Latest / The Path Went Chilly / Su Taraskiewicz Pt. One
Transcript
- 0:32Welcome back to the Path with Chili. I'm Robin, I'm Jules, and
- 0:36I'm Ashley. Let's dive right into this week's case. September thirteenth, nineteen
- 0:43ninety two, Boston, Massachusetts. While working as the ramp supervisor for Northwest
- 0:49Airlines at Logan International Airport, twenty seven year old Sue rasca Witz leaves in
- 0:55the middle of her shift to purchase food for her crew. She never returns
- 1:00and is found murdered inside the trunk of her car if the following morning.
- 1:03One year later, Sue's mother finds her diary and reads that Sue is the
- 1:08victim of non stop sexual harassment at her workplace. Some of Sue's harassers are
- 1:15later indicted for their role in a credit card theft ring, but the identity
- 1:19of her killer remains unknown. After that, the Path Went Chili, So
- 1:25the case were going to be covering today also happened to be featured on Unsolved
- 1:29Mysteries the nineteen ninety two murder of Sue Tarrascowitz and fair Warning, this is
- 1:34definitely one of the most rage inducing cases we've ever explored. I originally covered
- 1:38this on The Trail Went Cold in September of twenty seventeen and released the episode
- 1:44of the exact twenty five year anniversary if Sue's Murder, and sadly, here
- 1:48we are six years later, and we've recently passed the thirty one year anniversary
- 1:52and the crime is still unsolved, So I thought it would be a good
- 1:56idea to revisit it on the Path went Chili. It's going to seem pretty
- 1:59unbelievable that this case has gone on sold for thirty one years, because there
- 2:02are likely quite a few people out there who knew the truth about what happened.
- 2:07This is a pretty maddening story of a woman who found success in a
- 2:09male dominated industry, but some of our co workers just couldnot handle that,
- 2:15so she was tormented for years by a NonStop stream of sexual harassment. It's
- 2:20been out for debate whether the harassment itself was the primary motive for Sue's murder,
- 2:23or if she might have been killed because of a legal activity going on
- 2:27in her workplace. Whatever the case, this is a pretty disturbing story,
- 2:30but it needs to be told. Okay, so I'm already on board because
- 2:36you said it's the most rage inducing case we've ever explored. So bring it
- 2:39on, Robin. But also, I mean, we're talking about a young
- 2:45girl twenty seven years old who is working at an airport, and she's a
- 2:51ramp supervisor already at age twenty seven. This is in nineteen ninety two.
- 2:57We are still today and very vocally talking about out sexual harassment in the workplace,
- 3:00women's rights in employment, and back in ninety two that was not so
- 3:06much the case. You were expected to deal with it, particularly in a
- 3:09male dominated field, and to almost feel privileged if you were appointed to a
- 3:15certain position. And so I'm very concerned about Sue being harassed to a point
- 3:21where she's writing this in her diary saying that the harassment won't stop at work,
- 3:27that if she were to mention at work, it definitely makes you a
- 3:30target. And the fact that she's found in her trunk of the car the
- 3:35next morning, surely someone is seeing something happened to Sue between the times I'm
- 3:40assuming leaves work and makes it out to her car. So I need to
- 3:45know more. I'm already on the edge of my seat. Our story begins
- 3:50in Boston in nineteen ninety two. Our central figure is twenty seven year old
- 3:54Susan tarasco Is who goes by the name Zue. Sue lives in Saga with
- 4:00parents Ronald and Marleine Tarrascowitz, and is currently an employee of Northwest Airlines and
- 4:05works at Boston's Logan International Airport. She went to art school and originally dreamed
- 4:11of being a cartoonist, but instead she decided to break new ground by achieving
- 4:15success in a very male dominated industry. Sue started out her career at Northwest
- 4:21in nineteen eighty seven by cleaning the interiors of jets and became a ground service
- 4:27employee within the next two years, only the second woman in the history of
- 4:31the company to ever hold that position. She continued working her way up the
- 4:36ladder and eventually earned a promotion to the position of Equipment Service Crew Chief.
- 4:43Her job involves supervising round porkers who unloaded mail and baggage from the airplanes,
- 4:46and this time Sue became the very first woman to ever hold such a position
- 4:51at Northwest. Wow. Okay, so here she is twenty seven years old,
- 4:57and not only is she moving up and being a superior, but she's
- 4:59break these massive barriers where she's the second woman to hold this position. The
- 5:03first woman to hold another supervisory position. I'm very interested in knowing how the
- 5:10men who were working underneath of her, and even the females who were working
- 5:13below her and were not promoted to those positions, how are they reacting to
- 5:17Sue at work. It sounds like perhaps that alone could be a big reason
- 5:23why people were really targeting her and trying to make her uncomfortable, perhaps in
- 5:27a way to get her to not be the person supervising them. There's a
- 5:30lot of people, including young men, who are sitting there going I don't
- 5:34want some woman and a young woman at twenty seven telling me how to do
- 5:38my job. And what do you both think about the fact that these guys
- 5:43likely saw Sue from the beginning of her career at Northwest when she was cleaning
- 5:47the planes, and the fact that this upward mobility for her seemed to be
- 5:55just incredibly fast. She was obviously doing a really good job. If within
- 6:00two years she got another promotion and then she's promoted to round supervisor like that
- 6:04career trajectory says this woman is going to be a star. I can imagine
- 6:09that there would be some resentment from the men around her who weren't being promoted
- 6:14at that rate. Oh, definitely, I think that was one of the
- 6:16big issues there. And Ashley just asked about the other female employees. As
- 6:20far as I can tell, there really were not that many female workers at
- 6:25that particular airport, especially working in the baggage industry at that time, so
- 6:30there were only a handful of them. But as far as I can tell,
- 6:32Sue was still very close with them, and they were very supportive of
- 6:35her because I think they had the mentality that in this industry, a woman
- 6:40breaking ground and climbing up the ladder that quickly and becoming going into like a
- 6:45supervisory position is a pretty big deal. So I think they respected her for
- 6:48being able to pave the way for And I think, as we're going to
- 6:51find out, one of the reasons Sue would stay at this position and not
- 6:57quit even after facing a steady stream of harassment, is that she knew what
- 7:00would make it tougher for all the other female employees if she just decided to
- 7:03leave and not fight all the harassment she was facing. Oh man, been
- 7:08there, done that, Where it's like it's almost on you as a young
- 7:12woman to say, if my voice isn't heard, if I don't stick this
- 7:15out, then it's going to be just the next girl behind me. And
- 7:17so you feel this incredible responsibility, even at your own health risk, to
- 7:23stay and to put up with it. I know you've dealt with that in
- 7:27the workplace, Ashley, and you know how difficult it is. But can
- 7:30you imagine what it would feel like if in your workplace it was you and
- 7:34only men. Oh, it would be pretty intense. I think there'd be
- 7:40the both sides of the coin, which we talked about a lot. There
- 7:43would be the people who treated you like a sister and daughter and respected you
- 7:47and we're in awe of your progress and really proud of you. And then
- 7:51I do think there would be a whole other party that's sitting there, going
- 7:55this young girl like I don't think so there's not a place for her here.
