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David Bacon Part Two · The Path Went Chilly

0:27
Speaker 1: Welcome back to part two of our coverage about the
0:29
Speaker 1: murder of David Bacon. Let's dive right back in. It
0:33
Speaker 1: soon became obvious that David had a habit of keeping
0:35
Speaker 1: secrets from Greta because they found a diary in his
0:38
Speaker 1: bedroom which had been written entirely in some sort of
0:41
Speaker 1: secret code. And this is one of those things that
0:44
Speaker 1: sounds fabricated but is actually one hundred percent true, because
0:47
Speaker 1: it was reported on in the newspapers during this time period,
0:50
Speaker 1: and when they asked Gretta about it, she said that
0:52
Speaker 1: she knew this diary existed, but David never allowed her
0:56
Speaker 1: to read it. And apparently she was able to help
0:58
Speaker 1: police decipher some of the coded material inside the diary,
1:02
Speaker 1: and most of it turned out to be harmless. It
1:04
Speaker 1: was like names and phone numbers for a number of
1:07
Speaker 1: their friends and acquaintances, whom Greta already knew about. But
1:10
Speaker 1: there were also some coded portions of the diary where
1:12
Speaker 1: Greta was unable to provide any assistance and were unable
1:15
Speaker 1: to decode it, and the police actually went to the
1:18
Speaker 1: trouble of hiring cipher experts to try to decode certain
1:21
Speaker 1: sections of the diary. It's kind of like the Zodiac letters,
1:24
Speaker 1: Like it seems like a really high profile crime, but
1:26
Speaker 1: they were unsuccessful and there are sections in that diary
1:29
Speaker 1: where they were unable to find out what exactly David
1:32
Speaker 1: was writing. But I kind of wish that this diary
1:34
Speaker 1: was available to the public because I would love to
1:36
Speaker 1: see amateur sluice try to decode it today like they
1:39
Speaker 1: do with the Zodiac letters.
1:41
Speaker 2: This is a fascinating element. Like when you first said it,
1:44
Speaker 2: I'm like, oh, is this one of the fabrications that
1:46
Speaker 2: was dropped in at a later date. But to know
1:49
Speaker 2: that he went out of his way to write in
1:51
Speaker 2: a diary and to develop a code so that his
1:54
Speaker 2: wife wouldn't know what he was up to, and it
1:57
Speaker 2: just opens up the door for so many different possible abilities.
2:01
Speaker 2: Was he into, like you'd mentioned, if there was a
2:03
Speaker 2: man and a woman. Was he into being a third
2:05
Speaker 2: with other couples? Was it just meeting up with other men,
2:08
Speaker 2: because I mean, he was married to Greta, so maybe
2:11
Speaker 2: he didn't feel the need to meet up with women,
2:13
Speaker 2: and he had he liked both men and women. I'm
2:17
Speaker 2: not sure. Obviously, only David is the one who's going
2:21
Speaker 2: to know that for sure, and David has passed away,
2:23
Speaker 2: but we can just go based on everything that's been
2:27
Speaker 2: written here. I feel like this has some elements of
2:31
Speaker 2: the staircase with Michael right.
2:34
Speaker 1: Well, yes, yeah, that would make sense to me. And
2:36
Speaker 1: it is kind of interesting that he pretty much coded
2:39
Speaker 1: everything in the diary and some of it just turned
2:41
Speaker 1: out to be like regular information, like the contact information
2:44
Speaker 1: for his friends. But maybe he was misdirection where he thought, well,
2:47
Speaker 1: if I code everything, then there's less of a chance
2:50
Speaker 1: that Greta is going to find it to be able
2:51
Speaker 1: to see what kind of contents I have in there.
2:54
Speaker 2: Yeah, you're just casting a wide net that way, and
2:56
Speaker 2: you're making it a lot harder for whomever it is
2:59
Speaker 2: to be able to pin point what information is worth
3:01
Speaker 2: trying to decode.
3:03
Speaker 1: So another bizarre clue was a key that was found
3:06
Speaker 1: in David's wallet, which did not belong to his home
3:09
Speaker 1: and wound up being matched to a studio apartment that
3:12
Speaker 1: David had rented inside a house in a Laurel Canyon. Yeah,
3:15
Speaker 1: another secret you're throwing your hands up here. And this
3:17
Speaker 1: is another one that's one hundred percent real. It's not
3:20
Speaker 1: fabricated and it was only ten minutes away from David's house,
3:24
Speaker 1: and he had rented it only twelve days before he
3:27
Speaker 1: was murdered. Police found out that the house itself was
3:30
Speaker 1: owned by a retired physician named Charles Hendrix, who interacted
3:34
Speaker 1: with David, who told him that he was renting it
3:36
Speaker 1: for a quote unquote friend. Yeah, Jules is giving that
3:40
Speaker 1: look here, that sounds pretty cryptic. Greta said that she
3:43
Speaker 1: was aware that this apartment existed, as he told her
3:46
Speaker 1: it was for a gardener he was planning to hire
3:49
Speaker 1: to do some work at the house. But Greta still
3:51
Speaker 1: found this a little strange because they had a trailer
3:53
Speaker 1: on their property, which she felt would have been adequate
3:56
Speaker 1: living corridors for a gardener. So she's wondering, why is
3:59
Speaker 1: he renting this fanc apartment located ten miles from her house,
4:03
Speaker 1: And to make things even stranger, when the police searched
4:05
Speaker 1: the apartment, they found a lot of evidence to suggest
4:07
Speaker 1: that a woman had been living there, because they found
4:10
Speaker 1: three empty women's purses, the torn sleeve of a woman's
4:14
Speaker 1: blouse inside a drawer, and several women's cigarette holders. So
4:18
Speaker 1: it did not sound like he was renting it just
4:20
Speaker 1: for a nail gardener.
4:22
Speaker 2: Wow, this is like David Bacon's booty bungalow. This is
4:26
Speaker 2: really interesting. So again, he's subverting what our expectations are
4:31
Speaker 2: going to be thus far. Because he's been seen with
4:34
Speaker 2: a man, it's easy to assume that that is what
4:38
Speaker 2: he with regards to a relationship, that he could be
4:40
Speaker 2: pursuing sexual or otherwise. It seems the most logical explanation
4:45
Speaker 2: since he has Greta. But apparently if David isn't going
4:49
Speaker 2: to discriminate here, this sounds like a full on affair.
4:52
Speaker 2: Like if you are going to pay for somebody to
4:54
Speaker 2: live somewhere, and not only do they have just like
4:57
Speaker 2: a toothbrush there, they've got multiple empt he purses. It
5:01
Speaker 2: sounds like somebody's living a whole life there. So that
5:05
Speaker 2: would imply a certain level of closeness, would it not?
5:09
Speaker 1: I think so. Yeah. That's why I find it incredible
5:11
Speaker 1: that it was only rented twelve days beforehand, because, as
5:14
Speaker 1: we're going to talk about, there seemed to be a
5:16
Speaker 1: lot of activity going on in that apartment during that
5:19
Speaker 1: twelve day window. But the timing would make sense because
5:22
Speaker 1: Greta is reaching the stage in her pregnancy where she's
5:25
Speaker 1: not in the mood to have sex. So I could
5:26
Speaker 1: see David thinking to himself, I need to get my
5:29
Speaker 1: sexual activity, so I'm going to rent this apartment and
5:32
Speaker 1: then use it for a place to meet up with
5:34
Speaker 1: people secretly in order to have sex.
