Episode 233 - Red Baron Avenue
From insurance payouts to fatal "accidents," these deadly women proved that the most dangerous weapon in the room is a sweet smile and a sinister plan. Tune in as we dissect the twisted motives behind crime’s most calculating matriarchs.
Research links below!:
United States District Court: Middle District of Florida - "The Black Widow"
Florida Sheriffs Associations - "Judias Buenoano: Florida's Black Widow"
Crime Museum - "Judy Buenoano"
CBS News - "Florida Executes 'Black Widow'"
Justia - "Buenoano v. State (Fla. 1988)"
Oxygen - "Why Was There A Murder-Suicide Attempt At The 'Peanuts' Office? 'Snapped Dives Into The Shocking Case"
The Press Democrat - "Shirley Anne Nelson dies at 78"
SFGate - "Mistrial called in 'Peanuts' manager's shooting death"
CT Insider - "Wife Arrested in Cartoon Studio Shooting"
Stanford Law School - "People v. Nelson"
Mental Floss - "The Attempted Murder at Peanuts Headquarters"
Speaker 1: What they discovered upon their arrival was almost unspeakable.
Speaker 2: The dead won't bother you. It's the living you gotta worry.
Speaker 1: About. If I couldn't keep them there with me whole,
at least I felt that I could keep their skeletons.
Hello and welcome to the Bad Taste Crime Podcast.
Speaker 2: I'm Vicki. I'm Rachel. We are back again. Welcome back.
For another day of crime chat. Crime chat. The crime chat.
Chatting about crime. Yappers. Yeah, that's us.
Speaker 1: I have very much been like heavy on the yap recently.
Me too.
Speaker 2: I like cannot shut up.
Speaker 1: Well, and I tell people I am a yapper.
Speaker 2: I'm a yapper. You're a yapper.
Speaker 1: Yappers become my... favorite term to describe somebody yeah and
not mean not in a bad way no because i
am also i'm i will say that's why we have
a podcast because we can sit and talk for like
three hours you know what i mean yeah this is
imagine the yapping i would do if i didn't have
a dedicated space to just sit and talk for like
three hours.
Speaker 2: Sometimes i'll come home and perhaps like you're like kind
of like a little quieter i'm like yeah i let
off the pressure valve yep Yeah.
Speaker 1: And to be honest with you, normally when you're getting home,
your family is not there.
Speaker 2: Which is fabulous.
Speaker 1: And so now you've also had time alone.
Speaker 2: Right. Like truly alone. They go and see grandma and grandpa. Yeah.
So I get to relax and eat something without like
little hands being like, what if I also ate that?
And I'm like, that's mine. And then they're like, hey, actually,
I don't like that. So they're going to put it
in their mouth and then spit it out and then
put it back on my plate. But I'm like, I
never offered it to you.
Speaker 1: That's so gross.
Speaker 2: And now you're mad at me because you don't like it.
I'm like, I didn't say you'd, like, fed a dip.
That's so gross. You're five years old. Oh, my God.
Take your birth control, everyone.
Speaker 1: Nasty.
Speaker 2: This is your daily reminder.
Speaker 1: Anyway, if this is your first time listening, a special
hello to you.
Speaker 2: Special hello.
Speaker 1: We are going to head over to the newsroom.
Speaker 2: Let's go there. Okay, so our news this week comes
from Florida. Okay.
Speaker 1: Florida. Florida.
Speaker 2: From Miami, specifically. I'm in Miami.
Speaker 1: A woman named Irsi Machado Rivera, aged 50, was arrested
on burglary of an occupied dwelling and battery charges.
Speaker 2: Oh, no. Okay. Not supposed to do that.
Speaker 1: The report says that Machado Rivera and the victim, who
I don't believe is named, are neighbors.
Speaker 2: Oh, okay. They live in separate portions of a split trailer. Okay.
Speaker 1: Ooh.
Speaker 2: So they are like next door neighbors. Oh, no.
Speaker 1: And Machado Rivera went to the neighbor's house and started
banging on the door. And when they opened the door,
she started accusing the neighbor of having a sexual relationship
with her husband.
Speaker 2: Oh, no.
Speaker 1: And then she forced her way into the trailer and
threw a bucket of poop on her.
Speaker 2: What? And then left. Girl. Girl.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Why would you do that when you're only separated by
a wall? Now your apartment's going to be stinky as well. Yeah.
That's real dumb.
Speaker 1: The police are like, she pooped in a bucket for
the purpose of throwing it on this person, but then.
Speaker 2: How many poops? Machado, I don't know.
Speaker 1: Machado Rivera said she'd been trying to get rid of
the bucket of feces that she'd been using because her
toilet was broken, but denied throwing it at her.
Speaker 2: Just go to CVS.
Speaker 1: It says Machado Rivera also claimed that she and the
neighbor were involved in a dispute over the smell and
said the neighbor hit her over the head with a bat.
Speaker 2: Oh, my God.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So she got arrested. This is a stinky situation.
Speaker 2: Mm-hmm. Girl, with a bucket of open poop, I don't
think anyone's fucking in that trailer. She don't got to
worry about a thing. Well, no, I mean... She can
go elsewhere. There's other places other than at home. I'm
just imagining all of this is happening just within this
tiny trailer. Yeah, the split trailer, yeah. She's like, I
heard you having sex and I saw no cars were here.
Speaker 1: The moral of the story is don't poop in a bucket. Yeah,
don't do that. And then don't throw that bucket at
other people.
Speaker 2: You're so wise. That's battery. That was a good summary.
It's also yucky. Yeah, yeah. That's gross. I don't think
I'd recover if I had adult human poop thrown at me.
Speaker 1: No, and I definitely wouldn't recover if my name was
in the press for it. Oh, no.
Speaker 2: You know what I mean? Oh, that would be so embarrassing. Oh,
my God.
Speaker 1: We are going to move over to Netflix and Kill,
where this week we are talking about the investigation of
Lucy Letby. Oh, yes. So Lucy Letby, she's very well
known in the UK because she was found guilty in
2023 of of the murder of seven babies and attempted
murder of another six.
Speaker 2: So sad.
Speaker 1: And here, well, I mean, it's not necessarily as straightforward
as you would think.
Speaker 2: Well, no, I know. But when, you know, when babies die,
it's sad. Yes, yes, yes, yes.
Speaker 1: So this documentary covers her arrest, which– have you watched
this yet or no?
Speaker 2: No, but I'm familiar with the case.
Speaker 1: You would like it because it has a lot of
the body cam footage because they do a lot of
that in the UK. Like, almost everybody has body cams
of some sort.
Speaker 2: Yes. And there's CCTV everywhere. It's nice. Yeah, yeah. So–
It's a lot of that from.
Speaker 1: Like, her arrest because she was, like, brought in for
questioning multiple times before she was arrested.
Speaker 2: Oh, okay.
Speaker 1: And they kept showing up at her house and, like,
her parents are like, oh, my God, not again. And, like,
freaking out.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Anyway, so they have a lot of that.
Speaker 1: It follows her through the trial and through her conviction
and sort of the people who are now working her
appeal and believe this was a wrongful conviction and that
not all of the– Pertinent evidence was.
Speaker 2: Released at trial. Okay.
Speaker 1: So the facts are, in around June of 2015, babies
started mysteriously dying at the Countess of Chester Hospital.
Speaker 2: And....
