Episode 227 - Way to Be Rational

Pack your bags and leave your worries behind—or better yet, leave them for the local authorities to find. This week, the ladies are trading paradise for peril. From "lost in the woods" to "never seen again," join us as we explore the darker side of wanderlust and the vacation getaways that turned into permanent departures. Don’t forget your sunscreen, because these stories are about to get uncomfortably hot.

Research links below!


All That's Interesting - "What Happened To Lars Mittank, The German Tourist Who Vanished Near A Bulgarian Airport?"
People - "Lars Mittank Was Last Seen Sprinting Toward a Forest 11 Years Ago. Revisit the 'Most Famous Missing Person on YouTube' Case"
Mirror - "Chilling mystery of the 'most famous missing person on YouTube' who vanished into forest never to be seen again"
BKA - "Search for missing MITTANK, Lars Joachim"
Mel Magazine - "The Mystery of the Most Famous Missing Person on YouTube"
new.com.au - "People who mysteriously vanished from airports"
Spiegel Panorama - "Looking for Lars Mittank"

Al Jazeera - "Timeline: Case of Charles Sobhraj - 'Bikini Killer', 'Serpent'"
Britannica - "Charles Sobhraj"
CNN - "From diplomat to detective, this man helped bring Asia's notorious 'Serpent' killer to justice"
Oxygen - "Why Was Serial Killer Charles Sobhraj Nicknamed the Bikini Killer and The Serpent?"

Speaker 1: H why they upon their arrivals unspeakable. I'm not do

they did want bother. It's got to worry about.

Speaker 2: Something.

Speaker 1: If I couldn't keep them there with me whole, at

least I felt that I could keep their skeletons.

Speaker 3: Hello and welcome to the Bad Taste Crime Podcast. I'm

vicki I'm Rachel. We are back again.

Speaker 2: Hi everyone. We just watched a cat climatory. Well, we just.

Speaker 3: Watched a cat like hunting for prey. That was crazy.

It was really cool.

Speaker 2: It's true where you could tell word full summer because

the cats are out hunting. I told Tim, I'm like,

I love it here. It's like animal Planet, dude. Literally,

we were.

Speaker 3: Out on the back deck having the pre show cigarette

and yeah, the cat, the cat that's living under tips porch,

like the like feral cat, knows that there's a birdhouse

right next to the tree and just is hunting at.

Speaker 2: The bird like it was money foot tree. It was

like Discovery Channel. It was so and it got something. Yep,

she's eaten. She's got a full tummy full of ass. Well,

one of the kittens. I'm going to take that kitten home, please,

I'm going to rob is not he will leave you

after so many pets. Even it was in his files

that he would accept any animal I brought home. No,

it wasn't really legally binding, was it something like that?

I don't remember that. I was always at that one.

It was really hot.

Speaker 1: That was.

Speaker 2: Remember so hot. That was disgusting. It was beautiful though

everybody looked great. Yeah, but that ship was it was

it was really I literally got heat stroke.

Speaker 3: Anyway, if this is your first time listening, special elos

to you.

Speaker 2: We are going to head over to the nest. Let's

go there. Food watching us today we had fifty.

Speaker 3: Way Our news this week comes from China. Are you

familiar with the Shaolin Temple? Yes, very famous.

Speaker 2: Very like monkey.

Speaker 3: Currently it is being run by well not currently, but

was being run by this guy named Shi yang Jin,

and he apparently was known as the CEO monk Okay.

I didn't I've never heard of this guy. I did

not know any of this is happening. Yeah, he was

the abbot of the Shallon Temple. He has he's recently

been sentenced to twenty four years in prison. What after

he was convicted on multiple counts of embezzlements. Oh my

misappropriation of funds and bribery.

Speaker 2: Or oh that's not what monks do. Yeah, they don't

even like money.

Speaker 3: Yeah, that's crazy. In addition, he was also ordered to

pay a fine of three point five million one, which

is around five hundred and sixteen thousand dollars US doors.

Apparently this is something that has happened for like two decades.

So he was the temple's abbot and the president of

the Shaolin Charity and Welfare Foundation, and he.

Speaker 2: Was using both of these positions to embezzle.

Speaker 3: More than one hundred and thirty one million one between

two thousand and three and twenty twenty five.

Speaker 1: Uh.

Speaker 3: They also established that between twenty twelve and twenty twenty two,

he misappropriated an additional one hundred and fifty one million

million one for personal use, failing to return the funds.

Speaker 2: Over for over three months. What a dick? Yeah, what

is he buying? Like designer robes? Like Louis Vuitton in

says maybe the best shave is shy, Yeah, shave and polish.

She's like, oh, like they buffet with one of them

car things. Yeah.

Speaker 3: So he let's see, he offered more than five point

sixty seven million wand in bribes to various government functionaries

to secure ut improper benefits.

Speaker 2: Oh, let's see. I am curious if they haven't hear

what he what a shit has see because I like

watching Sometimes they post like videos of like this is

what we do all day, and I think it's so fascinating.

Speaker 3: Among the most damaging non finance allegations which initially triggered

the public outcry were reports of improper relationships with multiple

women and the fathering of illegitimate children.

Speaker 2: Yoh, yeah, this guy is a nasty monk.

Speaker 1: Yeah.

Speaker 3: Anyway, he's already he's had his UH ordination certificate revoked

already by the Buddhist Association of China. He's obviously going

to prison.

Speaker 2: Yeah, they're like, you cannot be corruption be corruption ing

ing ing everywhere. That's wild. I know, dude, you like

miss the whole point. What the fuck?

Speaker 3: He Also part of the reason he was like the

CEO monk is when he became I believe I maybe

also when he was the abbot the lah when he

became the president of the foundation, he ran like he

had this very like corporate leadership oh style, which I

think was very much about making money.

Speaker 2: Yeah, so that he can only like all of the

other younks who are probably like, real chill, Yeah, okay,

where's the money going? It doesn't need matter ever going

to Nirvana and they're like, hey, actually yeah, He's like,

let's make a folder in the computer. And they're like,

you're the guy. Yeah, you're the dude. All right, We're

going to move on to Netflix and kill This week

we are talking about the crash.

Speaker 3: Of course, is brand spakan new as for this. I

saved it for a week because I wanted to watch

it on the plane when I went out to Washington. Yo, girl,

tell me what a story. So I'm assuming you've probably

seen some stuff on hey social media about this.

Speaker 2: Yeah.

Speaker 3: So the documentary is about this girl named Mackenzie Shirrilla,

who was seventeen at the time that this happened. She

was a senior in high school. They're getting ready to

graduate or had just graduated. What happens is they police

get a report that there's this vehicle that crashed into

the side of the high school. It ended up being

that she was driving McKenzie Sherilla and her boyfriend Dominica

Gruso and their other friend and Davian Flanagan were both

in the car. Both of them unfortunately passed away from

this crash. Right, They started looking into this.

Speaker 2: Crash and all is not as it seems, because at

first everyone was like, oh my god, how tragic, like

this was obviously an accident. But then they were like, right, nuts,

so obviously it seems little.

Speaker 3: Then there it comes out that actually they smoke a

lot of weed, and they do a lot of drugs

as far as mushrooms and h you know, stuff.

Speaker 2: Like that drivable drugs.

Speaker 3: Right again, she was seventeen, he would her boyfriend was

like a couple of years older, right, Like, so just

a couple of.

Speaker 2: Years Yeah, I think I'm in nineteen or twenty.

Speaker 3: And they had been at this. They call it a

house party, I will agree. Like one of the good

friends of hers was interviewed. They interviewed like all the

family members in this documentary. She was like, they keep

calling it a house party, but it was just like us.

