This week we look at the infamous case of Mel Ignatow, whose girlfriend, Brenda Schaefer, went missing. Of course the investigation centered on Mel. Did he do it? Of course he did! But this case shows us that one, our rights in the Constitution really do mean something, and two, it really is possible to get away with murder.
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This week we look at the infamous case of Mel Ignatow, whose girlfriend, Brenda Schaefer, went missing. Of course the investigation centered on Mel. Did he do it? Of course he did! But this case shows us that one, our rights in the Constitution really do mean something, and two, it really is possible to get away with murder.
1. Topics
2. Additional Resources
3. Merchandise/Support the Show
4. Contact Us/Follow Us/Rate/Subscribe
New episodes every week!
Listen, rate, follow, and subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts!
Follow us:
5. Credits
This week using the Constitution to get away with murder. Welcome to Subpar Talks. Hey everybody, welcome to Subpar Talks, where we have conversations about everything. I'm Jeff.
Chris:And I'm Chris.
Jeff:Thank you so much for joining us for another episode here. And as always, let's start with our standard disclaimer, listener discretion advised. We do talk about some mature subject matter on this podcast from time to time, and there will likely be profanity, perhaps a lot of it. And if that's not your thing, then that's OK, to each his and her own. But for the rest of you, sit back because here we go with this week's topic. This is our first episode of 2023. Happy New Year to everybody. And I cannot think of a better way to start the new year then to talk about a murder. Can you?
Chris:Rock on! I'm sure a lot of people start the new year with a murder.
Jeff:With a murder, yeah. Well, don't they increase during the holidays? I think they do. I know suicide does.
Chris:That and suicides. Yeah.
Jeff:Yeah.
Chris:For obvious reasons.
Jeff:Right.
Chris:You know, it's the family thing and all.
Jeff:Yeah. It's like the Charlie Brown quote. I know nobody likes me, but why do I need the holidays to remind me of it?
Chris:Yep.
Jeff:There you go. OK. This takes place in Louisville, Kentucky. Have you been to Louisville?
Chris:Yeah, many times. I actually used to work for a company in Louisville, so I would travel there quite a bit.
Jeff:I've only passed through there. It seemed like a place I'd wanna stop and just kind of, I don't know, see the sites, hang out, or whatever.
Chris:For what I saw and experienced, I liked it. I was also told by the people that lived there that it was the most cosmopolitan place in Kentucky.
Jeff:Well...obviously.
Chris:It should not be confused with the rest of the state.
Jeff:Yeah, I can imagine so. Yeah, it seems more, uh, Midwestern-y. I don't think that's a word, but it seems more like a Midwestern place, as to where I think of Kentucky as just the south.
Chris:Yeah. Yeah, that's probably a good way to say it. It's um, what is it? I think at the time, and I don't know about now, it was like the 16th largest city in the country.
Jeff:Wow. OK.
Chris:Just saying that is, you know, it's significantly big enough that they've got anything that any major city would have.
