Latest / Crime and Horror / The-Horror-Mystery-Scotland-Yard-got-DEA

Transcript

The-Horror-Mystery-Scotland-Yard-got-DEA · Crime and Horror

0:00
Speaker 1: In today's story, you very likely will let some point
0:03
Speaker 1: go Okay, I know where this is going, but you
0:06
Speaker 1: won't because the ending to this story is so random
0:10
Speaker 1: that it actually took one hundred years to piece together
0:15
Speaker 1: what actually happened. But before we get into that story,
0:19
Speaker 1: if you're a fan of the strange, dark, and mysterious
0:21
Speaker 1: delivered in story format, then you've come to the right place,
0:24
Speaker 1: because that's all we do, and we upload once a week.
0:27
Speaker 1: So if that's of interest to you, please bring the
0:30
Speaker 1: like button out hiking with you on Kodiak Island and Alaska,
0:34
Speaker 1: but don't tell them you've secretly stapled a huge raw
0:37
Speaker 1: steak to the outside of their pack. Also, please subscribe
0:40
Speaker 1: to our channel and turn on all notifications so you
0:43
Speaker 1: don't miss.
0:43
Speaker 2: Any of our weekly uploads.
0:45
Speaker 1: Okay, let's get into today's story. On the night of
1:01
Speaker 1: January thirty first, nineteen ten, an American couple living in
1:05
Speaker 1: London named Bell and doctor Harvey Crippen were hosting a
1:09
Speaker 1: small dinner party for two of their friends. The group
1:11
Speaker 1: had just finished their food and they were now in
1:14
Speaker 1: the middle of a game called Whist, which is a
1:16
Speaker 1: card game, when suddenly Bell put her cards down and
1:19
Speaker 1: she stood up to tell a story, and doctor Crippen
1:22
Speaker 1: saw his wife doing this and kind of knew what
1:24
Speaker 1: was going to happen, and he kind of gestured for
1:26
Speaker 1: her to not tell the story and please sit down
1:28
Speaker 1: and play this game, but she just kind of waved
1:31
Speaker 1: at him dismissively, like, please leave me alone. I'm gonna
1:34
Speaker 1: do what I want to do. Doctor Crippen sighed and
1:36
Speaker 1: just kind of sat back and let this happen.
1:38
Speaker 2: Anywhere they went.
1:39
Speaker 1: He knew his wife had to be the center of
1:41
Speaker 1: attention and there was just nothing he could do. Doctor
1:44
Speaker 1: Crippen was a pretty passive guy who kind of got
1:47
Speaker 1: walked all over, especially by his wife.
1:50
Speaker 2: He was kind of.
1:50
Speaker 1: Little, he had big bulging eyes and huge glasses he wore,
1:54
Speaker 1: and his job was he basically sat inside of a
1:56
Speaker 1: dentist's office and mixed medicines for the dentist, and so
2:00
Speaker 1: he was just kind of like this anonymous, forgotten about
2:03
Speaker 1: guy that worked in a back office hidden from the world. Meanwhile,
2:07
Speaker 1: his wife, Belle is like this beautiful woman, huge personality.
2:11
Speaker 1: She's an aspiring actress and singer, and everywhere they went,
2:15
Speaker 1: everybody loved her and basically didn't notice doctor Crippen. Also,
2:19
Speaker 1: Belle would basically spend all of doctor Crippen's money on
2:23
Speaker 1: her very expensive wardrobe. And so doctor Crippen is just
2:27
Speaker 1: so annoyed. He's sitting on the couch and he's watching
2:29
Speaker 1: as Belle has now stood up in her big, flowing
2:32
Speaker 1: pink evening dress and she's regaling the guests with this
2:35
Speaker 1: big story of hers and at some point she just
2:38
Speaker 1: kind of transitions from telling the story to performing this
2:42
Speaker 1: bizarre song and dance routine that was the story. It's
2:45
Speaker 1: like she came up with a play in real time
2:48
Speaker 1: and performed it for the guests. And the dinner guests
2:51
Speaker 1: who were watching this performance their names were Paul and Clara.
2:54
Speaker 1: They were totally entranced by what Belle was doing. They
2:58
Speaker 1: thought it was incredible. Paul and Clara, we're both theater
3:00
Speaker 1: people like bell was. Paul was a former comedian, and
3:03
Speaker 1: Clara worked with Belle at their charity, which was called
3:06
Speaker 1: the Music Hall Ladies Guild. And so doctor Crippen just
3:09
Speaker 1: kind of scowled as the two dinner guests applauded really
3:12
Speaker 1: loudly for Belle's big performance. And Belle, you know, she
3:16
Speaker 1: smiled and kind of giggled and then sat down and
3:18
Speaker 1: said thank you so much. And then, you know, doctor Crippen,
3:21
Speaker 1: he's thinking, Okay, now that she's done with this performance,
3:24
Speaker 1: we can finally play the card game that I really
3:26
Speaker 1: want to play. But doctor Crippen, after grabbing his cards,
3:29
Speaker 1: looked around and could tell that they were not going
3:32
Speaker 1: to play cards. The big performance by his wife had
3:35
Speaker 1: eaten up all the rest of their time, and now
3:37
Speaker 1: it was too late and the guests had to leave.
