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The KILLDOZER Rampage · Stuff You Should Know

0:01
Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff you Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio. Hey,
0:11
Speaker 1: and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh, and there's Chuck
0:13
Speaker 1: and Jerry's here too, and it's just the three of
0:16
Speaker 1: us rampaging away in podcast land. That's stuff you should know.
0:22
Speaker 2: In case you didn't know well before we get started,
0:26
Speaker 2: I think we should mention that there are still tickets
0:28
Speaker 2: available for our show's coming up very soon in Chicago
0:32
Speaker 2: on August seventh and Minneapolis on August eighth.
0:35
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's gonna be pretty great. We're going to be
0:37
Speaker 1: at the Auditorium in Chicago and we're going to be
0:40
Speaker 1: at the State Theater in Minneapolis, and there are tickets
0:43
Speaker 1: left and you can come see us. It's a great show.
0:46
Speaker 1: We've gotten great feedback so far. Only like two people
0:49
Speaker 1: have been like that sucked. Everybody else is like that,
0:51
Speaker 1: it's pretty great. And you can go to stuff youshould
0:54
Speaker 1: Know dot com and click on the tour page tour button,
0:58
Speaker 1: and you can also go to link tree, slash sysk Live,
1:02
Speaker 1: and both of those places will take you to sites
1:04
Speaker 1: where you can buy legitimate tickets to come see us.
1:07
Speaker 2: Yeah, and those are both great cities for us. We
1:09
Speaker 2: love going to Chicago and Minneapolis. I know it's been
1:12
Speaker 2: a little while for Minneapolis, but we've had always had
1:15
Speaker 2: great shows there.
1:16
Speaker 1: Yeah, and we're not promoting Indianapolis because Indianapolis sold out,
1:20
Speaker 1: so we'll see them as well. But you can't come
1:23
Speaker 1: in if you haven't already bought your tickets. I'm sorry.
1:26
Speaker 2: Yeah. Well, you know, it's a Midwestern themed show, so
1:30
Speaker 2: sort of Chicago adjacent, really Indianapolis adjacent. So they got
1:35
Speaker 2: on it. They want to hear about their people.
1:36
Speaker 1: That's right. So yeah, come see us at the beginning
1:39
Speaker 1: of August.
1:40
Speaker 2: You guys, all right back to it?
1:42
Speaker 1: Right?
1:43
Speaker 2: Good one?
1:45
Speaker 1: Oh you think so?
1:47
Speaker 2: Yeah?
1:48
Speaker 1: Okay, thanks.
1:50
Speaker 2: I appreciate you letting us do this one first because,
1:54
Speaker 2: like I just announced to you, Yeah, I just watched
1:57
Speaker 2: the documentary on this topic, Tread Tread, directed by Paul Solette.
2:04
Speaker 2: Let's it's solet who knows we go with?
2:07
Speaker 1: So?
2:08
Speaker 2: Did you watch it?
2:10
Speaker 1: Yes? I have, Actually I've seen it. I saw a
2:12
Speaker 1: few years back. I haven't seen I didn't watch it
2:14
Speaker 1: recently for this For.
2:16
Speaker 2: Some reason, I think we covered this in like a
2:18
Speaker 2: video or something like how do I know about this?
2:21
Speaker 1: It was pretty big news, and I mean it's become
2:23
Speaker 1: an Internet legend. Maybe we did do like an Internet
2:27
Speaker 1: round up on it or something like that on the
2:28
Speaker 1: tenth anniversary. Maybe I don't know.
2:30
Speaker 2: Yeah, that feels about right, But I guess we should
2:33
Speaker 2: say what we're talking about.
2:34
Speaker 1: Eh, sure, Oh, I'll do that then. Okay, So for
2:39
Speaker 1: those of you who don't know, we're talking about an
2:41
Speaker 1: event that took place in two thousand and four in
2:43
Speaker 1: a little town called Granby, Colorado, about fifty miles west
2:47
Speaker 1: of Denver, population two thousand ish. I think at the
2:51
Speaker 1: time it's a small town, yeah, but it wasn't, you know,
2:54
Speaker 1: an economically depressed town. It's like sixteen miles away from
2:58
Speaker 1: the entrance to Rocky Mounta National Park. They're skiing around there,
3:01
Speaker 1: so there's tourists. There's also rural ranchers that come into
3:06
Speaker 1: shopping Granby. It's fine. It's just a cute, quinte small
3:09
Speaker 1: mountain town like South Park basically.
3:14
Speaker 2: That's right. And it remained that way until June fourth,
3:18
Speaker 2: two thousand and four, when a lot of this town
3:22
Speaker 2: was destroyed by a man in a bulldozer that had
3:28
Speaker 2: ended up being dubbed later on as the kill Dozer.
3:31
Speaker 2: And we'll get to that later, right, But it was
3:33
Speaker 2: a muffler shop owner, a fifty two year old guy
3:36
Speaker 2: named Marvin he Meyer, Marv he Meyer, and he had
3:41
Speaker 2: beefs with the town. He had beefs with people in
3:44
Speaker 2: the town. We're going to go over all that stuff.
3:46
Speaker 2: So he built or modified rather a gigantic bulldozer into
3:53
Speaker 2: basically a tank and destroyed the places of the people
3:58
Speaker 2: he had beefs with. More.
4:00
Speaker 1: Yeah, I left all that out of my introduction, so
4:03
Speaker 1: I'm glad you filled it in. Yeah, you said it
4:06
Speaker 1: was like a tank essentially in some ways, as we'll see,
4:09
Speaker 1: it was actually superior to a tank. It was crazy
4:12
Speaker 1: what this guy built. And if you have the time
4:15
Speaker 1: and you're not driving right now, just go look up
4:17
Speaker 1: killdozer and get a load of this modified bulldozer that
4:22
Speaker 1: Marv he Meyer created. So, Chuck, I say, let's just
4:25
Speaker 1: dive in. That was a pretty good little setup. Let's
4:28
Speaker 1: talk about Marv he Meyern who he was. He was
4:31
Speaker 1: known around town as Marv the muffler man, right.
4:34
Speaker 2: That's right, because he owned a muffler shop. Previous to that,
4:37
Speaker 2: he was in the Air Force. Served in the Air Force,
4:39
Speaker 2: was stationed in Colorado at Lowry Air Force Base, liked Colorado,
4:44
Speaker 2: decided to literally set up shop there. And this is
4:48
Speaker 2: in the early nineties. He moved to Grand Lake near Granby,
4:52
Speaker 2: and you know, pretty soon he got he started getting
4:58
Speaker 2: his feathers ruffled, ruffling feathers in the town kind of
5:02
Speaker 2: right away, it seems like, starting with having a beef
5:06
Speaker 2: against the local newspaper, the sky High News.
5:09
Speaker 1: Yeah, so they introduced the concept of legalized gambling in
5:14
Speaker 1: Grand Lake, which is pretty near grand By, and the
5:19
Speaker 1: town was very evenly divided on it. The local newspaper,
5:22
Speaker 1: the sky High News or one of the local newspapers
5:25
Speaker 1: is another one in Grand Lake, came out very heavily
5:28
Speaker 1: against legalized gambling. Marv was very heavily in favor of gambling,
5:34
Speaker 1: so much so that he edited, i think two editions
5:36
Speaker 1: of a newspaper that was created just to tout the
5:40
Speaker 1: benefits of legalized gambling. And so he lost. Like the
5:44
Speaker 1: I think they voted in the area, they voted four
5:47
Speaker 1: to one against legalizing gambling, and it was a bitter defeat.
5:52
Speaker 1: I think to Marv, he seemed like the kind of
5:55
Speaker 1: person who did not accept defeat very well and that
5:59
Speaker 1: it just trigged Stewing in him.
