You're listening to the Mind over Murder podcast. My name is Bill Thomas.
I'm a writer, consulting, producer, and now podcaster. I am now
trying to use my experience as the brother of a murder victim to help other
victims of violent crime. I'm working on a book on the unsolved Colonial Parkway
murders, and I'm the co administrator of the Colonial Parkway Murders Facebook group together
with Kristin Dilley. My name is Kristin Dilley. I'm a writer, a
researcher, a teacher, and a victim's advocate, as well as the social
media manager and co administrator for the Colonial Parkway Murders Facebook page with my partner
in crime, Bill Thomas. Hey, it's Bill Thomas. You know.
Each week, Kristin Dilley and I co host mind over Murder. Here this
week we're doing something special for Easter. We're participating in an Easter collaboration with
Shane Waters and a group of very talented podcasters, so it's kind of a
compilation show. Of course, we do a segment and other very talented podcasters
also participate. We think you'll really enjoy it. Next week we'll be back
to our usual schedule of interviews and discussions about what's happening in the true crime
space. Thanks, and we hope you enjoy. Hello, friend, have
a seat. Welcome to another fascinating collaboration podcast I've arranged. I'm Shane Waters,
the host of foul Play crime series, and today we're about to embark
on a wondrous journey and Easter adventure unlike any other during our time together.
Twelve podcast or friends of mine will be joining us to share true stories of
fake deaths. All podcasts are listed in the show notes, along with a
link on where to find them. As we prepare for the excitement that lies
ahead, let's take a moment to reflect on the origins of this cherished holiday.
The history of Easter is a fascinating blend of religious, cultural, and
pagan traditions. At its core, Easter is a Christian holiday celebrating the resurrection
of their central religious figure from the dead, an event that holds great significance
for Christians worldwide. However, the origins of Easter can be traced back to
even earlier traditions, with some elements of the holiday borrowed from ancient pagan customs.
The name Easter is believed to have originated from the Old English word Istra
or Ustra, which is connected to the name of a pagan goddess Istra.
Eastra was a goddess of spring and fertility in Englo Saxon and Germanic mythology,
celebrated during the spring equinox. The connection to the spring equinox, with spring
being a time of renewal and rebirth, likely influenced the adoption of Easter as
the name for the Christian holiday that celebrates the resurrection of Jesus. Now that
we've set the stage, let's dive into our adventure. Walking through the sun
dappled forest, a flash of movement catches our eye. A rabbit. But
this isn't just any ordinary rabbit. It's wearing a waistcoat and carrying a pocket
watch. Curiosity piqued, we follow the rabbit down a hole, tumbling into
a world of wonder and whimsie. As we dust ourselves off, we meet
our first peculiar character, a wise old owl named Ophelia, perched on a
tree branch. Hello, dear traveler, Welcome to the enchanted easter Lands.
I see you met our rabbit friend. I encourage you to continue on this
mysterious path at the base of the tree. As our first storyteller of the
night, Charlie from Crime Lines. It started on March fifteenth, nineteen fifty
seven, when thirty year old Lawrence Bader kissed his wife Mary Lou goodbye and
left their Akron, Ohio home for a business trip to Cleveland. Larry wrapped
up his business around four pm and set out to Lake Erie to sneak in
a little fishing time before he headed home. At four thirty. Larry shoved
off in a rented boat. That evening, a storm hit the area,
and Larry Bader disappeared. When the boat was found abandoned the next day,
all of the life jackets were accounted for. Without a life jacket, there
was no way Larry could survive long on the cold waters of Lake Erie.
A search of the lake in the surrounding area gave no clues, and Larry
Bader was quote presumed dead, leaving behind three young children and a pregnant wife.
Three years after Larry disappeared, Mary Lou had him declared officially dead,
and the family continued their lives in Akron, missing Larry, but moving forward
in nineteen sixty five, five years after Larry was declared dead and eight years
after he was last seen, a friend of his traveled to Chicago for a
sporting goods convention, and there he saw a man who was the spitting image
of Larry Bader. Almost the spitting image. This man had an eyepatch,
having lost an eye to cancer a couple of years before, and he had
a mustache. But other than that, this was Larry Bader alive and well,
at least the friend thought so. This friend quickly called Larry's family,
who showed up in Chicago and were also convinced that this man was Larry,
but he said he wasn't. He was Fritz Johnson of Omaha, Nebraska.
The family did talk Fritz into going to the police station to be fingerprinted.
Since Larry had been in the Navy his prince were on record, Fritz agreed,
seeing this as the fastest way to clear this whole thing up. The
fingerprint card was sent off to the FBI to compare to the Navy records,
and the prince matched. Fritz Johnson was, in fact Lawrence Bader. Even
after this, Fritz still denied his identity. He wasn't a Larry, and
he wasn't from Akron. He had arrived in Omaha five years before, four
days after Larry had disappeared, but Fritz said that was just a coincidence.
He had grown up in Boston, having been based in an orphanage there.
After arriving in Omaha, Fritz had a quickly gained popularity thanks to his flamboyant
personality. He bought an old horse and had the back converted into a mobile
lounge. He hosted champagne parties in his home and dated the most eligible young
women in town. After getting his dream job at a radio station, Fritz
threw himself into the promotional site of being a public personality. He addressed in
colonial garb for a Washington Day event. He sat on top of a fifty
foot flagpole for fifteen days to raise money for charity. He had his friends
poisted up to martinis a day to keep him sustained. Soon, Fritz was
noticed by television station KETV, and he was hired on as the sports director
and later married a local model, Nancy Zimmer. Fritz Johnson certainly wasn't playing
the part of a man who was trying to hide, going on TV and
rallying up publicity for himself. But after his true identity was revealed, Fritz
went back to Omaha and hired a lawyer. He was in a pickle.
