1 00:00:00,120 --> 00:00:02,879 Speaker 1: Imagine for a second moving to a brand new. 2 00:00:02,720 --> 00:00:05,040 Speaker 2: City, right, like, just a totally fresh start. 3 00:00:05,160 --> 00:00:08,960 Speaker 1: Exactly, you are nineteen years old, and you are absolutely 4 00:00:09,000 --> 00:00:13,519 buzzing with that very specific kind of electric hope that 5 00:00:13,599 --> 00:00:16,160 you only really get when your entire adult life is 6 00:00:16,320 --> 00:00:17,800 just this big blank canvas. 7 00:00:17,879 --> 00:00:19,879 Speaker 2: Oh yeah, that feeling of invincibility. 8 00:00:20,120 --> 00:00:22,600 Speaker 1: Right, So you unpack your bags, you look out the 9 00:00:22,600 --> 00:00:25,600 window at the skyline, and you are completely ready to 10 00:00:25,600 --> 00:00:29,920 conquer the world. But instead of starting this grand new chapter, 11 00:00:30,079 --> 00:00:32,399 you actually become a victim on your very second day 12 00:00:32,439 --> 00:00:32,799 in town. 13 00:00:33,560 --> 00:00:36,240 Speaker 2: It's just it's unimaginable, it is. 14 00:00:36,640 --> 00:00:39,759 Speaker 1: And to add a deeply macabre, like an almost unthinkable 15 00:00:39,799 --> 00:00:44,439 insult to injury, the killer leaves a cheerfully sinister, happy 16 00:00:44,479 --> 00:00:47,880 New Year card wiged carefully right between your toes. 17 00:00:47,840 --> 00:00:50,520 Speaker 2: Which is just so incredibly chilling, It really is. 18 00:00:50,560 --> 00:00:52,359 Speaker 1: And I want to be entirely clear right off the 19 00:00:52,399 --> 00:00:54,960 bat here with you listening, we are not dissecting a 20 00:00:54,960 --> 00:00:57,079 movie script today, No, not at all. This isn't some 21 00:00:57,200 --> 00:00:59,479 Hollywood thriller cooked up in a writer's room. Yeah, this 22 00:00:59,520 --> 00:01:03,119 is a documented forensic detail from one of the most 23 00:01:03,119 --> 00:01:06,959 paralyzing crime sprees in American history, and you. 24 00:01:06,920 --> 00:01:09,680 Speaker 2: Know, it is exactly that kind of detail that turns 25 00:01:09,680 --> 00:01:14,239 a standard homicide investigation into like this massive psychological. 26 00:01:13,640 --> 00:01:15,760 Speaker 1: Labyrinth, right, because of the messaging. 27 00:01:15,480 --> 00:01:19,599 Speaker 2: Exactly because the moment you introduce a prop like that 28 00:01:19,680 --> 00:01:22,719 greeting card, it is no longer just about the grim 29 00:01:22,760 --> 00:01:28,040 mechanics of violence. It becomes an active form of communication. 30 00:01:28,200 --> 00:01:29,560 Speaker 1: Yeah, a twisted conversation. 31 00:01:29,799 --> 00:01:32,879 Speaker 2: Right, You are dealing with a predator who is treating 32 00:01:32,920 --> 00:01:35,840 the crime scene like a stage. He's actively playing a 33 00:01:35,920 --> 00:01:39,480 high stakes psychological game with both the authorities and the 34 00:01:39,480 --> 00:01:40,840 public at large, which. 35 00:01:40,680 --> 00:01:43,920 Speaker 1: Is exactly the terrifying terrain we are navigating today. So 36 00:01:44,079 --> 00:01:45,280 welcome to Thrilling Threads. 37 00:01:45,319 --> 00:01:46,040 Speaker 2: Thrilled to be here. 38 00:01:46,079 --> 00:01:49,480 Speaker 1: As always, today, our mission is to completely deconstruct the 39 00:01:49,519 --> 00:01:52,239 anatomy of a city wide panic. We are going to 40 00:01:52,280 --> 00:01:55,560 look at the painful and honestly often clumsy evolution of 41 00:01:55,640 --> 00:01:57,000 modern criminal investigation. 42 00:01:57,719 --> 00:01:59,120 Speaker 2: Incredibly clumsy at times. 43 00:01:59,200 --> 00:02:02,000 Speaker 1: Yeah, and we're going to explore the horrifying reality of 44 00:02:02,000 --> 00:02:05,480 a killer who bypassed every lock, every alarm because his 45 00:02:05,599 --> 00:02:08,319 victims simply well they just open the door for him. 46 00:02:08,520 --> 00:02:10,759 Speaker 2: And just to give you a solid foundation for where 47 00:02:10,800 --> 00:02:13,400 we are pulling all of this from today we are 48 00:02:13,520 --> 00:02:16,639 drawing on a literal mountain. 49 00:02:16,240 --> 00:02:18,639 Speaker 1: Of historical records, so many documents. 50 00:02:18,400 --> 00:02:22,960 Speaker 2: Oh tons, the original declassified police case files, and the 51 00:02:23,039 --> 00:02:26,879 really sharp retrospective insights of modern criminologists and historians. 52 00:02:27,080 --> 00:02:29,120 Speaker 1: Really want to make sure we're getting all the angles right. 53 00:02:29,360 --> 00:02:33,159 Speaker 2: We are heavily referencing the exhaustive research of experts like 54 00:02:33,240 --> 00:02:37,439 Laurence Natalia Austin, Sammy, Mike John and Matthew. All of 55 00:02:37,479 --> 00:02:41,000 these folks have spent years just dissecting the source materials 56 00:02:41,080 --> 00:02:43,080 surrounding the Boston Strangler case. 57 00:02:43,199 --> 00:02:45,680 Speaker 1: And we are taking all of those disparate perspectives, so 58 00:02:45,919 --> 00:02:49,800 the forensics, the psychology, the historical sociology, and we're weaving them. 59 00:02:49,680 --> 00:02:51,840 Speaker 2: Together for you because we really want to challenge the 60 00:02:51,879 --> 00:02:54,280 fundamental assumptions you make about your own safety. 61 00:02:54,360 --> 00:02:56,240 Speaker 1: Yeah, that false sense of security we all have. 62 00:02:56,520 --> 00:03:00,479 Speaker 2: Exactly, we are going to explore the dark cast skating 63 00:03:00,599 --> 00:03:04,319 psychology of trauma and look very closely at how nineteen 64 00:03:04,360 --> 00:03:07,759 sixties law enforcement had to completely change. I mean, they 65 00:03:07,759 --> 00:03:10,120 were essentially built on just walking the beat and talking 66 00:03:10,159 --> 00:03:13,719 to informants, shoeleather detective work, right, and they had to 67 00:03:13,960 --> 00:03:18,080 radically and painfully reinvent their entire methodology just to catch 68 00:03:18,080 --> 00:03:18,560 a ghost. 69 00:03:18,879 --> 00:03:23,000 Speaker 1: It's wild this shift from that analog detective work to 70 00:03:23,080 --> 00:03:26,479 the very dawn of data driven profiling. It's one of 71 00:03:26,479 --> 00:03:28,840 the most fascinating sub narratives of this entire case. It 72 00:03:28,919 --> 00:03:31,479 really is. So let's plunge right into the timeline. We 73 00:03:31,479 --> 00:03:33,960 were starting in June of nineteen sixty two. 74 00:03:34,120 --> 00:03:35,719 Speaker 2: Okay, setting the scene right. 75 00:03:36,080 --> 00:03:39,280 Speaker 1: We're in Boston's Back Bay neighborhood. It is a Sunday. 76 00:03:40,000 --> 00:03:43,319 Anna Slesser's, a fifty five year old divorcee, is scheduble 77 00:03:43,360 --> 00:03:45,680 to attend a memorial service at her church. 78 00:03:45,680 --> 00:03:47,520 Speaker 2: Just a normal weekend routine, exactly. 79 00:03:47,680 --> 00:03:51,000 Speaker 1: Her son Juris, arrives to pick her up, exactly as 80 00:03:51,000 --> 00:03:55,319 they planned. But Anna doesn't come out right. Juris stands 81 00:03:55,319 --> 00:03:58,039 at her door, knocking, calling out, and he ends up 82 00:03:58,080 --> 00:03:59,960 waiting for forty five excruciating men. 83 00:04:00,439 --> 00:04:02,400 Speaker 2: And I actually want to pause on those forty five minutes, 84 00:04:02,400 --> 00:04:05,599 because from a psychological standpoint, that is an absolute eternity. 85 00:04:05,719 --> 00:04:06,680 Speaker 1: Oh, it's agonizing. 86 00:04:06,759 --> 00:04:09,280 Speaker 2: When you are standing outside a loved one's door like that, 87 00:04:09,360 --> 00:04:12,039 your brain just starts running a terrifying diagnostic. 88 00:04:12,199 --> 00:04:13,520 Speaker 1: You go to the worst case scenario. 89 00:04:13,599 --> 00:04:15,800 Speaker 2: Well, first, you cycle through irritation, right, like, come on, 90 00:04:15,840 --> 00:04:17,519 we're going to be late. Oh true, Yeah, Then it 91 00:04:17,560 --> 00:04:21,519 shifts to concern and then outright panic. And Juris knows 92 00:04:21,560 --> 00:04:24,680 his mother is meticulous about church, but he also knows 93 00:04:24,720 --> 00:04:28,199 she suffers from severe, documented bouts of depression. 94 00:04:28,639 --> 00:04:32,800 Speaker 3: Ah right, So that colors his whole perspective exactly so 95 00:04:32,959 --> 00:04:37,279 as the silence stretches on his mind naturally, almost protectively 96 00:04:37,279 --> 00:04:40,920 in a weird way, gravitates toward a tragic internal explanation 97 00:04:41,120 --> 00:04:43,000 rather than some kind of external threat. 98 00:04:43,279 --> 00:04:44,480 Speaker 1: He thinks she hurt herself. 99 00:04:44,759 --> 00:04:46,720 Speaker 2: Yes, he assumes suicide. 100 00:04:46,920 --> 00:04:50,040 Speaker 1: Okay, let's unpack this, because he finally makes the call 101 00:04:50,079 --> 00:04:52,720 to force his way in, and the scene he finds 102 00:04:52,839 --> 00:04:55,240 is just It's the absolute worst nightmare of any. 103 00:04:55,160 --> 00:04:56,839 Speaker 2: Child, truly horrific. 104 00:04:56,439 --> 00:04:58,639 Speaker 1: Because mother is lying on the floor near the bathroom, 105 00:04:58,720 --> 00:05:01,000 and she's ice cold, and the belt of her own 106 00:05:01,040 --> 00:05:05,000 bathrobe is wrapped securely around her neck. So, based on 107 00:05:05,079 --> 00:05:08,759 his pre existing knowledge of her mental health, Juris immediately 108 00:05:08,759 --> 00:05:10,639 calls the police and reports the. 109 00:05:10,600 --> 00:05:14,399 Speaker 2: Suicide, which again is entirely logical for Juris in that 110 00:05:14,439 --> 00:05:17,560 traumatic moment, he is interpreting the physical evidence through the 111 00:05:17,639 --> 00:05:19,439 lens of her psychological history. 