6:02
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's fair to say, I think. And that was
6:04
Speaker 2: in nineteen ninety two. That same year is when he
6:07
Speaker 2: bought some property that would be sort of at the
6:09
Speaker 2: center of his next dispute. It was a couple of
6:12
Speaker 2: acres in western Granby. He bought it at public auction
6:16
Speaker 2: and foreclosure for a little more than forty grand, which
6:20
Speaker 2: turned out to be a great deal. The guy had
6:22
Speaker 2: a really good knack for finding good deals on stuff.
6:25
Speaker 1: Yeah, what's funny that you remember the savings and loan scandal. Yeah,
6:29
Speaker 1: he actually bought it from the FDIC because it was
6:31
Speaker 1: a failed savings and loan bank in town.
6:34
Speaker 2: Yeah, including that big bulldozer that he would end up
6:38
Speaker 2: getting a great deal on.
6:39
Speaker 1: So that was a savings and loan bulldozer.
6:42
Speaker 2: He had a nose for a deal. So he ended
6:44
Speaker 2: up setting up his Mountain View muffler shop. There was
6:48
Speaker 2: apparently a great welder stuff that he brought into the
6:53
Speaker 2: Air Force. It seems like was just really good on
6:55
Speaker 2: machines and motors and engines and welding, and worked for
6:59
Speaker 2: a uffler shop for many years and finally was like,
7:01
Speaker 2: I'm going to open up my own shop as this
7:05
Speaker 2: is happening. There's another local family and this is one
7:08
Speaker 2: of the two two main families that he had beefs with,
7:12
Speaker 2: the dough Chef family, in particular the patriarch I guess
7:17
Speaker 2: of that family, Cody Dochef with his wife Susie and
7:20
Speaker 2: their son Joe, had a concrete factory and they were
7:26
Speaker 2: trying to expand this factory, so they bought up they
7:29
Speaker 2: wanted this property that Marv had bought. They bought up
7:32
Speaker 2: a bunch of land around it still needed more space,
7:37
Speaker 2: and tried to buy Marv's parcel from him that he
7:40
Speaker 2: paid forty two thousand dollars for and initially they had
7:45
Speaker 2: an agreement for two hundred and fifty grand which would
7:47
Speaker 2: have been a really nice take on that land deal
7:51
Speaker 2: for Marv.
7:52
Speaker 1: It would have for sure. And apparently the dough Chefs
7:54
Speaker 1: were at that auction that Marv bought it at and
7:57
Speaker 1: he outbid them, so yeah, they were very interested in
8:00
Speaker 1: this parcel of land. He agreed to that two hundred
8:03
Speaker 1: and fifty thousand dollars deal later on, I think that
8:06
Speaker 1: was eight years later, so that is a pretty significant
8:09
Speaker 1: increase in your investment. And then but he changed his mind,
8:13
Speaker 1: he decided that though land was worth more than two
8:15
Speaker 1: hundred and fifty grand, apparently kept getting appraisals on it.
8:19
Speaker 1: So it's not like he was just saying, like, no,
8:21
Speaker 1: it's worth a billion dollars, right. He supposedly got appraisals
8:25
Speaker 1: and was like, this land is worth more than two
8:27
Speaker 1: hundred and fifty grand. Now, so he said, He said,
8:31
Speaker 1: he backed out of the deal. I don't know how
8:33
Speaker 1: much how far the deal had gotten, but he definitely
8:36
Speaker 1: backed out of an agreement to sell it for two
8:38
Speaker 1: hundred and fifty grand.
8:40
Speaker 2: Yeah, he ended up asking four hundred. The dough chefs
8:43
Speaker 2: came up with three point fifty, and he said, now
8:46
Speaker 2: I want four to fifty again, he said, because of
8:49
Speaker 2: another reappraisal. I don't I'm not sure about all that stuff, Like,
8:55
Speaker 2: I mean, I'm just basing off kind of what I
8:57
Speaker 2: saw in the documentary and research. I hadn't seen the
9:00
Speaker 2: appraisals or anything, So I don't know if Marv was
9:03
Speaker 2: just like jacking this thing up or not. Who knows.
9:06
Speaker 2: But while this is happening, at least, you know, one
9:10
Speaker 2: of the things we have left to kind of piece
9:11
Speaker 2: us all together is the series of audio tapes that
9:14
Speaker 2: he made on cassette that he mailed to his brother.
9:17
Speaker 2: So the documentary features a lot of those, you know,
9:20
Speaker 2: just firsthand accounts from Marv detailing what's going on. And
9:24
Speaker 2: one of the things he just he didn't like the
9:26
Speaker 2: dough chefs. He said that Cody Docheff, and I guess
9:29
Speaker 2: this was after he had backed out of I'm not
9:33
Speaker 2: sure if it was after he backed out or not,
9:34
Speaker 2: but Cody Docheff at one point basically accosted him in
9:38
Speaker 2: a restaurant and that was one of their first exchanges
9:41
Speaker 2: about this. And Cody Docheff was known as a real
9:44
Speaker 2: hot head in town and Marv you should hear the
9:47
Speaker 2: words that he calls him on those audio tapes. He
9:49
Speaker 2: did not like this guy.
9:50
Speaker 1: Right, that appraisal thing. That's a really good example of
9:56
Speaker 1: the squishiness I guess of this story. It's really difficult
10:03
Speaker 1: to pin down because, yeah, was he just jacking the
10:05
Speaker 1: price up because he didn't like the doe Cheffs. Did
10:07
Speaker 1: he really think that the land was worth that? Did
10:09
Speaker 1: he really get appraisals? You don't know, But that kind
10:12
Speaker 1: of thing completely changes the complexion of it. If he
10:15
Speaker 1: was getting appraisals and the doe Cheffs wouldn't pay the
10:19
Speaker 1: appraised value. That's pretty reasonable. If he was lying about
10:22
Speaker 1: the appraisals and he was just jacking the price up
10:24
Speaker 1: on the doe Cheffs, that kind of makes him look
10:26
Speaker 1: like a jerk. And so that just something that small
10:30
Speaker 1: can make a story like this totally due a one
10:33
Speaker 1: point eighty. And this story is filled with those little
10:36
Speaker 1: kind of details that have either gotten overlooked at it
10:39
Speaker 1: or blown out in proportion.
10:41
Speaker 2: Yeah. Absolutely, So they the dough Chefs end up buying
10:47
Speaker 2: some other land, a business park, and they said, hey,
10:51
Speaker 2: you give us the land where your muffler shop is,
10:54
Speaker 2: and we'll give you the prime lot that's right on
10:57
Speaker 2: the highway, this frontage land where muffler shop is going
11:00
Speaker 2: to do a lot better, get a lot more attention.
11:03
Speaker 2: And he said, all right, I'll take that deal, but
11:05
Speaker 2: you've got to build this muffler shop for me, and
11:08
Speaker 2: that a really expensive one and really kind of highend
11:11
Speaker 2: muffler shop, I guess because that brought it up to
11:14
Speaker 2: about a million bucks. And they said, no, you know
11:18
Speaker 2: that muffler shop. Boy, how long were you waiting on
11:22
Speaker 2: that one?
11:22
Speaker 1: Good thirty seconds.
11:26
Speaker 2: Oh boy, I hope most people get that one. At least.
11:29
Speaker 1: It doesn't matter as long as you've got it. Friend,
11:32
Speaker 1: Oh I got it.
11:34
Speaker 2: So they said no deal, and he said, all right,
11:38
Speaker 2: then you basically started a war with me, and I'm
11:41
Speaker 2: gonna I'm going to do everything I can to fight
11:45
Speaker 2: the city to make sure that you're not able to
11:49
Speaker 2: open up that cement factory that you want to open up,
11:52
Speaker 2: and apparently got a lot of people on the side.
11:54
Speaker 2: There was a lot of opposition in the town that
11:57
Speaker 2: back to Marv against this expansion of the cement or
12:01
Speaker 2: concrete factory.
12:01
Speaker 1: Yeah. So what I don't understand is was there opposition
12:04
Speaker 1: before Marv started this kind of grassroots campaign against it?
12:09
Speaker 2: Yes?
12:10
Speaker 1: Okay, Yeah, so he didn't just drum that up out
12:12
Speaker 1: of thin air, like not everybody was happy about a
12:14
Speaker 1: concrete batch creating plant like this is almost in downtown Gramby.
12:20
Speaker 2: Yeah, there was opposition, but it seems like he really
12:23
Speaker 2: fueled the fire.
12:23
Speaker 1: Okay, Yeah, so now you have war between essentially what
12:27
Speaker 1: amounts to two hotheads who are neighbors, and a concrete
12:31
Speaker 1: plant is not like a tidy, quiet neighbor to be
12:38
Speaker 1: next to, right, So I'm sure that every sound and
12:40
Speaker 1: every clank and every bit of like dust that blew
12:42
Speaker 1: his way just made him less and less happy. And
12:47
Speaker 1: I guess I don't know. Also, if you said that
12:49
Speaker 1: they were buying up the land around him, so ultimately
12:53
Speaker 1: his muffler shop was the only little piece of parcel
12:56
Speaker 1: left and they were literally building a concrete plant owned
13:00
Speaker 1: his muffler shop. And one of the things if somebody
13:04
Speaker 1: tells you this, they don't know what they're talking about,
13:06
Speaker 1: and stop listening to them about this. If they tell
13:08
Speaker 1: you that when the dough Chets bought the land up
13:10
Speaker 1: around him, that they cut off access from the road
13:14
Speaker 1: to Marv's muffler shop, basically created an island legally out
13:18
Speaker 1: of his muffler shop, that's wrong. That's not correct. He
13:22
Speaker 1: always had access and everyone always had access in and
13:24
Speaker 1: out of his muffler shop. That's a really big point
13:27
Speaker 1: that a lot of people basically say, See, the guy
13:29
Speaker 1: had no choice, he couldn't he couldn't run a business
13:32
Speaker 1: like that, and that's just not true.
13:34
Speaker 2: Yeah, that is not true, but that's something you see
13:35
Speaker 2: a lot online. So thanks for clearing that up.
13:39
Speaker 1: Sure you got anything else, what else you want me, Clear.
13:42
Speaker 2: Up, I got a pimple on my shoulder here, No
13:47
Speaker 2: take care of them.
13:49
Speaker 1: Why did you say that?
13:51
Speaker 2: Oh I don't. I don't get pimples. So Marv is
13:56
Speaker 2: he's got another problem that's also brewing. So you've got
13:59
Speaker 2: this problem with the dough chefs. Then you have the
14:03
Speaker 2: second issue with the sewer line. In order. His property
14:08
Speaker 2: wasn't hooked up to a sewer line. You've got to
14:10
Speaker 2: get hooked up to a sewer line if you're going
14:13
Speaker 2: to be in compliance. They kind of look the other
14:15
Speaker 2: way for many many years when he didn't because it was,
14:19
Speaker 2: you know, small town western Colorado. It was sort of
14:22
Speaker 2: the wild West, and people would just sort of turn
14:26
Speaker 2: a blind eye if someone was making do on their own,
14:28
Speaker 2: which he was doing. But he also didn't have a
14:31
Speaker 2: septic tank, so he started dumping sewage into his concrete mixer,
14:37
Speaker 2: a concrete mixing tank, big violation. Then when that filled up,
14:42
Speaker 2: he started pumping it into the irrigation ditch on the property.
14:47
Speaker 2: All he had to do was pay a little bit
14:50
Speaker 2: of money at one point to hook up to some
14:53
Speaker 2: neighboring sewer lines. But he basically thought that's over the town. Yeah,
15:01
Speaker 2: that's the town holding me over a barrel. You shouldn't
15:04
Speaker 2: have a resident or a business have to pay for
15:07
Speaker 2: their own sewer line, which is a public utility.
15:10
Speaker 1: Okay, So I don't know, like the town overlooked this
15:15
Speaker 1: for a good decade, maybe twelve years something like that.
15:18
Speaker 1: That he was pooping and peeing I guess into a
15:20
Speaker 1: bucket or something and dumping it into a cement mixer,
15:23
Speaker 1: even if they had a line up to the cemt mixer. Yes,
15:26
Speaker 1: that's a huge health code violation. Right. So when that
15:30
Speaker 1: concrete plant was built, they ran a sewer line to it, right,
15:35
Speaker 1: and that made it way easier and way less expensive
15:39
Speaker 1: for Marv Hemeyer to connect his muffler shop to that
15:44
Speaker 1: sewer line that's now being run from the road to
15:47
Speaker 1: this concrete plant next door. Then it would to have
15:50
Speaker 1: the city run it from the road to just his
15:52
Speaker 1: muffler shop. The problem was this is the Dochef's sewer
15:56
Speaker 1: line and it was on their land and for him
15:59
Speaker 1: to tap into it, he needed to pay them. So
16:01
Speaker 1: they came back with an offer. They said, look, man,
16:05
Speaker 1: if you drop all these lawsuits and all this campaign
16:07
Speaker 1: against us, we will we will let you will give
16:12
Speaker 1: you an easement, a maintenance easement to connect to our
16:14
Speaker 1: sewer line from your muffler shop free of charge. That
16:17
Speaker 1: will be your little strip of land onto our land,
16:20
Speaker 1: connecting your muffler shop to the main line. You'll be
16:22
Speaker 1: in compliance, we won't have this lawsuit against us anymore,
16:26
Speaker 1: and we'll just call it a day. And I don't
16:29
Speaker 1: believe Marv ever made good on that.
16:32
Speaker 2: No, he didn't want to do it. He was done
16:35
Speaker 2: with him by that point, basically, so he was like,
16:38
Speaker 2: screw this. I'm not hooking up to your sewer line.
16:41
Speaker 2: I'm not paying the maybe as high as eighty grand
16:45
Speaker 2: to run the four hundred feet to the main sewer line.
16:48
Speaker 2: And so he wanted to sell the place. He's like,
16:52
Speaker 2: I'm getting out, I'm getting out of this muffler shop
16:55
Speaker 2: and I'm going to move. And the town then said, well, hey,
16:58
Speaker 2: now that we know about all this, you can't even
17:00
Speaker 2: sell this thing without a sewer line. So, all of
17:04
Speaker 2: a sudden, he was caught between a rock and a
17:06
Speaker 2: hard place there with this sewer connection. He refuses to
17:11
Speaker 2: do it. He ends up being fined one hundred dollars
17:13
Speaker 2: a day because of this sewage issue and other violations.
17:16
Speaker 2: That were going on, like more than thirty three hundred bucks.
17:20
Speaker 2: When he wrote the check to the town, he put
17:23
Speaker 2: in the memo, it's for the Cowards and Liars Department.
17:27
Speaker 2: So this is kind of where things were. This guy
17:30
Speaker 2: is fighting back against the town. He's fighting against these people.
17:34
Speaker 2: Whether or not you think it's fair that you have
17:36
Speaker 2: to pay for your own sewer line or not, it's
17:38
Speaker 2: the way it was. They weren't singling him out to
17:42
Speaker 2: try and screw him over anything. That was just how
17:45
Speaker 2: it works. I mean, I've had to replace sewer lines
17:48
Speaker 2: and it stinks. It's the worst thing to have to
17:50
Speaker 2: pay for.
17:51
Speaker 1: It stinks literally and figuratively.
17:53
Speaker 2: As a homeowner, it wrecks your yard or your property.
17:57
Speaker 2: It wrecks it's it's awful because it's not. It's just
18:03
Speaker 2: it's expensive. Have you ever had to do it? It
18:06
Speaker 2: just writing that check. I've had to do it a
18:10
Speaker 2: couple of times. It's awful. In the meantime, we need
18:13
Speaker 2: to introduce another family, because he ended up having two
18:16
Speaker 2: beefs with two prominent families, the do Chefs and then
18:20
Speaker 2: the Thompson family, who were had been there forever thereby
18:25
Speaker 2: owned tons and tons of the land in the town.
