Speaker 1: The world of serial killers is a strange one. Certain
Speaker 1: names have become so iconic over the years, with the
Speaker 1: public becoming fascinated with both them and the case that
Speaker 1: it borders on obsession. Today's case comes from that golden
Speaker 1: age of serial killers and is just one of those cases.
Speaker 1: This killer's name has become synonymous with psychology students and
Speaker 1: has given the world the chills since the late nineteen
Speaker 1: sixties with his obsession over women's shoes and clothing. The
Speaker 1: killer's will to get exactly what he wanted only seemed
Speaker 1: to grow with each victim he collected, until finally it
Speaker 1: all came crumbling down after a kidnapping went unsuccessful. This
Speaker 1: is the bizarre and bone chilling story of the infamous
Speaker 1: Jerry Brutos, a k a. The Shoe fetish Slayer. My
Speaker 1: name's Ben.
Speaker 2: I'm Nicole, and you're listening to Wicked and Gram.
Speaker 1: A true crime podcast material. Audience listener, dis I think
Speaker 1: I've already made Nicole mad at me today. It doesn't
Speaker 1: take much these days, Okay.
Speaker 2: I repeatedly have this song stuck in my head and
Speaker 2: I haven't for the last two days, which has been amazing.
Speaker 2: And you just started singing it wurst. That would piss
Speaker 2: me off. You get a mic in front of Ben
Speaker 2: and he just like you, I should record before I
Speaker 2: actually hit record, because there is always a what would
Speaker 2: you say, like show performance? I don't know.
Speaker 1: I mean, we do a pre show with lots of
Speaker 1: that in it all the time.
Speaker 2: Not it's that it's still not to its full extent.
Speaker 1: Okay, okay, fair enough. Well when no one's looking, you know,
Speaker 1: singing in the shower, that's the kind of stuff that
Speaker 1: Nichol's talking about.
Speaker 2: So but like next level.
Speaker 1: I've done it on the show before too, you know that, right?
Speaker 1: People know my goofy singing it happened.
Speaker 2: No I know, but thanks a lot. Well, you're gonna
Speaker 2: just have to hear me singing that song all day,
Speaker 2: so that's fine.
Speaker 1: It's a good song. Yeah. How's it going with everyone
Speaker 1: out there? We are officially in twenty twenty five? Hopefully
Speaker 1: your new year is still going good. Hasn't you know,
Speaker 1: crashed and burned? Like some people. I've saw some social
Speaker 1: media posts where it's like, well, twenty twenty five is
Speaker 1: already fucked.
Speaker 2: So curiously, yeah, it's.
Speaker 1: Mostly memes, but it's still funny.
Speaker 2: Holy Okay. Well, I mean just because it's a bad
Speaker 2: week or bad day, it doesn't mean the whole year
Speaker 2: is just done.
Speaker 1: True, true, But it's fun. It's funny.
Speaker 2: It is funny. Yeah.
Speaker 1: But before we get too deep into our conversations today,
Speaker 1: I first want to thank our patreons who signed up
Speaker 1: this week over on Patreon, So shout out to Darryl
Speaker 1: do grits. I'm going with. I'm saying do grits. I
Speaker 1: think that's how you're going to pronounce your name. It's
Speaker 1: d r u g A t Z. And yeah, I'm
Speaker 1: taking it's not it's either druggets or drugates. I'm going
Speaker 1: with drugids. Okay, that's that's my thought.
Speaker 2: Sounds good to me.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So Darryl drugets me, you me? No, not you me?
Speaker 2: Or do they put me?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 2: They probably? Okay. I was like, what the hell did
Speaker 2: you sign up to be a patron? Was so confused.
Speaker 1: No, not me me?
Speaker 2: Okay, okay, yeah, who's on the first situation here?
Speaker 1: We got Craig boy for and Samantha Shoots, So thank
Speaker 1: you very much for signing up over on Patreon. You
Speaker 1: guys are getting that exclusive behind the scenes content and
Speaker 1: of course the extra episode at the end of the month.
Speaker 1: If you sign up for you know that all inclusive
Speaker 1: or all access t here. So yeah, yeah, so shout out,
Speaker 1: thank you. You guys are incredible. If you guys want
Speaker 1: to sign up for a Patreon as well, link in
Speaker 1: the description of this podcast. But I got to talk
Speaker 1: about something else right now.
Speaker 2: We sure do?
Speaker 1: I got we sure do?
Speaker 2: Oh shit, sorry, I thought we were going on in
Speaker 2: the show.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, that's what I was going to but then
Speaker 1: A sounded like you had some other time.
Speaker 2: No. I was just like, let's go okay.
Speaker 1: Okay, that's what I was going to do too, So
Speaker 1: glad we're on the same page. I want to talk
Speaker 1: about how this is going to be a two parter episode,
Speaker 1: so heads up, this is part one, and I'm not
Speaker 1: saying that this is going to be a short first part,
Speaker 1: but I am going to say the second part will
Speaker 1: be much longer, much more involved. This is a bit
Speaker 1: of a deep dive, and I wanted to split the
Speaker 1: information like fifty fifty between the episodes, but there's too
Speaker 1: good of a spot to stop. So it's going to
Speaker 1: be heavier on part two than part one.
Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, makes sense, So.
Speaker 1: Probably looking at like forty percent Part one, sixty percent
Speaker 1: Part two, maybe maybe even thirty five percent Part one,
Speaker 1: and you know, yeah, I don't want to do the
Speaker 1: math in my head. I know it's small math, but
Speaker 1: I just don't want to. I haven't had enough coffee
Speaker 1: for it yet. But you know what I mean, heavier
Speaker 1: on part two.
Speaker 2: Okay, Okay, got it.