He was both currently dead and a big mist, two situations that put him
in precarious legal standing. The lawyer recommended a full work up at the hospital.
Fritz went impatient for ten days and the doctors could come to no conclusions.
Through multiple interviews, they could not rattle Fritz's story. He showed no
memory of his life as Larry Bader, yet remembered many details from Fritz's origin
story without issue. But the doctors also could not find any physical reason why
Fritz would have suffered from amnesia. Even if he was injured in the boat
incident, it didn't explain having a whole new life backstory. Four days later,
when he showed up in Omaha, some believed a Larry was lying,
having fled his considerable debts and the confines of his respectable life in Akron.
His second wife, Nancy, may have been among the doubters because she soon
sought an annulment. Fritz then lost his job at the TV station due to
the bad press and had to go work as a bartender. After he paid
child support to both of his wives, he had around thirty dollars left each
week and could only afford to live in a YMCA men's shelter. And then,
seven months after being legally restored to life, Lawrence Joseph Bader and or
Fritz Johnson died of cancer on September sixteenth, nineteen sixty six, at the
age of thirty nine. A memorial service was held for Fritz in Omaha,
after which his body was sent to Akron to be buried as Lawrence Joseph Bader
in the family plot. The question of if this was a hoax or a
true instance of a rare form of amnesia has never fully been answered. Some
have offered a middle of the road theory, marrying the two options. It
was first suggested by Fritz's attorney, whose job was to keep him from getting
charged criminally or civilly. In this version of events, Larry decided to ditch
the family in Akron and to live unencumbered in the wild metropolis of Omaha.
But after he had that first surgery that removed his eye due to his cancer,
something went wrong and his memory was affected. This surgery essentially erased his
memories of being Larry Bader, but left Fritz Johnson intact, and Fritz began
to believe his own lies. The rabbit leads us to a field of flowers,
swaying in the wind. As we meander through the field, the vibrant
colors of the flowers create a mesmerizing tapestry, and the sweet fragrance of blossoms
fills the air. Blossom dancing flower with a stunning smile, twirls gracefully,
her petals a brilliant shade of pink, the embodiment of joy and renewal.
Hello, traveler, don't be shy. Join me and my dance together.
We celebrate the rebirth of life in the enchanted easter lands. We dance with
blossom, our spirits lifted by the sight and scent of the blooming flowers.
Joining us now in the field of flowers is Josh from rotten to the core.
Hello, and a happy Easter everyone. It's time to celebrate the resurrection
of nature from the death of winter. It is also officially spring time and
time to shake off those winter blues. I asked my magic mirror to show
me a fake death from history, but make it funny, and it did
not disappoint. I bring to you the tale of a man who was born
a poor fool, grew to be a rich fool, and die an old
fool. His name was Timothy Dexter, and he faked his death not for
money, safety, or any of the usual reasonings. He did it solely
for the attention and to make sure his wife would be sad enough. Now,
most men will only receive flowers at their funeral. Timothy didn't want to
wait. But this was long before HI told us that we could buy them
ourselves. Timothy was born to poor colonial farmers in seventeen forty eight in what
is now Massachusetts. He only had a few years of schooling before dropping out
at the age of eight. After several years working on his parents farm,
he left for Boston to apprentice for a tanner. He is known as a
lucky fool, and when he was twenty one, Timothy met an older widow
who happened to be loaded. He was soon living with her on her lavish
estate in Boston. While he could have just enjoyed the lifestyle of having a
sugar mama, Timothy wanted to make a name for himself as well. As
his own fortune. So, being the somewhat pushy guy that he was,
he began to seek business advice from his neighbors. Like John Hancock. His
problem would be that his neighbors absolutely despised him humm new money, how droll.
Not only was he from out of their social circles, but he was
uneducated and eccentric beyond all get out. In an attempt to bankrupt him and
rid themselves of his presence, they gave him a lot of bad advice,
and he didn't hesitate to listen to every word. He had no knowledge of
their business dealings and foolishly trusted them. Again, his luck would show its
hand because out of all the bad advice they gave him, it miraculously kept
working out in his favor. One thing they convinced him to do was to
send a shipment of bed warming pans to the Caribbean sheet warmers to a tropical
climate. Well, he listened and lucked out. There was a desperate need
for ladles and pots for the booming sugarcane business on the islands. It gets
worse or better, I should say. They also convinced him to trap and
ship all the stray cats He could and send them as well. Just imagine
a cargo ship full of nothing but stray cats. He again listened and long,
and behold, guess who was in desperate need of a solution to their
rat infestation. You guessed it, the Caribbean. He sold out of cats
and the pans, all at a high price. Timothy made the largest portion
of his wealth after the end of the American Revolution. His neighbors had convinced
him to buy the newly printed Continental currency, which was a new form of
money used to help fund the war. They weren't backed by any kind of
asset like precious metals. They ended up losing value quickly. And that is
right when Timothy poured all of his and his wife's money into buying them for
a portion of a penny each. And yet again, as luck would have
it, everything worked out in his favor. At the end of the war,
Congress had agreed to buy them back at one penny on the dollar.
It was bad for everyone except Timothy. He had so many, in fact,
that it actually ended up making him a millionaire. Why isn't his life
a movie? Yet? It sounds like a high school drama where the rich
girls are mean to the not so smart new girl, all her ideas backfire,
and then it's revealed that the new girl was actually a genius the whole
time. The whole time, his neighbors were livid, and his increase in
wealth only fueled his eccentricity. He went and bought a mansion and decorated the
yard with huge stone bases topped with forty life size wooden statue. Next to
his own was one of Thomas Jefferson that had the Constitution of Independence engraved on
it. All bless his heart. By this time, the American Revolution was
over and it caused an end to people having titles such as lord and ladies.