It was more of a sleepover. There was like five

or six of us when over is somebody's house. Yeah,

it wasn't like a big house party. It was like

a group of friends over at somebody's house. Who's like

parents were out of town. Yeah, just like hanging out

early twenties.

Speaker 2: I know. I'm like, yeah, that wasn't like a house party,

it's like a you know, yeah, so let's have a

They were all at this and they leave early in

the morning, and when they start looking at this, they

are able to compile video from the route.

Speaker 3: That they took before the car crashed. They saw the

speed at which they were driving, the control that McKenzie

had over the car before all of this, and the

fact that there were not like skid marks or you know.

Speaker 2: Which you know, if you're like, oh, no, a building,

I'm going to try to get away from this building. No,

she wasn't really trying to get away from the building.

And then they were able to pull out like the

car's black box and look at that and see whether

they're was breaking or accelerating, and there was literally no

breaking whatsoever. So they investigate.

Speaker 3: They end up charging her with twelve felony charges that

included murder, felonious assault, and aggravated vehicular homicide. She was

found guilty and is currently serving two concurrent life sentences

with the possibility of parole after fifteen years. She this

whole time has maintained her innocence. Said that because obviously

the state had to go in and prove that she

intentionally drove this car into the side of the building,

which I think they did. It's pretty definitive due too,

I do too.

Speaker 2: It's a hard thing to prove.

Speaker 3: It is a hard thing to prove because they do

also talk about the possibility that, like, you know, this

relationship that her and her boyfriend had very tumultuous. Yeah,

they presented it as this very like you know and love,

very great relationship, and then turns out not all is

as it appears. There were lots of arguments and fighting, yes,

and so there is this possibility there was like an

argument happening and somebody was pulling on the wheel or

shifting to neutral and bad, you know what I mean.

Speaker 2: Like some of these things. I saw people thinking like

that she was totally passed out, like she had passed

out at the wheel. And they talk about this at

the end, about especially her parents who are very much

fighting for her, yeah, to be just released, which I

don't blame them. I don't blame them for that. Yeah.

Speaker 3: I think any parent in that situation wouldn't want to

believe that their kid intentionally drove a fucking car into

a wall.

Speaker 2: With other people, and especially someone so young.

Speaker 3: And they are trying to do everything they can to

get her out. One of the things they bring up

is the fact that she has pots, oh at the

very end, Yeah, and that kid podcasts out.

Speaker 2: Yeah.

Speaker 3: And they do talk about this at court, like during

the trial because her mom, I'm pretty sure was one

of the witnesses which she opts for a bench trial

when she.

Speaker 2: Really which I thought was really interesting.

Speaker 3: That is interesting, although I kind of don't blame them

for that either, because it's a very emotionally charged case,

like to young kids community.

Speaker 2: Oh, it was to get you know what I mean,

Like it was like social media.

Speaker 3: I do kind of get the I I do too

choice to do a bench trial, Yeah, but yeah, they

talk about this in court and he's talking about, well,

you know, you're talking about pots as a possibility, so

that can, like you said, that can make you pass

out or blackout or whatever. And she was like yeah,

and the attorney was like, well, you weren't so worried

about it that you let her drive everywhere, you know,

And they're also talking about if you were to pass out,

your foot wouldn't stay, You don't get all the fucking

way down. Because they also find they found her like

Gucci slipper, stuck to the pedal, the gas pedal, And

it turns out that because the crash, it had literally

like closed around the shoe, which means she was still

accelerating when the car hit the wall.

Speaker 2: She did that shit, yeah intentionally.

Speaker 3: The most interesting thing about this for me is at

the very end spoiler alert. Towards the end, they interview

Mackenzie Serrilla, Yeah, in prison, and obviously her attorneys are present,

oh of course, and they have I don't know if

you've seen a clip of this online, but they have

this moment where she's They're like, Okay, is there anything

else that you want to say that you wanted to

touch on whatever? And she's like, I just, uh, you know,

just that I didn't do some intentionally and blah blah

blah blah blah, and she like kind of had is

like almost teary, and then looks over her attorneys like

did I cover everything?

Speaker 2: Like did I get like it was very fucking sketchy?

It was col you know, you know the camp Like

that's crazy cameras are rolling, like, maybe come up with

a better code to make it like you have more

tears less? Yeah, what do you say? It's like, did

I hit all the points? Is that everything? Wow? To

get blah blah blahs or anything else? You know, that's creepy,

fing weird, very interesting YouTube documentary about it, like a

long time ago, so I'm familiar with the case, but

I'm really.

Speaker 3: Interested to watch this. It's like an hour and a half.

That's not so bad, I want to say. It's Yeah,

it's an actual like documentary film, our and a half

hour forty five maybe, Yeah, absolutely worth watching because it's

a crazy story. It's crazy hearing from Mackenzie's parents are

involved in this, and all the parents and family members

of everybody, Like hearing from all of them.

Speaker 2: Is like heavy, Wow, it's pretty wild. It's it's it's

a thinker. It's a thinker for sure. Yeah. Definitely recommend though,

because hell yeah yeah, it'll it'll put you out a

whole rabbit hole of it's a really interesting case. And

there's a lot of social media stuff involved in it too.

Speaker 3: Oh my gosh. Yes, yeah, just definitely check out. It's

called the crash it's on Netflix. Yeah, is that part

of the show where we say content may not be

appropriate for all listeners. This week we are talking about Actually,

mine is, as far as Grusome goes.

Speaker 2: Not crazy. Yeah, Mine's got a lot of murder. But

I think that's like about it, which is what we

do anyway, we do. Let we do that here for Yeah.

Speaker 3: So we have rolled right into the summer season, and

I think that.

Speaker 2: Most people.

Speaker 3: I mean I just got back from vacation, but I

think most people are taking vacations. Yeah right now, like

two weeks. Yeah, and where are you going?

Speaker 2: I'm going to Wisconsin? Fun, fun, fun, so exciting.

Speaker 3: I always at this time of year like to let's

just say to a little psa, oh right, that even

though you're on vacation, you still need to like you're

not be aware, well you know, keep what eye open? Yes, basically, yes,

you want to talk about a paranoid person, it's me.

Speaker 2: But you know you gotta be safe on vacation.

Speaker 3: So yeah, we're going to talk about I messaged you

and said we're going to do unfortunate vacations.

Speaker 2: Yeah, I love it. Do with that what you will.

That's what I said. I loved the White.

Speaker 3: So I am going to talk about a gentleman named

Lars Middanc So this is going to be European. This

is a good one, European based. So Midank was born

in nineteen eighty six in Berlin, Germany, but grew up

and lived his entire life in schlelswig Holstein. Oh, there

isn't too much about his uther background, but his adult ears.

He worked at a power plant and following a stroke

that his father had, he a lot of times was

like helping his parents out to work.

Speaker 2: He was really close with his parents. They would like

hang out.

Speaker 3: So honestly, I don't think there's anything real about childhood

because it wasn't that interesting.

Speaker 2: He was just like I was gonna say, no news

is good news, right, absolutely right. He was just like

a good kid.

Speaker 3: Reports no nothing, you know, probably played some sports, just

you know, average every kid. Yeah, there wasn't like I

said anything unusual to note. He was just this guy.

He was a football fan as in European football, as

in soccer. But he was a football fan. He supported

his local team, like hung out with his friends and

he had a girlfriend.

Speaker 2: Nice.

Speaker 3: So it seems like the pretty average guy, pretty average fellow.

But it was these friends that Minank would travel to.

He traveled with them to Varna, Bulgaria in June twenty

fourteen for a summer holiday, and this was his first time.

I'm traveling outside of Germany. Wow, which I find interesting

because I do feel like Europeans travel. They travel a

lot because they're in such close proximity to Yeah, so

many different.

Speaker 2: And jobs like care about them. Yeah, also that they

way more time off over Yeah.

Speaker 3: So where this is. It's along the Black Sea coast.

There's this little place named Golden Sands that's a super

popular tourist destination for Europeans. Yeah, this was a rabbit

hole that I did not think I was going to

fall down, to be honest with you. But what it

seems like to me is Golden Sands started as like

a resort that grew into this destination town. Essentially the

actual development of the resort starting in nineteen fifty seven.

But they added like hotels and villas and apartment buildings

and specs and restaurants grew around clubs and casinos and

attractions and shopping centers and sturilities. Yes, they just like

built this all up. They had a yacht marina, a

horse and a water park that they called Akopolis. I

love Coopolis. So they built this all up around this

resort and then basically became a resort town with tons

of these like hotels and stuff offering all inclusive vacations. Whoa, yeah,

so it really was just like a vacation. Sounds great town,

which sounds super safe right way way, So this is

where Mittank and his friends decided to vacation. Yeah, everything

went pretty normally. They arrived, they had a good time,

they were going out.

Speaker 2: Sounds fun to me.

Speaker 3: It sounds I've seen pictures of it too, and it's

very like tropically because.

Speaker 2: I'm thinking, like, what do I know about Bulgaria. Nothing? Nothing,

I know that shout out to Bulgaria. They won Eurovision

this year.

Speaker 3: Oh yeah, I know, you don't care, which will also

be very interesting because they have to host next year.

Oh and Bulgaria is not necessarily the most wealthy I

was in countries.

Speaker 2: That'll be interesting to see what they come up with.

I am I am interested to see what they come

up with. I am interested.

Speaker 3: But for the time being, congratulations Bulgaria. Yeah, so the

vacation went is normal. Paul Roman, who was one of

the friends on the trip. He told German television in

twenty sixteen, quote, we went by really fast. We relaxed

on the beach, so I went at the pool, played football,

went clubbing. He was relaxed. He was in a good

mood end quote. The day before the group had to leave,

they had gone to a bar in town and while

they were there, mid Tank got into an argument with

some other German nationals about football.

Speaker 2: Damn it.

Speaker 3: It was like rival football teams. We've been drinking, Yeah,

having some word.

Speaker 2: You're not home, so you feel like the pressures off

a little bit.

Speaker 3: Yeah, so they and to be fair like his friends

later was like that was kind of unusual for him

because he just wasn't necessarily likeational guy, but probably a little.

Speaker 2: I think the Bulgarian vodka was plowing, Yeah, for sure,

so a little. A little bit after this, they leave

to go to a restaurant and Midank at that point

he was like, I'm gonna keep going out. You guys,

go to the restaurant.

Speaker 3: I'll meet up with you later, and wasn't seen for

the rest of the evening. Okay, when they meet up

the next morning, Midank told everyone that after the bar,

he had been beaten up by four guys who had

been hired by the folks that he had argued with

at the bar.

Speaker 2: This is what he says.

Speaker 3: This altercation leaves him with a jaw injury and a

ruptured ear drum.

Speaker 2: Oh my god.

Speaker 3: So he shows up, he's like, beat the fuck up.

He's like, these guys hired some people to come after me.

That's why it was out.

Speaker 2: Okay, So are we going to hire somebody? I mean

that's crazy.

Speaker 3: So this was like right before they were getting ready

to fly out. So he goes to a doctor. Middank

wanted to make sure that he was good to travel, Yeah, definitely,

which he was not due to the changes in air

pressure on airplane. As we were just talking about this,

actually yeah, it could potentially make his ear worse. So

he was advised to stay for an extra day. He

was prescribed an antibiotic named sef prosil or. I saw

it also called sef furoxm okay.

Speaker 2: The same thing. Yeah, you know me the medical professional.

Every time I have to like say any medical word,

I'm like, girl, I don't know, I'm just gonna sound

it out, sound it out. I just tell it. I'm

not even doing that.

Speaker 3: So he was like, mid Ink was like, I don't

want to hold everybody up.

Speaker 2: Go on without me.

Speaker 3: I'll be home, Like I'm right behind you, guys, I'll

be home shortly after.

Speaker 2: Poor guy.

Speaker 3: So everybody checks out of the resort at the same time.

I'm assuming like the reservation was up right, you know,

time to go. But he still had to find a

place to stay, which unfortunately, they were there at Golden

Sands during like peak season. Yeah, so he had to

try to find a vacant room. But he did eventually

find availability at a place called Hotel Color Okay, and

it was pretty close to the airport. The rooms were

not crazy expensive. There were some like during my research,

I saw some you know, sort of references to it

not necessarily being hotel part of town, you know, like

a little sketchy. But he was like, it's one night,

It's fine. This hotel is pretty clean, pretty nice, like yeah,

so one night that was it. But once he had

made it to the hotel, that's when some strange things

started happening. So Midank called his mother. He claimed that

he was being followed and someone was after him, and

in sort of like whispered tones, tells his mom that

she needs to cancel his bank card, and then hangs

up the phone.

Speaker 2: Oh my god.

Speaker 3: Later, CCTV footage obtained from hotel Color shows like more

strange behavior from Midank, including pacing up and down the halls.

He was looking at the windows. He's like hiding in

the elevator. Gives me very like Eliza Lamb.

Speaker 2: Yes, like that kind kind of if he ends up

in the water tank, he does not wa no water

tanks here. Well, so proud of me. Everyone thinks the

Elisa Lamb's story is haunted, and I don't know.

Speaker 3: I think I think she got murdered. But okay, well

that's another another conversation for sure.

Speaker 2: But I just thought you'd be very proud of me

because that's a big paranormal one and I think that

those people are stupid. Yes, I am proud of you.

Good job. Wait to be rational. I did it to

be right. That's how I was your feel every time

whatever that feeling pre excited.

Speaker 3: So Mit Tank left the hotel around one am.

Speaker 2: Okay uh.

Speaker 3: He returns an hour later. No idea what he was

doing during that time. They still have not been able

to really tell where he went, what he did, He

was gone for an hour, comes back, that's weird. At

some point in the evening, he had messaged his mom

asking about the antibiotics that he was prescribed, and that

later is something that he's like, well, that's kind of

weird that he was like, Okay, what can you tell

me about X, Y and Z, Like this, okay, this

medication that he was on, just something to note for later.

The following morning, Mittank called his mother again, saying that

the people who were after him were getting closer. She's

like becoming more and more concerned. He takes a taxi

from the hotel to the airport, text his mom that

he was at the terminal and I didn't know this

was a thing, but apparently there's airport doctors. Yeah, I

didn't know that.

Speaker 2: Yeah. In hindsight, I'm like, yeah, it makes sense, doesn't it.

If there's like an emergency or something.

Speaker 3: You got to make an emergency landing, right, you want

doctor on a doctor on board, right, Yeah. Yeah, So

I was like, yeah, that makes sense, but I didn't.

I didn't realize that was a thing. So when Mittank

got to the airport, he goes to the airport doctor

because he needed to be cleared to fight. So he

goes to see this guy named doctor Costa Costa, who

would later say that despite this being a routine checkup,

Midtank seemed incredibly nervous and he was acting a little erratic,

like it wasn't most people just like roll up. But

I'm sure it's not a pleasant experience for everybody.

