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Speaker 2: You are now listening to True Murder, The most Shocking
Speaker 2: Killers in True Crime History and the authors that have
Speaker 2: written about them Gasey, Bundy, Dahmer, The Nightstalker DTK. Every
Speaker 2: week another fascinating author talking about the most shocking and
Speaker 2: infamous killers in true crime history. True Murder with your host,
Speaker 2: journalist and author Dan Zupansky.
Speaker 3: Good evening, This is your host Dan Zuhanski for the
Speaker 3: program True Murder, The most Shocking Killers in True Crime
Speaker 3: History and the authors that have written about them. David Mahler,
Speaker 3: a forty three year old East Coast lawyer, came to
Speaker 3: Holly for the celebrity lifestyle, the movie industry, and the women.
Speaker 3: At his seven level home in the Hollywood Hills, Maler
Speaker 3: rubbed elbows with the ceed elements of the entertainment world,
Speaker 3: wannabe rock stars, drug kingpins, and adult film stars, one
Speaker 3: of whom introduced him to Kristin Baldwin, a pretty upbeat blonde.
Speaker 3: One night, during a violent argument in his bedroom, a vicious,
Speaker 3: drug crazed Maler grabbed a gun, A shot rang out,
Speaker 3: and Kris Kristen was never seen alive again. The book
Speaker 3: we're featuring this evening is Date with the Devil with
Speaker 3: my special guest, journalist and best selling author Don Lassiter.
Speaker 3: Welcome back to the program, and thank you for agreeing
Speaker 3: to this interview. Don Lassiter.
Speaker 4: Thanks Dan, it's great to be here again.
Speaker 3: Well, thank you very much. This is one wild tale,
Speaker 3: as we were talking about beforehand. Now set the stage
Speaker 3: for us a little bit. We should really paint a
Speaker 3: picture of the king characters here, because there aren't that
Speaker 3: many characters in this story, but they are very, very
Speaker 3: important and very interesting characters. Let's maybe start with Kristin Baldwin.
Speaker 3: Kristin Franri Frenna Baldwin. Tell us a little bit, she's
Speaker 3: from New York originally, but tell us everything that you
Speaker 3: found out about who Kristin Baldwin was and her early
Speaker 3: life leading up to this faithful day.
Speaker 4: Well, Kristin, as you said, was born in New York
Speaker 4: and her parents were somewhat of no maddice at first,
Speaker 4: and they split up. Eventually. Her mother remarried a man
Speaker 4: who in the electronics industry, and he moved them to
Speaker 4: California to a very upscale San Fernando Valley section called
Speaker 4: Westlake Village. Beautiful home, rich environment, movie stars, upscale people
Speaker 4: live there. Kristen grew up in that environment and in
Speaker 4: an upper middle class lifestyle. Eventually she left home, moved
Speaker 4: to a coastal community and went to some college, and
Speaker 4: then she found that she was attracted to Hawaii. She
Speaker 4: went over to Hawaii and spent ten years over there,
Speaker 4: surfing and working as a waitress. Very happy life. But
Speaker 4: eventually she came back and she was a little difficulty
Speaker 4: in finding some roots. And that's what happened when she
Speaker 4: met David Maller.
Speaker 3: Now she was how old by the time she had
Speaker 3: met David Maler though when she was.
Speaker 4: Saying early forties, I believe about forty forty one at
Speaker 4: the time.
Speaker 3: Right now, tell us about David Maler. Tell us everything
Speaker 3: he found out about David Maller. His early life up
Speaker 3: to him becoming a civil attorney. Seems successful if he's
Speaker 3: living in Hollywood Hills. But tell us about the early
Speaker 3: life of David Maler. Please.
Speaker 4: It's interesting Dan that in my book I said his
Speaker 4: childhood was somewhat uneventful. He did. I knew he had
Speaker 4: some drug problems. He confessed that during the investigation. But
Speaker 4: I'm going to fill in a little something that happened
Speaker 4: just a few days ago here. I received an email
Speaker 4: from someone who is very close to David in his childhood,
Speaker 4: knew him quite well, and who said that you didn't
Speaker 4: tell half the story of David. He was far more
Speaker 4: evil than you even realized. And this person told me
Speaker 4: a considerable amount of about David, his fights with his
Speaker 4: own father, his hitting his grandfather with a baseball bat,
Speaker 4: is getting out kicked out of several schools, and his
Speaker 4: drug usage. So that establishes a little bit more of
Speaker 4: his background than I was able to tell in the book.
Speaker 4: He went to law school, he earned he passed the
Speaker 4: bar examine both New York and New Jersey, and was
Speaker 4: practicing there for several years. At one point he was
Speaker 4: living with a young woman who was from also from California.
Speaker 4: He met her during a trip out here and they
Speaker 4: fell in love, and she went back there and lived
Speaker 4: with him over a year or so. They continued their
Speaker 4: relationship for quite some time, even after he came back.
Speaker 4: That he moved to California. But it's a little questionable
Speaker 4: why he moved to California. Some people think it was
Speaker 4: just to come out here and live in the lifestyle.
Speaker 4: Others think he had some problems with some of his
Speaker 4: clients in New Jersey. It was even suggested that there
Speaker 4: was some let's see criminal aspects to some of his
Speaker 4: people that he didn't want to be around anymore. So
Speaker 4: he decided to pull up his all of his roots
Speaker 4: and move to California.
Speaker 3: Now was he a successful attorney? Was he would he
Speaker 3: handle high profile civil cases? What was his career like
Speaker 3: once he did get to Hollywood.
Speaker 4: Well, he was quite successful in the East Coast, but
Speaker 4: he could not pass the bar exam in California. So
Speaker 4: when he moved to the Hollywood Hills, he was a
Speaker 4: commodities trader. I put that in quote marks.
Speaker 3: Now it seems glamorous. He's living in a big, you know, plush,
Speaker 3: plush home in Hollywood Hills, but he's sharing the rent
Speaker 3: with a lot of co tenants. So maybe you can
Speaker 3: introduce us to some of those co tenants. And so
Speaker 3: please start with one of the most important roommates, Donald,
Speaker 3: and you can pronounce the last name, so I do
Speaker 3: not get it wrong when.
Speaker 4: I Donald van de Velde was a professional musician or
Speaker 4: a rock star, Well, his goal was to be a
Speaker 4: rock star. I should say he had. He had had
Speaker 4: certain levels of success prior to this episode and had
Speaker 4: issued some some CDs. But at the time he was
Speaker 4: living with David Maller in the seven level house in
Speaker 4: Hollywood Hills. He was having pretty rocky time. I understand
Speaker 4: since then the Donald has re emerged and is doing
Speaker 4: quite well in the music business. At that time, he
Speaker 4: was pretty much living as a handyman, and so he
Speaker 4: was one of the tenets of the big house that
Speaker 4: David Maller took uh. He became the least holder and
Speaker 4: manager on the house prior to his arrival, a man
Speaker 4: named Karl Norvig And that's that's a an assumed name.
Speaker 4: Several people, or I should say a pseudonym. Several people
Speaker 4: in this book have pseudonyms to protect their privacy. Carl
Speaker 4: had been the manager of the place and lived in
Speaker 4: the upper stories before David's arrival, but David took over,
Speaker 4: so Karl Norvick moved down a couple of floors, and
Speaker 4: then a third person, Jeremy Moody, lived in the floors
Speaker 4: below that, and then Don Vandervelde and his wife lived
Speaker 4: on the bottom floors.