Speaker 1: Then there was sort of a series of other babies
that died at the same hospital in the days following.
They looked at the records and she was like the
one that was always on duty.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: So they investigated her and she was charged and convicted. However,
like I said, there's a lot there's for me, there's
definitely a little bit of a question.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And it has to do with the experts that they
used at trial and the validity of some of the
things that they were saying.
Speaker 2: Right. Which they talk about in the documentary. Interesting.
Speaker 1: Also, it's a very sad story, but it's a very
interesting story just because it's not as clear cut as
you would think. Right.
Speaker 2: She's really hated in the UK. She really is. People
use her as like a euphemism. Like I've seen videos
of like people like, you know, jokingly throwing around their
kids and, you know, okay, Lucy, let be. I'm like, oh, damn. Right, right.
Speaker 1: The reason I wanted to talk about this, and we've
kind of talked about this in previous.
Speaker 2: Last time we.
Speaker 1: Talked about this was with the sort of second Mormon series.
The woman who's like out investigating Warren Jeffs.
Speaker 2: Yeah, she's like with them and stuff. Yeah, and then they.
Speaker 1: I saw that the trial for that guy is just starting,
I think.
Speaker 2: Oh, really?
Speaker 1: Like maybe just started last week.
Speaker 2: Or is about to start this week.
Speaker 1: Oh, my God.
Speaker 2: But the second one.
Speaker 1: if you recall, I talked about how they had re
used AI to replace the faces of some of the, uh,
underage children.
Speaker 2: Yes.
Speaker 1: So that they could preserve their identities, but still provide
a face.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Which allows the audience to like connect a little more.
Speaker 2: Totally. I thought that was really cool. Very clever. Okay.
Speaker 1: So the reason I bring this up is because at
that time, we talked about that potentially becoming a more
regular thing in this documentary, because you are talking about babies,
minor children. Right. And this is such a, like, she is, like,
probably the most well-known serial killer in the UK.
Speaker 2: Yes.
Speaker 1: Female serial killer in the UK. And this is a very, like,
hot button case, right? So some of the parents were
willing to be interviewed but not interviewed on camera.
Speaker 2: Uh-huh.
Speaker 1: And instead, they did a full AI replacement. Oh. of
these parents so they took the statements that the parents
had made and just used a like full completely different
ai interesting you can tell right um i mean there
are it's it's pretty close like don't get me wrong
it's pretty close but like there are aspects of it
where it like The way that it's presented, and this
might be on purpose so that you can tell when
it's a real interview and when it's like an AI interview.
Because there's a lot of like the doctors and experts
and attorneys and stuff are all interviewed in this on camera.
But I think they do it that way so that
you can tell, oh, this is an AI. And they
have a prompt on screen that's like we used AI versions.
Speaker 2: I like that.
Speaker 1: So we're starting to see this roll out in other ways.
And I do kind of like this use of AI because, again,
when you're talking about stuff like this that is very sad.
Speaker 2: Right. But very important. Yeah. I think.
Speaker 1: You want your message to land, and that message lands
better when you can connect.
Speaker 2: When you can connect. Yeah, completely.
Speaker 1: And having a face versus, like, somebody being in shadow.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: Or, like, filming behind them or whatever it is.
Speaker 2: Right, and babies already. I mean, like, young babies don't
really have, like, a personality you can connect with.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: So totally, like, robbing them of that would be wrong.
I totally agree with you. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Now, I will say they've never used this on babies.
I feel like babies is, like– because obviously– The babies
in this one are not with us any longer, unfortunately.
And even in the Mormon documentary, they blurred the faces
of infants. Uh-huh. But it was like once they got
to like toddler age.
Speaker 2: Uh-huh. Where more recognizable facial features. Yeah, that's when they
did like an AI replacement. But like baby babies, like infants,
they blurred still. They didn't replace the faces of the babies. Oh,
so this is like new technology. Well, they're just not
using it on babies. We have technology. Which I think
is interesting. Well, I mean, they're like pioneering using it
on that. That's cool. That's really cool. So anyway, it's
a very good documentary. It was very interesting.
Speaker 1: But I think this use of AI in true crime,
the true crime arena is interesting.
Speaker 2: It is interesting.
Speaker 1: I'm interested to see where they're going to go with
this because I am wondering– See, the last time I
predicted something like this, it has started to come to fruition.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you're pretty good at that stuff.
Speaker 1: I am curious if, because we have a lot of
shows like Dateline, Forensic Files, Unsolved Mysteries, that kind of stuff.
Speaker 2: Rather than using.
Speaker 1: They will start replacing reenactments with AI.
Speaker 2: I hope not.
Speaker 1: That I hope not because that is literally like taking
an actor's job.
Speaker 2: Yeah, taking their job. That's the thing. Every time I
hear AI, I feel like my dog hackles go up.
I'm very against AI. Yeah. But in certain spaces like
that where it's like it's being helpful, it's being used
for a helpful thing, that's fine. But where it's like
taking the job of like a human person, I'm like, dude, no. Yeah.
Get the fuck out of here. Get out of here.
Get out. Yeah. I totally agree. Yep.
Speaker 1: Anyway, so that is The Investigation of Lucy Lepi on Netflix.
Speaker 2: Check it out.
Speaker 1: This is a part of the show where we say
content may not be appropriate for all listeners. This week
we are talking about Moida.
Speaker 2: Moida. Mine's pretty tame, I feel. Yeah, I mean, it's still,
I mean, it's still burning. Full on. I can't spoil mine.
I know. Full on in my case.
Speaker 1: But it's been a minute since we gave it up
for the women.
Speaker 2: Woo! Woo! Women in male fields. Women with hobbies. Yeah.
Speaker 1: But this week we are talking about black widows.
Speaker 2: Black widow baby.
Speaker 1: So I'm going to start off with this woman named
Judy Bueno Año. She was born Judas Welty in Texas
in April 1943. And she was the youngest of three children.
Speaker 2: Okay. Okay.
Speaker 1: Now, sadly, Judy's mother died when she was four years old.
Speaker 2: Oh, my God.
Speaker 1: And she and at least her brother– it was unclear
if her sister also was sent, but at least her
and her brother were sent to live with their grandparents.
Speaker 2: Okay. For a little while. Right.
Speaker 1: It was like dad was like, I can't take care.
Speaker 2: Of these kids. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1: And then– Judy's father remarried.
Speaker 2: Ooh. And the kids were moved back in to the
house with them. I see. With this new stepmom. Oh, great.
That's not traumatic for the children at all.
Speaker 1: They, like, went to live with the grandma and grandpa.
Speaker 2: It's okay. We've replaced the mother figure. You can just
come back. Everything's fine now. Yeah. Girl. Which is so strange. Gross.
So strange.
Speaker 1: So they go back. They move in with her dad and...
his new wife in a house in New Mexico. And
there was definitely some conflict as you would have like assumed.
This new arrangement was not super, like Judy was not
a big fan of this arrangement.
Speaker 2: As she should not be.
Speaker 1: Now this from Crime Museum, quote, she claimed that her
father and stepmother abused and starved her, forcing her to
work as their slave, end quote. Things came to a
head when, at the age of 14, Judy attacked her father, stepmother,
and her two stepbrothers and was sent to prison for
two months.
Speaker 2: Gang, gang.
Speaker 1: Which sounds kind of extreme for a first-time juvenile defender.
Speaker 2: Right, a 14-year-old.