- 7:59I'm to make her as miserable as possible so that she leaves. And
- 8:03I think she would be dealing with both of those camps in her position and
- 8:07the ones that want to basically reduce you to a sexual object because it makes
- 8:13it a lot easier for them, and they know that it can break down
- 8:18a woman over time, and clearly that's what Sue is dealing with and she's
- 8:22such a hero like I just can't get over the fact that she continues to
- 8:28with this incredible fortitude because she wants to not allow them to make her quit
- 8:35her job. She wants to be strong and put herself in a position that
- 8:37would support other women who want to potentially take that position. I just think
- 8:43she's an incredible twenty seven year old woman. So on the evening of Saturday,
- 8:48September the twelfth, Sue showed up to work the eleven PM to seven
- 8:52am graveyard shift with her crew. Sometime around one am on the thirteenth,
- 8:56she volunteered to go on a food run to a nearby Samwich shop. After
- 9:00taking orders from her co workers and leaving the airport, Sue did not return
- 9:03for the rest of her shift. On the morning of September fourteenth, Sue's
- 9:07car was found parked at an auto body shop in nearby Revere, and after
- 9:11a passer by noticed blood dripping from the trunk, the police were notified.
- 9:16When the vehicle's trunk was opened, Sue's body was inside. She had been
- 9:20beaten and stabbed multiple times. Sue was not sexually assaulted, and the only
- 9:24item of hers which appeared to be missing was a necklace she usually wore.
- 9:28So what could have been the motive for her murder? Oh, my goodness,
- 9:33beyond the sexual harassment. I got to go back to this idea of
- 9:35Sue really was only at work for about two hours when she is the one
- 9:41who says, Hey, I'm gonna go grab some food at this nearby sandwich
- 9:43shop. Two questions, do we know if she ever made it to the
- 9:48sandwich shop or was she somehow kind of apprehended between the her walk from work
- 9:52to the car. And is there any way that this food run could have
- 9:58been staged, like someone on her shifts saying, Hey, I'm hungry,
- 10:01do you think you could go get us food? So that she was then
- 10:05outside of the building at that point. I see no indication that she ever
- 10:11made it to the sandwich shop. There's no record of her having ever purchased
- 10:15anything. And while we have no idea when exactly she was murdered, I
- 10:18have to assume it's a very short time after leaving the airport. And I
- 10:22don't get the impression that the food run was staged, because I think it
- 10:26was Sue's idea to go and buy food for her entire crew. But of
- 10:30course, as we're going to talk about later, one of the most disturbing
- 10:33elements is that she never returned with anyone's food even after taking their orders,
- 10:37and no one seemed overly concerned enough to notify the police. Wait, so
- 10:41no one said where's our food? Where's Sue until some time after the end
- 10:48of her shift, exactly like, no one really reacted at all. She
- 10:50just did show up for the rest of her shift, and they just seemed
- 10:54to go on business as usual, and then she's discovered in her car like
- 10:58the following day, as we're going to talk about, that's one of the
- 11:00major red flags in this case, that no one was overly concerned when she
- 11:03just went missing for around thirty six hours. Then you almost have a question,
- 11:09is this a conspiracy of many because nobody's asking a question, where is
- 11:13Sue? This dependable person. Then it seems almost as likely that you could
- 11:18ask what asked she was asking, and that was this whole food run stage,
- 11:22because either they're all conspiring to not report the two's missing or hasn't returned,
- 11:28or they're conspiring to say that there was a sandwich run or a food
- 11:31run when maybe one of the guys went and talked to Sue, something happened
- 11:35and he ended up putting her in the trunk or ended up causing her some
- 11:39kind of harm. But it just feels like they're covering for somebody well right
- 11:46from the outset. Alarm bells were raised for Sue's family when they learned that
- 11:50after she failed to return from her sandwich run on her shift, no one
- 11:54attempted to report her missing for the next thirty six hours. Since Sue usually
- 12:01worked overnight and did a lot of overtime, her parents did not find it
- 12:05unusual when they did not see her at their home on September thirteenth, But
- 12:09on the morning of the fourteenth, Marlene to Raskowitz received a call at work
- 12:13from her other daughter, Debbie, who told her she had received a phone
- 12:18call from one of Sue's co workers. In addition to disappearing during her shift
- 12:22on the morning of the thirteenth, Sue did not show up at all for
- 12:26her next shift. On the evening of the thirteenth, When Marlen went to
- 12:30the Saugust police station to report her daughter was missing, she was informed that
- 12:35Sue's body had already been found. It would turn out that, in spite
- 12:39of her disappearance, Sue's time card was punched to indicate that she completed her
- 12:45shift on the morning of the thirteenth like normal, and even though she failed
- 12:48to show up for her shift later that evening, her time card was punched
- 12:52again. Some of Sue's coworkers claimed they only did this to cover for her
- 12:58so she wouldn't get into try, even though Sue had never missed a shift
- 13:03without explanation during her entire tenure with the company. WHOA, all right,
- 13:09there's a lot to unpack there. So when mom is going and trying to
- 13:13report her daughter missing, she said, oh, by the way, we
- 13:15found her body. So this must have been a very odd coincidence of time
- 13:18where they're finding her body shortly before she comes, I hope, And there
- 13:24aren't hours that passed before Mom's informed that her daughter's body has been discovered.
- 13:28But also when we're sitting here and we're talking about Sue's time card, someone
- 13:33punched her out at seven am, which wouldn't be that weird if like she
- 13:37had left it five or something or six, and they're like, oh,
- 13:39crud, she didn't come back. We're all going home but it was six
- 13:45hours and she was supposed to be bringing me food back, So there's a
- 13:50lot of like Sue had a plan. We all knew she was going to
- 13:52the sandwich shop. She had a duty to bring us food back so that
- 13:56we could eat during our shift. And I suppose, if I'm trying to
- 14:01be a good friend, I don't want her in trouble, so I might
- 14:03punch her out. But as my supervisor and someone that does have a history
- 14:09of being at work following through being very responsible and punctual, I almost feel
- 14:13like my gut would be something's wrong, and there would have at least have
- 14:18been a discussion with some of us to say, hey, I'm concerned,
- 14:20let me follow up with Sue later this morning or something. If I covered
- 14:26for there was still more for me to do at that point to make sure
- 14:28Sue was okay. If that makes sense. Oh yeah, exactly. Like
- 14:33when you look at her history with the company, like if Sue had a
- 14:35habit of leaving shifts or not showing up without calling, there's no way that
- 14:39a woman in her position would have ever been promoted to ramp supervisor. So
- 14:43this was very out of character, which is why it just seems like a
- 14:46red flag that they didn't become more concerned that she did show up. She
- 14:50disappeared in the middle of one shift, didn't show up for her next shift,
- 14:52and they just decided to go on business as usual and punch her time
- 14:56card in it. I mean, if this was someone who had a history
- 14:58of slacking off and having people cover for that'd be one thing, but this
- 15:03was just so uncharacteristic. So in spite of this odd piece of business,
- 15:07the investigation into Sue's murder went nowhere and failed to turn up any solid leads.
