I'm John Hamm. I played Fred Heckman in this season of American Hostage,
and I want to send a big thank you to everyone who listened to our
podcasts on behalf of our team. Were so grateful that you've taken this journey
with us. Now that you're finished with American Hostage, there's another show from
Amazon Music and Wondry I think you should check out. It's called Killer Psyche.
On Killer Psyche, retired FBI criminal profiler Candice Delone dissects the thoughts and
behaviors of the most infamous felons in history. In the aftermath of a shocking
crime, people always ask why who would do something like that? Was it
about power, money, revenge? Was it done on impulse or was it
pre planned? These are the types of questions that Candace hopes to answer in
each episode of Killer Psyche. While you're listening, follow Killer Psyche on Apple
Podcasts, Amazon Music, or you can listen to new episodes early and add
free by joining Wondery Plus. In the Wondery app The man that sparked the
fear of a live execution was Tony kuritzis the subject of today's episode. A
listener note This episode contains adult content and is not suitable for everyone. Please
be advised. America in the nineteen seventies was in turmoil. The Watergate scandal
had undermined trust in the government, a trust already made unstable from the war
in Vietnam. Inflation rates and gas prices were skyrocketing. The effects of the
Civil rights movement were still settling in. As these changes took hold, banks
and corporations were seen as enemies, machines that everyday people were trying to fight
against. The Reflection of this in film gave way to the rise of the
anti hero. Movies like Taxi Driver, Dog Day Afternoon, Network, and
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest scored big in the box office, with people
relating to the little guy rising up against the man. Tony Caritzus was one
of those people that identified with these anti heroes. He aspired to be a
character who went up against the machine, and even if he did not win,
he was willing to go down in a blaze of glory. And that
was the attitude that Tony Curritzus seemed to have. On February eighth, nineteen
seventy seven, when he went to the offices of the company that held his
mortgage. Tony wired a sought off shotgun to the back of the head of
the president of the company. Tony was going to expose the perceived injustices he
felt the company had inflicted on him. To borrow a line from the nineteen
seventy six Film Network, he was mad as hell and he wasn't going to
take it anymore. What ensued was a sixty three hour hostage crisis broadcast live
on TV and radio. One way or another, Tony Curitzis was determined to
be the hero of his own story from Wondering Tree for I'm Candice DeLong and
this is Killer Psyche. I've spent five decades studying people's minds through my work
as an FBI profiler and psychiatric nurse. I've interviewed lots of murderers, including
serial killers, and the question of why they did it is what I get
asked time and time again. It is difficult to get a satisfying answer without
diving deep into their mindsets. So that's what we're doing, and I will
give you my best analysis in this series of what made them do what they
did? This episode is Tony Caritzis it was freezing cold in Indianapolis, Indiana.
On February eighth, nineteen seventy seven, forty two year old Richard Hall,
also known as Dick, was running late to an appointment with a client
at his downtown office. Dick was the president of Hall and Hoddle, a
holding company which had mortgage, construction, and real estate businesses. Dick's father,
Millard also known as mL, start at Hall and Hoddle in nineteen thirty
and was still chairman of the firm, but his sons had now taken up
running the day to day business. Dick's brothers, William and Jack headed up
the mortgage and construction companies, while Dick ran real estate management and served as
the company's president. While his father was snowbirding in Florida, Dick took a
meeting with one of his father's most troublesome clients, Tony Caritzis. When he
finally arrived for their appointment, Tony was already waiting. The forty four year
old Tony had a sling on his left arm, and with his right arm
he carried rolled up blueprints. A long white box about five feet in length
sat on a coffee table in front of him. However, despite the below
freezing temperatures outside, he was not wearing a coat. Dick greeted Tony,
inquired about his injured arm, and then immediately ushered him into the office so
they could spread out his blueprints on a large conference table. More than four
years earlier, in December of nineteen seventy two, the Hall's company lent Tony
one hundred and ten thousand dollars to develop a seventeen acre property on the western
side of Indianapolis. Tony renewed the loan two years later, and then in
October of nineteen seventy five, he received an appraisal valuing the seventeen acres at
five hundred and seventy five thousand dollars. A supermarket chain wanted to buy six
and a half of those acres and offered Critz's sixty five thousand dollars an acre.