18:28
Speaker 2: A guy named the elder Dick Thompson was on the
18:31
Speaker 2: county board and then became mayor for a while back
18:34
Speaker 2: when he was going through all this stuff in the nineties,
18:37
Speaker 2: and then he passed away, and he took up this
18:39
Speaker 2: beef with his two sons, basically saying like, you owe
18:42
Speaker 2: me money because of all this stuff that your dad
18:45
Speaker 2: and the town board made me go through.
18:48
Speaker 1: One thing that I couldn't find, and it's one of
18:52
Speaker 1: those things that could change the complexion of the whole stories.
18:55
Speaker 1: At what point did the sewer thing that the city
18:57
Speaker 1: overlooked for a decade or so become a thing? You know?
19:01
Speaker 1: Was it connected to the concrete plant? I don't know.
19:05
Speaker 1: It's just just something that sticks out to me. Yeah,
19:09
Speaker 1: So I guess what he did ultimately was he shut
19:11
Speaker 1: down his muffler shop in two thousand and two and
19:14
Speaker 1: he held an auction. He auctioned off all of his equipment.
19:17
Speaker 1: He sold his property to a local trash company for
19:20
Speaker 1: four hundred thousand, which I think what the highest he
19:23
Speaker 1: had asked the dough Chuffs for for it. But he said,
19:26
Speaker 1: I want to Lisa, this big old metal shed in
19:29
Speaker 1: the back. I got to keep a place to keep
19:31
Speaker 1: my bulldozer, because it's basically the only thing that no
19:34
Speaker 1: one bought in the auction of my stuff. So I'm
19:37
Speaker 1: just going to keep it back here and this will
19:38
Speaker 1: be my little workshop. That's part of the deal. And
19:41
Speaker 1: they shook on it, and that's the setup starting around
19:44
Speaker 1: two thousand and two.
19:46
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I'm also not sure how he was able
19:48
Speaker 2: to sell that stuff or sell it given that he
19:51
Speaker 2: didn't put in the sewer line, because in the documentary
19:53
Speaker 2: they said that the new owners this trash company, like
19:57
Speaker 2: within forty eight hours had the sewer line hooked up.
20:00
Speaker 1: I mean, I think the city was like, whoever, like,
20:02
Speaker 1: this thing can't change hands without somebody agreeing that they're
20:06
Speaker 1: going to put maybe the one And that's what I think.
20:09
Speaker 1: You could probably work that into a legal document.
20:13
Speaker 2: Probably. So should we take a break.
20:16
Speaker 1: Yeah, we'll take a break and go find out.
20:19
Speaker 2: All right. We'll be right back after this with more
20:21
Speaker 2: on the killdozer rampage.
20:52
Speaker 1: All right. So remember Marvy Myer's gotten out of the
20:55
Speaker 1: muffler business, but he's known around town as an excellent welder,
21:01
Speaker 1: I mean, just a superior welder. And when he leased
21:05
Speaker 1: that little maintenance shed. We'll probably not mate little. But
21:08
Speaker 1: when he leased the big maintenance shed in the back
21:10
Speaker 1: of the property that he had sold to the trash company,
21:13
Speaker 1: he used it to modify the bulldozer that would later
21:18
Speaker 1: become the killdozer. To start out with, it was a
21:21
Speaker 1: sixty ton Komatsu D three P fifty five a bulldozer, right,
21:26
Speaker 1: and I mean just as it came out of the
21:29
Speaker 1: package it was sixty tons. This guy added at least
21:33
Speaker 1: another twenty tons of reinforcement to it.
21:36
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was. It's not like a little front loader
21:40
Speaker 2: that you know your landscape person has brought over if
21:43
Speaker 2: you've ever had your yard done or something dingo. This
21:47
Speaker 2: is this was a very, very very large bulldozer, which
21:52
Speaker 2: you can tell and when you see footage when there
21:54
Speaker 2: are other bulldozers trying to stop it, and this Kamatsu
21:57
Speaker 2: is is clearly clearly larger.
21:59
Speaker 1: Right.
22:00
Speaker 2: So he buys this thing at auction in California, has
22:03
Speaker 2: it shipped in July two thousand and two, and starting
22:05
Speaker 2: at the beginning of two thousand and three, And this
22:08
Speaker 2: is one of the craziest parts of this whole story
22:10
Speaker 2: to me, is that this wasn't a guy that got
22:13
Speaker 2: mad and like had a plan and it sort of
22:16
Speaker 2: fizzles out after a week or two when you're like,
22:19
Speaker 2: all right, well, you know, maybe I'll just watch the
22:21
Speaker 2: Broncos game and let cooler heads prevail. Like he spent
22:25
Speaker 2: a year dedicated to this project with this idea, like
22:31
Speaker 2: planning this thing and equipping this thing. He set up
22:35
Speaker 2: a cot in a blanket and had a fridge. He
22:37
Speaker 2: was basically living in this shed basically full time, working
22:43
Speaker 2: on this thing at night so that people, you know,
22:45
Speaker 2: this company that bought it, this trash company, they're all
22:47
Speaker 2: around the place, right, Like an insurance adjuster came to
22:51
Speaker 2: inspect the shed because it was on the property of
22:54
Speaker 2: the trash company. He had it behind a tarp and
22:56
Speaker 2: made up some story about how he was working on
22:59
Speaker 2: some equipment like air conditioning for some professor, and like
23:03
Speaker 2: no one ever looked behind it. It fit by an
23:06
Speaker 2: inch on either side. And he thought this was all
23:09
Speaker 2: God telling him all these little things that happened that
23:12
Speaker 2: where he didn't get caught beforehand. He thought was God saying,
23:16
Speaker 2: this is your mission.
23:17
Speaker 1: Right, Marv he Meyer is a great example of why
23:21
Speaker 1: we need wives.
23:23
Speaker 2: Right. Well, he had a girlfriend for a long time,
23:27
Speaker 2: and she was all over the documentary. It sounded like
23:29
Speaker 2: she was Australian or from New Zealand maybe, but Tricia McDonald. Yeah,
23:33
Speaker 2: that was kind of one of the sadder parts is
23:36
Speaker 2: that she seemed like she really liked him, and she
23:38
Speaker 2: was like, I kind of had no idea that he
23:40
Speaker 2: was that angry and it was going this far.
23:42
Speaker 1: Yeah, if I remember correctly, she had a little bit
23:45
Speaker 1: of self blame maybe going on, or at least wondering
23:47
Speaker 1: how things could have turned out differently.
23:50
Speaker 2: Well, I think their breakup beforehand might have been one
23:53
Speaker 2: of the last draws too, and so she may have
23:55
Speaker 2: felt bad about that.
23:56
Speaker 1: Oh, that's another one too. So in addition to his
24:00
Speaker 1: muffler shop being completely cut off from access to the
24:04
Speaker 1: main road, he also caught his fiance in bed with
24:07
Speaker 1: another man. It's another dumb thing you'll find on the
24:11
Speaker 1: internet from people who don't know what they're talking about. Too. Oh,
24:14
Speaker 1: he chalked up to explaining him snapping.
24:18
Speaker 2: Oh. One thing I did forget to mention is that
24:20
Speaker 2: four hundred grand het. He was I guess savvy enough
24:25
Speaker 2: to know that they could come after that money afterward, Yeah,
24:28
Speaker 2: to help give people. So he while his father was
24:31
Speaker 2: still alive. His dad died shortly before, which was another
24:34
Speaker 2: last straw apparently, but he had given the money to
24:37
Speaker 2: his father, who then gave the money to his sister
24:40
Speaker 2: and brother. So it was like two people removed and untouchable.
24:44
Speaker 1: I guess, oh wow, yeah, that is pretty savvy.
24:47
Speaker 2: Yeah.
24:47
Speaker 1: So he's got this kill dozer that he's putting together.
24:51
Speaker 1: Let's talk a little bit about that. Like I said,
24:53
Speaker 1: it was a sixty ton bulldozer, just a big, big boy.