- 15:11For over a year. However, Sue's mother, Marlene, would make
- 15:16a shocking discovery which took the investigation in an entirely new direction. For a
- 15:20long time after Sue's murder, Marlene could not handle the grief of going into
- 15:24her daughter's room, but finally decided to do so around Christmas time in nineteen
- 15:28ninety three. Marlene found a briefcase inside the closet containing Sue's diary, but
- 15:33when she opened it, Marlene was horrified to read Her daughter described many disturbing
- 15:39accounts of sexual harassment which took place at her workplace in nineteen eighty nine.
- 15:43According to the diary, Sue faced this harassment because her male co workers did
- 15:48not like the idea of a woman entering their world. Sue never told her
- 15:52family about this, so Marlene was forced to read about the harassment for the
- 15:56first time in the diary. And I think it's important to put into context.
- 16:00This is again nineteen ninety two. So while now we have things like
- 16:03hashtag you know me too, and we have these movements where women are truly
- 16:07using their voice to make a difference not only for themselves but for other women,
- 16:11Sue is this kind of revolutionary groundbreaker at that point where she's saying,
- 16:15I'm going to endure this and take it, but it's really devastating to me
- 16:21as a career woman. And it's exactly what I thought when you were at
- 16:25the first paragraph. To me, you have this young woman. She's young.
- 16:27That matters as well. This is not some fifty five year old careered
- 16:30woman who men could look next to him and be like, yeah, she's
- 16:33been here forever. You know, I get it, she's young, and
- 16:37you know that there's people who have been there longer than her, that are
- 16:38older than her, who have more experience than her. That we're not picked
- 16:42for these promotions, and so especially when she's the soul woman and you have
- 16:48a bunch of men looking around, it is easy to move you aside and
- 16:52push you aside. Because I harass you long enough, you'll get uncomfortable enough
- 16:56and you'll step aside without saying anything. That's just a typical EMO in that
- 17:00kind of wolfpack aggressive behavior. And I think that's exactly what people were likely
- 17:06doing to Sue. Is they're saying, we will make it so miserable for
- 17:08her that she'll just step aside, and then one of us will get it
- 17:12because we deserve it more than her. And oh, I'm already upset.
- 17:18And poor Mom is sitting here reading this after her daughter has passed away.
- 17:22You know, there's a lot to the grief process where she's saying, what
- 17:26if I had known, could I have helped Sue. I wish Sue would
- 17:29trust me enough to share. And you know, that set off a whole
- 17:32another grief journey for Mom. Even though Sue was very well in control of
- 17:37what she was doing. There's a reason she protected her mom for that info.
- 17:40But I can only imagine Mom sitting on the floor of that bedroom and
- 17:44reading that and just wondering what if, like Sue, I would just wish
- 17:47you had told me I might have been able to save you. And that
- 17:49just breaks my heart. You think that we'd come leaps and bounds, being
- 17:53that it is twenty twenty three. Literally yesterday I was reading all of these
- 17:59tweets from surgeons in the NHS, female surgeons in the UK talking about sexual
- 18:06harassment in the workplace and sexual assault, and this prominent surgeon who just recently
- 18:11retired called them all snowflakes and told them to toughen up and that these types
- 18:18of situations will happen and you're just going to have to deal with it.
- 18:22This was a prominent male doctor who's saying you're just going to have to deal
- 18:26with it. And all of these women are brave enough to share their stories,
- 18:29but it's become so normalized that women are going to experience sexual harassment and
- 18:33sexual assault that people feel that it is okay to just say, just deal
- 18:37with it, sweetie, just deal with it, because it's going to happen.
- 18:41Boys will be boys, and it's uncomfortable for people to look at the
- 18:45facts of the impact of that, and that people need to be accountable and
- 18:48change their behavior, even though historically it's been accepted and allowed. I remember
- 18:53asking for help and talking to my very close family friend who's an older lady,
- 19:00and I remember her saying, oh, come on, ash, like
- 19:02we used to have men put their hands up our skirt at work, and
- 19:04like you just this is minor, this is not a big deal. I'm
- 19:07going wait, excuse me, Like okay, because that was normal for you,
- 19:11then it's acceptable, and therefore other generations should be treated the same way.
- 19:17Like normalcy doesn't mean right, and normalcy and history doesn't mean that it's
- 19:22should be allowed to happen. But you're right, Jewels, it's twenty twenty
- 19:25three, and while we've come a long way, while we've gotten stronger voices,
- 19:30behaviors haven't necessarily change. It takes unlearning behaviors and making changes from generation
- 19:34and generation to make an actual difference here. Yeah, it takes raising little
- 19:41boys that you're raising them with empathy and compassion and not with this kind of
- 19:48gendered idea that like of masculinity being this kind of overarching theme in a man's
- 19:53life where he cannot express his emotions and he can't be in touch with his
- 19:57feminine side because that would make him like, quote unquote weak. And it
- 20:00also takes women reinforcing that behavior and making it okay. Like you see it
- 20:07all the time right where it's like, oh, a guy just made a
- 20:10mistake, let's not ruin his life. You see women saying that in regards
- 20:14to somebody who's sexually assaulted a woman, and it's like, you'd think you
- 20:18would stick up for other women, But it's been so conditioned into us that
- 20:22it's going to take generations of unlearning. But I've got a lot of faith
- 20:26in gen Z. Yes, gen Z is going to save us. Yes,
- 20:32But to mention that point is like, I've always wondered if that's one
- 20:34of the reasons that Sue decided never to tell her mother about the harassment that
- 20:38she may have felt. If I tell my mother about this, she's probably
- 20:41going to tell me the same thing, that it's to be expected, and
- 20:45then I just have to put up with it, and it would have disappointed
- 20:47her. Though of course, now that we know that Marlene found out about
- 20:49it and was outraged, I'm sure she would have told her daughter that you
- 20:53don't have to put up with this, you can complain to someone. But
- 20:56I think Sue is just being selfless saying that I just don't want to and
- 21:00my mother with what I'm going through, and that's why I'm going to keep
- 21:02this from her. I think there can be a lot of shame associated with
- 21:04it as well, right, there can be like a multitude of reasons not
- 21:08wanting to burden your mother, but being in a situation like that, you
- 21:11can feel like, what did I do, even though you haven't done anything
- 21:15to deserve it. I know when I've been victimized in the past, I've
- 21:21certainly asked those questions myself, and I'm sure ash you probably have in situations
- 21:26too, even though you know logically that you did nothing wrong, nothing to
- 21:30bring that behavior upon you. Well, knowing and feeling are two very different
- 21:34things. Like I'm very logical and sensible, but then i also have a
- 21:38huge heart and you know, my own mental health to battle. So it's
- 21:42interesting when you're logic and you're you know, mental health kind of conflict with
- 21:47each other. But you're right, you also don't want to burden people around
- 21:49you, and you also don't want to feel like you're quote weak or that
- 21:52you can't handle things like it's part of it, Like we're raised to think
- 21:56it's part of it, and you fight through it. And I really don't
- 21:59want to bother anyone or have anyone ask questions or tell me to leave,
- 22:03you know, like I want to be able to be here and be strong
- 22:07and tough and stay put in this position and not have someone run me off.
