Speaker 1: This is Gary and Shannon and you're listening to KFI
Speaker 1: AM six forty, The Gary and Shannon Show on demand
Speaker 1: on the iHeartRadio app. We have a bit of a
Speaker 1: true crime Friday coming up about detectives investigating a student
Speaker 1: at UCLA's murder have uncovered a bit of a twist
Speaker 1: in the case. This is a murder that goes back
Speaker 1: to nineteen ninety and had all the markings of one
Speaker 1: of those occult type martyrs, complete with Manson family type connections.
Speaker 1: So we'll talk about that. Also a feel good story
Speaker 1: about what a retired firefighter has been up to.
Speaker 2: All Right, So, yesterday something happened at Dodger Stadium, and
Speaker 2: I'm not talking about the padres Win. Something happened yesterday
Speaker 2: morning specifically, and while we were on the show here,
Speaker 2: we got a bunch of televisions in all of the
Speaker 2: local stations. We're running with a story about ice agents
Speaker 2: that had shown up at the parking lot at Dodger Stadium,
Speaker 2: State or whatever.
Speaker 1: Bit of a timeline. Nothing happens inside a vacuum. The
Speaker 1: Dodgers had remained silent as all of the protests were
Speaker 1: going on. The Dodgers, who are a very pro immigrant organization,
Speaker 1: and to say the least as you could possibly say.
Speaker 1: They had the national anthem sung last week, the singer
Speaker 1: sang it in Spanish. She told that she she told
Speaker 1: somebody so TikTok that she was told not to do so,
Speaker 1: we don't know by whom. And then the story became, well,
Speaker 1: she was told you shouldn't have done that after the fact,
Speaker 1: or what have you. The Dodgers kind of got wrapped
Speaker 1: up in this white You didn't say anything about the protest,
Speaker 1: and now you told her she couldn't sing in Spanish,
Speaker 1: which is in the opposite of what the Dodgers would
Speaker 1: would do, you would think in normal circumstances. So they
Speaker 1: were already dealing with blowback from that, and then they
Speaker 1: came out and said that they were going to make
Speaker 1: this major announcement about something beneficial to the immigrant community,
Speaker 1: standing alongside the immigrant community, some sort of announcement of
Speaker 1: how they were going to maybe I don't know, pour
Speaker 1: money into the cause. I'm not sure what it was.
Speaker 1: But that was the backdrop of us getting reports yesterday
Speaker 1: around this time that ice officers were turning up in
Speaker 1: the gates outside of Dodger Stadium and that they were
Speaker 1: denied entry, they were trying to enter. That's when a
Speaker 1: handful of protesters showed up and there was some sort
Speaker 1: of confrontation.
Speaker 2: So there's two images, and again it feels like nobody
Speaker 2: was really trying to suss out the truth of what
Speaker 2: was going on.
Speaker 3: There's two images.
Speaker 2: One of them is of several vehicles, including unmarked white vans,
Speaker 2: unmarked in that they don't have a logo of whichever
Speaker 2: agency is driving them, that were using a parking area
Speaker 2: outside Dodger Stadium, not the parking lot, as a meeting
Speaker 2: place to just get together before they go and execute
Speaker 2: some immigration enforcement what do you call it in immigration
Speaker 2: enforcement operations?
Speaker 3: Whatever?
Speaker 1: If I'm not mistaken, and I'm not because I go
Speaker 1: there all the time. The fire department has a huge
Speaker 1: piece of property there. They actually I believe lease their
Speaker 1: parking area to Dodger Stadium for game days. Anyway, it
Speaker 1: is a big area for that fire facility. So if
Speaker 1: there needed to be a staging point for other law enforcement,
Speaker 1: that would be a likely place to do so that
Speaker 1: had nothing to do with Dodger Stadium.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it basically ends up the Vinscully Gate is where
Speaker 2: they were first.
Speaker 3: The main gate that everybody knows.
Speaker 2: There's plenty of roadway there before you actually get to
Speaker 2: the gates to get into the parking lot, and that's
Speaker 2: what they needed. They needed space to get together to
Speaker 2: plan whatever they were going to do. Apparently one of
Speaker 2: the vehicles that they were in broke down something like that.