24:58
Speaker 1: But on top of that, he he took sheets of
25:01
Speaker 1: steel and separated them by about twelve inches and poured
25:07
Speaker 1: concrete in the in the space between the two. So
25:11
Speaker 1: he made twelve inch on either side twelve inches of
25:16
Speaker 1: steel with concrete in the middle. Plates that he created,
25:20
Speaker 1: essentially a superstructure that he later before his rampage, right
25:24
Speaker 1: before his rampage lowered on top of the Komatsu itself.
25:31
Speaker 2: Yeah, sealing him in there. He also had gun ports.
25:34
Speaker 2: He had a fifty cow rifle, which is if you
25:38
Speaker 2: just look up what a fifty caliber round looks like,
25:40
Speaker 2: it's very large and destructive, a three eight semi automatic,
25:44
Speaker 2: and then a twenty two long rifle. He also had
25:48
Speaker 2: a three point fifty seven revolver inside, and he had
25:53
Speaker 2: five video cameras mounted on the outside feeding three monitors
25:57
Speaker 2: on the inside, and these lenses were protected by three
26:01
Speaker 2: inch lexand bulletproof plastic basically. So the small little tiny
26:09
Speaker 2: ports that were even on this thing were because they
26:12
Speaker 2: tried eventually shooting into these were only like two by
26:16
Speaker 2: three inches. So even these sharpshooters were having a hard
26:19
Speaker 2: time getting a bullet in there, and even if they did,
26:22
Speaker 2: it wasn't it was not effective anyway.
26:24
Speaker 1: Yeah, there were so many layers of this plastic bulletproof
26:28
Speaker 1: like cladding. I guess that like, even if they broke
26:31
Speaker 1: some of the layers, there was still more layers to
26:33
Speaker 1: go through. It was nuts. But there's something I want
26:37
Speaker 1: everybody to make note of. He put in those three
26:39
Speaker 1: gun ports. Like you said, it's really important because one
26:43
Speaker 1: of the things that a lot of people use to
26:45
Speaker 1: defend Marv is that he was all he wanted was
26:49
Speaker 1: property destruction. That's all he was intent on. And there's
26:53
Speaker 1: no way to explain away those three gun ports otherwise
26:57
Speaker 1: they don't jibe at that narrative at all. Certainly changes
27:01
Speaker 1: the complexion of things too.
27:03
Speaker 2: Oh, absolutely. Yeah, as far as like folk hero who
27:08
Speaker 2: just wanted to direct the business who wrecked his Yeah,
27:12
Speaker 2: you don't go in there with a fifty.
27:13
Speaker 1: Cal no, and I mean you can. He didn't even
27:15
Speaker 1: need to defend himself. They couldn't get through this the plating,
27:19
Speaker 1: the cladding, And even if he did need to defend himself,
27:22
Speaker 1: he certainly didn't need three guns. So there was basically
27:25
Speaker 1: no reason for those guns to be there aside from
27:27
Speaker 1: shooting people.
27:29
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely they would later obviously, he, like I said,
27:34
Speaker 2: he mailed those tapes to his brother right before the attack.
27:39
Speaker 2: They ended up finding a list afterward with sort of
27:42
Speaker 2: like a hit list for the buildings he wanted to wreck. Obviously,
27:46
Speaker 2: the Doe Chefs and the Thompson's were on that list,
27:50
Speaker 2: as was the church in town, the Catholic church. That
27:53
Speaker 2: is because on the tapes he was, or at least
27:57
Speaker 2: in this one part, he was very anti Catholic, called
27:59
Speaker 2: Catholic cowards, and the Thompsons were Catholic, and that was
28:03
Speaker 2: one of his big beats.
28:03
Speaker 1: Gotcha. So again that Dozer Manifesto, they make an amazing
28:08
Speaker 1: use of his actual tapes to let him just kind
28:11
Speaker 1: of present himself and like you said that he apparently
28:15
Speaker 1: believed that God was at the very least looking the
28:19
Speaker 1: other way and kind of tacitly condoning this mission, if not,
28:24
Speaker 1: you know, blessing the mission by all those ways that
28:27
Speaker 1: you had said, like people overlooking the dozer, the fact
28:30
Speaker 1: that the dozer was the one thing that he wasn't
28:33
Speaker 1: able to sell at auction. He even said that God
28:36
Speaker 1: told him to take take the winner off, put this
28:39
Speaker 1: whole thing off for a year, essentially, and he did.
28:43
Speaker 1: He also went on at length about the town that
28:46
Speaker 1: he was dealing with and gave his side of the
28:48
Speaker 1: story quite clearly, and he said that they use mafia
28:50
Speaker 1: type tactics against him. And there's this line from his
28:55
Speaker 1: tapes that this is like the people who consider him
28:58
Speaker 1: a folk hero point to it said, or he said,
29:03
Speaker 1: I was always willing to be reasonable until I had
29:06
Speaker 1: to be unreasonable. Sometimes reasonable men must do unreasonable things.
29:11
Speaker 1: And it's a just a sweeping thing to say, because
29:15
Speaker 1: it completely explains away everything he does after that point,
29:20
Speaker 1: and it completely gives him an alibi up to that point.
29:23
Speaker 1: He's saying, I know what I'm doing, wrecking the town.
29:26
Speaker 1: That's an unreasonable thing, but I have every reason to
29:30
Speaker 1: do this. I have a very reasonable reason to do
29:33
Speaker 1: this very unreasonable thing. It's really it's a very I
29:37
Speaker 1: don't know, it's just nuts how well it encapsulates everything.
29:40
Speaker 1: He just kind of lets him off the hook.
29:43
Speaker 2: Yeah, totally. He had also been hassling the paper for
29:46
Speaker 2: not covering his story, like he was like, no one's
29:49
Speaker 2: even writing about my beaf with the sewer line and
29:51
Speaker 2: all this stuff. And so they ended up giving him
29:55
Speaker 2: a free ad. They were like, oh, jeez, this guy,
29:58
Speaker 2: how about we give you an ad. They came out
30:00
Speaker 2: and photographed him and gave him a you know, an
30:03
Speaker 2: ad for his muffler shop, which it turns out wasn't
30:06
Speaker 2: enough to appease him. As we'll see, the end of
30:10
Speaker 2: his lease was coming up. He had gone through that breakup,
30:14
Speaker 2: his dad had just died, and so it was it
30:18
Speaker 2: was game time. Basically. On June fourth, two thousand and four,
30:22
Speaker 2: he uh, like we said, he sealed himself in that
30:24
Speaker 2: cockpit kind of like couldn't get out, basically, and to
30:30
Speaker 2: what looks like this a bulldozer meets ay the what
30:35
Speaker 2: were those crawlers called in Star Wars where the Jahwa's
30:39
Speaker 2: traded out of it kind of looked like that.
30:40
Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't remember what they're called. I just remember built.
30:43
Speaker 1: It was based on a brutalist hotel in Morocco that
30:45
Speaker 1: George Lucas saw exactly. And you don't need to write
30:48
Speaker 1: in everybody, we can go look it up later.
30:52
Speaker 2: Well, you know what it's called John at two pm
30:57
Speaker 2: and this was you know, when you see footage of
30:59
Speaker 2: this thing or watching the documentary, it's this thing goes
31:02
Speaker 2: four or five miles an hour, So it's a it's
31:05
Speaker 2: a different kind of rampage. It's a slow motion rampage
31:08
Speaker 2: going through town. But this thing was unstoppable, was the issue.
31:14
Speaker 1: Yeah, that, I mean, that's a really great way to
31:16
Speaker 1: describe it. They, as we'll see, couldn't come up with
31:20
Speaker 1: anything to put an end to this. I say, before
31:24
Speaker 1: we really get underway with the rampage, we take our
31:27
Speaker 1: final break and come back and tell everybody just what happened.
31:30
Speaker 1: What do you think?