- 22:10And so I think there's a lot of that kind of internalization and a
- 22:14lot of fear and shame you bring on yourself anticipating people's reactions, even though,
- 22:18like you said, her mama probably would have embraced her with open arms
- 22:22and said hell, yeah, let's fight this, or I'm here to listen.
- 22:25But we anticipate a lot of negative reactions from people, and so we
- 22:29don't turn to them. Yeah, And I think we worry in those situations
- 22:33that the narrative around us will shift to people having to walk on eggshells and
- 22:37that it will be like the quote unquote victim, right, And a lot
- 22:42of people don't want that. I've in the past been like I don't want
- 22:45to share this because I feel as though it makes me look weak or I
- 22:48feel as though it makes me appear to be a victim. But I mean
- 22:52I've kind of reframed that in my brain now where you know, it makes
- 22:55me a survivor, and it means that you're strong when you share that.
- 22:57I think that it can be that knee jerk reaction and did You're a problem,
- 23:02and it's going to make it worse exactly. Here are just a few
- 23:07examples of the harassment Sue was forced to face. On numerous occasions, she
- 23:11discovered explicit and demeaning graffiti written about her at the airport, usually in the
- 23:17men's room. At one point, she found a new drawing of her in
- 23:21a sexual position in the cargo hold of one of the jets. Sue frequently
- 23:25filed complaints with management at Northwest Airlines as well as her union, the International
- 23:30Association of Machinists, but very little was ever done to stop the harassment,
- 23:36and the union often advised her not to rock the boat. In fact,
- 23:40one of management's most common responses to Sue's complaints would be to assign her unappealing
- 23:45jobs such as cleaning and emptying the airline toilets. Yep, we'll help you.
- 23:52You're a problem, so we're going to help you on your way out,
- 23:55is what they typically do in these kinds of institutions. When you speak
- 24:00up, you now become a liability. And so instead of firing you or
- 24:03letting you go because that's illegal, they're going to make it as hard on
- 24:06you as possible. And that's exactly what they're doing here. Oh you had
- 24:08a problem, I'm so sorry. Also, could you go clean the toilets
- 24:11for us? It also didn't help that Sue was technically the highest ranking woman
- 24:17in the company, so anyone she complained to is going to be male,
- 24:21and they probably have the same mindset as a lot of the people who are
- 24:22doing harassments, so you can understand why nothing was done to stop it.
- 24:29Other female employees at Northwest would corroborate Sue's stories, claiming that some of the
- 24:33men there went out of their way to create a hostile work environment. Some
- 24:37of their tactics included using derogatory language to describe Sue and other women, scattering
- 24:41pornographic magazines throughout the lunchroom, and hanging women's undergarments and feminine hygiene products from
- 24:48the ceiling. Even those who's diary to only chronicled harassment, which took place
- 24:52until near the end of nineteen eighty nine, her family would learn that it
- 24:56continued to escalate in the ensuing years. It even spread outside of her workplace,
- 25:00as Sue's car was vandalized and she started getting anonymous, threatening phone calls
- 25:04in the middle of the night. On one occasion when Sue launched a complaint
- 25:08against her co worker's behavior, her sister Debbie's car was vandalized in her driveway.
- 25:14If any of Sue's co workers, both male and female, attempted to
- 25:18support her, they would find their own vehicles vandalized and receive death threats.
- 25:22This is so sad because here's Sue is and she's trying to really do the
- 25:27right thing right and every time she turns around she has worsening harassment. So
- 25:33you know she's sitting there going like, what do I do. I've done
- 25:37the like actual tactics I've been told to do, which is go to my
- 25:38superiors, ask people to stop, ask them to leave me alone. I
- 25:44try to ignore it. It seems like nothing's working, and it just keeps
- 25:47getting worse. And then when you watch people who are defending you also have
- 25:52retaliation against them. That's a lot to handle because you're watching with this sense
- 25:56of responsibility, like, wait, they're getting hurt they're getting vandalized, they're
- 26:00at risk with their position because they're protecting me. Like, that's a lot
- 26:06for a twenty seven year old to deal with. In spite of this hellish
- 26:10situation, Sue continued to perform stellar work for Northwest and applied for the position
- 26:15of equipment service crew chief. Another male employee in Sue's union initially got the
- 26:21job instead of her, but then she discovered that he had illegally bid for
- 26:25the position, So Sue filed a grievance about this, and after she won,
- 26:30the job was hers and she was officially promoted in February of nineteen ninety
- 26:33two. While not surprisingly, there was some male employees who had serious issues
- 26:40with the idea of a woman being in a supervisory position, so things became
- 26:45even more tense it were. Graffiti continued to be written about Sue, but
- 26:49it became more threatening. At one point, Sue opened her locker and discovered
- 26:56and discovered that a drawing of a coffin with her name on it had been
- 26:59scrawled in side. Wow, so it's become even more invasive and intense.
- 27:07It goes from kind of sexual harassment to more of death threats. Is what
- 27:12a coffin drawn inside of my locker looks like and this is because now someone
- 27:18in their brain, their perception is you've messed with me, and now you're
- 27:22going to pay for that. And instead of the jokes and instead of thinking
- 27:26that they're kind of doing this foul, gross humor to make her uncomfortable,
- 27:30it's turned to pictures of a coffin. So in here you have Sue saying,
- 27:36listen, maybe it's already bad. So when I am the one qualified
- 27:40for a job and I watch somebody next to me illegally obtain that position and
- 27:45I was overlooked for it, she gets a union behind her to support and
- 27:51eventually she gets this promotion. You know that now people are looking at her
- 27:56and saying, wow, this crazy kid and woman and actually messes with people's
- 28:00family and money. She's got to go, like, it's up to the
- 28:04auntie from just being this pain in people's butts to people feeling threatened by her
- 28:08even though she did the right thing. And yeah, the escalation is very
- 28:14scary. When you read that there was a drawing of a coughin the hair
- 28:17on my arms stood up. I went, wow, we've crossed the line.