Since this would give Tony a tremendous profit and also allow him to keep
ten acres, the Halls encouraged him to accept the offer. Against their advice,
Tony counter offered with a ridiculous number. The chain decided to purchase a
different property, so he refinanced his mortgage for a third time in February of
nineteen seventy six. This time it was for one hundred and thirty thousand dollars,
which incorporated the interest on the original loan. Tony was now left with
no offers and a lot of debt. The Halls had given Tony two payment
extensions already after his automatic renewal. It had been fifty months since the original
loan was made, and Tony had not yet made a single payment except for
a portion of the interest. The Halls warned him there would be no more
extensions, and that meant the hundred and thirty thousand dollars Tony owed had to
be paid by March first, nineteen seventy seven. If he could not satisfy
the entire loan, the company was prepared to foreclose on the property. That
deadline was now less than three weeks away. Tony was getting desperate. Once
inside the office, Tony shut the door, claiming that his shorts were bothering
him and he needed to adjust them. Dick turned his back to give Tony
some privacy and unrolled the blueprints on the conference table. A minute later,
Tony ordered Dick to turn around, and when he did. He saw Tony
had discarded his sling and was pointing a small silver revolver at his face.
Tony told him this is serious, Dick, I'm going to wire a shotgun
to your neck. Tony ordered Dick to remove his sportcoat and tie and squat
down. He turned up the collar on Dick's shirt and wrapped a wire around
Hall's neck. He then attached the wire to the muzzle of a twelve gage
sawed off shotgun. The barrel was pointed at the base of dick Hal's skull.
The wire was secured down the length of the barrel and hooked onto the
trigger. Chrisis also looped wire around the trigger and a ring on his finger.
Tony called this a dead man's line, because if he were to be
killed, the weight of his body falling would pull the trigger and kill his
hostage. Here's the deal about sawed off shotguns. They are illegal in most
states because removing the eighteen to thirty inch long barrel makes them concealable, and
it also makes them more deadly. Even being in possession of one, let
alone, threatening someone with it is a federal felony, and that can attract
a penalty of ten years in prison if an owner wants to alter the barrel
of their shotgun, approval by the ATF is mandatory. Tony then picked up
the office phone and called nine one. At this point, Tony was extremely
volatile. His conversation with the police dispatch operator was filled with profanity. He
told the operator he had a hostage and was going to kill him unless his
demands were met. Tony, however, was hard of hearing in his left
ear and could not clearly hear the dispatcher. He also could not switch the
handset to his right ear because his right hand was wired to the trigger of
the gun. So for almost an hour, Tony Kuritzys demanded that two Indian
police officers he was friendly with come to his location. Despite the dispatcher repeatedly
asking for an address, Tony did not answer the question, presumably because he
did not hear it. Tony's frustrations were compounded when it was discovered that those
two officers were off duty and the police were having trouble tracking them down.
Remember, the cell phone era was decades away. No longer willing to wait,
Tony pushed his hostage out of the office and he demanded two officers accompany
him outside. The police had cut off power to the elevators, so Tony
had to march his hostage down the stairwell outside the building. Multiple police officers
were waiting on the street, unsure of what to do next. Screaming profanities,
Tony threatened to quote blow Hall's head off if anyone got close to them.
And I can assure you that's exactly what a shotgun blasts that close to
the head would do. I've seen it. He pushed Hall down one of
the main streets in downtown Indianapolis, as officers walked helplessly alongside Tony and Dick,
directing shocked pedestrians to clear the streets and go inside. It was seventeen
degrees outside, but both Tony and Dick were in short sleeves. When a
rookie officer attempted to draw his weapon, Tony turned to scream at him,
yanking on the wire caller as he turned. It was at that heart stopping
moment when Tony slipped on a patch of Both men fell to the ground,
but the gun miraculously did not go off. Shocked, Tony screamed, the
gun didn't go off. The gun didn't go off. Dick. The gun
didn't go off. Tony seemed as shocked as everyone watching. Frankly, I
think it was a miracle that the gun did not fire. Sheer luck.