Speaker 3: Now there was another roommate Johann Langley as well lived.
Speaker 4: We're not going to talk about Johann Langley.
Speaker 3: Okay, I understand, got it? Okay, Now, now what was
Speaker 3: the relationship? You say that they were tenants, but how
Speaker 3: did they all come to live in this home? Were
Speaker 3: they friends by any route? Or tell us how they
Speaker 3: all came to live in this in this place.
Speaker 4: No, Actually, the man we're calling Karl Norvik, had been operating,
Speaker 4: had been a leaseholder and manager, and he had least
Speaker 4: he hadn't rented I should say, space to Donald Vandevelde
Speaker 4: and to Jeremy Moody, and then when Maller showed up,
Speaker 4: he took over. And so then those three men then
Speaker 4: were his tenants in the house. They weren't necessarily close
Speaker 4: friends at all, although Norvic and Mahler became quite close friends,
Speaker 4: but that turned out to be somewhat of a disaster
Speaker 4: for Norvic.
Speaker 3: Now, right from the outset was this party central this home?
Speaker 3: And if we're talking about drug use, we're talking about
Speaker 3: having some parties, but we're talking about drug use specifically
Speaker 3: what drugs were used.
Speaker 4: Maller had a habit he brought with him. He liked meth,
Speaker 4: he liked cocaine, and those were his two primary drugs,
Speaker 4: but he was also quite hooked on booze on mostly.
Speaker 3: Vodka, so was whatever whatever could get you through the night.
Speaker 3: And he was a serious drug user. Anyway, we're going
Speaker 3: to try to establish he was indeed. Yes, Now, just
Speaker 3: previous to May twenty seventh, two and seven, David Maler
Speaker 3: met with a business associate on May twenty third in
Speaker 3: Newport Beach. Maybe you can tell us what happened with
Speaker 3: this meeting and tell us about this meeting.
Speaker 4: Well, just a week before that meeting, Maler had met
Speaker 4: Kristin Baldwin. Let me just give you a little background
Speaker 4: how he met. When Maler came out to California, he
Speaker 4: was acting as a commodities trader, but he also wanted
Speaker 4: to get into some other industries and he was very
Speaker 4: interested in strippers and the porn industry, and he managed
Speaker 4: to make some contacts in that area. A rather well
Speaker 4: known porn actor at the time named Michael Coniuccente. His
Speaker 4: his performing name was Damian Michaels had met Maller and
Speaker 4: he somehow introduced him to Kristin Baldwin because Connoscenti had
Speaker 4: met her. I think in a restaurant, just in chatting up,
Speaker 4: and then they started dating a little bit. I don't
Speaker 4: know that Christen even knew that Michael Connocenti was a
Speaker 4: porn actor, but he introduced Kristin to Maller. They started dating.
Speaker 4: One weekend, Maller told Kristin, I have some business in
Speaker 4: Newport Beach and I would like to take you down
Speaker 4: there with me, and she had readily agreed. He had
Speaker 4: a brand new Jaguar and nice clothing and was spending
Speaker 4: quite a bit of money, and so she said sure,
Speaker 4: so she went along. The two of them went down
Speaker 4: there and they had a business meeting with one of
Speaker 4: the Maler's clients, and they were seen by the video cameras,
Speaker 4: the security cameras going into a very plush hotel down there,
Speaker 4: and that night there were some arguments in their room,
Speaker 4: and Maller in anger drove away and just deserted Kristin
Speaker 4: into the hotel. The next day she had to find
Speaker 4: some way back. Most people assumed that she took a
Speaker 4: taxi all the way from Newport Beach back to the
Speaker 4: San Fernando Valley, which would be at least a one
Speaker 4: hundred dollars taxi ride, right and then the next day
Speaker 4: then she called Maler and said she wanted her money
Speaker 4: back and she was going up to the house in
Speaker 4: the Hollywood Hills to see him.
Speaker 3: Okay, now, so what happened when she did get there?
Speaker 3: And at least and where was it? Was Donald at
Speaker 3: their president at that time.
Speaker 4: He was Kristin and Kristin and Maller. We were having
Speaker 4: a terrible argument about, probably about the money. No one knows,
Speaker 4: certainly they were arguing about. At one point, Mahler telephoned
Speaker 4: Donnie van de Velda in his bottom floor apartment and said,
Speaker 4: come on up here, I need your help. Van de
Speaker 4: Velda raced up some exterior stairs and went in and
Speaker 4: there was Kristin sitting on the floor crying where some
Speaker 4: wearing some flimsy shorts and a haltertop, crying and begging
Speaker 4: to leave. Maler is walking around wearing a white terry
Speaker 4: cloth robe taken from the Marriotte Hochel because they still
Speaker 4: has the label on it, and he's yelling and screaming
Speaker 4: and carrying on like a crazy man, according to Van Develda,
Speaker 4: And pretty soon he goes into close and comes out
Speaker 4: with a revolver. He puts one bullet into the chamber
Speaker 4: and spins it and starts clicking it at Kristin and
Speaker 4: at Donnie. Donnie said, the heck with this man, and
Speaker 4: he stepped out, and as he slammed the door closed,
Speaker 4: he heard the gun go off.
Speaker 3: So what did he do right after that?
Speaker 4: Well, Donnie raced down his apartment, just in fear and terror.
Speaker 4: He was just stunned and he didn't know whether she'd
Speaker 4: been hit or not. A few minutes later, he gets
Speaker 4: another call from Maller, come on up, I need your help.
Speaker 4: He goes out and he looks in and he sees her,
Speaker 4: her hand extending out from under a blanket. She's on
Speaker 4: the floor covered and she's quite still. Donnie is terrified.
Speaker 4: He's just struck dumb, and he says, I'm not helping you,
Speaker 4: and he left. A few minutes later, Karl Norvick was
Speaker 4: also summoned up to there, and he saw the body
Speaker 4: as well, and he was he was just shaking it.
Speaker 4: It's just just almost hysterical. He was so upset. He
Speaker 4: also refused to help mall Within said, well, I'll get
Speaker 4: someone else to help me get rid of this body.
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Speaker 4: But what he really did is go get in these
Speaker 4: Jaguar and drive to a hotel out near Lax where
Speaker 4: he met one of the most colorful characters in the
Speaker 4: whole book, a man we called Atticus Kings. Atticus is
Speaker 4: as a person who has procured hookers for Maler for
Speaker 4: months and months and brings them up to the mansion
Speaker 4: in his little van. And so Atticus met Maler. Now
Speaker 4: with a dead body of a young woman lying in
Speaker 4: that house. Maller and Atticus are partying at the hotel.
Speaker 4: He goes out and finds a hooker. They come in
Speaker 4: and they party all night long drinking and destroy a
Speaker 4: three thousand dollars television set and just have a great time.
Speaker 4: Just a stunning sequence of events considering that he had
Speaker 4: just killed a young woman.
Speaker 3: Now what does he talk about with Atticus Keene? What
Speaker 3: is he? What is he? Does he mention anything about Kristin?
Speaker 4: And all he does? He mentioned that there's a body
Speaker 4: he needs to get rid of, and Atticus says, man,
Speaker 4: I don't want anything to do with that. I'm not
Speaker 4: doing that. So one more of his Francis turned him down.