3:39
Speaker 1: Before doctor Crippen could even stand up to begin picking
3:42
Speaker 1: up in the room to get ready for this visit
3:44
Speaker 1: to end. Belle, his wife, was demanding he'd go outside
3:48
Speaker 1: and get their guests a horse and carriage to bring
3:50
Speaker 1: them back home. And so doctor Crippen just kind of
3:52
Speaker 1: put his head down and said okay. And as he
3:54
Speaker 1: was walking towards the front door to get the horse
3:56
Speaker 1: and carriage, Belle yelled after him, and don't get one
4:00
Speaker 1: of those cheap ones, get an expensive one, a nice one.
4:02
Speaker 1: Doctor Crippen just kind of rolled his eyes but said okay,
4:05
Speaker 1: and then he walked outside. But despite looking all over
4:08
Speaker 1: the place, there were no nice horse and carriages. It
4:11
Speaker 1: was just the kind of loud rickety bad ones that
4:14
Speaker 1: his wife did not want him to get. But after
4:17
Speaker 1: looking all over the place for a full hour and
4:19
Speaker 1: not finding a nice one, doctor Crippen finally just had
4:23
Speaker 1: to hail one of the bad horse and carriages. He
4:26
Speaker 1: called them over and then he went back inside and
4:28
Speaker 1: he told the guests, okay, I got your horse and carriage.
4:31
Speaker 1: And so they came outside and sew did Belle, And
4:33
Speaker 1: Belle's looking at this carriage after this long delay, and
4:37
Speaker 1: it's this terrible carriage, and she just stares at doctor
4:39
Speaker 1: Crippen furious.
4:41
Speaker 2: The guests don't seem to mind.
4:42
Speaker 1: They just walk down the stairs, they get in their carriage,
4:44
Speaker 1: they say goodbye, and they take off. But the second
4:48
Speaker 1: doctor Crippen had turned back around, Bell was already back
4:51
Speaker 1: inside their home. And so he knows, you know, as
4:53
Speaker 1: soon as he goes in there, he's gonna get yelled at.
4:55
Speaker 1: And so he went inside the home and in the
4:58
Speaker 1: living room was Bell, arms folded, just staring at him,
5:01
Speaker 1: absolutely furious, and she began laying into him about not
5:05
Speaker 1: only how ridiculous it was that it took him a
5:08
Speaker 1: whole hour to find the carriage, and it was a
5:10
Speaker 1: terrible carriage, something she said not to do, and she
5:14
Speaker 1: told him that he was the reason their whole dinner
5:16
Speaker 1: party had been a total disaster. Even though doctor Crippen
5:19
Speaker 1: was like, I think it went pretty well, but in
5:21
Speaker 1: Bell's mind, you know, her husband was the reason this
5:24
Speaker 1: party had totally failed. He was boring, he didn't contribute anything,
5:28
Speaker 1: and she told him that she caught that he did
5:31
Speaker 1: not applaud nearly as loudly as Paul and Clara had
5:34
Speaker 1: for her big performance, and that really hurt her feelings.
5:37
Speaker 1: When doctor Crippen just didn't say anything, he just kind
5:40
Speaker 1: of knew to keep his head down and let his
5:42
Speaker 1: wife talk.
5:43
Speaker 2: You know.
5:43
Speaker 1: When that happened, Bell got so frustrated she kind of
5:46
Speaker 1: huffed and then turned around and walked over to the
5:49
Speaker 1: mantelpiece and she took this framed photo that she shamelessly
5:53
Speaker 1: left up in their house that was of her former lover,
5:57
Speaker 1: who she openly had had an affair with, this beautifully handsome,
6:01
Speaker 1: square jawed prize fighter, who again doctor Crippen knew his
6:05
Speaker 1: wife had cheated on him with. And so Belle she
6:08
Speaker 1: takes this photo and she holds it up and she
6:10
Speaker 1: points right at him, and she looks at her husband
6:12
Speaker 1: and says, you know, I can get any man I want.
6:15
Speaker 2: Look right here, I can get him if I want to.
6:17
Speaker 2: I don't need you.
6:18
Speaker 1: But doctor Crippen was not affected by this. He was
6:21
Speaker 1: completely used to being treated this way by Belle, and
6:24
Speaker 1: so again he just stayed silent and took what she
6:27
Speaker 1: was thrown at him. And so again Belle gets even
6:29
Speaker 1: more frustrated because she's not getting a reaction from doctor Crippen.