Speaker 1: Not to say part one isn't gonna be good, because
Speaker 1: trust me, it's good.
Speaker 2: It's good, real good.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So with that being said, have you ever heard
Speaker 1: of the name Jerry Brudos?
Speaker 2: No? No, I wonder one day if you will ask
Speaker 2: me this and I will be like, yeah, I have
Speaker 2: heard of this.
Speaker 1: Well it's funny because I've never heard of the name
Speaker 1: Jerry Brudos either. And he is a very prolific individual
Speaker 1: in the true crime scene. Like most people know of him,
Speaker 1: he is very prolific, a very big case. He though
Speaker 1: there's not a single individual who inspired Buffalo Bill of
Speaker 1: Silence of the Lambs, there are aspects to him that
Speaker 1: reportedly did inspire that character. Oh okay, so I love
Speaker 1: Silence of the Lambs. So I'm surprised I haven't heard
Speaker 1: of Jerry Brudos. But yeah, massive case very well known,
Speaker 1: and we're doing a deep dive on it. Are you
Speaker 1: ready for this?
Speaker 2: Yeah? I am?
Speaker 1: Okay. Well, it all starts on a sunny afternoon in
Speaker 1: April of nineteen sixty nine, a woman by the name
Speaker 1: of Sharon Wood, a Portland State University employee, was heading
Speaker 1: to her car after she was finished her work. It
Speaker 1: was a walk that she'd made countless times before, you know,
Speaker 1: crossing the bustling campus, weaving through students, hallways, corridors, crosswalks,
Speaker 1: whatever you name it. And she's hurrying doing her thing
Speaker 1: getting to her car. It was simply routine and everything
Speaker 1: felt normal on this day, at least it did at first.
Speaker 1: And she was making her way closer to the parking
Speaker 1: garage where she parked her car, a strange feeling began
Speaker 1: to creep over. Her thing just wasn't quite right. Sharon
Speaker 1: had planned to use a side stairwell, which she was
Speaker 1: a quieter wrote she often took, but an unshakable instinct
Speaker 1: that was nagging in the back of her head made
Speaker 1: her change her mind. Feeling a bit off about it. Instead,
Speaker 1: she opted for the main entrance, stepping into the garage
Speaker 1: and heading towards the basement level it felt safer, but
Speaker 1: as she reached the bottom of the ramp, heavy footsteps
Speaker 1: began to echo behind her. Before she could react, a
Speaker 1: man grabbed her by the shoulder, spun her around, and
Speaker 1: immediately a gun was pointed directly at her chest, and
Speaker 1: the words don't scream or I'll kill you were spoken
Speaker 1: right to her face. She was terrified, but Sharon was
Speaker 1: also defiant, and she screamed anyways. Her voice pierced through
Speaker 1: the air, reverberating across the stone walls or i guess,
Speaker 1: concrete walls of the parking garage. The attacker quickly shoved
Speaker 1: her to the ground and clamped his hand over her
Speaker 1: mouth quickly in an attempt to silence her. But Sharon
Speaker 1: wasn't giving up so easy. She bit down hard on
Speaker 1: the man's hand, hard enough to even taste blood in
Speaker 1: her mouth. Holy shit, the man yelled in pain as
Speaker 1: the tables momentarily turned Infuriated and desperate to regain control
Speaker 1: over her, he grabbed a fistful of Sharon's hair and
Speaker 1: began slamming her head against the cold concrete ground. He
Speaker 1: slammed her head again and again, striking her head until
Speaker 1: Sharon's body went limp, she blacked out. The attacker, now
Speaker 1: stepping back from the situation, was panicked and realized he
Speaker 1: couldn't risk sticking around. A car engine was rumbling nearby,
Speaker 1: growing louder and louder as it approached the scene, and
Speaker 1: without another moment's hesitation, the man fled abandoned Sharon where
Speaker 1: she lay. He scooped up his gun ran into the
Speaker 1: shadows of the parking garage. He managed to escape, but
Speaker 1: his plan fell in shambles. Sharon, though battered and unconscious,
Speaker 1: fought back fiercely enough to throw off this attack.
Speaker 2: That's incredible. Hey, yes, so like good for her, that is,
Speaker 2: that was intense.
Speaker 1: Right, So this is a small piece of this entire
Speaker 1: story here, but that story in itself shows fight, always
Speaker 1: fight in that situation.
Speaker 2: No shit, holy fact, back make noise, huh.
Speaker 1: And that's what Sharon did and honestly it saved her life.
Speaker 2: Well. I also have to say good for her being
Speaker 2: observant too, because I feel like, if you're you're making
Speaker 2: the same walk, you know, out of work or whatever
Speaker 2: that you do daily, a lot of people would probably
Speaker 2: just be on their phone, like not really being observant
Speaker 2: of their surroundings. And stuff, but she knew and felt
Speaker 2: that something was off right away for sure.
Speaker 1: And I will say, I mean, this is in the
Speaker 1: late sixties, this is sixty nine, so she's in.
Speaker 2: Her cell phone to shape. But still you would probably
Speaker 2: be in your head thinking about your work. Like I
Speaker 2: don't think you would be paying super attention if you're
Speaker 2: doing this walk daily.
Speaker 1: Probably not. And also, like you've mentioned it before, like
Speaker 1: following that gut feeling, and that's what she did. She
Speaker 1: didn't go through that side stairwell, which yeah, we don't
Speaker 1: know for sure, but most likely he was waiting there
Speaker 1: for her. She took a different route and then he
Speaker 1: came up behind her, you know, in a different way.
Speaker 2: Eat creep. Oh that just gives you the shivers.