Jeff:What I, what people told you about Louisville and Kentucky. I had people tell me that about Nashville when I was there. How, you know, don't, don't think of Nashville as the rest of Tennessee. Like it's different. I was like, oh, thank God. OK, so this is gonna take us back to the 1980s. At least at first, let's talk about a woman named Brenda Schaffer. She was, I don't remember what her exact job was, but she was like an office worker, and she met a guy in 1986 named Mel Ido. From all accounts, at least at first, this was a pretty normal relationship. The only thing that was really standing out to people was that he was like 14 years older than she was. But other than that, it was like, OK, not anything abnormal. One night in 1988, they went on a date. And her mom the next day calls her and can't get an answer and repeatedly calls. And of course this is before cell phone, so no texting or whatever. She's calling and calling and calling. The phone's just ringing, and she gets concerned and so she calls the police and tells them she can't get ahold of her daughter. And, uh, she, the mom calls Mel Anado. Do you know what happened to her? And he says, you know, we went on a date last night and, uh, dropped her off at the house. And then that was that. I think he said he dropped her off at like 10 o'clock at night and he went home and, and, OK, so he says, um, I'm gonna go ahead and call the police and file a missing person's report. I'm concerned. So he does just. And so the police start investigating this, and they find her abandoned car on the interstate just about a half a mile from her house, and there's no sign of her. anywhere else. So they've got a missing person. Um, and they contact the FBI and they get their criminal profile unit on it. And, and so they start like a big investigation into this whole thing. By the way, speaking of FBI criminal profile, have you seen Mind Hunter on Netflix? No. You should watch that. It's really good. It's only two seasons, unfortunately. Uh, it is based on a book by John Douglas, who was the first criminal profile person at the F B I. So all of that stuff that we know about serial killers now, like what their MO is and why they do certain things and all that, that all came from the FBI's Behavioral Crime Unit and he was the one who started that whole thing. But anyway, this shows is a, uh, fictional account, but there's a lot of truth in it into how that whole thing came to be. So anyway, it's really. Do you know when he started there? Like was he around with Ted Bundy? Yeah, so this was in, um, this was in the 1970s. OK. I don't know the exact year, but it was in the 1970s when they started this. I wanna say it was the late seventies, and they're the ones who coined the term serial killer. Like that was not a thing before that. So that was, um, with Ted Bundy, because I think Ted Bundy was the first one that was termed that. Oh, really? OK. Yeah, yeah, yeah. When was he caught? I mean, I know he escaped twice. When was he caught and kept? I think it was late. Do I want to say like 78, 79. OK. So that would've been, yeah. Uh, right then. OK. So Mel here and, uh, Brenda, their relationship again, uh, seemed pretty normal to most people. They had recently gotten engaged, so they met in 1986. They get engaged in 1988. She said, yes, you know, accepted the ring, said she was looking forward to it, all that good stuff. It turns out though, she had told her brother's girlfriend that Mel had sexually abused her and that she was afraid of him and that he had gotten violent with. And that she was gonna break up with him. She's gonna just cut off the engagement. She's gonna break up with him. She can't be with him anymore. So her brother's girlfriend hears this and didn't do anything about it. She didn't confront Mel or do anything, but now Brenda's missing and she's like, oh shit. I need to go tell the police this. So that's exactly what she does. So the police want to have a talk with Mel, of course. And we've seen enough stuff in movies and TV shows and documentaries. Whenever a woman goes missing, it's like, who is she dating or is she married? Like that's the first person they're gonna look at. Yep. So they go to Mel's house and they question him. and when they walk in, he invited them in like it, he wasn't standoffish or anything. He invited them in and takes'em over to the kitchen table. And on the kitchen table he had notes spread out. That was like a minute by minute account of what they had done that day before she went missing. He said they had gone to a boat show, an art show. Would you find that suspicious if somebody had taken notes like what they had done? Well, generally, uh, I, I mean, I would think also exactly what you said, you're gonna be a prime suspect until you're not. So I would kind of think, well, they're gonna be asking me this stuff. I better have some answers. Maybe I wouldn't make it that. Um, Blatant Yeah. Like, huh. Let me think. And then I just happen to have the answers. Yeah. Oh. Oh, look what I got in my pocket here. So that's another thing, and that reminds me of this. If you are ever suspected of murder and hopefully that won't be the case. Or I guess of anything, but if the cops ask you what you were doing on Wednesday night, two weeks ago, the people who are innocent, their response is, I don't know what I was doing. I have no idea. Exactly. Yeah. The morons who are guilty, they'll say, oh, I was at this place at whatever time. And the cops know they're full of shit cuz people don't remember what the hell they were doing two weeks ago on a specific, I don't remember what I did yesterday, Exactly. Yeah. That's