6:33
Speaker 1: She finally just goes, you know what, I'm going to
6:35
Speaker 1: leave you tomorrow.
6:36
Speaker 2: I'm done with you. I can't be with you. It's over.
6:38
Speaker 1: And again doctor Crippen just didn't react. I mean, this
6:42
Speaker 1: really was typical behavior for his wife, even this threat
6:46
Speaker 1: of leaving him tomorrow.
6:48
Speaker 2: You know, she had done this before but never followed
6:51
Speaker 2: through on it.
6:52
Speaker 1: It was just kind of like doctor Crippen was her
6:53
Speaker 1: punching bag basically twenty four to seven. And so for now,
6:57
Speaker 1: all doctor Crippen really wanted was for his wife to
7:00
Speaker 1: just stop ranting and raving so he could just go
7:03
Speaker 1: to bed. He didn't really care what she was saying. Frankly,
7:06
Speaker 1: he wouldn't even care if she did leave him. The
7:08
Speaker 1: next day, he was totally unhappy in this marriage, as
7:11
Speaker 1: obviously she was, but he was so scared of scandal
7:15
Speaker 1: he couldn't bring himself to divorce his wife. But if
7:18
Speaker 1: she actually followed through and left him, he'd be free.
7:22
Speaker 1: The marriage would be over, and it would be her fault.
7:24
Speaker 1: And so doctor Crippen just stood there waiting for his
7:26
Speaker 1: wife to finish. But it was clear she had a
7:29
Speaker 1: lot to say. Even after threatening to leave him, she
7:31
Speaker 1: just kept on laying into him about all his faults.
7:34
Speaker 1: And then at some point doctor Crippen just totally caught
7:36
Speaker 1: her off guard by interjecting and saying, Hey, Belle, do
7:40
Speaker 1: you want some whiskey? And Belle just kind of stopped
7:42
Speaker 1: and stared at her husband inquisitively, and then it was
7:45
Speaker 1: like her whole mood.
7:46
Speaker 2: Changed and she was like, actually, yeah, I'll take some whiskey.
7:49
Speaker 1: And so doctor Crippen said, great, I'll go make it,
7:52
Speaker 1: and he walked over to the liquor cabinet and he
7:54
Speaker 1: poured both of them a drink. Two days later, the
7:57
Speaker 1: members of the charity that Belle and Clara the dinner
7:59
Speaker 1: Goet were a part of the music Hall Ladies killed.
8:03
Speaker 1: They were all sitting in their office in London, waiting
8:05
Speaker 1: to start their meeting.
8:06
Speaker 2: But there was a problem. Bell, who was.
8:08
Speaker 1: Their treasurer and therefore needed to be at this meeting,
8:12
Speaker 1: was not at this meeting. She was late and nobody
8:14
Speaker 1: knew where she was. And so after they sat in
8:16
Speaker 1: this office for a while, just waiting, they finally heard
8:19
Speaker 1: a knock on the door, and so one of the
8:21
Speaker 1: women got up. They opened up the door, and standing
8:24
Speaker 1: outside is doctor Crippen's assistant, this young woman named Ethel,
8:28
Speaker 1: and she looked kind of frazzled and maybe a little
8:30
Speaker 1: bit out of breath, and she was carrying a letter
8:33
Speaker 1: and a package in her hands. And so Ethel would
8:36
Speaker 1: tell the woman who opened the door that she was
8:38
Speaker 1: here on behalf of doctor Crippen and also Bell, And
8:41
Speaker 1: so the woman who opened the door said, okay, come
8:43
Speaker 1: on in, and so Ethel walked into the office and
8:46
Speaker 1: she placed the letter and the package on the table,
8:48
Speaker 1: and then she quickly turned around and left. After she
8:52
Speaker 1: was gone, the guild members kind of looked at each
8:54
Speaker 1: other confused, and then just reached out and they grabbed
8:57
Speaker 1: the letter.
8:57
Speaker 2: They opened it up and they read it.
9:00
Speaker 1: Letter was written by doctor Crippen and he was telling
9:02
Speaker 1: the members of the skilled that unfortunately, one of Belle's
9:06
Speaker 1: family members back in America had fallen ill, and so
9:09
Speaker 1: Belle had to go back to America and take care
9:12
Speaker 1: of this person, and she'd be gone for at least
9:14
Speaker 1: several months. And then when they opened up the package
9:17
Speaker 1: that Ethel had dropped off that contained the guild's checkbook
9:21
Speaker 1: and also their ledger, that way they'd be able to
9:23
Speaker 1: go out and find a new.
9:24
Speaker 2: Treasurer to replace Belle.
9:26
Speaker 1: And so when they had finished reading this letter and
9:28
Speaker 1: seeing the contents of this package, the members of the
9:30
Speaker 1: skuild just kind of looked at each other, not really
9:32
Speaker 1: sure what to do. You know, it seemed odd that
9:35
Speaker 1: Belle had not told them she was doing this, that
9:37
Speaker 1: she had left without saying goodbye. But at the same time,
9:41
Speaker 1: it seemed like whatever she was dealing with in America
9:43
Speaker 1: was very serious, and so they decided the only thing
9:46
Speaker 1: they could do was to just hire a temporary treasurer
9:50
Speaker 1: and wait for Belle to come back. About three weeks later,
9:52
Speaker 1: Clara and the rest of the Ladies Guild members hosted
9:56
Speaker 1: their annual ball, and like always, they invited Belle as
9:59
Speaker 1: well as her husband, doctor Crippen. Even though they knew,
10:02
Speaker 1: you know, this invitation was kind of a formality because
10:06
Speaker 1: Belle was still in America. But doctor Crippen would show
10:10
Speaker 1: up to this ball, and he would not show up alone,
10:13
Speaker 1: and it caused a bit of an outrage on doctor
10:15
Speaker 1: Crippen's arm was very obviously his date, Ethel, his assistant,
10:20
Speaker 1: the young woman who had dropped off that letter in
10:22
Speaker 1: the package to the members of the Guild about.
10:25
Speaker 2: Belle's sudden departure.
10:26
Speaker 1: Clara stared incredulously at doctor Crippen and Ethel as that
10:31
Speaker 1: kind of swayed around.
10:32
Speaker 2: The room dancing.
10:33
Speaker 1: I mean, Clara just could not understand what was going
10:36
Speaker 1: through doctor Crippen's head. How could he possibly think it
10:39
Speaker 1: was appropriate to so openly cheat on his wife around
10:44
Speaker 1: all of his wife's friends and in such a public place.
10:47
Speaker 1: It just seemed unfathomable that anybody would do what doctor
10:51
Speaker 1: Crippen was doing. And so that night, Clara and the
10:54
Speaker 1: other members of the Ladies Guild they got together and
10:58
Speaker 1: they decided that, you know, because of doctor Crippen's obvious infidelity,
11:03
Speaker 1: they could not invite him to be a part of
11:05
Speaker 1: anything to do with the Ladies Guild, at least not
11:07
Speaker 1: until they talked to Belle.
11:09
Speaker 2: Again when she got back.
11:10
Speaker 1: But Belle didn't come back, and she never wrote to
11:13
Speaker 1: any of the members of the Guild or any of
11:15
Speaker 1: her friends.
11:16
Speaker 2: She just disappeared.
11:18
Speaker 1: And on March twentieth, nineteen ten, so roughly two months
11:21
Speaker 1: after Belle supposedly fled to America, doctor Crippen came out
11:25
Speaker 1: and said he had just gotten some terrible news. It
11:28
Speaker 1: would turn out his wife, Belle, had fallen ill wall
11:32
Speaker 1: in America and she had died. When Clara and the
11:35
Speaker 1: rest of the Ladies Skilled members heard about this, their
11:38
Speaker 1: disgust at doctor Crippen's cheating quickly turned into suspicion that
11:43
Speaker 1: maybe he had something to do with Belle's early demise.
11:52
Speaker 1: As many of you may already know, two years ago,
11:54
Speaker 1: we launched the Mister Ballen podcast and we actually launched
11:58
Speaker 1: it on Valentine's Day twenty twenty, which was not intentional,
12:02
Speaker 1: but we decided to just kind of go with it,
12:04
Speaker 1: and eventually we began calling the release day Bollentine's Day,
12:08
Speaker 1: and last year, to commemorate Bollentine's Day, I hosted a
12:12
Speaker 1: live digital storytelling event and it was totally awesome.
12:16
Speaker 2: It was very.
12:16
Speaker 1: Intimate and I got to meet a lot of all
12:18
Speaker 1: you amazing fans of the Strange, Dark and Mysterious. And
12:21
Speaker 1: so for this year's Balentine's Day, we decided we would
12:24
Speaker 1: just do that again. We would host another live digital
12:27
Speaker 1: storytelling event. The event is totally free. All you have
12:30
Speaker 1: to do is click the link in the description to
12:32
Speaker 1: join the official Mister Ball and Discord Server. And then
12:35
Speaker 1: once you're in there, there's all these prompts that'll get
12:37
Speaker 1: you all set up. And then on Bollentine's Day twenty
12:40
Speaker 1: twenty four so Wednesday, February fourteenth, at seven pm Eastern,
12:45
Speaker 1: you will just click on the event within Discord and boom,
12:48
Speaker 1: I'll pop up on your screen and.
12:50
Speaker 2: Start telling you some stories.