Speaker 1: But at that time, there weren't any other juvenile courts or.
Speaker 2: That's crazy.
Speaker 1: So they had to send her to like an adult prison.
Speaker 2: Oh, great. For two months. Oh, sure. Let's just give
her some more trauma. Right. Yeah. Because a 14-year-old girl
is going to attack four people by herself for no reason.
Get out of my face.
Speaker 1: When she was released, she decided to go to a
reform school and graduated in 1960.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 1: And then following this, she became a nursing assistant and
had a son, Michael.
Speaker 2: Who was like... An oopsie baby. Oopsies. Gang gang. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Shout out to all my other oopsie babies. He was
born out of wedlock. I think that makes us very sexy.
Speaker 1: Now, a few years later in 1962, Judy met and
married Sergeant James E. Goodyear, a sergeant in the U.S.
Speaker 2: Air Force.
Speaker 1: Oh. And the couple moved to Orlando. They had two kids,
a son and a daughter. And James also adopted Judy's son.
prior son, Michael. Oh, nice. He adopted him as well. Now,
James ends up being sent to Vietnam for a tour
of duty, and he returns back to Orlando in June 1971.
Almost immediately after his return, James starts becoming sick with
nausea and vomiting.
Speaker 2: Oh, no.
Speaker 1: And it seems like Most of us. James assumed it
was just, like, a run-of-the-mill sickness. Especially now that all
of our food is poison.
Speaker 2: Oh, yeah.
Speaker 1: I'm hitting points where I will, you know, be having
a stomach ache or some GI issues or something.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Is this from the food or is this just my
body hating me?
Speaker 2: Right. It's crazy, though. Right. That's where we're at. I've
been shopping, like, mainly at Aldi. Yeah. Which is, like,
supposed to be, like, one of the best Like, because
they don't use Taylor Farms. But then there's, like, all
this other stuff. I'm like, oh, my God.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but it's, like, everything now. You just can't escape it.
Speaker 2: No, no, no.
Speaker 1: So he was like, well, it's probably just, like– Some
sort of flu or something and that it would pass eventually.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: But when he finally went to the doctor in September
of that year, he told them that he had been
experiencing these symptoms for a number of weeks.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 1: Shortly after being admitted, his condition worsened and he unfortunately.
Speaker 2: Died while he was in the hospital. Oh, no. On
September 16th, 1971. Sheesh.
Speaker 1: Oh. Right.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Because he was under a doctor's care. Right. And
all that together sounds pretty serious. Right. Failure and all
that stuff. So it's like, well, you know, took him out. Exactly. Exactly.
Speaker 1: So they didn't do an autopsy. He gets buried.
Speaker 2: And the end.
Speaker 1: James is no more. James had been a responsible adult
and had various insurance policies out, which meant that Judy
collected $ 33, 000 from life insurance and $ 62, 000 from the Veterans Administration. Wow.
Speaker 2: Wow. Not too shabby.
Speaker 1: Not too shabby. Close to 100,000. A little shy of 100,000.
About a year after James' death, Judy met and started
dating a man named Bobby Joe Morris. Oh. She moved
into his home in Colorado in 1977, taking all of
her kids with her.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 1: However, weirdly enough, within a few months, Bobby Joe gets sick.
Speaker 2: Maybe all these guys are just allergic to her. Maybe.
Maybe that's what's happening. Maybe.
Speaker 1: Yeah, she just puts off a... A cloud of pollen.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I know. A cloud of spores. Yeah, I know.
Maybe she's a mushroom. We haven't thought of that. She
is a mushroom, yeah. So he starts getting sick.
Speaker 1: Oh, no. He's suffering from some mysterious symptoms that kind
of came out of nowhere. Sheesh. And gets sick enough
that he is admitted to the hospital. The doctor is determined...
At some point that he was well enough to leave
and discharge him. However, when he returned home, he collapsed
and was again admitted to the hospital.
Speaker 2: Oh, no. And then died two days later. Jeez.
Speaker 1: Luckily, prior to his death, Judy had taken out some
insurance policies.
Speaker 2: Oh, well, isn't that lucky?
Speaker 1: On Bobby Joe, which she was able to collect on.
And then shortly after Bobby Joe's death, Judy changes her
last name to Bueno Año, which is Spanish for good year.
Speaker 2: The last name of her first husband, Goodyear, but in Spanish.
I don't know. That's so weird.
Speaker 1: But she changes it to Bueno Año.
Speaker 2: What? Which means good year, which is like– Yeah. Yeah, yeah.
That's so awkward.
Speaker 1: And so she changes her last name. She relocates to Florida.
Speaker 2: Okay. So now she's Judy Bueno Año. She's like, bye. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Bye. A few years after Bobby Joe's death, Judy's first son, Michael,
decides that he's going to go and join the army.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 1: And was on his way to Georgia, where he was
going to be stationed at Fort Benning.
Speaker 2: Uh-huh.
Speaker 1: But he decides before he goes out to report for
duty that he's going to stop at his mom's house
on the way, stop in Florida.
Speaker 2: Yeah. After his visit.
Speaker 1: Michael continues on to Fort Benning to begin his army service.
But weirdly enough, shortly after he arrives, Michael starts to
exhibit symptoms, mysterious symptoms that doctors determined were signs of poisoning.
Speaker 2: Your own son? What?
Speaker 1: Further tests found high levels of arsenic in his blood.
Speaker 2: Not the bitter almonds.
Speaker 1: Again from Crime Museum, quote, a few weeks later, Michael's
muscles in his arms and legs had atrophied to the
point that he could not use his hands and required
metal braces on his legs to walk. He was discharged
from the army and returned to his mother's home in Florida.
Speaker 2: No, send him somewhere else.
Speaker 1: No.
Speaker 2: You can't go back there.
Speaker 1: Now, I had seen, as I was doing my research,
I had seen in a couple of places that Judy
sort of had, they described her as having this resentment
for Michael.
Speaker 2: Okay. Because he was born out of wedlock. Right. That, like,
he was the.
Speaker 1: Bastard child and, like, yeah. So, it does seem like
he was. That's great.
Speaker 2: That's why he was targeted. He didn't have anything to
do with that. No. Geez. Yeah. But. Poor Mike.
Speaker 1: Given Judy's history of the men in her life becoming, like,
mysteriously ill, it sort of seems like he was doomed
from the start.
Speaker 2: Poor Michael. Yeah.
Speaker 1: After his return home, Judy took... Both of her sons
out on a canoe trip in a river in Florida.
Speaker 2: Uh-huh.
Speaker 1: During this trip, the canoe that they were riding in capsizes.
Speaker 2: Oh, no.
Speaker 1: Judy and James Jr. managed to swim to the shore.
But poor Michael, he was wearing his metal leg braces.
He was not wearing a life vest. He sinks to
the bottom of the river and drowns.
Speaker 2: That's horrible. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 1: But it's fine because Michael had a military life insurance
policy and Jeannie was able to collect $ 20, 000.
Speaker 2: Oh, well, great. So it's fine. Don't worry. Son comes
up tomorrow.
Speaker 1: Family was taken care of. It's all good. Although the
loss of her son must have been devastating.
Speaker 2: Devastating.
Speaker 1: She found the strength to get her life back together
by using the money from Michael's life insurance policy to
purchase and open a beauty salon. Girl!
Speaker 2: Girl!
Speaker 1: I'm going to go do hair to mask the pain.
Speaker 2: Oh, my God.
Speaker 1: It was also around this time in 1982 that Judy
met and started dating John Gentry.
Speaker 2: John, run. John, run away. John, get away. Don't eat
the beans. No, seriously. Well, don't worry. It wasn't in
the beans.
Speaker 1: Oh, no. So they get engaged in October of that
year in 1982.
Speaker 2: Mm-hmm. And....
Speaker 1: Just to plan for the future, Judy talks John into
getting life insurance policies. They each take them out on
each other.
Speaker 2: Oh. Okay.
Speaker 1: Because it's not a one-way street.
Speaker 2: Right. This is almost a marriage.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Almost.
Speaker 1: Just to make sure they never had to use those policies,
Judy has John start taking these special vitamins. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Oh, how thoughtful of her.
Speaker 1: You want to keep your husband healthy. Love a mystery tool. Yeah,
we just got these life insurance policies. He was like, yeah,
she told me she was just looking out for my health. Like,
she wanted me to take these vitamins.
Speaker 2: One-a-day male vitamins.
Speaker 1: Unfortunately, these vitamins had the opposite effect and sent him
to the hospital in 1982.
Speaker 2: Oh, my God.
Speaker 1: After being in the hospital and not taking them for
a few days, he started feeling better.
Speaker 2: What a coincidence. Surprise, surprise. Surprise, surprise.
Speaker 1: But he assumed that it was the vitamins that he
was taking. Like, for some reason, they're making me sick.
So Judy does not have anything to do with it.
He is not like, Judy's been poisoning me. He's like,
must have just been a bad batch from the factory or.
Speaker 2: Something. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1: So things health-wise seems to improve for him for a
little bit. But then, again, seemingly out of nowhere, while
John was driving to the liquor store, his car explodes.
Speaker 2: What? Hate it when that happens. Which is wild.
Speaker 1: I'm reading through this and she very much has like
a poisoning history, right?
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And then it was like, boom, car bomb. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Well, it's like boom, drowning. Yeah. Boom, car bomb. Yeah, true, true.
She's like, I'm just going to, you know, I'm just experimenting.
She just escalates so quickly. I'm in like a really
like experimental time of my life.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So John's car explodes while he's on his way to
the liquor store.
Speaker 2: Police obviously are called. They call 911. They come. They
get John.
Speaker 1: They take him to the hospital. Oh, he lived? He
ends up surviving. What?
Speaker 2: He ends up surviving.
Speaker 1: While he was there under doctor's care, police start looking
into who could have possibly put a bomb, planted an
explosive on John's car.
Speaker 2: Yeah, John, who did you piss off? Because what the fuck?
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: Cars aren't supposed to do that, I've heard. No. And
it is unbelievable. Because it is so uncommon. Right.
Speaker 1: Especially when you're talking about these small towns wherever. Like,
I don't know that this was necessarily a small town. But, like,
it's not a common thing.
Speaker 2: Not like a high crime area.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And so it's fucking weird. Yeah, that is weird. If
someone's car explodes. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And it is almost immediately treated as suspicious.
Speaker 2: Yeah. It's not just like, oh. She's stupid.
Speaker 1: Those darn Toyotas. There they go exploding again.
Speaker 2: You heard there was a recall? Yeah, right. Yeah.
Speaker 1: No, it's immediately treated as suspicious. So they start investigating. And,
of course, they are first going to start with people
that are the closest to him.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: Which naturally means they were starting with John's fiancée, Judy.
Speaker 2: Bum, bum, bum.
Speaker 1: Who seems to have this background that is a little suspicious.
Speaker 2: Oh, no.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Not the two dead husbands. They start– the two
dead husbands and one dead son.
Speaker 2: And the dead kid. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So they start sort of digging a bit deeper into
her history. They notice this recent hospital stay that John had,
and they discover that these special vitamins that he had
been taking were actually laced with arsenic.
Speaker 2: Whoops. Whoopsie-daisy.
Speaker 1: Now, during their investigation, they also discovered Judy had a
husband and ex-boyfriend and a son that had all died
under mysterious circumstances.
Speaker 2: Yes.
Speaker 1: And they decide to have all three of their bodies exhumed.
Speaker 2: Nice. They dig them up.
Speaker 1: They run a bunch of, like, toxicology tests and stuff
on the bodies of James Goodyear, Bobby Joe Morris, and
Michael Goodyear. And it was determined that all three men
had been given arsenic. Wow. Police investigations also revealed Judy
had financially benefited from all of their deaths thanks to
the life insurance payouts. And really, up until John's car exploded,
Judy had not been suspected of any of this.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So Judy was arrested in 1983 on multiple felony counts,
including the murder of all three men and attempted murder
of John Gentry, who survives. Oh, phew.
Speaker 2: Yeah. And he's like able to testify. Poor John. Yeah.
I bet he had trouble dating after that. I would
have trouble driving. Yeah. Oh, I would never drive again.
Speaker 1: I'd be like, I'm never getting into another car.
Speaker 2: I'd be a bike guy. Like, from that point forward. Yeah,
at least if there's an.
Speaker 1: Hopefully, if there's an explosive device, you can see it
before you.
Speaker 2: Get on a bike. It's just a stick of dynamite
taped to the bottom of your bike.
Speaker 1: Anytime anyone's talking about an explosive device, that's all I
picture is, like, the.
Speaker 2: A stick of C4 with, like, a timer on it. Right.
Every time.
Speaker 1: Yeah, just, like, six dynamite sticks all wired together. It's
because we watch too much Looney Tunes.
Speaker 2: It's really.
Speaker 1: No, it's so true. And I know now they can
have them in just, like, little, you know, quarter-sized whatever.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Every time I watch like some procedural, I'm like,
where's the giant red bomb? Yeah. They're like, it's not
like that anymore, Rachel.
Speaker 1: No, it's like, dude, it's like the bag with the
money symbol on it.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: That's what it means. See, Looney Tunes fucked us up.
Speaker 2: It's so true.
Speaker 1: It's so true. At least I'm not running into painted walls.
So there's that.
Speaker 2: I run into everything. Oh, damn. Well, let's see.
Speaker 1: So at the trial, there was some interesting testimony from
doctors and examiners. First, a later appeal. This is from
a later appeal decision out of the Supreme Court of Florida.
Speaker 2: Quote, Dr.
Speaker 1: Achenbach testified that he had he known in 1971 arsenic
was present in Goodyear's body. His medical opinion would be
that Goodyear could have died as the result of acute
arsenic intoxication because arsenic The circulatory collapse and the other
symptoms Goodyear exhibited are manifestations of arsenic poisoning. Oh. And
he was the one who had like renal failure and
like that whole– the pulmonary collapse and everything.
Speaker 2: Like that was all listed out. Right. And they, again,
like didn't do an autopsy or anything. But like that's
the thing. You wouldn't necessarily think of that if you
don't know that it's present. Right. Right. But the symptoms
are like the same. Interesting.
Speaker 1: Interestingly enough, John Gentry, like I said, he survived. He
had recovered enough to testify at trial as well. And
he said, quote, Bueno Año told him Goodyear died in
a plane crash in Vietnam and Morris died of alcoholism. Girl.
Speaker 2: Yeah. That's not what happened.
Speaker 1: There was also testimony that following John's strange illness and
sort of hospital stay, that Judy went around telling all
of their friends and everybody that he actually had terminal cancer.
Speaker 2: And, like, that's why he was in the hospital. That's
what innocent people do.
Speaker 1: She'd be lying her– ass off yeah that's not a
good look judy to everybody oh my god in 1984
judy was found guilty of the murder of her son
michael and the attempted murder of john gentry and the
following year um she was found guilty of the murder
of james goodyear she received 12 years for the attempted
murder of john life in prison for michael's murder and
the death penalty for james's murder And I think that
mostly has to do with.
Speaker 2: Some of it happened in Texas. Right. Some of it
happened in Colorado. Right. Some of it happened in Florida.
Speaker 1: That makes sense. Yeah. And this is, again, from Crime Museum. Quote,
she was also convicted on multiple counts of grand theft
and multiple acts of arson as means to gain insurance money.
Speaker 2: Uh-huh.
Speaker 1: She was suspected of several other deaths, including a 1974
murder in Alabama and the 1980 death of her boyfriend,
Gerald Dossett.
Speaker 2: Oh, my God. But these were never proved. No way.
I also, I believe she was not.
Speaker 1: Officially convicted i think she confessed to bobby joe's murder
uh-huh but she wasn't officially convicted because by the time
that was going to trial she was already sitting on
death row right so well yeah whatever yeah yeah so
they way so judy bueno año was executed by electric
chair on march 30th 1998 wow at the florida state
prison She was the first woman executed in Florida since 1848.
Speaker 2: Oh, my God.
Speaker 1: And the first woman in the U.S. to be electrocuted
since 1976.
Speaker 2: That's crazy.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Oh, my God. So, Judy dead. She's nuts. Yeah. Stop
doing that. She's a lot. Yeah, that's a lot. And she,
let me show, hold on, let me show you a
picture of her.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Because she is exactly what I would picture.
Speaker 2: Okay. Oh, she looks so, like, cute and old.
Speaker 1: Now that, I will say, that is one from her
in prison.
Speaker 2: She looks like my ex-friend's mom. That's so weird. Yeah.
Here she is, like, when she was at trial. Oh, okay. Yeah.
Nice bone structure. With a very sort of ruffly shirt. Yeah.
High collar. Yeah. Very stoic. Stoic. But, like, she knows
she's going to be photographed, so she's wearing her ruffliest shirt.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Anyway, that is Judy. Wow. Oh,
my God. She just could not stop slaying.
Speaker 1: No.
Speaker 2: No more slaying. And honestly, she got away with it
for a long time. She sure did. Long time. Whoa.
That's a good one. Okay, Black Widow. Yep. Black Widow, baby.
One time, I found a Black Widow in my mailbox.
Speaker 1: Gross.
Speaker 2: Not the, like, murdering woman, but the spider. Yes. I
had innocently reached in to grab my mail, and it, like,
charged me. It was, like, running at me. I literally ran. Yeah, well,
you came into its habitat. Well, it's my mailbox. Yeah,
but you don't live there. I should. Like a little mouse.
But it, like, literally, like, was, like, running at me.
I literally ran screaming down the street like a lunatic.
But then when my big strapping spider squishing husband got home,
it was nowhere to be seen. Of course. I still
open my mailbox very carefully. This is, if this is
a space, good night. If this is a safe space,
I'm telling you that sometimes I open my mailbox with
like a little stick because I'm scared.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I'm scared it's going to run out into my hand.
Speaker 1: This is why I'm so glad I have an inside mailbox.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's what I want. Like a door. But I
live in a building. Right. I'm like, yeah, terrible. On
the true crime flip side, a black widow is defined
as a woman who kills her husband. See, I happen
to like my husband, but not everyone is as lucky
in marriage as I am. Again, I must bring up
big spider killing arms. Yeah. I'm very happy where I'm at. Yes, yes.
Did today's subject, Shirley Nelson's husband, kill spiders for her?
I'm not sure. Honestly, I kind of feel like she
would have had trouble doing the killing for herself. Hmm.
In this case, we'll explore the reasons why women kill,
why Shirley did what she did, and also Snoopy will
be there. Let's begin. Okay. So Shirley Nelson was born
in 1930. She grew up in Pennsylvania. She had kind
of a pretty typical upbringing. She was described as very caring. Also,
this is an episode of Snapped. So if you want
to see like more about like her childhood and stuff,
you should definitely check that out. I'll put it in
the show notes. But here's a quote from one of
her granddaughters, Amy. She was always very caring. She loved animals.
She loved sports. She loved people. Okay. Sounds like every
human being. Pretty average.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: Yeah. The only thing I don't like out of those
is sports. Pretty average white woman. Right. For real. Animal, people. Yeah. Sport.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Coffee. Yep.
Speaker 1: Pretty much.
Speaker 2: She grew up, got married. There was a bit of
a problem with her first marriage. Again, she was born
in the 1930s. This is kind of a while ago.
And the point of most marriages was to have children. Sure.
And she would end up being unable to conceive. Okay.
So that marriage actually ended in annulment.
Speaker 1: Aw.
Speaker 2: They were like, ma-ma. Damn. But her second marriage, she
got two little bonus kids, two stepchildren. And- she really
would become like a mother figure to her and they
spoke positively of her. Okay. Even after like they got–
because that marriage would also I think pretty quickly end
in divorce. Even after they split up, those children would
kind of stay in her life. She was a mother
figure to them. So it's like at least she got
some kids. Right, right, right. So after they got divorced,
she met a CPA named Ronald Allen Nelson. Now– Kind
of the difference was he was 24 and she was
12 years older. Okay. So, like, I don't think that's
that bad. No. Honestly, like, I feel like as long
as everyone's over, like, 21. Yeah. It's fine. Yeah. Like,
it might be a little weird.
Speaker 1: I agree.
Speaker 2: And I will always side-eye, like, People who are much
older going for like 22 year olds because I'm like,
what do you have in common? Right. But, you know.
Speaker 1: I mean, you're talking to somebody who is admittedly into
older gentlemen.
Speaker 2: Me too. Like not, I'm not talking like. Elderly. But
older than I am. Right. It's a thing. It's not
that weird to me. No, it's not weird. It's really not.
It's really not. Like, I can see, like, sometimes when
situations like that go south, I'm like, okay, so it
was the fucking age difference. But sometimes people can really
make it work. Yeah. Like, it just depends. Yeah. So
it was definitely unusual for the time. I'm sure people
were looking at them a little like, what? But, like,
she was a cougar. Let her live her cougar life. Right. Right.
So they... Really hit it off and ended up getting
married in 1967. Okay. Now, Shirley was always, like, she
was really pretty. But when she started getting with Ron,
she seemed to pay, like, more attention to her appearance.
So she became a lot more, like, focused on that.
And I think it was because she knew people were, like,
looking at them. So she didn't want to be, like,
the old wife. She wanted to look young. She wanted
to look fashionable. She always had her hair done. She
always had great outfits. Like watching Snapped, I was like, okay,
cute top. She always looked really cute. And I mean,
she was in her 30s. It's not like she was
like the critical part. No, no, no, no.
Speaker 1: No, but when you're dating somebody that much younger than you,
like you are hyper aware of.