112 00:05:19,560 --> 00:05:20,959 Speaker 1: It makes total sense for him to. 113 00:05:20,959 --> 00:05:24,439 Speaker 2: Think that it does. But when the detectors actually cross 114 00:05:24,519 --> 00:05:28,079 the threshold, they aren't looking at her emotional history. They 115 00:05:28,079 --> 00:05:31,600 are reading the room forensically. They have a totally different lens, 116 00:05:31,639 --> 00:05:36,639 and immediately the physical evidence violently contradicts the suicide theory. 117 00:05:36,800 --> 00:05:39,879 Speaker 1: The juxtaposition is honestly what gets me. I was reading 118 00:05:39,959 --> 00:05:43,759 Natalia's analysis of the crime scene photos and the domestic 119 00:05:43,839 --> 00:05:45,920 normalcy of the apartment is just jarring. 120 00:05:46,079 --> 00:05:46,759 Speaker 2: It really is. 121 00:05:47,040 --> 00:05:50,120 Speaker 1: There are fresh baked muffins sitting on the kitchen table. 122 00:05:50,800 --> 00:05:53,560 There is a kettle resting on the stove. I mean, 123 00:05:53,560 --> 00:05:56,160 I don't care how deep a depressive episode is. The 124 00:05:56,199 --> 00:05:59,079 psychological momentum required to bake muffins and put the kettle 125 00:05:59,120 --> 00:06:02,199 on does not align with someone who ten minutes later 126 00:06:02,600 --> 00:06:03,720 decides to end their life. 127 00:06:03,879 --> 00:06:04,720 Speaker 2: No, not at all. 128 00:06:04,800 --> 00:06:07,959 Speaker 1: It looks like someone who was briefly interrupted while preparing brexast, 129 00:06:08,040 --> 00:06:08,480 and that. 130 00:06:08,480 --> 00:06:11,360 Speaker 2: Is the absolute hallmark of a blitz attack. Yeah, the 131 00:06:11,399 --> 00:06:14,879 police quickly confirmed that Anna had been sexually assaulted, but 132 00:06:15,000 --> 00:06:19,399 the detail that completely obliterates the suicide theory, and the 133 00:06:19,439 --> 00:06:22,800 detail that would eventually define this entire panic. Is the 134 00:06:22,879 --> 00:06:25,279 bathrobe belt itself right? 135 00:06:25,399 --> 00:06:26,120 Speaker 1: How it was used? 136 00:06:26,480 --> 00:06:30,600 Speaker 2: Yes, it wasn't just utilized as a simple ligature. It 137 00:06:30,720 --> 00:06:35,800 was tied under her chin in a very deliberate, perfectly symmetrical. 138 00:06:35,199 --> 00:06:37,639 Speaker 1: Bow, A bow like a gift a bow. 139 00:06:38,079 --> 00:06:40,839 Speaker 2: And you know you do not tie a decorative knot 140 00:06:40,879 --> 00:06:43,959 when you were in the desperate, agonizing throes of taking 141 00:06:44,000 --> 00:06:44,639 your own life. 142 00:06:44,680 --> 00:06:45,279 Speaker 1: Obviously not. 143 00:06:45,480 --> 00:06:48,839 Speaker 2: That is an external signature. That is a killer leaving 144 00:06:48,879 --> 00:06:51,879 a deliberate, highly personalized mark on the scene. 145 00:06:51,920 --> 00:06:54,199 Speaker 1: It's so twisted it is, and it. 146 00:06:54,160 --> 00:06:58,839 Speaker 2: Brings up this really fascinating criminological debate about methodology among 147 00:06:58,879 --> 00:07:03,040 the experts we research. Why use the victim's own clothing? 148 00:07:03,360 --> 00:07:06,000 Why the bathrobe belt instead of bringing I don't know, 149 00:07:06,040 --> 00:07:07,160 a groat to a rope. 150 00:07:07,240 --> 00:07:10,000 Speaker 1: See, I'm actually stuck on that too. If this killer 151 00:07:10,079 --> 00:07:13,040 is confident enough to meticulously stage your body and tie 152 00:07:13,040 --> 00:07:16,360 a decorative bow, why risk relying on finding a weapon 153 00:07:16,360 --> 00:07:17,040 in the apartment? 154 00:07:17,199 --> 00:07:18,079 Speaker 2: That's a great question. 155 00:07:18,160 --> 00:07:20,759 Speaker 1: Doesn't relying on a weapon of opportunity suggest this wasn't 156 00:07:20,759 --> 00:07:23,560 really premeditated, Like maybe it was just a burglary that 157 00:07:23,680 --> 00:07:24,759 escalated into a panic. 158 00:07:24,920 --> 00:07:27,560 Speaker 2: So that is a brilliant pushback, and it's exactly what 159 00:07:27,600 --> 00:07:31,160 the initial detective is likely debated in that room. Yeah, 160 00:07:31,279 --> 00:07:35,120 because in behavioral analysis, using a weapon of opportunity often 161 00:07:35,199 --> 00:07:38,519 does point to an impulsive, disorganized. 162 00:07:37,759 --> 00:07:40,120 Speaker 1: Crime, right, like a crime of passion or a break in. 163 00:07:40,079 --> 00:07:43,199 Speaker 2: Gone wrong exactly. However, the application of the weapon here 164 00:07:43,279 --> 00:07:46,439 totally changes the math. How so, Well, yes, he used 165 00:07:46,439 --> 00:07:50,600 what was available, but manual or ligature strangulation is an 166 00:07:50,639 --> 00:07:54,120 incredibly intimate, physically demanding way. 167 00:07:53,879 --> 00:07:55,600 Speaker 1: To kill someone takes a lot of strength. 168 00:07:55,800 --> 00:07:58,279 Speaker 2: It takes strength, and it takes minutes of sustained effort 169 00:07:58,680 --> 00:08:01,279 to do that, and then take the time to fashion 170 00:08:01,319 --> 00:08:05,399 a bow. Displays a terrifying level of psychological control and 171 00:08:05,480 --> 00:08:09,600 expressive violence. Yeah, it's not a panicked burglar. It's an 172 00:08:09,639 --> 00:08:13,000 offender who is so utterly confident in his physical dominance 173 00:08:13,040 --> 00:08:15,079 that he doesn't need to bring a weapon. He knows 174 00:08:15,079 --> 00:08:17,959 he can subdue her with literally whatever is lying around. 175 00:08:18,279 --> 00:08:21,800 Speaker 1: That level of arrogance is just chilling, and it perfectly 176 00:08:21,839 --> 00:08:24,360 sets up the locker room mystery element of this case, 177 00:08:24,680 --> 00:08:25,519 which is wild. 178 00:08:25,639 --> 00:08:27,240 Speaker 2: Oh, the locker room aspect. 179 00:08:26,879 --> 00:08:29,839 Speaker 1: Is baffling because the forensics yielded absolute nothing. There were 180 00:08:29,839 --> 00:08:32,440 no foreign fingerprints. The neighbors in the adjoining apartments heard 181 00:08:32,480 --> 00:08:36,919 absolutely no struggle, no screams, nothing at all. And most importantly, 182 00:08:37,279 --> 00:08:41,399 there was zero sign of forced entry. The lock wasn't picked, 183 00:08:41,559 --> 00:08:44,960 the door wasn't jimmied, no windows were broken. It's like 184 00:08:45,039 --> 00:08:46,879 the ultimate trojan horse scenario. 185 00:08:47,159 --> 00:08:48,320 Speaker 2: That's a perfect way to put it. 186 00:08:48,399 --> 00:08:50,559 Speaker 1: I mean, the scariest monster isn't the one shattering your 187 00:08:50,559 --> 00:08:52,559 glass in the dead of night. It's the one you 188 00:08:52,600 --> 00:08:54,600 willingly invite into your home for tea. 189 00:08:54,919 --> 00:08:58,600 Speaker 2: It fundamentally subverts the entire architecture of domestic security. Yes, 190 00:08:58,639 --> 00:09:02,200 think about it. The door is our primary boundary against 191 00:09:02,279 --> 00:09:05,639 the chaos of the outside world. But what happens when 192 00:09:05,679 --> 00:09:08,639 the threat knows the exact social script required to make 193 00:09:08,720 --> 00:09:10,320 you open that boundary yourself? 194 00:09:10,519 --> 00:09:14,360 Speaker 1: It makes you question everything. Yeah, but at this specific moment, 195 00:09:14,600 --> 00:09:18,000 right in mid June nineteen sixty two, the Boston Belize 196 00:09:18,039 --> 00:09:19,919 don't know they have a serial predator yet. 197 00:09:20,120 --> 00:09:22,679 Speaker 2: No, they just think it's a tragic anomaly exactly. 198 00:09:22,720 --> 00:09:26,720 Speaker 1: They just have this one deeply weird, incredibly strange murder. 199 00:09:27,480 --> 00:09:29,600 Weeks pass, the trail goes cold. 200 00:09:29,440 --> 00:09:30,240 Speaker 2: Until it doesn't. 201 00:09:30,320 --> 00:09:34,240 Speaker 1: Right then, the killer loudly announces that Annis Lezar's was 202 00:09:34,320 --> 00:09:35,120 not a one. 203 00:09:35,080 --> 00:09:39,200 Speaker 2: Off event, because a single bizarre murder is an isolated tragedy. 204 00:09:39,759 --> 00:09:43,360 But the moment the highly specific, impossible circumstances of that 205 00:09:43,440 --> 00:09:48,279 crime repeat themselves, the entire investigative paradigm shifts. 206 00:09:48,600 --> 00:09:51,320 Speaker 1: And this pattern really solidifies during one of the most 207 00:09:51,360 --> 00:09:54,720 punishing heat waves in Boston's history, which adds such a 208 00:09:54,759 --> 00:09:56,080 crazy layer to the story. 209 00:09:56,159 --> 00:09:58,320 Speaker 2: Oh, the environmental factor is huge here. 210 00:09:58,559 --> 00:10:00,840 Speaker 1: Let's really place ourselves in that ronment for a second. 211 00:10:00,879 --> 00:10:05,399 It's late June. It is a sweltering, oppressive Boston summer. 212 00:10:05,960 --> 00:10:09,279 We're talking about the early nineteen sixties, long before central 213 00:10:09,320 --> 00:10:12,799 air conditioning was like a standard utility in every apartment. 214 00:10:13,039 --> 00:10:15,879 Speaker 2: He basically had fans and open windows if you were lucky. 