12:51
Speaker 1: So again, the Bollentine's Day Live Digital Storytelling Event will
12:56
Speaker 1: take place at seven pm Eastern on Wednesday, February fourteenth,
13:00
Speaker 1: only on the official Mister Ball and Discord Server. Oh
13:03
Speaker 1: and one more thing before you go. Next week's YouTube
13:07
Speaker 1: video will have another big announcement about Ballentine's Day that
13:11
Speaker 1: I'm pretty sure you're all going to be very happy
13:13
Speaker 1: to hear about. So one of the members of this
13:20
Speaker 1: guild went to the police and reported Bell missing. However,
13:24
Speaker 1: at first, the police were not inclined to pursue this
13:28
Speaker 1: case because, from their perspective, there was no evidence of
13:31
Speaker 1: a crime committed here. You know, all they knew was
13:34
Speaker 1: this woman Bell had died in America, supposedly from natural causes,
13:39
Speaker 1: and so the only thing that was contrary to that
13:42
Speaker 1: were Bell's friends, who basically were saying, well, you know,
13:45
Speaker 1: maybe she was murdered by her husband because her husband
13:48
Speaker 1: was cheating.
13:48
Speaker 2: On her, and the police were like, that doesn't line up.
13:51
Speaker 2: Just because he was cheating on her does not mean
13:53
Speaker 2: he killed her.
13:54
Speaker 1: But Belle's friends continued to keep the pressure on police,
13:58
Speaker 1: and finally, after three months, the police would assign a detective.
14:02
Speaker 1: His name was Walter Doo, and Inspector Dou had been
14:05
Speaker 1: a detective for more than twenty years, and he had
14:08
Speaker 1: even worked on the very famous serial killer case, Jack
14:11
Speaker 1: the Ripper, and had been one of the people who
14:13
Speaker 1: actually found the last body. Although the Jack the Ripper
14:16
Speaker 1: case had gone unsolved, but coming out of that investigation,
14:20
Speaker 1: Walter Dou had really developed a great reputation as a
14:23
Speaker 1: really good detective, and so to have him lead this
14:27
Speaker 1: case was a big deal and so On the afternoon
14:30
Speaker 1: of July sixth, nineteen ten, so roughly five months after
14:33
Speaker 1: Bell had gone missing, Inspector Dou, as one of his
14:36
Speaker 1: first things he would do for this case, went to
14:38
Speaker 1: doctor Crippen's house to ask him about his wife. Now,
14:41
Speaker 1: Inspector Do expected that doctor Crippen would tell him the
14:46
Speaker 1: same story he had told everybody else about Bell, which is,
14:50
Speaker 1: you know, she had to go to America to take
14:52
Speaker 1: care of the sick relative, and while she was over there,
14:56
Speaker 1: unfortunately Bell passed away. But what ultimately told Inspector Do
15:02
Speaker 1: was not that.
15:03
Speaker 2: Now.
15:04
Speaker 1: At first, Inspector du just asked doctor Crippen a lot
15:07
Speaker 1: of basic questions about his wife. But doctor Crippen seemed
15:11
Speaker 1: really awkward as he answered these questions. He actually almost
15:15
Speaker 1: seemed really embarrassed, and Inspector Du clearly noticed this, but
15:19
Speaker 1: just kept on asking these routine questions and just allowed
15:23
Speaker 1: doctor Crippen to act however he was going to act.
15:25
Speaker 1: But at some point doctor Crippen just stopped answering the
15:28
Speaker 1: questions altogether, and he paused for a minute with his
15:31
Speaker 1: head in his hands, and then he took up his glasses.
15:34
Speaker 1: He put him on the table and then he looked
15:35
Speaker 1: up at Inspector Doo and.
15:37
Speaker 2: He said, you know, I should just tell you the truth.
15:40
Speaker 2: Belle isn't dead.
15:41
Speaker 1: Doctor Crippen told the inspector that the day following that
15:45
Speaker 1: dinner party they hosted with Paul and Clara, that that morning,
15:48
Speaker 1: when doctor Crippen woke up, his wife was gone, and
15:51
Speaker 1: all her things were gone too. She packed up in
15:53
Speaker 1: the middle of the night and left without telling him
15:56
Speaker 1: where she was going, and so doctor Crippen realized his
15:59
Speaker 1: wife had finally.
16:00
Speaker 2: Made good on the threat to leave him.
16:02
Speaker 1: Doctor Crippen said he lied about what happened to Belle
16:05
Speaker 1: because he was trying to avoid a scandal.
16:08
Speaker 2: He said that, you know, while.
16:09
Speaker 1: Bell was horrible to him personally and really mistreated him,
16:13
Speaker 1: she was really kind of amazing with everybody else, and
16:16
Speaker 1: everybody else loved her, and so doctor Crippen really believed
16:20
Speaker 1: that lying about this would ultimately save her reputation and
16:24
Speaker 1: his own. So it was a win win. And once
16:26
Speaker 1: doctor Crippen was relatively sure Belle was not going to
16:30
Speaker 1: be coming back, that she really had left him for good,
16:33
Speaker 1: that was when he began openly dating Ethel Because he
16:36
Speaker 1: had actually been in love with his assistant Ethel for
16:39
Speaker 1: a long time, and he felt like now with his
16:41
Speaker 1: wife out of the picture, he could finally love her out.