Speaker 1: Now, when Sharon came to, she found herself surrounded by
Speaker 1: concerned students, with an ambulance crew arriving moments later. She
Speaker 1: was dazed, her head was pounding. I mean, after all,
Speaker 1: it was just cracked against the concrete a few times,
Speaker 1: and at first she couldn't piece together what had just happened.
Speaker 1: But as her mind cleared and she kind of began
Speaker 1: to calm down a little bit, Sharon managed to give
Speaker 1: police a description of her attacker. It was a tall,
Speaker 1: heavy set man, likely in his thirties, with short, light
Speaker 1: colored hair. But there was one unusual detail that really
Speaker 1: stuck out. The man was wearing women's clothing.
Speaker 2: Okay, yeah, that would probably be something you member.
Speaker 1: For sure, yeap. Now, at the time, the significance of
Speaker 1: Sharon's encounter wasn't quite fully understood, but her description would
Speaker 1: later prove to be the first known sighting of a
Speaker 1: serial killer who had already been preying on women across Oregon.
Speaker 1: The man who attacked Sharon would become the infamous shoe
Speaker 1: fetish slayer.
Speaker 2: Okay, okay, wow, so.
Speaker 1: This is the first incident where he was identified reported.
Speaker 1: However you want to say it where there is evidence
Speaker 1: linking this individual a sighting, I guess is what we'll say.
Speaker 2: I should just say, like to each their own. If
Speaker 2: he wants to wear women's clothing, that's like more than fine.
Speaker 2: But I was just you would remember that mostly he
Speaker 2: would stand out in your mind.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, that's a standout detail. I mean, someone has
Speaker 1: a giant scar across her face, it's a standout detail. Yeah,
Speaker 1: someone has a sleeve of tattoos, it's a standout detail.
Speaker 1: Absolutely has nothing to do against morality or being right
Speaker 1: or wrong. It's just a standout detail. You weren't a
Speaker 1: bright yellow hoodie. That's a stand out detail. I say
Speaker 1: that because I have a bright yellow.
Speaker 2: Hoodie, So don't wear it if you're ever going to
Speaker 2: attack someone apparently noted.
Speaker 1: Now, this killer's dark trail began over a year earlier,
Speaker 1: on January twenty sixth, nineteen sixty eight, with the disappearance
Speaker 1: of a woman by the name of Linda Slawson. Now,
Speaker 1: Linda was a nineteen year old who was going door
Speaker 1: to door in Portland suburbs selling encyclopedias. You know those
Speaker 1: encyclopedias that all those like boomers had lining their walls
Speaker 1: because they were told, hey, it's a thing to pass
Speaker 1: down and knowledge, and didn't know the Internet was a thing.
Speaker 2: So my parents definitely had a set, so did mine.
Speaker 1: That's what Linda was doing. She was going door to
Speaker 1: door selling those encyclopedias. Now, that night, Linda didn't come
Speaker 1: home from her job, and when her family reported her missing,
Speaker 1: police went and retraced her sales route. They too knocked
Speaker 1: on the doors and spoke with people that she would
Speaker 1: have interacted with and many of them confirmed that Linda
Speaker 1: had visited their home. But somewhere along the line they
Speaker 1: began reporting that no, Linda didn't stop by here. Somewhere
Speaker 1: along the line, she just seemed to vanish without a trace,
Speaker 1: no witnesses, no clues, and no body. It would be
Speaker 1: months later, on November twenty eighth, in nineteen sixty eight,
Speaker 1: when another young woman, twenty three year old Jan Whitney, disappeared. Now,
Speaker 1: Jan had been driving home with our sorry driving home
Speaker 1: to Mcinnisville after celebrating holidays with family when a car
Speaker 1: broke down near a rest stop north of Albany. Her
Speaker 1: car was later found abandoned, but Jan was nowhere to
Speaker 1: be found. Her disappearance left police baffled until this strange,
Speaker 1: anonymous letter arrived days later. The letter claimed to be
Speaker 1: from a writer who had been at the rest stop
Speaker 1: at the time of Jan being there too, and they
Speaker 1: witnessed Jan leaving with an unknown man. Now, investigators made
Speaker 1: a public plea for the writer to come forward to
Speaker 1: get any more details from this person that they could,
Speaker 1: but this anonymous writer of the letter never came forward.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: Handwriting analysis later on this letter suggests that the letter's
Speaker 1: author had actually intentionally tried to disguise their writing. So
Speaker 1: when you just write something normally, there's certain flows to
Speaker 1: how you do it, right, like oh yeah, muscle memory
Speaker 1: almost right, yeah, And there was certain things that were
Speaker 1: done that were obviously not patterns that they typically do
Speaker 1: or repeating patterns and stuff. So they're doing things specifically
Speaker 1: to hide their actual handwriting.
Speaker 2: Thinking that maybe it's actually the person then exactly.
Speaker 1: Okay, that's what they began to think. They're like, okay, well,
Speaker 1: if this individual's hiding their real writing, yeah, maybe this
Speaker 1: letter wasn't a concerned citizen. Maybe this letter is from
Speaker 1: the very person responsible for Jan's disappearance, basically turning this
Speaker 1: anonymous tip into a taunting kind of thing.
Speaker 2: To have to think though, hey, is just I don't know, creepy.
Speaker 1: It really is like to think that, oh, this helpful
Speaker 1: thing is not something that's helpful, this is a taunt. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Like that's fucked up. This guy already just has me
Speaker 1: like completely creeped out. I feel like, oh, I've said
Speaker 1: that word a few times.
Speaker 2: I'm like, that's just the vibe of this this I
Speaker 2: don't know podcast I guess today.
Speaker 1: Oh no, this this dude is a creepy fuck.
Speaker 2: Okay, trust me, So I've gathered this correctly.