5:36
Speaker 2: And I'm wondering how easy it was to meet women,
5:39
Speaker 2: being that he had just come off doing the Masked
5:42
Speaker 2: Marvel and he'd just been cast in another movie, so
5:45
Speaker 2: it seemed like David was on the up and coming trajectory.
5:49
Speaker 2: So I'm wondering how many women would have been interested
5:52
Speaker 2: in him based on that. And do you have any
5:55
Speaker 2: photos of him? Like if I google him, can I
5:57
Speaker 2: see what he looks like? Or is there not anyhotos
6:00
Speaker 2: of them on the internet? Uh?
6:02
Speaker 1: No, you can just type in David Bacon and you'll
6:04
Speaker 1: be able to I think there's only one, but I
6:06
Speaker 1: think you can see it at the Internet movie database.
6:10
Speaker 1: So he looks like, you're just average, like twenty nine
6:13
Speaker 1: year old man from the nineteen forties. He gotta looks
6:15
Speaker 1: like an FBI agent, and the one that they use
6:17
Speaker 1: for him, he won.
6:18
Speaker 2: One hundred percent, looks like an FBI agent or some
6:21
Speaker 2: private investigator in a movie.
6:23
Speaker 1: Yeah, so I'm guessing that's a photo of his character
6:26
Speaker 1: in The Mass Marvel, because I think he played like
6:28
Speaker 1: a reporter or a private investigator, but not too many
6:31
Speaker 1: like headshots of him trying to look glamorous.
6:34
Speaker 2: There's also like another guy named David Bacon who is
6:39
Speaker 2: a photo journalist, and there's a lot of photos of him,
6:42
Speaker 2: So I'm hoping that this is okay. This is an IMDb,
6:44
Speaker 2: so it has to be him and not the photojournalist.
6:48
Speaker 1: But that seems to be the only one I've seen
6:50
Speaker 1: of him. It doesn't I guess there are a couple
6:52
Speaker 1: of If you go to Google Images, you can see
6:53
Speaker 1: some screenshots of him from the Mass Marvel where he's
6:56
Speaker 1: dressed in a suit in a fedora and is like posing. Well,
6:59
Speaker 1: they put his credit on screen.
7:01
Speaker 2: On a side note, you could have convinced me if
7:04
Speaker 2: you showed me this picture and I'm looking at photos
7:06
Speaker 2: of Kevin Bacon, you could have told me that they
7:08
Speaker 2: were just in relatives and I would have believed you.
7:10
Speaker 1: It's true. Yeah, they do seem to have some sort
7:12
Speaker 1: of resemblance, so that's quite amusing. So when they were
7:16
Speaker 1: searching David's apartment, they also found a towel with the
7:19
Speaker 1: name Buckland on it, but it was eventually traced to
7:22
Speaker 1: a guy named Wilfred Buckleyton Junior, who said he had
7:25
Speaker 1: only been there briefly because he had been helping another
7:28
Speaker 1: friend named Harry Frize move into the apartment. For Ze
7:32
Speaker 1: was a music producer from New York who had responded
7:34
Speaker 1: to a rental ad that David had placed in the newspaper,
7:37
Speaker 1: which offered the use of the apartment in exchange for
7:40
Speaker 1: several hours of gardening work per day, and for Ze
7:43
Speaker 1: was able to confirm that the cigarette holders in the
7:46
Speaker 1: apartment belonged to a female friend who had also helped
7:49
Speaker 1: him move in, but he was unable to account for
7:51
Speaker 1: the three empty women's purses and the torn sleeve of
7:54
Speaker 1: the blouse, so we still don't know who that belonged to.
7:57
Speaker 1: And according to for Ze, he only stayed in the
7:59
Speaker 1: apartment days before he was offered a job elsewhere and
8:02
Speaker 1: then decided to move out, and he was cleared as
8:05
Speaker 1: a suspect in David's murder. But considering that he never
8:09
Speaker 1: actually did any gardening work or visited David's house, it
8:12
Speaker 1: makes me wonder if he was in there for four
8:14
Speaker 1: days for entirely different reasons.
8:17
Speaker 2: Okay, so I've got a question here. Is there a
8:20
Speaker 2: possibility that this apartment could have been used to run
8:24
Speaker 2: sex workers, which could explain the torn blouse and maybe
8:30
Speaker 2: the multiple persones.
8:32
Speaker 1: Possibly, Yeah, because it seems like anyone who frequented this apartment,
8:36
Speaker 1: when they're interviewed, you kind of get the sense that
8:38
Speaker 1: they might be hiding something and not telling the full truth.
8:41
Speaker 1: And pretty much everyone who went into this apartment was
8:44
Speaker 1: cleared as a suspect in David's actual murder. But if
8:47
Speaker 1: they went there for the purposes of hanging out with
8:49
Speaker 1: sex workers or something like that, I can see them
8:52
Speaker 1: not being forthcoming and sharing that information with the police.
8:56
Speaker 2: And if that is true, if David was somehow embroiled
9:00
Speaker 2: in that world, that would increase the probability that he
9:03
Speaker 2: would be exposed to somebody who would end up doing
9:07
Speaker 2: him harm.
9:09
Speaker 1: Yes, exactly, And that is kind of my theory that
9:12
Speaker 1: he had someone in that apartment at some point who
9:15
Speaker 1: was responsible for his murder, but that person just did
9:17
Speaker 1: not get interviewed by the police and completely slipped under
9:20
Speaker 1: the radar. And the guy who owned the house, Charles Hendrix,
9:24
Speaker 1: had another interesting story. He claimed that two days before
9:27
Speaker 1: the murder, he showed up there to collect some rent
9:29
Speaker 1: money from David and saw him there with an unidentified
9:32
Speaker 1: man who seemed kind of uncomfortable and left in a hurry.
9:36
Speaker 1: Hendricks was able to confirm that this guy was not
9:38
Speaker 1: Harry Frizze, who had just been interviewed, but they eventually
9:42
Speaker 1: found out that this was a twenty year old man
9:44
Speaker 1: named Glenn Irwin Schaum, who was tracked down when investigators
9:48
Speaker 1: found his phone number in David's belongings. He had actually
9:52
Speaker 1: recently deserted from the Navy and was looking for work,
9:55
Speaker 1: and he claimed that he also answered David's ad that
9:58
Speaker 1: he was looking for a gardener. He claimed that he
10:00
Speaker 1: only visited David's apartment that one time and never actually
10:03
Speaker 1: moved in or took the job, but according to Charles Hendrix,
10:07
Speaker 1: he looked like he was very unhappy that he had
10:09
Speaker 1: come in there and interrupted him and left in a
10:11
Speaker 1: big hurry, so it seemed like he might have been
10:14
Speaker 1: there for other reasons. They were able to clear Shaum
10:17
Speaker 1: as a suspect because he had an alibi placing him
10:20
Speaker 1: with his wife on the day of the murder. But
10:22
Speaker 1: I'm also thinking to myself that he was not lured
10:25
Speaker 1: to that apartment to get a gardening job. He may
10:27
Speaker 1: have been there for other reasons.
10:29
Speaker 2: Is gardening or gardener like a euphemism for something?
10:32
Speaker 1: Nah? I don't even know what kind of garden they
10:34
Speaker 1: had at David's house, but it seems like he's going
10:37
Speaker 1: to a lot of trouble to find a gardener, but
10:39
Speaker 1: not actually bringing them to see the garden.
10:41
Speaker 2: Let me look this up quickly. I just have to see, like,
10:44
Speaker 2: is there is gardening or gardener? Okay? Gardening has recently
10:51
Speaker 2: become a popular euphemism, particularly on TikTok and other social
10:54
Speaker 2: media platforms, but it generally refers to smoking or consuming
10:58
Speaker 2: marijuana rather than a sexual act.