Speaker 2: They carry out their immigration enforcement operations in Hollywood, and
Speaker 2: then after that they went back to Dodger Stadium the
Speaker 2: E gate, which is that one that is closer to
Speaker 2: the fire facility there, and they said that they were
Speaker 2: using that space again to process some of the people
Speaker 2: that had been picked up earlier in their immigration enforcement operations.
Speaker 3: Protesters are the ones that then saw them and.
Speaker 2: That's when they put up That's when the cameras came out,
Speaker 2: although there were cameras there already because of what you
Speaker 2: said was the announcement that was supposed to come from
Speaker 2: Dodgers' management.
Speaker 3: Dodger Stadium was not targeted.
Speaker 2: Agents were never inside the parking lot until they left,
Speaker 2: and the Dodgers apparently allowed them to use a different
Speaker 2: exit gate because the path to leave was blocked by protesters.
Speaker 2: It was not Immigration and Customs enforcement, and I know
Speaker 2: that that may be splitting hairs. But if you're going
Speaker 2: to get information wrong, it's going to throw a lot
Speaker 2: of the argument out the window. Apparently it was Customs
Speaker 2: and Border Protection. Yes, it does fall under Department of
Speaker 2: Homeland Security, but it is a clear distinction between the
Speaker 2: two agencies.
Speaker 3: They have been working in hand.
Speaker 2: They have been working hand in hand, but that that
Speaker 2: was again to be clear, they weren't doing any operation
Speaker 2: at Dodger Stadium, and I'm frustrated by people who think
Speaker 2: that they would, or remember last week there was a
Speaker 2: discussion that they were going to be showing up at
Speaker 2: Sofi Stadium for the soccer match that took place at Sofi.
Speaker 2: Why in the world would an agency like that put
Speaker 2: itself in a position to be completely surrounded by fifty
Speaker 2: thousand people who would be upset if they're trying to
Speaker 2: get one or two guys out of there.
Speaker 3: That's the part I don't quite understand.
Speaker 2: You think that they're so dumb they would set foot
Speaker 2: at Dodger Stadium knowing that that crowd would overwhelmingly against them.
Speaker 2: That's not what they do. That is not what they do,
Speaker 2: and they're not going to sit in the parking lot
Speaker 2: and wait for people to look brown and then arrest them.
Speaker 1: Federal agents were not trying to get into Dodger Stadium.
Speaker 1: They were not trying to raid Dodger Stadium. They were
Speaker 1: using an adjacent parking lot. The Dodgers did not Lee,
Speaker 1: did not ask federal agents to leave Dodger Stadium. They
Speaker 1: asked them, Hey, this is a distraction.
Speaker 3: Can you leave the.
Speaker 1: Parking lot or just move along with your day. That's
Speaker 1: what happened. It was. The spin is that they were
Speaker 1: trying to Ice was raiding Dodger Stadium, and the Dodgers
Speaker 1: turned them away, said no, not on our watch. Like
Speaker 1: it's all way more dramatic than it actually was.
Speaker 2: They would show up at eight thirty in the morning
Speaker 2: for a seven first to raid. Yeah, come on so again.
Speaker 2: Stan cast and team president did say that because of
Speaker 2: the finger quotes activities earlier in the day, we continue
Speaker 2: to work with our with groups that were involved with
Speaker 2: our programs, but we are going to have to delay
Speaker 2: today's announcement while we firm up some more details.
Speaker 3: We will get back to you soon with the timing.
Speaker 4: You're listening to Gary and Shannon on demand from KFI
Speaker 4: AM six forty.
Speaker 1: Well, we have a bit of a true crime Friday
Speaker 1: to tell you about. And to do so, we have
Speaker 1: got to go back to June of nineteen ninety. At
Speaker 1: the time, a common theme in the zeitgeist was a cult,
Speaker 1: a cult inspired Mayhem, darker spirits. The serial killer, the Nightstalker,
Speaker 1: a Satanist. Professed Satanist had been sentenced to death a
Speaker 1: year before. People were still talking about it. The McMartin
Speaker 1: pre school molestation case was in the news slogging through
Speaker 1: the course at the time. If you're unfamiliar, this was
Speaker 1: a case that just created mass hysteria about what was
Speaker 1: going on in local preschools. There were claims of ritual
Speaker 1: abuse of and the children were kind of coached into
Speaker 1: lying about it, and not even so lying about it.
Speaker 1: You know how kids are, They're very suggestive. It changed
Speaker 1: the way children, I believe were interviewed in any sort
Speaker 1: of law enforcement process, if I'm not mistaken. So this
Speaker 1: was very much top of mine a cult. And so
Speaker 1: when some local teenagers were in just you know, they
Speaker 1: were just exploring a pitch black tunnel above Chatsworth Park
Speaker 1: and found a young man's body, the first conclusion that
Speaker 1: was jumped to was occult motives. The victim in the
Speaker 1: tunnel was identified as a twenty one year old USLA
Speaker 1: UCLA student majoring in astrophysics. His name was Ronald Baker,
Speaker 1: and he was killed on June twenty first, which was
Speaker 1: a day considered holy by occultists, and this was a
Speaker 1: site where they were known to congress Gate. Look no
Speaker 1: further than the graffiti outside the tunnel.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's a couple of things that would point to
Speaker 2: this being Satanist or a cult or something. He one,
Speaker 2: for one thing, had a pendant that had a pentagram
Speaker 2: on it.
Speaker 3: In the bedroom of his apartment.
Speaker 2: There were books on witchcraft, there was a pentagram decorated candle,
Speaker 2: a flyer for a mystic circle, which is a group
Speaker 2: devoted to shamanism, and a lot of I mean, the
Speaker 2: conclusions were easy to jump to. Student killed on Solstice
Speaker 2: may have been sacrificed. The Times had a headline slain
Speaker 2: man frequently visited site of the occultists. But the detectives
Speaker 2: learned that this guy, that's not what he was about. Yeah,
Speaker 2: he was into Wicca, but they said he was a
Speaker 2: really sweet guy, just detested violence in any way, adamantly
Speaker 2: against Satanism, and arguably the occult at the same time.
Speaker 2: So they said, well, maybe he had changed. I mean,
Speaker 2: maybe that may have been one of the things that
Speaker 2: would explain why he was there, that he had gone
Speaker 2: to the dark side.
Speaker 1: Something that was not very explainable was the fact that
Speaker 1: the toxicology test showed he was heavily drunk when he died. Well,
Speaker 1: this guy was an introvert, like you said, shy, he
Speaker 1: was maybe a light drinker at best. So what happened there.
Speaker 3: Well, there was also the ransom calls.
Speaker 2: Ronald Baker's dad started getting phone calls demanding one hundred
Speaker 2: thousand dollars in exchange for his son's life.
Speaker 1: Now, he had roommates at the time who turned out
Speaker 1: to be both military veterans, both roommates in their early
Speaker 1: twenties as well. They had been the last people known
Speaker 1: to see him, last known people to see him alive,
Speaker 1: and they were each other's alibi. They said they had
Speaker 1: dropped him off at a bus stop in Van Eyes,
Speaker 1: that he had planned to join his friends, his mystics
Speaker 1: circle friends for the solstice. No signs of any animosity
Speaker 1: between the roommates. In fact, one of the guys, Duncan Martinez,
Speaker 1: the killed guys that Duncan was his best friend. He
Speaker 1: helped carry his casket. He spoke with the memorial service.
Speaker 1: He said his friend was never really physically strong, like
Speaker 1: a lot of guys I know, but he was the friendliest,
Speaker 1: sweetest guy. Why you would mention that I will do
Speaker 1: that for you at yours, I'll be like, you know what,
Speaker 1: the strongest guy I've ever met, But he was nice.