Speaker 1: Trust me. You're we haven't even scratched the surface, and
Speaker 1: you're creeped. He's gonna get much worse.
Speaker 2: Okay, cool noted.
Speaker 1: So a few months later after that, on March twenty seventh,
Speaker 1: nineteen sixty nine, Karen Sprinker, a student at Oregon State University,
Speaker 1: had plans to meet her mother for lunch at Mayor
Speaker 1: and Frank's department storing downtown Salem. Different Salem than you're
Speaker 1: probably thinking. We're talking east versus West coast here, right, Okay,
Speaker 1: So now, witnesses saw her arrive at the rooftop parking lot,
Speaker 1: but Karen, however, never made it inside to have lunch
Speaker 1: with her mother. When she didn't return to her door
Speaker 1: or show up for that lunch date, her worried mother
Speaker 1: called police to report her missing. They looked for her,
Speaker 1: they called around, but she was gone. Karen had vanished
Speaker 1: without a trace. Now, not long after Karen's disappearance came
Speaker 1: Sharon Wood's terrifying encounter that we talked about right at
Speaker 1: the beginning, with the same man that we already discussed.
Speaker 1: You know that one right, yep, and now thankfully she
Speaker 1: managed to survive. Now, this encounter marked a turning point
Speaker 1: in this story, though authorities didn't quite know it yet. Now,
Speaker 1: the very next day after Sharon, the man attacked again
Speaker 1: on April twenty second, targeting fifteen year old Gloria Jean
Speaker 1: Smith near Parish Middle School in Salem. Again, not the
Speaker 1: Salem you're thinking of.
Speaker 2: Holy shit though, that's young. Yeah, fifteen also crazy. It
Speaker 2: was just the next day, right now.
Speaker 1: This would be his youngest targeted individual, just for reference. Okay, Now,
Speaker 1: Gloria was walking alone on some train tracks when a
Speaker 1: green car pulled up beside her. From this vehicle, a
Speaker 1: man jumped out, and the man immediately grabbed her and
Speaker 1: tried to drag her into the car, with him pointing
Speaker 1: a gun directly at her. However, Gloria noticed something something odd.
Speaker 1: The gun was clearly not a real gun. It was
Speaker 1: a cheap plastic.
Speaker 2: Toy Ooh, that's observant right.
Speaker 1: This realization gave her the courage to fight back. She screamed, kicked,
Speaker 1: and struggled, drawing the attention of a nearby woman who
Speaker 1: called out from her yard. Startled. The man gave up
Speaker 1: the assault jumped back into his car and sped away.
Speaker 1: For the second time in two days. His plan failed again.
Speaker 2: He's probably just like, what the fuck, right, But I'm
Speaker 2: also shook that someone would be, you know, getting attacked
Speaker 2: like that and actually realized that the gun was fake, right.
Speaker 2: I know that's impressive.
Speaker 1: It is, it really is. It's extremely observant, observant, especially
Speaker 1: like when you say you're getting attacked.
Speaker 2: Well, and she's fifteen.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so she managed to keep a level head enough,
Speaker 1: keep her her wits about her to make this observant
Speaker 1: realization that oh that's not real.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so huh wow.
Speaker 1: So the man, undeterred, though, struck again the very next
Speaker 1: day wow yeah, determined to get what he was after.
Speaker 1: On April twenty third, twenty two year old Linda Saley
Speaker 1: went to Portland Lloyd's Center shopping mall to pick up
Speaker 1: a birthday gift for her boyfriend. After spending time browsing
Speaker 1: for the perfect present, Linda was last seen leaving a
Speaker 1: jewelry store at around five thirty PM, somewhere between the
Speaker 1: store and her car. She vanished. Linda's disappearance following so
Speaker 1: closely on the heat of the previous incidents finally made
Speaker 1: police suspect that they were dealing with a serial predator.
Speaker 1: The abductions seemed calculated, the victims they were diverse, but
Speaker 1: somehow they were kind of eerily connected with these patterns. Right.
Speaker 1: With no concrete evidence or leads, investigators feared the worst,
Speaker 1: and soon their fears would tragically be confirmed. On May tenth,
Speaker 1: nineteen sixty nine, a man by the name of Sam Wallace,
Speaker 1: a fisherman, headed out for an early morning fish. He
Speaker 1: was headed to go find a good spot along the Tom,
Speaker 1: the Long Tom River. As he walked the banks, something
Speaker 1: caught his eye, a flash of white beneath the surface
Speaker 1: of the water. Curious, Sam climbed up to a tree
Speaker 1: branch to get a better look. What he saw was chilling.
Speaker 1: A body suspended just beneath the water's surface.
Speaker 2: Oh gosh, that would just be such a chilling site.
Speaker 1: This was the body of twenty two year old li
Speaker 1: Into Sali.
Speaker 2: Is that that's the one that was getting what we
Speaker 2: just talked about the last one? Right?
Speaker 1: Ah?
Speaker 2: Yes, who was buying the present for her boyfriend?
Speaker 1: Correct? Okay, yeah, and this was just two weeks after
Speaker 1: she had disappeared.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 1: Sam quickly called the police and divers soon sent were
Speaker 1: sent to recover her body, but when they entered the water,
Speaker 1: what they discovered was Linda's body was not floating, at
Speaker 1: least not to the surface. It was weighed down. It
Speaker 1: was tied down by a heavy car transmission using copper
Speaker 1: wire and nylon cord keeping it submerged, but not floating
Speaker 1: to the surface, just kind of suspended.
Speaker 2: Oh oh my gosh, okay, holy shit. People that end
Speaker 2: up finding bodies like I just I just can't. Now.
