

True Murder: The Most Shocking Killers
Dan Zupansky
Every week host Dan Zupansky will interview the true crime authors that have written about the most shocking killers of all time.
Episodes
Mentioned books

Jun 1, 2017 • 1h 32min
A CLOCKWORK MURDER-Steve Jackson
They thought about their evil fantasy for months. Then wound up like clockwork toys ... they acted. In April 1997, pretty, 22-year-old Jacine Gielinski stopped her car at a red light in Colorado Springs, Colorado. She had no idea that the two young men looking at her from the car next to hers would in that moment decide she would be their target for unspeakable horrors. George Woldt and Lucas Salmon were an unlikely pair of best friends, much less killers. Woldt was a fast-talking, well-dressed ladies’ man who boasted of his sexual conquests. Salmon was deeply religious, and socially misfit, obsessed with losing his virginity. Woldt was the leader, Salmon his willing follower, but neither had been in serious trouble with the law. However, inspired by the cult movie, A Clockwork Orange, with its dystopian violence, they fantasized for months what it would be like to abduct, rape, torture and murder a woman. Then, aroused by watching ultra-violent ography, they decided to act upon their evil thoughts. Revised and updated with a new afterword from the author, A CLOCKWORK MURDER recounts the steps that led to an unthinkable crime and its impact on a community, as well as the friends and especially the parents of an innocent young woman who paid with her life for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. From The True Crime Library of New York Times Bestselling Author Steve Jackson comes A CLOCKWORK MURDER-The Night A Twisted Fantasy Became A Demented Reality-Steve Jackson. Follow and comment on Facebook-TRUE MURDER: The Most Shocking Killers in True Crime History https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100064697978510Check out TRUE MURDER PODCAST @ truemurderpodcast.com

May 25, 2017 • 1h 27min
LIST OF 10-C.L. Swinney
A narcissistic professional photographer lived a dangerous double life as a serial killer. He'd focus his rage on prostitutes mostly. It wasn't uncommon for him to bring them home then try to explain why they were there to his wife.Sexual urges met, the killer would strangle his victims and dump their bodies in places he knew the police would eventually find them. The evil murderer needed the world to know that he was smarter than the police and women meant nothing to him but a necessary sexual inconvenience.Then, by a stroke of chance and aggressive police work, the wheels of justice stumbled upon a lead. It was nothing more than a lined sheet of paper that read, "List of 10," but shortly after its discovery, a task force was created and a serial killer was nabbed. This book is about the victims he left behind, not the person who took their lives. I will never condone such actions, nor will I try to rationalize his behavior. He will go to the grave, hopefully sooner rather than later, knowing the identity of four women from his fabled List of 10. It's his sick way of showing people he's still in charge.His name is Joseph Naso, and this book will grip you from the beginning and won't let you go until the final word. LIST OF TEN: The True Story of Serial Killer Joseph Naso-C.L. Swinney Follow and comment on Facebook-TRUE MURDER: The Most Shocking Killers in True Crime History https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100064697978510Check out TRUE MURDER PODCAST @ truemurderpodcast.com

May 18, 2017 • 1h 34min
BLOOD THIRST-Alan R. Warren
Known as the 'Vampire Rapist' or 'Strangler Bill' for his distinctive modus operandi, Wayne Boden would rape, strangle and bite the breasts of his victims. His murdering rampage would continue in two cities over three years; he was only caught by superior evidence gathering and the help of an orthodontist. This book asks the question: How do we really know people when we don’t want to ask the questions, not only because we don’t want to know the answers for what it will tell us about them, but because of what it tells us about ourselves? True Crime Author Alan R. Warren takes you through the details of the case including the dental impressions used in court to convict Boden, a first in Canadian history, as well as Boden's escape from a maximum-security prison. BLOOD THIRST: True Story of Wayne Boden-Vampire, Rapist, Serial Killer-Alan R. Warren Follow and comment on Facebook-TRUE MURDER: The Most Shocking Killers in True Crime History https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100064697978510Check out TRUE MURDER PODCAST @ truemurderpodcast.com