11:01
Speaker 1: Well, marijuana would have been a big deal in the forties,
11:04
Speaker 1: so I could see them concealing that for that reason.
11:06
Speaker 2: But ladygarden this is separate and sometimes slang term for
11:10
Speaker 2: female genitalia. But this is distinct from the general verb gardening,
11:15
Speaker 2: so I guess it could be seen as some euphemism
11:17
Speaker 2: if you were referring to a lady garden.
11:20
Speaker 1: I think that's quite hilarious. Using TikTok euphemism. Back in
11:23
Speaker 1: nineteen forty three, like way ahead of its time.
11:26
Speaker 2: Yeah exactly.
11:27
Speaker 1: But yeah, like I said, Sean had an alibi where
11:30
Speaker 1: his wife vouch from that day. But we've talked about
11:33
Speaker 1: this on past episodes that you sometimes have to be
11:35
Speaker 1: skeptical when someone's spouse is the only one who can
11:38
Speaker 1: provide them with an alibi. And as you recall, David
11:41
Speaker 1: was seen in his car with a man and a
11:43
Speaker 1: woman shortly before he was murdered. So theoretically, if Sean
11:48
Speaker 1: and his wife were in on it and were in
11:49
Speaker 1: the car with him that day, then I could see
11:52
Speaker 1: them providing each other with an alibi in order to
11:54
Speaker 1: clear themselves. So I'd like to be curious of police
11:57
Speaker 1: how thoroughly they vetted Sham's alibi. Were they able to
12:00
Speaker 1: fight other witnesses who could verify his whereabouts or was
12:03
Speaker 1: just his wife?
12:05
Speaker 2: But like, what would be the motive? We know that
12:08
Speaker 2: David was found wearing rings and he also had money
12:11
Speaker 2: on him.
12:11
Speaker 1: Correct, yes he did.
12:13
Speaker 2: Yeah, so robbery wasn't the motive. What would the motive
12:17
Speaker 2: have been? Do you think?
12:18
Speaker 1: I don't know. Like the way that Cham was acting,
12:21
Speaker 1: it makes me think that he might have been planning
12:23
Speaker 1: sex with David in there and was very thrown about
12:26
Speaker 1: when Charles Hendrix came in there and realized that he
12:29
Speaker 1: had seen them together. So that's why he left in
12:31
Speaker 1: a big hurry. So theoretically, if David and Sean were
12:34
Speaker 1: involved in something, maybe they arranged to meet two days
12:37
Speaker 1: later at another location instead of the apartment, And if
12:40
Speaker 1: they were swingers, maybe his wife wanted to join in.
12:43
Speaker 1: That's when things escalated into murder, and that's why they
12:46
Speaker 1: were seen in the car altogether.
12:48
Speaker 2: And I suppose to there is a scenario where a
12:52
Speaker 2: couple decides to be swingers, and perhaps let's just put
12:57
Speaker 2: up a hypothetical where David is in an intimate embrace
13:01
Speaker 2: with the wife and the husband has thought that he
13:04
Speaker 2: would be okay with this, but in seeing it, he
13:07
Speaker 2: becomes enraged and he stabs David. So I think there's
13:11
Speaker 2: a possibility when you become embroiled in these types of
13:15
Speaker 2: relationships that some especially if with people that you don't
13:20
Speaker 2: know very well. But something like this could happen. I mean,
13:24
Speaker 2: if he was discharged and what did you say from
13:28
Speaker 2: the Navy, Oh yeah.
13:29
Speaker 1: He was actually wanted for desertion, and he actually got
13:31
Speaker 1: in legal trouble when he was interviewed by police because
13:34
Speaker 1: the Navy still wanted him on this charge. So I
13:36
Speaker 1: think he served some time in the brig.
13:38
Speaker 2: Yeah, So I think there's a possibility that if you've served,
13:41
Speaker 2: that you might be carrying some type of weapon on you,
13:44
Speaker 2: especially if you're a deserter and you're worried about being
13:48
Speaker 2: pulled back in and put up in front of a
13:51
Speaker 2: jury and held responsible for what you've done. So I
13:56
Speaker 2: don't know, there's so many possibilities open here, and this
13:59
Speaker 2: case just keeps getting weirder and weirder.
14:01
Speaker 1: It is like, even though we have these mysterious guys
14:04
Speaker 1: in David's apartment who had been cleared to suspects, I
14:07
Speaker 1: still think it's possible that he was murdered by someone
14:09
Speaker 1: completely different who may have been at the apartment at
14:12
Speaker 1: one point but we just don't know it and has
14:14
Speaker 1: managed to slip under the radar. And again, even weirder,
14:17
Speaker 1: they actually found something unpleasant in David's pass, which even
14:21
Speaker 1: Greta did not know about. But it turned out that
14:23
Speaker 1: in September of nineteen thirty nine, well David was still
14:26
Speaker 1: living in Los Angeles, he was arrested for and I'm
14:29
Speaker 1: using the actual quote from the newspaper articles quote contributing
14:33
Speaker 1: to the delinquency of a fifteen year old newsboy. The
14:36
Speaker 1: story goes that this newsboy had visited David's home to
14:40
Speaker 1: collect some money for newspapers. When David answered the door
14:43
Speaker 1: wearing nothing but a pajama top. He invited the newsboy
14:46
Speaker 1: inside and soon made an inappropriate sexual advance towards him,
14:50
Speaker 1: and the boy left before things actually crossed the line
14:53
Speaker 1: into sexual assault. But the newsboy did go to the
14:56
Speaker 1: police and David did get into some legal trouble. According
15:00
Speaker 1: to everyone who knew him, he did seem very regretful
15:02
Speaker 1: for his actions, and he wound up getting a suspended
15:05
Speaker 1: sentence on the condition that he leave the state of
15:07
Speaker 1: California for three years, and he did just that. He
15:11
Speaker 1: went to New York for a couple of years, and
15:12
Speaker 1: then returned to Los Angeles in nineteen forty two, which
15:15
Speaker 1: is where he met Greta and then kind of restarted
15:18
Speaker 1: his acting career. So I don't know if that says
15:21
Speaker 1: anything bad about David. This is the only black mark
15:24
Speaker 1: on his record that we know about, and did seem remorseful,
15:27
Speaker 1: So I don't know if this was just a one
15:28
Speaker 1: time only thing where he did something inappropriate, but the
15:32
Speaker 1: fact that he made a move on a fifteen year
15:34
Speaker 1: old newsboy is very uncomfortable and shows that he was
15:38
Speaker 1: capable of having dark secrets.
15:40
Speaker 2: It's absolutely disgusting. It feels like a scene straight out
15:44
Speaker 2: of To Catch a Predator where you have this fifteen
15:46
Speaker 2: year old come to the door and I'm sorry it
15:48
Speaker 2: was David not wearing any underwear.
15:50
Speaker 1: They just say he was wearing nothing but a pajama top,
15:52
Speaker 1: which I guess is an implication maybe that he had
15:55
Speaker 1: no underwear.
15:56
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm hoping that it covered his naughty bits because
16:00
Speaker 2: if that child, I don't think that this fifteen year
16:03
Speaker 2: old child would have gone in if he was completely exposed.
16:07
Speaker 2: But either way, to make sexual advances on a fifteen
16:10
Speaker 2: year old newsboy, there's absolutely no words. And I don't
16:14
Speaker 2: like to ever shame a victim of murder, but I
16:17
Speaker 2: think it is important that we point out that this
16:20
Speaker 2: is absolutely egregious and of course he's going to be
16:24
Speaker 2: remorseful about it. Anytime somebody gets caught, they're going to
16:27
Speaker 2: be remorseful. And you wonder, was this just a one
16:30
Speaker 2: time thing, and they're truly remorseful or are they just
16:32
Speaker 2: remorseful for what they did because of the implications that
16:36
Speaker 2: has on their character.
16:38
Speaker 1: Yeah, Like, we don't have any other documented cases of
16:41
Speaker 1: David doing anything like that, but that's only what we
16:44
Speaker 1: know about. Like could he have done it with other
16:46
Speaker 1: young men who didn't go to the police and no
16:49
Speaker 1: one ever found out about it. But when you see that,
16:51
Speaker 1: and then you hear about him luring young men to
16:54
Speaker 1: his apartment for the promise of a job of a gardener,
16:56
Speaker 1: then you begin to think that this could have played
16:58
Speaker 1: a role in his murder. So things got even weirder
17:01
Speaker 1: because another man named Charles Wild came forward and confessed
17:05
Speaker 1: to David's murder, but he turned out to be nothing
17:07
Speaker 1: more than an attention seeker and he was ruled out
17:09
Speaker 1: as a suspect. And yet another man named Blakelee Patterson
17:13
Speaker 1: came forward in contacted the Los Angeles Examiner newspaper to
17:17
Speaker 1: say that David was his friend and that he had
17:19
Speaker 1: received a threatening extortion letter from him demanding money prior
17:23
Speaker 1: to his death. This made the papers, it made them
17:26
Speaker 1: think that the case was about to be solved, but
17:28
Speaker 1: once Patterson was questioned by police, his story completely fell apart,
17:32
Speaker 1: and it turned out that he had never even met
17:34
Speaker 1: David in his life. And what was crazy is that
17:37
Speaker 1: Patterson said, well, I'm an inspiring actor, and I thought
17:40
Speaker 1: that if I shared this crazy story and got my
17:42
Speaker 1: pitcher in the paper, this might help jump start my
17:45
Speaker 1: acting careers. So I'm just going to confess that I'm
17:47
Speaker 1: involved in a murder and hope that causes me to
17:49
Speaker 1: make it as an actor. So he was charged with
17:52
Speaker 1: preparing false evidence, served ten days in jail, and wound
17:55
Speaker 1: up being excommunicated from the state of California and forced
17:58
Speaker 1: to return to his hometown in Minnesota.
18:00
Speaker 2: I didn't know you could be excommunicated from a state,
18:03
Speaker 2: so I just learned something new. But that all checks out.
18:07
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's kind of like with the David where it's
18:09
Speaker 1: kind of I think it is an option where they
18:10
Speaker 1: will give you a lighter sense if you promise to
18:12
Speaker 1: leave the state for the next few years, and that's
18:15
Speaker 1: exactly what David did after the incident with the newsboy,
18:18
Speaker 1: though he eventually did return, so the case pretty much
18:22
Speaker 1: disappeared from the spotlight, and Greta Keller eventually returned to
18:26
Speaker 1: Europe to resume her career before she died in nineteen
18:29
Speaker 1: seventy seven at the age of seventy four. And like
18:32
Speaker 1: I said, this case wasn't particularly well known. But when
18:36
Speaker 1: I started writing for lispers dot com and was looking
18:39
Speaker 1: for unsolved mysteries involving entertainers, that's when I decided to
18:43
Speaker 1: include it in my article. And unfortunately I included some
18:46
Speaker 1: of the details which later turned out to be false.
18:50
Speaker 1: So some of the stuff I'm about to share with
18:51
Speaker 1: you the sole source for it is a writer named
18:55
Speaker 1: Darwin Porter, and like I said, he is known for
18:58
Speaker 1: writing biographies about celebrity and famous figures, but he doesn't
19:02
Speaker 1: publish them until long after they're dead, so there's no
19:05
Speaker 1: one around to refute his allegations. And he has made
19:08
Speaker 1: a lot of wild claims that either are based on
19:11
Speaker 1: nothing more than secondhand, uncorroborated information, or it's possible he
19:16
Speaker 1: just flat out made it up. And one of his
19:18
Speaker 1: most controversial books was a biography about James Dean in
19:22
Speaker 1: which he alleged that he was Marlon Brando's sex slave
19:26
Speaker 1: and that the two of them had some sort of
19:28
Speaker 1: secret gay affair. And of course he did not publish
19:31
Speaker 1: this book until they were both dead and everyone associated
19:34
Speaker 1: with Brando and James Dean were dead, so some people
19:37
Speaker 1: have taken this as fact, but most scholars will say
19:40
Speaker 1: there is no evidence of this whatsoever, and Darwin Porter
19:43
Speaker 1: is just making this up to sell books.
19:45
Speaker 2: Clearly it works because I remember reading that somewhere and
19:48
Speaker 2: being like, oh, that's really not what I was expecting,
19:52
Speaker 2: but okay, and I sort of took it as fact
19:55
Speaker 2: as much as you can take something as fact that
19:58
Speaker 2: goes so far back and there's nothing to really corroborated.
20:01
Speaker 2: But it shows that he's somehow seeped into like pop
20:05
Speaker 2: culture literature and stuff, because that would have been somewhere
20:08
Speaker 2: that I would have consumed it, like on some website.
20:11
Speaker 1: Yes, and I was researching this before this episode, and
20:13
Speaker 1: it's on one of those fact checking websites, and they say, no,
20:16
Speaker 1: there is no evidence that James Dean and Marlon Branda
20:19
Speaker 1: were lovers and had this S and M relationship. This
20:22
Speaker 1: is all likely a fabrication from Darwin Porter, but that's
20:25
Speaker 1: pretty much his m. He likes to say that you
20:27
Speaker 1: remember that big Hollywood star from the cast, they were
20:30
Speaker 1: secretly gay and having affairs with these other big Hollywood
20:33
Speaker 1: star But I'm pretty sure most of it is bunk.
20:36
Speaker 1: So what's hilarious is that if you visit Darwin Porter's
20:39
Speaker 1: Wikipedia page, sometimes they will have sections which talk about
20:43
Speaker 1: his credibility issues and his false claims. But if you
20:46
Speaker 1: go to it now, that section is miraculously vanished. It
20:48
Speaker 1: seems to keep coming back and disappearing. And Darwin Porter
20:52
Speaker 1: is still alive at the age of eighty eight, and
20:54
Speaker 1: I think he spends a lot of time trying to
20:56
Speaker 1: do edits to his own Wikipedia page and getting rid
20:59
Speaker 1: of all the people who are saying use a complete fraud.
21:02
Speaker 2: That sounds like a full time job. And I think
21:04
Speaker 2: sometimes people don't even really realize that anyone can go
21:07
Speaker 2: in and edit Wikipedia.
21:08
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I have a feeling he also does a
21:11
Speaker 1: lot of edits on David Bacon's Wikipedia page, because if
21:15
Speaker 1: you go there, a lot of the stuff I'm about
21:17
Speaker 1: to share with you is still listed and cited as
21:19
Speaker 1: being completely true. But the only source is a book
21:23
Speaker 1: that Darwin Porter wrote. The big revelation here is that
21:27
Speaker 1: David was having a secret affair with none other than
21:30
Speaker 1: Howard Hughes, the very famous aviator who was also involved
21:34
Speaker 1: in films he like produced quite a bit of movies
21:36
Speaker 1: in his lifetime. And have you seen the movie The
21:39
Speaker 1: Aviator where Leonardo DiCaprio played Howard Hughes, directed by Martin Scorsese.
21:44
Speaker 2: Yes, that was an excellent movie, it was.
21:46
Speaker 1: Yes, And you might remember a section in that movie
21:49
Speaker 1: where they talk about how he once produced a controversial
21:53
Speaker 1: western called The Outlaw, which starred a very busty actress
21:57
Speaker 1: named Jane Russell, and it was a subject of a
21:59
Speaker 1: lot of content because she showed too much cleavage. And
22:03
Speaker 1: there's an hilarious scene in there where he's in front
22:05
Speaker 1: of the censorship board and they were saying, well, your
22:08
Speaker 1: movie is showing too much of this woman's memories. It
22:10
Speaker 1: has a excessive amount of memories. It probably sets a
22:13
Speaker 1: record for the most usage of the word memories in
22:15
Speaker 1: a scene. And he's giving a demonstration, say, actually, she
22:18
Speaker 1: doesn't show any more cleavage than other actresses in these
22:21
Speaker 1: famous films. So it was completed in nineteen forty one,
22:24
Speaker 1: but it did not actually get a release until nineteen
22:27
Speaker 1: forty three because of all the controversy about her bus sides.
22:31
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, that is so funny. I do remember
22:33
Speaker 2: the controversy over that movie. In the scene in the Aviator,
22:37
Speaker 2: but I don't remember memories being used over and over
22:40
Speaker 2: and over again.
22:41
Speaker 1: But that is quite hilarious, yes, and so that ties
22:45
Speaker 1: into this story because I think it was like two
22:48
Speaker 1: thousand and five, Darwin Porter published a biography titled Howard
22:52
Speaker 1: Hughes Hell's Angel, and he says that he was friends
22:55
Speaker 1: with Greta Caller and that shortly before Greta's death, she
22:59
Speaker 1: told Darwin all this juicy details about David Bacon having
23:04
Speaker 1: a secret relationship with Howard Hughes, which he decided to
23:07
Speaker 1: publish in this book. But conveniently, Greta has been dead
23:10
Speaker 1: for decades, Howard Hughes has been dead for decades. David
23:13
Speaker 1: has obviously been dead since nineteen forty three, so there's
23:16
Speaker 1: no one around to refute any of these claims. But
23:19
Speaker 1: he claimed that Howard was the one who discovered David
23:23
Speaker 1: and jump started his acting career in Hollywood, and that
23:26
Speaker 1: he was originally planning to cast him in the lead
23:28
Speaker 1: role as Billy the Kid in The Outlaw, but for
23:31
Speaker 1: whatever reason, it fell through and someone else got the role.
23:35
Speaker 1: But if you do research, you will find out there
23:37
Speaker 1: are numerous holes in this story because I just said
23:39
Speaker 1: that after David was arrested for his inappropriate conduct with
23:43
Speaker 1: a newsboy in nineteen thirty nine, he was forced to
23:46
Speaker 1: leave the state of California and he did not return
23:48
Speaker 1: until nineteen forty two. But the production of The Outlaw
23:52
Speaker 1: started in nineteen forty when David was living in New York.
23:55
Speaker 1: So how could Howard Hughes have discovered him and cast
23:59
Speaker 1: him in the role. And if you go to David
24:01
Speaker 1: Bacon's Wikipedia page, it even says that Howard discovered him
24:05
Speaker 1: in nineteen forty two, But you just do a bit
24:07
Speaker 1: of researching find out actually the movie was already filmed
24:10
Speaker 1: in nineteen forty one and then got released in nineteen
24:13
Speaker 1: forty three, So how did he discover David and cast
24:15
Speaker 1: him in this role when the production was already done.
24:18
Speaker 1: So this is yet another case of Darwin Porter just
24:21
Speaker 1: putting all these false claims in his book and hoping
24:24
Speaker 1: that no one fact checks them.
24:26
Speaker 2: Yeah, the math ain't mathin and Darwin Porter seems to
24:30
Speaker 2: be very creative, but obviously it seems to be a
24:33
Speaker 2: pattern where like you said, he's choosing people that are
24:36
Speaker 2: deceased and everybody connected who could either corroborate or refute
24:40
Speaker 2: is also deceased, and so it makes it incredibly difficult
24:43
Speaker 2: to fact check his work.
24:45
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's the problem here. And I kind of wish
24:47
Speaker 1: I'd known this before I wrote that list first article,
24:50
Speaker 1: because I included the detail about David of possibly being
24:53
Speaker 1: involved with Howard Hughes. Because Darwin's story is that before
24:57
Speaker 1: Greta died, she said that her husband hadriden right a
25:00
Speaker 1: tell all memoir about Howard Hughes and was going to
25:03
Speaker 1: expose or affair. So Granta believe that Howard Hughes had
25:07
Speaker 1: David killed and was responsible for the murder. But you
25:10
Speaker 1: do any research and you'll find out there's no evidence
25:12
Speaker 1: that they even met or knew each other, let alone
25:15
Speaker 1: had this secret affair. And none of the police reports
25:18
Speaker 1: or the newspaper articles mentioned anything about this tal aal
25:21
Speaker 1: mamoir about Hughes.
25:23
Speaker 2: And I'm sorry, Like, if Howard Hughes was going to
25:25
Speaker 2: have somebody killed, this man is a billionaire. Do you
25:29
Speaker 2: think that he would hire somebody to stab David or
25:32
Speaker 2: do you think that it would be somebody who would
25:34
Speaker 2: use a gun and they would make sure that he
25:35
Speaker 2: was dead. David wasn't dead, he was driving around with
25:39
Speaker 2: a stab wound. This doesn't sound like a hit man
25:42
Speaker 2: to me. This sounds like an impulsive act.
25:45
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's what I always thought, that this is not
25:47
Speaker 1: someone with skilled and murder because they obviously stabbed David
25:51
Speaker 1: and probably left the scene without checking that he was dead,
25:53
Speaker 1: which I'm sure a contract killer would not do. They
25:56
Speaker 1: would be a lot more careful than that. And even
25:59
Speaker 1: though Howard Hughes was romantically involved with a lot of
26:02
Speaker 1: famous actresses in Hollywood during that time period, I know
26:05
Speaker 1: that he was involved with Catherine Hepburn and Ava Gardner,
26:08
Speaker 1: but there is no evidence whatsoever that he was bisexual
26:11
Speaker 1: and ever involved in any secret affairs with other men.
26:14
Speaker 1: But what's crazy is that the Howard Hughes biography port
26:17
Speaker 1: decides to throw in details about the murder itself which
26:21
Speaker 1: are completely false and have been accepted as fact. And
26:24
Speaker 1: I remember when I first learned about this, one of
26:26
Speaker 1: the details that intrigued me was that they said that
26:29
Speaker 1: they found a camera in David's car, and when they
26:32
Speaker 1: developed the film, they found one photograph of David's smiling
26:36
Speaker 1: while he was lying nude on a beach, which led
26:38
Speaker 1: to speculation that the photograph was taken by his killer
26:41
Speaker 1: shortly before he was murdered. But guess what, when I
26:44
Speaker 1: read that La Daily Mirror website, I found out they
26:47
Speaker 1: checked all the police reports, they checked all the newspaper articles.
26:51
Speaker 1: There is no mention about this camera or this mysterious photograph,
26:54
Speaker 1: and the sole source is Darwin Porter.
26:57
Speaker 2: Well, Darwin Porter knows how to make it a lot
27:00
Speaker 2: more intriguing and add a lot more layers to a story.
27:03
Speaker 2: It's just too bad that none of them could be
27:05
Speaker 2: corroborated and are likely not true.
27:07
Speaker 1: Yeah, because that was I think one of the reasons
27:09
Speaker 1: that people voted for this for My Trail Went Cold
27:12
Speaker 1: first anniversary show, because they read those details and said, ooh,
27:15
Speaker 1: this is a really juicy and interesting case with these
27:18
Speaker 1: weird details. And then you find out, like you said,
27:20
Speaker 1: a lot of them aren't true and another inaccurate detail
27:24
Speaker 1: is like he also writes that David was carrying one
27:27
Speaker 1: hundred and fifty dollars in his wallet when he was killed.
27:29
Speaker 1: When you read all the news articles they say it
27:32
Speaker 1: was only thirteen dollars, Because one hundred and fifty dollars
27:35
Speaker 1: in nineteen forty three money twenty eight hundred dollars to day,
27:38
Speaker 1: so it just seems like he's exaggerating details that have
27:41
Speaker 1: no relevance whatsoever to make the story more exciting. And
27:45
Speaker 1: he also said that before Greta died, she's had the
27:48
Speaker 1: photograph of David while he was naked, as well as
27:51
Speaker 1: his bloodstained wallet, and decided to turn it over to
27:54
Speaker 1: Darwin when she died, and he said that I still
27:57
Speaker 1: have these items in my possession to this day. And
28:00
Speaker 1: it's like, okay, if you have the photograph, then put
28:03
Speaker 1: it on the internet and show it to people. But no,
28:05
Speaker 1: this is just complete bunk.
28:07
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's like you can lie, and you can lie,
28:10
Speaker 2: and you can lie, but when you say that you've
28:11
Speaker 2: got evidence and it comes time where it's like, okay,
28:15
Speaker 2: but this is true, you should be able to put
28:18
Speaker 2: that out there, and especially if you're saying that you
28:20
Speaker 2: have it, you should be able to produce it, right,
28:23
Speaker 2: Like I don't know what the Latin word for evidence is,
28:26
Speaker 2: like habeas corpus would be bringing the body, but like,
28:29
Speaker 2: bring us the evidence, Starwin. There's really no reason not to,
28:32
Speaker 2: especially when you're promising that you have it. Why even
28:35
Speaker 2: go to your way to say that or to add
28:37
Speaker 2: that detail when you know that you can't produce it exactly.
28:41
Speaker 1: And that's what we were talking about. So many crazy
28:44
Speaker 1: details in this case already, and I had to confirm, Yes,
28:47
Speaker 1: this sounds weird, like the coded diary and whatnot, but
28:50
Speaker 1: it's one hundred percent true. So this case is already
28:52
Speaker 1: interesting enough without you having to make up all this
28:55
Speaker 1: extra stuff. And sadly, the biography also made a lot
28:59
Speaker 1: of uncorre oberated claims about Greta herself, claiming that she
29:03
Speaker 1: was also bisexual and was having affairs with some other
29:05
Speaker 1: famous Hollywood actresses like Marlene Dietrich, which I'm pretty sure
29:10
Speaker 1: is one hundred percent untrue. And the implication he wrote
29:13
Speaker 1: was that David and Greta were hitched together in a
29:16
Speaker 1: lavender marriage, which did happen in Hollywood during that time period.
29:19
Speaker 1: A bunch of big stars like Rock Hudson married women
29:22
Speaker 1: because the studio executives did not want them to come
29:25
Speaker 1: out that they were interested in other men because that
29:27
Speaker 1: would destroy their career. But David was still a relatively
29:31
Speaker 1: unknown actor. He wasn't a big star, and like we
29:34
Speaker 1: talked about, he really wanted to have sex with Greta.
29:37
Speaker 1: He had gotten her pregnant. So I do think that
29:39
Speaker 1: even though there is a lot of evidence that he
29:41
Speaker 1: was bisexual and interested in other men, I think he
29:44
Speaker 1: did genuinely love Greta and have an interest in women,
29:47
Speaker 1: and that they were just not getting married for show
29:49
Speaker 1: because they were trying to save their careers.
29:53
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think it's something that exists in the gray area.
29:56
Speaker 2: It's very easy to be like black and white, like
29:59
Speaker 2: either one hundred percent Greta and that's it, or he
30:03
Speaker 2: was gay and living a secret life and not interested
30:06
Speaker 2: in her and it was a lavender marriage. I think
30:08
Speaker 2: it exists in the gray and it's somewhere in between,
30:11
Speaker 2: and that he liked men, but he also liked women,
30:13
Speaker 2: and he loved Greta, but he also loved having trysts
30:17
Speaker 2: with other men. I think that in trying to explain it,
30:20
Speaker 2: it's very easy to put a label on it, like
30:22
Speaker 2: a lavender marriage, because, like you said, it was something
30:25
Speaker 2: that was I don't even I don't know if we
30:27
Speaker 2: want to call it typical, but it was pretty common
30:29
Speaker 2: back then because your currency as a movie star would
30:33
Speaker 2: be being appealing to women. The thought process back then
30:39
Speaker 2: was that a gay man wouldn't have had the same
30:42
Speaker 2: appeal to women that a straight man does. So it's
30:46
Speaker 2: a very toxic thought process and very i'm sure deleterious
30:51
Speaker 2: to the mental health of many of the actors and
30:54
Speaker 2: executives in Hollywood at the time, but that was the
30:57
Speaker 2: reality that they were dealing with. If we look back,
30:59
Speaker 2: it's still something that I think a lot of actors
31:02
Speaker 2: probably struggle with because we have a lot of actors
31:06
Speaker 2: who are out, but I've heard different actors speak about
31:10
Speaker 2: getting cast in those lead character roles and how their
31:15
Speaker 2: sexual orientation has affected that. So it's not something that's
31:21
Speaker 2: without its challenges even today, and we're a lot more
31:24
Speaker 2: progressive in the way that we.
31:25
Speaker 1: Think, oh yeah, definitely, Like we have a lot more
31:28
Speaker 1: actors now who are out and openly say that they're gay,
31:31
Speaker 1: and they still get frequent work. But I'm sure there's
31:34
Speaker 1: still a lot of them who feel that this is
31:36
Speaker 1: going to destroy my brand. No one will be able
31:38
Speaker 1: to take me seriously if I play a straight role.
31:40
Speaker 1: So even if they do have a secret interest in men,
31:43
Speaker 1: they decide to keep it from the public. And of
31:45
Speaker 1: course this would have been a lot more prominent during
31:48
Speaker 1: the nineteen forties, and especially for someone like David, who
31:51
Speaker 1: hadn't even really started his career, like he'd only done
31:53
Speaker 1: a few B movies and was hoping that he could
31:56
Speaker 1: become a star someday, but he was not yet at
31:58
Speaker 1: that level. So I think when you see the fact
32:01
Speaker 1: that he was renting out this secret apartment, I think
32:03
Speaker 1: he was thinking to himself, I want to satisfy my
32:06
Speaker 1: interest in men, but I don't want anyone to find
32:08
Speaker 1: out about it, because if anyone does, it's going to
32:11
Speaker 1: kill my career and my life as an actor is over.
32:15
Speaker 1: So I can definitely understand why he was doing stuff
32:17
Speaker 1: like writing coded diaries and living this secret double life,
32:20
Speaker 1: but unfortunately it seems like it led to him being killed.
32:24
Speaker 1: So yeah, one thing I am safe saying is that
32:26
Speaker 1: Howard Hughes did not kill him. I think we can
32:28
Speaker 1: now rule him out as a suspect. I'm not sure
32:31
Speaker 1: about any of the other men like Harry Frizzy or
32:33
Speaker 1: Schaum who visited his apartment. I think he may have
32:36
Speaker 1: lured them there, maybe propositioned them. I'm not entirely sure
32:39
Speaker 1: if they had sex, but I do think that he
32:41
Speaker 1: met up with someone on the day that he was killed.