He still declared that he should be considered as a lord from now on
and began going by Lord Dexter. Eventually, Lord Dexter, as I said,
grew to be an old fool, and out of what I can only
imagine as boredom, he decided to fake his own death to see how many
people would show up and how hard they would mourn him. He had a
mausoleum built for it and told his family to play along. Over thirty thousand
people showed up to the funeral, but during he noticed that his wife wasn't
crying hard enough. She was even seen laughing and having just a gay old
time. So when she was alone in a corner, he got up and
began beating her loud enough that everyone soon became aware. I wonder how everyone
reacted to him just suddenly coming up out of his coffin. I would have
taken off running for the rest of the funeral. In fact, he acted
as if it was just a big joke and a surprise party. Oh good,
you're back. I'm not sure why people stayed after that. I know
there wasn't a lot to do then, but I don't deal with buffoonery.
Before his actual death in eighteen oh six, Lord Dexter managed to self publish
several books that had so many errors that he added eleven pages of punctuation marks
for them too. And I quote they made peeper and soul it as they
plays. I will end with a poem that he had written about himself.
Lord Dexter is a man of fame, most celebrated. Is his name more
precious far than gold. That's pure, Lord Dexter, shine for evermore well,
mirror. I asked for funny, and you did not disappoint I laughed,
I cried, and I felt better about all my own decisions. I
hope you all enjoyed learning about the lucky fool that was the false Lord Timothy
Dexter. Have a happy Easter, Shane and everyone else. Enjoy your candy.
Remember rabbits are a tenure commitment, and it's a lot harder to catch
a chicken than you might think. Trust me. As we continue our journey,
we stumble upon a quaint village where the houses are made of chocolate,
eggs and candy. Here we encounter our third character, Chacolina, a sweet
and bubbly chocolate tear Greetings traveler, feel free to sample my Easter treats.
They are crafted with love, and each bike can take a touch of enchantment.
We savor Chacolina's delicate confections, the rich, velvety chocolate melting in our
mouths, and we feel a warmth spread through our body. Suddenly, Peter
appears from Frightful to join in on the chocolate goodness and to share our next
story. Tonight, I'll be taking you back to the nineteenth century for a
case of ghosts and murder. When nothing is as it seems. This is
the case of the fake yet still deadly ghost of Hammersmith. Toward the end
of November eighteen oh three, something frightening was being reported in Hammersmith, which
at the time was a small village on the outskirts of London. Locals were
claiming to have seen a ghostly specter drifting through the dark streets at night.
Rumor was that this was the ghost of a villager who had committed suicide the
year before by slitting his own throat. One pregnant woman claimed she'd been crossing
the churchyard when she saw this spirit rise up from the two stones. It
grabbed her as she ran away. People were terrified, and during those wintry
months of eighteen oh three, you had to be brave or mad to walk
the streets of Hammersmith at night. Until a group of young men gathered rifles
and pistols to take down this supernatural being. And so on the third of
January eighteen oh four, twenty nine year old excise officer joined the spooky hunt.
His name was Francis Smith, and on that fateful night he was armed
with a fowling piece, a shotgun designed for shooting wild birds. He headed
out into the streets hunting for the spirit, and found himself in a part
of Hammersmith called Black Lion Lane, near the River Thames. But at the
exact same time, a twenty two year old man called Thomas Millwood was leaving
his parents house. He was a bricklayer and was heading out to pick up
his wife from a late job. He didn't want to walking these haunted streets
alone, and Thomas's outfit for work was a white shirt, a white flannel
waistcoat, a white apron, and freshly washed white linen trousers. Perhaps you
can see where this is going. I read the court transcripts, which state
that it had been an exceptionally dark night, and the lane where the encounter
took place was narrow and ran between two high hedges. I also checked the
as of the moon for that evening on January the fourth, eighteen oh four.
The moon was in its last quarter, not full, but big enough
to cast an eerie glow across the city and over the white clothes of Thomas.
The two men stumbled upon one another at the junction where Black Lion Lane
meets Beaver Lane, and poor old Thomas simply turned the corner and saw a
random man holding a gun in the darkness, but Francis saw the white,
ghostly figure that had terrorized London and shocked at the sight of this specter,
Francis started to shout demand, saying, damn you, who are you?
What are you? Damnuel shoots you. And this is where Thomas Millwood made
a fatal choice. He began to walk closer to Francis. Maybe he hadn't
realized the danger he was in, or hadn't even seen the gun in the
darkness, but he knew about the weapons soon enough, when a second later
Francis seemed the barrel of the spirited and pulled the trigger. The street boomed.
His shot scattered into a deadly pattern around Thomas, and the man dressed
all in white, who just wanted to walk his wife home, fell to
the floor dead Now once he was shot, Francis Smith was shaken, yes,
but he was excited. He had killed the ghost of Hammersmith, and
at ten thirty pm he sprang off to tell people of his success. He
gathered some men to come to see this spirit he had destroyed, and they
all raced back and saw the reality of the situation. Lying in the street.
His face staring upward at the moon was the very real corpse of a
human being, Thomas Millwood. He had been shot in the lower part of
the jaw on the left side, and the impact had broken that jaw and
penetrated the vertebra of his neck, injuring his spinal marrow. It was,
as court records would state later, a mortal wound. The gravity of the
situation started to sink in for Francis Smith as the men called for the High
Constable to come and advise, and Francis just paced back and forth, agitated,
saying. The Constable arrived and immediately told Francis Smith to go home and
wait, which he did. Then the men lifted the shattered corpse of Thomas
Millwood and carried him to the nearby Black Lion Inn and set his corpse down,
probably on a table or perhaps the floor. Thomas would have spent many
a night here drinking with his parents and wife, but now he lay dead.