Tony was no doubt happy about that, because had that gun got off and
Hall was killed, Tony would have been killed by the police. Immediately getting
up, Tony continued making his way down the road. The police followed him
for five and a half blocks. At that point, Tony commandeered an empty
police car, left with its engine running, door open, and red lights
flashing. Before he got into the vehicle, Tony removed the handcuffs from the
belt of the officer who was walking near him. He then sat down in
the driver's seat, slid over to the passenger side, and pulled Hall into
the police car. Dick drove eight miles west to Tony's apartment complex. As
they exited the vehicle, Tony screamed that he had booby trapped his apartment with
explosives, so police immediately evacuated all one hundred and ten residents from the complex.
Tony had a one bedroom apartment on the third floor. Inside he strung
fishing line throughout, and later it was discovered he had constructed a Rube Goldberg
type of contraption with a lit candle hovering over two gallons of gasoline. If
vibrations from a gun or force were applied to the door, then the candle
would drop into the gasoline. Police feared there could be dynamite or nitroglycerin present,
which could spark a gasoline fire and further complicate rescue efforts, but fortunately
there was nothing else. Tony handcuffed Dick, sat him down at the dining
room table, and turned the wire collar from the back of his head to
his face. Tony then propped up the shotgun on two telephone books, telling
him he was lucky to be taken hostage by a man with a steady hand.
To prove his point, Tony grasped the shotgun, put his finger on
the trigger, then took it off, and then put his finger back on
the trigger. He did this several times, teasing his hostage quote see how
steady My hand is. Tony was tying up the line with calls to family
and friends complaining about the media's false reports about his past. Reporters and the
general public who were watching the events unfold on live television, found Tony's name
listed in the phone book and started calling him, which also jammed up the
phone line. Negotiators were finally able to get through at two thirty PM.
Tony made four demands. First that the mortgage company issue a public apology to
him. Second, they dropped one hundred and thirty thousand dollars loan repayment and
pay him unspecified damages for his pain and suffering. Third, he would not
undergo any psychiatric evaluations. And lastly, he wanted complete immunity for kidnapping Hall
and all related charges. Tony also let negotiators know he had enough food to
last a week. He also told them he was willing to kill Hall and
die himself if his demands were not met. That night, Tony took the
dead Man's line off Dick Hall's neck and forced him to lie down on the
bathroom floor. Then he chained and padlocked Dick's handcuffs to the base of the
toilet. At nine PM, an employee of Dick's company read an apology that
was broadcast on local television. Tony's brother, George, went to the apartment
door to ask if he heard the apology. Tony confirmed he did, and
then said he wanted to stop talking for the night and sleep on it.
The next morning, a Wednesday, Tony called into WIBC AM radio station and
asked to speak to Fred Heckman, the station's popular on air news director.
Tony said he was a longtime listener to Heckman's morning reports and believed he was
an honest man who could correct the media portrayal of him as a craze lunatic.
Heckman advised Tony that while the episode was live on air, he was
recording their conversations for rebroadcast. He calmly interviewed Kuritzis about his grievances while also
trying to tamp down Tony's profanity and folatile rants. Tony believe that Dick's company
intentionally interfered in his development plans so they could eventually foreclose on his property and
take it from him. He also told Heckman that the statement read to the
public the night before was quote totally inadequate. Tony and Fred Heckman had seven
phone calls during the hostage crisis. Heckman later said he was in constant fear
for Dick Hall's life. By noon on Wednesday, Tony let his hostage taught
to negotiators and state police that he had food and water, and he also
allowed him to call his wife. In between talking to negotiators and monitoring the
news, Tony held court sessions with Hall. He would say, Dick,
We're going to have a little trial here, and I'm going to be the
prosecutor, the judge, and the jury. You are going to have to
answer all the questions and I'm going to convict you. Before taking Dick Hall
as his hostage, Tony prepared over two hundred file cards with typed statements for
his mock trial, but they never got through them all. Tony also played
other card games with Dick, but his screaming fits never stopped. At one
point, he hit Hall on the back of his head with his pistol hard
enough to cause a laceration. Later that second day, Tony flew into a
rage when he heard reports that a bomb squad was going to enter the building.
