighty five, at midnight,
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: with the notation quote eighty six. Again, they think it
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: means deceased. Once investigators assemble the notes, the picture becomes clear.
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: There appear to be sick victims, the first in nineteen
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: eighty four, the last in the summer of nineteen eighty seven,
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: six months before Bryson had escaped. For the first time,
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: Kansas City police have uncovered a serial killer, Bob Burdella.
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: At the time, the very idea of a serial killer
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: is very new. Investigators in Kansas City have never handled
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: a case like this before, and when they start digging,
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: they realized something chilling. Bob had been right under their
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: noses for years. He had quietly been the prime suspect
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: in multiple investigations, cases that were later abandoned for reasons
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: no one can fully explain.
• 9:40
  Speaker 5: It's obviously the biggest case that I've ever been involved in.
• 9:44
  Speaker 5: He was the first serial killer that we had here
• 9:47
  Speaker 5: in Kansas City. There's been one since, but he was
• 9:50
  Speaker 5: the first.
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: Bob Burdella is born in Ohio, where he attends Cuyahoga
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: Falls High School.
• 9:56
  Speaker 3: I was involved in the Stamp Club. I think one
• 9:59
  Speaker 3: of the Algebrickley never did get involved in a lot
• 10:06
  Speaker 3: of school activity.
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: It's nineteen sixty six. Bob is sixteen and his life
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: suddenly changes. During a Christmas visit with relatives, his father
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: dies unexpectedly from a heart attack. This will affect Bob
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: profoundly and change the course of his life.
• 10:24
  Speaker 3: It was over a Christmas holiday down in Canton visiting relatives.
• 10:29
  Speaker 3: He had trouble breathing, went in for a respiratory problem,
• 10:34
  Speaker 3: and the second night he was there, during his sleep,
• 10:37
  Speaker 3: he started coughing and apparently unwedged some cholesterol that went
• 10:46
  Speaker 3: into his heart and basically gave him a heart attack.
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: The tragedy reshapes Bob's worldview completely. He's already carrying a
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: secret he feels he can't share with anyone. He's getting
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: living in a time and place that refused to accept
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: him for who he is. He never tells his father,
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: and even at the time of his confession decades later,
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: he admits that he's never discussed it with his mother.
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: That silence leaves him sitting with shame. He never resolves
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: his father was only thirty nine with no history of
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: health issues. After the death, Bob's emotions turn inward and darken.
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: His grief hardens into resentment, and his worldview begins to corrode.
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: He starts to grow cynical towards education, politics, religion. Everything
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: he once believed in feels hollow now. After graduation, Bob
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: leaves Ohio. He moves to Kansas City to attend the
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: Art Institute and lives in the dorms. He majors in
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: painting and ceramics, hoping to become a college professor, and
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: for the first time, he's able to live openly as
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: a gay man. In his junior year, is arrested in
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: a small drug related incident. To pay legal fees, he
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: starts working in the restaurant industry.
• 12:07
  Speaker 3: And very quickly found out I could make twice as
• 12:12
  Speaker 3: much flipping Hamburgers as I could as a college professor
• 12:16
  Speaker 3: in that field.
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: Within a few years, Bridella becomes an executive chef, saves money,
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: and this is how he's able to buy the two
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: story home on Charlotte Street. It's the same house police
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: will search years later.
• 12:30
  Speaker 3: I bought the house. It was through a mortgage company.
• 12:39
  Speaker 3: I put one hundred dollars down and started making payments.
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: By nineteen seventy one, Bridella has become deeply interested in
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: ancient Roman and Egyptian artifacts. He collects and sells them out.
• 12:51
  Speaker 2: Of his home.
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: This is where he begins to fill his house with collectibles,
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: eventually establishing a shop in the Westport flea market.
• 13:00
  Speaker 3: For the first four or five years, from about seventy
• 13:03
  Speaker 3: one through seventy six, I was collecting and dealing in
• 13:08
  Speaker 3: Roman and Egyptian artifacts, ancient artifacts more associated with the
• 13:15
  Speaker 3: Mid East, and at seventy six I had just gotten
• 13:18
  Speaker 3: into folk art.