32:44
Speaker 1: And I'm still on the fence about whether he was
32:47
Speaker 1: killed by a man or possibly a man or a woman.
32:49
Speaker 1: I guess it depends on how much stock you put
32:51
Speaker 1: into the eyewitness sighting of the man and the woman
32:54
Speaker 1: in the car with him. But it seems obvious that
32:56
Speaker 1: he met up with someone, and I don't think this
32:59
Speaker 1: was a premeditated I think it was a crime of
33:01
Speaker 1: passion and that at one point David turned his back
33:04
Speaker 1: and this person just got so angry that they decided
33:07
Speaker 1: to stab him. But they did not wait to make
33:09
Speaker 1: sure he was dead, and David did live long enough
33:11
Speaker 1: in order to drive away to try to seek help
33:14
Speaker 1: before he crashed his car.
33:16
Speaker 2: So my question is how well stocked was the kitchen,
33:20
Speaker 2: Like was this knife something that somebody was carrying on
33:22
Speaker 2: their person or could it have been a weapon of
33:24
Speaker 2: opportunity taken from the kitchen in the apartment.
33:28
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, they never checked that. That's a good question
33:31
Speaker 1: because I'd be curious to know if David took it
33:33
Speaker 1: with him or something like that, or maybe it was
33:36
Speaker 1: kept in the apartment. I don't know if they really
33:38
Speaker 1: looked at that, but I know they described it as
33:40
Speaker 1: a stiletto, and I know that that's often described as
33:43
Speaker 1: like a murder weapon a lot of the time, that
33:45
Speaker 1: assassin's carry or something like that. Spot of course, because
33:48
Speaker 1: they never recovered the murder weapon itself, there are not
33:50
Speaker 1: one hundred percent certain. So yeah, that's what I think
33:53
Speaker 1: did happen here, And I think this is a very
33:56
Speaker 1: intriguing case that has pretty much been lost to history,
33:58
Speaker 1: and unfortunately because of Darwin Porter's book. I guess the
34:02
Speaker 1: good side is that it did return it to the
34:04
Speaker 1: spotlight for the first time in several decades. But unfortunately
34:07
Speaker 1: a lot of this stuff about like Howard Hughes and
34:10
Speaker 1: the naked the naked photograph of David are still being
34:13
Speaker 1: circulated around the Internet to this day. If you go
34:15
Speaker 1: to David Bacon's Wikipedia page, they'll still share the detail
34:18
Speaker 1: about the photograph and the Howard Hughes stuff, and so
34:21
Speaker 1: it's very difficult to separate fiction from reality. But I
34:25
Speaker 1: would be curious to know if they still have the
34:27
Speaker 1: blonde hair from the sweat or as evidence, because they
34:30
Speaker 1: could do DNA testing and even if it obviously the
34:34
Speaker 1: killer is probably long dead, if they could like match
34:36
Speaker 1: it up to someone, it may shed some light on
34:39
Speaker 1: who is responsible for this murder.
34:41
Speaker 2: I would love to see that hair bey DNA tested,
34:44
Speaker 2: like was it a male hair, was it a woman's hair,
34:47
Speaker 2: was it a mouns And was it even connected to
34:51
Speaker 2: David's murder. I think there's a possibility that it could
34:54
Speaker 2: be completely unconnected, especially if we see a pattern of
34:58
Speaker 2: David having these potential extramarital either trysts or affairs. You're right, though,
35:05
Speaker 2: with the inclusion of all of these weird details, it's unnecessary.
35:08
Speaker 2: I feel like there's enough juicy details with this story,
35:12
Speaker 2: with this random apartment, with these empty purses. We've got
35:16
Speaker 2: that coded diary, that sweater, like, we don't need to
35:20
Speaker 2: throw in that there was naked photo of David on
35:23
Speaker 2: this undeveloped camera film and that he was on the
35:28
Speaker 2: beach nude and maybe it was taken by his killer.
35:30
Speaker 2: Even if the camera was found and there was a photo,
35:35
Speaker 2: it's just like the sweater. Unless there's a date published
35:39
Speaker 2: on that and you know that it's the day that
35:41
Speaker 2: David died, Even if it is the same day, you
35:43
Speaker 2: still can't prove that the person that took that is
35:45
Speaker 2: necessarily the killer. It's so hard to know. Even if
35:49
Speaker 2: he was at the beach, we know that he had
35:51
Speaker 2: sanded his shorts, but that doesn't mean that he didn't
35:53
Speaker 2: just pull on a pair of shorts in order to
35:55
Speaker 2: make it look like he'd gone swimming. When he comes
35:58
Speaker 2: back and gret a season, he can be like, look
36:00
Speaker 2: I was at the beach, Look what I'm wearing. So
36:03
Speaker 2: there's just so many bizarre details. But I really wish
36:06
Speaker 2: that we could crack the code on that diary and
36:09
Speaker 2: we could know all of the entries that he made,
36:12
Speaker 2: because there's so much mystery associated with David. I'm with
36:16
Speaker 2: this case in general, this weird apartment. I just want
36:19
Speaker 2: to know everything.
36:21
Speaker 1: It's true. I kind of wish that that diary, if
36:23
Speaker 1: they still have it in evidence, that they could just
36:25
Speaker 1: release it to the public and let some amateur sluice
36:27
Speaker 1: to code it, because I know that's how one of
36:29
Speaker 1: the zodiac letters was cracked, because some random professor and
36:32
Speaker 1: his wife were reading it in the newspaper and figure
36:35
Speaker 1: it out. And of course it's been over eighty years.
36:37
Speaker 1: It's not like you're going to jeopardize an active investigation
36:40
Speaker 1: because obviously the killer is probably never going to be
36:43
Speaker 1: arrested and prosecuted. But just for curiosity's sake, I love
36:47
Speaker 1: to release it, just to try to figure out what
36:49
Speaker 1: he was writing in there and maybe shed some light
36:51
Speaker 1: on why he was killed.
36:53
Speaker 2: Yeah, I feel like when you get this far along,
36:56
Speaker 2: it's around like eighty years ago, right, So it's a
37:00
Speaker 2: long time ago. There's likely barely anybody who was attached
37:04
Speaker 2: to this case who's still alive. So are you going
37:08
Speaker 2: to be kicking a hornet's nest by allowing amateur sleuths
37:12
Speaker 2: to have a crack at that journal? I don't think so.
37:15
Speaker 2: I really think, like, what do you have to lose?
37:18
Speaker 2: Citizens Louths love to decode something, and I bet even
37:22
Speaker 2: now you could probably put it into some program in
37:24
Speaker 2: AI and it could pretty easily be decoded. I can't
37:28
Speaker 2: imagine that it's this amazing code that is so difficult
37:33
Speaker 2: to break that like code breakers can't break it.
37:36
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly. So I would like to see, even if
37:39
Speaker 1: this case has never conclusively saw, maybe someone come up
37:41
Speaker 1: with a theory that shed some light on what happened
37:45
Speaker 1: before we close it off. I just wanted to confirm
37:47
Speaker 1: that this story I shared earlier about him being friends
37:50
Speaker 1: with Henry Fonda and Jimmy Stewart, that's once again the
37:53
Speaker 1: sole source is Darwin Reporter's biography and Howard Hughes, and
37:56
Speaker 1: it's another case of him making up these salacious details
38:00
Speaker 1: for no reason whatsoever, even though, like the whole thing
38:02
Speaker 1: with Fonda and Stewart has nothing to do but the
38:04
Speaker 1: actual crime himself. And he also makes up another story
38:08
Speaker 1: that David was nearly expelled from Harvard because of a
38:11
Speaker 1: scandal where he and his roommate were quote unquote and
38:14
Speaker 1: this is the actual language he used auditioning some of
38:16
Speaker 1: the best bodies on the football team. What yeah, that's
38:20
Speaker 1: what he said as well. Just that's the kind of
38:23
Speaker 1: salacious writing that Porter does. It's just ridiculous. But once again,
38:27
Speaker 1: that story is probably not true.