- 28:19At this point, beyond sexual to a physical risk. To me,
- 28:25these guys are super creepy. The fact that they want out of their way
- 28:27to get feminine hygiene products in the beginning, and they were putting it like
- 28:32in the break room and hanging up women's panties. It's like, where did
- 28:36you procure this? You certainly put a lot of time and effort into this,
- 28:40but you could almost see that they were trying to be almost like a
- 28:42little bit cute or funny about it, leaving the pornographic magazines around. You
- 28:47could see them laughing amongst themselves. But then when it starts to get to
- 28:51that point where Sue's complained, she's given all of these duties like cleaning toilets,
- 28:56so there's no consequences for their actions. No one's there to check their
- 29:00behavior. And when you're left free to behave like that, you're left to
- 29:06be able to escalate that behavior to a point where, like you said,
- 29:08Ash, they're feeling like they're threatened, you know, their livelihood, and
- 29:14they're seeing themselves all in this guy who illegally bid I'm sure, because they're
- 29:18trying to find any excuse to hate Sue. And so this is a perfect
- 29:22one but just the threatening nature of that, Like, I can't imagine what
- 29:29poor Sue must have felt like. Like it's one thing to have to look
- 29:32at pornomegs spread everywhere. It's a whole other thing to see a coffin with
- 29:36your name drawn on it. Oh yeah, And you would think that would
- 29:40be the line that you could not cross, and that Sue would finally get
- 29:44action from complaining. But nope, once again she tried to do so,
- 29:47and it didn't help. When she attempted to report this issue to the higher
- 29:51ups at Northwest, things did not go well during a meeting, so she
- 29:53broke down crying. She later told a female co worker that she felt a
- 29:57shame for crying in front of them, but I was not going to quit
- 30:00because that would send a message that the harassers had won and only make things
- 30:04more difficult for other women who entered the industry. Also, though, Two,
- 30:10what's interesting is when you're sitting here looking at the dynamics of where she's
- 30:12working and jewels, you just said this. I just popped into my head.
- 30:15You know it too. The guys there in some ways it wasn't even
- 30:19probably really directed towards Sue. The silly stuff. You know. It's like
- 30:23I remember working at a police department and so obviously it was me and a
- 30:29bunch of men, and I remember like just their jokes and language and things
- 30:33like that, and then like you know, three hours into they be like,
- 30:36oh my god, Ashley, I'm so sorry. I forgot you were
- 30:37here, and like genuinely we're like, ah, sorry about that, sorry
- 30:41about that, and I'm like, yeah, been here the whole time.
- 30:45It's just so ingrained, especially back in the nineties, to have those I'm
- 30:49very sexualized humor jokes, pictures things like that. Now, for Sue,
- 30:53she can tell that she's the brunt of it, which makes it different.
- 30:57But when it crossed that line to risk a physical threat now and I'm threatening
- 31:03your life, not just your kind of safety and security of your womanhood,
- 31:07but I'm also like telling you I'm going to kill you. There's no way
- 31:11you could explain that in a way as like this just crude humor that wasn't
- 31:15really shunned at the time, right, So I don't know, I'm just
- 31:19I feel sick because I you know what's coming, and everyone around her was
- 31:25watching this treatment of her, and it's like you stood up, you got
- 31:29silenced and you were at risk. And so in time, a lot of
- 31:33people just keep their mouth shut and watch in horror with Sue and say,
- 31:37hey, my job is important. I gotta protect my family and that kid
- 31:40is going to have to survive on her own. Was there not one man
- 31:42there that was looking at this behavior and went, WHOA, Like this is
- 31:47too much. I have to stand up and say something. Or is it
- 31:49likely that one of the guys was like the alpha and they were afraid to
- 31:53step to him, and he had his eye on Sue getting fired or doing
- 31:59some thing horrible to her. I think it takes a lot for someone,
- 32:02Robin, you can speak to this more. It takes a lot for someone
- 32:05to stand up while everyone thinks is that this is hilarious and say this is
- 32:08wrong? Like same, you know, like now it's like you know,
- 32:12say see something, say something, or when a racist joke's told, when
- 32:15a joke about a you know, someone getting assaulted is told, I turn
- 32:19around and I shut it down. But it takes I mean, my gut
- 32:22flips when I do it. Do you know what I mean? It takes
- 32:23a big like ah, there's a survivor in this room somewhere, you need
- 32:27to keep your mouth shut, or like, you know, your jokes aren't
- 32:29funny, but everyone else looks at you like you're a monster and you're crazy
- 32:34when you stand up for people, And especially back then, I don't I
- 32:37don't know why it is, but it seems to be very difficult for people
- 32:40to stand up and say something. Yes, we're going to talk about that
- 32:45later. That there was one male coworker who did confront someone who was harassing
- 32:49Sue, and they got threatened themselves. And I think there was just such
- 32:52a bad culture of fear there that everyone knew that something bad could happen to
- 32:55me if I try to defend Sue. And of course the fact that she
- 33:00just disappear from her shift and miss another shift and none of her male co
- 33:04workers would do anything to alert the police or or launch an alarm because Sue
- 33:07was missing, shows that everyone there must have been so terrified about what would
- 33:12happened if they tried to do the right thing. It's that whole idea of
- 33:15like, how dare you call me out on my bad behavior? I'm now
- 33:20the victim because you've called me out and you are the villain, And it's
- 33:23just it's so insane. How you can see things like that turned on their
- 33:28head and ask you just described it perfectly with the situation where you're calling out
- 33:32a really poor joke and somebody is very offended that you decided to say,
- 33:37hey, this could be really hurtful, and you know, I really don't
- 33:40like it, and it's like, how dare you say that? I'm rude.
- 33:45Yeah, people aren't comfortable being like taught that maybe their way of thinking
- 33:49it's not right, And I mean I get it. I don't either,
- 33:51Like I have people that are like, oh you don't. We don't use
- 33:53that word anymore, right, And I'm like, wait, what what?
- 33:57And then you're humiliated, you're embarrassed. But like, my response as I've
- 34:00gotten older is not to defend myself and explain it away. It's to go,
- 34:04oh, I'm so sorry, will you teach me why? Like and
- 34:07that's a change generational thing, right, But instead of saying no, this
- 34:10is how I've always said it or this is what I've always heard, I'm
- 34:14like, oh my god, I'm so sorry. Will you please teach me
- 34:17why that is not an appropriate word? And thank you for educating me.
- 34:22I'm going to change my verbiage now. But that takes some emotional intelligence and
- 34:27maturity to say, like, whoa, maybe everything I've been doing for thirty
- 34:30nine years is wrong and it doesn't have to be a personal attack on me.
- 34:34You're trying to help me be a better person or make those around me
- 34:37safer. I'm okay with that. But it takes saying I'm willing to learn
- 34:40that what I know is not acceptable behavior. Takes humility, right, yes,
- 34:47deep humility to go whoa, eke, I'm so sorry, I'm so
- 34:51sorry, not my intention teach me instead of oh well, not a big
- 34:54deal. No, if someone has the courage to say don't say that,
- 34:59or hey, and I and you can say it in a way that's really
- 35:00helpful, like hey, I know you didn't mean anything, but can I
- 35:04can I say like, hey, that was my daughter? That would make
- 35:07me really uncomfortable that you had said that. Maybe we should clean it up
- 35:09and like watch how we speak around sue. You know, like there's a
- 35:12sweeter way than like hey man, you're a dick. You know, there's
- 35:15a nicer way to say it and be like hey man, if that was
- 35:17my wife, I'd be like appalled. Did someone talk to her like that?