31:31
Speaker 2: All right, let's do it. All right, So the rampage starts. Obviously,
32:05
Speaker 2: the first people he's going to go after are the
32:08
Speaker 2: dough chefs and that concrete plant. When he gets there,
32:14
Speaker 2: they quickly realize what's going on. Cody Dochef is like,
32:18
Speaker 2: that's Marv he Meyer in there, and cops are like,
32:21
Speaker 2: are you sure, how do you know? And he's like,
32:22
Speaker 2: trust me, it's Marv he Meyer. He tries to stop it.
32:26
Speaker 2: He tries shooting a revolver at this thing, which is
32:30
Speaker 2: just a joke. I guess that's just the first sort
32:33
Speaker 2: of reaction is like shoot it. Yea in western Colorado
32:36
Speaker 2: at least, so hey, no shade there by the way,
32:42
Speaker 2: But he starts shooting at this thing. He's he's literally
32:47
Speaker 2: getting in his own This is Cody dochev getting in
32:50
Speaker 2: his own little front end loader and driving at it.
32:53
Speaker 2: He gets he rams aside of it, and he's trying
32:55
Speaker 2: to lift it up off of the ground because basically
32:58
Speaker 2: they're like, we can't. You know, they've tried shooting into
33:00
Speaker 2: it already. They know that's not going to work, so
33:02
Speaker 2: they want to disable those treads. If you can disable
33:04
Speaker 2: a tank's treads, then you're in business. So they thought
33:08
Speaker 2: if they could lift it off the ground, that might work.
33:11
Speaker 2: They thought if they jammed this huge steel pole into
33:15
Speaker 2: the treads, that that might you know, get stuck or
33:18
Speaker 2: throw something out of whack. None of that works, and
33:21
Speaker 2: when Cody doe Chef rams this thing and tries to
33:23
Speaker 2: pick it up, his wheels come off the ground. He
33:26
Speaker 2: hits the front windshield and gets knocked out cold and
33:29
Speaker 2: awakes to bullet fire coming his way.
33:31
Speaker 1: Yeah. That was one thing that MARKI Meyer did was
33:35
Speaker 1: he took aim and shot at Cody Deutcheff's his front
33:39
Speaker 1: end loader, and there were bullet holes from the fifty
33:41
Speaker 1: caliber in the bucket of the front end loader. Astoundingly,
33:45
Speaker 1: he didn't hit Cody Dochef and he, I guess left
33:51
Speaker 1: the cement plan at this time and started moving toward
33:54
Speaker 1: the town. And one of the ways that he got
33:56
Speaker 1: to the town was busting through a concrete road barrier,
34:00
Speaker 1: a pair of them that I believe some highway patrolmen
34:03
Speaker 1: were hiding behind, and they got out of the way just
34:05
Speaker 1: in time because that killed those who went right through
34:08
Speaker 1: those concrete barriers on its way to downtown Gramby.
34:12
Speaker 2: Yeah, and he didn't have to go that way. So
34:14
Speaker 2: that was another instance where he he literally turned left
34:17
Speaker 2: and headed right toward those guys. And these are cops.
34:21
Speaker 2: They're bringing in forest service people, they're bringing in larger guns.
34:26
Speaker 2: They ended up firing about two hundred shots at this thing,
34:29
Speaker 2: but again they're just firing it at hard and steel
34:33
Speaker 2: and so nothing is doing any good. Cody Docheff also
34:37
Speaker 2: tried to climb up on top of it, but Marp
34:40
Speaker 2: and I shouldn't be laughing here, but this is the
34:42
Speaker 2: one part I thought was kind of funny. Marp thought
34:45
Speaker 2: of that too, and he greased this thing up with
34:48
Speaker 2: like axle grease, and so Cody Docheff is slipping off
34:52
Speaker 2: of this thing. Eventually. There is a guy, a deputy
34:56
Speaker 2: named Glenn Trainor, who climbed up on top of the
35:00
Speaker 2: building and jumped right on top of the thing, and
35:03
Speaker 2: he rode this thing around town. There's footage of this
35:05
Speaker 2: guy riding this kill dozer around town trying to disable
35:09
Speaker 2: it from above.
35:10
Speaker 1: Yeah, under Sheriff Glenn Trainer is typically referred to as
35:13
Speaker 1: one of the big heroes of the day just for trying.
35:16
Speaker 1: Nobody was successful, but a lot of people tried, and
35:19
Speaker 1: he definitely risked life and limb essentially to try to
35:23
Speaker 1: disable this thing. He found what he thought was a
35:26
Speaker 1: weak point into the engine and shot into it a
35:29
Speaker 1: bunch of times. Turns out it was a cover for
35:32
Speaker 1: the air conditioner that Marv had put onto the bulldozer.
35:38
Speaker 1: He also got a flashbran grenade, dropped it down the
35:41
Speaker 1: exhaust pipe. It blew up. It did absolutely nothing, and
35:45
Speaker 1: despite yeah being greased, Glenn Trainor hung on until Marv
35:50
Speaker 1: he Meyer got the killdozer to the town hall building,
35:53
Speaker 1: and Glenn Trainor saw quite clearly he was going to
35:56
Speaker 1: be taken along with this thirteen foot tall, eighty ton
35:59
Speaker 1: bold Those are right into town hall and he would
36:02
Speaker 1: not fare very well in that circumstance. So he jumped
36:05
Speaker 1: off and rolled onto the grass from that thirteen foot height.
36:09
Speaker 2: Yeah, so he's out of there safely. Like you said,
36:13
Speaker 2: he goes after the town hall. It has a local
36:16
Speaker 2: library in there where who knows whether he knows this
36:21
Speaker 2: or not, but there were a bunch of kids in
36:22
Speaker 2: there in a reading program, including the eleven year old
36:26
Speaker 2: daughter of the mayor at the time, so they're huddling
36:29
Speaker 2: in the basement. The town has issued a reverse nine
36:32
Speaker 2: to one one call to basically where they call every
36:35
Speaker 2: single resident in town at once and say, you know,
36:39
Speaker 2: shelter in place, or in this case, calling the people
36:41
Speaker 2: at the library saying get out of there. He then
36:46
Speaker 2: turns on the bank the Liberty Bank branch, because obviously
36:52
Speaker 2: he had problems with the banking system there. He then
36:55
Speaker 2: turns on the newspaper and the Patrick Brower, the editor
36:59
Speaker 2: the that he'd been you know, having his newspaper beef with,
37:03
Speaker 2: is running out the back door as he is collapsing
37:06
Speaker 2: this building. You know, he gets out in the nick
37:09
Speaker 2: of time as he's collapsing the building.
37:11
Speaker 1: Yeah, and frequently in interviews, Patrick Brower points out that
37:14
Speaker 1: had he tripped and fall and he'd be dead, it
37:16
Speaker 1: was that close. Yeah, it does seem to have been
37:19
Speaker 1: that kind of experience for people on the ground during
37:21
Speaker 1: this rampage. Somebody would run in shouting like get out,
37:25
Speaker 1: get out, and probably didn't even have time to say
37:27
Speaker 1: what the heck was coming when the killdozer would come
37:30
Speaker 1: crashing through the front of the building, not the front door,
37:34
Speaker 1: not a side door. It would come right through the
37:36
Speaker 1: front wall or the side wall. And one of the
37:39
Speaker 1: things that people pointed out who were there was that
37:42
Speaker 1: he would he would come crashing through the front wall
37:46
Speaker 1: and it would take out like, you know, the front wall,
37:48
Speaker 1: but the roof would still be thinking. So he back
37:49
Speaker 1: up and he'd go after a corner of the building,
37:51
Speaker 1: so like he was trying to demolish these buildings, he
37:54
Speaker 1: was making a pretty great attempt at it, and toward
37:57
Speaker 1: the end of the rampage he got pretty good at
37:59
Speaker 1: taking building out in a couple of swipes.
38:02
Speaker 2: No, absolutely, So then you know this is a small town.
