In 1932, a group of men in a speakeasy in Prohibition-era New York City hatched a plan — to take out life insurance on a loner named Michael Malloy, and make his death look like an accident. They thought it would be easy money. But Michael Malloy would become known as the man who just wouldn’t die. Simon Read’s book is On the House: The Bizarre Killing of Michael Malloy.Say hello on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Sign up for our occasional newsletter, The Accomplice. Follow the show and review us on Apple Podcasts: iTunes.com/CriminalShow.We also make This is Love and Phoebe Reads a Mystery.Artwork by Julienne Alexander. Check out our online shop. Episode transcripts are posted on our website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

On May 8, 2013, a man named Timothy Jones was arrested in Chicago. He says it wasn’t until he got to the police station that he found out that he was being charged with murder. He didn’t even know someone had died. Earlier that day, a woman named Jacqueline Reynolds had been driving through the intersection of 76th and Yates Boulevard when she was hit and killed by a police car. Because the officers driving the car, James Sivicek and Jairo Valeriano, had been pursuing Timothy Jones, Timothy Jones was charged with felony murder. We speak with Timothy Jones, Livonia Noble King, Keith Spence, and Guyora Binder.Say hello on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Sign up for our occasional newsletter, The Accomplice. Follow the show and review us on Apple Podcasts: iTunes.com/CriminalShow.We also make This is Love and Phoebe Reads a Mystery.Artwork by Julienne Alexander. Check out our online shop. Episode transcripts are posted on our website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In the mid-1800s, Harvard Medical School had a reputation for being a “den of body snatchers.” And then, in November 1849, the school’s most prominent supporter, Dr. George Parkman, went missing. He was last seen walking into the medical school building. Several days later, a janitor, named Ephraim Littlefield found something strange in the lab of faculty member Dr. John Webster.Paul Collins’ book is Blood & Ivy: The 1849 Murder That Scandalized Harvard.Say hello on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Sign up for our occasional newsletter, The Accomplice. Follow the show and review us on Apple Podcasts: iTunes.com/CriminalShow.We also make This is Love and Phoebe Reads a Mystery.Artwork by Julienne Alexander. Check out our online shop. Episode transcripts are posted on our website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Early in his career, Errol Morris read about a shocking series of alleged insurance crimes in a small town in Florida, which some referred to as “Nub City.” There were allegations that men and women were mutilating themselves -- removing hands and feet -- in order to exploit accidental dismemberment clauses in insurance policies, and collect money. It was very difficult to prove that these injuries were intentional and not accidental. As one insurance official put it, “it was hard to make a jury believe a man would shoot off his foot.” When Errol Morris told an insurance investigator he wanted to go to Florida to make a documentary about it, the investigator said, “Don’t even think about it.” Errol Morris went anyway.Today, the story behind the “Nub City” movie he couldn’t figure out how to make, plus his memories of making The Thin Blue Line, his work as a private detective, and meetings with Ed Gein, James Grigson, Randall Adams, David Harris, and Herbert Mullen.Say hello on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Sign up for our occasional newsletter, The Accomplice. Follow the show and review us on Apple Podcasts: iTunes.com/CriminalShow.We also make This is Love and Phoebe Reads a Mystery.Artwork by Julienne Alexander. Check out our online shop. Episode transcripts are posted on our website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The summer after Jessica Maple finished 6th grade, she found out that her great-grandmother’s house had been burglarized. So, 12-year-old Jessica got out her notebook, looked for fingerprints, and decided she would conduct her own investigation. This week, four stories of kids who cracked the case. We speak with 10-year-old Griffin Steele, Griffin’s dad Shane Steele, his mother Carol Steele, and his brother, Jackson. Logan Hultman, age 10, and his mother Alyssa Hultman share a story about helping out. Plus, National Police Service tactical flight officer Rory Niblock tells Phoebe about the day he was in his helicopter searching for two suspects in a rural part of England. Some children on an Easter Egg hunt showed which way to fly, by lying down on the ground to create an arrow with their bodies.Say hello on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Sign up for our occasional newsletter, The Accomplice. Follow the show and review us on Apple Podcasts: iTunes.com/CriminalShow.We also make This is Love and Phoebe Reads a Mystery.Artwork by Julienne Alexander. Check out our online shop. Episode transcripts are posted on our website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Tim Jenkin was a member of the ANC (African National Congress). The organization had been declared unlawful in South Africa, seen by the white minority as a threat to public order. In 1978, Tim Jenkin was charged under South Africa’s Terrorism Act for disseminating anti-apartheid material and sentenced to 12 years in prison. Just before he was convicted, someone gave him a book called Papillon, by Henri Charrière, which he said “was really a manual of escape.” Along with two other incarcerated activists, Stephen Lee and Alex Moumbaris, he began to secretly collect materials and cash, following instructions from the book. Tim Jenkin knew that the only way to open the many locked doors between him and the outside world would be to find a way to make some keys. Lots of keys.Tim Jenkin’s book is Escape from Pretoria.Say hello on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Sign up for our occasional newsletter, The Accomplice. Follow the show and review us on Apple Podcasts: iTunes.com/CriminalShow.We also make This is Love and Phoebe Reads a Mystery.Artwork by Julienne Alexander. Check out our online shop. Episode transcripts are posted on our website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In 1989, Helen Ackley decided to sell her old Victorian house in Nyack, New York at 1 Laveta Place. It didn’t go as planned. There were stories of ghosts, and the house became the center of a case that’s referred to as “The Ghostbusters ruling.” The judicial opinion read: “as a matter of law, the house is haunted.” We speak to Mark Kavanagh, Cynthia Kavanagh, Richard Ellis, University of Chicago law professor Lior Strahilevitz, and Randall Bell, who specializes in real estate damage economics. Randall Bell has consulted on the property where 39 members of the Heaven's Gate cult died by suicide in 1997. He also consulted on Nicole Brown Simpson's condo, and one of the sites of the Manson family murders. Part of his work is evaluating how the psychological stigma attached to these properties affects their value.Say hello on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Sign up for our occasional newsletter, The Accomplice. Follow the show and review us on Apple Podcasts: iTunes.com/CriminalShow.We also make This is Love and Phoebe Reads a Mystery.Artwork by Julienne Alexander. Check out our online shop. Episode transcripts are posted on our website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