Speaker 2: I'm thinking, like I go paddleboarding a lot, I would
Speaker 2: just like I would.
Speaker 1: Die, right, And it's funny. Well, I mean it's not funny,
Speaker 1: but it's thinking about it. Like so many fishermen in
Speaker 1: these stories are the ones finding body. Yeah, it's like
Speaker 1: you head to the water to go fishing. Oh shit,
Speaker 1: it's a body. The last story we covered, I'm pretty
Speaker 1: sure was an oysterman heading out on the water.
Speaker 2: Oh body, guess I'm not going fishing today, right, cool boy? Now.
Speaker 1: The police spent the next two days dredging the river bed,
Speaker 1: scouring the mud in search for more evidence. Divers were
Speaker 1: heading down searching, searching, searching, and on the second day,
Speaker 1: one of the divers found a rusted car engine, and
Speaker 1: attached to it were the same cord and wire they
Speaker 1: found another body. It was the body of Karen Sprinker,
Speaker 1: the third woman to disappear, Her remains heavily decomposed after
Speaker 1: six weeks in the water. Now, the gruesome details of
Speaker 1: Karen's body, though, made it clear just how horrific her
Speaker 1: fate had been. The killer had mutilated her, cutting not off,
Speaker 1: but out her breasts and stuffing the wounds with brown
Speaker 1: paper towels.
Speaker 2: What the shit?
Speaker 1: And the paper towels were held in place by a
Speaker 1: bra that didn't belong to her. Now, this was an
Speaker 1: unsettling clue that pointed to the killer's growing pattern and obsession.
Speaker 2: Huh okay, so this is like some dexter shit he
Speaker 2: has like a dumping grounds.
Speaker 1: I mean, if you put it that way, I guess sure.
Speaker 2: And also those poor people that have to actually go
Speaker 2: and dive for these bodies like in search, that's just
Speaker 2: nightmare material. Really.
Speaker 1: Well, imagine being diving in murky water or going through mud,
Speaker 1: so you probably have visibility like inches in front of
Speaker 1: your face, right boy. Yeah, And then you find this
Speaker 1: engine and you find twine and stuff wrapped around it
Speaker 1: and then wire and you follow it and then all
Speaker 1: of a sudden you would feel it before you saw it,
Speaker 1: and the moment.
Speaker 2: Can we do this right now? Holy shit, this is
Speaker 2: literally like the worst nightmare for me.
Speaker 1: Sorry, I'll stop.
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh. Okay.
Speaker 1: At this point, it was undeniable to the police. They
Speaker 1: were dealing with a serial killer. You're squirming in your chair.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm trying to pay attention now, but I can't.
Speaker 1: Okay. Well, the police are like, yeah, we got a
Speaker 1: serial killer. It's obvious, right, yes, And the victims shared
Speaker 1: a troubling profile. They were young, attractive women, often well dressed,
Speaker 1: and typically they were students or workers at universities in Oregon.
Speaker 1: With this in mind, police began to stake out places
Speaker 1: where these young women would be gathering, particularly at college campuses,
Speaker 1: hoping that someone might be able to identify the killer,
Speaker 1: trying to talk to individuals, maybe saying, hey, have you
Speaker 1: seen something? Have you heard something? Do you know of anything? Right?
Speaker 1: And it wasn't long before one of the female students
Speaker 1: came forward with a crucial piece of information. She had
Speaker 1: a story that would basically crack this case wide open. Okay, Now,
Speaker 1: On May fourteenth, nineteen sixty nine, this student from a
Speaker 1: local university reached out to police with a disturbing tip.
Speaker 1: She explained that she'd been receiving unsettling phone calls from
Speaker 1: a man who claimed to be a lonely Vietnam veteran.
Speaker 1: He reportedly asked her out on a date, and his
Speaker 1: persistence wasn't limited to her. Apparently, dozens of women at
Speaker 1: women at the university got similar calls. But his approach
Speaker 1: was rather odd and unsettling. But shockingly, he managed to
Speaker 1: persuade a persuade a few of these women to actually
Speaker 1: go out on dates with them. Now, particularly this woman
Speaker 1: who tacted police, had actually agreed to meet the man
Speaker 1: as well. She had described him as heavy set, with
Speaker 1: light colored hair and freckles. He had piqued her curiosity
Speaker 1: by claiming he wanted to discuss psychiatric psychiatric treatments that
Speaker 1: he had learned about during his time as a patient
Speaker 1: at Walter Reed Medical Center. Now this just so happened
Speaker 1: to tie into her academic pursuits, so she reluctantly decided
Speaker 1: to give him a chance. The date started off innocently enough.
Speaker 1: They met for lunch and coffee, and their conversation was polite,
Speaker 1: if a little bit off, but as the date wore on,
Speaker 1: things took a bit of a strange turn. At one point,
Speaker 1: the man leaned across the table, placed a hand on
Speaker 1: her shoulder, and began massaging it. Then, in a move
Speaker 1: that left her even more uncomfortable, he asked her to
Speaker 1: pretend she was sad so he could comfort her.
Speaker 2: Oh, whoa talk about a date gone wrong?
Speaker 1: Right now? If that doesn't give you the dick, I
Speaker 1: don't know what.
Speaker 2: Oh that is so just fuck. I don't even know
Speaker 2: how to describe that. That is so uncomfortable.
Speaker 1: Remember when I said, we haven't even scratched the surface
Speaker 1: of how creepy this guy is. Yeah, here, here's a
Speaker 1: little bit more.
Speaker 2: Okay, even Ripley just got up. She's like, oh, I
Speaker 2: just can't deal with that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, it's bad when the dog gets the dick.
