Latest / Weeknight Mysteries Podcast / Ep. 104 | Babies Cooked Alive - True Stories To & Cursed Kleenex Commercial Changing At

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Ep. 104 | Babies Cooked Alive - True Stories To & Cursed Kleenex Commercial Changing At · Weeknight Mysteries Podcast

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: This case was going to be just about one story,
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: a real-life case so grim that I assumed it was
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: a one-off occurrence. That was until I started researching it
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: and found a whole raft of similar stories, proving that
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: no matter how low I think humans can sink, there's
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: always something new out there to surprise me. So here's
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: a collection of real-life cases of oven-related infantasadas. Melissa Wright
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: was considered a caring mother and generally a kind and
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: loving person. In 2001 she lived in a trailer in
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: Alabama with her partner Robert Lynn Smith, 8-year-old daughter Courtney
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: and newborn baby Ashley. It was around this time that
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: things began to change for the family. After the birth
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: of Ashley, Melissa Wright began to suffer from postpartum depression
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: and she was put on anxiety medication. She also lost
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  Speaker 1: her weight tracing job and now with both her and
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  Speaker 1: her partner unemployed and confined within a small trailer, tensions
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: began to rise. Melissa's behavior began to change. She became
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: obsessed with the idea that the world was ending. Several
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: times Robert Smith found a wandering aimlessly outside talking about
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: some sort of impending apocalypse. Her mood would swing from
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: manic rage to a catatonic apathy. One time she tried
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: to jump out of her moving vehicle. On another occasion,
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  Speaker 1: eight-year-old Courtney ran to her neighbor's house claiming that her
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: mother was trained to kill her. It seemed that Melissa
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: Wright's mental health was deteriorating rapidly but nobody could have
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  Speaker 1: predicted what would happen next. It was 14 months after
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  Speaker 1: Ashley's birth. Melissa was in a trailer with her daughters
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  Speaker 1: whilst Robert was outside in the yard. For reasons known
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: only to her, Melissa went into the kitchen, removed the
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  Speaker 1: racks from the oven, set it in broil and let
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: it heat up. She then took 14-month-old Ashley and shoved
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: her head first into the oven and shut the door.
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: Hearing screams coming from inside, a horrified Robert Smith entered
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: the trailer to find his daughter being cooked alive. He
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  Speaker 1: quickly dragged her out of the oven and, despite suffering
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: severe burns to 30% of her body, she amazingly survived
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: the ordeal. At first, Melissa Wright claimed it was an accident.
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: Somehow Ashley had crawled into the oven herself and managed
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: to close the door behind her. When it became clear
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: that her story wasn't credible, She changed tacks, claiming to
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  Speaker 1: have heard a voice in her head from Jesus, commanding
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  Speaker 1: her to cook her baby alive. The fact that she
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  Speaker 1: had removed the grills from the oven to make room
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  Speaker 1: and preheated it to the required temperature showed that this
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: was not some spontaneous psychotic act but a premeditated torture
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  Speaker 1: and attempted murder of an infant child. She was found
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  Speaker 1: guilty of attempted murder and sentenced to 25 years in prison.
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: In the intervening years, Ashley's recovery has been incredible. Enduring
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: over 25 agonizing operations to fix the severe burns to
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: her body, she has overcome an overwhelming amount of physical
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  Speaker 1: and mental pain. She's even found the emotional strength to
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: forgive her mother for what she did. She still believes
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: Melissa is a danger to children though. In 2014, she
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: testified at her mother's parole hearing to keep her behind bars.
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: Graphs of Ashley's horrific burns were enough to convince the
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  Speaker 1: parole board not to grant Melissa Wright an early release.
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: She's up for parole again in 2021. Exactly how long
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: a human body can survive inside a hot oven is
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: the kind of morbid science that's hard to find a
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: definite answer to. The general consensus online is that it
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: all depends on the heat of the oven and what
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  Speaker 1: setting it was on, the body weight of the person involved.
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  Speaker 1: A lot of the burns would come from the body
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  Speaker 1: touching the hot sides and floor of the oven. A
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  Speaker 1: death would most likely occur from suffocation, although if you
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: didn't suffocate death from the heat alone would be a
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: long and grown-out affair due to the time it would
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: take to increase the internal body temperature to a lethal degree.