Speaker 2: And she was. That difference. Yeah, for sure. And I
think that started like understandably enough, but it spiraled over
time to where it became like an obsession for her
where she was like, I need to look young and
like I'm not a burden. You know, it's going to
be obvious why he's coming after me. So something that
was kind of cool, remember I mentioned Snoopy earlier. Ron
started working for Charles M. Schultz, who is the creator
of the Peanuts magazine. comic strip. Of course. Which is really,
really cool. Yeah. So they relocated to Northern California to
an area called Santa Rosa, which is where the job was,
where Schultz was based. So the job that Ron ended
up taking was really important because he was Charles Schultz's
business manager. So he was overseeing all of these like
million dollar deals and everything. And so he was getting
like a really good amount of money.
Speaker 1: Sure.
Speaker 2: So there's all of these, like, beautiful shots of them
on these, like, lavish vacations. Shirley, who is, again, getting
more and more obsessed with her appearance, is, like, really
zhuzhing it up with these fancy outfits. Yeah. They're holding
these crazy dinner parties. And they literally, so obviously, they're, like,
very fancy in this. california area so they belong to
the local country club slash golf resort they also live
right on it yeah they have this big gorgeous like
a manor house oh it's like nice gorgie gorgie i
want some rich people shit sometimes But I just don't
want to have to pay for it. I don't want
to be around rich people. No. Because they're so annoying.
But I do want the rich people shit. Me too.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: But I don't want to talk to any of them. No.
I'll bring around my poor friends. Yay! Yay. In July,
so like everything's going good. They end up staying married
for a very long time. They had just at this
point celebrated their like 28th wedding anniversary. So it's like,
all right, everything's going great.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 2: Okay. 28, wow. 28th wedding anniversary. Wowie, wow. That's a
long time. Right. That's like a whole life, you know?
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So less than two months later, after that like 28th
anniversary mark, on the morning of July 5th, 1995, the
Santa Rosa police received like a really unusual 911 call. Okay.
And what was unusual about the call wasn't necessarily the
contents of the call, but the location because it was
called from home. One Snoopy place. Okay. Which is where
Schultz's production office is. Oh, geez. I was just so obsessed.
Like this is like, like it's sad because it's a crime, obviously.
But like watching the episode of Snapped, I was just
obsessed with like, okay, there's been this like. Horrible, like,
bloody attack. Yeah, just come to the building with Snoopy.
I was like, please.
Speaker 1: I feel like that's not super uncommon for businesses, though.
Speaker 2: I'm sure.
Speaker 1: Like, the head, just from work, I know this, but the, like,
main headquarter building in a Chicago area for UPS is
on 1 UPS Way in Hodgkins.
Speaker 2: That's cute. Yeah, so, like... I mean, that's not uncommon.
It's not, but it was the juxtaposition of like this
horrible crime. Yeah. And then one Snoopy place. I was like, oh.
Speaker 1: If you've gotten to Woodstock, you've gone too far.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Right, right, right, right. Definitely. So cute.
Speaker 1: After Red Baron Avenue.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Red Baron Avenue. Stop it. Listen, I know my peanuts.
I know my peanuts. I love peanuts. I do too.
Love Snoopy. That'll be a tattoo on my arm at
some point. Little Snoopy. So officers, probably giggling a little bit,
rushed to the scene. They found Ronald Nelson laying face
down on the sidewalk. He had been shot twice in
the back. Oh, no.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So they found him collapsed. Okay. When they very
carefully went inside the building to kind of check and see, like,
where is this intruder? They found a second victim, Shirley Nelson. Okay.
But when they went up to her and they were like, okay,
you've been shot, they found that the gunshot was pretty
obviously self-inflicted. Okay. Because she was holding the gun. She
shot herself in the chest. I mean, ballsy. Right. Which
is very like kind of like romance novel. I'm going
to shoot myself right in the heart. Yeah. Because you've
broken my heart. But also. Ow. Then like drop the gun. Well, right. Well,
I think she thought she was like going to die.
Was she trying to kill herself? Yes. Okay. Okay. Okay. Yeah.
Like I figure whenever I see things like that, I
always figure it's like an intruder came in and shot
all of us and I was just here. Ouchie. I
have a wound. I didn't do it, but she was
trying to kill herself.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 2: Not like blame it on some like imaginary intruder.
Speaker 1: I see. I see.
Speaker 2: So it was a. 357 caliber revolver that they found
like kind of like right next to her. So they
were both rushed to the hospital and the officers, so
there's tape of this that you can hear. It's crazy
to hear. But the officers, she was still conscious. Yeah.
They're like, Shirley, what happened? What happened, girl? She replied, quote,
I shot him. I shot my husband. Is the son
of a bitch dead? Yeah. I'm sorry. She kept the-
I shouldn't be laughing at that probably. No, it's so funny. No,
it is funny.
Speaker 1: It's okay.
Speaker 2: By the end of this, you're going to be able
to laugh. Everything is okay. So this was a, one
of the officers who transported her was like very, you know,
a lady officer, officer Amanda Pelkey. She was like, I'm
going to be able to relate to her and like
talk to her because she didn't know what had happened.
So she's like, what happened, Shirley? What's going on? And
she kept repeating, quote, she was very agitated, very angry
and kept repeating, did I kill him? I hope he's dead.
Speaker 1: Surely oh my god listen i mean you know i
say kudos for the focus right like i i think
i would be saying how i admire the dedication to
one soul right mission right but goddamn like you're bleeding
out you're bleeding out like i think i would be
saying ouch my chest yeah do you have any band-aid
for my chest is.
Speaker 2: He dead is he dead i hope he's dead oh
my god i hope he's dead Oh, my God. So
even though she was conscious on the ride over, it
became more serious as it progressed, obviously, with her blood
loss and everything. By the time they both reached the hospital,
no one was sure whether either of them was going
to survive. Yeah. So it became very serious, like very, very,
very quickly. Yeah, yeah. So they're in the hospital. Now
the police come back to one Snoopy drive and are asking,
because this is his like publishing office. Okay. Where Ron
was working at the time. So they're like, all right,
let's go try to figure out what's going on. So
they went back to go and interview his son. Charles.
Speaker 1: Oh. They do talk to him eventually, but I don't
think he was there.
Speaker 2: No, he probably wasn't there. But I'm just the idea
of being like, hello. Put down the Snoopy drawings, sir,
and tell us what's going on.
Speaker 1: He's like, please.
Speaker 2: I just want to draw depressed children and cute animals.
So they went and they were talking to the receptionist
and they were like, what happened? They were like, Shirley
pulled up Obviously, he's been working there for so long
that they all knew Shirley. Right. And they knew her car. Yeah.
So when she got out, they were like, hey, what's up?
And they noticed right away that Shirley, who I've already said,
is like so obsessed with her appearance. And she wore
a lot of like bright colors.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Like I feel like if you and I got rich,
it would be like. expensive goth clothes you know yeah.
Speaker 1: It would be like a lot of it i probably
wear more bright colors than you i see as i'm
sitting across from you in this like tan sweatshirt with.
Speaker 2: Bright orange you do have your like.
Speaker 1: Halloween like definitely at least half of it is just
black that's true close but for shirley it was very
unusual for her to wear anything dark yeah like they
were like where is she going like why is she
dressed like this because she always dressed like super flashy
that's also my problem if some shit like this was
happening they would have no idea they would have no
idea because there are things that i wear because they
are intentionally weird or like unusual or like like that
would not be that unusual no it wouldn't if i
just showed up with like i don't know yeah they'd
be like oh i keep seeing um betty crocker i
think has released a series of purses no that are
just like slices of cake oh i And I'm like,
I kind of love that.