Speaker 4: He also made several phone calls to other men and
Speaker 4: they all turned him down.
Speaker 3: How many more people did he call asking for help
Speaker 3: in disposal.
Speaker 4: Well, no one knows for certain. We know that he
Speaker 4: called Michael Conocente for one, and Michael didn't wantnything to
Speaker 4: do with it, and probably one or two others. Finally,
Speaker 4: about the third day after he killed her, about midnight,
Speaker 4: his Jaguar is photographed by a security camera next door
Speaker 4: to the house in the Hills, and he pulls out
Speaker 4: and then backs into his garage and then pulls out
Speaker 4: again and is gone for several hours, just long enough.
Speaker 4: It was later determined too that he could have driven
Speaker 4: out to Barstow way out in the desert, over one
Speaker 4: hundred miles and back, and that's where two weeks later,
Speaker 4: Kristin Bowen's body was discovered.
Speaker 3: Okay, now tell us about the discovery of the body,
Speaker 3: and then I'm gain a little bit of the sequence
Speaker 3: of events. A little confused here, But is Kristin reported
Speaker 3: missing immediately? And if not, why not tell us what
Speaker 3: happened right after in terms of anyone realizing that she
Speaker 3: was in danger or missing. Tell us about that.
Speaker 4: Well, because Kristin had moved around to several various apartments
Speaker 4: and several jobs in the in the months prior to
Speaker 4: the murder. I shouldn't say murder because there was never
Speaker 4: a murder conviction. Next. Prior to the killing, she didn't
Speaker 4: have regular contact with a lot of people. She had
Speaker 4: a sister who lived in the area and they often
Speaker 4: talked by phone or by texting. And the sister hadn't
Speaker 4: heard from Kristin for nearly two weeks and she was
Speaker 4: getting a little nervous. But no, there was no no missing,
Speaker 4: no missing person's report, no indication or any crime at all.
Speaker 4: Until about two weeks after the killing. A woman was
Speaker 4: driving out in the desert. She crossed over this low
Speaker 4: bridge over a wash way out in the middle of nowhere,
Speaker 4: and a car came around a curve from the opposite
Speaker 4: direction nearly had a head on crash, but the young
Speaker 4: woman driving her pickup pulled over to the side of
Speaker 4: the road in time to avoid the crash. But she
Speaker 4: was stuck in the shoulder and she was frightened. We're
Speaker 4: out in the middle of this one hundred and five
Speaker 4: degree desert in the middle of the day, and she
Speaker 4: had no water and her cell phone wouldn't work. So
Speaker 4: she's sitting there, doesn't know what to do, and a
Speaker 4: couple of marines pull up behind her and offer to
Speaker 4: help her. They can't get her car unstuck, so they
Speaker 4: stepped down into that wash to get some rocks or
Speaker 4: sticks or something to put under her tires, and one
Speaker 4: of them spots the glint of a golden wristwatch sticking
Speaker 4: out from under the low bridge. He walks over and
Speaker 4: he finds a dead body, a desiccated, mummified He couldn't
Speaker 4: even tell the sex of the body, but they called
Speaker 4: the detective and now there's a homicide to be investigated.
Speaker 3: Now you talked about decomposed and this is important how
Speaker 3: you've described it. But how decomposed is this in terms
Speaker 3: of as far as the police are concerned or forensics
Speaker 3: are concerned.
Speaker 4: Well, the flesh is almost completely desiccated and dried and black.
Speaker 4: The clothing is almost in shreds. The face is just
Speaker 4: virtually a skull covered by black leather. But amazingly, when
Speaker 4: they took the body into the morgue for autopsy, through
Speaker 4: a new process, they were able to put some some
Speaker 4: material on her fingertips and draw draw up fingerprints, and
Speaker 4: that was that led to the identification of the body
Speaker 4: as Kristin Baldwin.
Speaker 3: They could tell through autopsy as well, maybe not the
Speaker 3: complete story, but they at least knew how she was killed,
Speaker 3: or at least tell us about that.
Speaker 4: What they did determine, well, Dan that wasn't even certain.
Speaker 4: There was some question later about one autopsy report said
Speaker 4: there was a hole in the chest, another said there
Speaker 4: was a hole in her head, and neither one were
Speaker 4: as absolutely conclusive as to what the cause of death was.
Speaker 4: But circumstantially it was later indicated that she was probably shot,
Speaker 4: either in the chest or the head.
Speaker 3: Now, the other thing for all those CSI bots out
Speaker 3: there and everybody talking about DNA in the last twenty years.
Speaker 3: This body, this corpse, did not provide a DNA sample.
Speaker 4: Know, there was no DNA available at all on her,
Speaker 4: and I'm not certain why. I've talked about that with
Speaker 4: several experts, and there may have just been failure to
Speaker 4: do the process correctly, because as you may know, the
Speaker 4: mumbified body of King Tut produced DNA. So it's mysterious
Speaker 4: why there was no DNA in this case. But there
Speaker 4: wasn't Perhaps it wasn't even necessary when they were able
Speaker 4: to identify her through fingerprints right right.
Speaker 3: And then later we'll talk about how they got around
Speaker 3: this DNA quite easily, and of course that's just a
Speaker 3: nature of DNA. Now, so what do the police know
Speaker 3: on June first? Tell us what happens on June first,
Speaker 3: and in terms of the police and what the police
Speaker 3: are toold.
Speaker 4: Well, Karl Norvik, who was one of the two who
Speaker 4: saw the body, worried about it for but two or
Speaker 4: three nights. He was just in agony. What shall I do?
Speaker 4: What shall I do? He was afraid of Marler because
Speaker 4: Marler was an extremely controlling and at times violent person,
Speaker 4: and he seemed to have a great deal of power
Speaker 4: he exerted over clients, friends, people, who was a powerful man,
Speaker 4: and Norwick was scared for his own life. It also
Speaker 4: would turn out later that Mahler had kind of pulled
Speaker 4: some shenanigans on Norwick, costing him a great deal of money.
Speaker 4: And Norwick's own mother had trusted Mahler to invest the
Speaker 4: money that cost her her home and her car later,
Speaker 4: so there were some stress. There was some stress between
Speaker 4: the two men. Norwick left the premises after he saw
Speaker 4: the body and went to another county. But finally, three
Speaker 4: nights later he decided I need to report this, and
Speaker 4: he called the police, and that said in motion, detectives
Speaker 4: going up to the house in the Hollywood Hills. But remember,
Speaker 4: now there's no body, there's no report of a missing person.
Speaker 4: There's nothing except this man calling and saying that he
Speaker 4: saw a woman who'd apparently been shot in Maller's bedroom.
Speaker 3: Now police able to get a warrant, and if they were,
Speaker 3: what did they find at the home.
Speaker 4: The police came out and about midnight after Narvik's called
Speaker 4: and three of the finest detectives I've ever met in
Speaker 4: my twenty years of writing, Detective Wendy Burnt, who was
Speaker 4: the supervisor. Detective Vicky Bynham was one of the two
Speaker 4: assigned the investigators, and Detective Tom Small. I just can't
Speaker 4: say enough about how terrific these three were in doing
Speaker 4: this case. But Wendy Burnt dispatched some night watch people
Speaker 4: out there first to the house, and they didn't have
Speaker 4: a warrant, but they did knock and the resident renter,
Speaker 4: Jeremy Moody, allowed them to come in. And as two
Speaker 4: or three uniformed officers went in, one of them glanced
Speaker 4: to a doorway to the left from the entry which
Speaker 4: led to a garage, and he spotted spots of blood
Speaker 4: on the floor of the garage. That led to a warrant.