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: In Ashley's case, the oven was set to boil, which
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: if you've ever put your hand under a hot grill
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  Speaker 1: you'll know how quickly it can cause their skin to burn.
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  Speaker 1: The fact that she survived the ordeal as a baby
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  Speaker 1: is a testament to the resilience of the human body.
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: In a similar case from 2016, Tasha Hatcher, a mother
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  Speaker 1: with a history of neglect and substance abuse turned up
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  Speaker 1: on her neighbor's doorstep in Glen Rose, Texas. She was
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  Speaker 1: completely naked and acting erratically. She was carrying her two-year-old
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  Speaker 1: daughter who was also naked and covered in severe burns.
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  Speaker 1: When the police arrived, Tasha was singing to God and
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: trying to make sexual advances towards the officers. She told
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  Speaker 1: police that she'd shot a cat and put it in
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  Speaker 1: the oven. As the cat started to cook, she picked
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  Speaker 1: up her daughter and shoved her in there too. A
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  Speaker 1: blood test revealed she was high on meth unfettering at
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: the time. When asked why she had put her daughter
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: in the oven, she simply said, curiosity killed the cat.
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  Speaker 1: Again the infant survived the ordeal. but suffered third-degree burns
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: to 14% of her body. In 2012, police were called
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: to the home of Terry Robinson. They discovered the body
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  Speaker 1: of three-year-old Tristan Robinson still warm in the oven. An
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  Speaker 1: autopsy found that he had died from thermal injury as
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  Speaker 1: a result of their severe heat he was exposed to.
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  Speaker 1: There was also traumatic injury to his head. Forensic examiners
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  Speaker 1: determined that this was promptly caused by the child writhing
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  Speaker 1: around inside the oven from the agony of being cooked alive.
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  Speaker 1: Perhaps he was attempting to knock himself unconscious to stop
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  Speaker 1: the pain. Friends and family of Terry Robinson knew her
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  Speaker 1: to be a kind-hearted woman and an excellent mother. Whether
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: or not she just had a mental break or whether
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: she hit an extremely sadistic side is unknown. This had
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: happened in Greensville, Mississippi. Just 20 miles away inshore, a
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: similar murder happened in 2018. 20-month-old Royalty Floyd was stabbed
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: by her grandmother, Carolyn Jones, before being placed in a
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  Speaker 1: hot oven. The body was found days later by Jones' brother.
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: An autopsy determined that although the child had been stabbed,
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: she was still alive when she had been placed into
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  Speaker 1: the oven. In a particularly horrible case from 2015, Rackle
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  Speaker 1: Thompson and Cornell Malone went out to get pizza, leaving
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  Speaker 1: four children, the oldest of which was just five years
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  Speaker 1: old alone in their apartment. Whilst the adults were away,
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: their five-year-old decided to take a nap and the two
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  Speaker 1: middle children, both aged three, decided to play a prank
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  Speaker 1: on their younger sister, 19-month-old Chisara Thompson. They picked her
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  Speaker 1: up and pushed it into the oven, then turned it
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  Speaker 1: on full. As the oven slowly heated up, a panicked
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  Speaker 1: Chisara began to kick the oven door in an attempt
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  Speaker 1: to escape. The oven then tipped forward, landing face down
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  Speaker 1: with the door and the oven controls against the floor,
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  Speaker 1: trapping Chisera inside. When Rackle and Cornell arrived home, they
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  Speaker 1: could smell the burning from outside their door. I can
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  Speaker 1: hardly imagine the horror and shock they experienced as they
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  Speaker 1: lifted up the oven to find the burnt corpse of
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  Speaker 1: their child within. Rackle and Cornell were arrested for child
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  Speaker 1: endangerments and the surviving children were taken into CPS custody.
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  Speaker 1: The final few cases are slightly different to the others,
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  Speaker 1: but I imagine the deaths were equally as painful. In 2006,
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  Speaker 1: a 28-day-old baby named Paris Talley was brought into a
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  Speaker 1: hospital in Ohio by her mother, Chyna Arnold. The child
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  Speaker 1: had no vital signs and, although medical professionals tried to
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  Speaker 1: revive her, by that point it was too late, the
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  Speaker 1: child was dead. An examination showed that there were burns
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  Speaker 1: on the baby's limbs and torso, but not enough to
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  Speaker 1: cause death. When asked about the burns, the mother expressed
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  Speaker 1: surprise claiming not to know how it happened. The baby's
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: death was a mystery at first. An autopsy showed that
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  Speaker 1: Paris Talley's internal organs had been subjected to extreme heat,
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  Speaker 1: enough to cause the death of the child's, but the
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  Speaker 1: external burns were mild in comparison. Someone with these kinds
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  Speaker 1: of internal injuries should have been burnt to a crisp.