People incarcerated in California’s San Quentin State Prison aren’t allowed to have pets — but some people, like Ronell Draper, have found ways to work around that. Meet Ronell Draper, also known as “Rauch,” plus Ear Hustle’s Nigel Poor and Earlonne Woods join Phoebe to talk about the impact of Covid-19 at San Quentin.Say hello on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Sign up for our occasional newsletter, The Accomplice. Follow the show and review us on Apple Podcasts: iTunes.com/CriminalShow.We also make This is Love and Phoebe Reads a Mystery.Artwork by Julienne Alexander. Check out our online shop. Episode transcripts are posted on our website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

“I didn’t do what they said I did. And it was like, I don’t know how to disprove the police. I mean, it’s my word against theirs. I don’t really stand a chance.”In 2015, the 15th Circuit Drug Enforcement Unit in South Carolina gave a confidential informant $100 to buy marijuana from Julian Betton. And then they broke down his door. Officers David Belue, Chris Dennis, and Frank Waddell shot at Julian an estimated 29 times.We speak with Julian Betton and Jonny McCoy.Say hello on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Sign up for our occasional newsletter, The Accomplice. Follow the show and review us on Apple Podcasts: iTunes.com/CriminalShow.We also make This is Love and Phoebe Reads a Mystery.Artwork by Julienne Alexander. Check out our online shop. Episode transcripts are posted on our website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

On May 13, 1862, in Charleston, South Carolina, a man named Robert Smalls took command of a Confederate ship called The Planter and liberated himself and his family from enslavement. As they passed the Confederate-held Fort Sumter, Robert Smalls was said to have saluted it with a whistle, and then added an extra one, “as a farewell to the confederacy.”Robert Smalls’ great-great-grandson, Michael Boulware Moore, tells the story.Say hello on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Sign up for our occasional newsletter, The Accomplice. Follow the show and review us on Apple Podcasts: iTunes.com/CriminalShow.We also make This is Love and Phoebe Reads a Mystery.Artwork by Julienne Alexander. Check out our online shop. Episode transcripts are posted on our website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices