Speaker 1: Welcome to the Great Detectives of Old Time Radio from Boise, Idaho.
This is your host, Adam Graham. In a moment, we're
going to bring you this week's episode of Dragnet. But
I do want to encourage you, if you're enjoying the podcast,
to please follow us using your favorite podcast software. Our
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Detectives dot net. And I want to welcome our latest
Patreon supporter, Denise, coming on board at the Shawmus level
of four dollars or more per month. Thanks so much
for your support, Denise. Now from January eleventh, nineteen fifty
here is the big jump.
Speaker 2: The story you are about to hear is true, only
the names have been changed to protect the innocent. You're
a detective sergeant. You're assigned the homicide detail. A man
crouches on the window ledge of a downtown building thirteen
stories above the street. He threatens to leap to his
death within the hour.
Speaker 3: Your job stop him.
Speaker 4: Dragnet the documented drama of an actual crime for the
next thirty minutes in cooperation with the Los Angeles Police Department.
You will travel step by step on the side of
the law through an actual case transcribed from official police violence,
from beginning to end, from crime to punishment. Dragnet is
the story of your police force in action.
Speaker 5: It was Thursday, September sixth was warm in Los Angeles.
We're working the day watch out of homicide detail. My
partner's Ben Romero. The boss is Captain Steve.
Speaker 6: My name is Friday.
Speaker 5: I was on the way back from communications and it
was one twenty eight pm when I got to room
forty two homicide.
Speaker 7: You ready to skip it?
Speaker 8: Yeah?
Speaker 6: Am man? What's up? It's got the call Third and Temple,
you know, Fitzroy Building, thirteenth floor.
Speaker 9: They got a jumper, right then?
Speaker 6: That's how's it? Right? What's the story?
Speaker 10: Skipper took?
Speaker 6: Could go? Not much to tell. Guys perched out on
a window ledge thirteen floors up, threatening to jump. Yep,
what time you got round now?
Speaker 9: One thirty three?
Speaker 6: Not much time? What the guy and alleged you, sir? Notice,
well what do you mean? He says he's going to jump?
At two o'clock.
Speaker 5: One six pm, Ben pulled the card to a stop
at Third and Temple. We double parked near the intersection,
started across the street to the building on the northeast
corner was a steel frame structure with a block granite facing.
The stone lettering over the main entrance read R. H.
Fitzroy Building, nineteen twenty seven. The immediate area had been
blocked off in all directions. The sidewalks directly adjacent to
the building on Third Street and on Temple Street had
also been cleared of all pedestrian traffic. Hundreds of curious
onlookers jammed against police lines at the fire side of
the intersection, reaching back for.
Speaker 6: A full block in either direction.
Speaker 5: Hundreds more packed in behind them. Thirteen stories above the
pavement was the center of attraction, the figure of a
man standing upright on a narrow ledge, looking down at
the crowd on the street directly below him. Men from
the fire Department's rescue squad were hurriedly stretching out nets.
Speaker 8: We entered the building, took the elevator to the thirteenth floor.
Speaker 6: Who's stand by A Pierce Giver Bechel and Wiseman. I
saw the crowd gathering in the street. On the way
back from lunch, looked up and saw a guy on
the edge that came right up.
Speaker 8: How long has the guy been standing out there?
Speaker 6: About fifteen minutes?
Speaker 9: Sure drawing a crowd. Must be a couple of thousand
people down there.
Speaker 6: Now.
Speaker 10: How was that room number?
Speaker 6: Friday thirteen oh five. Yeah, it's down on this way.
There's Bechel Beck. I been watching for you. The office
is down here. Okay, how's it stand now? He's still
out there ready to jump. We got twenty two minutes
to figure out how to stemp them.
Speaker 9: What's the story anyway?
Speaker 6: I let the doctor tell you. Go ahead through here, nurse,
where doctor Turner go?
Speaker 9: He look down to meet doctor right, he's bringing him
right up.
Speaker 6: Uh, this is Captain Steve Homicide in this Lenaham. How
do you do? Right? Friday?
Speaker 10: Rame?