16:44
Speaker 2: In the open.
16:45
Speaker 1: Even though he admitted, you know, nobody would actually understand
16:48
Speaker 1: the dynamic here, because everybody else thinks Belle is over
16:51
Speaker 1: in America and here I am cheating on her. But
16:54
Speaker 1: you know, doctor Crippen insisted to the inspector that this
16:58
Speaker 1: was the truth. He was not cheating on Belle. He
17:00
Speaker 1: didn't have anything to do with her disappearance. She left
17:02
Speaker 1: of her own accord, and here he was. And so
17:05
Speaker 1: after doctor Crippen explained all this to the inspector, doctor
17:08
Speaker 1: Crippen just put his face in his hands and just
17:11
Speaker 1: looked so ashamed and embarrassed, to the point where Inspector
17:15
Speaker 1: du really believed doctor Crippen. I mean, this is a
17:18
Speaker 1: guy who has just poured his soul out about some
17:21
Speaker 1: of the most embarrassing things of his entire life, so
17:24
Speaker 1: he's got to be telling the truth. Also, Inspector dou
17:27
Speaker 1: couldn't help but think to himself that doctor Crippen was
17:30
Speaker 1: this little, kind of passive seeming guy who did not
17:34
Speaker 1: really seem capable of killing somebody else. But at the
17:37
Speaker 1: same time, Inspector du could definitely see a woman like
17:41
Speaker 1: Bell leaving doctor Crippen the way that she did. Still,
17:45
Speaker 1: just to be thorough, Inspector Do asked doctor Crippen if
17:48
Speaker 1: he wouldn't mind allowing the inspector to search the property, because,
17:52
Speaker 1: after all, this is a missing person case and so
17:54
Speaker 1: we got to check everything. Doctor Crippen said, absolutely, search
17:57
Speaker 1: my house, do whatever you gotta do.
17:59
Speaker 2: Inspector Dou would do just that.
18:01
Speaker 1: He went all over the house, looked everywhere, and he
18:03
Speaker 1: would find nothing. So the inspector told doctor Crippen that
18:07
Speaker 1: as of now he believed his story and that basically
18:10
Speaker 1: the case was closed, but Inspector Dou really needed to
18:14
Speaker 1: talk to Bell in order to officially close the case
18:17
Speaker 1: because right now everybody thought she was dead. No one
18:20
Speaker 1: had heard from her, and so that was the one
18:22
Speaker 1: missing piece. And so doctor Crippen said that was totally fine,
18:25
Speaker 1: and he and the inspector actually worked together to draft
18:29
Speaker 1: up this little advertisement that would go in newspapers.
18:32
Speaker 2: In America that basically would say, hey.
18:34
Speaker 1: Bell, if you see this, you need to contact police
18:37
Speaker 1: in London because we're looking for you. And so after
18:39
Speaker 1: the two men had come up with the language they
18:41
Speaker 1: wanted for this advertisement. Inspector Do thanked Doctor Crippen, said
18:45
Speaker 1: he'd be in touch, and then he left. But five
18:48
Speaker 1: days later, when Inspector Dou went to follow up with
18:51
Speaker 1: doctor Crippen, he discovered that doctor Crippen and his new lover, Ethel,
18:56
Speaker 1: his assistant, were both gone and nobody knew where they were,
18:59
Speaker 1: and this changed everything about the Bell case. Inspector Do
19:03
Speaker 1: couldn't help but think, you know, doctor Crippen and Ethel
19:07
Speaker 1: look like they're running from something, so probably they lied
19:10
Speaker 1: to me about their involvement with Bell's disappearance. And so
19:14
Speaker 1: Inspector Dou sent physical descriptions to all the newspapers and
19:18
Speaker 1: police stations all across Europe, and also he made a
19:21
Speaker 1: note to check all the ships that were bound for
19:23
Speaker 1: America in case doctor Crippen and Ethel had decided to
19:27
Speaker 1: flee Europe that way. And while this big man hunt
19:29
Speaker 1: was just getting underway, Inspector Dou and his team went
19:33
Speaker 1: back to doctor Crippen's house to do a much more
19:36
Speaker 1: thorough search. So police descended on doctor Crippen's beautiful three
19:40
Speaker 1: story home on a quiet street and they went inside
19:43
Speaker 1: and they tore apart everything. They flipped over mattresses, they
19:47
Speaker 1: opened up drawers and closets, they threw everything out, but
19:50
Speaker 1: they found nothing suspicious. But at some point, Inspector dou
19:54
Speaker 1: who was feeling really annoyed that he'd been totally duped
19:58
Speaker 1: by this doctor, you know, he walking down the basement
20:01
Speaker 1: steps in doctor Crippen's house, and as he went down,
20:04
Speaker 1: he saw there were other investigators already in the basement
20:07
Speaker 1: conducting yet another fruitless search. But as Inspector do kind
20:12
Speaker 1: of turned the corner at the base of the basement stairs,
20:15
Speaker 1: he noticed the bricks that were laying in front of
20:17
Speaker 1: the fireplace that was in the basement just looked a
20:20
Speaker 1: little bit off, like they were maybe too new or something.