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: In nineteen eighty one, Bob is laid off from his
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: executive chef job. He begins to work at the flea
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: market booth full time, renaming it Bob's Bizarre Bizarre. We
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: tracked down one of Bob's former roommates, a man named
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: Paul Cooper, who lived with Bob at the Charlotte Street House,
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: moving out a year before Bob's arrest.
• 13:41
  Speaker 6: But it was bizarre, buzzar you know it because he
• 13:45
  Speaker 6: was bizarre. His stuff was in there was bizarre.
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: When I talked to Paul, I wanted to know what
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: Bob was really like. He described him as eccentric, strange, yes,
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: but also surprisingly respected in the small world of niche
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: art and collectibles.
• 14:03
  Speaker 6: I saw numerous times where people would come to Bob
• 14:07
  Speaker 6: and have him a praise their art. So who's well
• 14:11
  Speaker 6: known in the art community. And Bob told me that's
• 14:13
  Speaker 6: what we made his real money.
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: You know, Bob is known for his obscure knowledge of gems,
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: and he always has his hands in something the shop
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: selling odds and ends out of his house jewelry, making
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: all sorts of adventures.
• 14:28
  Speaker 2: He barters with anyone who will barter back.
• 14:31
  Speaker 6: He was cheap, you know and like he had a rule.
• 14:35
  Speaker 6: He was an atheist, right, completely true atheist. And this
• 14:38
  Speaker 6: ruler says there's only one commandment from God and as
• 14:42
  Speaker 6: thou shalt not pay retail, and he did not.
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: He never gets angry, he never raises his voice. He's polite,
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: but he's undeniably bizarre.
• 14:54
  Speaker 6: We went to a toga party. I had never been
• 14:57
  Speaker 6: to a toga party my life, didn't even really know
• 14:59
  Speaker 6: what one. It was cold outside wintertime. I was dressed
• 15:03
  Speaker 6: in regular clothes with the coat. He had a full
• 15:05
  Speaker 6: length rabbit fur coat on and flip flops. We went
• 15:09
  Speaker 6: to the party and the host came up. The hostess
• 15:12
  Speaker 6: came up to us to take our coats. I took
• 15:16
  Speaker 6: my coat and people was in togas Bob took off
• 15:19
  Speaker 6: that fur coat, didn't have a stitch on, he didn't
• 15:22
  Speaker 6: have a thing on but his necklace in his flip flops.
• 15:25
  Speaker 6: That's Bob. That was Burdella. And you either could go
• 15:31
  Speaker 6: with that or you couldn't be with Bob. He was
• 15:34
  Speaker 6: that type of a guy.
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: Burdella also keeps large dogs that he breeds and cells,
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: and through these animals, he's able to purchase veterinary supplies.
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: These are medications typically intended for animal care.
• 15:48
  Speaker 3: I was getting everything from vitamins, calcium pills, vaccines, and
• 15:54
  Speaker 3: then also was able to get some of the tranquilizers,
• 15:57
  Speaker 3: ace promisine, chlore promisine, and.
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: Investigators will come across numerous reports of Bob using these
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: substances socially. He sells them, trades them, or offers them
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: an exchange for companionship. Bob is known to frequent gay
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: bars downtown, a local park, and a bus station where
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: many vulnerable young men pass through. One witness tells police
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: a story of spending.
• 16:23
  Speaker 2: The night at Bob's house.
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: Bob provided these medications in exchange for being held in
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: the man's arms all night. The man tells police quote,
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: it was like Bob was scared or insecure. It's around
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: this time that Bob begins what he later calls test runs.
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: He invites young men to his house for consensual encounters,
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: often training items or substances for companionship. Some guests would
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: become heavily sedated and have little or no memory of
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: what happened. This is something the men didn't understand till
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: years later. We found a witness report in the Kansas
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: City Police archives, in which a man who knew Bob
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: describes a disturbing pattern Bob offering drugs, the men becoming sedated,
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: and then being restrained. It reads, in part, quote, he
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: had seen three or four different white males twenty one
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: to twenty six years of age tied up in Bridella's bedroom.