Speaker 6: Nurse? Here's how he climbed outside this window here? Yeah,
right now, he's standing on the ledge about twelve feet
to the right of the window. The ledge is about
fourteen inches wide. No other windows closer to doing No,
this is it? Did you try to talk him out
of it? Get him back inside? We took a turn
at it. Yeah, Wiseman crawled out on the ledge. Talk
to him so did I. It's one of the queerest
jumpers i've come across. What honey mean, got a hammer
with him, carpenter's hammer. Whenever you get close to him,
he takes a cut at you. Wiseman wasn't looking for it,
had a duck fast he almost went over.
Speaker 8: Was there any other way to reach him?
Speaker 6: Double checked the whole lay out. This window is the closest.
What about lowering a man from the roof, white piece
of corners up.
Speaker 3: There, a big overhang.
Speaker 6: Put a man down on a rope and he'd be
hanging three feet from the side of the building. Wouldn't
come close to the guy?
Speaker 9: How about this doctor you mentioned Beck? You figured he
can yell?
Speaker 6: It's worth a try this Lenand yes, sergeant, you saw
it happen. You know better than I do of what
doctor Turner's idea is. Would you fill these men in place?
Make it brief surely.
Speaker 8: Now this man on the ledge, who is he?
Speaker 6: Do you know?
Speaker 11: Walter Harrison's his name. He's one of the doctor's patients.
His sister brought him in for a routine check up.
That was about one o'clock.
Speaker 6: How old is the man? Forty one?
Speaker 11: His sister told us. He's been complaining of the back
ache lately. While the doctor was examining him and mister
Harrison flew up all of a sudden, he yelled out
we were trying to cripple him, that we wanted to
kill him. Oh excuse me, please sure doctor Turner's office.
Speaker 12: No, I'm sorry, not that that you know him. We
have an offline of trouble.
Speaker 8: Yes, all right, fancy, Well what happened after Harrison started
to act up in this land?
Speaker 11: Doctor Turner and I tried to hold him. He shoved
his both out of the way. He hit the doctor
in the face. Then he ran to the window, got
out on that ledge and crawled along the side of
the building.
Speaker 6: He's been there ever since.
Speaker 9: Miss Harrison is a mental case.
Speaker 11: Yes, he's been for ten years, been in and out
of the State hospital at camer Allot a couple of times.
Sister Ru's been taking care of him.
Speaker 6: She was here.
Speaker 12: What has happened?
Speaker 6: Where is she now?
Speaker 11: Next door the treatment room, Filma, that's the other nurse
she's looking after Miss Harrison.
Speaker 6: She's pretty clock. Tried to talk to a skipper. Not
much help so far. You said the doctor's been treating
this mister Harrison.
Speaker 11: No, he just came in for a physical check out.
Doctor Wright's been handling his nomal condition. That's where doctor
Turner is now getting right. He has his office in
the next building.
Speaker 8: Uh, what time you got, ben?
Speaker 9: Hm, it's getting short, nineteen minutes to two.
Speaker 6: How about the time element back? If he's gonna kill himself,
why is he waiting for two o'clock to do it?
It's got me. He scribbled a note out there, threw
it down to the street. One of the men the
rescue squad grabbed it and run it up and I
got it right here. Let me see. And I look
at that too. And you want my life? They want
me what's his next one? Oh?
Speaker 10: Dead dead?
Speaker 6: They want me dead here. I'd like to pray first.
I'll jump at two o'clock, I'll what's this last thing?
Speaker 10: Ben?
Speaker 6: I can't read this.
Speaker 9: Let me see it. I had two o'clock don't touch
my body that said don't touch my body.
Speaker 6: Now you saw the guy close range back. What do
you think he's serious? I don't know. I'm not even
gonna guess.
Speaker 9: How about me going out and talking to him, skipper,
It might work and we'll do that.
Speaker 6: Ledge is fourteen inches wide, Romera. If you slip by,
I don't want to explain it to your wife and kid.
Speaker 5: Well, how about me giving it a try. That jumper
case last October I was on that one.
Speaker 6: It's volunteer duty, Joe. I'm not gonna order you, you
know the rest of Yeah, I'll watch it. You want
to stand by here at the window bend. Okay, let's
get that window up, says Lines. Yeah, there's blind.
Speaker 8: Okay, I'll give your hand with the window.
Speaker 9: All right, Hope she goes a little stuck.
Speaker 6: Yeah, yes, all the way up. Huh it goes Okay,
make careful now, huh yeah I will, Joe, Yeah, back.