Yet this was no ordinary murder, because there was no mystery. Francis
Smith had done this, but was he actually guilty of murder? An inquest
was carried out right there in the inn, and it came to the only
conclusion they felt was possible that Francis Smith had indeed willfully murdered Thomas Millwood in
the street Ghost or no Ghost. The coroner announced that Francis would stand trial
at the Old Bailey for murder. The trial began and the witnesses were called,
testifying to what they saw that night, but also of the ghost stories
leading up to it. The court records confirmed that there were actually several ghost
hunting parties out that very night. One man who attended the corpse a night
watchman, admitted that he had seen the ghost himself on the Thursday before.
Another local told the court that this ghost had attacked him in the churchyard,
leaping up from behind a tombstone and grabbing him by the throat. And it
was even said in that court room that, on account of his white clothes,
Thomas Millwood had already been mistaken for the Hammersmith Ghost on two previous occasions,
so much so that his family had advised him to wear a long coat
whenever he went out at night. Anne Millwood also took the stand. She
was the sister of Thomas, and she had heard the entire exchange between Thomas
and Francis. She said this, I ran out of the door, and
when I got halfway from my father's house to my brothers, I saw my
brother laying dead at the gate. I took hold of his right hand and
said, speak to me, but he could not, and his head was
laying towards me. I thought I went up to him. The jury retired
for about three quarters of an hour and returned with a verdict of manslaughter,
but the Lord Chief baron them that this option was simply not available to them.
They would have to find the prisoner either guilty or not guilty of murder,
because in a case where someone has deliberately shot another, there was no
in between, and so the jury disgusted it again and came back with a
devastating verdict. Francis Smith was guilty of murder, and he was sentenced to
hang, and his body would be given to the Medical College to be dissected
afterwards. He left the court room with little hope, but there was a
great amount of public sympathy for him, and after an agonizing few weeks,
Francis heard the news he had prayed for. Despite the deliberate shooting, those
ghostly elements meant that this was not a cold blooded murder after all, and
he was granted a stay of execution and was offered a pardon if and only
if he served a year hard labor in prison. And what of the ghost
of Hammersmith who started all this? Well, the publicity surrounding the shooting and
court case caused a local shoe make it to come forward. His name was
John Graham, and he admitted to dressing as a ghost to scare villagers.
He did this to take revenge on his apprentices because they had told Graham's children
some scary ghost stories. It seemed that the Hammersmith Ghost was no more until
eighteen twenty four, when reports began that the ghost had returned to Hammersmith,
only this time it could breathe fire. The ghost was sighted up until the
eighteen thirties, until a new supernatural figure took its place, Spring Heeled Jack.
Yet, those who say the Hammersmith Ghost never existed might have some caution,
because after Thomas Millwood was shot, there have been reports of his spirit
haunting the Black Lion Inn, where his corpse lay on that night. The
landlord of the inn in two thousand and four told the BBC that there had
been a strange voice speaking to people in the pub, and yet no one
was there to speak it. Perhaps the clearly fake ghost of Hammersmith ended up
creating a very real ghost who still wanders those streets after all these years,
searching for a wife you will never find. We leave the village with a
spring and our step, and soon arrive at a serene lake, shimmering with
the golden light of the setting sun. Here we meet our fourth character,
Ripple, a wise and gentle water spirit. Welcome traveler. My like is
a place of reflection, a respite for those who seek inner peace. Allow
yourself a moment to be still and let the water's tranquility wash over you.
We pause at the lake's the water's calming embrace, soothing our soul. Suddenly
appearing on a small boat on the lake. It's Bill and Kristen from Mind
Over Murder. On this episode of Mind Over Murder, we're discussing Wally Thrasher,
the notorious drug smuggler from Virginia's New River Valley. During the nineteen seventies
and nineteen eighties, Thrasher transported marijuana and cocaine into the United States from South
America, working under some of the biggest drug kingpins in South Florida. According
to Ron Peterson, author of Chasing the Squirrel, in nineteen seventy four,
Thrasher was one of the highest paid drugs smuggling pilots in the business, earning
up to ninety six thousand dollars per playing load of weed. Hailing from Pulaski,
Virginia, Thrasher was a criminally handsome, charming, and gifted athlete.
He was known as the Squirrel for being widely and a loose. He served
in the US Navy for three years before being honorably discharged. He attended Virginia
Tack for less than a year before deciding to forge his own path without further
education. After marriage, a child, a divorce, and a stint owning
a hippie clothing story called the Hydraulic Buffalo, Thrasher finally found his niche when
he took flying lessons in Roanoke, Virginia. He earned both his private and
commercial pilot certificates and moved to Florida to pursue his new career, eventually saving
up enough to buy his own airplane, a twin engine Beach eighteen. In
nineteen seventy two. Wally Thrasher was introduced to Ken Bernstein, who hired Thrasher
to run loads of weed from Mexico or the Caribbean to Fort Lauderdale, waiting
vans would take the drugs north on Interstate ninety five. Thrasher was wildly successful
and was making money hand over fist, though his career wasn't without its problems,
including a two year stint in a Mexican prison. He worked for various
kingpins throughout Florida until nineteen seventy seven, when he married his third wife,
Olga Wright. After his marriage, he tried very hard to get out of
the business. In order to go legit. He attended real estate classes and
tried a series of business adventures, all of which failed. Eventually, he
got back into the smuggling business to earn money for his growing family. By
the end of nineteen seventy nine, Wally Thrasher was running drugs for forty six
year old kingpin Frank Brady, who was well on his way to building the
largest drug smuggling operation on the East Coast. Thrasher again wanted out of the
smuggling game for the safety of his family. He tried once more for a
career out of the drug smuggling buss he and Olga opened up a furniture store
called Captain's Catch Furniture, first illegitimate business and then a shell corporation for laundry
and his smuggling profits. Back into the Games, Thrasher went. This time,
he had a few close calls, including ending up in jail in the
Bahamas. Olga had to buy his way out of the Bahamian prison to the
tune of fifty thousand. In nineteen eighty two, Olga and Thrasher decided moving
to their home in Virginia full time was the best option for their family.