38:06
Speaker 2: When he makes a turn toward a thing, they kind
38:09
Speaker 2: of have a pretty good idea of where he's going
38:11
Speaker 2: because of the well known beef. So after he destroys
38:16
Speaker 2: the newspaper building, he makes a turn and everyone's like
38:19
Speaker 2: he's going after the Thompsons. He ends up Thelma Thompson,
38:24
Speaker 2: eighty two year old widow of former mayor Dick Thompson,
38:29
Speaker 2: was literally asleep taking a nap thirty minutes before her
38:33
Speaker 2: house is just gone because they get her out of there.
38:37
Speaker 2: He completely destroys her house and then turns toward their business,
38:42
Speaker 2: which is the Thompson and Sons excavating business and services,
38:47
Speaker 2: and starts destroying those buildings.
38:49
Speaker 1: Yeah, he cost them a good million and a half
38:52
Speaker 1: dollars I saw to rebuild again, despite the people he
38:56
Speaker 1: had the beef with not even being alive any longer.
38:59
Speaker 1: But it's how much he hated the Thompson family after
39:04
Speaker 1: that The next thing he did, this is a really
39:06
Speaker 1: really critical thing that he did that really kind of
39:08
Speaker 1: takes away a lot of sympathy I had for him.
39:11
Speaker 1: He took out. He drove up to the propane company,
39:13
Speaker 1: a local propane company, and uses fifty caliber rifle to
39:17
Speaker 1: shoot at propane tanks for small ones, then big ones.
39:21
Speaker 1: He tried to shoot in an electrical transformer so that
39:23
Speaker 1: the sparks, ostensibly so the sparks would ignite the propane.
39:27
Speaker 1: When he shot a propane tank open and the whole
39:29
Speaker 1: thing would blow up. And that would have been significant.
39:32
Speaker 1: Had this propane company blown up. I saw an estimate
39:37
Speaker 1: that everyone within a half mile radius would have been
39:40
Speaker 1: in danger. The blast would have been that big. Yeah,
39:44
Speaker 1: this is downtown. It was as densely packed as the
39:46
Speaker 1: town of Gramby could be, So half a mile radius
39:49
Speaker 1: is you know, that was a significant thing. And the
39:53
Speaker 1: reason why Patrick Brower points this out, and I tend
39:56
Speaker 1: to agree with him. He takes issue with people who
39:59
Speaker 1: are like these were all just warning shots. He just
40:01
Speaker 1: wanted to destroy property. He just wanted to blow up
40:04
Speaker 1: the propane company so that he could destroy more property.
40:07
Speaker 1: He wasn't trying to kill anybody, And Patrick Brower was like,
40:10
Speaker 1: this is no, this is not true. The reason he
40:12
Speaker 1: didn't kill anybody was because the way that he had
40:15
Speaker 1: mounted the rifles was so kluegy that he had almost
40:18
Speaker 1: no chance whatsoever of shooting anybody. Those bulletproof class sights
40:23
Speaker 1: that you were talking about, like the two by three
40:25
Speaker 1: inch sights, or they weren't near the guns. The guns
40:29
Speaker 1: weren't mounted right by them. The video cameras that he
40:32
Speaker 1: was using to kind of drive around with they weren't
40:34
Speaker 1: in line with the guns either, So when he was
40:37
Speaker 1: aiming the gun, he had to do some sort of
40:39
Speaker 1: weird mental topography to kind of figure out what he
40:44
Speaker 1: was looking at in relation to the gun and try
40:46
Speaker 1: to shoot that way. And Patrick Brower's point is that's
40:50
Speaker 1: why no one was shot to death. That's why those
40:52
Speaker 1: propaane tanks didn't blow up, that's why the electrical transformer
40:56
Speaker 1: didn't blow up because he missed, not because he was
40:58
Speaker 1: just firing warning shots. Because he missed. And if those
41:01
Speaker 1: guns had been mounted more I guess efficiently, it could
41:08
Speaker 1: have been a totally different outcome from this whole event.
41:12
Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure. He also, I mean, most of those
41:15
Speaker 2: bullets didn't even make it out of his own vehicle
41:18
Speaker 2: because the way he had the big fifty cow mounted,
41:22
Speaker 2: it ended up hitting his own armor. So you see
41:26
Speaker 2: like shooting toward this propane thing, and immediately these shots
41:30
Speaker 2: are just sort of exploding because I think they were
41:34
Speaker 2: some special kind of round or something, and they were
41:37
Speaker 2: sort of exploding at you know, into his own tank.
41:41
Speaker 2: So yeah, and then who knows if he even knew
41:44
Speaker 2: what was going on, Like, no one knows what he
41:46
Speaker 2: could even see inside that thing. So the machines damaged.
41:50
Speaker 2: At this point, all the anti freeze has dumped out.
41:53
Speaker 2: There's white smoke just pouring from this thing. There's hydraulic
41:57
Speaker 2: fluid leaking all over the place, and it's pretty clear
42:00
Speaker 2: that like the last gasp is happening. So he heads
42:04
Speaker 2: down to Gambles of Granby hardware store. There was a
42:10
Speaker 2: guy on the town board there related to the hardware
42:15
Speaker 2: store that approved the concrete plant, and so they were
42:17
Speaker 2: on the list. And you see this thing chugging along.
42:20
Speaker 2: It's on its last legs. Somehow remarkably had not failed
42:24
Speaker 2: up into that point. Yeah, Like I can't believe at
42:26
Speaker 2: some point it didn't. Those treads didn't. I guess that's
42:29
Speaker 2: why the bulldozer there there's you know, it's like a tank.
42:31
Speaker 2: It's it's supposed to do that, so it was doing
42:34
Speaker 2: it well. But what he didn't know was that there
42:37
Speaker 2: was a basement in that hardware store, and eventually that
42:40
Speaker 2: right front tread slipped down just a couple of feet
42:44
Speaker 2: just enough into that basement to where the tread had
42:49
Speaker 2: nothing against it and it was just spinning. So it
42:52
Speaker 2: was finally stopped.
42:53
Speaker 1: Yeah, people were walking alongside of this thing for a
42:56
Speaker 1: lot of the time, so there were people within earshot
42:59
Speaker 1: at this point, and there suddenly comes a muffled gunshot
43:04
Speaker 1: from inside the pull the kill dozer, and people were like, well,
43:10
Speaker 1: I'm pretty sure that if that's Marv he Meyer who's
43:12
Speaker 1: in there, he's no longer with us, and they were correct.
43:16
Speaker 1: They the next day they tried to blow a hole
43:20
Speaker 1: into the kill dozer, and do you remember at the outset,
43:24
Speaker 1: I said that it was probably superior to a tank.
43:26
Speaker 1: The reason I said that is because the swat team
43:28
Speaker 1: who was creating this explosive charge to try to breach it,
43:32
Speaker 1: they consulted with some explosive experts who told them what
43:35
Speaker 1: charge to create to blow a hole in the side
43:38
Speaker 1: of a tank and it didn't work. Yeah, the explosive
43:41
Speaker 1: charge that could blow a hole in a tank did
43:44
Speaker 1: not blow a hole in the kill dozer. That's how
43:48
Speaker 1: thick and well welded this superstructure over the bulldozer was.
43:54
Speaker 2: So nobody was killed or injured in this thing, which
43:57
Speaker 2: was remarkable considering what was happening. It was a little
44:01
Speaker 2: over two hours, up to seven million dollars in damage.
44:05
Speaker 2: I think eleven of the thirteen buildings were occupied at
44:10
Speaker 2: the time, and like you said, people were literally running
44:12
Speaker 2: out the back door for a lot of these and
44:16
Speaker 2: that was it. You know, the guy ends up, you know,
44:20
Speaker 2: they take this tank apart, and they didn't want any
44:24
Speaker 2: memory of it in town, so they take it apart,
44:27
Speaker 2: get rid of the parts. I think one of them
44:29
Speaker 2: ended up staying with the Thompson family, like one small part, Yeah.
44:32
Speaker 1: A trunion I think, something that connects the bucket to
44:35
Speaker 1: the rest of the dozer that had broken off when
44:38
Speaker 1: he came crashing through their house.