215 00:10:16,039 --> 00:10:18,720 Speaker 1: Exactly the physical reality of living in a brick apartment 216 00:10:18,720 --> 00:10:21,159 building in the back bay during a heat wave means 217 00:10:21,200 --> 00:10:24,279 you desperately need to leave your windows open to catch 218 00:10:24,279 --> 00:10:25,320 any kind of crossberries. 219 00:10:25,440 --> 00:10:26,960 Speaker 2: Otherwise you're basically in an oven. 220 00:10:27,159 --> 00:10:30,559 Speaker 1: Right But suddenly, as rumors of a killer start to circulate, 221 00:10:30,919 --> 00:10:34,600 there is a very real paralyzing fear of doing exactly that. 222 00:10:34,960 --> 00:10:39,039 Speaker 2: It creates this absolute pressure cooker environment. The residents of 223 00:10:39,039 --> 00:10:42,000 Boston are essentially trapped baking in the heat of their 224 00:10:42,039 --> 00:10:45,200 own locked apartments because of the alternative feels like an 225 00:10:45,200 --> 00:10:46,720 open invitation to a phantom. 226 00:10:46,840 --> 00:10:47,440 Speaker 1: It's awful. 227 00:10:47,559 --> 00:10:50,960 Speaker 2: The physical discomfort really amplifies the psychological terror. 228 00:10:51,080 --> 00:10:53,320 Speaker 1: And right in the middle of this awful heat wave, 229 00:10:53,879 --> 00:10:56,440 we look at the case of Mina Nichols. She's a 230 00:10:56,519 --> 00:10:59,360 sixty eight year old retired psychotherapist. 231 00:10:59,000 --> 00:11:00,720 Speaker 2: And just trying to go about her yeah. 232 00:11:00,799 --> 00:11:03,960 Speaker 1: To escape the stifling heat of her apartment, she decides 233 00:11:04,000 --> 00:11:06,720 to go shopping for the afternoon, and according to the 234 00:11:06,759 --> 00:11:10,600 timeline meticulously laid out by researcher Sammy, she returns home 235 00:11:10,639 --> 00:11:13,759 around five zero zero zero pm and begins getting ready 236 00:11:13,799 --> 00:11:15,639 for a planned dinner at her sister's house. 237 00:11:15,960 --> 00:11:18,960 Speaker 2: But seven point thirty pm rolls around and Nina hasn't 238 00:11:18,960 --> 00:11:21,799 shown up right, and here we see that exact same 239 00:11:21,919 --> 00:11:24,919 ripple effect of anxiety that we saw with jurisalizers earlier. 240 00:11:25,360 --> 00:11:29,200 The sister calls, gets no answer, the panic escalates. 241 00:11:29,279 --> 00:11:30,240 Speaker 1: It's that same building. 242 00:11:30,279 --> 00:11:33,039 Speaker 2: Driss Yes, She drives over, knocks on the door, and 243 00:11:33,080 --> 00:11:35,559 eventually has to track down the building janitor to open 244 00:11:35,600 --> 00:11:36,519 the apartment with a. 245 00:11:36,440 --> 00:11:41,399 Speaker 1: Master key and What the janitor finds is horrifying. Nina 246 00:11:41,480 --> 00:11:44,639 is in her bedroom. She has positioned half on, half 247 00:11:44,679 --> 00:11:48,200 off her bed, and around her neck is a nylon stocking. 248 00:11:48,519 --> 00:11:50,960 Speaker 2: The scene itself is chaotic too. The apartment has been 249 00:11:51,000 --> 00:11:52,559 heavily ransacked. 250 00:11:52,080 --> 00:11:54,759 Speaker 1: Right drawers, pulled out, stuff everywhere. 251 00:11:54,320 --> 00:11:58,279 Speaker 2: Exactly belongings just scattered to a beat. Cop walking in 252 00:11:58,399 --> 00:12:03,399 it immediately reads as a bird glory gone catastrophically. 253 00:12:02,440 --> 00:12:04,679 Speaker 1: Wrong, which would make sense on the surface. 254 00:12:04,440 --> 00:12:08,200 Speaker 2: It would, but criminologist Mike highlights a detail in the 255 00:12:08,200 --> 00:12:11,639 files that completely rewrites the narrative. Her cash is sitting 256 00:12:11,720 --> 00:12:13,039 right there in plain sight. 257 00:12:13,120 --> 00:12:15,840 Speaker 1: Which is the ultimate tail. Right. If you are risking 258 00:12:15,879 --> 00:12:18,879 a breaking and entering charge, let alone a murder charge, 259 00:12:19,360 --> 00:12:21,960 you do not leave the untraceable paper money behind. 260 00:12:22,159 --> 00:12:25,200 Speaker 2: Precisely, the fact that the cash is untouched proves the 261 00:12:25,200 --> 00:12:29,159 motive is completely divorced from financial gain. The ransacking is 262 00:12:29,200 --> 00:12:31,519 actually a behavioral artifact known as staging. 263 00:12:31,799 --> 00:12:34,039 Speaker 1: Okay, wait, I need to jump in here. Usually staging 264 00:12:34,120 --> 00:12:36,720 is done by someone who knows the victim right, typically yes, 265 00:12:37,120 --> 00:12:40,399 like a husband killing his wife and breaking a window 266 00:12:40,440 --> 00:12:42,360 to make it look like an intruder did it just 267 00:12:42,399 --> 00:12:45,159 to throw the cops off his trail. Why would a 268 00:12:45,240 --> 00:12:48,120 random serial killer bothers staging a robbery? 269 00:12:48,320 --> 00:12:51,120 Speaker 2: That is exactly how staging was understood by the FBI 270 00:12:51,200 --> 00:12:54,399 at the time. It was viewed purely as a defensive 271 00:12:54,440 --> 00:12:56,519 countermeasure by a known associate. 272 00:12:56,759 --> 00:12:57,679 Speaker 1: So why do it here? 273 00:12:58,039 --> 00:13:01,759 Speaker 2: Because in this case the staging isn't offensive, it's almost theatrical. 274 00:13:02,039 --> 00:13:05,200 It's the killer actively playing a game with the detectives. 275 00:13:05,240 --> 00:13:08,159 Oh wow, he wants them to briefly think it's a robbery, 276 00:13:08,519 --> 00:13:11,360 only to realize the horrible truth when they look closer 277 00:13:11,399 --> 00:13:14,480 at the victim, because the staging is immediately betrayed by 278 00:13:14,519 --> 00:13:16,000 his own psychological signature. 279 00:13:16,080 --> 00:13:17,039 Speaker 1: The bow again, the. 280 00:13:17,000 --> 00:13:21,000 Speaker 2: Bow, the nylon stocking used to strangle Nina Nichols wasn't 281 00:13:21,039 --> 00:13:23,360 just pulled tight and knotted. It was fashioned into that 282 00:13:23,440 --> 00:13:25,279 exact same grotesque bow. 283 00:13:25,559 --> 00:13:26,320 Speaker 1: It's so dark. 284 00:13:26,480 --> 00:13:28,879 Speaker 2: It takes the murder weapon and transforms it into a 285 00:13:28,919 --> 00:13:33,120 macabre presentation. It suggests the killer who views his victims 286 00:13:33,159 --> 00:13:36,799 not just as targets, but as objects to be arranged 287 00:13:36,840 --> 00:13:37,360 and wrapped. 288 00:13:37,759 --> 00:13:40,600 Speaker 1: And the timeline here is what genuinely breaks my brain 289 00:13:42,200 --> 00:13:45,519 because on that exact same day, the same day, fifteen 290 00:13:45,519 --> 00:13:48,519 miles north of Boston, in the relatively quiet suburb of Lynn. 291 00:13:49,240 --> 00:13:53,080 Police are dispatched to another apartment right Helen Blake, a 292 00:13:53,120 --> 00:13:57,879 sixty five year old divorcee, is found murdered. The methodology 293 00:13:58,200 --> 00:14:03,320 manual strangulation, utilizing and nylon stocking, the signature tied in 294 00:14:03,360 --> 00:14:05,720 a bow, and the entry point absolutely no sign of 295 00:14:05,720 --> 00:14:06,360 forced entry. 296 00:14:06,480 --> 00:14:10,519 Speaker 2: The physical and psychological stamina required to execute this timeline 297 00:14:10,600 --> 00:14:14,879 is staggering, and it completely shatters the existing behavioral models 298 00:14:14,960 --> 00:14:15,519 of that era. 299 00:14:15,879 --> 00:14:17,799 Speaker 1: I mean, I have to stop you there, because how 300 00:14:17,879 --> 00:14:21,320 is that even physically possible? Two manual strangulations in a 301 00:14:21,360 --> 00:14:24,840 single day, separated by fifteen miles of nineteen sixties traffic. 302 00:14:24,919 --> 00:14:27,279 Speaker 2: It's a logistical nightmare, right, And. 303 00:14:27,200 --> 00:14:30,200 Speaker 1: We always hear about serial killers needing a cooling off period. 304 00:14:30,519 --> 00:14:33,919 They commit a horrific act that psychological tension releases, and 305 00:14:33,960 --> 00:14:36,919 they recede into the shadows for weeks or months to decompress. 306 00:14:37,240 --> 00:14:40,360 Speaker 2: You're touching on a fundamental pillar of traditional profiling. The 307 00:14:40,440 --> 00:14:43,440 cooling off period is what distinguishes a serial killer from 308 00:14:43,480 --> 00:14:47,360 a spree killer. But this offender completely defies that. Gravity 309 00:14:47,639 --> 00:14:50,519 strangulation is not like pulling a trigger from across a room. 310 00:14:50,600 --> 00:14:51,559 Speaker 1: No, it's very hands on. 311 00:14:51,799 --> 00:14:57,879 Speaker 2: It requires immense sustained physical exertion. It is exhausting to 312 00:14:57,960 --> 00:15:02,679 complete that act, meticulously staged the scene, tie, the signature bow, 313 00:15:02,799 --> 00:15:06,679 travel fifteen miles, successfully con his way into a second apartment, 314 00:15:06,759 --> 00:15:09,200 and do it all over again in the span of hours. 315 00:15:09,399 --> 00:15:10,320 Speaker 1: It's insane. 316 00:15:10,440 --> 00:15:13,759 Speaker 2: That suggests an offender operating in an absolute fugue state 317 00:15:13,799 --> 00:15:17,399 of adrenaline, or someone whose compulsion is burning so hot 318 00:15:17,519 --> 00:15:20,759 that a cooling off period is just impossible. It is 319 00:15:20,799 --> 00:15:24,879 a level of brazen frenzy that absolutely terrified the profiling community. 320 00:15:24,960 --> 00:15:27,440 Speaker 1: It's like a Category five hurricane. The physics of the 321 00:15:27,519 --> 00:15:31,159 escalation suggests it simply cannot be stopped by normal friction. Right, 322 00:15:31,519 --> 00:15:33,919 and the moment the detectives in Boston and the detectives 323 00:15:33,960 --> 00:15:37,519 and Lin compare notes and they realize the undeniable signature 324 00:15:37,559 --> 00:15:40,200 linking these three women, the lack of forced entry, the 325 00:15:40,279 --> 00:15:43,279 nylon or belt, the decorative bow, the entire weight of 326 00:15:43,279 --> 00:15:44,480 the investigation shifts. 327 00:15:44,679 --> 00:15:47,399 Speaker 2: It transitions from a series of localized tragedies into a 328 00:15:47,519 --> 00:15:48,960 unified existential threat. 329 00:15:49,080 --> 00:15:50,200 Speaker 1: Everyone is on edge. 330 00:15:50,440 --> 00:15:55,120 Speaker 2: Yes, it is the entire Greater Boston area realizing they 331 00:15:55,120 --> 00:15:59,879 are being hunted by a single cohesive entity, and that 332 00:16:00,080 --> 00:16:03,960 realization forces the authorities into a posture of absolute. 333 00:16:03,440 --> 00:16:06,879 Speaker 1: Desperation, and naturally the press gets wind of the bow signature. 334 00:16:07,000 --> 00:16:08,039 Speaker 2: Oh, of course they do. 335 00:16:08,080 --> 00:16:09,399 Speaker 1: You know, the media is going to run with a 336 00:16:09,440 --> 00:16:13,759 detail like that. They officially christened the killer the Boston. 337 00:16:13,440 --> 00:16:15,919 Speaker 2: Strangler, which is just a terrifying moniker. 338 00:16:16,039 --> 00:16:19,080 Speaker 1: Just hearing that name in the daily papers incites mass hysteria. 339 00:16:20,000 --> 00:16:23,799 Hardware stores sell out of dead bolts, locksmiths are working around. 340 00:16:23,559 --> 00:16:25,840 Speaker 2: The clock, people are terrified. 341 00:16:25,440 --> 00:16:28,519 Speaker 1: And the police are standing there empty handed, unable to 342 00:16:28,519 --> 00:16:32,159 find a single connective thread between these victims other than 343 00:16:32,159 --> 00:16:35,279 the grim mechanics of how they died. I mean, they 344 00:16:35,279 --> 00:16:37,039 didn't go to the same church, they didn't shop at 345 00:16:37,039 --> 00:16:39,240 the same stores, they didn't share a milkman. 346 00:16:39,559 --> 00:16:42,840 Speaker 2: Historian John makes a brilliant point about the sociological pressure 347 00:16:42,919 --> 00:16:46,720 of this exact moment. When a killer operates this randomly, 348 00:16:47,159 --> 00:16:49,799 the pressure on the police department ceases to be merely 349 00:16:49,840 --> 00:16:51,159 about solving a homicide. 350 00:16:51,320 --> 00:16:52,159 Speaker 1: What does it become. 351 00:16:52,279 --> 00:16:56,159 Speaker 2: It becomes about restoring the fundamental social contract. Ah the 352 00:16:56,200 --> 00:16:59,440 public feels that the basic agreement of civic life that 353 00:16:59,480 --> 00:17:03,240 you are safe behind your own lock door has been violated. 354 00:17:03,600 --> 00:17:06,000 The police aren't just hunting a man, They're trying to 355 00:17:06,079 --> 00:17:08,039 save the city's sanity. 356 00:17:07,799 --> 00:17:11,680 Speaker 1: Which leads us to Boston Police Commissioner Edmund McNamara. Right. 357 00:17:11,799 --> 00:17:14,039 He is a veteran of the force, but he is 358 00:17:14,200 --> 00:17:17,920 relatively new to the top job. He is watching his 359 00:17:18,039 --> 00:17:21,359 city lose its collective mind, and he decides he has 360 00:17:21,400 --> 00:17:24,519 to take drastic, unprecedented. 361 00:17:23,799 --> 00:17:25,000 Speaker 2: Action, very drastic. 362 00:17:25,240 --> 00:17:28,680 Speaker 1: On July second, he issues a mandate. He takes every 363 00:17:28,720 --> 00:17:31,519 single detective on the Boston Police Department, every single one, 364 00:17:31,960 --> 00:17:34,720 and assigns them exclusively to the Strangler case. 365 00:17:34,920 --> 00:17:38,839 Speaker 2: The logistical shock wave of that decision simply cannot be overstated. 366 00:17:38,920 --> 00:17:40,759 It is an administrative earthquake. 367 00:17:41,000 --> 00:17:43,160 Speaker 1: Let's really gain this out for the listener, because assigning 368 00:17:43,160 --> 00:17:45,599 every detective sounds amazing, and press conference. 369 00:17:45,400 --> 00:17:47,680 Speaker 2: Oh, it sounds fantastic. We are putting one hundred percent 370 00:17:47,680 --> 00:17:49,839 of our resources on this monster, exactly. 371 00:17:50,359 --> 00:17:53,759 Speaker 1: But in practice, it's like trying to fix a delicate 372 00:17:53,799 --> 00:17:56,960 Swiss watch by having fifty people simultaneously poke at the 373 00:17:57,000 --> 00:17:58,440 gears with screwdrivers. 374 00:17:58,519 --> 00:17:59,519 Speaker 2: That's a great analogy. 375 00:17:59,839 --> 00:18:03,880 Speaker 1: More hands do not equal more precision. They just create gridlock. 376 00:18:04,759 --> 00:18:07,160 What happens to the city's other crimes. What happens to 377 00:18:07,200 --> 00:18:09,799 the armed robberies, the auto thefts, the other homicides. 378 00:18:09,960 --> 00:18:11,039 Speaker 2: It fall by the wayside. 379 00:18:11,039 --> 00:18:13,759 Speaker 1: And more importantly, how do you even process that much 380 00:18:13,759 --> 00:18:15,119 information on one case? 381 00:18:15,240 --> 00:18:18,480 Speaker 2: You don't. And that's the ultimate tragedy of McNamara's decision. 382 00:18:18,640 --> 00:18:22,000 It almost certainly caused massive informational gridlock. 383 00:18:22,319 --> 00:18:24,079 Speaker 1: Just too much data, way too much. 384 00:18:24,119 --> 00:18:27,880 Speaker 2: When you have hundreds of detectives independently chasing down thousands 385 00:18:27,920 --> 00:18:32,200 of citizen tips, interviewing witnesses, and typing up physical carbon 386 00:18:32,240 --> 00:18:36,480 copy reports, without a centralized, efficient way to cross reference 387 00:18:36,559 --> 00:18:40,000 that data, you get absolute paralysis. 388 00:18:39,319 --> 00:18:41,519 Speaker 1: Right because there's no digital database exactly. 389 00:18:41,839 --> 00:18:44,839 Speaker 2: Detective A in the North End might interview a suspect 390 00:18:44,880 --> 00:18:48,160 with a green jacket. Meanwhile Detective B in the South 391 00:18:48,279 --> 00:18:50,119 End has a witness who saw a man in a 392 00:18:50,119 --> 00:18:53,880 green jacket. But those two pieces of paper will literally 393 00:18:54,000 --> 00:18:55,839 never meet in the filing cabinet. 394 00:18:55,920 --> 00:18:57,279 Speaker 1: That is so frustrating. 395 00:18:57,359 --> 00:19:00,799 Speaker 2: The sheer volume of raw, unfiltered data comes a weapon 396 00:19:00,880 --> 00:19:03,000 against the investigation itself. 397 00:19:02,880 --> 00:19:06,200 Speaker 1: And the killer clearly recognized that the police were flailing. 398 00:19:06,960 --> 00:19:10,880 Because the strangler continues to strike, and crucially the profile 399 00:19:10,920 --> 00:19:12,920 of the victims begins to shift in a way that 400 00:19:13,039 --> 00:19:14,599 throws absolutely everything. 401 00:19:14,279 --> 00:19:16,440 Speaker 2: Into chaos, a very terrifying shift. 402 00:19:16,680 --> 00:19:19,839 Speaker 1: Up until now, the victims were older women. But in 403 00:19:19,920 --> 00:19:23,000 late November of nineteen sixty three, twenty three year old 404 00:19:23,079 --> 00:19:26,880 Joan Graff, a young industrial designer, is found strangled in 405 00:19:26,880 --> 00:19:29,680 her apartment thirty miles north of Boston. 406 00:19:29,640 --> 00:19:31,839 Speaker 2: A huge change in demographic huge. 407 00:19:32,480 --> 00:19:34,920 Speaker 1: And then just weeks later we arrive at the tragedy 408 00:19:34,920 --> 00:19:37,920 you mentioned in the intro, nineteen year old Mary Sullivan 409 00:19:38,240 --> 00:19:40,119 murdered in the heart of the city on her second 410 00:19:40,200 --> 00:19:44,119 day living in Boston. The scene features the exact same methodology, 411 00:19:45,200 --> 00:19:47,440 the ligature, the strangler's not fashed into a. 412 00:19:47,400 --> 00:19:51,160 Speaker 2: Bow, and that taunting New Year's card wedged between her toes. Yes, 413 00:19:51,319 --> 00:19:52,880 if we look at the shift through the lens of 414 00:19:52,920 --> 00:19:57,119 modern behavioral science, the escalation in victimology is profound. Initially, 415 00:19:57,160 --> 00:20:00,599 the killer strictly targeted older women, and it was fifty five, 416 00:20:00,880 --> 00:20:03,880 Nino was sixty eight, Helen was sixty five. It pery consistent, 417 00:20:04,079 --> 00:20:06,160 but jumping down to a twenty three year old and 418 00:20:06,200 --> 00:20:09,880 a nineteen year old shatters that rigid victim type model. 419 00:20:10,319 --> 00:20:14,200 Usually a highly organized serial offender hones in on a 420 00:20:14,319 --> 00:20:18,799 very specific physical demographic that fulfills a rigid psychological fantasy. 421 00:20:18,920 --> 00:20:22,799 Speaker 1: So what does it mean when they change types so drastically. 422 00:20:22,319 --> 00:20:25,799 Speaker 2: To drastically alter the age demographic suggests an offender who 423 00:20:25,839 --> 00:20:29,519 is either psychologically unraveling or an offender whose compulsion is 424 00:20:29,599 --> 00:20:32,079 driven more by the opportunity of access than by a 425 00:20:32,119 --> 00:20:33,400 strict physical preference. 426 00:20:33,519 --> 00:20:36,200 Speaker 1: And that New Year's card. I just cannot shake the 427 00:20:36,240 --> 00:20:38,519 image of that card. It is so arrogant. It's not 428 00:20:38,559 --> 00:20:39,759 just a killing, it's a performance. 