Speaker 2: So like, it wouldn't be weird if I just like
showed up with that. You know what I mean? I'm
gonna order a purse. It's in my cart and it's
like a, like a plush purse and it's like a
little brain. Yeah. It's so cute.
Speaker 1: You'd never know if something was wrong because it would
not be that weird for me to show it.
Speaker 2: Yeah. It would be unusual because I'd have more than
like two bags. Yeah. Because I'd have money. Wasn't it
weird that she was carrying in a taxidermied hamster? It's like, no. No,
that's Vicky. That's actually normal.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: She has that in four colors. Yeah, yeah. Have you
seen her house? Yeah, no, it's fine. Yeah. I love
your apartment. But they right away were like, that's so weird.
She's dressed in black. Like, I wonder if they thought
she was going to like a funeral or something. They
were like, what the hell? So she walks into the
office and they're like, hey, Shirley, what's up? And she's like,
is he here? And they're like, who, Ron?
Speaker 1: Yeah, sure.
Speaker 2: He's in his office. So she walked back into his office.
The receptionist saw like through the window that he stood
up to greet her. She turned and shot him twice
in the back. Wait, shot her husband or the receptionist?
Her husband. The receptionist was a lady. Okay. And then
fired twice more, but those apparently missed. Okay. So she
was like trying to empty the clip. Damn. Pretty much. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So they were like, oh, my God. Like and
everyone in the office was like shocked. They were like,
she must have had a mental break or something because
this is so not like Shirley. Shirley is a nice,
fancy lady. Pretty much everyone who knew her was like
she was so kind. And so sweet. They were like,
something crazy must have happened.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So they're like, okay. And as they're talking to all
of the coworkers in the building, they're getting the same
story until they go to the man himself, Charles Schultz.
They're like, well, these are just your employees. So obviously
you probably don't know what's going on. He goes, oh,
I do know what the fuck's going on. Actually, newsflash. Yeah.
I got my pulse on the public. I do know
what's going on.
Speaker 1: Well, also a business manager is like a relatively close
relationship to the person he's managing.
Speaker 2: It's like they were friends, but they were like work friends.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: So they didn't really know everything that was going on.
I'm sure some of them did, but they probably were like,
I don't know. Well, and you know how it goes.
There's sometimes your personal life.
Speaker 1: Seeps in you know you talk about things you did
on the weekend or.
Speaker 2: Well and especially if something you're doing is closely tied
to your work and it's not something you're supposed to
be doing maybe that's something that will get out like
say if you have an affair with your secretary oh
fuck okay wop wop oh no so when they went
to charles schultz and they were like what do you
know about this probably nothing big boss and he was
like oh no he was getting some strange in the office.
He was sleeping with the secretary. He was fucking his
secretary for an extended period of time. Oh, my God. Okay. Wow.
Speaker 1: So.
Speaker 2: It's not really known whether like how Charles found out
because when they were interviewing all the other employees, a
lot of the employees didn't seem like aware of anything
going on. You know, because that would be like the
first thing like, oh, he's fucking the secretary. That's why
she shot him. None of them really said that until
it got to Charles. The reason Charles knew is he
found out somehow either from one of them telling them
or like walking into something. Who's to say? Or from
like a complaint or. But he found out and was like, guys,
this is like a sexual harassment lawsuit like waiting to happen.
He's like, you idiot. You can't sleep with your secretary.
So he like pulled them in to his office and
was like, you guys better fucking stop or you're fired.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And he was like, don't do this to your wife. Right. Like,
how could you do this? So he was like, I
think he. Good guy, Charles Schultz.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: Should have called her, but, you know, whatever. Well, I mean... Whatever. No,
I disagree. I disagree. I think that's what you're supposed
to do. Have somebody call her. I mean.
Speaker 1: I wouldn't do it. If I'm not friends with your wife,
why would I call her and be like.
Speaker 2: I would. Yeah, but you're insane. I am. And also,
I don't care. And you don't care. I really would.
Speaker 1: A regular person would not do that.
Speaker 2: If I knew a secret like that, I'd tell. I know.
Why get involved? Why get involved? Because it's not true.
That's not nice. You can't sleep with somebody else. That's
not nice. No, you're right, but that's not really your business.
Sure it is.
Speaker 1: If he was beating the shit out of her, that
would be a different story.
Speaker 2: That's true. That would be a different story. That's true.
I'm not saying that, but this kind of... I don't know.
Speaker 1: That's a little too messy for me to get involved
in somebody's life that I'm tangentially sort of.
Speaker 2: That's fair. Associated with. And that's a very like mature opinion.
I'm just not about that.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: You're like, I want to get messy.
Speaker 1: I want to stir the pot.
Speaker 2: Let's go fuck up some marriage. Cast me on reality
TV now. I'm exposing all the secrets. Oh my God.
So the big thing about the affair, they go over
this a lot in Snapped. I like Snapped because they
tend to talk about like the– people's, like, mental state
a lot. It's a very, like, psychological show. Mm-hmm. And
the secretary was younger. Yeah. So Ron was 53. She's
12 years older. In her 60s, the wife, the secretary
is in her early 40s.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So luckily, it's not like, you know, a 19-year-old secretary.
But I mean, she was still younger. And this was
this big thing with her where she felt insecure and
was probably talking to him all the time about like, oh,
I'm just your ugly old wife. And he's like, no,
I would never go for a young lady such as
like my secretary.
Speaker 1: Oof.
Speaker 2: And then he did. Yeah. And then he did. So
it's like, you motherfucker. Right. So she only learned of
the affair a month before the shooting. So she hadn't known.
She had like just found out. technically, the marriage, like,
so it seemed on the outside to be very, like,
idyllic and sweet. But of course, when they started delving into, like,
the couple's friends and acquaintances, they were like, hmm, it's
actually kind of, like, Shirley actually hasn't been in a
good place for a long time. See, in 1991, she
had had a stroke. Luckily, it was a minor stroke,
and it didn't affect, because sometimes there can be, like,
Facial paralysis and things like that. But she saw it
as a marker of her age. Okay. So she was like,
I am so old. And she started to become so
anal retentive about her appearance that it started affecting their marriage. Gotcha.
Like she was going to the gym. She was losing weight.
And she was like, I have to win him back.
But I think that she kind of pushed him away. Yeah.
Like with that. Yeah. So she I made a mistake
earlier when it's like the the employees recognized her car.
They actually saw a strange car pull up and surely
got out of it. They thought that she had been
like dropped off because they were like, well, that's not
Shirley's car. Right. It was actually a rental. Oh, this
would be a big thing in court. citing premeditation. Yes.
Because she didn't use it for anything else. She just
used it to throw, which is also like stupid because
you walked out and talked to people in the office.
They knew it was you, idiot. Right. But like otherwise,
it could kind of be written off as like a
crime of passion.
Speaker 1: But also it doesn't seem like she had any intention
of leaving.
Speaker 2: Well, right. That's true too. But it's like, then why
did you get a rental car? That's stupid. That's weird.
But I think it was more She didn't want to
warn her husband. She didn't want her husband to see
the car and know she was there. She was like,
I'm killing you, motherfucker. Right. So it turned out that
she had been planning this for like a little bit
of time. She had a friend who was like the
owner of a local gun store. She had gone in
and been like, oh, I'm just a pretty little lady
and I want to purchase a pistol. And he said, well, great.