hard to remember. I mean, this morning, Jesus Christ. I don't know what I did. I'd have to sit and think about it and write down notes. OK, so. Yeah, he's got all these notes spread out on the kitchen table, telling them exactly what they did that day. He said they went to a boat show, there was an art show and some other stuff. I think they went to eat. So they start looking into Mel and talking to people in his life, people who have known him before and everybody who they interviewed said things like He's compulsive. He's a bullshitter. He's controlling. He's manipulative. What do you think of when you hear the term bullshitter? Uh, breaking bad. Yeah, me too. And he said, don't bullshit. A bullshitter. Yep. Yeah, that's exactly right. But that's what they said. This male guy is, he's a complete bullshitter. He'll just lie to your face. He'll cover it up. He'll, he'll manipulate you. Try to control. All that kind of stuff. OK, so then they start interviewing Brenda's coworkers, and one coworker said that Brenda had told her that Mel was obsessed with sex, that he wanted it all the time. He wouldn't let up. He complained that she didn't want it enough. He complained that she was too uptight. He would try to quote, unquote, loosen her up by showing her porn he would give her weed. Tranquilizers. It's like, how loose do you want this woman? So
Chris:Bill Cosby to
Jeff:he did he cosme her? Absolutely. And of course, OK, that's not funny,
Chris:It's kind of funny. That's,
Jeff:and then he told her that one time he had put a rag on her face that evidently had chloroform on it and knocked her. And did, who knows what to her while she was knocked out, but you know, she had no idea. Yeah,
Chris:but they were, they're already dating at this point.
Jeff:They were already dating, yes. But why, I know hindsight's 2020 and you gotta be careful with victim blaming and all that. But why would she not just tell him to fuck off right after that? Break off the relationship right then, unless she was scared of him and I guess she was. But yeah,
Chris:I think that has a huge amount to do with it. That all of that stuff is so complicated and it's easy to, I, I totally, I asked the question too, like, what in the world, how are you there? But it's, that's not blaming her. But you still gotta ask like, what the hell's going on?
Jeff:OK, so the police find out that the girlfriend he had before Brenda was a woman named Mary Ann Shore. So they go interview her, and she's a little standoffish. She's, uh, having trouble answering some questions, and so they suspect her, they just suspect that she's not being totally truthful. So they want to give her a polygraph. If you were suspected of anything and the cops asked you to take a polygraph and you were innocent, would you do it?
Chris:Knowing what I know now, I don't
Jeff:think so. I don't think I would either. I used
Chris:to think that they were better than they are, but that's the last thing I need, is to know that I'm innocent and appear guilty,
Jeff:Yeah. And you fail it. Yes. Yeah. Because then they're just gonna look at you harder. Exactly. How
do
Chris:you get out of that?
Jeff:Yeah, it's like a no win. It's like if you take it and pass, OK, but that doesn't guarantee that they're gonna stop looking into you. I mean, there's a reason polygraphs are unreliable, that they're not allowed in. Yeah, I just don't see what the advantage is of taking one. But anyway, Maryanne Shore, she gets asked to take a polygraph and she says, OK, I'll take it. And she failed it. So now they really suspect her of knowing more than she's letting on. And so they put her under surveillance, like they tail her, see where she goes, who she's talking to, whatever. And that. after she had talked to the cops, she goes and meets Mel. So they, now they're, they're really thinking something's up. They know something about the disappearance of Brenda Schaffer. We gotta find out what it is. So they bring her in for questioning again, and now this detective is like, look, we know you weren't being truthful before you were standoffish. You were. Appearing that you were just being untruthful, weren't giving us all the information, now you failed a polygraph. So we know, you know something, and he gets pretty vocal with her. And this cracks me up. He got right in her face and he flat out told her quote, you're fat and ugly and he's gonna kill you too, That's just a matter of time. It's a matter of time. In other words, he's not your type anymore. I mean, I know y'all dated before. He is not your type anymore, and if you know something, he will kill you to get away with it. So, You're fat and ugly and he's gonna kill you too, But we sure need your help, Yeah. You know how cops can lie, right? They can lie in the interrogation, right? Just doesn't matter at all. Well, this detective wasn't lying. take a look at, at a picture of, uh, Maryanne Shore and he was dead on. It's just a fact. just a fact. OK, so. Everybody now is starting to zero in on Mel. They think he's got something to do with it. The cops think he does, you know, words making around, uh, its way around town. Yeah. He had something to do with it. So Brenda's boss sends a threatening letter to Mel, basically says, if you don't confess, I'm gonna have you. And so Mel takes that letter to the cops, and Brenda's boss is arrested on terroristic threat charges, which back in 19. This was by Li, this was 1989 or 90 by this point. I didn't even know that was a thing back then. Terroristic charges. I only thought that came up like after nine 11 stuff. But evidently, yeah, I mean, unless
Chris:like a hijacked plane or something.