Speaker 2: But I was gonna say for him to say that

a lot of people are very nervous in airports, like me,

I hate an airport, you. So it's like for him

to really note that he was nervous. That guy had

to be tweaking.

Speaker 3: Right, not the normal like twitchy kind of It's the

twitchy kind of nervous, not the normal kind of right,

doctor nervous.

Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, So he's like, what's up with you, right,

besides your ear and stuff.

Speaker 3: Ultimately he was cleared to fly okay, but before leaving

the office express concerns about the medication that he had

been prescribed for his ear. From mal magazine quote. A

constructure construction worker entered the room the terminal was being refurbished.

Midanks started to tremble. He muttered something under his breath,

and he said I don't want to die here. I

have to get out of here. Mid Tank leaves out

of the chair. He rushes out of the room completely

leaves his luggage behind, including his phone, his wallet, and

his passport. He then jogs through the airport, runs past

all of the gates, all of the agents, runs out

the main entrance into the parking lot, and he goes

through the parking lot, jumps the fence between the airport terminal,

and runs into the forest that's next to the airport. Goodbye,

runs off. Yeah, very strange. When he flees into the forest,

Mittank was wearing a yellow T shirt, jean shorts, and

white sneakers.

Speaker 2: Okay, the last fews of him were from like the video, Yeah,

surveillance video, Yeah, where him running through the prt He

climbs the fence, disappears into the forest. Spoilerttle spoiler alert.

Speaker 3: He's never been seen again. Yeah, nobody knows where he is.

Nobody knows, So let's talk about what has what's going

on because this is just very unusual, so weird. I'm

sure you thought I was gonna come with a story

of kidnapping and murder, but.

Speaker 2: No, this some weird ass shit. When you said, like

bad vacations, I thought about him. Yeah, because I've seen

that video through the airport. This is another one that

people are like, he was possessed. I'm like, no, there's

definitely all their explaining. Do we know what those explanations are? No, No,

I know what I think.

Speaker 3: So I'm interested to see you. Yeah, So what has happened? Uh,

there's been tons of speculation and theories thrown out there,

none of which has really found, like reversal agreement. There

is not any one theory really that anybody's like, oh, yeah,

this is the more likely.

Speaker 2: Yeah.

Speaker 3: There really is so weird and they just don't have

a lot to go on. Unfortunately, the police have conducted

searches but haven't really turned up anything, not hide nor hair.

Speaker 2: No.

Speaker 3: Mittank's family also hired a local private investigator, hoping he'd

be able to like uncover something maybe the police weren't

able to uncover Zip, but he has not yeped. The

private investigator, Andreas Gutig, reached out to homeless shelters, hospitals

and stuff on the off chance that he had maybe

entered as like a John Doe, because remember he left

all of his identifications at the airport.

Speaker 2: All they know is.

Speaker 3: What he looks like and what he was wearing at

the time that he left. So maybe he was a

John Doe. But he hasn't had any luck either. He

even went to the airport in Varna and handed out

like missing person flyers has not gotten a response from

any of those. In the year following his disappearance, police

have received numerous reports of Midtanks sightings, but like Bigfoot, right,

very much unable to substantiate any of these claims. Right,

there was a trucker that claimed to have seen him

hitchhiking near Varna. Some claimed that he was seen as

a homeless man in Poland Okay, And there was even

a claim on Reddit that someone had met Mittank as

a homeless man in Canada, which I'm like, that would

be the least likely of all of those.

Speaker 2: Absolutely, what are you doing in Canada? Also, how would

he get there?

Speaker 3: Right, he doesn't have any ID, Right, he would have

to have fake everything, which is a lot harder than

people because again we're talking about when I said twenty fourteen, Yeah,

like this is not olden days where you can just

like hop on a ship, right, I mean you probably

still can do that. Don't get me wrong.

Speaker 2: I'm sure that it's still happening, right, but like impossible,

but it's highly unlikely, and he would have been able

to cross continents into another country without being recognized in

some way, right, right, I agree, Yeah, I think he's there.

Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, I'll be honest, I think he at

this point. I do think he's probably done.

Speaker 2: I think so too.

Speaker 3: So obviously there's big questions as too what happened to

him after he went into the forest so spooky. His

family did tell the media that he was like the

outdoorsy type, Like he was a hunting, camping, fishing kind

of guy.

Speaker 2: Interesting, so he'd have more chance in the woods than

like me.

Speaker 3: Correct, Like, there was definitely a possibility that he attempted

to survive in the forest, right, at least for a time, right,

I don't think that you can survive out there forever.

Speaker 2: No.

Speaker 3: After learning about that area too, like, it seems a

little less likely the chance, the possibility for me at

least becomes smaller or more grim anyway, like that he

was staying out there. So this is again from mel

magazine quote. Varnic gets really hot in the summer temperature

temperatures reach around the mid nineties, and without a water source,

it's pretty much possible to impossible to stay alive. There's

a big river near the airport, but that leaves food

and shelter. If he tried to survive in the woods,

he died there. He might have found an abandoned cabin somewhere,

but there isn't much to eat in the wilderness, right.

Police searched the area with drums, then kidavin rogs but

found nothing.

Speaker 1: Wow.

Speaker 3: So yeah, that's that's part of the reason why I'm like,

I mean, maybe he did, but like that kind of heat. Yeah,

you know, like I said, he left and was wearing

a T shirt and shorts and town of shoes.

Speaker 2: Yeah that's it. Yeah. So even if it's really hot

during the day, I'm sure it gets a little cooler night. Yep.

You know.

Speaker 3: So Unfortunately, I think if he remained out there, if

he didn't somehow come back, yeah, he's probably no longer

long gone.

Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 3: Now, there is also some obvious questions I would say,

as to what caused what appears to me to be

some sort of like psychotic I agree essentially with Mittank

mentioning the antibiotic that he had been on.

Speaker 2: He mentioned it like multiple times.

Speaker 3: Yeah, he was worthy antibiotic. Sounded really concerned about it.

It was definitely something that was worth looking into. The

medication he was on, steff prosil is a stephalosporin which

has a rare psychotic side effect, including hallucinations and paranoia.

Speaker 2: Oh there you go.

Speaker 3: Right, this all seems to make sense until you find

out that he didn't.

Speaker 2: Actually take it. That's what I thought. Yeah, he Uh.

Speaker 3: Doctor Kostovs said that Mittank hadn't even filled the prescription

for the antibiotics, so there's no way that he could

have been taking it. Weird though, because he keeps bringing

it up as like what about this antibiotic?

Speaker 2: What about like what about this medication?

Speaker 3: Yeah, so he was very concerned about something that he

wasn't actually taking, Yeah, and never filled right, which is strange,

So that kind of rules that out. Mittang's family also

said that he didn't have a history of mental illness

that they were aware of, but there is also possibility

that there is undiagnosed mental illness that got some sort

of mental break that he didn't talk about was relatively new,

like that is he didn't know what was going on, right,

This could have been the first time that he was

experiencing this type of psychosis right and didn't know what

you know what I mean, like that first.

Speaker 2: All time away from home and everything. Yeah, what do

you what do you think of it? I can't wait

to hear your theory.

Speaker 3: I truly I think he probably had a mental break

and just disappeared and died in the forest.

Speaker 2: I just I think the whole thing about like he

gets in a bar fight, which is like, okay, fine,

people do that on vacation, people do that in our hometown,

you know, hope people get get in bar fights. But

then like the detail about like, oh, these German dickheads

who hate my soccer football team hired people to beat

me up. That's why would they do that. That's weird. Yeah,

that's weird.

Speaker 3: Maybe because they're in a different country, and if you

get arrested in a different country, it's a lot more

difficult to deal with.