Speaker 1: It's so weird, right, his voice filled with emotion, Martinez
Speaker 1: is did at the service. He said about his dead friend,
Speaker 1: he would talk to anybody, be there for anybody at
Speaker 1: the drop of a dime. And I just hope that
Speaker 1: it's something I can get over because I love him.
Speaker 1: It's hard to think of a time without Ron.
Speaker 2: Okay, but there's a weird thing that happened when Ron
Speaker 2: Baker's dad. Remember He's getting these ransom demand calls. When
Speaker 2: Baker's dad told the roommates about the ransom calls, they said, oh,
Speaker 2: you know what, We'll go look for him at Chatsworth Park.
Speaker 2: Well wait a minute, I mean they knew that that
Speaker 2: was one of the places he wanted to go, But
Speaker 2: why would they assume that a kidnapper took him there.
Speaker 2: That was one of the logical things and probably the
Speaker 2: first real crack in their story.
Speaker 1: There was another troubling detail that emerged earlier on and
Speaker 1: it was that Duncan Martinez, the best friend, had cashed
Speaker 1: a check that the dead kid had given him for
Speaker 1: one hundred and nine dollars, but an excerpt an expert
Speaker 1: determined that the dead Kid's signature was forged. I'm trying
Speaker 1: to do Keith Morrison again. Is it working? Probably not.
Speaker 3: You're getting close. It is closer.
Speaker 1: We'll sell you the rest of the story doing Paul Harvey. Now,
Speaker 1: is that working? When we return White Guys, you.
Speaker 4: Know you're listening to Gary and Shannon on demand from
Speaker 4: KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 1: The Apple snooze is now adjustable. And what the snooze
Speaker 1: function on your Apple phone? Oh, on your iPhone? So
Speaker 1: if you use it, which I do, you know that
Speaker 1: it gives you nine minutes and that's it. Actually thought
Speaker 1: it was eight minutes. I guess it's nine minutes and
Speaker 1: that's it. You can't adjust it. Well, now, for eighteen
Speaker 1: years you couldn't adjust it. Now you can. You can
Speaker 1: even adjust it for as many as fifteen whole minutes.
Speaker 1: Snooze to me. I used to love it, and now
Speaker 1: I feel like it's just so detrimental because I'm awake
Speaker 1: when the alarm goes off, and I'm like, I don't
Speaker 1: want to wake up, so I hit the snooze and
Speaker 1: then I fall right back to sleep, and then I've
Speaker 1: got to go through the whole rigamarole again. I think
Speaker 1: it throws things off to a detriment.
Speaker 2: I don't have an option to change the time of
Speaker 2: this news.
Speaker 1: Do you have the OIS twenty six running?
Speaker 4: I do not.
Speaker 1: Okay, that's what you need to do. It's in beta
Speaker 1: right now. Ah, it's in beta, so it's not ready yet, Okay,
Speaker 1: but it's coming. It's a coming.
Speaker 2: General Mills, by the way, latest US food company to
Speaker 2: remove the artificial dies from its portfolio of products. The
Speaker 2: food giant says it's going to remove artificial colors from
Speaker 2: all of its US cereals and all school foods K
Speaker 2: through twelve school foods by the summer of next year.
Speaker 1: So we're talking about the murder of Ronald Baker, a
Speaker 1: twenty one year old UCLA student found in the Chatsworth
Speaker 1: Park tunnel. Some people called it the Manson Tunnel. By
Speaker 1: the way, because Manson and his disciples had lived nearby
Speaker 1: at the Spawn Ranch. The spray paint over the tunnel
Speaker 1: even read with big white block letters Holy Terror and
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety. As we pointed out, it was very big.
Speaker 1: A cult culture was very big in the zeitgeist. People
Speaker 1: were talking about it. Nightstalk are still in the news.
Speaker 1: The McMartin mess was still in the news. It was
Speaker 1: a couple of years before the Craft came out. Anyway,
Speaker 1: Witchcraft and all of that very much talked about in
Speaker 1: pop culture. So this guy UCLA student twenty one years old,
Speaker 1: turns up dead inside this tunnel, and everyone is very upset.