Jeff:Right. OK. So Brenda's boss, pleads not guilty. So there's a trial, and so the prosecutor calls Mel to the stand to have him testify because this is about him. I mean, you know, Brenda's boss suspected him. Of having something to do with, with her disappearance and all that. So he's gonna put Mel on the stand. Mel testifies, he denies knowing anything about Brenda's disappearance and I, I don't know anything about her whereabouts? I don't know anything. Nothing at all. He just denies everything. So her boss has found guilty. I think he got, I don't remember. I think he had to pay a fine. I don't even think he got jail time for terroristic threat. Well, now. They've had the FBI investigating Mel Ido here. And so now the assistant US attorney in Louisville wants to convene a grand jury and which they're allowed to do, they can investigate stuff, they can convene a grand jury for basically anything, right? So they call Mel in to testify, uh, in front of the grand jury. And again, he denies everything. I don't know anything about her disappearance, nothing at. They also call Maryanne Shore, his former girlfriend, then to testify. She starts, uh, being standoffish again. The same thing that was happening when the cops interviewed her for the first time. And she basically gets caught in a lie. Like, I don't remember exactly what it was, but she, I didn't even know this was a possibility. She just runs out of the c. She just left, like just ran out of the courtroom and I figured they would go like track her down and make her come back, but they didn't Like they just let her go. But the next day they call her back in and the assistant US attorney offers her a deal. And the deal is you tell us what you know about Brenda's disappearance and we will not charge you with murder. Conspiracy, nothing. We won't charge you with anything. Leading up to Brenda Schaffer's death. Mm-hmm. And so she says, all right, you got a deal. So she says to the cops, A month before Brenda went missing, she had helped Mel dig a grave in the woods behind her home. What the fuck? I know gets worse. The night before Brenda went missing, uh, she said Mel brought over to her house, rope and duct tape, garbage bags and chloro. By the way, what is chloroform? Do you know what that is?
Chris:I don't. I wanna say it's kinda like ether. I mean, you know, they used to use Ether to put people to sleep for surgery. Yeah. I wanna say it's like that, but I don't know exactly. I know it's a liquid, but you know, like a liquid put on a rag, but then it's the smell from that that'll take you out. Yeah. OK. And I think Ted Bundy used that too, didn't he?