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: The witness says. The victims would try to resist. He says, quote,
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: they would tell Burdella to stop, but he wouldn't stop,
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: and they couldn't defend themselves. Bob's polaroids of this time
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: are later discovered under his mattress, and this is where
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: he begins to keep notes on medications and his victim's reactions.
• 17:46
  Speaker 3: This wasn't a sit down and planned scientific experiment by
• 17:50
  Speaker 3: any means, but just to have some record or reference
• 17:55
  Speaker 3: to it in the future.
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: According to Bob, his actions are an attempt to recreate
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: a movie he became obsessed with as a teenager, an
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: Oscar nominated nineteen sixty five horror film called The Collector
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: starring Terence Stamp but a socially awkward young man who
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: abducts a woman and holds her captive in his.
• 18:15
  Speaker 7: Cellar, a film that I saw as a teenager that
• 18:20
  Speaker 7: I guess left the lasting fantasy, a dark fantasy in
• 18:24
  Speaker 7: my mind was a film called The Collector. The movie
• 18:28
  Speaker 7: just gave me the framework to be able to fantasy Isaac,
• 18:32
  Speaker 7: and in eighty four I started allowing my dark fantasies.
• 18:36
  Speaker 3: To come true.
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: It's July fifth, nineteen eighty four, and we're four years
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: before Burdella's arrest.
• 18:43
  Speaker 2: Bob picks up.
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: A nineteen year old named Jerry Howell at a bus
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: station near his home. Witnesses report seeing Jerry at a
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: seven eleven with Bob on thirty sixth and Main Street.
• 18:54
  Speaker 3: The first victim was Jerry Howell. This death happened in
• 18:57
  Speaker 3: my house, as did all the day.
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: Now here's the strange part. Jerry is no stranger to Bob.
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: In fact, Bob knows Jerry and his father. Jerry's father
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: owns the store next to Bob's Bizarre Bazaar at the
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: Westport Flea Market.
• 19:13
  Speaker 3: Jerry informed me that he had started tricking, first down
• 19:16
  Speaker 3: on Independence Avenue and then down at tenth and McGee.
• 19:25
  Speaker 3: This is the first time that I became aware of
• 19:27
  Speaker 3: any information that Jerry was in any way, shape or
• 19:31
  Speaker 3: form involved with Gates, and I don't think he was
• 19:34
  Speaker 3: eighteen at this time.
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: Over the years, Bob had taken advantage of Jerry's vulnerability.
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: Bob wants helped Jerry to get a dentist appointment. Another time,
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: Jerry needed a lawyer and Bob stepped in. But Bob's
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: motivations are not purely generous. Jerry always ends up at
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: Bob's house to.
• 19:53
  Speaker 2: Repay the debt.
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: On the night of Jerry's disappearance, the pattern repeats itself.
• 20:00
  Speaker 3: I mean, the only intent on going over to my
• 20:02
  Speaker 3: house was just that good party.
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: On July fifth, nineteen eighty four, Bob begins writing in
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: his journals six minutes after Jerry is last seen.
• 20:12
  Speaker 3: This is the first time I had done anything like this.
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: This moment gives us extraordinary insight into Bob's mind. It
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: takes him more than five hours to fully subdue and
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: capture Jerry, five hours in which any reasonable person might rethink, reconsider, reevaluate.
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: Yet Bob remains detached and clinical. He's a true psychopath,
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: unable to grasp or simply unable to truly care about
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: the gravity of what he's doing.
• 20:42
  Speaker 3: Perhaps it wasn't pleasurable, but satisfy a need or an
• 20:45
  Speaker 3: emotion that I had at the time.
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: Bob spends the entire night letting his dark fantasies run wild.
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: The next day, Bob leaves for work with Jerry still restrained.
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: When he returns, he picks up exactly where he left off.
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: It's a methodical, clinical routine, and he repeats it hour
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: after hour after hour.
• 21:10
  Speaker 3: There was no intent to hurt him or anything like that.