Speaker 1: The father is upset, the roommates are upset, both Army veterans,
Speaker 1: by the way, and the roommates started to raise a
Speaker 1: couple issues because the dead kid's father had been getting
Speaker 1: these ransom calls, and so the roommates kind of said,
Speaker 1: all right, we'll take care of it. We'll go looking
Speaker 1: for the guy that's making the calls.
Speaker 2: Right that, they were going to look in Chatsworth Park,
Speaker 2: which raised the question, how would you know that that's
Speaker 2: where he was. They also found that one of the
Speaker 2: roommates had cashed a check that he said came from
Speaker 2: Ron Baker, but figured out that Baker's signature had been forged.
Speaker 2: So Martinez, one of the roommates, agrees to this polygraph test.
Speaker 2: The test showed deception, if you will, and he took off,
Speaker 2: gone for about eighteen months, finally turned up in Utah,
Speaker 2: arrested for lying on a passport application. Was trying to
Speaker 2: reinvent himself and when he was asked about all of this,
Speaker 2: assured that his statement could not be used against him.
Speaker 2: He finally talked and he said this was all Nathan's idea.
Speaker 3: The other roommate that.
Speaker 2: They'd been watching an old episode of Dragnet about a
Speaker 2: botched kidnapping. They're both, like you, said, military. They said
Speaker 2: they could probably do a better job. So they lure
Speaker 2: Ron Baker to the park with a case of beer
Speaker 2: and say there's girls on the other side of this.
Speaker 3: We'll meet some chicks there.
Speaker 1: That's when the other roommate, according to this roommates, stabbed
Speaker 1: the dead kid with a Marine Corps k bar knife
Speaker 1: that this roommate had lent the other roommate. The dead
Speaker 1: kid apparently begged for his life and that went nowhere.
Speaker 2: Martinez then told his roommate Blaylock, to finish the job.
Speaker 2: Said I told him to make sure that it was
Speaker 2: over because they didn't want Ron to suffer. He also
Speaker 2: admitted to disguising his voice to make those ransom calls
Speaker 2: to Ron's father for the one hundred thousand dollars.
Speaker 1: He even admitted the whole story it doesn't click with
Speaker 1: me either. The dead kid's oldest sister, in a recent
Speaker 1: interview at the time, said they ruined their lives and
Speaker 1: all of the family's lives with the stupidest crime. The
Speaker 1: occult narrative obviously a red herring, wanted to throw the
Speaker 1: police off the scent of the real culprits and the
Speaker 1: real motive. They set the thing up for summersaulticts because
Speaker 1: they knew that he would go out celebrating the solstice.
Speaker 2: Blaylock was charged with murder, and detectives knew that both
Speaker 2: of them were responsible for it, but Martinez stayed free
Speaker 2: until he gets arrested for robin a sporting good store
Speaker 2: in Utah and then claims a guy put him up
Speaker 2: to it by threatening to expose his real role in
Speaker 2: the murder down in California, and he put him at
Speaker 2: the scene of the death while downplaying his guilt. But
Speaker 2: the detective said that was really the first time that
Speaker 2: legally they were able to put him in the tunnel.
Speaker 2: So jurors found both of these guys guilty of first
Speaker 2: degree murder, both of them sentenced to life without the
Speaker 2: possibility of parole.
Speaker 1: Both yes. Then in June twenty twenty, the dead kid's
Speaker 1: sister was startled to come across a news article reporting
Speaker 1: that Newsome had intervened to commute the roommate sentence, making
Speaker 1: him eligible for parole, and no one had told her.
Speaker 1: The Governor office said at the time that Martinez, the
Speaker 1: roommate who routinely lied, called the father with the ransom
Speaker 1: calls the whole bit that he had committed himself to
Speaker 1: self improvement during his time in prison. Not only had
Speaker 1: he helped to he failed to help his roommate at
Speaker 1: the time. If you believe the story that the other
Speaker 1: roommate was stabbing this guy, but in fact urged the
Speaker 1: other roommate to finish him off, like you said.