Speaker 1: Now if that, though in itself, wasn't bad enough, the
Speaker 1: conversation grew even darker from there. He suddenly brought up
Speaker 1: the recent news about the bodies being discovered in the river,
Speaker 1: the victims of this suspected killer. He asked her, why
Speaker 1: would you meet a stranger like this? How would you
Speaker 1: know I wouldn't take you down there and throw you
Speaker 1: in the water with the others.
Speaker 2: Holy shit?
Speaker 1: Okay, Yeah, the woman was understandably terrified. She managed to
Speaker 1: end the date without further incident, and immediately reported the
Speaker 1: encounter to the authorities. Yeah, I don't know if I
Speaker 1: would have hung around for very long even either, if
Speaker 1: that was the case.
Speaker 2: I know, I honestly don't think that there could be
Speaker 2: another like she will never have another day. That is
Speaker 2: that fucked up.
Speaker 1: No, No, that that's about as fucked up as it gets.
Speaker 1: I'm surprised she didn't fucking smack him across the face
Speaker 1: for that, like start massage. He pretend to be sad
Speaker 1: so I can comfort you. By the way, how do
Speaker 1: you know I'm not a serial killer?
Speaker 2: B gosh, I would be running for the goddamn hills
Speaker 2: right wow. Oh.
Speaker 1: Regardless, though, despite the unsettling behavior during their first encounter,
Speaker 1: the man's somehow managed to secure a second date with her,
Speaker 1: or so he thought.
Speaker 2: Oh, okay, here we go. I could hardly swallow my
Speaker 2: water after you said that, I was just like.
Speaker 1: What your jaw dropped. And then when I said or so,
Speaker 1: he thought, then your eyes lit up it was. The
Speaker 1: emotion was amazing, so detectives working with the woman asked
Speaker 1: her to continue engaging with him on these phone calls
Speaker 1: to help their investigation. She agreed, and after a few
Speaker 1: more phone calls, they set up another meeting scheduled for
Speaker 1: May twenty fifth, nineteen sixty nine. But this time, when
Speaker 1: the man pulled up to her dorm to pick her up,
Speaker 1: he wasn't met by her. He was met by the police.
Speaker 1: It was a scene that seemed to be pulled straight
Speaker 1: out of a Chris Hansen handbook, because yeah, he's expecting her,
Speaker 1: but police were there instead. And the officers are like,
Speaker 1: can you step out of your car and come talk
Speaker 1: to us? So they led him straight into an empty
Speaker 1: office in the dormitory for questioning. The man was identified
Speaker 1: as Jerry Brutos, a thirty year old electrician from Portland.
Speaker 1: He was polite and cooperative during the interview, explaining that
Speaker 1: he was just a lonely man trying to find love
Speaker 1: despite having a wife and two kids at home.
Speaker 2: What yep, Okay, yeah, okay, so what a complete asshole yep.
Speaker 1: Now, after some questioning, the police had no hard evidence
Speaker 1: on him. I mean, sure, he's a little creepy. Maybe
Speaker 1: he's cheating on his wife, that sort of shit, But
Speaker 1: there was nothing really confirming just yet, so after a
Speaker 1: little while through the interview, eventually they let him go.
Speaker 1: The next day, however, the police decided to follow up
Speaker 1: with a visit to Jerry's home, and what they found
Speaker 1: was a little more than suspicious. His basement garage, an
Speaker 1: unusual place in itself, was locked up tight with access
Speaker 1: trolled by an intercom system. Even his wife and kids
Speaker 1: were not allowed to enter without his permission.
Speaker 2: Oh, I would not be okay with that. I'd find
Speaker 2: my fucking way in there, right, you had this secret
Speaker 2: little room. I'd be like, nope, I'm going in there,
Speaker 2: like we gotta know what the fuck's happening.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's that's a red flag and a half right there.
Speaker 1: So inside this basement garage situation, detective spotted rolls of
Speaker 1: nylon cord and as well copper wire, both that matched
Speaker 1: the ones found in the river and or. More over
Speaker 1: than that, they also found distinctive knots that were used
Speaker 1: to tie up the bodies of Linda and Karen that
Speaker 1: matched in the garage as well. The discoveries didn't end there,
Speaker 1: investigators also noted that Jerry's mother owned a green Volkswagen car,
Speaker 1: the exact same make, model, and color of the car
Speaker 1: seen during the attempted abduction of Gloria Jean Smith just
Speaker 1: weeks earlier.
Speaker 2: Okay, yeah, at first, christ getting real here.
Speaker 1: Oh one hundred percent, but still trust me, we're only
Speaker 1: scratching this surface. At first, the police didn't have quite
Speaker 1: enough to arrest Jerry here, but they did have enough
Speaker 1: to secure a search warrant for his vehicles. So on
Speaker 1: May twenty seventh, detectives returned to his home and search
Speaker 1: the cars, hoping for conclusive evidence to tie him to
Speaker 1: the murders. While nothing definitive turned up, the whole event
Speaker 1: clearly rattled Jerry because he decided to take his chances
Speaker 1: and pack his wife and kids into a into a car.
Speaker 2: And run get the fuck out of there. Eight.
Speaker 1: Yeah, he fled north, possibly trying to make it an
Speaker 1: attempt to hit Canada.
Speaker 2: Oh go away. Also, like, you don't say that he's
Speaker 2: not guilty here, hey.
Speaker 1: Oh right, yeah, if you run that, that's a sure
Speaker 1: sign that you did something fucking wrong.
Speaker 2: Totally.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Now, Jerry might have escaped for good. Honestly, if
Speaker 1: he had left earlier, but by this point police were
Speaker 1: keeping a close eye on him, and then they realized
Speaker 1: he was gone not too long after he took off,
Speaker 1: so they wasted no time issuing an APB for the
Speaker 1: family car, and it didn't take long for the vehicle
Speaker 1: to be pulled over just a few hours north of Portland.