Jeff:Maybe, I don't remember. It wouldn't surprise me after he got ahold of people. Yeah. OK. So she says he brought all that shit, you know, the garbage bags and the rope and the duct tape and the chloroform. He brought all that to her house. So he went out with Brenda that day and night and he told Brenda that he had to go to Maryanne Shore's house. To, I think it was to retrieve some jewelry, like get some jewelry back from her or something like that. And so that was the pretense to getting Brenda into the house. All right. This is according to Marion Shore. So Mel and Brenda walk into the house and Marion Shore locks the door behind her, and Mel takes out a sheet of paper. Here he goes again. Again with the notes. He takes out a sheet of paper and this was all the stuff that he planned to do to Brenda, and he told her exactly what he was gonna do to her and he told Maryanne Shore to take pictures. All right. This is according to Marianne Shore. He told
Chris:Marianne Shore, these are all the things I'm gonna do
Jeff:to Brenda. No, he told, well, I mean he had the, they were both there. He told Brenda that he, like, he had the sheet of paper that told exactly what he was gonna do. So I guess he read it out and they both heard it. Yeah. Wow. All right. Yeah, a sick dude. OK. So he tells Maryanne Shore to take pictures of all this stuff. Here's what I'm gonna do. I want you to take pictures. So he ties Brenda to the coffee table in the living room and rapes. He unci her and drags her back to the bedroom and rapes her there and beats her. And then he got the chloroform, put it on her face and it killed her. So according to her, they, uh, she was taking pictures this whole time, and according to her, they tie the body up like in the fetal position and they carry it out to the grave that they had dug and. Covered it up. So once Maryanne Shore tells them this, he is now arrested for murder and you know, they feel like they've got enough to charge him. They've got an eyewitness testimony obviously, and prosecutors always want motive. Right? Like it helps if you have a motive. And so, you know, evidently, or according to Marianne, sure he had gotten word that Brenda was gonna break off the relationship. So now he's got motive, uh, and then opportunity, like he was alone with her, you know, that day and night. So they feel like they've got him, they, um, charge him with murder and of course they conduct a search of his house, more than one search, and now they're looking for anything incriminating. But specifically they wanted to find those photos because if they can find the photos, then like, what else do you have to do? Just show'em to the jury and. It's an opening Chuck case. Yep. Uh, but they couldn't find him. They couldn't Marion shore's saying, I took pictures, but they couldn't find it. But, you know, they felt like they had enough, even without the photos to, to get a, a guilty verdict. So they charged him with rape and murder and Marion Shore, he pleads not guilty. Right. Mel pleads not guilty. Marion Shore takes the stand. She is the, you know, the star witness. And she gets on the stand and if you listen to what jurors say afterwards, she was just not a believable witness. She wore a short skirt. They said it was really inappropriate for somebody testifying in court. She had trouble answering questions. She like stumbled over words. I think a few jurors said it sounded like she was high on something when she was testifying. She was just not, not a good witness, and Mel's attorney makes her out to be the killer. Like she had a motive. In other words, it was jealousy. Like if, if, if, uh, if I can't have Mel, then you can't either. And so he's insinuating to the jury that she's the one who killed Brenda. Not Mel. Right. OK. So they get done closing statements, the jury deliberates for six hours and they come back with a not guilty verdict. Really? Yep. Said it didn't do it. Government couldn't prove their case, and I'm sure a lot of'em thought outright, you know, maybe she did kill her. It was Marion Shore who did it. So Marion Shore. She didn't get charged with anything related to the murder, but she did get charged with tampering. Uh, yeah, tampering with evidence was the charge against her. And she got five years in prison for doing that because, you know, disposing of the body and there was something else, I don't remember, but it was all under the umbrella of tampering with evidence. That seems like
Chris:a little bit of a weak charge when you know that she is admitting to burying the body. I know
it
Jeff:it does. Like
Chris:how about an accomplice to