Speaker 2: I just don't like for a drunken bar fight, I mean,

it's like whatever, I think that at that point, either

something else happened and he lied about it, or yeah,

he got beat up by somebody random and he was

already so paranoid that he was like, they fucking hired people.

People are out to get me, and people are following

me because he had that kind of mindset. So it's like,

I wonder, Yeah, I mean, it's also when you're talking

about a fight that is you get hit hard enough

to cause jaw damage. That's what I think too.

Speaker 3: There's a percussion. But they talk to one of the

doctors that they talked about that I was reading during

my research, was talking about concussions and a concussion specifically

the psychosis symptoms from that typically do not are not

on set for like a number of years, right, Like

it takes a and like repetitive. I've had a concussion before.

It just makes you real stupid. Yeah, it makes you

like drunk almost like and ready to pass. I forgot

my mother in law's name. Yeah, I've heard that my

dad came to the hospital. I didn't know that my

dad came to the hospital.

Speaker 2: I got when I had my concussion. It just makes

you dumb. I still don't. I still do not remember

my dad being he was there, apparently, I do not remember.

Speaker 3: My dad being at the hospital. I got mine from

whiplash soccer soccer header with another girl.

Speaker 2: Yeah, dunch up. That was the time that, yeah, I

had but another girl and we were both going up

for a header and my mom was driving to the

hospital and I had this water bottle, wide mouthed water bottle,

like throwing up into cute sitting there going I can't

feel the right side of my face, Like I couldn't

feel the right side of my head. Yeah, and she

was like driving like, oh, which my face again in

hide sight being an adult and like knowing how a

parent would react, like I'm so sorry about that because

I would have probably she's like rushing to the hospital.

Speaker 3: Yeah, But that's the thing is, it's like repetitive head injuries, right, and.

Speaker 2: Concussion is not going to make you go nuts. I

almost wonder, like I watched like a video essay about

this case, and I've always wondered if he went there,

they're clubbing, and he took something like slipped something, yeah,

and it affected him badly, and I know we would

really like compounded on it.

Speaker 3: We were just talking about how like an acid trip

is like like an eight hour right experience, Like it's

not like a quick thing, you know, and depending on

how much you take. You're talking hours, I know.

Speaker 2: Trip like for days. Yeah, yeah, so I mean that's

definitely potential. Yeah.

Speaker 3: At this point, it's been about twelve years since mid

Tank disappeared. Authorities have almost nothing to go on since then,

Like you said, mit Tank has become He's come to

be known as the most famous missing person on YouTube.

Speaker 2: Poor guy. What a terrible legacy.

Speaker 3: I know, I know, but this case has become sort

of internet famous.

Speaker 2: Yeah. If you're watching and you're like I think I've

seen a video of again, you probably report you have.

That's a very famous footage.

Speaker 3: That sort of notoriety brings with it thousands of Internet theories,

which are like range from plausible to like buck wild

to ghost yeah, to to aliens like oh, I've.

Speaker 2: Seen so many people being like you could have abducted

and like shut yeah.

Speaker 3: And it's things like intentionally planning his own disappearance to

I don't believe to start over, I don't believe that either.

I just think it's so risky, Like airports are so

scary that like I would be afraid if I ran

in the wrong place in the airport, I'd be afraid

they're going to kill me.

Speaker 2: Like you don't want to go to Bulgarian jail. Yeah, yeah,

I don't think he's that stupid. I don't think he's

that stuvid either. There's also things like he took a

bunch of drugs and then panicked that he was going

to be caught and so he like ran into the

woods and then died from a drug overdose, which I

think is more likely.

Speaker 3: I think it's more plausible, But I didn't get the

impression from when they talked to like his friends and like, oh, he.

Speaker 2: Was not this big drug guy.

Speaker 3: Now if maybe they smoked some weed or whatever, but

it's not like he's out here like doing coke and like.

Speaker 2: You know, being crazy. Yeah, so at least with something.

Speaker 3: I mean, that could definitely be possible. There's also the

fact that Bulgaria happens to have one of the highest

human in trafficking rates in the EU.

Speaker 2: Oh that's right. So there have also been a lot

of people theorizing that he ended up in like this

sex trafficking human trafficking trade. Uh huh. Again, I don't

think that's that likely. He's just like where did you

pull that from, right, you know.

Speaker 3: And who is going to chase this guy? Into the

woods to try to sell him into human trafficking.

Speaker 2: You know what I'm saying, isn't there's easy I hate

to say it, There's easier ways to get people. Oh, absolutely,

chasing that is the thing. But got a lot to

fear in the forest, bears perhaps, but not human traffickers

wandering around with like a big butterfly man.

Speaker 3: So they also like in the footage, like it's it's

not like somebody is chasing him.

Speaker 2: No, he's running. He's just running. Yeah, like like he

was scared.

Speaker 3: Yeah, So every internet theory kind of lands on that

spectrum of like, you know, he had a psychotic break too,

he was sold into trafficking, he got abducted by aliens,

it's all over then, Yeah, Yeah, whatever happened to Lars Mittank,

one thing is for sure, I would say he was

clearly struggling with something, absolutely and unfortunately. I also think

that he will likely never be found his poor mom,

I know, I know, but that is the story of

the disappearance of Lars's a good one. Very strange, Yeah,

unfortunate vacations. I did love like the super wide net.

Speaker 2: Yes, that you would, Yeah, that was I knew you would.

Speaker 3: Appreciate that there's all there are actually, Okay, I hate

to say it, lots of shit that happens on because.

Speaker 2: Like, and this is the thing is like I feel

like when you think of this topic, you think of

like someone goes on vacation and something bad happens, and

that happens right, Like, you're on vacation, especially if it's

like international or to some big, you know, destination, you're

like kind of chilling. You're on island time, You're maybe

not paying so much attention to your surroundings. You feel

a little freer because it's like, hey, nobody at home

is going to see what I'm doing right, and do

a drug I can't pronounce, and then it's like, well

now you're in trouble. Yeah, you know, you feel like

kind of free on vacation. And that was that was

what I was kind of aiming for when I was

doing my research, but I ended up kind of going

the opposite way. Okay. I decided to focus on someone

who turned what for many was supposed to be a

delightful seventies international dream into a traveler's worst nightmare. Oh gosh,

So I know you really like the seventies, Like the

aesthetic of the seventies. Have you ever heard of the

destination known as the Hippie trail. It sounds familiar, You're

gonna be like, oh for sure, yea. In the seventies

obviously this very free love, freedom kind of era. And

it's also like a lot of these like flower Children

were very interested in like cultural different cultures.

Speaker 3: Yeah, the seventies was like a big transitional period from

that like flower child into disco. Like it was kind

of this transitionary period. Yeah, but you were either going

that way into like cocaine like you know what I mean,

the party night life, or you went harder into the

hippie dippy crunchy. This is hippie dippya.

Speaker 2: We're definitely on. The seventies was very interesting because it

was right after a bunch of bad shit and transitioned

into like hard party. I think it was a big

international disassociation. Yeah, weird, it seems like that's happening now. Wow,

that's crazy. It's almost like history repeats it time. So

the Hippie trails so on the vein of all of

these flower children. You know, I know this is sixties,

but I'm thinking of like the Beatles, doing Indian music. Yeah. Yeah,

that was definitely very much early seventies. This whole craze

into like interesting, we talked about our news thing, we

were talking about Buddhism. There was this big interest in

like Buddhism spirituality. Yes, very much. So a lot of

these and not to generalize, but a lot of these

hippies were like white children from rich parents. Yeah, so

they would take their parents' money and be like I'm

gonna go on this international trip but be anti establishment.