Speaker 4: Then where they could search the place.
Speaker 3: Now, once they had that warrant and probable cause, what evidence,
Speaker 3: if any, was found in the house? I mean, do
Speaker 3: you think, obviously a person that's well accustomed or well
Speaker 3: versed in the law tell us what police did find,
Speaker 3: if anything, in terms of evidence. Once they did get
Speaker 3: that warrant for the home and fall.
Speaker 4: In bedroom, they found at first a lot of clean
Speaker 4: up material, but the place was a horrid mess. The
Speaker 4: guy was not a good housekeeper and apparently didn't hire
Speaker 4: anyone to do that. There were a lot of cleaning material,
Speaker 4: and of course an experienced detective could see, oh, there's
Speaker 4: a crime scene and somebody's been time to clean it up.
Speaker 4: So that inspired them to begin looking at the carpets,
Speaker 4: and they began to see that there was a blood
Speaker 4: underneath the carpet. Now, meanwhile, one of the officers went
Speaker 4: downstairs to the renter's rooms. Jeremy Moody, his girlfriend had
Speaker 4: been spending the night, and they knocked the door, and
Speaker 4: knocked on the door and allowed her to get dressed
Speaker 4: and went into the room. One of them just happened
Speaker 4: to glance into a closet and in the top of
Speaker 4: the closet in a shelf, he thought he saw something move,
Speaker 4: and he did. He looked up there and pulled some
Speaker 4: things aside, and there was David Maller up there in
Speaker 4: a fetal position of the top of the closet, hiding.
Speaker 3: And so how did they proceed from there? Well? What did?
Speaker 3: What did? What was David Maler's state at that time,
Speaker 3: just his psychological state once he was hiding in there
Speaker 3: and was caught.
Speaker 4: Marler had this wonderful excuse. He told him, Oh, you know,
Speaker 4: I heard some noises and people were hitting on my
Speaker 4: door at night. I didn't know what it was, and I,
Speaker 4: you know, I have some a lot of clients who
Speaker 4: may not like me very much, and I was afraid.
Speaker 4: So that's why I was hiding in the closet. I
Speaker 4: didn't know what was going on. But when they talked
Speaker 4: to Donnie van Dervelda down in the bottom apartment, Donnie
Speaker 4: was shaky and frightened and he had a hard time
Speaker 4: expressing himself in clear terms. But he also mentioned having
Speaker 4: seen David Mahler with that gun. So David Maler under warrant,
Speaker 4: is arrested and Moody and Donnie van Dervelda are transported
Speaker 4: to the famous Hollywood Police Station Detective Bureau for investigation
Speaker 4: and questioning. You know, Joseph Wamba has made that Hollywood
Speaker 4: Police Station world famous because not only did he write
Speaker 4: a couple of nonfiction books, but he wrote several fiction
Speaker 4: books all centered in the famous Hollywood Police Station. It
Speaker 4: was fun for my co author and me to go
Speaker 4: and get the tour of the detective Bureau there.
Speaker 3: Wow, that must have been fun. Yeah, probably breathe oozes
Speaker 3: in breeze crime that place.
Speaker 4: It does it? Does it? Just there's just so much
Speaker 4: history there. The famous Onion Feel killing was you know
Speaker 4: that was that was the center of that place.
Speaker 3: Mm hmm, absolutely a true crime classic. Now, how does
Speaker 3: the how how does the interrogation go? Tell us who
Speaker 3: police concentrate on. Obviously they've got Donnie's testimony, but uh
Speaker 3: and and of course he what does he tell police?
Speaker 3: And how do they proceed with David Maler once they
Speaker 3: have this information? Obviously they're speaking to Donnie for first
Speaker 3: and foremost, and obviously right from the beginning, David Maler
Speaker 3: is trying to and concocting his version of the story.
Speaker 3: So tell us what police were able to determine from
Speaker 3: uh Don's testimony?
Speaker 4: Or they learned a little bit from Jeremy Moody first,
Speaker 4: the tenant, and he told him a little bit that
Speaker 4: he knew about so he didn't know anything about the killing yet.
Speaker 4: But Donnie, of course had been almost an eyewitness and
Speaker 4: he I think my readers of this book, Date with
Speaker 4: the Devil are going to enjoy Donnie's interview. Donnie is
Speaker 4: like an out of control machine gun speaking or I
Speaker 4: think I compared him to a fire hose, a loose
Speaker 4: fire hose. He just talks in incomplete sentences and just
Speaker 4: spraying from right to left, and the detectives had such
Speaker 4: a hard time getting him to put any kind of
Speaker 4: an understandable story together. It's humorous in a way, but
Speaker 4: it's also tragic in a way. But Donnie provided some
Speaker 4: excellent information for them, and of course that caused the
Speaker 4: detective to zero in on David Maller as the person
Speaker 4: who caused Kristen's death. So now David's been sitting in
Speaker 4: the sale for several hours waiting for his turn. But
Speaker 4: he's so confident. He's an attorney, he knows he can
Speaker 4: outwit these two amateurs, these two detectives, what do they know.
Speaker 4: I'm a I'm a sharp guy. They can't pin anything
Speaker 4: on me. So Vicky buying him and Tom Small put
Speaker 4: him in a little interview room and they start talking.
Speaker 4: And as I said, these are two of the smoothest
Speaker 4: detectives I've ever met. They don't use good cop, bad cop,
Speaker 4: but Tom is a powerful force when you speak to him,
Speaker 4: and Vicky is such a sweet, gentle, little motherly type person,
Speaker 4: and they use this to just wonderful effect. And gradually,
Speaker 4: very gradually, they start getting admissions, little comments here and there, Ballard.
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Speaker 4: Dropping In a nine hour interview Dan, they finally got
Speaker 4: this guy saying, well, maybe, if you if you can,
Speaker 4: if you can promise me this or promise me that,
Speaker 4: promise me that I can go home tonight, maybe I
Speaker 4: can tell you where the body might be. I have
Speaker 4: sources that might know that. What else might you give us? Well,
Speaker 4: if you promise me this or promise me that, I
Speaker 4: might be able to tell you where the gun wound
Speaker 4: up in a trash ban on on Sunset Plaza Drive.
Speaker 4: They they got this guy spilling the beams all over
Speaker 4: himself and he's a he's a he's a professional lawyer
Speaker 4: who knows how to with them, and they just beat
Speaker 4: him to a ball with all that.
Speaker 3: At the same time, though, he is intimating, very highly
Speaker 3: intimating that that Kristen is alive.
Speaker 4: Is that'scre Yeah, he's he's suggesting that. He didn't say body,
Speaker 4: He said I know where she can be found, and
Speaker 4: he did name the desert. He said out near Barstow.
Speaker 4: And he finally admitted that he had taken her out there,
Speaker 4: but she was she was she was maybe not feeling well,
Speaker 4: maybe not in perfect condition, but he left her in
Speaker 4: front of a hospital.
Speaker 3: Out there, yeah, equivalent to a hospital.
Speaker 4: Yeah, right.