Jeff:murder? Right. They offered her that deal and I guess that just wasn't on the table because of the deal. But yeah, I mean, without a doubt, she buried the body. At least helped somebody do it. OK, so they contact the FBI's criminal profile unit again because they're like, They wanna know more about this guy. And I've read since that the FBI had an extensive file on Mel Ido because he had taken business trips into Southeast Asia, I think. So they were looking into connections there. Uh, they were wondering if he had, uh, connections with the Soviet Union. Just all sorts of stuff that they were investigating on this guy. And the FBI criminal profile. People said if there were pictures taken of what he. He didn't throw those away. Like people who are that sick and twisted, they like to keep those, they see'em as trophies, right? Kind of like serial killers do. They keep stuff from their victims because they can kind of relive it when they see, you know, whatever they kept from the victim, right? So, That was that it's a not guilty verdict. And it turns out that Mel had had to move out of his house to pay for his defense attorney. So he had sold his house and years go by and there's a new family in there and they were having carpet installed in the house. And so the carpet layers are there. And they're uncovering all this carpet, and one of them notices that underneath the floorboard there is a hidden, uh, vent cover. Mm-hmm. So there was a vent cover that at some point with the house's history it was exposed, but now it had been covered up. The FBI and the Louisville police, they had never uncovered it. They had done, I think, two or three searches of the house and they had never uncovered it. So they ask the family about it. These carpets ask the family about it, and the family didn't know about it. So they look in the vent cover and they find a film canister, and so they contact the police and the police obvious. Develop it. And on that roll of film is exactly what Maryanne Shore said. She was taking pictures of pictures of him raping her and posing next to her, obviously dead body. Busted. Busted. So that's interesting. They weren't ever developed. Yeah, I know it. I've thought about that. I mean, speaking of, you know, trophy or whatever, you wanna do that and then, He seemed meticulous, right? I mean meticulous in carrying out this murder, but all his note taking and, and people, what people said about his personality being compulsive and all that. How could you forget that that was in there? I dunno. like, my God, think that'd be the first thing I would get. Let's put that on the
Chris:moving truck first. Yep.
Jeff:But anyway, he forgot about it, but there's a problem. He's already been tried and found not guilty of rape and murder because of, but that's new evidence. It doesn't matter. It's double jeopardy if they try to prosecute him again. You've already got a not guilty verdict. I thought you could with new evidence. No. The fifth Amendment is adamant like no person shall be. I'm trying to remember the exact phrasing. Shall twice be put in jeopardy of life or limb or something like that. So yeah, once you get, once the, once there is a not guilty verdict, that's it. You cannot try them again for that crime or crimes. Yeah. So he got away with it. He got away with murder and people were pissed, obviously, especially Brenda Schaffer's family. So the prosecutor. Brought him up on perjury charges cuz he lied during that, that trial, right. Of Brenda's boss? Mm-hmm. when he sent the letter, he was gonna face a 10 year sentence, but they said, we'll give you eight if you confess to the murder. And so that's what he did. he in open court in front of the judge, he confessed to the murder and so they gave him eight years and he got out in five. Yeah. And then he was convicted on, or that was the grand jury, so he lied in the federal grand jury and then the state brought him up on perjury charges and he got nine years for that, but he served only a few. There you go. That is the story of Mel NATO and Double jeopardy. You know,
Chris:I get, I don't know that, I think that's, that was part of my misunderstanding. I, I, Yeah, we can't just keep trying the person over and over for the same thing, hoping that a different jury is gonna say something different. But I do, I did think that it was different if you had new evidence. Something about that doesn't seem right. like we discover what we can discover within a certain amount of time. You're tried based on that. Then some years later, something turns up that 100% shows your guilt and we can't do anything about it.
Jeff:So what that, and that's the, the issue. What would that new evidence have to, to. Would it have to be 100% incontrovertible proof, like a photo in this case? And then to me it seems like it might be a slippery slope. You know, like if that's, if that's gonna suffice, then what? What about something that falls short of a photo, but it does point to that person being guilty. It's just a right, to me, it's a slippery slope. True. But, Definite evidence that he did it. I wonder
Chris:how many people are out walking around in some kind of similar situation. They've done something, they got off for it, but it's, you
Jeff:know, that they did it. So you saying went through the trial, like the whole process got a not guilty verdict. Yeah. Right. Oh, they're out there for sure. Do you think there's more of those people, or do you think we have more people locked up for stuff they didn't do? Probably
Chris:that more peop, more innocent people locked up. Because I think people feel better about pinning stuff on somebody. Yeah. And if they think making
Jeff:somebody pay.