Speaker 2: And don't forget, we haven't said. We haven't used George
Speaker 2: Gascone's name here in a long time. But George Gascon
Speaker 2: had a policy that forbid prosecutors from advocating for victim's
Speaker 2: families before parole boards, and this was the case, so
Speaker 2: the victim's sister had to speak for herself. But the
Speaker 2: parole boards sided with Martinez and he got out of
Speaker 2: prison April of twenty one.
Speaker 3: Nathan Blaylock still behind bars.
Speaker 2: Great and basically all of the family members, all the detectives,
Speaker 2: they all say that both of these guys are equally
Speaker 2: responsible for Ron Baker's death.
Speaker 1: Old enough to show their evil and truly mean it,
Speaker 1: and now thank you, thank you. Apparently you kill people,
Speaker 1: you plan a brutal killing like that, and you take
Speaker 1: a couple of self help classes inside and boom, you're out,
Speaker 1: while the prosecutors or the DA's get to or the
Speaker 1: governor gets to live in his gated community.
Speaker 3: Ye all right, we have a good.
Speaker 1: Story coming up. Do you want a good story coming out?
Speaker 5: Sure?
Speaker 3: Which one?
Speaker 1: Okay? Well, I have a feel good story about Peyton
Speaker 1: Manning and Tom Brady, or you can choose the retired
Speaker 1: firefighter who has found a new hobby in retirement to
Speaker 1: help the greater good.
Speaker 2: I also have a good sports story for next hour two,
Speaker 2: so we can do both of those.
Speaker 3: If you want, we'll do them all. How about that
Speaker 3: white You's back.
Speaker 1: We're here for a while.
Speaker 4: You're listening to Gary and Shannon on demand from KFI.
Speaker 5: This is Kevin from Kila Vista and I am recovering
Speaker 5: from skin cancer surgery the past two days. I just
Speaker 5: want to say thank you for bringing smiles and lefter
Speaker 5: to me. Take care of your skin and I love
Speaker 5: your show.
Speaker 1: Thanks, that's awesome. Thank you, Kevin. And he makes a
Speaker 1: strong point. What's that sunscreen?
Speaker 3: Okay?
Speaker 2: Mom? Jeez I We were talking earlier today as well
Speaker 2: about the Minnesota state lawmakers who were shot by that
Speaker 2: crazy guy who showed up to their door.
Speaker 5: That just goes to show Gary that you do have
Speaker 5: low tee because you'd be a little girl and be like, oh, okay,
Speaker 5: open the door.
Speaker 3: Yes, I'd be like, yo, but you want at two am?
Speaker 1: Open up?
Speaker 2: No, if it's urgent, I'll see you guys tomorrow at
Speaker 2: the police station.
Speaker 4: Have a good night.
Speaker 3: That's how you would have handled him.
Speaker 4: That's how he should have handled it.
Speaker 3: You guys are idiots.
Speaker 1: You're an idiot. First of all. If a cops bang
Speaker 1: on your door at two am, it's not because they
Speaker 1: have a parking ticket or something to settle with you.
Speaker 1: That's an administrative thing where you'd show up the police
Speaker 1: station for not that you would do that for a
Speaker 1: parking ticket. But you know you're catching my dreads. It's
Speaker 1: probably because there's some sort of standoff in the neighborhood.
Speaker 2: I ask listen, I love the I love the Bravado.
Speaker 2: When it's ten o'clock in the morning and you're not
Speaker 2: woken up out of a deep.
Speaker 1: Sleep, that's you know what, when you have low TI.
Speaker 1: Sometimes I do no, no, like he does.
Speaker 6: Love the show. You never opened the door ever. Never
Speaker 6: open the door. You don't say anything. You don't let
Speaker 6: them know that your home. Never open the door. You
Speaker 6: don't turn lights on, because if the person is there
Speaker 6: to inflict harm, how do they know that you're actually home?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 2: You can actually, yes, I could do that with your
Speaker 2: with your was a video doorbell, you could say, hey,
Speaker 2: we're not home.
Speaker 3: I don't know what, but I got an alert on
Speaker 3: my phone.