- 35:21We should. We should watch it and protect her a little bit,
- 35:22and then it's not as threatening to somebody. I don't think these guys would
- 35:25respond well to sweet. They probably they'd respond more to you're a dick.
- 35:32Fine, fine, I'll go that route with them when they when they look
- 35:36at me like I'm crazy. In the weeks preceding her death, Sue apparently
- 35:40told friends that she was in fear for her life. Needless to say,
- 35:45all of those revelations about Sue's years of constant workplace harassment opened up a potential
- 35:52motive for her murder, so her family started making waves. Sue's parents,
- 35:55Marlene and Ronald, eventually took legal action by finally complaint with the Massachusetts Commission
- 36:01against Discrimination about the failure of Northwest Airlines and the International Association of Machinists to
- 36:08stop their harassment against their daughter. They also sued Northwest Airlines for sexual harassment,
- 36:15and the two sides would reach a settlement where the airline agreed to pay
- 36:17seventy five thousand dollars just use a state and put up a two hundred and
- 36:22fifty thousand dollar reward for information, which led to the arresting conviction of Sue's
- 36:27killer. However, it turned out there might have been a different reason for
- 36:30Sue's death, which had nothing to do with sexual harassment. Well good for
- 36:36them. You know, here's Marlene. Remember she opens up a diary she
- 36:39finds in Sue's bedroom and in a hidden briefcase. Years later, and all
- 36:45of a sudden, she goes, oh, my god, my daughter was
- 36:47not only murdered at work, but she also had been subject to this horrific
- 36:52harassment. And had someone stepped forward and listened and not just listened, but
- 36:59acted and held people accountable for their actions, would my daughter still be alive
- 37:04today? Because it seems very clear that something around the airport likely led to
- 37:09Sue's death. I think there's a very very very small percent chance that Sue
- 37:14met a stranger that killed her. But we know that's not likely. We
- 37:16know Sue had people angry with her, Sue had people who were threatening her,
- 37:22and then Sue ends up dead. It's much more logicble at someone that
- 37:24she knows. But here her parents say, you know what, you didn't
- 37:30answer while she was here, and now someone's going to answer. We're going
- 37:32to make sure that Northwest Airlines and the International Association of Machinists is held accountable
- 37:40for what they failed to do while she was alive. I'm incredibly proud of
- 37:44them. They took up a fight the same way they would have taken up
- 37:46a fight if Sue had called on them to act while she was alive.
- 37:50But here this is almost like a symbolic way to bring her justice without really
- 37:55having an offender to hold accountable. I don't think at a moment this was
- 38:00about a financial payout for them, because this doesn't come close to pain for
- 38:05my child's life. But it is a symbolic screw you for failing my child
- 38:12because I wasn't in tight are privy to this information. I wasn't given this
- 38:16information while she was alive, and you were, and you failed her.
- 38:21And so bravo Marlene and Ronald. I'm incredibly impressed that they said, you
- 38:24know, maybe the next young lady or young man who comes in your office
- 38:28and says they're scared that they're mistreated, maybe you will step forward and say,
- 38:32guess what the culture is about to change in this department. Exactly what
- 38:37you just said is what I was thinking when you were talking, like this
- 38:39is the legacy that Sue Tarrascoitz would want to leave, and her parents picked
- 38:45up where she left off and was like, we're gonna hold your feet to
- 38:47the fire and we're gonna make you pay for your inaction with our daughter.
- 38:52And the next human that walks through here that is dealing with something similar to
- 38:58what our daughter was dealing will be treated in a different way because you will
- 39:02think of the lawsuit that preceded whatever is happening to them, and you'll go,
- 39:07Okay, WHOA, we don't want to have to deal with that again.
- 39:09Let's take the appropriate actions. I also think it's poetic that the majority
- 39:14of the payout went to a reward to find the killer, because it's kind
- 39:16of symbolic to say, well, because you didn't do any effort to stop
- 39:20this and prevent a murder from taking place, we're going to take your money
- 39:22and use it to find the person who did this. So during the summer
- 39:27of nineteen ninety two, a federal investigation was launched against Northwest Airlines because it
- 39:31turned out that some of their baggage handlers were participating in a stolen credit card
- 39:36ring, which netted over seven million dollars. It was a massive investigation involving
- 39:40the FBI, the Secret Service, and the US Postal Service. Whenever at
- 39:45Northwest Jet transported shipments of new credit cards from Minneapolis to Boston, which were
- 39:50supposed to be delivered to customers, these handlers would steal some of the cards
- 39:53from the mail bags. The people involved in this scheme would generate phony driver's
- 39:59licenses which at the names on these cards, which were then used for nefarious
- 40:02purposes. One of their biggest scams was to use the card to take out
- 40:07large cash advances at casinos, and they would sometimes use this money to gamble
- 40:10there and make even more money. Other times, the stolen cards would be
- 40:15sold off through a fence. The advantage here is that the cards were stolen
- 40:20in transit, so the thieves would have several days to profit off them before
- 40:23the customers even noticed their cards hadn't arrived yet. So okay, let me
- 40:29get this right. You have the baggage handlers are the ones who are actually
- 40:32running this scheme, So it's actually the people working right underneath of Sue pretty
- 40:38much. Yeah, like they didn't know this at the time, but some
- 40:42people are going to get into a lot of legal troll who turned out we're
- 40:45working under Sue, which is why this theory has come up that perhaps she
- 40:49found out about illegal activity that was going on there at the airport and that's
- 40:52what led to her being murdered. Yep, that would be a massive red
- 40:57flag beyond even the sexual harassment. That's what I was saying, Like,
- 41:00I think part of them thought it was cute that they were sexually harassing her.
- 41:02They thought they were like in the good old boys club and they're being
- 41:06silly. But in nineteen ninety two, seven million dollars would be fifteen and
- 41:10a half million dollars today one hundred and eighteen percent more like fifteen million dollars
- 41:16by little baggage handlers that are working underneath of Sue. And if she did
- 41:21have any knowledge that even something was wrong, that is a massive, massive
- 41:29federal crime. And so the risk of her opening her mouth I think calls
- 41:35for silencing her way more than a sexual harassment or kind of oh I got
- 41:38this position or you lost this position, it didn't get your promotion. I
- 41:43think this speaks amplified volumes over the sexual harassment. One month before Sue's murder,
- 41:51several baggage haddlers were subpoena to testify in front of a federal grand jury.
- 41:57In the end, a total of thirty seven people were indicted and convicted
- 42:00on federal charges for their involvement in this scheme, and ten of them were
- 42:05baggage handlers at Northwest. In fact, some of these handlers just happened to
- 42:09be named in Sue's diary as employees who'd been sexually harassing her, and two
- 42:15of these people really stood out. One of them was Joseph Nuzo, the
- 42:21ring leader among the baggage handlers, who wound up getting a three year prison
- 42:24sentence In nineteen eighty nine. Sue filed a harassment complaint about Nuzo after she
- 42:30attempted to break up a fistfight between him and two other employees, and he
- 42:35responded by calling her a very derogatory term. Nuzo soon wound up getting fired
- 42:39from Northwest, though he was hired back six months later under a last chance
- 42:45policy. Yikes. So he's on thin ice anyway, and Sue is actually
- 42:50one of the people who is part of his problems at the airport. So
- 42:54not only is he involved in this handler scheme, but then he gets in
- 43:00a fight and there is Sue coming forward and saying, listen, I'm going
- 43:05to file a harassment charge against you. You called me a derogatory term.
- 43:08You're a dangerous person here and again she's standing up not only for herself but
- 43:14the environment and the integrity of the department that she's leading, and Nuzo has
- 43:19to look at her as a massive problem, kind of a thorn in his
- 43:22side. But when you then turn to say, oh my god, he
- 43:23was also involved in this federal crime that's going on at the same time,
- 43:28Sue becomes a very dangerous person in his script in the way that he's kind
- 43:32of living out this employment on incredibly thin ice. I've had. It's so
- 43:37laughable, this whole last chance policy thing for her a guy who had like
- 43:42a history of harassment, and in the end, karma got back to them
- 43:45because he wound up his last chance of fence was literally stealing credit cards worth
- 43:50millions of dollars. So I think it's safe to say that that policy doesn't
- 43:52actually work. I don't think Northwest policies were all that great at the time,
- 43:58given that would complain about sexual harassment end up cleaning toilets and Joseph Buzo
- 44:04gets to screw up here, there, and everywhere and have fi fights with
- 44:07people, and he gets to come back six months later on a last chance
- 44:12policy, only to basically embarrass the airline greatly. It just really hoped that
- 44:16they revised their policies after all this. By the sound of things, Nuzo
- 44:22had committed a number of disciplinarian fractions, and the incident involving Sue and the
- 44:27fist fight was not the only reason he got fired, but he seemed to
- 44:30hold a massive grudge against Sue and was believed to be the instigator of some
- 44:35of the worst harassment against her, including the vandalism of her car and the
- 44:38threatening phone calls. When the subpoenas were handed down in the credit card ring
- 44:43investigation in August of nineteen ninety two, Nuzo was finally fired from Northwest for
- 44:47good, and reportedly told people that he believed Sue was a snitch who had
- 44:52ratted them out to the authorities. However, the investigation concluded that Sue had
- 44:57no involvement or knowledge of the credit card ring and never been asked to assist
- 45:00in the investigation or testify in front of a grand jury. So what month
- 45:06was she killed? Timber Okay, so literally a month before new Zo is
- 45:12given a subpoena, right or is in charge or in dited for this.
- 45:19Let me start over. So literally a month beforehand, you have newso subpoena
- 45:24about this credit card ring and then he's telling people listen that you know,
- 45:30you know, he's calling her nasty names, that little brat is the one
- 45:32who snitched on me. I know she did. She's always had a problem
- 45:36with me. Oh my god, it's going to ruin me. And then
- 45:38she's dead a month later. Keep in mind, if he truly believed that
- 45:43she is a snitch, wouldn't she be one of the individuals called to testify
- 45:47or to at least be, you know, asked what happened in that workplace.
- 45:52And that's what's said about this whole thing, is that she may have
- 45:54been murdered because people believe that she was involved in this credit card ringing,
- 45:59was working as an informant when an actuality. She knew nothing about it.
- 46:02So she may have been killed for nothing. And maybe not even by news.
- 46:06Oh maybe by someone he told, oh, Sue's the snitch, and
- 46:08they go, oh, shoot, right, like that girl's got to go.
- 46:13Well, you're about to find out another guy from Sue's diary here.
- 46:15Oh Lord, bring it on. So another participant in this scheme who really
- 46:21stood out and had been named in Sue's diary was a baggage handler named Bobby
- 46:24Brooks. Sue and Bobby supposedly had a brief affair, but he became increasingly
- 46:30hostile towards her after it ended, particularly when she became involved with another coworker.
- 46:37Things reached a boiling point after an incident in the employee break room where
- 46:40Bobby grabbed Sue's radio and smashed it on the floor. Sue's boyfriend at the
- 46:45time confronted Bobby and demanded he replace the radio. When Sue confronted Bobby about
- 46:51this herself, he blew her off and threatened to beat up and kill her
- 46:53boyfriend. Yikes. So you have someone who not only was violent with her,
- 47:00but also involved with her and then rejected by her, and then he
- 47:05is working alongside her and her new boyfriend. I assume, so incredibly dangerous
- 47:10situation for someone who seems unstable like Bobby and someone who seems pretty darned strong
- 47:16like Sue. That's going listen, I'm gonna live by life. We didn't
- 47:19work out. It is what it is. But you're sure not going to
- 47:22disrespect me. You're not going to be violent in my workplace, and you're
- 47:25not going to threaten my boyfriend and I. And it's almost as if you
- 47:30can just feel the tension and the anger and the rage that's boiling inside of
- 47:34Bobby that he can't have Sue or that it didn't work out and he is
- 47:37forced to work with her and watch her move on with her life anyway.
- 47:43When the subpoenas were handed down in nineteen ninety two, Bobby Brooks immediately requested
- 47:47a transfer. He moved out of state and got a job as a bagga
- 47:52chandler at Minneapolis Saint Paul International Airport, but he was eventually indicted in the
- 47:55credit card scheme. In exchange for testifying against Joseph Neuzo, Bobby received a
- 48:01sense of three years probation. One question about Sue's murder, Bobby claimed he
- 48:06was working the late shift at the airport in Minneapolis on the night she was
- 48:09killed and that he never had any communication with Newzo at all that entire weekend.
- 48:15Well, they're clearly involved in this scheme together. Can we confirm that
- 48:19he was working, and did we know if they could confirm with records that
- 48:22he didn't communicate with Neuzo. No, we're about to talk about that.
- 48:27That Bobby's alibi is not exactly rock solid. No shock, Okay? Cool.
- 48:32However, in nineteen ninety seven, Bobby found himself in hot water again
- 48:37when he was indicted on three counts of perjury and two counts of obstruction of
- 48:42justice. It turns out that is alleged to alibi for Sue's murder was not
- 48:45exactly rock solid, as time cards showed that he was not actually working at
- 48:51Minneapolis Saint Paul International Airport that night, and even though Bobby had testified under
- 48:57oath that he had no communication with Joseph Newso that weekend, there were records
- 49:01of a phone conversation between the two men on the same day Sue was killed.