I don't forget about that hammer the guy's got. It's
just my guess. Yeah, what's that? The guy might want
to die. I don't think he wants to do it alone.
Speaker 8: One PM.
Speaker 5: If we could take Walterer Harrison's word for it, we
had exactly seventeen minutes to talk him into a change
of mind before he plunged to his death in the
pavement thirteen stories below. I crawled out of the window
and started enging my way along the narrow ledge went slow.
Speaker 6: I kept my eyes on Harrison.
Speaker 5: He stood about ten feet away from him, looking down
at the crowds jamming the streets below.
Speaker 8: I edged along to within eight feet of him. He
didn't seem to notice me.
Speaker 5: It was a fairly tall man, about five foot ten,
medium bill of dark hair. He was wearing gray pin
striped trousers, a white shirt, no coat, no necktie. I
got to within six feet of him. He raised one
arm and made a motion with his fist at the
crowd below.
Speaker 7: Had a lot. You're dirty, take a man of don't you.
Speaker 12: You are fetched me out?
Speaker 13: Rst you?
Speaker 7: What ever done?
Speaker 8: I kept edging toward him. He still didn't seem the
notice man.
Speaker 6: He turned his body a little.
Speaker 8: He kept pounding the side of the building.
Speaker 6: With a hammer.
Speaker 5: I got a look at his right hand and that
he held the carpenter's hammer. I got to within five
feet of him. A narrow liner passed overhead. Harrison looked up.
He muttered some thing. Then he turned he saw me.
Speaker 6: I'm gonna kill you.
Speaker 14: It's all right with me, Waller. Why do you want
to kill yourself? You're only gonna hurt people.
Speaker 12: You don't care about people, You don't care about me.
Speaker 14: What am I doing out here. Well, you got it wrong, Waller.
A lot of people care about you. They want you
back inside and want you where it's safe.
Speaker 15: You're another one of those. You want to get your
hands from me. You want to cut where you are.
Speaker 12: Not I'm going to kill me.
Speaker 8: It's all right, Water, you can kill me. I want
to help you first.
Speaker 12: You stay back. Don't you mean anymore? I got this
hammer and out smash your face for the hop, smash you.
Speaker 8: I only want to talk. I know we can straighten
this out.
Speaker 12: I'll do it my way. You understand my way. I
know who you are. You you've been after me before.
I know what it's all about.
Speaker 8: I know you do Water, but you got it wrong.
Speaker 6: Now.
Speaker 14: Look, you're gonna jump up this building at two o'clock.
Speaker 8: That's in fifteen minutes.
Speaker 9: That's right, you bet I hand all right.
Speaker 14: Now, Let's let's talk it over for five of those minutes. Huh,
can't do any harm. I'm not gonna hurt you. How
about it?
Speaker 8: Okay?
Speaker 12: Why should I talk to you?
Speaker 14: Because I care about what happens to you. So does
your sister, so to a lot of people.
Speaker 12: Well, then you're like a lot of people.
Speaker 15: You want to get your hands on me right that
those animals down there, the whole dirty pack them, they
want to grab on them and get all.
Speaker 12: Around close and put their hands on me.
Speaker 14: Well they're not gonna do it, of course they're not.
Nobody's gonna hurt you. You know that, don't you bet
your life?
Speaker 12: They're not. You see that dirty.
Speaker 7: Pack down there.
Speaker 15: Well they don't know. But I'm gonna jump right to you.
I'm gonna jump right through all would.
Speaker 14: They won't even attach to me, and I could do
it right down minute, Wallace, we'll forget your promise.
Speaker 12: What are you talking about?
Speaker 7: What promise to a clock?
Speaker 14: You wrote that down yourself. They said you wouldn't jump
until it was two o'clock.
Speaker 12: Was no promise, I just wrote it down there, so
just two o'clock.
Speaker 14: Yeah, when your sister believed it, we gave her the note.
She says, that's your promise. Now you're gonna make a
liar out of yourself.
Speaker 12: You're you're the liar. Ruth didn't say that. She didn't
say it was a promise.
Speaker 8: You gotta take my word for that. All right, Let's
go in and ask her how about it?
Speaker 12: See see Ruth inside?
Speaker 8: Sure, man, come on, take my hand water all.
Speaker 9: Right, all right, I'll take your hands, patch.