Speaker 1: No, and that is accurate, and that is correct, And
Speaker 1: that's a way to avoid getting shot by somebody in
Speaker 1: personing the police nine times. I'm just saying me, if
Speaker 1: I'm woking up in the middle of the night, coming
Speaker 1: out of a sleep and I hear police, my first
Speaker 1: impulse is going to be to go open that door.
Speaker 2: I just know myself. You assume something's wrong. Yeah, and
Speaker 2: you've been taught. I mean, I know that a lot
Speaker 2: of people haven't been taught that, but you've been taught
Speaker 2: your whole life to trust the police.
Speaker 1: I don't have any reason not to.
Speaker 3: Uh.
Speaker 2: John Zito Junior thought he had put his career as
Speaker 2: a first responder behind him, but one time out in
Speaker 2: the mountains in Arizona, he here's the echo of gunshots,
Speaker 2: and he follows the sound to a guy under a
Speaker 2: sleep underneath a bush who had fired the bullets as
Speaker 2: a last Hail Mary distress call. The guy was out
Speaker 2: of water, he was suffering heatstroke and pretty much figured
Speaker 2: this is my last.
Speaker 3: This is it.
Speaker 2: If nobody comes from the sound of gunshots, I'm dead.
Speaker 3: And there he was.
Speaker 2: Zito approached him, gave him water, carried Colt Johnson about
Speaker 2: three miles off the trail back in May of last year,
Speaker 2: before he drove Johnson's car about twenty miles to the
Speaker 2: nearest store to buy him gatorade. He said that would
Speaker 2: rescue was one of the most dramatic of John Zito
Speaker 2: Junior's mission. Since retiring as a firefighter, he has now
Speaker 2: been saving hikers on those very difficult trails that wind
Speaker 2: through the state of Arizona. He picked up hiking as
Speaker 2: a retirement thing. Four to five days per week. He's
Speaker 2: out there, always carries extra water bottles, always has trail
Speaker 2: mix and granola bars and electrolyte tablets and ankle braces
Speaker 2: in his backpack so that he could give them out
Speaker 2: if they're ever needed.
Speaker 1: That's really cool, I mean, because you have such a
Speaker 1: sense of per as a firefighter. I would imagine for
Speaker 1: thirty years or however long your career is such a
Speaker 1: sense of purpose of helping people when they need you most.
Speaker 1: And for him to do this in retirement while doing
Speaker 1: something that he loves, I think is wonderful because people
Speaker 1: are dumbasses, and who knows that first and foremost firefighters.
Speaker 3: This is kind of a funny story.
Speaker 2: He grew up or was serving as a firefighter in Tampa,
Speaker 2: visiting his son in Phoenix and goes to the Grand
Speaker 2: Canyon and loves it, stays longer than he wanted, ends
Speaker 2: up getting his own apartment, and one time while he's
Speaker 2: hiking Camelback Mountain a couple of years ago, I don't
Speaker 2: know when, near the end of twenty twenty three, so
Speaker 2: still warm in Arizona. He stops at one point because
Speaker 2: he's tired, fatigued, and he's embarrassed, so he pretends to
Speaker 2: take a photo on his phone, and a woman walked
Speaker 2: by and realized that he was in a little bit
Speaker 2: of distress, and she asked if he was okay, and
Speaker 2: he said that motivated him to get in shape, to
Speaker 2: get in condition for these tough trails.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and then was doing those hikes four or five
Speaker 3: days a week. That's pretty good story.
Speaker 1: That's so true though. That's such like a real life situation.
Speaker 1: If you're like winded on a trail and you're like,
Speaker 1: I'll just make it look like I'm taking a picture. Well,
Speaker 1: I catch my breath.
Speaker 2: Eighty four year old grandma goes by you and she's like,
Speaker 2: are you okay? You don't look so good? All right,
Speaker 2: swamp watch when we come back. You've been listening to
Speaker 2: The Gary and Shannon Show. You can always hear us
Speaker 2: live on KFI AM six forty nine am to one
Speaker 2: pm every Monday through Friday and anytime on demand on
Speaker 2: the iHeartRadio lap