Speaker 3: So so basically he believes in is deluded still, you know,
Speaker 3: feeling the effects of all this cocaine and crystal math.
Speaker 3: And when you talked about Donnie's disjointed rant to police,
Speaker 3: he was just dying to confess. But the thing was
Speaker 3: he was tripping over himself to do it. Is that
Speaker 3: he had been doing lines with Kristin as well, so
Speaker 3: he was indulging in the crystal math as well, wasn't he.
Speaker 4: Yeah, well, yeah, he he. Here's many people in the
Speaker 4: in the music business. He imbibed once in a while
Speaker 4: in a little short or a little injection, I think,
Speaker 4: But he wasn't. I don't think he was a drug addict.
Speaker 4: I think he was a tweaker.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but it does explain part of that testimony that
Speaker 3: you know, hard to make sense of it.
Speaker 4: So that's right, state.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Okay, So now we have David basically boxing himself
Speaker 3: into a corner. You're seeing. It's quite hilarious actually in
Speaker 3: some regards. What do police do as as a result
Speaker 3: of this information, where do they go next?
Speaker 4: Well, next, they arrest him, in charge him with the murder.
Speaker 4: But you know, remember now they don't have a body yet,
Speaker 4: but they rest him on suspicion of maybe kidnapping or
Speaker 4: something of that effect, just so they can hold him,
Speaker 4: so the body doesn't turn that then until almost two
Speaker 4: weeks after her death, when when they it's discovered out
Speaker 4: in the desert. Now the investigators can move forward with
Speaker 4: a homicide case.
Speaker 3: Now, how does how does the prosecution decide to try
Speaker 3: this case? And then before we talk about how the
Speaker 3: defense lines this up, but tell us about what the
Speaker 3: prosecution thinks that they have in terms of evidence in
Speaker 3: how they're going to proceed with this case, and obviously
Speaker 3: who are their likely witnesses for their theory on the
Speaker 3: motive and why this all happened and who did it.
Speaker 4: Well, evidence is very scarce in this case. As I said,
Speaker 4: the autopsy was a little vague about the actual cause
Speaker 4: of death, and the gun was ever found, although Mahler
Speaker 4: said it would be in a trash barrel. Apparently the
Speaker 4: trash barrel had been emptied and they never found, so
Speaker 4: the evidence was pretty sparse here. So the prosecutor moves forward.
Speaker 4: Bobby Grace, one of the best prosecutors in the Los
Speaker 4: Angeles County District Attorney's office, took on the case, and
Speaker 4: they wrestled with what the charge should be, and finally
Speaker 4: they went for second degree murder because even with Donny
Speaker 4: van de Velda's statement, they realized that Mahler was probably
Speaker 4: under the influence of drugs, was acting crazy, and would
Speaker 4: probably present some kind of a defense in which he
Speaker 4: wasn't really responsible due to his mental condition. And that's
Speaker 4: exactly what happened.
Speaker 3: Later, right, Yeah, very interesting, you know, so they they
Speaker 3: have do they believe they have more than a circumstantial
Speaker 3: case though in terms of the evidence, because they have
Speaker 3: by this time where at some point, by the time
Speaker 3: the trial happens, they have evidence of him asking to
Speaker 3: dispose of a body, they have that type of evidence.
Speaker 3: Does that type evidence survive for the trial though?
Speaker 4: That yes, that that will that You're correct, they did
Speaker 4: have that evidence of Donnie's having having seen him pointing
Speaker 4: the gun, his own admission that he took her out
Speaker 4: to the desert. And but these are all circumstantial. And
Speaker 4: I you, I attended the entire trial, and I was
Speaker 4: in the defense attorney put on a great case, presenting
Speaker 4: experts on bipolar disorder, and it certainly appeared to me
Speaker 4: that that jury might very well even come up with
Speaker 4: a verdict of involuntary manslaughter, in which Muller would have
Speaker 4: walked out of there a free man, just on time
Speaker 4: served while waiting for the trial. And I think it
Speaker 4: was very touch and go all the way what kind
Speaker 4: of a verdict they would come up with with the
Speaker 4: skimpy evidence and the mental disability case.
Speaker 3: It was very interesting. I'd like to, you know, actually
Speaker 3: check out sort of the background on that that the
Speaker 3: psychiatrist that did testify for the defense, because his testimony
Speaker 3: fit almost note for note or piece by peace, basically
Speaker 3: Don van Dervelda's testimony, so that it fit it said, well,
Speaker 3: this created this and this is manic. This is what
Speaker 3: happens with the manic mind, and this is what this
Speaker 3: drug does, and this is this is what this person
Speaker 3: people have been known to be manic will do, which
Speaker 3: fit exactly the description of Mahler's erratic behavior. So explain
Speaker 3: a little bit about that, because I agree with you there.
Speaker 3: He was a game changer in terms of his testimony
Speaker 3: was quite strong. He made some points that, like you say,
Speaker 3: it would be somewhat convincing to a jury at least,
Speaker 3: and all you're looking for is one jurors to get
Speaker 3: this reasonable doubt. So tell us a little bit more
Speaker 3: about that, because I think that was part of a
Speaker 3: very smart defense strategy.
Speaker 4: It was. It was an excellent defense strategy. Mister Young,
Speaker 4: the defender had a down pat and he presented a
Speaker 4: great case to that jury that this is definitely bipolar disorder.
Speaker 4: This man didn't have any idea what he was doing
Speaker 4: at the time. His temper was was flaring. Donald van
Speaker 4: de Velda's own testimony supported that. And he's he's spinning
Speaker 4: a gun, he's walking around with that. He's naked except
Speaker 4: for his robe which is open, and he's running around
Speaker 4: there like a crazy man, scaring the heck out of Vandevelda.
Speaker 4: And it appeared to me that they had a very good,
Speaker 4: strong defense case. Now they were hoping desperately that Atticus
Speaker 4: King during that episode at the hotel would show that
Speaker 4: Maller was very well within his right mind. He drove
Speaker 4: over there, he was, he was calm by the time
Speaker 4: he got to the hotel. He's uh, he's he's partying
Speaker 4: with the hooker. He's he's uh, he's buying all this
Speaker 4: great expensive booze and they're having a wonderful time. They
Speaker 4: get drunk and blake break a TV. But but let
Speaker 4: me tell you something, Atticus King was, He was the best.
Speaker 4: Was one of the most colorful witnes as I've ever seen. Atticus,
Speaker 4: with probably not even a high school education, completely baffled
Speaker 4: both the prosecutor and the defense attorney. He would not
Speaker 4: answer a question directly, no, no matter how now they
Speaker 4: rephrase it over and over. Even the judge Dan was
Speaker 4: sitting there covering his mouth trying not to laugh at
Speaker 4: Atticus King's testimony. It was hilarious. This guy is, he's rotund,
Speaker 4: he's he likes to wear these flashy white or bright
Speaker 4: red jumpsuits. And he came in. I described him like
Speaker 4: a wrestling star coming into the arena with the spotlight on.
Speaker 4: When he walked into the courtroom and he sat in
Speaker 4: that witness chair and he gave them no one any
Speaker 4: useful information. He was beautiful.
Speaker 3: Yeah, need to very much enjoy himself as well.