Thrasher suggested that he fly the drugs into Virginia instead. It was a much
shorter road trip between Virginia and New York. Now the spring of nineteen eighty
three, Whalley was a bona fide drugs smuggling ring leader, heading up operations
in Virginia. They started small, flying in one thousand to fifteen hundred pounds
of weed into the NRV airport a few times a month. Thrasher was also
mentoring a copilot named Nelson King, who made the trips back and forth to
Belize with him for drugs While King wasn't the most skilled pilot out there,
he was calm and steady, and he made a good backup for Thrasher when
he needed a quick cat nap on a long flight. In October of nineteen
eighty four, Thrasher was set to make a run to Belieze to pick up
a load of pot. A Jeff and the family forced him to curtail his
plan, so he allowed Nelson King to make the run along with smuggling associate
and close friend Mark Bailey as copilot. At this point, King had been
copilot with Thrasher on four flights. He extensively planned every aspect of the trip
with the two men, laying out that they would make the run over two
days, flying from Virginia to Florida for a refueling stop, then Florida to
Belize, where they would pay two hundred and fifty thousand dollars for the pot
and fly it back to Virginia. The first part of the flight went smoothly,
the second part did not. King did not hand over the two hundred
and fifty thousand dollars to Thrasher's contacts in Belize. King said Thrasher had instructed
him that the load was to be fronted, that is, paid for in
full later. Thrasher had such a stellar reputation with this Belize contact that they
agreed and allowed the two men to take off with the twelve hundred pounds of
Belize breeze pot and the two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. The trip back
to Virginia ended in disaster. King attempted to avoid fog over Fancy Gap Mountain
in Virginia by flying under the weather a danger was productice, rather than attempting
to climb over it, as Thrasher had instructed. King, not good at
reading instrument panels, tried to navigate visually, but found himself unable to do
it because of the fog. He crashed the plane into the side of Fancy
Gap Mountain, going one hundred and seventy five miles an hour. The plane
broke into four pieces. Mark Bailey was burned to literal ashes. In the
ensuing inferno, Nelson King miraculously survived. Limping away from the crash site.
King called Thrasher to come to his rescue. Thrasher came to the panicky realization
that the plane full of pot would shortly be traced to him, as with
the injured pilot. He burned all paperwork that linked him to the aircraft,
the log books, the bill of sale for the plane, and the maintenance
records. He loaded King into his truck and drove thirteen hours to a hospital
in Florida. They decided on the story that King had been injured in a
motorcycle accident. As expected, Thrasher's plane was traced back to him within forty
eight hours of the crash, as was the identity of Mark Bailey via dental
records. Hoping to recoup his losses for the load of pot and unaware that
King had stolen two hundred and fifty thousand dollars, Thrasher made a call to
Belief to ask if he could fly down for another load. When he learned
of King's double cross, he went in search for his associate, but no
dice. King was now in the wind. Thrasher decided to go back to
Virginia to sell a significant stash of pot that he'd stored in a shit at
clatter Lake in order to pay off the debt that he owed his contacts in
Belize. He called a smuggling associate, Joe Selby, and offered him the
pot, which was worth about three hundred thousand dollars. Selby agreed to buy
it, but only for one hundred and fifty thousand. Between a rock and
a hard place, and needing to pay back his debt, Thrasher agreed,
but the double crossing wasn't done. Thrasher and Selby stopped at a New Jersey
motel overnight on their way to New York to sell the load of pot.
While Thrasher slept, Selby absconded with the product and the van. Thrasher now
owed two hundred and fifty thousand dollars to a Beliesian kingpin. He was being
hunted by authorities, He had lost his favorite plane, and was now out
another three hundred thousand dollars worth of pot. Unable to do anything else,
Thrasher flew to Believes to meet with his contact and convinced him to front how
one more load of pot to sell in order to pay back his depths.
Thrasher did not return home as planned on November fifth. Finally, on November
eighth, one of his Florida associates, Dicky Synot, called Olga and reported
bad news. Wally had been in a plane crash in Jamaica. The fire
had burned so hot that Wally had been incinerated. There was nothing left of
him but his wedding ring, which Dicky brought back to Olga unscathed. Olga
heartbroken, and Breft did the only things she could do, arranged a funeral
for her husband. But even at the funeral, groups of Wally's friends whispered
that they didn't think Wally was dead. He was pulling in an audacious stunt
to avoid legal trouble over the plane crash and the drug snuggling. They firmly
believed the squirrel was still alive. The federal government didn't buy that Wallace Thrasher
had died in the plane crash. They set up a federal grand jury to
look into Thrasher's business dealings. When she was subpoena to appear in front of
a federal grand jury to discuss her husband's business dealings, she pled the fifth
and was held in contempt of court. The grand jury found that Wallace Samuel
Thrasher was guilty of a dozen instances of smuggling drugs in addition to tax evasion.
Olga Thrasher found herself in the hot seat being questioned about her husband's business
transactions. Eventually, in an effort to save herself and her family, she
became a federal informant. All the while, Olga continued wondering what happened to
her husband. Was he still alive? The FBI, the DA, Customs,
and the US Marshals were all actively looking for Thrasher. FBI, DA
and VSP agents who worked on this case all have different theories. Some believe
he died in a crash and believes Others believe he faked his own death to
go into hiding but has died since then. Still others believe he's gone off
the grid and is alive today. The US Marshals actively hunted or Wally Thrasher,
following up on tips and sidings until twenty fifteen, when the US Attorney
filed a motion in Roanoke to dismiss the open warrant for Thrasher's arrest. He
stated that available evidence showed Thrasher to be deceased and there was no further reason
to keep the warrant open. Wally Thrasher would be eighty three years old today.
Is he still somewhere out there living his best life? Or did he
die in a fiery plane crash in nineteen eighty four. Much like the notorious
case of skyjacker dB Cooper, we will never really know the answer. For
more information on the fascinating case of Wally Thrasher, pick up Chasing the Squirrel
by Ron Peterson, available on Amazon or wherever books are sold. Thank you
so much for listening to this episode of Mind Over Murder. We'll see you
next time. With renewed purpose, we set off on the next leg of
our journey, traversing a whimsical forest of towering candy canes and marshmallow mushrooms.
Our path is illuminated by the soft, magical glow of fairy lights. In
the heart of this sugarcoated wonderland, we encounter our fifth character, Sir Sticky,
a dashing, chivalrous candy cane night he'll travel. Be on your guard,
for as farest is full of surprises. Stay true to your path,
and you'll reach the heart of the enchanted easter Lands. With a firm grasp
of our newfound courage, we think, Sir Sticky, and press onward.
Just as Sir Sticky dashes out of sight, Robin appears from the trail went
cold. It's good to see a familiar face, and he has our next
story. So one of the most controversial and divisive topics in the world today
is the death penalty. Obviously, one of the biggest arguments against the death
penalty is that there's always a risk of an innocent person being executed for a
crime they did not commit. But if you want a more extreme version of
this scenario, what if an innocent person was sensed to death for murdering someone
who turned out to be alive. Or even worse, what if the so
called victim's family hated the defendant's family so much that they intentionally faked the victim's
death in order to frame the defendant had hoped to see him executed for a
murder that never happened. We'll believe it or not this exact scenario actually occurred.
Yes, there have been documented cases of innocent people being executed for supposedly
murdering a victim who turned out to be alive, but these incidents mostly occurred
over a century or two ago. However, this particular case took place during
the nineteen eighties in Uganda at the start of the decade twenty seven year old
Edward and Marie Mapogey lived in Uganda's capital city of Kampala and had a wife
and six children. He ran a successful taxi business, but after an incident
in which his taxi was stolen at gunpoint, Edward decided to relocate his family
to the village of Kayambala, where he had grown up. They moved in
with Edward's father, and he quickly established himself as one of the village's most
well respected citizens. But on June the twelfth, nineteen eighty one, everyone
was taken by complete surprise when Edward and his cousin Fred Massembe were arrested and
charged with murder. The alleged victim was George William Wandiaka, who went by
his middle name and was one of Edward's neighbors in Kayambala. Edward and Fred
were both accused of robbing William and stabbing him to death. One year after
their arrest, the two men were taken to trial for William's murder, where
they were both found guilty and sense to death. The two defendants continued to
maintain their innocence and seemed to have one fairly convincing piece of evidence their favor
namely the fact that Edward were certain he had seen William standing in the courtroom
during the trial. Maybe it's just me, but I do feel that if
someone is being tried for murder, the victim not actually being dead should probably
be enough to generate reasonable doubt. Regardless, I'm sure the courts just thought
that Edward was hallucinating or making up any ridiculous story he could to save himself,
as both he and Fred were sent to death row at Lazera Maximum Security
Prison in order to await execution. Now, when someone is sends to death
in the United States, it will usually be many years before their execution goes
through, as they are entitled to file numerous appeals, and once they run
out of legal options and execution, data is officially set for them. So
the defendant will at least know when they are scheduled to die. However,
that's not how the system worked in you Gonda back in the nineteen eighties,
as condemned prisoners were taken to death row but not given any information about when
they were scheduled to die. They would only find out when someone suddenly showed
up and dragged them out of their cell, informing them that they were going
to be executed in three days by hanging, So you can imagine the psychological
torture of being on death row for years, never knowing if this was the
week you were going to die. Edward would later say that he witnessed a
total of fifty two inmates get taken from their cells and executed in this fashion,
and they would often do this with batches of ten or eleven prisoners at
a time. This experience was pure hell for Edward and Fred, and while
Fred's execution never went through, he wound up developing malaria and stomach complications.
Since Fred was a condemned prisoner who was going to die anyway, prison authorities
did not feel the need to provide him with proper medical treatment, so he
passed away in nineteen eighty five. To make things even more tragic, Edward's
wife also died while he was incarcerated. Well. As time went on,
he'd appeared that Edward's account about having seen William in the courtroom might have actually
been true, as numerous sightings started pouring in from witnesses who were certain they
had seen William at various locations throughout Uganda. In nineteen eighty nine, eight
years after William's murders supposedly took place, the authorities finally uncovered conclusive evidence that
he was alive and living in the village of Mobico, as he sometimes took
trips back to Kaiabala in order to visit his family. So how in the
world could something like this have happened. Well, since this story took place
in Uganda, they're not exactly in abundance of English language sources available out there,
so certain details are very big. But the gist of it seems to
be that William Wandiaka's parents had a major grudge against Edward Mapaguy's father. Unfortunately,
I haven't been able to find out exactly what this grudge was, only
that it was based around the land dispute, but it was apparently serious enough
that William's family believed that going to the trouble of faking his death in order
to frame Edward for his non existent murder was the most appropriate way to handle
it. You might be wondering how they pulled something like this off, but
apparently they bribed witnesses to say that they had seen Edward and Fred kill William
and dispose of his body, and their frame up job was given additional credibility
when they bribed a pathologist to falsely testify that he had done a post mortem
on William's body. I'm not sure why the defense team never asked to see
the body or any other corroborating evidence to prove that a crime took place,
but it's good to know that the courts were totally fine was sentencing two innocent
end to death on the basis of one witness who testified. Do take my
word for it, it was totally a murder. Unfortunately, as is often
the case in many wrongful conviction stories, the higher powers did not want to
admit that they had made a colossal mistake. So even after the Attorney General
of Uganda was given conclusive evidence that no murder ever took place and the so
called victim was still alive, Edward continued to language on death row for another
eleven years, as it's apparently very difficult to overturn a conviction in that country.
It was not until July of two thousand when Edward finally received a full
pardon from the President of Uganda and was released from prison, but by that
point he had spent nineteen years behind bars for a crime that never happened.
Not surprisingly, Edward has become a major activist for abolishing the death penalty,
and his story is considered to be one of the worst miscarriages of justice the
world has ever seen. And if you're wondering what happened to William Wandiaka,
he actually wound up dying in natural causes in two thousand and two, two
years after Edward was released, and hopefully William's family didn't try to frame anyone
again. Edward never got the opportunity to confront William, and that's probably the
best outcome for everyone involved, since i there's a good chance that Edward would
have wound up going back to death Row for a real murder. As we
make our way through the enchanted forest, we come across a beautiful garden where
the grass is a lush emerald green and the trees are adorned with shimmering silver
leaves. It is here that we mean our sixth character, Melodia, a
songbird with a voice so enchanting you could hear the heart of the most troubled
soul. Welcome traveler. My songs are an expression of love and harmony.
Listen and live in melody. And feels your spirit with joy. We pause
to appreciate Melodia's tunes, and our hearts are filled with a sense of contentment
and unity. Appearing now at the call of Melodia's tune is Kristen from the
Hidden Staircase with our next story. It's officially spring time, and along with
it comes Easter and all of the flowers popping open. You may even feel
the urge to run through a field of them and enjoy being high on life.
The man in my story today was often high on more than life and
wrote one of the most popular books ever because of it, One Flew Over
the Cuckoo's Nest, which happens to be my personal favorite. This was all
when LSD was still legal, but when he was busted for marijuana, he
decided to fake his death and escape to Mexico. The author's name is ken
Tz, and his success began when he participated in a CIA RAN's psychoactive drug
test, during which he was exposed to drugs like LSD and cocaine. The
trials were only temporary, but he became hungry to further his distortions of reality.
Ken soon became engulfed in a world of LSD, pills, THHC,
mushrooms, and payote, later even attributing the success of his famous book to
his participation in the drug test and further personal tests afterward. If you've read
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, You'll probably know what I'm talking about.
During his escapades, Ken became friends with like minded people who dubbed themselves the
Mary Pranksters. Together, they began to study the effects of the mind altering
medication by traveling in a road show on an altered school bus known as the
Further. They used the Further to express themselves and spread the word about a
lifestyle based on freedom of self and creating art out of daily life. Riders
in the trippy bus shared in a plethora of mind altering substances while road noise
was piped in through the speakers from the outside and their conversations were blasted through
a speaker on the outside. As Ken said, their motto was freedom of
body and mind, no matter what the law states. They played a massive
part in the blooming of hippie culture and the success of The Grateful Dead.
You were essentially the house band of the Pranksters. As you can imagine authorities
didn't usually react kindly to a rainbow bus full of tripping people. Sadly,
for Ken, when he was found with marijuana in his possession, he was
arrested two separate times in an effort to not only crack down on marijuana users
but also the widespread influence Kesey seemed to have. As a result in arrest,
warrant was issued for Ken in nineteen sixty six, not for the further
or for LSD, but just over marijuana possession. That began a several month
long ploy to evade arrest and prosecution, and it started with the author faking
his death. To do so. Ken drove the f to a secluded cliffside
along the coast of California and left a suicide note that read, Ocean,
Ocean, I'll beat you in the end. I'll break you this time.
I'll go through with my heels at your hungry ribs. Then, with the
help of his pranksters, Ken lay in the trunk of a getaway car and
was driven to Mexico. Kenn evaded the FBI and the Federals in Mexico for
eight months. He was traveling to several towns, including Puerto Volata and a
place known as Marijuana City. His time on the Lamb was filled with sunshine
and a plethora of thhc Eventually, Ken grew tired of his life in Mexico,
and with a continued help of the pranksters, he returned to California.
Then, one day, as he was driving, a couple of police officers
recognized him and quickly pulled him over. Ken jumped from his truck and once
again attempted to flee arrest. The officers chased him down a steep embankment,
over a fence, and eventually apprehended him. After a five block pursuit,
Ken Kesey was finally caught and sentenced to five months in an experimental Redwood's work
camp clearing brush. After serving time, Ken moved to Pleasant Hill, Oregon,
and began a more secluded life with his family. However, he still
managed to write and eventually made a second Trippy Bus in the nineties to accompany
his memoir based on his time on the first bus. His actual death occurred
on October twenty first, two thousand and one, after complications from liver surgery.