May 11, 2017 • 54min
MOMMY DEAD AND DEAREST-Erin Lee Carr
In Mommy Dead and Dearest, provocative documentarian Erin Lee Carr (HBO’s Thought Crimes: The Case of the Cannibal Cop) explores a grisly tale where nothing is quite what it seems. Following Dee Dee’s brutal murder, a mysterious status ended up on her facebook page announcing “The bitch is dead,” which investigators used to track her daughter, Gypsy, to a house in Wisconsin. Gypsy, who had been ill and confined to a wheelchair for nearly her entire life, was the subject of much concern in their community. But once she was brought into the courthouse, everybody was shocked to discover that she could walk after all. The inspiring tale of a mother and her sick daughter turned into something much darker than anybody anticipated, with Gypsy a victim of one of psychology’s most controversial conditions: Munchausen by proxy. Carr digs deeper into this rabbit hole of deception with unprecedented access, and weaves a tale that proves that truth really is stranger than fiction. MOMMY DEAD AND DEAREST-Erin Lee Carr. Follow and comment on Facebook-TRUE MURDER: The Most Shocking Killers in True Crime History https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100064697978510Check out TRUE MURDER PODCAST @ truemurderpodcast.com

May 4, 2017 • 1h 25min
THE PHARMACIST OF AUSCHWITZ-Patricia Posner
The Pharmacist of Auschwitz is the little known story of Victor Capesius, a Bayer pharmaceutical salesman from Romania who, at the age of 35, joined the Nazi SS in 1943 and quickly became the chief pharmacist at the largest death camp, Auschwitz. Based in part on previously classified documents, Patricia Posner exposes Capesius’s reign of terror at the camp, his escape from justice, fueled in part by his theft of gold ripped from the mouths of corpses, and how a handful of courageous survivors and a single brave prosecutor finally brought him to trial for murder twenty years after the end of the war.The Pharmacist of Auschwitz is much more, though, than a personal account of Capesius. It provides a spellbinding glimpse inside the devil’s pact made between the Nazis and Germany’s largest conglomerate, I.G. Farben, and its Bayer pharmaceutical subsidiary. The story is one of murder and greed with its roots in the dark heart of the Holocaust. It is told through Nazi henchmen and industrialists turned war criminals, intelligence agents and zealous prosecutors, and intrepid concentration camp survivors and Nazi hunters. Set against a backdrop ranging from Hitler’s war to conquer Europe to the Final Solution to postwar Germany’s tormented efforts to confront its dark past, Posner shows the appalling depths to which ordinary men descend when they are unrestrained by conscience or any sense of morality. The Pharmacist of Auschwitz is a moving saga that lingers long after the final page. THE PHARMACIST OF AUSCHWITZ: The Untold Story-Patricia Posner Follow and comment on Facebook-TRUE MURDER: The Most Shocking Killers in True Crime History https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100064697978510Check out TRUE MURDER PODCAST @ truemurderpodcast.com

Apr 20, 2017 • 1h 34min
RAW DEAL-Gil Valle and Brian Whitney
"When, if ever, does a thought cross the line and become a crime?"RAW DEAL is the untold story of former New York City police officer Gil Valle, who in 2012 became known throughout the world as “The Cannibal Cop.” It is part the controversial saga of a man who was imprisoned for “thought crimes,” and a look into a world of dark sexuality and violence that most readers don’t know exists, except maybe in their nightmares. After Valle’s arrest, media coverage exploded in a frenzy of lurid tabloid headlines and stories about the cop charged with planning to kidnap, torture, rape ...and eat ... women, including his own wife. But here’s the fascinating part; there was no such plan in reality. Valle was simply engaging in his own private fantasies, albeit fantasies that are abhorrent and grotesque, and for that he was thrown into prison. Valle faced life in prison for his charges, and served 21 months for nothing more than having online chats about his fantasies. He was finally exonerated of all charges. RAW DEAL raises the question of when does thought become a crime? A question that goes beyond his perverse sexuality to answers society must deal with in order to meet the challenge of terrorism. It will challenge the reader’s beliefs about free speech, the right to privacy, and government’s role in watching over us. RAW DEAL: The Untold Story of NYPD's 'Cannibal Cop'-Gil Valle and Brian Whitney Follow and comment on Facebook-TRUE MURDER: The Most Shocking Killers in True Crime History https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100064697978510Check out TRUE MURDER PODCAST @ truemurderpodcast.com

Apr 13, 2017 • 1h 37min
THE MAD CHOPPER-Fred Rosen
Fred Rosen follows a killer’s trail back in time 2 decades to discover how a monster slipped through the legal systemWhen police in Tampa, Florida, arrested Larry Singleton in 1997 for brutally murdering prostitute Roxanne Hayes, they soon realized it wasn’t the man’s first violent attack. Back in 1978 he had gained notoriety as “the Mad Chopper” for raping and cutting off the arms of 15-year-old Mary Vincent on a patch of desolate, sun-scorched land 5 miles off the highway near Modesto, California.When Singleton was let out of prison on supervised parole after serving only 8 years for his crimes, no community in California would accept him. He eventually moved back to his home in Florida, where he killed Hayes nearly 20 years after his original crime. But his first victim, Vincent, had survived, walking nearly a mile to get help after the assault, and testified against him at his trial for murdering Hayes. THE MAD CHOPPER: How the Justice System Let a Mutilator Free, This Time to Kill-Fred Rosen Follow and comment on Facebook-TRUE MURDER: The Most Shocking Killers in True Crime History https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100064697978510Check out TRUE MURDER PODCAST @ truemurderpodcast.com