38:29
Speaker 2: But I think, like Darwin Porter borrowed from things like
38:33
Speaker 2: The National Inquirer, the more sordid details that you can
38:37
Speaker 2: have and the bigger the celebrity names that you can
38:39
Speaker 2: have attached to a story, the more you're going to sell.
38:43
Speaker 2: And I guarantee you that to add Jimmy Stewart and
38:45
Speaker 2: Henry Fonda to the list, and then later to add
38:49
Speaker 2: Howard Hughes as a potential murder suspect, which seems like
38:52
Speaker 2: absolutely bs. But when you add these names, the interest deepens,
38:58
Speaker 2: and so people are going to be like, oh, like,
39:00
Speaker 2: let me read more. I want to know more. And
39:02
Speaker 2: when there was no way to fact check Darwin Porter
39:06
Speaker 2: at the time, he could easily skate by not getting
39:09
Speaker 2: sued and not having as many questions asked of him.
39:13
Speaker 2: Now it's so easy to research it, and it's so
39:15
Speaker 2: easy to go and like disprove it. And you said
39:18
Speaker 2: that whole article was written basically fact checking Darwin Porter's
39:22
Speaker 2: work and showing like egregious errors and fla full on fabrications.
39:27
Speaker 2: Let's just call it like it is.
39:29
Speaker 1: Yeah, so I think that has complicated the case. But
39:32
Speaker 1: unlike our last series about Gene Spangler, where there was
39:35
Speaker 1: really credible allegations against Kirk Douglas, none of the celebrities
39:38
Speaker 1: we talked about today, I'm pretty sure we're involved in
39:41
Speaker 1: the crime or did anything wrong. But yes, since we've
39:44
Speaker 1: done Geen Spangler and David Bacon, it just shows that
39:46
Speaker 1: Hollywood in the nineteen forties was a really weird place
39:49
Speaker 1: and that there's some compelling unsolved mysteries and we'll probably
39:52
Speaker 1: never find out the truth about what happened, but I
39:54
Speaker 1: sure would like to know what eventually led to David
39:57
Speaker 1: Bacon's death. So any further thought on the murder of
40:00
Speaker 1: David Bacon.
40:02
Speaker 2: My heart just really goes out to Greta because I
40:05
Speaker 2: can't imagine what she had to experience. It would be
40:08
Speaker 2: hard enough living in the country that you weren't born in.
40:11
Speaker 2: You're forging this whole new life. You meet a man,
40:14
Speaker 2: you fall in love, you get married, maybe it's not
40:17
Speaker 2: perfect what relationship is. And you're pregnant with a child,
40:21
Speaker 2: which is you're going to be your first child at
40:23
Speaker 2: around the age of forty. That's not going to be
40:25
Speaker 2: necessarily an easy pregnancy. It is for some women, but
40:28
Speaker 2: I think for most women it can have its challenges.
40:31
Speaker 2: And then to find out that you've lost your partner,
40:34
Speaker 2: that he's been murdered, and then you have complications with
40:37
Speaker 2: your pregnancy and your baby is still born. My heart
40:41
Speaker 2: broke for her in that moment when Robin said that,
40:44
Speaker 2: it literally felt like I've been punched in the gut.
40:46
Speaker 2: There's nothing worse than losing the two people that the
40:50
Speaker 2: one person you haven't met yet but you know you're
40:52
Speaker 2: going to love more than anybody else in the whole
40:54
Speaker 2: entire world, and then to lose your partner it's the
40:59
Speaker 2: grief must have been a title wave for Greta. So
41:02
Speaker 2: I'm glad that she lived her last years with a partner,
41:05
Speaker 2: and I hope that that partner brought her all of
41:07
Speaker 2: the happiness that she deserved.
41:09
Speaker 1: Yeah, Greta is definitely the most sympathetic person in this story.
41:12
Speaker 1: And obviously, even though David didn't deserve to be murdered,
41:15
Speaker 1: he definitely had some problematic things about his own life,
41:18
Speaker 1: like the incident with the newsboy. But Greta didn't do
41:21
Speaker 1: anything wrong, and she had to go through this tragedy
41:23
Speaker 1: losing both her husband and her unborn child, and then
41:27
Speaker 1: the fact that someone is saying, years after she's dead,
41:29
Speaker 1: that she had affairs with other actresses and gave like
41:31
Speaker 1: this conspiracy theory about how her husband was murdered by
41:34
Speaker 1: Howard Hughes, which is completely untrue. I don't think she
41:37
Speaker 1: even knew Darwin porter let alone shared all these secrets
41:40
Speaker 1: with them, So it's kind of sad that they're kind
41:42
Speaker 1: of slandering her name posthumously. But yeah, this is a
41:45
Speaker 1: very intriguing case and I definitely feel a lot of
41:48
Speaker 1: sympathy with her, and maybe one day we can finally
41:51
Speaker 1: get the answers. So that about brings an end to
41:54
Speaker 1: our series about the murder of David Bacon. Thank you
41:57
Speaker 1: so much for your continued support, and we'll be back
41:59
Speaker 1: next week with a series about another cold case, Robin.
42:03
Speaker 2: Do you want to tell us a little bit about
42:04
Speaker 2: the Trail Went Cold? Patreon?
42:06
Speaker 1: Yes, The Trail Cold Patreon has been around for three
42:09
Speaker 1: years now, and we offer these standard bonus features like
42:12
Speaker 1: early ad free episodes, and I also send out stickers
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42:19
Speaker 1: with us on Patreon. If you join our five dollars
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Speaker 1: tier tier two, we also offer monthly bonus episodes in
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Speaker 1: which I talk about cases which are not featured on
42:29
Speaker 1: the Trail Went Cold's original feed, so they're exclusive to Patreon,
42:32
Speaker 1: and if you join our highest tier tier three, the
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Speaker 1: ten dollars tier. One of the features we offer is
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Speaker 1: a audio commentary track over classic episodes of Unsaved Mysteries,
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42:45
Speaker 1: up the original Unsolved Mysteries episode on Amazon Prime or
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Speaker 1: the background, where I just provide trivia and factoids about
42:55
Speaker 1: the cases featured in this episode, and incidentally, the very
42:59
Speaker 1: first episode that I did a commentary track over was
43:02
Speaker 1: the episode featuring this case. So if you want to
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Speaker 1: download a commentary track in which I make more smart
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43:11
Speaker 3: So I want to let you know a little bit
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Speaker 3: about the jeweles and Nashty patreons. So there's early ad
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Speaker 3: free episodes of The Path Went Chili. We've got our
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Speaker 3: Pathwent Chili mini's, which are always over an hour, so
43:22
Speaker 3: they're not very mini, but they're just too short to
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Speaker 3: turn into a series, and we're really enjoying doing those.
43:27
Speaker 3: So we hope you'll check out those patreons.
43:29
Speaker 2: We'll link them in the show notes.
43:31
Speaker 1: So I want to thank you all for listening, and
43:33
Speaker 1: any chance you have to share us on social media
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43:38
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43:50
Speaker 2: Music by Paul Rich from the podcast Cold Callers Comedy