• 21:13
  Speaker 3: My motivation was mainly to have control over the situation.
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: According to Bob, Jerry's physical condition worsens due to the
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: prolonged restraint and sedation. At one point, Bob leaves the
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: room briefly. When he returns, Jerry is unresponsive.
• 21:32
  Speaker 3: The second day he was at my house, he apparently
• 21:35
  Speaker 3: asphyxiated and checked for a pulse. I tried to use
• 21:40
  Speaker 3: some resuscitation. Tried this for probably two or three minutes
• 21:45
  Speaker 3: and got no response. First I brought him down to
• 21:49
  Speaker 3: the basement, then came back up and tried to figure
• 21:53
  Speaker 3: out what to do. It appeared that the only viable
• 21:58
  Speaker 3: option was to to dismember him and have the trash
• 22:03
  Speaker 3: pick it up.
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: This is a method Bob will repeat five more times.
• 22:09
  Speaker 3: All the bodies sat out on the curb for the
• 22:12
  Speaker 3: trashman to pick up on Monday morning.
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: Jerry's disappearance immediately alarms his family. He's been excited for
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: a Michael Jackson concert and had tickets that he never
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: picked up. When he doesn't show, they file a missing
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: person's report with the Kansas City Police Department. After sifting
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: through boxes, we recovered the case file of the Jerry
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: Howell investigation. One of the first person police interview is
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: Jerry's father, Paul, who immediately points the finger at Burdella.
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: Witnesses also confirmed Jerry was last seen with Bob. This
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: prompts investigators to interview Bob himself. He lies, claiming he
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: dropped Jerry off at seven to eleven and went home.
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: He provides no evidence, no alibi. He says Jerry quote
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: owed a lot of money to people end quote could
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: have been picked up by anyone. Investigators are suspicious, and
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: they even write down their suspicion.
• 23:10
  Speaker 2: In one part of the interview, the investigator.
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: Writes, quote, it should be noted that during the interview,
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: mister Burdella appeared very nervous and sweating a lot. Yet
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: the case file shows that investigators conducted minimal follow up
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: After speaking to Bob and a few more interviews, the
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: case is essentially abandoned in favor of other cases. In truth,
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: this failure was shaped by the era. Police lean into
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: harmful stereotypes about gay men, and as a result, they
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: dismiss crucial information Bob is targeting marginalized young men, and
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: law enforcement largely overlook their experiences, and Bob knew this.
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: Years later, during a search of his home, police recover
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: an envelope buried in his closet. On the front, Bob
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: has written HouseGuest. Inside his newspaper clippings and missing Persons posters,
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: all following the investigation and disappearance of Jerry Howell.
• 24:08
  Speaker 2: That's what still haunts me. Bob was aware of the
• 24:11
  Speaker 2: investigation into his first victim, but.
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: He understood that no one could stop him, not the neighbors,
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: not the police, not the witnesses who reported him. After
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: committing his first murder, Bob just slips back into his routine.
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: He works at the flea market, he's selling artifacts, he's
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: volunteering for the neighborhood Watch. The mask of normality holds,
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: But behind the mask, in the secret room on Bob's
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: second floor, Bob is evolving, the mistakes he made with
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: Jerry he corrects, and the fantasies he saw in the
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: movies he begins perfecting because Jerry Howell wasn't the end
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: of something, it was the beginning. In Part two, deeper
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: into Bob's diaries and into the years when his fantasies
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: darkened into a calculated pattern of abduction, captivity, and murder.
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: We'll talk about the victims who vanished inside Bob's house,
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: the police who missed the signs, and the roommate who
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: unknowingly was standing just a few feet away when Bob
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: committed a murder bizarre Bob thought no one could see him,
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: but eventually the truth caught up. That's next time on Unworked.
• 25:37
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• 25:44
  Speaker 1: phone calls, insights, and interviews, and we'll be posting daily
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  Speaker 1: episode of Unmarked is produced by John Dedau, edited by
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: Dave Alderson, and our additional producers are Jesse demurray and
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: Steve McClellan