Speaker 1: Jerry was arrested on the spot and charged with attempted kidnapping. Now,
Speaker 1: this arrest and attempted kidnapping charge came thankfully from Joria
Speaker 1: sorry Gloria Jean Smith, because of her positive identification of
Speaker 1: him as the man who tried to abduct her.
Speaker 2: Okay, and that's the fifteen year old, wasn't it? Yes? Okay.
Speaker 1: So, as Jerry was being booked into the Salem County Jail,
Speaker 1: the guards got a glimpse into his unsettling private world
Speaker 1: and also a little bit of a glimpse on the
Speaker 1: connections on between everything. While stripping him down to change
Speaker 1: him into his prison jumpsuit, they discovered that he was
Speaker 1: wearing a pair of silky women's underwear beneath his clothing.
Speaker 1: It was an unnerving detail that hinged at a much
Speaker 1: deeper and darker obsession as you said earlier, Hey, wearing
Speaker 1: those women's clothing whatever, where you want, No one fucking cares.
Speaker 1: But in this case, it is definitely something a little
Speaker 1: bit noteworthy. You know. It's not something that in the
Speaker 1: nineteen seventies they see too often when bringing people into
Speaker 1: the jail, I'm sure, And it's a bit of a
Speaker 1: pattern that unfolds throughout this case. So the search of
Speaker 1: his basement meanwhile, or basement garage, I don't really understand
Speaker 1: the exact layout. I've just kind of been like, it's
Speaker 1: this garage, it's this basement. It's kind of this like
Speaker 1: limbo between the two. So I'm not sure exactly how
Speaker 1: to describe it. But this room, let's call it that.
Speaker 1: Maybe I don't know. The search of this room revealed
Speaker 1: far more than just rope and wire to be found.
Speaker 1: With a green light to conduct a comprehensive investigation on
Speaker 1: the locked up space, police uncovered a trove of chilling evidence.
Speaker 1: The full extent of his crimes were about to come
Speaker 1: to light, and it was far worse than any of
Speaker 1: the authority figures, investigators or police could have imagined. But
Speaker 1: before we talk about that, we first need to understand
Speaker 1: how Jerry Brudos became this infamous shoe fetish slayer. So
Speaker 1: we're going to dive into his early life because it's
Speaker 1: a psychological roller coaster that roots right down to his childhood.
Speaker 1: Born on January thirty first, nineteen thirty nine in South Dakota,
Speaker 1: Jerry Brudos was the second son in his family. His mother, Eileen,
Speaker 1: had desperately wanted a girl. She prayed for a daughter,
Speaker 1: and then when Jerry arrived instead and she was given
Speaker 1: a boy, a second son, she resented him deeply for it.
Speaker 1: Wall She never hid her disappointment either, and Jerry grew
Speaker 1: up under the weight of her open disdain. As a
Speaker 1: form of punishment and perhaps a way to vent her
Speaker 1: frustration over his gender, Eileen would dress Jerry in girl's
Speaker 1: clothing and ridicule him for it. These experiences became formative.
Speaker 1: I became yeah formative for young Jerry, blending shame and
Speaker 1: confusion about his identity with an early fixation on femininity.
Speaker 1: Eileen strict and judgmental views about sex and sexuality only
Speaker 1: made things worse, and he mentioned of such topics excuse
Speaker 1: me was treated with absolute disgust, and Jerry's natural curiosities
Speaker 1: or eccentric behaviors were used to excuse used as an
Speaker 1: excuse to ostracize him, branding him as the family freak.
Speaker 2: Seriously, yes, holy shit, that's fucked up.
Speaker 1: Oh oh yeah, trust me, it is.
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh. Like you hear about stories of parents,
Speaker 2: like you know, damaging their children, but that is something.
Speaker 1: Oh she did more than damage her child. She instilled
Speaker 1: something into him and we're going to talk about it here,
Speaker 1: trust me. So by the time he was just a toddler,
Speaker 1: even Jerry was already developing psychological issues.
Speaker 2: Oh No.
Speaker 1: At the age of five, he had an encounter that
Speaker 1: would profoundly shape the rest of his life. While wandering
Speaker 1: through a junkyard, Jerry spotted something that caught his eye,
Speaker 1: a bright red pair of open toe, high heeled shoes.
Speaker 1: They were discarded among the piles of scrap metal and junk,
Speaker 1: and for some reason, a reason that he didn't fully understand,
Speaker 1: because I mean, hey, he's only five years old. I
Speaker 1: think many adults wouldn't even understand either, But he was
Speaker 1: captivated by these shoes laying there. He went over to them,
Speaker 1: reached down and picked them up, and he slipped them
Speaker 1: on his feet. They were many sizes too big. I mean,
Speaker 1: he's five years old and these are adult women's shoes.
Speaker 1: So they were slopping around this kid's feet as he
Speaker 1: strutted back home, excited to show off his discovery. To him,
Speaker 1: it was a harmless act of play, you know, imagination
Speaker 1: dress up. After all, he'd been forced into women's clothes
Speaker 1: many times before by his mother, right, it wasn't foreign
Speaker 1: to him. But his parents, especially his mother, didn't seem
Speaker 1: it is just play, just imagination, just dress up. Eileen,
Speaker 1: hearing the click clack of high heeled shoes on the
Speaker 1: front porch, horrified her when she saw her son.
Speaker 2: How would this horrify her? I am just so confused right.