Apr 4, 2017 • 1h 14min
ESCAPE FROM DANNEMORA-Michael Benson
t was one of the biggest crime stories of the decade—two deadly killers, desperate and on the run. After months of planning, Ricky Matt and David Sweat cut, chopped, coerced, and connived their way out of a maximum-security prison in the wilderness of upstate New York and managed to elude police for three weeks, sending the region into lockdown and keeping the entire country on edge. The media called it “a bold escape for the ages,” and veteran true-crime writer Michael Benson leads us along the story’s every wild path to dig out a tale of adventure, psychology, sex, and brutality. Escape from Dannemora examines the strange case of Joyce Mitchell, the long-time prison employee who had a sexual relationship with at least one of the killers, and who smuggled them tools and aided in the escape, while they cooked up a plan to kill her husband. In the end, Benson looks closely at conditions at the Clinton Correctional Facility in Dannemora, NY, a crumbling Gothic pile now under investigation for charges of drug trafficking and brutality. ESCAPE FROM DANNEMORA: Richard Matt, David Sweat, and the Great Adirondack Manhunt-Michael Benson Follow and comment on Facebook-TRUE MURDER: The Most Shocking Killers in True Crime History https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100064697978510Check out TRUE MURDER PODCAST @ truemurderpodcast.com

Mar 30, 2017 • 1h 33min
ABOVE SUSPICION-Alan R. Warren
Young girl’s panties started to go missing; sexual assaults began to occur, and then female bodies were found! Soon this quiet town of Tweed, Ontario, was in panic. What's even more shocking was when an upstanding resident stood accused of the assaults. This was not just any man, but a pillar of the community; a decorated military pilot who had flown Canadian Forces VIP aircraft for dignitaries such as the Queen of England, Prince Philip, the Governor General and Prime Minister of Canada.This is the story of serial killer Russell Williams, the elite pilot of Canada’s Air Force One, and the innocent victims he murdered. Unlike other serial killers, Williams seemed very unaffected about his crimes and leading two different lives. Alan R. Warren describes the secret life including the abductions, rape and murders that were unleashed on an unsuspecting community. Included are letters written to the victims by Williams and descriptions of the assaults and rapes as seen on videos and photos taken by Williams during the attacks. ABOVE SUSPICION: The True Story of Serial Killer Russell Williams-Alan R. Warren Follow and comment on Facebook-TRUE MURDER: The Most Shocking Killers in True Crime History https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100064697978510Check out TRUE MURDER PODCAST @ truemurderpodcast.com

Mar 23, 2017 • 1h 31min
THE BUNDY SECRETS-Kevin Sullivan
Within the pages of THE BUNDY SECRETS:Hidden Files Of America's Worst Serial Killer is a unique, never-before-published look at the investigations undertaken to stop the depredations of America’s most infamous serial killer, Ted Bundy. Presented here in an easy-to-follow chronology are the raw, unedited and most fascinating official case files as they appeared to the detectives from the Pacific Northwest to the Rocky Mountains to Florida.Book Three In Sullivan’s ‘The Bundy Trilogy’THE BUNDY MURDERS:A Comprehensive History, the first book in Sullivan’s comprehensive trilogy, was a dramatic narrative of the killer’s life, and book two, THE TRAIL OF TED BUNDY:Digging Up The Untold Stories, was dedicated to recollections of various friend, witnesses and detectives associated with Bundy. Now, THE BUNDY SECRETS, completes Sullivan’s opus by presenting readers with a “just the facts” rendition of the formerly classified files of the manhunt, as well as contemporary interviews, gathered by Sullivan from dozens of sources along Bundy’s trail of terror. A must-have for true crime students of Ted Bundy. THE BUNDY SECRETS: Hideen Files on America's Worst Serial Killer-Kevin Sullivan Follow and comment on Facebook-TRUE MURDER: The Most Shocking Killers in True Crime History https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100064697978510Check out TRUE MURDER PODCAST @ truemurderpodcast.com