429 00:20:40,079 --> 00:20:43,079 Speaker 2: It is a direct, unilateral dialogue. It is a brazen 430 00:20:43,119 --> 00:20:45,920 display of a god complex. Yeah, the killer is fully 431 00:20:45,960 --> 00:20:48,839 aware that literally every detective in the city of Boston 432 00:20:48,920 --> 00:20:52,359 is looking for him, and yet he feels so supremely confident, 433 00:20:52,480 --> 00:20:55,400 so untouchable, that he lingers at the crime scene to 434 00:20:55,480 --> 00:20:57,680 arrange a prop specifically to mock them. 435 00:20:57,799 --> 00:20:58,559 Speaker 1: Unbelievable. 436 00:20:58,640 --> 00:21:01,240 Speaker 2: He's telling the police, I own this city and you 437 00:21:01,240 --> 00:21:02,640 were powerless. 438 00:21:02,319 --> 00:21:04,880 Speaker 1: And honestly, at that point he was kind of right. 439 00:21:05,279 --> 00:21:08,799 The Boston Police Department is drowning in carbon copy reports, 440 00:21:09,200 --> 00:21:12,720 the public panic is causing economic and social disruption, and 441 00:21:12,799 --> 00:21:14,039 the murders are continuing. 442 00:21:14,400 --> 00:21:16,440 Speaker 2: Things were bleak, very bleak. 443 00:21:16,920 --> 00:21:20,240 Speaker 1: Eventually, a higher power has to step in. The floundering 444 00:21:20,240 --> 00:21:23,000 at the local level has to be stopped, and this 445 00:21:23,160 --> 00:21:27,319 necessity leads to a revolutionary and incredibly fraught shift in 446 00:21:27,359 --> 00:21:29,079 the history of American policing. 447 00:21:29,039 --> 00:21:31,680 Speaker 2: Because the state government realizes it can no longer just 448 00:21:31,759 --> 00:21:35,079 stand by while the city fails. Two weeks after Mary 449 00:21:35,079 --> 00:21:39,680 Sullivan's murder, Massachusetts Attorney General Edward Brooke invokes his authority 450 00:21:39,920 --> 00:21:42,880 and legally strips the case away from the Boston Police Department. 451 00:21:42,960 --> 00:21:46,319 Speaker 1: Wow, we have to unpack the historical and sociological weight 452 00:21:46,400 --> 00:21:49,799 of this move because context is everything here, it really is. 453 00:21:49,880 --> 00:21:52,640 Attorney General Book is a brilliant legal mind, and he 454 00:21:52,759 --> 00:21:55,759 is also an African American man, a black Republican in fact, 455 00:21:56,119 --> 00:21:58,119 stepping in to take direct authority over the box and 456 00:21:58,119 --> 00:21:59,960 Police Department in the early nineteen. 457 00:21:59,680 --> 00:22:01,559 Speaker 2: Sixth which was a massive deal. 458 00:22:02,079 --> 00:22:05,200 Speaker 1: Massive sources note that the BPD at the time was 459 00:22:05,279 --> 00:22:10,039 predominantly white, fiercely Irish, Catholic, highly insulurt, and notoriously proud. 460 00:22:10,640 --> 00:22:13,880 The racial and political friction of that takeover must have 461 00:22:13,960 --> 00:22:15,480 been absolutely blinding. 462 00:22:15,680 --> 00:22:19,119 Speaker 2: Oh. It was a tectonic clash of cultures. The Boston 463 00:22:19,160 --> 00:22:22,440 Police Department viewed themselves as the absolute sovereign authority on 464 00:22:22,519 --> 00:22:25,359 their own streets. To have the state government step in 465 00:22:25,519 --> 00:22:29,440 and declare them incompetent is inherently insulting to them. But 466 00:22:29,640 --> 00:22:33,759 Brooke compounds that institutional insult by how he structures his 467 00:22:33,799 --> 00:22:37,279 new command. He doesn't just put state police brass in charge. 468 00:22:37,359 --> 00:22:38,720 He brings in civilians. 469 00:22:38,839 --> 00:22:39,039 Speaker 3: Right. 470 00:22:39,440 --> 00:22:41,880 Speaker 1: Brook assigns the day to day operation of the case 471 00:22:41,920 --> 00:22:45,119 to his trusted friend from law school, assistant US attorney 472 00:22:45,200 --> 00:22:46,480 John Bottomly, and. 473 00:22:46,400 --> 00:22:48,559 Speaker 2: Bottomly brings a completely different mindset. 474 00:22:48,720 --> 00:22:51,480 Speaker 1: He really does. Bottomly looks at the situation and decides 475 00:22:51,680 --> 00:22:54,240 they don't need more cops, they need different brains. So 476 00:22:54,279 --> 00:22:59,759 he builds a task force comprised of psychiatrists, forensic academics, sociologists, 477 00:22:59,799 --> 00:23:01,119 and outside researchers. 478 00:23:01,279 --> 00:23:03,200 Speaker 2: Imagine the reaction in those precinct houses. 479 00:23:03,240 --> 00:23:05,759 Speaker 1: Oh, we must have lost their minds completely. 480 00:23:05,920 --> 00:23:09,640 Speaker 2: To the veteran Boston police detectives, who prided themselves on 481 00:23:09,720 --> 00:23:14,319 traditional shoe leather detective work, hitting the pavement, shaking down informants, 482 00:23:14,599 --> 00:23:17,319 trusting their gut, bringing in a panel of academics with 483 00:23:17,359 --> 00:23:21,519 elbow patches to theorize about the killer's mother complex felt 484 00:23:21,559 --> 00:23:23,119 like a massive slap in the face. 485 00:23:23,319 --> 00:23:24,519 Speaker 1: Right you thought it was useless. 486 00:23:24,599 --> 00:23:28,279 Speaker 2: It was viewed as academic elitism, encroaching on the gritty 487 00:23:28,359 --> 00:23:30,720 reality of blood and God's police work. 488 00:23:31,240 --> 00:23:34,960 Speaker 1: But John Bottomley had a vision that went far beyond 489 00:23:35,000 --> 00:23:38,119 psychiatric profiling. And this is the part of the research 490 00:23:38,119 --> 00:23:40,039 that absolutely fascinates. 491 00:23:39,519 --> 00:23:40,839 Speaker 2: Me, the technological leap. 492 00:23:41,000 --> 00:23:43,599 Speaker 1: Yes, Bottomly walks into the command center and looks at 493 00:23:43,640 --> 00:23:47,920 the literal mountains of unorganized paper, thousands of suspect interviews, 494 00:23:47,920 --> 00:23:52,799 witness statements, alibis, and he realizes that human cognition simply 495 00:23:52,880 --> 00:23:54,720 cannot process the data fast enough. 496 00:23:54,759 --> 00:23:57,160 Speaker 2: It's mathematically impossible for a human right. 497 00:23:57,359 --> 00:24:00,279 Speaker 1: So he introduces early computer science to the hunt is. 498 00:24:00,240 --> 00:24:03,640 Speaker 2: An absolute watershed moment. It is the genesis of modern 499 00:24:03,680 --> 00:24:05,759 cyber policing and data driven profiling. 500 00:24:05,960 --> 00:24:06,440 Speaker 1: So cool. 501 00:24:06,519 --> 00:24:10,480 Speaker 2: Before Bottomly tracking a serial killer meant pinning index cards 502 00:24:10,480 --> 00:24:14,039 to corkboards and connecting them with red string, Bottomley decides 503 00:24:14,119 --> 00:24:17,079 to take every single piece of evidence, every variable, and 504 00:24:17,119 --> 00:24:20,359 feed it into a machine to mathematically hunt for correlations. 505 00:24:20,680 --> 00:24:23,880 Speaker 1: I really want you, the listener, to visualize what this means. 506 00:24:23,880 --> 00:24:27,160 In nineteen sixty four, we aren't talking about opening an 507 00:24:27,200 --> 00:24:28,839 Excel spreadsheet on a laptop. 508 00:24:29,079 --> 00:24:29,640 Speaker 2: Not even close. 509 00:24:29,720 --> 00:24:34,160 Speaker 1: We are talking about giant, room sized mainframe computers that 510 00:24:34,279 --> 00:24:37,759 have less processing power than a modern musical greeting card. 511 00:24:37,839 --> 00:24:41,200 Speaker 2: Yeah. They were massive and incredibly slow by today's standards. 512 00:24:41,240 --> 00:24:44,119 Speaker 1: They used IBM punch cards, so if a suspect was 513 00:24:44,200 --> 00:24:47,319 left handed, a researcher literally punched whole number forty two 514 00:24:47,480 --> 00:24:50,720 on a cardboard card. If the suspect owned a green jacket, 515 00:24:50,839 --> 00:24:52,240 they punched whole seventeen. 516 00:24:52,440 --> 00:24:54,279 Speaker 2: It was so manual, very manual. 517 00:24:54,480 --> 00:24:57,079 Speaker 1: They would load thousands of these cards into the mainframe, 518 00:24:57,079 --> 00:24:59,599 which would run them through physical light sensors. If the 519 00:24:59,680 --> 00:25:02,559 light sh shine through both holes simultaneously, the machine dropped 520 00:25:02,599 --> 00:25:04,799 the card and boom, you had assess book it was 521 00:25:04,880 --> 00:25:06,160 left handed with a green jacket. 522 00:25:06,279 --> 00:25:08,240 Speaker 2: It was agonizingly tedious work. 523 00:25:08,519 --> 00:25:11,599 Speaker 1: Yeah, but it allowed them to cross reference data points 524 00:25:11,680 --> 00:25:13,960 at a speed that human eyes just couldn't match. 525 00:25:14,200 --> 00:25:17,920 Speaker 2: And it forced law enforcement to undergo a massive paradigm shift. 526 00:25:17,960 --> 00:25:21,200 They had to stop looking at crimes merely as isolated 527 00:25:21,279 --> 00:25:24,400 physical events and start looking at them as data. 528 00:25:24,160 --> 00:25:27,000 Speaker 1: Sets right, seeing the matrix exactly if. 529 00:25:26,920 --> 00:25:30,720 Speaker 2: An offender operates within a pattern, a computer using boolean 530 00:25:30,839 --> 00:25:35,000 logic is infinitely better equipped to recognize the mathematical structure 531 00:25:35,039 --> 00:25:38,440 of that pattern than a tired detective on our forty 532 00:25:38,480 --> 00:25:39,039 of a shift. 