Yeah I don't even need no hotels. I'm gonna stay

under the star. And this is what this was. Okay,

so the Hippie Trail. It was also called the Overland

like the Overland Trail. It was this trail kind of

a form of all alternative tourism. But it was this

trail that led from Europe to West Asia that was

kind of formulated for people to travel through. So, just

like you were talking about with your resort, like things

kind of popped up around it. On this trail. You

would find like different little hostels and different stores because

they were all of these white people trampling through. Yeah,

it sounds very much like you come here to go

on your spiritual journeys where you walk this trail and

you end up in like, yes, the spiritual center right

for is that kind of the absolutely. So it started

in let me see it. So typically it wasn't like,

you know, a complete marked trail, but it was like

around this destination. So there were starts in Copenhagen, West Berlin, Amsterdam, Milan,

big centers of yoga. Absolutely hippy absolutely I almost said

hippie burg Usa, but this is zero so hippie bird

yerra ye. And then the road. The route went through

uh Tehran, which has been in the news for some reason.

You can't think of why uh Peshawar before going to

more like India Nepal, which is like you know where

they all wanted to Yes, they want to meditate with

an elephant, which is like there, yeah, listen all tracks

right exactly, this all sounds right. And there where it

was like kind of an interesting I always think it's

interesting when people talk about it, like and these hippias

were so enlightened, and it's like, well, all of these

areas had a lot of issues going on at the

time that they were sort of like blissfully unaware of.

They're like, this is so beautiful, and it's like, meanwhile,

you can't get into Tibet because all of the free

Tibet stuff is happening. Burma is one hundred percent closed

at this point, so it's like all of this crazy

shit happening. Meanwhile, these hippies are like tripping on acids,

Like wow, it's so beautiful. It's like, well, yeah, right,

And also, I mean you're talking about a bunch of

I would are you primarily white people? Absolutely?

Speaker 3: Who being white in these places it's probably fine, you know.

Speaker 2: Well, yeah, like they definitely had. It was definitely like

a little bit of privilege, the privilege of like look

at all the o they're eating their protein bars. Meanwhile

these people have nothing to eat, right, you know, it's

like fuck you, Like I always thought that was a

little like all right, like why don't you go over

there to help them instead of going over there to

like smoke fun weed and meditate, I you can do.

Speaker 1: Things.

Speaker 2: They mostly only did the fund, okay, you know, and

that's what I kind of yeah with. So there is

a certain amount of privilege when it comes obviously to

these like rich white children running around in these areas.

But there was also a little bit of targeting all

of the As I said earlier, the majority of these

hippies were from like pretty upper middle class backgrounds, so

they weren't well versed in the ways of the world.

They were not street smart. Yeah they had book smarts,

not streets. Yeah, some of them not even book smarts, right, right, right,

So they were kind of an easy target for things

like pickpocketers. And you know, there were a lot of

them that like would get held up, but most of

the time I would end up being Okay, you know,

you'd get some money stolen, Daddy, why are you some more?

It's out of big deal, right. But then we kind

of get to more serious things. So we're going to

talk about a serial killer today who has the very

interesting moniker, the bikini killer. Oh he wears bikini murders,

I hope. So I don't have any evidence that he didn't.

I really don't. I hope there is. There isn't any

Until we get it that he did it. We will

assume that he was probably under his clothes. Okay, now

that's part of the cannon. That's what I want. So

we're gonna talk about this guy. So he's got a

very long name, hatchend Bowani gurmuk so Brag was born

in in nineteen forty four in Saigon, Okay, So he

had he came from two pretty distinct not economic what

am I thinking like ethnic backgrounds. So his mother was

Vietnamese and his father was Cindy. It was what Cindy,

It's like Sindy, like s I n d h I.

It's like an Indian. Okay. This was unusual for sure.

And his parents were never married and I think pretty shortly.

I think he did stick around for a little bit

during his childhood, but his father never asserted paternity and

would end up abandoning the family. Great, right, that cool, great?

See you later. His mother remarried to this like French

Army lieutenant who was stationed in that area in French Indo, China. Okay,

so which you know was cool. It's like, okay, a

father like But of course, as in many of these stories,

he was not a nice dand not the best father

figure and would pay attention to his own children. Him

and the mom would go on to have more children,

but he had any attention. It's like you're not one

of right, you're the before child. And he never adopted

him like, I feel a little bad for this. I

feel that child well and a child thing. He won't

feel bad for him later, But I didn't feel like

at some point everyone was a child, you know. I

think that's normal that way. I feel super bad, so

as one does when you come from like kind of

a fucked up background. He started to commit petty crimes,

just little like burglaries and stuff like that, so he

did get sent to prison. Unlike other petty criminals who

it's like, Okay, you got a couple months in jail,

maybe just sit it out and try to whatever. He

was like, this is actually a great time for me

to reveal that I am a huge master manipulator. He

was seemingly born with this ability to get people to

do what he wanted them to do. So he was

able to manipulate. And this was like a penniless kid,

you know. So it's not like he bribed anyone, but

he was able to convince prison officials to let him

have special treatment in jail. So he had books in

his cell, he was getting special meals. Yeah, okaya, very

al Capone. Absolutely, this guy would have loved the mob.

He was born in the wrong continent for sure he

would have thrived in the Italian model. So there was

a guy who was volunteering at his prison, like a

French guy, Felix Escon. He was the super rich guy

who seemed to have like at first, seemed to have

like a big heart. He's volunteering at the prison, and

he kind of endears himself to our guy as sort

of like a like a father figure. He's like, I

can help you, and after you get out of jail,

why don't you come and move in with me. It

was like a sweet deal. So Sabrag moved in with Discon,

and uh, they ended up going to Paris. That's where

this guy lived. So out of jail, went to Paris.

He's French. No, I'm I'm kidding, he is French.

Speaker 1: I know.

Speaker 2: Sorry French people. I'm probably saying that's a little test,

that's a little little Italy. It is kind of the

way you say it what I'm saying. Listen, Okay, So

he went he went to our French guy went to prison. No,

not not I know, not volunteer volunteer. He was like

prison volunteer and he actively took yes, our guy Sabrage,

Sabrage under his wing. Yes, it was like, when you're

out of prison, you really have nowhere to go, because

I'm sure his mom and fuck asked stepdad were like

they didn't give a ship. I'm sure they didn't either

and didn't know, and he probably saw that and it

tugged his little French heart strings. I was like, oh

my god, come with me and I'll help you. Weep weep, weep, yeah,

we weep, no, weep weep. So he subrage was living

it up in the Parisian high life. This was a

cool time for Paris, so he was in like sort

of the high society, but he also discovered the very

vast and dingy Parisian underground of this like criminal activity.

But he was able, for some reason, to do this

more successfully than in his homeland. He was able to

start actually sort of like accumulating some wealth, okay, because

he was stealing shit, right, So people started sort of

paying attention to him, including a young frenchwoman from a

very conservative family who were probably like what chantal Copagnon

and they would end up getting married okay, because he

was like, I'm just like a super cool you know,

and it's fine.

Speaker 3: Did the Frenchman know that he was out stealing things.

Was he pro criminal activity? Not so much, not so much, Okay.

Speaker 2: I don't think he was super aware of what was

going okay, And at first I thought his new wife

wasn't aware either, but she was. She knew the whole time.

She was like, Oh, you're bad, bad boy, like a

bad boy. Literally, this is really cute. The day, well,

it's not cute, it's horrible. Like the day that he

proposed to her. He got arrested because he stole a car.