44:40
Speaker 2: Yeah. But aside from that, people basically wanted to forget
44:44
Speaker 2: about it, and with the help of you know, insurance
44:46
Speaker 2: and everything, they ended up rebuilding everything. Not that it
44:51
Speaker 2: wasn't at great personal cost as well, of course, but
44:56
Speaker 2: Marv was gone and they were really eager to move
44:59
Speaker 2: on for the most part as it.
45:00
Speaker 1: Yeah, Casey Farrell, who owned Gamble's hardware store, it took
45:03
Speaker 1: him seven years because his store was insured, but it
45:06
Speaker 1: wasn't insured for the kind of money it takes to
45:08
Speaker 1: rebuild after a dozer rampage. But I guess the Denver
45:13
Speaker 1: Post visited a year after on the anniversary of it
45:15
Speaker 1: to do a story, and they found that most of
45:17
Speaker 1: the buildings had either been rebuilt or were in the
45:20
Speaker 1: process of rebuilding. And I believe the mayor at the
45:23
Speaker 1: time this, I guess this would have been a year after.
45:25
Speaker 1: A guy named Ted Wang. He said that the whole
45:28
Speaker 1: rampage had actually inspired the town to become tighter as
45:32
Speaker 1: a community, Like more people became involved in local politics,
45:35
Speaker 1: and the town just kind of like took pride in
45:37
Speaker 1: its own resurrection and rebuilding itself brick from brick, which
45:41
Speaker 1: is essentially I guess, the opposite of what Marvy Meyer
45:44
Speaker 1: would have wanted from his rampage.
45:46
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, probably, And you know the narrative that
45:50
Speaker 2: you hinted at early was still lives on for a
45:54
Speaker 2: lot of people. A lot of people think this guy's
45:55
Speaker 2: a folk hero, probably not surprisingly a lot of those
45:58
Speaker 2: people on the very far right of the political spectrum,
46:03
Speaker 2: and say, you know, this was a guy taking down,
46:06
Speaker 2: you know, his local government that was being he was
46:08
Speaker 2: a victim of his local government, and he was taking
46:11
Speaker 2: them out, you know, doing what we all want to
46:14
Speaker 2: do on any given day. And people still celebrate June
46:18
Speaker 2: fourth is Killedozer Day in some of those circles.
46:21
Speaker 1: Yeah, And so, you know, doing research on this, I
46:25
Speaker 1: just got less and less sympathetic with the guy and
46:27
Speaker 1: really just came to dislike him. And then I came
46:30
Speaker 1: across that Dozer Manifesto webcomic by mister V and just
46:35
Speaker 1: reading some of it, I was like, well, I'm not
46:38
Speaker 1: exactly sure how I think about this whole thing, and
46:41
Speaker 1: I think I don't have enough information about what really
46:44
Speaker 1: went on in that town or didn't go on to
46:48
Speaker 1: decide one way or another, and get I don't think
46:50
Speaker 1: that matters, But I just thought it was interesting that
46:54
Speaker 1: I had an about face. I guess, yeah, I find
46:59
Speaker 1: it interesting when I think of my thoughts.
47:03
Speaker 2: There was no one is quite sure who came up
47:06
Speaker 2: with the name kill Dozer in terms of this case,
47:08
Speaker 2: but there was obviously the band kill Dozer got to
47:14
Speaker 2: shout them out from Madison, Wisconsin, Okay, and they may have.
47:18
Speaker 2: I think they were the early eighties where they before
47:21
Speaker 2: or after the movie, because when they're a movie as well.
47:23
Speaker 1: There was a movie called kill Dozer from nineteen seventy four.
47:25
Speaker 1: It was the ABC Suspense Saturday Suspense TV movie that
47:29
Speaker 1: was based on a nineteen forty four short story by
47:33
Speaker 1: fantasy writer Theodore Sturgeon.
47:36
Speaker 2: Okay, so I bet kill Those are the band named
47:38
Speaker 2: themselves after. That would be mine, I would think.
47:40
Speaker 1: But yeah, I don't understand why. It's like, well, where
47:42
Speaker 1: did the name come from? Like kill those? Like you
47:45
Speaker 1: would just look at that thing and be like, that's
47:46
Speaker 1: a kill dozer without ever hearing that word together. It's
47:51
Speaker 1: not like some great mystery like that's a kill dozer.
47:54
Speaker 1: That's just what you call that thing. Humans have some
47:56
Speaker 1: sort of innate genetic understanding of seeing that thing and
48:01
Speaker 1: knowing that it's a kill dozer without ever seeing that
48:04
Speaker 1: word before.
48:06
Speaker 2: Yeah, though it didn't kill, No.
48:08
Speaker 1: It didn't. That's a great point. So it's a I
48:11
Speaker 1: guess destroy dozer is a better one, yeah, or a bulldozer.
48:15
Speaker 1: Oh yeah. If you want to know more about kill Dozer,
48:19
Speaker 1: there's plenty of stuff to read and watch on the internet.
48:22
Speaker 1: Just be wary. Hopefully we've armed you with a little
48:25
Speaker 1: bit of info to measure against. And since I said that,
48:30
Speaker 1: it's time of course for a listener mail.
48:33
Speaker 2: Yeah, and watch Tread You can rent it. I think
48:37
Speaker 2: it's free on two V and some other stuff.
48:39
Speaker 1: But it is really well done. It's a great documentary.
48:43
Speaker 2: Well, he does these recreations that I guess are CGI,
48:46
Speaker 2: but it looked to me like I was like, man,
48:50
Speaker 2: did they actually build another kill dozer replica to shoot
48:53
Speaker 2: the stuff?
48:54
Speaker 1: Yeah? It was one of those few documentaries that had
48:56
Speaker 1: one hundred and fifty million dollar budget.
48:59
Speaker 2: Not sure, but it looked good. And it's only like
49:02
Speaker 2: ninety eight minutes long or less than that eighty eight
49:04
Speaker 2: minutes ninety It's it's definitely worth seeing, all right, Listener Mail.
49:08
Speaker 2: Dangers of Whistling. Hey, guys, just finish that episode. And
49:12
Speaker 2: I thought you were going to mention the one thing
49:14
Speaker 2: about not whistling in a theater. Not one hundred percent
49:17
Speaker 2: sure of the veracity of the history of this, but
49:19
Speaker 2: old theater. Legend has it that early stage hands were
49:22
Speaker 2: also sailors and or dock workers who communicated in whistles,
49:26
Speaker 2: and therefore, if you were a casual bystander whistling in
49:29
Speaker 2: a theater, you could actually cause an accident through miscommunication.
49:33
Speaker 2: As with some of other superstitions in the theater, this
49:36
Speaker 2: one is based more on safety than anything else, and
49:38
Speaker 2: I always find it fascinating. The concept of bad luck
49:42
Speaker 2: was apparently effective for early safety compliance. Thanks for keeping
49:46
Speaker 2: me entertained on my long LA commutes. And that is
49:49
Speaker 2: from Claudia, who was a stage hand in Los Angeles.
49:52
Speaker 1: Awesome. Thanks a lot, Claudia. I feel like we talked
49:54
Speaker 1: about that. It came across it in research or something
49:57
Speaker 1: like that. I don't know if it was related to
49:59
Speaker 1: whistling or what, but had to do with salty sea
50:02
Speaker 1: dogs moonlighting as stage hands for the theater.
50:06
Speaker 2: Oh I remember that? Yeah?
50:08
Speaker 1: All right, Well, thanks Claudia for getting in touch. And
50:10
Speaker 1: if you want to be like Claudia and share something
50:12
Speaker 1: awesome and interesting with us, we'd love that you can
50:14
Speaker 1: wrap it up, spank it on the bottom, and send
50:16
Speaker 1: it on its way to stuff. Podcasts at iHeartRadio dot com.
50:23
Speaker 1: Stuff You Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio.
50:26
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50:30
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