533 00:25:39,240 --> 00:25:41,759 Speaker 1: But okay, I have to play devil's advocate here, Oh, 534 00:25:41,799 --> 00:25:45,440 for it was the Boston PD's resistance to this purely 535 00:25:45,559 --> 00:25:49,559 driven by bruised egos and racism? Or did they have 536 00:25:49,599 --> 00:25:51,279 a valid philosophical point? 537 00:25:51,400 --> 00:25:52,960 Speaker 2: That's a really fair question. 538 00:25:52,839 --> 00:25:55,519 Speaker 1: Like are we sure the computer actually helped or did 539 00:25:55,559 --> 00:25:58,480 it just create a false sense of mathematical certainty? Does 540 00:25:58,519 --> 00:26:02,279 a giant calculating machine actually translate to the chaotic reality 541 00:26:02,279 --> 00:26:02,880 of the streets. 542 00:26:03,039 --> 00:26:06,400 Speaker 2: It's a deeply nuanced conflict. The ego and cultural resistance 543 00:26:06,440 --> 00:26:10,759 were undeniably massive factors, but their philosophical objection was not 544 00:26:11,039 --> 00:26:15,240 entirely baseless. Okay, how so, well, a mainframe computer can 545 00:26:15,279 --> 00:26:18,079 efficiently tell you that eighty percent of the attacks happened 546 00:26:18,119 --> 00:26:21,640 on a Tuesday. A psychiatrist on the task force can 547 00:26:21,720 --> 00:26:26,240 theorize that the killer has deep seated misogyny stemming from childhood. Sure, 548 00:26:26,319 --> 00:26:30,400 but neither of those abstract conclusions physically puts handcuffs on 549 00:26:30,440 --> 00:26:31,000 a suspect. 550 00:26:31,119 --> 00:26:32,039 Speaker 1: Right, That makes sense? 551 00:26:32,200 --> 00:26:35,359 Speaker 2: The beat cops felt that while Bottomley's high tech task 552 00:26:35,400 --> 00:26:38,880 force was busy chasing a theoretical phantom inside a machine, 553 00:26:39,400 --> 00:26:42,400 they were completely losing touch with the physical reality of 554 00:26:42,440 --> 00:26:42,880 the city. 555 00:26:43,079 --> 00:26:46,200 Speaker 1: And the darkest irony of this entire saga is that 556 00:26:46,279 --> 00:26:47,279 the beat cops were right. 557 00:26:47,440 --> 00:26:48,640 Speaker 2: They absolutely were. 558 00:26:48,880 --> 00:26:51,440 Speaker 1: While the high tech task force is busy feeding cardboard 559 00:26:51,480 --> 00:26:54,000 punch cards into a mainframe trying to build a digital 560 00:26:54,039 --> 00:26:58,440 profile of the strangler, a very tangible, physical predator is 561 00:26:58,599 --> 00:27:01,640 literally walking right through the front doors of Boston apartments 562 00:27:01,680 --> 00:27:02,519 in broad daylight. 563 00:27:02,759 --> 00:27:06,119 Speaker 2: Exactly while the entire city's focus and all the media 564 00:27:06,160 --> 00:27:10,119 oxygen is consumed by the strangler, a parallel string of 565 00:27:10,160 --> 00:27:12,759 horrifying crimes is occurring right under their noses. 566 00:27:12,799 --> 00:27:13,599 Speaker 1: It's terrifying. 567 00:27:13,799 --> 00:27:17,160 Speaker 2: A rash of brutal sexual assaults is sweeping the Boston area, 568 00:27:17,200 --> 00:27:19,839 where crucially the victims are not murdered. 569 00:27:19,720 --> 00:27:23,480 Speaker 1: And the modus operande this guy uses is the skeleton 570 00:27:23,559 --> 00:27:27,079 key that completely solves the locker room mystery from the 571 00:27:27,119 --> 00:27:28,759 sluzzer's case and all the others. 572 00:27:28,839 --> 00:27:30,880 Speaker 2: Yes, the handyman ruse. 573 00:27:31,000 --> 00:27:34,880 Speaker 1: Surviving victims are reporting a nearly identical scenario. A man 574 00:27:34,960 --> 00:27:36,640 comes to their door in the middle of the day. 575 00:27:37,160 --> 00:27:40,880 He's dressed casually, bit cleanly in greenwork clothes, and he 576 00:27:40,920 --> 00:27:43,839 claims to be a handyman sent by the building's landlord 577 00:27:44,160 --> 00:27:45,240 or management company. 578 00:27:45,279 --> 00:27:49,720 Speaker 2: It's a con, a brilliantly simple, devastatingly effective social con. 579 00:27:49,880 --> 00:27:52,720 Speaker 1: It really is the weaponization of trust. In one of 580 00:27:52,720 --> 00:27:55,240 the attacks, a woman opens her door to a man 581 00:27:55,279 --> 00:27:57,880 in a green uniform who says he's there to inspect 582 00:27:57,880 --> 00:28:00,400 a leaky pipe in the bathroom. Right, that's him in 583 00:28:00,640 --> 00:28:03,519 He follows her to the bathroom, physically assaults her, and 584 00:28:03,519 --> 00:28:06,519 then flees the apartment. It's horrible, but here is where 585 00:28:06,519 --> 00:28:09,680 his hubris finally catches up with him. A few days later, 586 00:28:09,720 --> 00:28:11,960 this exact same man knocks on the door of another 587 00:28:12,000 --> 00:28:15,039 apartment building, but this time the woman on the other 588 00:28:15,079 --> 00:28:17,200 side of the door refuses to unchain it. 589 00:28:17,359 --> 00:28:18,279 Speaker 2: She trusts her gut. 590 00:28:18,599 --> 00:28:21,039 Speaker 1: She does. She tells him to go away. He gets 591 00:28:21,119 --> 00:28:24,400 visibly frustrated. He storms out of the building, and because 592 00:28:24,400 --> 00:28:26,279 he's operating in the middle of the day and causing 593 00:28:26,319 --> 00:28:29,240 a scene, he is spotted by half a dozen different 594 00:28:29,240 --> 00:28:30,920 witnesses on the street, and. 595 00:28:30,839 --> 00:28:34,200 Speaker 2: Those witnesses provide a description sharp enough that local police 596 00:28:34,240 --> 00:28:37,839 are finally able to identify and apprehend a thirty three 597 00:28:37,880 --> 00:28:41,000 year old factory worker named Albert DeSalvo. 598 00:28:41,039 --> 00:28:42,599 Speaker 1: Finally a break. 599 00:28:42,799 --> 00:28:46,279 Speaker 2: Yes, they bring him into the precincts solely for questioning 600 00:28:46,319 --> 00:28:49,079 regarding these green men sexual assaults. 601 00:28:49,519 --> 00:28:52,519 Speaker 1: We really need to pause and examine the terrifying psychology 602 00:28:52,559 --> 00:28:55,640 of his entry method, though, because it affects every single 603 00:28:55,640 --> 00:28:56,079 one of us. 604 00:28:56,119 --> 00:28:58,039 Speaker 2: Oh, absolutely, it's universally applicable. 605 00:28:58,119 --> 00:29:02,319 Speaker 1: He exploited our fundamental reliance on cognitive shortcuts. If someone 606 00:29:02,400 --> 00:29:05,559 knocks on your door wearing a utility uniform and speaks 607 00:29:05,559 --> 00:29:07,880 with the bored authority of someone just doing their job, 608 00:29:08,039 --> 00:29:11,480 like management sent me to check the radiators, our default 609 00:29:11,519 --> 00:29:13,559 societal setting is compliance. 610 00:29:13,839 --> 00:29:15,799 Speaker 2: We're conditioned to cooperate. 611 00:29:15,960 --> 00:29:19,200 Speaker 1: We want to be polite. We want our radiators fixed. 612 00:29:19,599 --> 00:29:21,640 Think about the last time a maintenance worker knocked on 613 00:29:21,640 --> 00:29:24,359 your door. You probably let them in without a second thought. 614 00:29:24,559 --> 00:29:28,799 I know I have that innate neighborly trust. Is exactly 615 00:29:28,799 --> 00:29:30,279 what this predator hijacked. 616 00:29:30,359 --> 00:29:34,359 Speaker 2: He understood that perceived authority and utility override caution. And 617 00:29:34,440 --> 00:29:37,559 consider the psychological fallout for the city once this method 618 00:29:37,559 --> 00:29:41,559 became public. Oh, the paranoia, exactly what happens to the 619 00:29:41,559 --> 00:29:45,160 fabric of a community. When the incredibly mundane act of 620 00:29:45,319 --> 00:29:47,680 answering your door at two twenty zero pm on a 621 00:29:47,720 --> 00:29:49,599 Tuesday becomes a life or. 622 00:29:49,519 --> 00:29:51,279 Speaker 1: Death gamble, it ruins everything. 623 00:29:51,559 --> 00:29:55,240 Speaker 2: It introduces a permanent paranoia into the domestic space. You 624 00:29:55,240 --> 00:29:57,880 can no longer trust your own eyes. A uniform is 625 00:29:57,920 --> 00:29:59,920 no longer a symbol of help. It's a potential thing. 626 00:30:00,680 --> 00:30:03,839 Speaker 1: But here is the massive, glaring contradiction that throws the 627 00:30:04,000 --> 00:30:05,119 entire narrative into a. 628 00:30:05,079 --> 00:30:06,839 Speaker 2: Spin, the behavioral anomaly. 629 00:30:07,000 --> 00:30:09,640 Speaker 1: Right researcher in Italia points it out beautifully in her 630 00:30:09,680 --> 00:30:13,400 analysis the case files. DeSalvo is captured and identified as 631 00:30:13,400 --> 00:30:16,799 the green Man rapist, but the high tech task force 632 00:30:16,880 --> 00:30:20,440 immediately starts wondering could the green Man also be our 633 00:30:20,440 --> 00:30:21,440 Boston strangler. 634 00:30:21,559 --> 00:30:23,160 Speaker 2: It's a natural leap for them to make. 635 00:30:23,400 --> 00:30:26,599 Speaker 1: But if he is, it raises a massive red flag. 636 00:30:27,039 --> 00:30:30,480 Why would a ruthless, organized serial killer who is already 637 00:30:30,519 --> 00:30:33,720 brutally murdered over a dozen women suddenly start leaving his 638 00:30:33,759 --> 00:30:34,440 victims alive? 639 00:30:34,640 --> 00:30:37,920 Speaker 2: That is the great anomaly that continues to fuel debate today. 640 00:30:38,000 --> 00:30:39,039 Speaker 1: It just doesn't make sense. 641 00:30:39,079 --> 00:30:43,319 Speaker 2: In behavioral science and predatory profiling, violent offenders operate on 642 00:30:43,359 --> 00:30:46,759 a curve of escalation. They might start with voyeurism, graduate 643 00:30:46,759 --> 00:30:50,200 to sexual assault, and eventually across the threshold into murder. 