Speaker 8: Your step lookout, will you do?
Speaker 7: You'll get back to get back now?
Speaker 12: Next time I want miss, I'll.
Speaker 7: Straight your whole harm you.
Speaker 12: You think you're pretty smart, don't you. You're trying to
trick me. Well, I've told you before.
Speaker 13: I know who you are.
Speaker 12: You're trying to get your hands on.
Speaker 14: You promised your sister two o'clock. You're still gonna break
that promise.
Speaker 12: I'm not like you in that pack down there. I
don't break promise.
Speaker 14: Everybody knows that water. They trust you. Come on, how
about talking this thing out?
Speaker 12: What time is.
Speaker 6: One?
Speaker 8: Fourteen minutes to go?
Speaker 12: How do I know if that's the time?
Speaker 8: Now? You can look at my watch there, right.
Speaker 12: Why don't you stand back? I told you before you
stay away.
Speaker 8: I just wanted to show you the time. That's all
all right.
Speaker 14: You can look at that big clock up the street,
see the one on the side of the whole bart
building up there?
Speaker 10: Fourteen?
Speaker 12: How do I know that's right? How do I know
they're not even with you too?
Speaker 14: You already said it, big company. They don't care about
you or me. They got a business to run their clock.
Speaker 8: They don't care what happened.
Speaker 12: No, all of course not, they don't.
Speaker 2: They don't care.
Speaker 12: All right, Well, i'll just keep an eye on.
Speaker 8: That clock, all right. You don't mind if I talk
while you wait? Do you?
Speaker 12: That's plain? What's it doing without dam or?
Speaker 8: It's just an airliner, probably on its way into Bourban.
Speaker 12: That things been by before. It's flying low too.
Speaker 8: Yeah, I guess I didn't notice. What difference does it make?
Speaker 15: Probably watch flying back and forth. Maybe they're the police,
so they're trying to do something. They're trying to get
their hands on me.
Speaker 8: Oh let's see. Yeah, might be their plane. It's a
big one.
Speaker 15: Sure, sure, they're trying to do something. Coming right by here,
flying law. It's the same one I can see.
Speaker 12: Look what do you see there on the wing?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 8: What's that the number right there on the wing.
Speaker 12: It's the same one that passed over a few minutes ago.
Speaker 8: So you get away from me to give it me.
Speaker 12: You thought you tricked me. You didn't know I had
my pocket knife. Well I can kid you with it now,
I can kill you right now.
Speaker 8: Yeah, I told you before. It's all right with me.
Just look out there, watch your step on the ledge.
Speaker 15: When you should have cut your hand off. I should
have cut your whole arm off and throw I went
to those animals down there.
Speaker 12: Look at that blood all over your hand.
Speaker 14: Tell I'm sorry, Walter, It's not your fault. I just
wanted to talk the whole thing over, to tell you
how your sister feels.
Speaker 12: You're a liar.
Speaker 15: I knew it when I looked at you, and I
know you'll get away. You'll get away before I kill you.
Speaker 14: But there's only one thing I can tell you. There's
sits the root sitting inside there, and she's worried, sick.
Speaker 8: She's waiting for you. He wants to take your home.
How about it. There's no reason for all this. You
know that, don't you.
Speaker 10: I'm sure you do.
Speaker 14: Your sister and your family they care about you. They
want your home again, They want you with him. There's
no reason to be standing out here, now, is there.
Speaker 12: You you wait un two o'clock, mister, Yeah, I'll show
you the reason.
Speaker 5: One twelve minutes left. I made my way along the
ledge through the window back into the office. Doctor Wright,
a man who'd been treating Walter Harrison for his mental sickness,
was already there with doctor Turner.
Speaker 8: While the nurse bandies my hand. Captain Steve ben and
I talked with him.
Speaker 6: I've treated Harrison for ten years, on and off. I
guess he showed some improvement, not much definite paranoid tendencies.
Speaker 9: Did he ever try this before, doctor, right?
Speaker 6: Not to my knowledge. His sister might tell you more.
I really don't know what to advise you to do.
He's never been this violent before using a hammer, and
I think, yeah, that's fine, thank you. There's only one
thing I've got to know, doctor, Is it worth letting
another one of my men go out there on that ledge.
I'm afraid that's your decision, Captain. It may help, it
may not. I know the patient, but I can't read
his mind.