So he was evading police in this car and got

arrested and went to jail. You can't arrest me. I

just got engaged and he's like, please my wife, and

then you're like, that's even wist. So he went to

jail for eight months. And if I were her, I

would have dipped. I would have been like bye, And

we're actually supposed to be picking cake flavors like that asshole.

The things that we see as red flagged were not

They were very much like beije flags. Oh yeah. She

was back in France in the olden years, so one

thing that was actually kind of cool. France and Vietnam

have like a weird history in that France colonized Vietnam,

which a lot of people don't know. But when he

was born, like to his Vietnamese mother, because she was

a natural citizen of Vietnam, he automatically got French citizenship

upon his birth. So it made it a lot easier

for him when he got out of jail to get

married and like do all of that stuff. Otherwise that

would have been very difficult. Sure, sure, so as did

he speak French? Okay, at least like past a little bit. Yeah,

And I'm sure, I'm sure he was very smart. I

will say, dickhead, but real smart. Does his jail time

since he's been doing dirty deeds, dounder cheap he has,

Like as soon as he gets out of jail, he's

already in trouble again and they already want to arrest him.

He's literally walking out of the jail to see the car. Hey, hey,

except that you were supposed to be cured of that.

That's what we just total aside. We just I heard

about this guy and decalb like last week or the

week before, got a dui, got taken in oh leaves

the police station, gets on his motorcycle, drives and they

see him leaving the police station, like, we just fucking arrested.

Got another DUI like an hour late, Like he got

like two or three d us one night, Colin Uber,

That's what I'm saying. This is this guy. It's the

modern day guy. Oh my god, it's like his reincarnation.

That's so funny. So what do you mean, I'm arrested again?

Double job Barney. He did have a baby girl, otherwise

I'd be like, this is his son. So he gets

out of jail. The police are like, hey, hey, hey,

actually we'd like to talk to you again, and he

was like rf what. So he took his now pregnant

wife and was like, we're just gonna set skate through

Eastern Europe. Yeah, I know. He was like, what are

you gonna do for money? Like at a job, and

he's like, no, I'm gonna rob tourists. So that's what

he did, and his wife would kind of like help

him with that. She was kind of like with him yea.

So he they ended up going all the way to Mumbai,

which was then called Bombay. Okay, his daughter was born,

and as soon as his daughter was born, he fully

was like, all right, I'm a criminal. Now I'm gonna

be like boosting cars. He had a whole smuggling operation.

He had I had a family to provide for right now.

But he was also in the midst of a full blown,

very serious gambling addiction. So how much they were getting

I think was probably not much. Cool. Uh, So he

had this whole thing that he would do. Part of

their like one of their little schemes was that when

he would get arrested, he would like pretend to be

like really sick so they wouldn't pay as much attention

to him, and then he would be like goodbye. Yeah,

so they'd be like please Shou'd be like please, my husband,

he's so sick, and they'd be like, okay, that's fine.

Then they turn around he'd be gone, wow, okay. Yeah.

So they at that point fled to Kabul, which was

right smack dab on the hippie trail. Ohay was like,

look at all of these delicious white people with dangling purses.

I'm gonna get it right.

Speaker 3: I know you said this is in the seventies, but

this whole time, I'm like sixteen hundreds.

Speaker 2: Like, I know, it kind of sound like like old time,

It totally does, but Nope, the seventies. So he uh

goes to Kabul and that's when he was sort of

like aware of like, oh, there's this like whole trail

of all these hippies. This is an interesting thing. Yeah.

So he would end up he goes to so many

different places it's like almost a little hard to keep

track because he would flee, flee from Kabool to Iran.

At this point, his wife was like, Hey, this is

getting like a little crazy for me. I have like

a baby, so I'm gonna go to France eat a dicky.

So she was like goodbye. I don't think they like

on paper, got divorce.

Speaker 3: She probably was like I'm going to go to France

if you need me or you feel like doing this family.

Speaker 2: Oh no, she said, I will never see you again.

She vowed to never see him again. Oh okay, never mind.

Then she was like, fuck you, I'm going to France. Right. So, he,

through his smuggling business, had all of these like fake IDs,

fake passports. I think like at one point when they

arrested him, he had like ten stolen passports that he

would use stolen Okay, yeah, okay, so he oh yeah,

my bad, not like fake, not like but like ones

that you like, I'm this guy. Yeah. So he didn't

have long to be lonely because his half brother Andre

turned up in Istanbul, not Constantinople, Istanbul, and they would

become partners in crime. Okay, so he was like, hey,

there you go, can't be lonely for long. So they

started like doing criminal business together. And one of the

big things that he would do would he would pose

as a gem salesman. Okay, He's like, I'm just selling

gem sure. And he was also like part time, I'm

also a drug dealer. I'm just like multi tail. But

if you need a little side oh yeah, yeah yeah,

reach into the left pocket a big diamond, reach into

the right pock.

Speaker 3: There's a big different kind of rock.

Speaker 2: Right, oh rocks all. We're also talking the crack cocaine years. Absolutely,

And see how indispensable would he be for these hippies.

So a lot of them would get to on this

hippie trail do okay for a while, and then their

parents would be like, I'm not helping you anymore, I'm

not sending you any more money, or they would run

out of money. But what they would have would be

their class ring, or they would have a diamond necklace,

and they'd be like, I'll just pawn this and then

I can keep partying it up in Europe in the

Middle East. Sure, so he's like, what a coincidence, I'm

a gem salesman.

Speaker 1: For you.

Speaker 2: That's clever, right, Or they're like, I want a beautiful

little keepsake from my fun trip. So he started not

innocently but like a little lighter where he was just

kind of like robbing these tourists, but it ended up

becoming a lot more serious. Sure, So later in court

he would claim that most of his murders were accidental

drug overdoses. I accidentally gave this girl too much heroin

and she died boopsy Daisy. But investigators would say would

always find elements of this person that you killed, had

discovered your like how in deep shit you were, and

had threatened to expose him, and then they would die. Okay, yeah,

Because he was hanging out with all of these hippies,

he was this cool guy to them, but then all

of a sudden peopleould start disappearing. So his first known

victim was Teresa Nolton. She was from Seattle. She was

a very typical sort of flower child on the road

sewing her wild oats. She was unfortunately found in the

Gulf of Thailand and like a tidalpool, drowned and she

was wearing a flowered bikini. Okay, So that was his

first although there would be many of these girls were

found in bikini So that's how he became known as

the bikini killer. Gotcha. So a lot of these murders,

of course, at first they like they had thought that

she had drowned, and then they would find like, right,

you know, and they would not be that impausible because

a bunch of people who were out here clearly doing

drugs on these and they're coming one with nature, like

you know, right, that doesn't sound that implausible to me,

right exactly. The next victim was Itally Hakim. They found

his body totally burnt, so they were like, what the

and they were able to discover later with forensics that

he had been poisoned.

Speaker 1: Oh.

Speaker 2: So he would do this like creepy thing where he

would poison people and then sort of like nurse them

back to health so that he would be like, I'm

your pal, but you can trust me. Yeah, I'm your

friends okay, weird. Yeah. Another girl, Charmaine Carot, another French lady,

so they connected over that. He's like, oh my god,

I've been to France and done many crimes there. She's like,

that's so cute. So she ended up becoming his girlfriend.

Her burnt body would be discovered later as well, and

she was the second one to be like in a bikini.

They were like bikini killer. Okay. So the problem sort

of started because he was getting too cocky and he

would kill these people and use their passports. Oh god, okay.