20:23
Speaker 1: And so just kind of acting on a hunch, he
20:25
Speaker 1: walked over to these bricks that were laid out right
20:28
Speaker 1: in front of this fireplace, and he's looking at them,
20:31
Speaker 1: and he grabs a poker, one of the pokers he
20:33
Speaker 1: used to move the logs around in a fire and
20:35
Speaker 1: he just began tapping on each of the individual.
20:38
Speaker 2: Bricks right in front of them, and with.
20:39
Speaker 1: Every tap he would hear the solid thump sound that
20:42
Speaker 1: you're hitting something hard that is beneath this brick. But
20:46
Speaker 1: as he went along hitting each of these bricks, he
20:49
Speaker 1: eventually reached the kind of center of these bricks, and
20:52
Speaker 1: when he brought that poker down on one of those bricks,
20:55
Speaker 1: it made.
20:56
Speaker 2: A hollow sound.
20:57
Speaker 1: Clearly there was something underneath these bricks, and so Inspector
21:01
Speaker 1: Dou is super excited.
21:02
Speaker 2: He calls for his team to.
21:03
Speaker 1: Come over, and one by one they begin pulling up
21:06
Speaker 1: all these bricks, and after they're all gone, they see
21:09
Speaker 1: there's this perfectly smooth layer of clay that these bricks
21:13
Speaker 1: were sitting on top of, and so Inspector Dou called
21:15
Speaker 1: for a shovel. A guy brought one over, and Dou
21:18
Speaker 1: he took one scoop with the shovel, and immediately this
21:22
Speaker 1: horrible smell began coming out of the ground that was
21:25
Speaker 1: so gross that the guys around Inspector Dou began ratching
21:29
Speaker 1: and vomiting, and before long the entire group of investigators
21:33
Speaker 1: had basically fled the basement to get away from this
21:37
Speaker 1: horrible smell. But after composing themselves, Inspector Dou and the
21:41
Speaker 1: rest of his team put handkerchiefs over their nose and
21:44
Speaker 1: their mouths, and they went back into the house, down
21:46
Speaker 1: into the basement, they grabbed that shovel and they continued
21:50
Speaker 1: to dig, and after just a couple of scoops, they
21:53
Speaker 1: saw what was causing this terrible smell. In this clay pit,
21:58
Speaker 1: this hole in the basement. Onneath the bricks were all
22:01
Speaker 1: these human body parts in the ground. But there were
22:05
Speaker 1: no arms, there were no legs, there was no head.
22:08
Speaker 1: All you had were just the internal organs of somebody.
22:12
Speaker 1: And then also there was like a blanket of skin
22:15
Speaker 1: that looked like it had been extracted from somebody's body
22:18
Speaker 1: with near surgical precision. Now, the police could not, based
22:21
Speaker 1: on these limited remains, make an actual positive identification of
22:26
Speaker 1: who exactly this was, but they did find in this pit,
22:30
Speaker 1: along with the organs and the skin were several strands
22:34
Speaker 1: of hair that matched Bells. There were several pieces of
22:37
Speaker 1: pajamas that belonged to doctor Crippen. And then also on
22:41
Speaker 1: that skin filet, they found there was a distinctive birthmark
22:44
Speaker 1: on it that matched the one that Bell had. Also,
22:48
Speaker 1: investigators were able to determine that inside of the intestines
22:52
Speaker 1: that were found in this hole were traces of a
22:55
Speaker 1: particular kind of tranquilizer that in the weeks leading up
22:58
Speaker 1: to Bell's disappearances, doctor Crippen was making that particular tranquilizer
23:04
Speaker 1: at his work he mixed medicines for dentist's offices. That
23:07
Speaker 1: was the tranquilizer he was working with right before Bell disappeared.
23:11
Speaker 1: Shortly after these shocking discoveries were made, doctor Crippen and
23:15
Speaker 1: Ethel were found on a boat trying to flee the
23:18
Speaker 1: country that way, and so they would be arrested, and
23:21
Speaker 1: so ultimately doctor Crippen would be found guilty of murdering
23:24
Speaker 1: his wife and he would be sentenced to death. As
23:27
Speaker 1: for Ethel, she would be acquitted of any participation.
23:30
Speaker 2: In the crime.