Speaker 5: It's just thinking we might bring Harrison's sister to the
window and have her talks on.
Speaker 6: I think that might help, Doctor, very possible, it might.
And a spot like this time in the same boat shore.
It's all guess what you think Harrison's really gonna be
ready to jump at two o'clock, doctor, From what Sergeant
Friday tells me, Yes, I think you would jump. We
got to come up with something. We can't just stand around.
What the guy take a dive down thirteen story. I
wish I knew the answer. It's got to be one someplace.
It's got to be an answer. Let's check your watch.
We've got ten minutes to find it.
Speaker 4: You are listening to drag met authentic stories of your
police force and action.
Speaker 5: It's a sworn duty of the peace officer to protect
the lives of the citizens of the community in which
he serves.
Speaker 6: That isn't always.
Speaker 8: Limited to protecting the citizens.
Speaker 6: From criminals and lawbreakers.
Speaker 5: Oftentimes the citizen has to be protected from himself. The
drunken driver can do as much harm to his own
person as he.
Speaker 6: Can to others. The same for the narcotic addict.
Speaker 8: The same for mental incompetence such as Walter Harrison.
Speaker 5: If he was being assaulted, robbed, or shot at by
a gunman, it would have been no more serious. Harrison's
life was in jeopardy. Trying to save him had to
be the first consideration one. Sergeant Jack white Man east
his way out on the ledge of the thirteenth story
and kept Walter Harrison busy talking anything to keep his mind.
Speaker 6: Off the jump.
Speaker 8: Captain Steve got on the phone and talk to the
manager of the whole.
Speaker 5: Art building, a twelve story structure three blocks away, with
a large clock set into either side of it, the
same clock Harrison was keeping time by.
Speaker 6: Yeah, that's right, just so you don't make it look
too obvious. Okay, mister Wallis, thank you. They're going to
do all I can. That's hope it works. You know,
what do you say they're going to start slowing down
the clock in the building right away. If Harrison goes
by that time, it's going to be a long ten minutes.
Speaker 8: Well how much they figure they can stretch it about five.
Speaker 6: Or six minutes without making it look too obvious when
you sure you use it. Let's hope Harrison doesn't catch on.
Manager said, they'll stop the clock when it's a minute
to go. It'll never reach two o'clock, skip, Garramarow. I
just checked with the rescue squad down the street. They're
stringing out more nets. You know, they're not guaranteeing anything.
How do you mean they're worried about those ledges jetting
up from the building every other floor. They say, if
Harrison jumps close enough, he's bound and hit one of them.
He does, he'll be dead before he reaches street level.
Nets down there won't do him any good.
Speaker 10: Nothing we can do about it.
Speaker 6: Something else we'll have to hand over the locker they
come up with.
Speaker 9: Any ideas, Ben just one sounds like a good word.
Speaker 6: What's that? They figured, like we did, the overhang on
the roof is too wide to lower a man directly
down on topp of Harrison to grab it.
Speaker 9: I think it might work if they try this.
Speaker 6: Put a man in a rope sling just over the
edge of the roof, lower him down toward Harrison as
close as possible without death, give him a good line,
let him try to rope Harris. I don't know they
got any candidates to try it. Yeah, one guy's been
on the rescue squad for years, supposed to be an
expert with the lasso capvin, Oh my, do it? I
don't know.
Speaker 8: Yeah, what happens if he misses Harrison?
Speaker 9: Who knows what happens if Harrison jem happened.
Speaker 6: I just got off that ledge in a hurry. He
came at me with that knight see any closer to
the window, and backed off again. Something else that clock
in the Hobart building. Yeah, pretty sure he's wise to
that gimmick. He's given it up. What do you mean
the two o'clock deadline. He's not going to wait for it.
Speaker 5: One five pm, especially equipped police car w loud speakers
mounted on the roof was rushed at the intersection of
Third and Temple Streets, opposite the Fitzroy Building. Sergeant Jack
Wiseman took Walller Harrison's sister Ruth down in the elevator
to the street. She got on the police car microphone and.
Speaker 8: Started talking to her brother over the loud speakers.
Speaker 5: Word was passed to the special detail of men from
the Fire Department's rescue.
Speaker 6: Squad standing by on the roof of the building. They
went to work.