- 49:07In the end, Bobby agreed to plead guilty to obstruction of justice,
- 49:10and when sentenced to fifteen months in prison, but as part of his plea
- 49:15bargain, he would not have to face further questioning about Sue's murder. What
- 49:21kind of plea bargain is that, Hey, you're in you're in for this
- 49:24credit card ring. We're going to have you testify against new Zo And if
- 49:30you do that for us for this credit card ring, that little murder that
- 49:35happened, we won't ask you anymore about that. Like that seems incredibly backwards
- 49:40that I'd be more concerned about the murder that I was the credit card ring.
- 49:45And how do you just say, oh, you're helping us here,
- 49:50so we won't talk to you about any other crimes that took somebody's life.
- 49:53Does this remind you both of the case that we literally just covered the Blount
- 49:58family bombing and there was the one guy had like charges of interfering with miners
- 50:04or like you know, molesting children or whatever it was, and he basically
- 50:08had his charges. You know, they didn't charge him with that because he
- 50:13gave evidence against who is it Tony? Yeah, Michael roy Towny. Yeah,
- 50:19unbelievable, Right, the worst crime you could possibly commit, a crime
- 50:21against a child. They're like, ah, we're just gonna look away from
- 50:23that if you'll help us with this. Yeah, like what in order to
- 50:28put an innocent man in prison? So it didn't do anybody any good.
- 50:30And Yeah, this thing with Bobby Brooks, I've never heard of this before
- 50:34a plea bargain where you're exempt from being questioned about another crime which is considerably
- 50:38worse than the crime that you're being indicted for. It's it's so weird and
- 50:43I'd like to see the terms of this pleak Reeman. But it sounds like
- 50:45if they did find evidence that showed that Bobby was responsible for Sue's murder,
- 50:50they could charge him for it at a later time. But I guess these
- 50:52terms was we can't ask him about or to question him about it. So
- 50:57he's essentially getting a free pass for a crime only got him fifteen months in
- 51:00prison, So it doesn't seem like a fair trade off. Okay, one
- 51:04thing I'm confused about. So Bobby originally did a plea bargain, he got
- 51:09the three years probation when he spoke out against new Zo and Neuzo's role in
- 51:15the crime, and then this later plea bargain. What is this later plea
- 51:21bargain about? Why do they have to do a plea bargain with him?
- 51:23Are they just trying to ensure that they get a conviction because he's already done
- 51:29testifying against new Zo? What do they really need to plea down this thing
- 51:34and go, we're never going to ask you about anything about Sue. To
- 51:37Askowitz again, like that seems like a really weird ad that they didn't need
- 51:40to do. It is because he technically got probation for testifying against new Zo,
- 51:46but he technically violated the terms of the probation because they caught him in
- 51:50a lie because they uncovered the phone records which showed that they had communication that
- 51:54weekend, even though he had testified under oath that they didn't. So they're
- 51:59holding all the cars. They really don't have to offer him anything. They
- 52:01could just give him like a fifteen month prison sends and he's got nothing in
- 52:06exchange to offer, So I don't know why they threw those terms into the
- 52:09plea bargain. Sadly, Sue's death took a huge toll on her parents' marriage,
- 52:15as Marlene and Ronald tarasco Its eventually divorced. Sadly, they would be
- 52:20forced to endure the pain of losing another child when Sue's brother, Ronald Tarascus
- 52:23Junior, i'd expectedly passed away in July of two thousand and seven at the
- 52:28age of thirty five, though I'm not sure what the cause of death was
- 52:31Ronald Senior himself passed away four years later at the age of sixty nine,
- 52:36so the only surviving members of the Tarrasqwitz family are Marlene and her daughter,
- 52:39Debbie. Marlene is now eighty two years old, but she continues to work
- 52:44diligently to keep her daughter's case in the spotlight. Every year, on the
- 52:47anniversary of Sue's murder, Marlene holds a solitary vigil outside Logan Airport while carrying
- 52:53a sign containing all the information about the case. She is also paid to
- 52:58put up billboards for at the Boston An area featuring Sue's photograph and contact info
- 53:02for the authorities. During one interview for Inside Edition, Marlene stated, quote,
- 53:07these people that did this are looking over their shoulder every year because I'm
- 53:12not going anywhere. I'm a fighter. My daughter was a fighter. End
- 53:15quote. This is incredible. It's really sad that you have a marriage that
- 53:23dissolved in this moment. And one of the things I found when I worked
- 53:27with families of these unsolved murders is that whatever the marriage was like before the
- 53:31murder usually gets amplified. That's not always the case, but let's say you
- 53:36were kind of struggling anyway, then it quickly dissolves it. If you were
- 53:39incredibly strong and your marriage is at the forefront of your family, then it
- 53:44usually brought people closer together. But as time goes on, you would start
- 53:49to see a husband and wife or a mom and son grieve very differently and
- 53:53fight very differently, one wanting to constantly be working on the case, one
- 53:58wanting to constantly be talking about the victim and their loved one someone who wanted
- 54:02to constantly be working with the media, and the other one wanting to try
- 54:07to move forward, not on, but forward, while keeping those antennas up
- 54:13but still needing to move forward to heal. And it's very possible that happened
- 54:16here. I'm obsessed with Marlene because she's just like her daughter was. Sue
- 54:22refused to lie down when the fight got tough. She said, I'm gonna
- 54:28be strong. I'm going to show people why I got promoted to these positions.
- 54:31I'm a fighter, like her mom said. And then you have in
- 54:36her death her mom saying, bring it on. I don't care if I'm
- 54:39one hundred and eight right, I'm going to be tap dancing to my grave,
- 54:43fighting for my daughter because I'm a fighter, and then get this people,
- 54:47My daughter was a fighter, and it's unbelievable to me the strength of
- 54:53these people have. I feel so much kind of just sadness and pain for
- 55:00every single family member. They not only lost their marriage, they lost another
- 55:06baby. And then Mom's sitting here going well, I might be losing a
- 55:10heck of lat in life, but I will not lose my fight to protect
- 55:13my kids. So even though Northwest Airlines merged with Delta Airlines in two thousand
- 55:17and eight, Delta told the Tarrascoit's family that they would still honor at the
- 55:22two hundred and fifty thousand dollars reward if it led to an arrest in Sue's
- 55:25case. In addition to being featured on Unsolved Mysteries and Dateline, this story
- 55:30also inspired a two thousand and three episode of Law and Order Criminal Intent titled
- 55:35Baggage, about a female airline baggage supervisor who is murdered after enduring constant harassment
- 55:40from her male co workers. But unlike that fictional episode, the real life
- 55:45story would not have a conclusive ending. After thirty years, there's still no
- 55:49answers about who actually killed Sue Tarrascowitz. So I guess you could say the
- 55:53path went chilly. So I think this would be a good time to bring
- 55:58an into Part one. Join us next week for Part two as we continue
- 56:01to discuss the murder of Sutrascoitz