I could hook you up with free lessons. Why don't
I teach you how to, you know... uh, shoot the gun, uh, for,
for a while. So, so fun. I'll just give you
private lessons. And he thought it was just a fun activity,
but really she was like, oh yeah, I'm practicing for
my crime. I'm going to commit. Of course. So Shirley
did recover. Shirley recovered from her self-inflicted chest wound. And
a lot of people would like clam up and like
not talk to the police, but she was like, nah, no,
I did that shit. I did that. One of the, uh,
Officer Bonniot said, I started asking her what happened and
she said she shot herself in the chest. She was
pretty clear that she wanted to kill her husband and
kill herself. So she was pretty like straight up like, no,
this is what I wanted to do. I mean, okay.
She had initially planned on killing the secretary. She had
had a plan initially of like, well, if I kill
the secretary, then he will come back with me. But
as she was taking like the gun lessons, the shooting lessons,
it kind of morphed into like, no, I'm going to
kill him and then kill myself. But she did tell
the detectives, quote, she also commented that she wished she
had taken her too, which is pretty fucked up. Okay.
So it's like, okay, girl. This woman is all over
the place. Yeah, she sure is. But luckily, I guess
those shooting lessons weren't like super good because Ron ended
up surviving his injuries. He had major wounds to his lungs, intestines,
major artery bleeds. He had kidney– he was really, really,
really close to death.
Speaker 1: I mean, did he– okay, keep going. I was going
to ask, did he testify on his own?
Speaker 2: He sure did. Okay. Oh, as soon as he was
able– because he was in the hospital for a while.
He was in the ICU, and I think he had
to do some physical therapy. But as soon as he
could talk, he was like, get the police in here now.
I want to tell you everything that happened. Gotcha. He
totally did not see it coming. So him and Shirley
had had, when she had found out about the affair
a month previous to the shooting, he had kind of
been like, it was all very unofficial, but he had
moved out, been like, I'm going to stay with somebody else,
but we're still married. And he said that they were
still having sex, like him and his wife. And he
was like, I hope that we can be fine. Such
a man. He's like, everything's fine, I thought. Oh my God.
She's mad about that? Are you sure? Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Such a man. Yeah, such a man. And he made
it sound a lot more like hunky dory than it
really was. When they were talking to the couple's friends,
they were like, okay, so what were you guys doing
the day before the shooting? They were all at the
golf course having like a little get together with some
of their friends. Yeah. And they had a big argument
and people were, the police were like, what did they say? Yeah.
And he was shouting at her, you're not good enough.
You're old. I found someone younger. We're going to have
children and we're going to have a life. Damn. Buddy,
you're not getting nothing but physical therapy. Yeah. Nothing. It's
not funny, but I kind of laugh at Shirley being
so dramatic when they went to the couple's home after
taking them to the hospital and everything. They found on
her bed she had laid out all of their, like,
wedding photos and all of– and she had written notes to, like,
her friends and her stepchildren. That is, like, very dramatic.
I cannot– live without Ron, quote, I'm sorry to cause
everyone so much pain, but I am in hell and
must take him with me. Damn. Whoa. And then she
shoots herself like in the chest trying to shoot herself
in the heart. I'm like, you need to put the
romance novels down. Yeah, that's all very dramatic. You need
to be on probation from Fabio. Very performative. Very performative. Yeah.
So she was arrested and charged with attempted murder. Okay.
Her bail was set at a Fucking crazy. $ 2 million? Damn.
This is kind of nuts. She was like, okay, well,
obviously $ 2 million, I'm going to be in jail. Nope,
somebody bailed her out. Guess who it was? Charles Schultz?
Charles Schultz. What? This is a quote from one of
the detectives. He recognized, knowing Shirley and who she was,
that this was completely out of character for her and
that she needed help. She didn't need to be locked
up in prison. He called me and said, I got
the money, let's go get her.
Speaker 1: I'm sure he probably felt bad knowing about the.
Speaker 2: Affair, too. He probably did. It was guilt money.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I told him to stop doing this, and he didn't.
And now his wife tried to kill him. I'm gonna
bail her out right like i feel bad for her
type of thing right that's that's a little insane it
is but it was honestly like kind of a good
i i don't know it was kind of smart at
the same time it's interesting i don't know it could
go either way i guess interesting it's interesting it's a
choice for sure choices it is a choice it's a
choice yeah so now we get into legal stuff you'll
love it okay april 1996 she went on trial for
attempted murder and She ended up– so when she was
in the hospital, they were doing, like, a lot of, like,
evaluations of her, psychological evaluations.
Speaker 2: She ended up going with an insanity defense. Okay. Which
I think is stupid.
Speaker 1: It's– I mean, it is the logical move in this case.
Speaker 2: It just never works. It's dumb.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but it provides– it doesn't matter if it never
works or not.
Speaker 2: I know.
Speaker 1: It provides an alternative sentencing option.
Speaker 2: I know. I'm always like, oh, my God.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 2: It ended up being an acquittal because the jury deadlocked
nine to three. So then it turned into a mistrial. Yeah.
So they were like, OK, we can do another trial.
And she was like, I'm just going to plead guilty. OK.
I did that shit. Yeah. Like, OK. So she went
to prison for a year. She had five years probation, 3,000
hours of community service. Okay. And she didn't even spend...
How many months did she... She only served six months,
and then they transferred it to home confinement for 18 months. Okay.
And during this whole time, they were still... married.
Speaker 1: She was probably very sympathetic to the juror. Oh, yeah.
To the jury as like this spurned woman.
Speaker 2: Right. Yeah. But like, I just don't, I don't know. Interesting.
I don't really buy it. Interesting. But they ended up
getting divorced. Ron got remarried to somebody else. Probably somebody
much younger. Probably somebody much younger. And then Shirley died
in 2008. She ended up getting colon cancer. Wow. But
Throughout her life, she had a lot, like you were saying,
there was a lot of sympathy. There was a lot
of sympathy from everywhere. She was that spurned wife. He's
going off with this younger woman. A lot of people
in her family, her stepchildren, everyone really supported her. And
I just think that's really interesting to see. It's interesting. Interesting.
She may be an attempted Black Widow, but I think
that she still qualifies. Yeah. And again, it's a very
interesting episode of Snapped.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: If you guys want to check it out. So that
is the story of the attempted Snoopy-fied murder of Ron.
I don't have to tell you things are bad. Everybody
knows things are bad. It's a depression. Everybody's out of
work or scared of losing their job. The dollar buys
a nickel's worth. Bank.
Speaker 1: Well, that has been our episode. Yeah. Do you have
any final thoughts before we.
Speaker 2: I love Snoopy. Before we... Okay. Now I want to watch...
It's like getting like fall.
Speaker 1: I can't wait to watch The Great Pumpkin.
Speaker 2: Yes. I watch it every year. Yeah. I could see
you getting a.
Speaker 1: Like Halloween Snoopy tattoo.
Speaker 2: That's what I want. I have a little drawing of
him like in a little witch hat. Yeah. It's so cute. Yeah.
I can see that. I'm totally getting that. Cool.
Speaker 1: Well, with that, our sound and editing is by Tiff Fulman.
Our music is by Jason Zashefsky, The Enigma. I forgot
that I forgot that I was the one who had
to press automatically filled in the noise. This has been
the bad taste crime podcast. We will see you in
two weeks.
Speaker 2: Goodbye. It was as if a wave of evil washed
over this town.