Speaker 5: Captain Steed went up to the roof to see if
he could assist them. Ben and I waited in the
office on the thirteenth floor. The nurse, Miss Lenihan and
Jean Becknel were with us. One fifty seven pm, the
men on the roof started to lower the man from
the rescue squad in the rope sling. He held a
double strength lasso in his hands. The end of it
was wrapped around his body and tied securely. Ben and
I watched from the window. We looked along the narrow
ledge Walder. Harrison stood erect and motionless, an open pocket
knife in one hand, his feet poisoned the brink of
a thirteen story jump. The voice of Harrison's sister drifted
up from the loud speakers down on the street.
Speaker 4: What Walder, can't you hear me?
Speaker 7: Miss Role?
Speaker 11: I want you to come home with me?
Speaker 3: Walder? Please?
Speaker 1: You don't want understand?
Speaker 8: All right?
Speaker 9: I've benish you for sure.
Speaker 6: If you look that. Yeah, there's nothing wrong.
Speaker 12: No one's going to hurt you.
Speaker 7: Why do you want to help you, Walter?
Speaker 12: Please?
Speaker 6: I can't see, Jill.
Speaker 9: They're letting the man down.
Speaker 8: Yeah, coming slow, you know that.
Speaker 6: Don't you.
Speaker 7: Come home with me?
Speaker 11: Please, I'll take care of you.
Speaker 7: I'll see that. You're saying that you're all right?
Speaker 6: Joe haws Harrison doing? Can you see?
Speaker 14: Yeah?
Speaker 8: He's looking down, not moving at all.
Speaker 12: Nobody's gonna hurt.
Speaker 6: You, believe me.
Speaker 14: These anybody your friends, they want to help you. Hear me,
water help you?
Speaker 8: That's it? What man coming down on the rope. He's
just above Harrison.
Speaker 7: Now hear your friend. You get to trust me, your ship.
Speaker 6: Your.
Speaker 12: You to trust me?
Speaker 9: Yeah, I see the man now he's righting bron now.
Speaker 6: Nothing last, already, keep your fingers crossed. What is it?
What's happening? And lest so he's throwing me?
Speaker 12: Get away for a minute, Miss Joey missed water.
Speaker 8: Wait a minute, Harrison, very away from it, man and
pull him out of the way. He's still on the ledge.
Speaker 9: I'm going out, joe Wait a minute, it's only a chance.
Speaker 6: Yeah, why don't you get him mad at you, saying
anything and sorting anything to make him go for you.
Speaker 9: If you can get him down to this window, I
can grab him.
Speaker 8: If I get him by the window, I'll hold onto him.
Speaker 6: Huh Yeah.
Speaker 9: When you grab him, try to lean as close to
the building.
Speaker 12: As you can.
Speaker 8: It's none much to lean on the other way. One
nine pm. I got through the window and out onto
the legs.
Speaker 5: The crowds jamming the streets below had swollen almost twice
their size. A few blocks away, the big clock on
the side of the Hobart building read five minutes to two,
but Harrison wasn't looking at it. He still had his
eyes fixed on the pavement thirteen stories beneath us. He
torn off his collar and his shirt was ripped open
at the neck.
Speaker 8: He waved his arms and shouted at the crowd below
as he tottered along the ledge toward the corner of
the building, away from the window.
Speaker 5: Though I was supposed to lure him into in his
right hand, he still held under the open pocket night.
Speaker 12: You're not gonna get your hands on me.
Speaker 7: You're not even gonna get close.
Speaker 8: Wait a minute, Harrison, watch it, you watch me, mister.
Speaker 7: I've got a do right froot him down there for
dirty animal. Jujia's what I Wait a minute, I got
a message for you from his sister.
Speaker 8: Root. Now do you want to hear it?
Speaker 10: You?
Speaker 12: You won't get your hands on me, none of you.
I'll see you lay this.
Speaker 8: You're a phony, Harrison.
Speaker 7: You're a pony liar.
Speaker 12: I'm a whale, heard me.
Speaker 8: You're not kidding anybody.
Speaker 12: You don't think I can jump? Huh where you're what?
Speaker 8: Anybody can jump?
Speaker 7: Any phony can do that.
Speaker 8: It doesn't take anything.
Speaker 7: Those animals down there in the street, any one of
them can do that.
Speaker 8: You're just like one of them.