Speaker 4: He did. Yeah, he's a character. And that's what Ron Bowers,
Speaker 4: my couth and I have said that this book has
Speaker 4: the best cast of characters and his cass in Hollywood,
Speaker 4: of course, of any book we worked all together. But
Speaker 4: back to the trial, So Atticus didn't help. The defense
Speaker 4: attorney put on the experts to show the bipolar disorder.
Speaker 4: But somehow, somehow, that jury saw through all that and
Speaker 4: they knew that this attorney, maybe perhaps by his own behavior,
Speaker 4: sitting sitting on the prosecution or the defense table, this
Speaker 4: guy looked arrogant and was smirking and being defensive and
Speaker 4: trying to argue with the judge. And at one point
Speaker 4: he was very out of order and had to be handcuffed,
Speaker 4: and usual, you know, he's wearing a suit, and usually
Speaker 4: defendants for a murder are not, or even manslaughter are
Speaker 4: not handcuffed in front of the jury. But his behavior
Speaker 4: and maybe Maler was trying to prove just how to
Speaker 4: vout of control he is. But the jury saw through
Speaker 4: that and eventually came back with a second degree murder conviction.
Speaker 4: But that wasn't the end of the story.
Speaker 3: Dan, now tell us what happened obviously the appeal process
Speaker 3: as for any person's right, but especially a person that
Speaker 3: did fairly well at trial despite this verdict and has
Speaker 3: the means or would have the means, especially one way
Speaker 3: or another a lawyer would take this because of the
Speaker 3: high profile nature of this. And maybe you can tell
Speaker 3: us how big the coverage was of this as well,
Speaker 3: because I think this is, like you said, has had
Speaker 3: all those elements. How big was this story in terms
Speaker 3: for the media?
Speaker 4: You know, ordinarily this would have been all over the
Speaker 4: headbines and the television show that it got very little
Speaker 4: coverage even despite the color of the story and they
Speaker 4: explosiveness of it, because unfortunately Phil Spector was being tried
Speaker 4: at the same time for a very very similar murder.
Speaker 4: Those crime boffs who know about Phil Spector, the famous
Speaker 4: music king in Los Angeles, who took Lana Clerkson up
Speaker 4: to his matsion got angry and produced a gun and
Speaker 4: started waving at her and pulling the trigger and killed her.
Speaker 4: And that's almost precisely what David Maller did to Kristin Baldwin.
Speaker 4: So to two murders. But of course Phil Spector had
Speaker 4: all this notoriety, and he's famous, world famous, and he's
Speaker 4: in the music business. So the news media were only
Speaker 4: interested in Phil during that time and then also during
Speaker 4: during the during the Mahler trial, interestingly enough, was one
Speaker 4: of the biggest forest fires in Los Angeles history. It
Speaker 4: covered exactly the span of the trial and burned, you know,
Speaker 4: thousands of acres and the hills just above Los Angeles.
Speaker 4: So the media was focused on that, so our story
Speaker 4: didn't get a whole lot of media coverage.
Speaker 3: Yeah, now back to the appeal process. Obviously, as per right,
Speaker 3: they have the right to appeal. On what grounds did
Speaker 3: they appeal and were they successful? And tell us about that.
Speaker 4: You know, Ron Bauers and I were a little mystified
Speaker 4: because we knew that Moller missed the six month deadline
Speaker 4: for lodging an appeal, so in September last year, we
Speaker 4: were both stunned when we found that an appeals court
Speaker 4: had overturned the verdict and the sentence of course, and
Speaker 4: that the whole process was going to have to start over.
Speaker 4: The appeals court found some extremely rare of technicality in
Speaker 4: the jury instructions the judge had given in defining what
Speaker 4: second degree murder is, and it had nothing to do
Speaker 4: with whether Maller did it or not. But it's some little, little,
Speaker 4: tiny technicality that the appeals court decided to carried weight
Speaker 4: and they overturned the whole thing. And so the book
Speaker 4: was scheduled to come out and last November, but I
Speaker 4: as soon as I heard in septemb member of the
Speaker 4: overturned verdict contacted the publisher and they push it out
Speaker 4: to this June. Now we thought, oh my gosh, can
Speaker 4: the book ever come out? Because this could take two
Speaker 4: or three years to get this guy retried again. The
Speaker 4: legal process is so slow, but remarkably incredibly in my view,
Speaker 4: last February, Maller when they were starting to have hearings
Speaker 4: to have a new trial Maler stood up and decided
Speaker 4: to plead guilty to voluntary manslaughter. Rather than face the
Speaker 4: possibility of maybe first degree murder or second degree murder
Speaker 4: again with a virtual life sentence, he decided to accept
Speaker 4: a twenty year sentence for voluntary manslaughter. And I was
Speaker 4: a pretty happy guy because I call the publisher and said, Okay,
Speaker 4: we're back in business. Hope we can bring our book
Speaker 4: out in June.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I know that feeling. The book I was doing
Speaker 3: was delayed at the last minute for two and a
Speaker 3: half years, so it was like, Okay, that was a
Speaker 3: long wait. So yeah, yeah, Now voluntary manslaughter versus second
Speaker 3: degree murder, maybe you'll have to tell me how you
Speaker 3: second degree murder is a little bit different in Canada
Speaker 3: where I am. Second murder is anywhere from the possibility
Speaker 3: of parole of ten year minimum before you're eligible for
Speaker 3: a parole to twenty five years and that's that's life.
Speaker 3: And usually people do not spend the rest of their
Speaker 3: lives on either first degree, but especially second degree murder convictions.
Speaker 3: Now you say voluntary manslaughter, why would he take that
Speaker 3: deal as opposed to the second degree of second degree conviction?
Speaker 3: Tell us what the second conviction would mean in real terms,
Speaker 3: in typically what would happen with a person like David
Speaker 3: Maler and what was the deal that he got, and
Speaker 3: what in voluntary manslaughter in terms of how much time
Speaker 3: you'll actually do, what would that actually be?
Speaker 4: Well, the original second degree murder conviction with some added
Speaker 4: specifics like use of a weapon, threatening a weapon, of
Speaker 4: assault with a weapon, of use of a gun. Those
Speaker 4: are enhancements to the sentence that made it over forty years.
Speaker 4: Originally he'd been serving over forty years, but by coming
Speaker 4: back and pleading guilty to voluntary manslaughter, the basic sentence
Speaker 4: I believe is fifteen years plus the enhancements which make
Speaker 4: it twenty. Now it's a little uncertain as to whether
Speaker 4: he will be eligible for parole or not. I think
Speaker 4: that's still yet to be decided, but the opinions are
Speaker 4: that he will have to serve about at least eighty
Speaker 4: percent of that term before he can come up for parole.
Speaker 4: And knowing Mahler, with his behavior and his aggressiveness and
Speaker 4: his need to control everything, he will not be an
Speaker 4: ideal prisoner inmates, So he's probably in a service full
Speaker 4: twenty and he's I think about forty five years old now,
Speaker 4: so he's going to be in there for a while.
Speaker 3: What was I going to ask as well too, in
Speaker 3: terms of how much time did he he was He
Speaker 3: was refused bail obviously most people are in murder cases.
Speaker 3: But how he was in prison since two and seven.
Speaker 4: So this this took place in May of May of
Speaker 4: two thousand and seven, and the trial was September two
Speaker 4: thousand and nine, so he.
Speaker 3: Has also had the additional time of in prison already,
Speaker 3: so we can add that. So he got a pretty
Speaker 3: decent sentence despite the plea agreement.