644 00:30:50,240 --> 00:30:54,559 As they require increasingly extreme stimuli to satisfy their compulsion. 645 00:30:54,400 --> 00:30:56,480 Speaker 1: They escalate. They don't dial it back exactly. 646 00:30:56,759 --> 00:31:00,000 Speaker 2: For an offender to routinely murder, to take the time 647 00:31:00,160 --> 00:31:02,960 to pose the bodies and tie decorative bows and then 648 00:31:03,000 --> 00:31:06,359 suddenly de escalate back to mirror assaults and intentionally leave 649 00:31:06,480 --> 00:31:09,799 living witnesses who can identify him, it completely contradicts the 650 00:31:09,880 --> 00:31:12,400 established laws of predatory behavioral evolution. 651 00:31:12,599 --> 00:31:15,319 Speaker 1: It's like a Category five hurricane suddenly deciding it just 652 00:31:15,359 --> 00:31:16,400 wants to fly a kite. 653 00:31:16,559 --> 00:31:17,359 Speaker 2: That's exactly it. 654 00:31:17,519 --> 00:31:20,400 Speaker 1: The physics of the psychological momentum just don't allow for it. 655 00:31:20,480 --> 00:31:22,799 But what if the murders were just accidents, like he 656 00:31:22,880 --> 00:31:25,920 only meant to assault them but things got out of hand. 657 00:31:26,240 --> 00:31:28,759 Speaker 2: That theory was floated at the time, actually, but it 658 00:31:28,799 --> 00:31:31,039 falls apart when you look at the crime scenes because 659 00:31:31,079 --> 00:31:34,519 of the boat, because of the bow. An accidental panic 660 00:31:34,559 --> 00:31:38,680 strangulation during an assault is frantic and messy, right, Taking 661 00:31:38,680 --> 00:31:41,599 the time to fashion a symmetrical bow under the victim's 662 00:31:41,680 --> 00:31:46,440 chin requires post mortem time and deliberate, calm intent. The 663 00:31:46,559 --> 00:31:50,519 murders weren't accidents. They were the goal wow, which makes 664 00:31:50,559 --> 00:31:53,319 the sudden shift to leaving the green man victims alive 665 00:31:53,759 --> 00:31:54,599 so baffling. 666 00:31:55,160 --> 00:31:57,559 Speaker 1: Baffling or not Capturing the man in the green uniform 667 00:31:57,640 --> 00:32:00,720 was one thing. But when John Bottomley and the psychiatrist 668 00:32:00,799 --> 00:32:03,559 started digging into Albert Disselbo's past to see if he 669 00:32:03,680 --> 00:32:07,880 possessed the specific terrifying architecture required to be the strangler, 670 00:32:08,240 --> 00:32:10,759 they uncovered a history of trauma that shocked even the 671 00:32:10,799 --> 00:32:12,640 most hardened experts on the task force. 672 00:32:12,960 --> 00:32:16,960 Speaker 2: Dissalvo is transferred to Bridgewater State Hospital for a comprehensive 673 00:32:17,000 --> 00:32:21,279 psychiatric evaluation, and the deeper the psychiatrists probe into his 674 00:32:21,359 --> 00:32:24,880 formative years, the more the pieces of a classic, albeit 675 00:32:24,960 --> 00:32:27,680 horrifying behavioral puzzles start to walk into place. 676 00:32:28,240 --> 00:32:31,440 Speaker 1: The abuse in his childhood is staggering. It's difficult to 677 00:32:31,480 --> 00:32:32,480 even read the transcripts. 678 00:32:32,519 --> 00:32:33,799 Speaker 2: It's incredibly dark. 679 00:32:34,119 --> 00:32:38,000 Speaker 1: During these evaluations, it comes out that Dissalvo was viciously, 680 00:32:38,359 --> 00:32:43,000 repeatedly beaten by his father. He vividly recalled witnessing his 681 00:32:43,039 --> 00:32:47,640 father break his mother's fingers one by one, just horrifying 682 00:32:48,000 --> 00:32:51,359 and most disturbingly, he claimed his father would frequently bring 683 00:32:51,400 --> 00:32:54,880 prostitutes into their small home and violently have sex with 684 00:32:54,920 --> 00:32:56,279 them right in front of the children. 685 00:32:56,720 --> 00:33:00,400 Speaker 2: If we evaluate that through the lens of modern criminal psychology, 686 00:33:00,960 --> 00:33:05,039 severe compounding childhood trauma is an incredibly common foundation in 687 00:33:05,079 --> 00:33:07,119 the profiles of violent sexual offenders. 688 00:33:07,200 --> 00:33:08,119 Speaker 1: It lays the groundwork. 689 00:33:08,240 --> 00:33:12,839 Speaker 2: It does witnessing extreme domestic violence, specifically violence perpetrated by 690 00:33:12,839 --> 00:33:17,079 a patriarchal figure, severely fractures the developing psyche. It teaches 691 00:33:17,119 --> 00:33:20,559 the child that physical violence is the primary currency of control, and, 692 00:33:20,599 --> 00:33:24,480 in Dssalvo's specific case, witnessing his father abuse sex workers 693 00:33:24,640 --> 00:33:28,640 intrinsically linked violence, degradation, and sexual arousal. In his formative 694 00:33:28,640 --> 00:33:31,839 neural pathways, he was taught that sex and violence are 695 00:33:31,880 --> 00:33:33,160 completely inseparable. 696 00:33:33,440 --> 00:33:37,200 Speaker 1: Bottomly sensing, he finally has his man steps in and 697 00:33:37,279 --> 00:33:40,519 personally conducts the grueling series of intensive interviews with the 698 00:33:40,599 --> 00:33:41,880 Salvo at Bridgewater. 699 00:33:42,200 --> 00:33:44,200 Speaker 2: He really zeros in on him now. 700 00:33:44,240 --> 00:33:47,759 Speaker 1: At first, DeSalvo is surprisingly candid about his life as 701 00:33:47,759 --> 00:33:52,599 a criminal. He freely admits to hundreds, literally hundreds of 702 00:33:52,680 --> 00:33:56,279 break ins and sexual assaults operating as the Green Man. 703 00:33:56,400 --> 00:33:58,119 Speaker 2: He was very open about those. 704 00:33:57,920 --> 00:34:01,599 Speaker 1: But when Bottomly pushes him on the murders, DeSalvo vehemently 705 00:34:01,640 --> 00:34:02,960 denies killing anyone. 706 00:34:03,039 --> 00:34:07,279 Speaker 2: But during the standoff, a very interesting, highly circumstantial piece 707 00:34:07,319 --> 00:34:08,559 of data emerges. 708 00:34:08,639 --> 00:34:09,800 Speaker 1: Oh, I know where you're going with this. 709 00:34:10,000 --> 00:34:13,119 Speaker 2: While Albert DiSalvo is locked securely inside the walls of 710 00:34:13,119 --> 00:34:17,480 Bridgewater State Hospital, the strangulations completely stop. 711 00:34:17,519 --> 00:34:18,400 Speaker 1: Just abruptly end. 712 00:34:18,599 --> 00:34:22,000 Speaker 2: The phantom disappears. No other women in Boston are killed in. 713 00:34:21,960 --> 00:34:25,360 Speaker 1: That manner, which is exactly the kind of circumstantial coincidence 714 00:34:25,559 --> 00:34:30,400 that makes desperate police departments and terrified politicians very, very hopeful. 715 00:34:30,559 --> 00:34:31,639 Speaker 2: Oh they were thrilled. 716 00:34:31,760 --> 00:34:34,480 Speaker 1: The public finally starts to sleep a little better, But 717 00:34:34,519 --> 00:34:37,440 the prosecutors know they can't take a timeline pause to 718 00:34:37,480 --> 00:34:37,920 a jury. 719 00:34:38,480 --> 00:34:40,199 Speaker 2: They need more, They need a confession. 720 00:34:40,440 --> 00:34:43,199 Speaker 1: And then, in the summer of nineteen sixty six, the 721 00:34:43,320 --> 00:34:49,519 dam finally breaks. During another session with Bottomley, DiSalvo suddenly confesses. 722 00:34:49,320 --> 00:34:51,880 Speaker 2: And it isn't just a partial confession. He confesses to 723 00:34:51,920 --> 00:34:55,280 the eleven known canonical Boston strangler murders. 724 00:34:55,320 --> 00:34:56,880 Speaker 1: But then he goes even further right. 725 00:34:56,760 --> 00:34:59,920 Speaker 2: He does, he provides a stunning surplus. He confesses to 726 00:35:00,079 --> 00:35:03,800 to two additional previously unsolved killings that the police hadn't 727 00:35:03,840 --> 00:35:07,960 even definitively linked to the Strangler yet the murder of 728 00:35:08,000 --> 00:35:10,559 eighty year old Mary Mullen in June of sixty two 729 00:35:11,159 --> 00:35:13,440 and sixty nine year old Mary Brown in March of 730 00:35:13,480 --> 00:35:17,119 sixty three. Wow, he delivers a perfectly tidy confession to 731 00:35:17,199 --> 00:35:19,119 a total of thirteen murders. 732 00:35:19,480 --> 00:35:21,440 Speaker 1: I have to push back on this narrative, though, Okay, 733 00:35:21,480 --> 00:35:24,360 what are you thinking. We talked extensively about his horrific 734 00:35:24,440 --> 00:35:27,320 childhood trauma and how it wired him for violence. But 735 00:35:27,599 --> 00:35:30,239 does severe trauma guarantee a monster has made or does 736 00:35:30,280 --> 00:35:32,559 it just set the stage? That's the big question, because 737 00:35:32,559 --> 00:35:35,679 from where I'm sitting looking at the historical record, this sudden, 738 00:35:35,880 --> 00:35:40,000 sweeping confession to bottomly feels incredibly, I don't know, convenient. 739 00:35:40,320 --> 00:35:42,960 Speaker 2: You are hitting on the crux of the entire historical 740 00:35:43,000 --> 00:35:46,719 and legal debate surrounding the Boston Strangler. Yes, trauma sets 741 00:35:46,760 --> 00:35:50,639 the stage. It absolutely does not guarantee the outcome. Millions 742 00:35:50,679 --> 00:35:54,320 of people suffer unimaginable abuse and never emit a single crime, right. 