Speaker 12: I've still got this knife. I've used it before, I
can kid it.
Speaker 7: You couldn't kill anything.
Speaker 8: You haven't got the cut. You're a phony.
Speaker 12: You're alive, You're you're a rotten liar.
Speaker 7: I can cut you to peace.
Speaker 8: Oh you talk me, Harrison, but you're all talk.
Speaker 12: I can cut you to patience.
Speaker 8: You haven't got me, fool mister, not for a minute.
Speaker 12: I've cut you to pieces.
Speaker 7: You haven't got half the nerve. You're a phony in
your nose. You're a rotten liar. Stands the going, stands
to the hawkstone. Oh you talk a real good game,
but that's about all.
Speaker 12: You're all I saw.
Speaker 7: I still have my knife and right now, yeah, sure
you will.
Speaker 12: You're backing away.
Speaker 7: You're a fright. You're a pony, Harrison. Nobody's afraid of
a phone.
Speaker 12: He cut your rough.
Speaker 7: I'm waiting for you. Come on, no matter, Arison, you're not.
Speaker 12: You're not waiting.
Speaker 7: Stay stealing and stop talking away. Don't stop. I'll tell
you you come and get me.
Speaker 14: Huh.
Speaker 7: I haven't got enough nerve. You're just talking again.
Speaker 14: I'll talk.
Speaker 6: Huh.
Speaker 7: That window.
Speaker 12: You gotta stop by the window, and and then I'll
cut you to piece.
Speaker 8: All right, Harrison, here, now you go ahead, prove your rough.
Speaker 10: Pony.
Speaker 12: All right, I'll show you.
Speaker 15: You're running right wrn it dropping cut you run the world.
Speaker 8: Get you the fee robbing the rubber.
Speaker 7: Don't look out, clapp.
Speaker 8: And they're gonna fall.
Speaker 9: Well, how close can it get? Nurse just wonderful, can't
tell you?
Speaker 8: Are you all right?
Speaker 6: Yeah? Fine?
Speaker 8: Would you mind getting Captain Steve Horse please?
Speaker 6: You know who is extruly right? Right? Yeah? It was
a rough one minute, Darren, looked like you were both
going over the side. Yeah, thought I lost to Joe.
Well you didn't have to worry. No, no, you told
me which way to lean.
Speaker 2: The story you have just heard was true, only the
names were changed to protect the innocent.
Speaker 4: On September tenth, the sanity hearing was held at the
County Hospital Psychopathic Ward, City and County of Los Angeles,
State of California.
Speaker 10: In a moment the results of that hearing, after.
Speaker 4: Being examined by six psychiatrists, Walter John Harris was judgmentally incompetent.
On his sister's request, he was committed to a private sanitarium.
Seven months later, Harrison took his own life by hanging.
You have just heard Dragnet a series of authentic cases
from Official five. Technical advice comes from the Office of
Chief of Police W. H. Parker, Los Angeles Police. We
the people is next with Stories of Today on NBC.
Speaker 1: Welcome Back. Really a great episode and different from your
typical Dragnet story. Listening to the series, you really appreciate
Stacy Harris's range as an actor. Plays a lot of criminals,
mad men, ordinary citizens, occasionally other police officers, but they're
not all the same. A great example of this is
this episode, because most recently on Public Domain Video Theater
we featured the Human Bomb, the first TV episode of Dragnet,
where he played another character who was a bit disturbed
in Vernon Carney, who was threatening to blow up city Hall. However,
it's a very different performance, as Carney's more of a
monomaniac and the man in this story is more paranoid
and disturbed. In so many ways, one big role of
modern storytelling is show, don't tell, and Friday's explanations of
why the police do things they do tend to violate
that rule, but nevertheless, I think it's helpful as it
communicates information that explains the actions in a way that
I think are hard to otherwise. You can imagine a
listener thinking, Okay, it's horrible that this guy's going to jump,
but you try to talk him down. He's violent, He's
determined to jump. What are you guys doing risking men
trying to save someone who doesn't want to be saved.