Speaker 1: Now, he's willingly doing it. She forced him to do
Speaker 1: it to ridicule him before, and now he's doing it
Speaker 1: on his own for fun. Oh jeez, I'm not saying
Speaker 1: I understand or get it. I'm just putting it in
Speaker 1: a perspective to Devil's advocacy, you know.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So when she saw this, she lashed out at him,
Speaker 1: berating him and demanding that he throw those shoes back
Speaker 1: in the dump where he'd found them. But Jerry just
Speaker 1: couldn't part with these shoes. So this little five year
Speaker 1: old secretly stashed them away, sneaking them back into the house,
Speaker 1: and when his mother discovered what he'd done, she confiscated
Speaker 1: the shoes and burned them right in front of him,
Speaker 1: reducing his prize possession and first real source of joy
Speaker 1: to ash. This moment became a turning point in Jerry's
Speaker 1: young life, the inciting incident, if you will. It wasn't
Speaker 1: just about losing the shoes. It was the collision of
Speaker 1: his growing fascination with women's footwear and the cruelty of
Speaker 1: his mother's control into her one son. Eileen poured her cruelty,
Speaker 1: her malice, and her will to dominate his life, and
Speaker 1: as a result, from that day forward, collecting women's shoes
Speaker 1: became a deeply secretive and compulsive act for Jerry, a
Speaker 1: fascination that became darkly intertwined with his resentment towards his
Speaker 1: mother and by extension, women as a whole. And this
Speaker 1: is where we're going to end Part one.
Speaker 2: Of course, I am just so I don't even know,
Speaker 2: just like torn right now, like just so torn, I know,
Speaker 2: right because we just determined that this guy is a
Speaker 2: complete piece of shit. But then also like that is
Speaker 2: just kind of heartbreaking.
Speaker 1: It's so heartbreaking.
Speaker 2: I don't even know what to think right now.
Speaker 1: So this is a classic case study for many psychology
Speaker 1: students in university, Yeah, because there is so much to
Speaker 1: fucking open and examine here. It's been researched over and
Speaker 1: over and over again. And yeah, it is dark, it's
Speaker 1: very sad, and it's very creepy. And though Jerry goes
Speaker 1: on to be a complete piece of shit the obvious,
Speaker 1: as I said, inciting incident, you look at it and
Speaker 1: it's like, well, that's not his fault, Like his mother
Speaker 1: made a monster.
Speaker 2: Yeah, like what was his mother doing right?
Speaker 1: All because she wanted a daughter?
Speaker 2: Which is just so disgusting.
Speaker 1: I know, Like I'm sorry, fucking bitch. Yeah, I've been
Speaker 1: called out on the show a few times for swearing
Speaker 1: a lot, but I don't care. Eileen is a fucking.
Speaker 2: Well yeah period, that is I don't know. That is
Speaker 2: just like you shouldn't be having kids, I guess if
Speaker 2: you can't be like, you know, happy with just having
Speaker 2: a healthy baby or whatever you're gonna make. She basically
Speaker 2: turned him to kind of be unhealthy.
Speaker 1: Really exactly now I understand, sure, Like a mother might
Speaker 1: want a daughter, a father might want a son, or
Speaker 1: you know, someone's looking for a specific you know, child
Speaker 1: to bear and raise. I'm looking forward to, you know,
Speaker 1: doing this with my son's sort of situation, right.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: But but the moment that you birth something different that
Speaker 1: you expected into the world, I think all that should
Speaker 1: go out the window, and it's just like, now you're
Speaker 1: just focused on what you do get to enjoy with
Speaker 1: this child.
Speaker 2: And I would say, normally, would you like I think
Speaker 2: there could be like small little you know, inside inside
Speaker 2: voices you're like, oh, like I wish you know, I
Speaker 2: could be doing this with my son, like you said.
Speaker 1: But you could do that with your daughter.
Speaker 2: Yeah, oh that is oh bad.
Speaker 1: So yeah, Now, as I mentioned, part two is gonna
Speaker 1: be much longer than part one. Here that part one's
Speaker 1: not it's I don't know a little On the short side, I.
Speaker 2: Can't understand how there's that much more to this. I
Speaker 2: think our minds are gonna be blown.
Speaker 1: There is a lot to unpack, there is a lot
Speaker 1: to talk about. So yeah, part two we're gonna get
Speaker 1: much more into this deep dive of Jerry Brutos. Sorry,
Speaker 1: I don't know what I'm like my voice is weird today.
Speaker 1: I don't know. Maybe okay, maybe I just need more coffee,
Speaker 1: more beer.
Speaker 2: Next maybe you need some water.
Speaker 1: Maybe I do, but I can. I was gonna say,
Speaker 1: next episode, I will be drinking whiskey because we're gonna
Speaker 1: need that. At least I'm gonna need that. Oh geez,
Speaker 1: So makes your next episode. You've got a drink ready.
Speaker 1: Whether it is water, whether it is whiskey, doesn't matter.
Speaker 1: Have a cup of something that you can.
Speaker 2: Enjoy because we got to buckle up.
Speaker 1: Yeah, because you're gonna need something to help kind of
Speaker 1: relax you through this process for the part. So just
Speaker 1: saying that, okay.
Speaker 2: Well, looking forward to that.
Speaker 1: All right, Well, we'll talk to you in part two.
Speaker 1: In the meantime, if you want to check out our
Speaker 1: social links, all are in the description of this podcast
Speaker 1: and including Patreon. If you want to go ahead and
Speaker 1: give this podcast a rating, we'd greatly appreciate that five
Speaker 1: stars if I may recommend. But hey, you do you.
Speaker 1: We appreciate you being here. We are an indie podcast, produced, written,
Speaker 1: recorded all on our own. It's us and thank you
Speaker 1: for your support. It means the world. And until part
Speaker 2: Two, stay wicked.