Ken lives on today through his writings and is known as one of the
most influential authors in history. Unfortunately, through his efforts to avoid arrest,
he fled longer than his actual punishment. It seemed to be enough to set
him on the straight and narrow, or at least be a lot less public
about his mind altering lifestyle. Our journey then leads us to a grand listening
palace made of crystal, where we meet our seventh character, King Erulus,
a wise and benevolent ruler whose kindness knows no bounds. Readings Traveler, my
palace is a symbol of hope and light, shining bright even in the darkest
times. May your journey be filled with courage and resilience. King a Rules
allows us to rest tonight within his beautiful palace. Before we end this night,
do you mind if I share a story myself. I mentioned at the
beginning that I am a crime podcaster, but I also am a history podcaster,
and I'd like to share a quick story to end the night for my
show Hometown History. Hello. Hello, Hello, Hello, Hello. This
is the sound of a resurrection. This is actual audio from the funeral of
an irishman named Shay Bradley in Dublin, Ireland. It's a plee sucking here
and yes it's coming from inside the coffin, from the bottom of a six
foot hole. The family is surrounding the graveside, five to ten people deep.
The initial shock is giving way to laughter that grows as more people realize
what's happening. He can show the fuck no. Shortly before his death,
Bradley have recorded this message to be played from his casket for one last laugh
with his loved ones. But sometimes it's not so funny because sometimes it's real.
This is actual audio from another grave side. And notice no one is
laughing. What may be. In July of twenty sixteen, pregnant teenager Nicey
Perez collapsed in the middle of the night on her way to the bathroom.
The sound of gunfight in a nearby street triggered a stress reaction, either a
panic attack or what is known as a cataphylactic episode, in which the victim's
body shuts down in response to trauma, a kind of waking coma. Within
an hour, Nacy was pronounced dead and buried on the following day in an
above ground vault in the town of Lahentrada, Honduras. The day after the
burial, muffled screams were heard in the area of the tomb. Her mother
would later say, as I put my hand on her grave, I could
hear noises inside. I heard banging, then I heard her voice. She
was screaming for help. What you hear is a circle of people attempting to
perform CPR. In the next video, Lacy does not look dead, but
by the time she's rushed to the hospital, she's gone. Oxygen deprived may
have been the final cause of death. According to her mother, even after
a day in the tomb, the color of her body was normal. Her
corpse didn't smell. She just looked like she was in a deep sleep.
There was no rigor mortis. Her body was still flexible. It was impossible
that she had been dead for so many hours. Tragically, there are countless
other examples from history of this type of halfway resurrection. In twenty eleven,
in Kazan, Russia, a woman named macomic Xanev set up in her casket
in the middle of her own funeral. The shock of that experience led to
a second heart attack, which was unfortunately fatal. History is full of stories
like this, and there are times, of course where people do it on
purpose. Sometimes they faked their death, as in many of these other stories.
Sometimes it's a performance. Harry Hudini had himself buried alive to prove that
he could escape even the grave. As it turned out, he could not
escape the grave, and he had to be rescued when he nearly died for
real. Years later, in Fresno, California, a Houdini admirer named Joe
Burris would attempt the same feat with a twist. He would have six thousand
pounds of wet concrete poured on top of his casket. Amazing Joe was a
struggling magician looking for his big break, so he invited a camera crew to
cover his escape. More than one hundred and fifty people were in attendance.
This footage would later be used by television programs like A Current Affair to tell
Joe's story and then buried alive under seven tons of dirt and cement. But
something goes terribly wrong Exclusive the Greatest show of Amazing Joe. All of Joe's
family was there to witness his greatest moment, and they were videotaping it so
they could cherish it forever. But his arm Mike Watchett tells us something happened
that turned this video into a horror movie. In the video, you can
see Joe wins as a uniform police officer cuffs his hands in front of him,
and it's clearly not an act. The cuffs are too tight, but
it wouldn't have mattered anyway. Through a change, through the shadow, through
the hand shuff grow my way through a three and a half feet You can't
do all this before A reporter covering the events ask Joe if he understands the
four implications of what he's about to attempt here. It's clear that he does
not. He tries to play off the awkward moment with a joke, but
it's obvious that he's in over his head. You realize it. So it
starts a hardened verse at a lower elevation. It's gonna be hard the hardened
at the lower part. In fact, I didn't. It's a very serious
there's no magic trick. But you've been seeing this night. Your heart sinks
as you watch them pour concrete, six thousand pounds of it, on top
of Joe in his frail plastic coffin at the bottom of a seven foot hole
for contexts, six thousand pounds is roughly the same weight as the largest SUVs
or two Volkswagen Beetles. Almost immediately after being filled to the top, the
concrete drops a foot and a half. The plastic coffin has collapsed. By
the time rescuers reached him by digging a second hole beside the first, Joe
has passed way. He told me just a few days before that something Udini
said that it will either be say to my foolishness, that giousy and it
was Rudini's foolishness and Joe's too. As easy as it is to criticize someone
like Joe, we all do foolish things. If we're lucky we survive them.
And this may seem like an unusual takeaway from stories like these, but
they really just make me glad to be alive. Life is precious, and
we can waste a lot of time and energy trying to impress people or pulling
stupid stunts that are really just attempts to feel alive. What I'm reminded of
when I hear stories like this is that we're already alive. We already have
a lot to be grateful for, and the older I get the more I
look at every morning as a little resurrection. I think of all the people
who didn't wake up on that day or any other day, who didn't come
back from the darkness, and I feel grateful that I did. So.
I make a commitment just to be completely present in the present, and ironically,
that's one of the things the history helps us do. Happy Easter everyone,
Hello again, friend. Thank you for joining me tonight in what was
part one in this two part special collaboration Easter episode. I'm Shane Waters,
the organizer and creator of these collaborations, and I truly hope that you enjoy
them. If you do consider leaving a review for this podcast wherever you're listening.
If this isn't your cup of tea, well then my name is George,
and forget all about the whole review thing, won't you remember? All
podcasts that you heard are listed in the show notes in order of appearance,
along with a link on where to find them. I'll see you soon.
It is distant sting of