Chris:Yeah. And, and not that they, not saying that. Doing it out of, you know, spite or something that, Hey, I just want to, well, here, here's a person that I can pin it on, so let's do it. I'm not saying that, but hey, I think they did it, so let's go ahead and eliminate this problem when they shouldn't be that easy about it. Right? We've talked about this before. You know, the very idea of having your, your life, your time taken away from you and how horrible that would be for mm-hmm. a, a truly innocent person, person on the jury needs to think twice before, like that whole beyond a reasonable doubt needs to be taken more than seriously because if you're that person who's being tried, you sure want that jury. To not have a doubt. Yes. And uh, I don't know that that people are always looking at
Jeff:it that way. No, they don't. They don't. And that's troubling, and I hate that mindset, and it covers a lot of different scenarios in life, but people can't put themselves in other people's shoes. and or they don't see anything as a problem or they don't see something as a problem until, oh, it affects me now. So now it's a problem. It's like, no, like Exactly. Look at the bigger picture. Yeah.
Chris:Yeah. Well, and I heard, I think it was a comedian recently that I heard saying, you know, the very idea and how would we do this differently? It's the way it is. But the very idea that you have a jury of your peers, And the guy said, these are not my peers. Right. You go, you know, go down to the DMV or something. Look at these people and I mean that seriously, people that
Jeff:who put your pants on
Chris:Yeah. They, they, they can't, they can barely function in society. And these are the, this is the pool that we have to pull from to be
Jeff:on a jury. It's scary. Now think if you were a defendant looking at those people Yeah. It's like I'd be
Chris:scared outta my mind. I would too. I mean, even worse if you're really innocent.
Jeff:Yeah. But, oh man, I can't imagine that's troubling. Yeah. Well I remember an attorney several years ago telling me it's the first 12 people outta Walmart. That's what you're getting. So good luck. That's true.
Chris:It is a completely random, it's your turn, you know, show up today.
Jeff:Yeah. Um, have you ever. I think I know the answer, but you've sat on a jury before just once.
Chris:I've done a lot of mock trials. I did that.
Jeff:Yeah. I've done a couple of those. Yeah,
Chris:so I think the, the very first one of those mock juries that I did was a, a guy suing his former employer over an injury. We, and as the, the mock jury, were thinking most of the time that these guys presenting the case were working for the defense, like working for the employer. Mm-hmm. well, we were all siding with the employer because the guy did a lot of things wrong. And so, hey, this was not the employer's fault. Our feeling, but we found out at the end they were working for him and so we were all upset, like, oh, we just gave you a bunch of information to help you, and he
Jeff:is the one in the wrong. Yeah.
Chris:So, wow. It, it, it's interesting to do those things, but yeah, I was. I've been called for jury duty. I, I wanna say only about three or four times, not nearly as much as I would've expected. Knock on wood, I'll probably go something tomorrow, but I've only
Jeff:actually served once. Yeah, I've been called three or four times. I do remember twice. It was a civil case. and those are boring for the most part. Like if I get called, I want it to be a criminal case. Those are, those are more interesting, I think. Right. One was a, a child's custody case. We were gonna have to decide where a two year old was gonna live with his mom or his dad. I was like, I don't want any part of that. Jesus Christ. But they kick me off. They don't, attorneys don't want other attorneys on a jury, so, I wasn't really worried about getting called. The first one. I was, when I got, um, put on a jury, it was during law school and it was a criminal case. So they were OK
Chris:with it. Even while you were in law school?