Speaker 4: Which he did, but that time served between the time
Speaker 4: he was arrested and the time of the trial was
Speaker 4: two years. And that's why many people were sitting there
Speaker 4: nervously thinking, if the jury comes back with just a
Speaker 4: manslaughter conviction or involuntary manslaughter, even he might have walked
Speaker 4: out of that after that first trial if that's what
Speaker 4: the jury had decided. But they were pretty bright and
Speaker 4: pretty wise when they came back with probably what was
Speaker 4: the correct verdict.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it was interesting to see. The difference is because
Speaker 3: we've probably discussed this before, or at least you may
Speaker 3: I have discussed this before on this program. That there
Speaker 3: is that difference. The same evidence that I heard at
Speaker 3: that trial would have made would have given him one
Speaker 3: way or another, through a plea agreement or through trial
Speaker 3: a manslaughter. And we don't have the specifics that you
Speaker 3: have the first degrees or those type of determinations. It's
Speaker 3: just a manslaughter. So but with manslaughter at that time,
Speaker 3: he would have had credit for the pre trial custody.
Speaker 3: At one time he would add double credit for that
Speaker 3: pre trial custody. And typically manslaughter sentences were around the
Speaker 3: range of ten years, and we automatically have a two
Speaker 3: thirds of a sentence before a mandatory parole, so like
Speaker 3: good behavior, so we're talking about a pretty short sentence
Speaker 3: if a person was convicted, and in our courts, typically
Speaker 3: what this person, David Maler did would be considered insanity.
Speaker 3: There would have been no bonus sentencing for those other
Speaker 3: crimes that would have been concurrent, and so it would
Speaker 3: have been a different outcome. I've been looking at a
Speaker 3: completely different outcome for the same So that's what it
Speaker 3: was very interesting to me to see the same kinds
Speaker 3: of things that I do here we do here for
Speaker 3: the defense of psychiatrists get up and it's almost seems
Speaker 3: tailor made to the testimony that they are facing, and
Speaker 3: then they're fitting that psychiatric testimony. It's very interesting to
Speaker 3: hear that and do not go ahead.
Speaker 4: I'm sorry, go ahead. I was just going to say it.
Speaker 4: It was just a fascinating case and it was just
Speaker 4: I was on the edge of my seat that whole trial,
Speaker 4: just trying to see which way it was going to go,
Speaker 4: one way or the other, and trying to you know,
Speaker 4: have you noticed I don't know if you have many
Speaker 4: trials you sat through, Dan, but everyone thinks you can.
Speaker 4: You can look at a jury and try to guess
Speaker 4: where they're going, And my experience is that's totally impossible.
Speaker 4: Jurors somehow automatically when they sit and then those chairs
Speaker 4: up there, have that ability to put on these impassive
Speaker 4: masks of faces and betray nothing. It's amazing how they
Speaker 4: can do that.
Speaker 3: Well, all I know is that I've really only attended
Speaker 3: to murder trials, but the one murder trial that I
Speaker 3: paid any kind of it, and I wasn't watching the
Speaker 3: jurors constantly. But when you do mention that I have,
Speaker 3: you could not tell what was going on at all,
Speaker 3: especially the evidence that these people had to look at
Speaker 3: and hear, you know, and I have seen I won't
Speaker 3: say which trial, but people sleeping at the trial, so
Speaker 3: you know' not compelling. It's not compelling to everybody because
Speaker 3: there is so much, you know, for every not for everybody.
Speaker 3: Is it is fascinating. I think people lose. I think
Speaker 3: the more you know, the more interesting it is. And
Speaker 3: this I think the true crime reader is one of
Speaker 3: those very knowledgeable people, whether they've been at a murder
Speaker 3: trial or not. Great authors like yourself have brought the
Speaker 3: trial to these people we want.
Speaker 4: But there's one point in this case that I could
Speaker 4: I could see the emotion on every juror's face, and
Speaker 4: it was this moment during the victim impact statements before
Speaker 4: the sentencing. Kristen's sister, Robin, walked in there and she
Speaker 4: was carrying a little what looked like a little wooden
Speaker 4: jewelry case or something like a little cask, and she
Speaker 4: walked up to the lectern and she stood there for
Speaker 4: a moment and she put that little cast down on
Speaker 4: the lectern and she looked at the juror and she said,
Speaker 4: this is my sister. And she was carrying the ashes
Speaker 4: of Kristen in that box. And I tell you, every
Speaker 4: person in that courtroom had goosebumps on their arms, and
Speaker 4: I could see the tears welling and the jurors' faces.
Speaker 4: And she spoke of her loving relationship with Kristen and
Speaker 4: how they'd been so close, and now this is all
Speaker 4: this left. This is my sister.
Speaker 3: What was the composition of the jury in terms of
Speaker 3: male female?
Speaker 4: And sort of roughly, but I think it was about
Speaker 4: seven women and five men, if I remember. I may
Speaker 4: be wrong on that. I've forgotten. I've seen so many
Speaker 4: jurors and I believe that's close.
Speaker 3: Right, And so finally they got when was this trial? Finally?
Speaker 3: Was it? You say, two thousand and eleven? Was this
Speaker 3: finally dealt with?
Speaker 4: And no, September two thousand and nine was the trial
Speaker 4: three years?
Speaker 1: No?
Speaker 3: No, no, But in terms of all the appeals and everything,
Speaker 3: Oh well.
Speaker 4: The appeal was just last. The overturn was just last
Speaker 4: September twenty eleven. Yeah, right, right, And then it was
Speaker 4: just what four months ago, five months ago that he
Speaker 4: four months ago that he decided to cop a deal.
Speaker 3: And it was interesting that you just got the email,
Speaker 3: you say, not that just a few months ago from
Speaker 3: someone that grew up with David Maler.
Speaker 4: It was a person very very close to him during
Speaker 4: his childhood who knew all about him, and this person
Speaker 4: has since since. I was amazed because when I was
Speaker 4: when I first received the email, I thought this person
Speaker 4: was going to excoriate me for not being fair with
Speaker 4: a person that they knew so well, poor David. But
Speaker 4: as it turned out, this individual wanted to reveal just
Speaker 4: how bad David was. And this individual has since sent
Speaker 4: me fifty typed pages of great detail about his childhood
Speaker 4: and some of the things that were going on in
Speaker 4: his family life.
Speaker 3: Well, well, whenever you do the follow up, so you
Speaker 3: have all this other incredible. That is amazing. How you
Speaker 3: were in every you are in every camp in this.
Speaker 3: You know, you're at the trial, You're getting personal messages
Speaker 3: from people that knew David Maler. Are you speaking to
Speaker 3: all these People's incredible to be in the midst of
Speaker 3: all of this, and you're tell us a little bit
Speaker 3: about your partner, Ronald Bauers, too, the gentleman that you
Speaker 3: have as your co author. Tell us a little bit
Speaker 3: of our audience, a little bit about his contribution and
Speaker 3: who he is.
Speaker 4: Ron is an extremely valuable collaborator. We've worked on four
Speaker 4: books together. Ron is a forty year veteran of the
Speaker 4: Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office. The last ten or
Speaker 4: fifteen he was the person who prepared audio visuals for
Speaker 4: all of their trials, all of the murder trials, and
Speaker 4: he has wonderful files of everything we're thinking about right now.
Speaker 4: Putting together a book of an illustrated book with photographs
Speaker 4: of a crime history of notorious crimes in Hollywood and
Speaker 4: Los Angeles is right now. Ron's on one of his
Speaker 4: sixth crews as a lecturer aboard the cruise ships telling
Speaker 4: about Hollywood crimes, and the audiences, mostly Australian and British,
Speaker 4: absolutely love it. Yeah, they're just fascinating, fascinated by it,
Speaker 4: and they know more about it than most Americans. For
Speaker 4: some reason, I'm always very complimented when Ron says don
Speaker 4: when I mentioned your name, a lot of them say,
Speaker 4: oh yeah, yeah, I know Tom Lassiter's books. That's a
Speaker 4: nice feeling from British and Australian people.
Speaker 3: Well, I get a lot of fan mail from Australia
Speaker 3: and some from England and as far away to Sweden.
Speaker 3: A lot of course from America, but quite a few
Speaker 3: people are tuned in from Australia and then they keep
Speaker 3: telling me, well, could you do some stories from Australia,
Speaker 3: And I said, well, you know this. The fact of
Speaker 3: the matter is is that some of these cases are
Speaker 3: a little bit older, and I give them the heads
Speaker 3: up on busy guys like yourself not being so eager
Speaker 3: to revisit, you know, crimes twenty years in the past.
Speaker 3: But at the same time I recognize that Australia and
Speaker 3: England have you know, illustrious true crime histories very much.
Speaker 3: America is not the only place hotbed of true crime activity.
Speaker 3: There are other places where there are a lot of
Speaker 3: authors and a lot of amazing and crazy stories as
Speaker 3: well too.
Speaker 4: Ron Danny is still there.
Speaker 3: Yes, I am sorry.
Speaker 4: You're fading way out on my phone here, so I
Speaker 4: don't know if I'm going on battery here. I guess
Speaker 4: we're getting pretty close to the end of our hour. Anyway,
Speaker 4: let me put in a quick plug. I would hope
Speaker 4: people might go to my website Don Lesster dot com
Speaker 4: and check out some of my other books. One of
Speaker 4: them Your Canada was very involved. One of our emotion
Speaker 4: notroyous killers was Charles ng who escaped to Canada, and
Speaker 4: there was quite a controversy to get him returned to
Speaker 4: California for trial. Your Supreme Court finally had to make
Speaker 4: that decision.
Speaker 3: Yeah, this amazing story. That's the first interview that I
Speaker 3: did with you, don and my introduction to your writing.
Speaker 3: And what a heck of an introduction to And that's
Speaker 3: tell our audience what that book is called.
Speaker 4: It's Die for Me, and it's about Charles Ing and
Speaker 4: Leonard Lake who killed anywhere from maybe twenty to forty
Speaker 4: five people up in the Gold Country of the Foothills
Speaker 4: in California. And Lake committed suicide and Charles Ing was
Speaker 4: tried and he's on death row now in California.
Speaker 3: Yes, this is an amazing story. Now tell us how
Speaker 3: many true crime books you do have, and tell us
Speaker 3: what your next project is. And yeah, tell us what
Speaker 3: your next true crime project will be.
Speaker 4: Well, I'm looking at that right now. And as I said,
Speaker 4: Ron and I are considering an illustrated book of crime
Speaker 4: history here. I'm also even considered a book from the
Speaker 4: individual who contacted me about David Mother's background, But those
Speaker 4: are kind of open right now, and I haven't pinned
Speaker 4: down another true crime story yet. But I know, I've
Speaker 4: written twenty books and I think, let's see, seventeen of
Speaker 4: my guests are true crime, and you're.
Speaker 3: With most of a lot of those books are with
Speaker 3: Kensington Press, and that's Pinnacle True Crime imprint.
Speaker 1: That's right.
Speaker 4: The imprint is Pinnacle and MICHAELA. Hamilton, the editor in
Speaker 4: chief there are just one of the greatest people in
Speaker 4: the world to work with. She's been my editor for
Speaker 4: several years and I just think the world of Michael.
Speaker 3: Yeah, she seems great. And you know the thing is
Speaker 3: when I know that when I first start looking seriously
Speaker 3: at true crime, just you know, as part of the
Speaker 3: research for my own book and just readly. I mean
Speaker 3: i'd read true crime, but obviously I got much more
Speaker 3: immersed about two thousand and four and I start seeing
Speaker 3: the names that everyone sees in true crime, the big
Speaker 3: names like yourself, and then i'd see the imprint Pinnacle
Speaker 3: and even Killer Clown, the John Wayne Gacy story from
Speaker 3: nineteen eighty three, believe was Pinnacle, and I was I
Speaker 3: was surprised. And then I started seeing night Stalker with
Speaker 3: with Philip Carlo, and you know, it's amazing the rise
Speaker 3: of the Pinnacle and just in the last few years
Speaker 3: to be really the top dog in true crime if
Speaker 3: you're looking for those kinds of stories. There are obviously
Speaker 3: other people in true crime, other you know, companies, but
Speaker 3: Pinnacle seems to not shy away from any story. And
Speaker 3: and then that and in that as well, it seems
Speaker 3: that a lot of really great authors have gravitated towards Pinnacle,
Speaker 3: and Pinnacle really, like I say, is a top dog
Speaker 3: in true crime and uh and puts up good, great
Speaker 3: books all the time.
Speaker 4: So they are by the way, I got just an email,
Speaker 4: just just an hour ago, I got an email that
Speaker 4: I will be doing a documentary about Date with the
Speaker 4: Devil for television and that's that'll be my twelfth TV documentary.
Speaker 3: Well when what will that be aired on? Do you know?
Speaker 4: Asy on the I D channel, the Investigation Discovery Channel.
Speaker 4: But we haven't started taping. Yeah, so it'll probably be
Speaker 4: later this year.
Speaker 3: Well, congratulations on that. I look forward to seeing that.
Speaker 3: I love that channel.
Speaker 4: Thank you. I do too. They say they all true
Speaker 4: crime fans that know the ID channel, I think, Dan.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And the thing is too, is they
Speaker 3: don't just cover American crimes. You see Canadian crimes of
Speaker 3: merit in Australian I've seen from all over the world.
Speaker 3: And yeah, if you if you love true crime, boy,
Speaker 3: I just plunk yourself in front of the TV set
Speaker 3: there and you'll get your filth, no doubt about it.
Speaker 3: But there's so many other programs too, Oprah Winfrey Network.
Speaker 3: I see there's you know, true crime is slowly I think,
Speaker 3: gaining in prominence again as it was once. You know,
Speaker 3: it was a lot of great authors wrote a lot
Speaker 3: of really big and important books in true crime, and
Speaker 3: I think people have forgotten. Sometimes when I hear people
Speaker 3: say I don't really read true crime, they say, well,
Speaker 3: I haven't read true crime, and I say, you know what,
Speaker 3: You've got to remember it is history as well, so
Speaker 3: it's just that strange history as all.
Speaker 4: It is.
Speaker 3: Well done. Well, Don, I want to thank you very
Speaker 3: much for coming on the program and talking about your
Speaker 3: latest date with the Devil. Thank you very much for
Speaker 3: this interview. I hope you have a good evening.
Speaker 4: It was my privilege, Dan, and thank you very much.
Speaker 4: You have a good evening too.
Speaker 3: Thank you very much, Don. Good night, good night.