743 00:35:54,559 --> 00:35:58,199 But your instinct about the convenience of confession is exactly 744 00:35:58,239 --> 00:36:01,800 why this case remains so ferly debated among experts today 745 00:36:02,199 --> 00:36:06,719 because here is the massive, unavoidable, glaring red flag. 746 00:36:06,840 --> 00:36:07,360 Speaker 1: What is it? 747 00:36:07,480 --> 00:36:12,440 Speaker 2: Despite this incredibly detailed, sweeping confession to thirteen murders, there 748 00:36:12,519 --> 00:36:17,360 was absolutely zero physical evidence that conclusively linked Albert DiSalvo 749 00:36:17,480 --> 00:36:19,119 to the strangler crime scenes. 750 00:36:19,239 --> 00:36:21,679 Speaker 1: Wait, nothing, not a single fingerprint. 751 00:36:21,880 --> 00:36:24,519 Speaker 2: Nothing. Obviously we are in the pre DNA era, but 752 00:36:24,559 --> 00:36:27,559 there were no definitive blood typing matches, no fibers, no 753 00:36:27,599 --> 00:36:30,119 shoe prints, no fingerprints that placed him in those rooms. 754 00:36:30,280 --> 00:36:31,079 Speaker 1: That is wild. 755 00:36:31,360 --> 00:36:33,760 Speaker 2: The entire foundation of the case was his word to 756 00:36:33,840 --> 00:36:35,119 John Bottomley. 757 00:36:34,639 --> 00:36:37,320 Speaker 1: And yet Bottomly and the task force decide that his 758 00:36:37,440 --> 00:36:38,119 word is enough. 759 00:36:38,239 --> 00:36:38,800 Speaker 2: They took a win. 760 00:36:38,920 --> 00:36:41,760 Speaker 1: They have the confession. The computer models don't matter anymore. 761 00:36:41,760 --> 00:36:44,280 They officially announced to the press that the Boston Strangler 762 00:36:44,320 --> 00:36:45,199 has finally been. 763 00:36:45,079 --> 00:36:46,880 Speaker 2: Caught, and the city just exhales. 764 00:36:47,280 --> 00:36:50,760 Speaker 1: The city throws a collective parade, the hardware stores stops 765 00:36:50,760 --> 00:36:53,880 selling out of dead bolts. The long suffocating nightmare is 766 00:36:53,880 --> 00:36:57,280 declared over. But was it really? 767 00:36:57,639 --> 00:36:59,800 Speaker 2: This is where we have to ask you, the listener, 768 00:37:00,159 --> 00:37:03,400 to consider the deeply flawed nature of the Justice Sister's 769 00:37:03,480 --> 00:37:08,079 reliance on confessions, especially in the era before forensic science 770 00:37:08,159 --> 00:37:10,239 could definitively corroborate them. 771 00:37:10,199 --> 00:37:12,280 Speaker 1: Right, because people confess to things they didn't do all 772 00:37:12,320 --> 00:37:12,679 the time. 773 00:37:12,880 --> 00:37:17,480 Speaker 2: Exactly. We know today, through the exhaustive work of organizations 774 00:37:17,519 --> 00:37:23,239 like the Innocence Project, that false confessions are shockingly, terrifyingly common. 775 00:37:23,400 --> 00:37:24,079 Speaker 1: Why do they happen? 776 00:37:24,280 --> 00:37:26,559 Speaker 2: They can be coerced through exhaustion, or they can be 777 00:37:26,639 --> 00:37:29,920 willingly offered by a deeply mentally unwell individual who is 778 00:37:29,960 --> 00:37:34,079 seeking infamy, attention, or maybe even just better living conditions and. 779 00:37:34,039 --> 00:37:39,000 Speaker 1: Custody and DISSALVL was undeniably mentally unwell. The transcripts show 780 00:37:39,079 --> 00:37:41,679 he absolutely reveled in the attention he was getting from 781 00:37:41,679 --> 00:37:44,760 Bottomley and this team of prestigious psychiatrists. 782 00:37:44,800 --> 00:37:45,639 Speaker 2: He loved the spotlight. 783 00:37:45,719 --> 00:37:48,360 Speaker 1: He was a nobody factory worker who suddenly had the 784 00:37:48,360 --> 00:37:50,599 most powerful men in the state hanging on his every word. 785 00:37:50,960 --> 00:37:55,199 Speaker 2: Exactly, you have a highly suggestible, deeply traumatized man with 786 00:37:55,280 --> 00:37:59,320 a documented history of sexual violence, who clearly enjoys being the. 787 00:37:59,280 --> 00:38:01,559 Speaker 1: Center of a t It's a dangerous mix. 788 00:38:01,800 --> 00:38:06,280 Speaker 2: Combine that volatile psychology with a police force, an attorney general, 789 00:38:06,360 --> 00:38:09,880 and a political establishment that are all absolutely desperate for closure. 790 00:38:09,960 --> 00:38:13,760 To save their careers and calm the public. It is 791 00:38:13,800 --> 00:38:16,639 a perfect recipe for a profoundly flawed resolution. 792 00:38:17,079 --> 00:38:21,360 Speaker 1: Did bottomly intentionally feed him details of the crime scenes 793 00:38:21,480 --> 00:38:22,880 to secure the confession? 794 00:38:23,239 --> 00:38:25,960 Speaker 2: Many historians suspect he did even subconsciously. 795 00:38:26,159 --> 00:38:28,639 Speaker 1: It's incredibly unsettling when you step back and look at 796 00:38:28,639 --> 00:38:31,599 the massive scope of what we've unpacked today on thrilling threads. 797 00:38:31,840 --> 00:38:33,320 Speaker 2: It really is a massive story. 798 00:38:33,440 --> 00:38:36,679 Speaker 1: We started this analysis looking at the jarring, innocent visual 799 00:38:36,760 --> 00:38:40,840 of fresh baked muffins in anislauser's apartment, completely contradicting the 800 00:38:40,880 --> 00:38:41,679 violence around it. 801 00:38:41,760 --> 00:38:42,880 Speaker 2: Such a haunting image. 802 00:38:42,960 --> 00:38:46,039 Speaker 1: We moved through the sweltering, oppressive, claustrophobic panic of the 803 00:38:46,119 --> 00:38:49,400 nineteen sixty two heat wave. We saw the revolutionary, albeit 804 00:38:49,519 --> 00:38:52,960 incredibly clunky, introduction of mainframe computers and punch cards to 805 00:38:53,039 --> 00:38:55,639 law enforcement to hunt a digital phantom. 806 00:38:55,320 --> 00:38:57,000 Speaker 2: Which changed policing forever. 807 00:38:57,360 --> 00:39:00,559 Speaker 1: And we confronted the chilling reality of the handymail ruse, 808 00:39:01,119 --> 00:39:06,079 the predator who bypassed every lock simply by asking nicely. 809 00:39:06,400 --> 00:39:09,639 Speaker 2: We covered massive ground today, tracking the painful evolution of 810 00:39:09,679 --> 00:39:15,320 investigative methodology alongside the darkest, most fractured corners of behavioral psychology. 811 00:39:15,639 --> 00:39:17,920 Speaker 1: But we are left with a haunting consideration that is 812 00:39:17,960 --> 00:39:21,679 simply not fully resolved by the historical record we examined. 813 00:39:21,880 --> 00:39:24,199 Speaker 2: No, it's still an open question in many ways, in. 814 00:39:24,159 --> 00:39:26,760 Speaker 1: A case that was ultimately built entirely on a verbal 815 00:39:26,800 --> 00:39:31,000 confession with absolutely zero physical evidence linking the suspect to 816 00:39:31,039 --> 00:39:34,079 the dead, and knowing that Albert Dissolvo left his later 817 00:39:34,159 --> 00:39:37,559 green Man victims alive, which devised everything we know about 818 00:39:37,559 --> 00:39:41,199 how serial killers evolve. Did the high tech, computer driven 819 00:39:41,239 --> 00:39:44,480 task force truly catch the Boston Strangler or. 820 00:39:44,400 --> 00:39:47,119 Speaker 2: Did they simply lock away a very bad, very damaged 821 00:39:47,199 --> 00:39:49,360 rapist who was willing to wear the terrifying mask of 822 00:39:49,360 --> 00:39:51,639 the strangler just to give a panic city its peace 823 00:39:51,639 --> 00:39:52,039 of mind. 824 00:39:52,159 --> 00:39:54,280 Speaker 1: That is the million dollar question, and that. 825 00:39:54,280 --> 00:39:58,800 Speaker 2: Leaves us with one final, broader reality to consider. Regardless 826 00:39:58,840 --> 00:40:01,679 of whether Dissolvo acted alone or if the real strangler 827 00:40:01,719 --> 00:40:05,400 slipped away, the legacy of this case fundamentally altered the 828 00:40:05,519 --> 00:40:09,480 architecture of American society. Also before nineteen sixty two, the 829 00:40:09,559 --> 00:40:12,360 concept of a woman living alone in a city apartment 830 00:40:12,559 --> 00:40:17,039 was becoming a symbol of newfound independence. The Strangler case 831 00:40:17,199 --> 00:40:20,960 weaponized that independence. It ushered in the era of the 832 00:40:21,039 --> 00:40:24,880 dead bolt, the peopole, and the chainlock. Wow, it permanently 833 00:40:24,960 --> 00:40:27,079 changed how we build our apartments and how we view 834 00:40:27,079 --> 00:40:30,400 our neighbors. The strangler didn't just kill women. He killed 835 00:40:30,400 --> 00:40:33,440 a very specific era of urban innocence. 836 00:40:33,079 --> 00:40:36,400 Speaker 1: The architecture of paranoia that is incredibly profound. It really 837 00:40:36,400 --> 00:40:38,039 makes you look at your own front door differently. 838 00:40:38,119 --> 00:40:38,960 Speaker 2: It definitely does. 839 00:40:39,119 --> 00:40:41,719 Speaker 1: What do you think about today's discussion? Does the psychological 840 00:40:41,760 --> 00:40:44,440 profile of Disalvo's trauma and the sheer volume of his 841 00:40:44,519 --> 00:40:48,159 confession convinces that he was the sole monster haunting Boston? 842 00:40:48,840 --> 00:40:51,840 Or do the glaring inconsistencies like the lack of physical 843 00:40:51,880 --> 00:40:55,599 evidence the impossible de escalation of violence suggests the real 844 00:40:55,639 --> 00:40:58,360 strangler might have vanished into history while everyone was busy 845 00:40:58,400 --> 00:40:59,400 staring at the green. 846 00:40:59,199 --> 00:41:01,360 Speaker 2: Mant to ponder it is. 847 00:41:01,800 --> 00:41:03,719 Speaker 1: Drop your theories in the comments. We really want to 848 00:41:03,719 --> 00:41:06,480 know where you stand on this. Thanks for joining us 849 00:41:06,480 --> 00:41:08,800 on today's thrilling threads. Catch you next time.