So as he's doing this and traveling, people are starting

to be like, oh, that's not you. Person's missing, right,

So in like nineteen seventy six, he's starting to get

arrest warrants through Interpol, Like this is like a big

serious So at this point he was charged with four

murders in Thailand are suspected of okay, so there he's like,

uh so he's starting to like kind of get nervous,

but it doesn't stop him killing people. At this point.

This is one of those where I think they'll end

up charging him with like twelve murders, but it's probably

like way like forty or fifty. Yeah, because there's a

lot of unsolved murders that time, I'm sure. So he

he was like, oh no, I have this uh warrant

for my arrest, I'll lay low just kidding. I'm going

to go to Bombay and kill French people. He also

was at this point getting like this like gang of

girls like a harem yeah, okay who They were all

like we're going to commit crimes together. It was very

like Manson family kind of thing. Okay. So like in Bombay,

him and two American women killed this like frenchman loved

French guys. They poisoned him. They were apparently going to

incapacitate him, but he took too much poison. He died. Oops.

And then he went to New Delhi and was like

trying to do his criminal shit, but and like gave

these like three French guys. He was like, these are

anti dysentery pills, so like you do not want dysentery,

so here are those pills. And they're like, actually I

feel very bad. I feel very sick. They're like we've

been traveling, like we know this is not normal. They

were able to overpower him because they're like this dude

fucking poisoned us. They were able to overpower him, called

the police, and the police figured out who he was

because originally he was like, I'm not that guy. We

think that you are that guy. Okay, I'm that guy. Okay,

I'm that guy. So you would think that this would

be like he's going to go to jail and that's

it the end. The police got him. It's fine, you'd hope.

So you would hope. So, so he's in prison at

this point, they're waiting for trial. Both of his he

was found with these two Western women who were helping

him with his crimes. They would make full confessions. He

would confess to something, Okay, so they're in prison. Both

of them would kill themselves full prison. They never made

it to trial, which is very sad. He when he

went to prison had had gems probably up his booty

hole and had bribed all of the guards. So he

was living you said earlier alcohol, He was living very comfortably.

This is when we learn that this guy is really

addicted to attention, fame and attention. So he is making narcissis. Oh,

he is a died in the wold narcissist. He would

hire these big lawyers and then fire them and say

that they're all incompetent. He went on this like crazy

hunger strike that was bullshit. So he wanted like the

spectacle of it, Yes, he wanted the spectacle. Yes, the

human spectacle. So he in his cell had restaurants that

were catering his food, he had television. There's this little

like subplot that I won't go into, but it's very interesting.

There was this magazine back in I don't know if

there's still a magazine, OZ magazine, which is a huge magazine.

They had interviewed him, and their commentary on like his

behavior and all of the luxuries that he had in

jail is really really really interesting. So this was like

a big big deal. Yeah, so I'll link that because

it's really cool because this was like these poor reporters

like first international trip, this was their first like big case,

and this is this crazy guy, right, so it's like

really really interesting to listen to. And he told these reporters,

these like American reporters from this magazine. He told them

everything that he did, and then when they left, he

was like, I didn't do that. I didn't do that.

He's like, my whole thing is I'm against imperialism, and

they're like shut up, cell Brad shut Wow. Okay, so

he's in prison in India. He gets convicted, but it's

like kind of a weird thing where he's convicted of

poisoning but not of murder because he said it was

an accident, right, yeah, and they kind of bought that, okay.

They were like, okay, and I'm sure it had a

lot to do with all of his bootyhole gems. Oh

probably this was a big corrupt, big corrupt Yeah. So

he served. He had this twenty year sentence in March

nineteen eighty six. This was his tenth year in prison.

This was how big his influence was and how he

was just able to do whatever the fuck he wanted.

He threw this party in prison. It was like, let's

have this fun party. But he had smuggled in sleeping pills. Okay,

so he drugged all of the food and drink at

this party. Oh and all of the guards and inmates

fell asleep and he walked. He fucking left. How crazy

is my dream party? So yeah, I know, right, it's

like and you don't even have to clean up, that's no.

Everybody falls asleep and I can just leave and go home, right,

So what what the thing was. The reason that he

did this is because at this point, so he's in

jail in India, which India unfortunately has like a pretty

corrupt system. It's pretty easy to like bribe, especially at

this time. It's very like laxadaisical. But he was facing

extradition for his crimes in Thailand. Thailand, will fucking kill

the Thai prisons are some of the worst in the world. Absolutely, yes,

And so he was like, I don't want to do that.

So this was coming up to the point where he

would have to be extradited, so he did this where

he drugged everyone and put everyone to sleep and escaped jail,

allowed himself to be recaptured because he knew he would

just be sentenced to more jail time in India because

he wanted to stay there. Yeah. Yes, So he got

a ten year sentence for that. In India, he kept

living it up with his carpets and his plants and

his TV. And then on February seventeenth, nineteen ninety seven,

he was fifty two at this time, he was released

okay and allowed to return to France. Okay. So in

twenty ten he married his interpreter Okay She was the

daughter of one of his lawyers. She was only twenty

years old. He was Yes, she told this is a

quote from this article. She told the media that his

gaze and his eyes were mesmerizing and that his French

charm had done everything. Okay, she even like he needed

heart surgery and she like donated blood for he wasn't

even right, right, But that shows like what a what

a manipulator, big manipulator. So he has this whole thing.

You might have heard of this. There's a BBC series

about him called The Serpent. That was another name for

him because he was so like flippery. That is on Netflix. Okay,

so we should definitely check it out. But he became

this like very public figure. Okay, do you remember that,

like that like Asian guy who killed this like Dutch

woman and ate her and then he ended up being

released and he's like a celebrity. Yes, do you know

who I'm talking about? Actually, I'm pretty sure that we

covered I think on the show. I think so too.

It's a pretty common case. But I knew you would

know what I was talking about. That's very this vibes.

He was this, he's still alive, he's this like celebrity.

He does interviews, He's been in documentaries playing himself. He's

a big media figure. That's what he likes. So after

killing what they suspect was twelve but really was probably

more in the fifty range, he's just living it up,

eating croissants on the sein with his twenty year old wife. Wow.

And that is the very annoying story of why you

should be careful being hippie. See, that's more of a

cautionary tale than my ass home. Like and free love

is one thing, but like, girls, stay on the trail,

don't talk to that gem salesman who has heroin. Stop that.

I'm not victim blaming all of these people, like didn't

know what was going on. They were all young and idealistic.

But it's like, dude, don't trust everyone you meet. That's

what I'm saying.

Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean same, don't trust people period, anybody, period.

Speaker 1: I don't have to tell you things are bad. Everybody

knows things are bad.

Speaker 2: It's a depression. Everybody not their job. All right, folks,

that has been our episode before before I forget, before

we get too far, we have decided to take June

off from recording. You need a break. We need a break.

H it's not it's a little crazy.

Speaker 3: So this means we will not be releasing any episodes

in July, which is fine. You don't need to listen

to us all outside. Touch some grass, it's fine.

Speaker 2: Yeah, go watch a cat climb a tree. Yeah. So

Jessa heads up on that.

Speaker 3: We will be back releasing as normal in August, in

September and October.

Speaker 2: And then we won't release any of November. But we

missed you.

Speaker 3: Yeah, we just we just need a little summer break.

We need a little summer break.

Speaker 2: Anyway. Anyway, do you have any final thoughts before we

wrap up? I didn't know. Okay, all right. Our sound

in editing is by Tiffulman.

Speaker 3: Our music is by Jason zak Chevsky THEGMA. This has

been the Bad Taste Crime Podcast. We will see you

in two weeks.

Speaker 2: Good Bye along the Highway. I think this is it

for of Sebel washed over, with terra being utili the

word in some form or another.