To appease Tony, negotiators offered to give him immunity. At seven pm
on Wednesday, February ninth, negotiators slid a one page statement from the Marion
County Prosecutor under the apartment door, granting full immunity from criminal prosecution for the
kidnapping and any other charges. That evening, the Deputy District Attorney read the
terms of the immunity agreement on live television. Still the next morning, the
beginning of day three, Tony remained hold up in his apartment with Dick.
He was now demanding a promissory note for five million dollars. Tony's demands were
escalating, but why wouldn't they He thought he was getting everything he wanted,
so why not asked for more? Five million dollars in nineteen seventy seven was
asking for the moon. He also said that he needed a key for the
handcuffs Hall was wearing. One of his wrists was swollen because the handcuffs were
on too tight. Police sent a key and then expected Kuritzys to walk out
of the apartment, set his shotgun down in the hallway, and release his
hostage as the kidnapper and negotiators had agreed, But just thirty minutes later the
negotiations broke down. Tony was angry and won a documentation of the five million
dollars he would be paid by Hall's company. An FBI profiler who was brought
to the scene directed police to create a stage in the lobby of the apartment
building across from Tony's. The profiler believed that by assembling the police and media
there, it would lure Tony out, and he was correct. At ten
twenty pm, Chritzis unexpectedly marched Hall out of his apartment, with the dead
man's lines still around Hall's neck and the barrel of the shotguns still aimed at
Hall's head. Tony pushed Hall into the recreation room, where all the media
was gathered. He shouted at reporters to turn on their cameras. While the
cameras were rolling, Tony handed a list of his grievances to Dick Hall and
demanded he read them. Barely able to talk with the wire around his neck,
Dick started reading, but Tony got angry because he felt that Dick's delivery
was too monotony Tony clearly needed to be in control of everything. He ripped
the paper out of Dick's hands and said, I'll read it. I'm the
one who was called a kidnapper. I'm a goddamn national hero, and don't
you forget it. It took almost thirty minutes for Tony to finish reading because
he kept stopping to curse the Hall family and berate the media. During his
speech, Tony was extremely emotional, tearing up at times. To those in
the room, it looked like he was going to shoot Hall. Tony even
told them quote, I've had a gun stuck in this cocksucker's head for three
days. They've had one stuck in mine for four and a half years.
I hope this gun doesn't go off. I'm having too much fun. Some
TV stations then dropped their live broadcast, believing Tony was going to kill Hall
on live televi vision. Finally, satisfied that all of his demands were met,
Churitsus and Hall were led down the hall by police to the command post.
There, the police used wirecutters to remove the wire around Hall's neck.
He was immediately whisked away and transported to the hospital. He was shaken,
fatigued, and dehydrated. Tony had only fed him one plate of salami and
cheese and only permitted him to use the bathroom once during his sixty three hours
of captivity, but he was alive, still holding the shotgun. Tony announced
to the room full of police officers, quote, I've wanted to fire this
thing ever since I've had it. Then he walked to an open patio door,
pointed the barrel of the shotguns skyward, and pulled the trigger. Police
quickly grabbed Tony and arrested him. Tony was surprised and called it a cheapass
shot. Tony, you lied. You said you would let that man go
before you came down. The media hearing the shot feared the worst, but
miraculously, after sixty three hours of sheer terror, everyone was still alive.
Anthony Tony Krisis was born August thirteenth, nineteen thirty two to Greek immigrant parents.
He had three brothers, a sister, and one half brother. He
was reportedly a sickly child. At the age of seven, Tony began working
at his parents' store selling ice cream. He claimed his father had him working
twelve hour days when he was just nine years old. Although he was a
good student, his after school job left him barely any time to do homework
or socialized with his peers. In high school, he worked up to seventy
hours a week while his classmates were outdating and playing ball. He claimed he
was a seventy five pound kid pushing a hundred and fifty pound cart. His
father was physically abusive, but Tony testified he still loved him. His mother,
who was much more nurturing, died of cancer at the age of forty
one. When his mother died, Tony was distraught. He put his high
school ring in her coffin, and, according to one of his brothers,
lost his faith in God. After graduating high school, he went into the
army, where he became an expert in demolition, explosives, and booby traps
at the rank of corporal. He even became a small arms instructor at West
Point for a time. Tony was not a big man. He stood only
five foot seven and weighed approximately one hundred and fifty pounds. He did not
seem to have any romantic relationships. He never married, and later revealed he
never even had a long term relationship. After leaving the military, Tony joined
one of his brothers and sister in managing his family's mobile home park in Indianapolis.