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: These searched China Arnold's apartments. They found a bathtub filled
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  Speaker 1: with cloudy water and what looked like flakes of human
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  Speaker 1: skin floating on the surface. Nearby they found a bathtub
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  Speaker 1: covered in a black substance, but still what caused those
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: burns remained a mystery. Eventually though, after a more thorough search,
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  Speaker 1: forensic teams identified the cause of death. Little Paris Talley
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  Speaker 1: had been microwaved. The day before her arrival at the hospital,
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  Speaker 1: China Arnold had got intoxicated and got into an argument
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  Speaker 1: with her partner about Paris's paternity. In a fit of
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  Speaker 1: drunken anger, she placed the baby into the microwave and
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  Speaker 1: cooked the child on full power for two minutes. Afterwards
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  Speaker 1: she took the baby out and tried to wash it
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  Speaker 1: in the bath, which caused a lot of the burnt
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  Speaker 1: skin to peel away. It wouldn't be until the next
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  Speaker 1: day that she decided to take her to hospital. Miss
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  Speaker 1: Arnold has since been arrested and sentenced to life imprisonment.
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  Speaker 1: Another case from 1999 in Kent, Virginia. A new mother
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  Speaker 1: named Elizabeth Rennie Ott cooked her month-old baby Joseph Louis
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  Speaker 1: Martinez in her microwave oven for 10 minutes, killing him outright.
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  Speaker 1: After her trial, she pled not guilty to murder, claiming
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: she had no memory of the incident. Apparently she suffered
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: from epileptic seizures and blackouts, which she managed with medication. However,
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: she stopped taking the medication when she became pregnant. Her
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  Speaker 1: defense was that she suffered a blackout before feeding the child.
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  Speaker 1: In her confused states, instead of putting the bottle in
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  Speaker 1: the microwave to warm up, she instead picked up Joseph
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  Speaker 1: and crammed him in there instead. If this is true then,
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  Speaker 1: she'll have to live with that knowledge for the rest
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  Speaker 1: of her life. She was sentenced to five years imprisonment
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  Speaker 1: for involuntary manslaughter. Another case where the blackout defense was
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  Speaker 1: used was that of Ka Young. A sacramental woman who
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  Speaker 1: cooked her six-week-old daughter Mirabelle to death in a microwave.
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  Speaker 1: She survived at Ka Young's house to find her in
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  Speaker 1: a state of distress with her burnt baby dead on
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  Speaker 1: the floor in front of a space heater. Young claimed
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: that she had had a blackout seizure from looking at
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  Speaker 1: her computer screen. When she woke up, she realized her
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  Speaker 1: baby had burnt to death in front of the heater.
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  Speaker 1: Something about the injuries though didn't seem consistent with the
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  Speaker 1: space heater story, and when he searched the house, they
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  Speaker 1: discovered a melted pacifier in the microwave. Young then changed
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  Speaker 1: the story, claiming that she might have a split personality
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: and she had no memory of the incident. An autopsy
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  Speaker 1: of the child showed that her internal organs had been
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  Speaker 1: cooked by a high dose of microwave radiation. Ka Young
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  Speaker 1: was found guilty of first-degree murder and sentenced to life imprisonment.
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  Speaker 1: So that's all the story they could find for now.
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: I'm sure there's many more out there, but I think
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: that's probably enough for today. Like I said at the beginning,
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: at first I thought there was only one case of
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: this kind of thing happening. Cooking your own child and
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  Speaker 1: causing them one of the most prolonged and painful tortures imaginable.
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  Speaker 1: Now you've Lee I assume this could only happen once
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  Speaker 1: in a blue moon. Without your help I wouldn't be
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: able to ruin someone's day by telling them about things
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  Speaker 1: like this. Just going to be a fine day tomorrow.
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: It's a fine day. People will come when those very
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: bad guys just for a shot. They won't bother them.
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: They won't bother them. They won't bother them. They won't
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: bother them.