23:31
Speaker 1: However, this was not the end of the story, far
23:34
Speaker 1: from it. One hundred years later, in twenty ten, a
23:37
Speaker 1: forensic scientist from Michigan State University fished out a piece
23:41
Speaker 1: of tissue from the remains found in doctor Crippen's basement
23:45
Speaker 1: that had been preserved inside of a London museum. Now,
23:48
Speaker 1: this murder case had been officially closed since nineteen ten,
23:52
Speaker 1: but the bizarre details of this case had never really
23:56
Speaker 1: fully made sense to a lot of people, Like they
23:58
Speaker 1: didn't understand how or why doctor Crippen had successfully disposed
24:04
Speaker 1: of his wife's head, her arms, her legs, all her bones.
24:08
Speaker 2: Those are all gone. Nobody ever found those, but he
24:11
Speaker 2: decided to.
24:12
Speaker 1: Keep her organs and her skin buried in his basement
24:15
Speaker 1: under loose bricks.
24:16
Speaker 2: That doesn't make any sense.
24:18
Speaker 1: Also, if doctor Crippen killed his wife by poisoning her,
24:22
Speaker 1: which is what is suggested from all that tranquilizer that
24:25
Speaker 1: was found in her intestines, that basically he overdosed her,
24:28
Speaker 1: then why did he dismember her afterwards? The reason killers
24:32
Speaker 1: often kill with poison is because it makes the victim's
24:36
Speaker 1: death look a bit more natural, Whereas if you mutilate
24:40
Speaker 1: someone's body, then obviously someone did it and you're calling
24:43
Speaker 1: suspicion on yourself. And so did doctor Crippen poison his
24:46
Speaker 1: wife and then just throw that out the window and
24:49
Speaker 1: mutilated her body? Anyways, it just didn't make sense. So
24:52
Speaker 1: this forensic scientist from Michigan State University decided he was
24:56
Speaker 1: finally going to get some answers to this case. And
24:59
Speaker 1: so what he did is he compared the DNA from
25:02
Speaker 1: the tissue he dug out to the DNA of one
25:05
Speaker 1: of Bell's grand nieces, and when he compared the two,
25:08
Speaker 1: he saw they didn't match, which meant the body that
25:12
Speaker 1: was found in doctor Crippen's basement was not Bell's. But
25:17
Speaker 1: that wasn't even the weirdest part. It was determined following
25:20
Speaker 1: this test by this forensic scientist that the body in
25:24
Speaker 1: doctor Crippen's basement wasn't even female. It was a male.
25:28
Speaker 1: But to this day, no one has ever been able
25:31
Speaker 1: to identify who that body was, and Bell was never found.
25:36
Speaker 1: All we know is an innocent man, Doctor Crippen was
25:39
Speaker 1: put to death for something he didn't do. In February
25:47
Speaker 1: of two thousand, a police officer in a small Missouri
25:49
Speaker 1: town stepped into an apartment where a man had just
25:52
Speaker 1: taken his own life. Now, this police officer felt bad
25:56
Speaker 1: for the guy, but at the same time, when he
25:58
Speaker 1: walked inside the apartment and he fully expected this to
26:01
Speaker 1: be a pretty straightforward and easy case.
26:04
Speaker 2: Man commits suicide the end.
26:06
Speaker 1: However, after walking over to the body, the officer spotted
26:10
Speaker 1: something odd laying on the ground near the dead man's head.
26:13
Speaker 1: It was a book and it was opened to a
26:15
Speaker 1: page with writing on it. So the officer knelt down
26:18
Speaker 1: and read what was on the page and it sent
26:21
Speaker 1: shivers down his spine. Clearly, this writing was meant to
26:25
Speaker 1: be found, but before the officer could flag this to
26:28
Speaker 1: anyone at the scene, another discovery was made. A videotape
26:33
Speaker 1: was found in the dead man's trash can, and when
26:35
Speaker 1: the police watched that video, they were not prepared for
26:39
Speaker 1: what they saw.
26:41
Speaker 2: So that's going to do it.
26:43
Speaker 1: Be sure you check out our brand new Ballin Basics
26:46
Speaker 1: merchandise line over at Shopmsterballan dot com.
26:49
Speaker 2: We got some really good stuff over there.
26:51
Speaker 1: And also, if you enjoyed today's story, be sure to
26:54
Speaker 1: check out our podcast called The mister Ballin Podcast, where
26:57
Speaker 1: we have hundreds more stories, a lot like this one,
27:00
Speaker 1: but many of them are only available on the podcast. Again,
27:03
Speaker 1: it's called the mister Ballen Podcast and it's available on
27:06
Speaker 1: Amazon Music.
27:07
Speaker 2: Wait, don't go anywhere.
27:09
Speaker 1: If you're looking for more strange, dark and mysterious videos,
27:12
Speaker 1: click here