Residents there recalled him walking around the park with a shotgun and enforcing the
five mile per hour speed limit. Tony was rigid about which workmen were permitted
on his property, threatening all whom he felt had trespassed. In nineteen sixty
seven, he had a disagreement with two of his brothers over money. He
shot at them but luckily missed. He was arrested for assault and battery with
intent to kill, but the detective who arrested him was a friend and the
charges were minimized. Tony was released. The very next year, Tony barricaded
himself and his invalid sister inside her home for two days at gunpoint. He
wanted to leave the family business and demanded fifty five thousand dollars he felt his
family owed him. They agreed to give him the money, which he eventually
used to purchase the seventeen acres. The family never pressed charges against him.
His sister even said after the incident, we loved Tony. On December nineteenth,
nineteen seventy two, Tony took out a loan from Dick Hall's company.
The company had not wanted to loan Tony the money, but Dick's father,
m l believed in Tony and championed his cause. He liked the idea that
Tony was a self starter, and he wanted to support him. Tony worked
on clearing the land himself, but became protective of his property, just as
he did at his family's mobile home park. In nineteen seventy four, police
were called when Tony wielded an acts at utility workers installing a gas pipe running
underneath his land. Once again, he stayed out of jail. After Tony
received offers on his seventeen acres from the grocery store chain, he reportedly acted
paranoid and suspicious. This type of paranoia is reminiscent of what we covered in
our episode on Andrew Kehoe. I put Tony in the same category as him.
Both men were middle aged when they exploded, and furiously angry with the
man who they perceived as cheating them and destroying their lives. Both of them
developed paranoia, both blamed everyone but themselves for their financial problems, and neither
could control their anger. Both Kehoe and churritzis at explosive tempers and could not
be reason with, and both took very desperate measures to make their point that
the establishment was the demon, not them. One factor that could have contributed
to this is the male climac terric or what is commonly known as male menopause,
and yes, that's a real thing. It has also been referred to
as the middle age crazies. According to the American Psychiatric Association, male climac
terric is a hypothetical period in some men's lives that can be compared to female
menopause. It appears to be associated with declines in the levels of various hormones
such as testosterone. The National Health Service reports that end i quote, some
men develop depression, loss of sex drive, erectile dysfunction, and other physical
and emotional symptoms when they reached their late forties to early fifties. Other symptoms
common in ment this age are mood swings and irritability, loss of muscle mass
that redistribution, a general lack of enthusiasm or energy difficulties, sleeping, insomnia,
poor concentration, and short term memory loss. These symptoms can interfere with
everyday life and happiness, so it's important to find the underlying cause and work
out what can be done to resolve it. Tony's claimed that the Halls cheated
him out of his land deal was one hundred faults, and Tony later told
one of his police officer friends he had been planning the kidnapping for three and
a half years, at a time when he still had loan extensions granted to
him. In fact, Tony even rearranged his apartment to mirror Hall's office layout
to prepare for the big event. Later, he told the staff at Hall
and Hotel that he was getting surgery on his arm. It was a ploy
to add validity to the sling he wore the day he took Dick Hall hostage,
the sling that hid his gun. So what's the answer as to why
Tony committed that spectacular abduction and hostage taking? What was going on with him?
Or should I say in him? Doctor Stephen Diamond, a forensic psychologist
and an expert in the psychology of mass murderers, evaluated violent offenders for fifteen
years for the California court system. He came to a few conclusions about this
type of criminal mind. Quote for me, the one underlying force influencing most
violent behavior is pathological anger, rage, resentment, and embitterment. By pathological,
he means anger that is way over the top, excessive, destructive,
debilitating, and abnormal. He goes on to say, quote violent offenders in
general, with the possible exceptions of those who commit impulsive and unpremeditated crimes of
passion or suffer from some sudden medical crisis or neurological impairment. Don't just snap.
They slowly and insiduously bend, stew simmer, and then boil before erupting
or exploding. And that is a perfect description of Tony chrisis. Some of
these offenders are very good at hiding their feelings and behaviors of rage and resentment
from those around them, but Tony didn't hide his feelings. He broadcasts them
to the world. Diamond explains that for these types of criminals quote, their
embitterment builds over time, eventually becoming toxic and pathological. As this happens,
the embitterment begins to become a fantasy, sometimes intrusive, such as an unwanted
obsession. The fantasy itself the content of the fantasy is of exacting revenge on
the people the killer. In this case, the offender perceives is to blame
for his problems. Tony blamed Haul's mortgage company for his failure to pay his
obligations. If the offender's fantasy continues to grow wild, unchecked or ignored,
and there was no evidence Tony sought help, the vengeful and sometimes murderous fantasies
turn into a reality, and as we've already discussed, Tony had a habit
of holding people hostage at gunpoint to get the money he believed they owed him.
It's not unusual to see evidence or premeditation and significant planning of the massacres
or in Tony's case, of the hostage taking by these type of violent offenders,
primarily because they are in most cases not seriously mentally ill or legally insane.
Tony knew what he had planned was wrong, and he said as much
many times. Make no mistake, Tony Chitzis was not overtly psychotic. To
be sure, he was disturbed, but he was not out of touch with
reality. He was not hearing voices. He was in control of his behavior.
That said, I would not want to be in his crosshairs. But
there's another psychological disorder that I think fits Tony, paranoid delusional disorder. People
with this very serious disorder appear to be in the grips of a delusion.
Perhaps you recall this from our two part episode on Susan Polk. She was
normal eighty percent of the time and twenty percent of the time believed her husband
was out to kill her. But these people are not in the grips of
a bizarre delusion, such as Richard Chase in episode eleven, he believed his
blood was turning to dirt and he had to replace it. That is known
as a bizarre delusion, and only seriously mentally ill ie insane people suffer from
that. I think Tony Crisis is in the Susan Polk category of someone suffering
from paranoid delusional disorder. But Tony's twenty percent of the time being paranoid and
delusional made him, as it did Susan Polk, very dangerous. Only hearing
Tony's side of the story on radio and TV, some of the public began
to regard him as a hero. They believed that, like the movies of
the time, Tony was sticking it to the man. Strangers started a fund
for his defense, some of them empathizing because they too had been foreclosed on
by a bank. They did not see Dick Hall as a person. They
saw him as a symbol of greed and their mind, Tony Crisis was David
to Dick Hall's goliath. Tony was charged with the felonies of armed kidnapping,
inflicting physical injury in the commission of a crime, commission of a crime of
violence while armed, obtaining a signature by threat, and armed robbery. His
bail was set at seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars. He was soon transferred
to Marion County Jail. Another charge of disorderly conduct was added and bail increased
to eight hundred and fifty thousand dollars. The deputy county prosecutors stated there was
never any intention of honoring the terms of immunity, which were signed under durests.
During his arraignment, the judge ordered him to have a psychiatric evaluation,
something Tony had adamantly opposed during hostage negotiations. It's entirely possible, since Tony
was a big fan of TV and movies, that he was afraid a psychiatric
evaluation would lead to a lobotomy, such as the antihero in One Flew Over
the Cuckoo's Nest suffered. Tony wanted to plead not guilty and say that because
Hall and company had swindled him, his actions were justified. His lawyer told
him that was not of defense and would get him life in prison. At
his lawyer's insistence, Tony finally agreed to plead not guilty by reason of insanity.
In the late seventies in Indiana, it was the prostitution's burden to prove
the defendant was sane, not like today, where the defendant must prove they
are insane. Tony Kuritzz's trial began October sixth, nineteen seventy seven. The
jury of seven men and five women were sequestered in a hotel near the courthouse.
The defense attorney told the jury there was no fraud on the part of
Hall and Hoddle Mortgage Company, and Kuritz his act of taking Hall hostage was
irrational. The defense also called over twenty witnesses, mostly friends and family,
who testified Tony was not acting normally during the hostage taking. Dick Hall took
the witness stand the first day. He stoically recounted how Churitz has repeatedly threatened
to quote, blow my head off if I disobeyed instructions, fainted, or
slipped. Jurors might have found the calm and unemotional Dick Hall cold and detached
on the stand, whereas Tony wept openly and often throughout the trial. If
you recalled during the hostage taking, Tony would alternate between screaming and yelling and
venting his rage to crying, and here he is doing it in court.
This is called being emotionally labile. Who else's labile? A two year old?
One minute they're happy, the next minute they're screaming. When Tony took
the witness stand, it was clear that he was extremely paranoid, but that
does not get the legal definition of insane. Lots of people are paranoid and
they don't commit crimes. Most of the nine mental health experts who testified at
the trial believe Tony. Wassane, a court of pointed psychiatrist, said that
based on his observations, Tony was not insane and he fell into the classification
of paranoid personality, not psychotic or neurotic. Type. Today that is known
as paranoid delusional disorder. Tony also had deep rooted feelings of insecurity and inferiority.
Only one psychiatrist believed from the time he spent observing Tony that he was
insane. Of course, Tony did not fully cooperate with the evaluations. On
October twenty first, nineteen seventy seven, the jury came back and delivered a
verdict of not guilty by reason of insanity. A female juror hugged Tony after
the trial. When the verdict was announced over the PA system during the Indiana
Pacers basketball game, the crowd reportedly cheered Tony Caritzis had achieved folk hero status
in a certain percentage of the public's mind. Still, politicians and much of
America were outraged by the verdict. The Indiana legislature immediately decided to rewrite the
laws so that the burden of proof of insanity switched to the defendant. The
next year, laws around the country followed suit, but Tony crisis was not
able to walk free. On November ninth, the judge once again ordered him
to undergo a psychiatric evaluation, which Tony still refused to do. He was
held in contempt of court and was sent to a psychiatric hospital. Life was
not as kind to Dick as it was to Tony. In nineteen seventy eight,
a year after the kidnapping, his father mL died. His two brothers
followed suit, and both passed away prematurely in nineteen seventy nine and nineteen eighty
one due to climbing interest rates and the much held Although fallacious claim that his
family swindled Tony. Dick's company experienced a precipitous downturn. With his business failing,
Dick almost lost his family home to foreclosure. He started drinking heavily and
in nineteen ninety two was arrested for a dui. He then joined Alcoholics Anonymous
and became sober. However, his wife filed for divorced shortly after. Dick
Hall refused to discuss his ordeal with Tony Curitzis with anyone until twenty seventeen,
when he finally released a book on the subject. His children encouraged him to
write his story to help him heal. The PTSD he must have suffered would
have been profound because Tony was thought to be dangerous and would not submit to
any psychevaluations. He was held in contempt of court, but rather than serving
time in prison for that, he spent eleven years in custody of state mental
hospitals. If he had cooperated and undergone an evaluation, he probably would have
been released in a fraction of that time. But the truth clearly is Tony
was not a well man. He finally agreed to be examined in nineteen eighty
seven, and a judge released him in nineteen eighty eight after the state failed
to prove he was still a danger to the public. Tony Carizus passed away
from natural causes in January of two thousand and five. He died at the
age of seventy four. From Wondering and tree Fort Media, This is Killer
Psyche. I'm your host Candice c. Long. This episode was written and
produced by Lisa Amerman and Julie Burke, edited by Joshua Morrales and Maxwell Carney,
with research and editing assistants from Anne lou Our senior audio producer is Tom
Monicer. Renee Leavek is production manager, and Hailey Mandelburg is production coordinator.
Brandon Clark and Lindsay Whistler. Our production assistants and the line producer is Oscar
Meto. Our executive producers are Kelly Garner and Lisa Amerman form Treeport and Marshall
Louie and Aaron o'clarity for Wondering. The series is produced by Wondering and Freeport
Media. Me