Friday's explanation makes their point of view clear. It's like
any other citizen in danger. Part of the job is
being willing to put your life at risk in order
to protect the lives of citizens, and if you're not
willing to do that, you don't really belong on the
police force. It was tragic that he ended up killing
himself anyway seven months later, but following Friday's reasoning and analogy,
that would be like if you're a police officer and
you save someone from an armed robbery, only for them
to get killed in a mugging seven months later. I
also like the part of the end with Friday's remark
that he was going to be all right because Romero
had told him the right way to lean. It's a
classic bit of camp humor to diffuse a situation and
did not dwell on the fact that you just nearly died.
It's in the same vein as when at the end
of the City Hall bombing or radio version the human Bomb,
Friday slips and falls on the steps of City Hall
and sent the bomb flying, which could have killed him
and probably some other people had done major damage to
the City Hall, but it didn't go off because of
how the device was rigged for a hard pull, and
Romero just kind of stood over him and said clumsy.
It really indicates the thoroughness with which Jack Webb had
researched the police and the amount of time he spent
with him, that he picked up the cadences of their
humor and works that into the scripts. Well, now we
turn to listener, calm and feedback and on Facebook, Emmett
Rights regarding the episode The Big Family, this was a
surprisingly good episode. In order to avoid spoilers, he just
leaves it at that. And regarding the episode The Big Break,
Catherine wrote, I thought this episode showed the police in
a good light today. If someone is shooting at them,
there is no way they're going in breaking the door down.
Hoffman certainly was a piece of work though, And that
comment comes from YouTube, and I definitely agree on Hoffman.
And it's very unique, very dangerous, but still fascinating character
and one of the best ones that you'll find in
the nineteen fifties TV series. And we have a couple
of comments over on the sight called X John Ritts
love your show, and then Laurel Rits, I think I'm
on the second listen to all of your feeds. Depot
Bench here eight hours overnight at the USPS on one
point two speed covers a lot of shows. Thanks Adam
for hours of entertainment in one place. Well, thanks so much, Laurel.
And for those of you who aren't in Boise. The
bench is an area in Boysey and I've never heard
the phrase depot bench before, but it's actually kind of
helpful in that it's near the old train depot. Here
in Boise, we don't actually have train service passenger train service,
but we used to, and now that area is a park.
I actually took my now three year old son down
there and he loved the engine they have on display.
And of course I lived really close to the depot,
within about two and a half miles. I guess I
would have been depot Bench for about sixteen years, so
those things. I'm really tickled when I hear the show
is being listened to in parts of the world far away,
but it's also something special when you hear folks are
listening to it within a few miles of where you live. Well,
thanks so much. Appreciate the comment, Lauren. Well, now it
is time to thank our Patreon supporter of the day,
and I want to go ahead and thank Emily. Emily
has been one of our Patreon supporters since February twenty
twenty one, currently supporting the podcast at the rookie level
of two dollars or more per month. Thanks so much
for your support, Emily, and that will actually do it
for today. If you're enjoying the podcast, please follow us
using your favorite podcast software. And if you're enjoying the
podcast on YouTube, be sure to like the video, subscribe
to the channel, and mark the notification bell. We'll be
back next Saturday with another episode of Dragon It, and
join us back here next Tuesday for hot copy. But
we will be back tomorrow with all four thousand, six
hundred and fiftieth episode special.
Speaker 13: Where all right, doc? Now it's your turn. You mentioned
the letter, Yes, yes, here read it? You quite are
all alike murderers. Honest people aren't safe from butchers like you.
If the law won't punish.
Speaker 10: You, I will be avenger.
Speaker 13: Now she went to a lot of trouble, didn't She
cut out all the letters on the magazine. She reads
like a woman could be a man. Of course, I
suppose you handle this, haven't, June?
Speaker 10: You mean fingerprints? Yes, I guess so.
Speaker 6: I didn't know what it was. Of course, Well it
doesn't matter. Dark. She probably wore gloves.
Speaker 8: I wouldn't worry too much about it. You wouldn't worry
about it. No, no, it's not addressed to you.
Speaker 13: No, no, no, take it easy. I only meant we
get hundreds of poison pen stuff like this every year.
Ninety nine percent of them turn out to be crank
letters and the other one percent, Lieutenant, what do they
turn out to be?
Speaker 1: Hope you'll be with us then in the mean? Send
your comments to Box thirteen at Greatdetectives dot net, follow
us on Twitter at Radio Detectives, and check us out
on Instagram, Instagram, dot com, slash Great Detectives from Boise, Idaho.
This is your host, Adam Graham signing off.