Jeff:They never asked. They never asked. Yeah. I think I put on the, like the questionnaire thing, like students, but they didn't ask what kind of student and so, well, that was a not guilty verdict. We gave the guy a not guilty verdict. It was an assault case, so maybe he's one of those people walking around who did actually do it. But yeah,
Chris:mine was a marijuana possession and this was, this is at least 17 years ago, so just saying that obviously. General feeling and mentality through the entire country about marijuana was very different than it is now. My personal feelings about it then were different than it is now, but as the jury member, he was just being charged with possession and I think it was possession with intent to deal because of the quantity and. The thing is none of us on the jury had any question that he possessed it and that he possessed the quantity. And so it really wasn't an issue of is he guilty or not from us on the jury. Now what happened is we found out during the sentencing phase all these other things that he had done and it. Burglary and assault. Assault with a deadly weapon, breaking and entering. I mean, and, and the thing was, you know, the defendant's attorney he was bringing up, it was girlfriend's pregnant. She was, but you know, trying to make an emotional thing of it. Like, Ooh, if you send this person to prison, they're not gonna be around for the birth of their child in the first, you know, year or two. We all went to the jury room and felt like, man, we're doing that child a favor. Probably the mom too. The, I mean, the guy's rap sheet was crazy and. So it was not, it ended up being not so much about the possession, but everything else that had gone on, that we gave him the maximum sentence that we could, and the prosecuting attorneys came to us. The DA came to us in the hallway when we got out of the jury room and said, we just want to know. What your deliberation was like because you just hand it down the stiffest sentence for this that's ever happened in the county Whoa. Yeah. And, and we told him like, you know, it wasn't a question to us about what he was being charged with. Yeah. But the reason we did that penalty was not just about the marijuana, it was about everything else leading up to that. Yeah. And this guy is a threat in society and probably to the mother and unborn
Jeff:child. That's the thing with the sentencing phase is you can bring out anything they've ever done, ever in their life, whether it was a crime or not, all the bad shit. Right. That's
Chris:the thing in this case is all of those things were fairly recent. I mean, within the last few. and they were factual. I mean, he had been arrested for these things and it, it wasn't really disputed that they happened, so it's not like just a character witness showed up and said, oh, this is a bad guy. This was OK. We've got actual evidence of these things that have happened in the
Jeff:past. Right. Makes me wonder why he chose to go to trial. because what is there to argue about with possession? Like do you remember what his defense was as far as possession goes? Like what is there to said? It wasn't marijuana. That was his defense. But they had the marijuana there in the courtroom. Right? Um, they
Chris:had the pipe, so there was a pipe and I, I don't remember that they had the marijuana. I mean, they did talk about the weight of it. I know that because that's where they got which charge they were putting on him. But he said it was, I don't remember if it was the age old oregano or some other kind of herb thing, but it was a pipe. And so here was the problem. I mean this, this sealed the deal for us. Is we the jury asked, can we see that pipe? Well, they had it as evidence and it was in a sealed plastic bag.
Jeff:Yeah.
Chris:Sealed. Sealed. I don't mean zip lock, I mean sealed. However that was. It was sealed, but it gets around to me and I'm looking at it and kind of pushed the bag and all, and I put it up to my nose. There was a hole in the back
Jeff:and
Chris:it reeked of marijuana. It was like, Nope, whatever you said it was
Jeff:Pass it around. Exactly. You know, uh, speaking of mock juries, ojs defense team considered putting him on the stand. Mm-hmm. and they had enough money, OJ had enough money to where they could conduct a mock jury to see how a jury would respond to OJ being on the stand of being asked questions by the prosecution of the defense, and he got up there. And he's like eyeing the female mock jurors. He's like winking at'em and smiling and all that, and they're like, OK, well seriously. Question answered. Yeah, like, all right, we're done. He's not taking the stand. Unbelievable. He
Chris:couldn't be coached to control that or trusted to control
Jeff:it? I don't think so. I don't think so. Wow. Yeah, it's a good move. Have you seen the people versus OJ Simpson on uh, I think it's on Netflix. I
Chris:have not, I've wanted to watch it multiple times, but it seems like I'm never in the right mood to get started on it, so I haven't,
Jeff:so I don't remember when that was released. It was originally on FX and yeah, it's on Netflix now. And my wife wanted to watch it and for me, I was like, I remember all of this, you know, so why do I need to watch it? I remember the whole thing going down from the Bronco chase all through the not guilty verdict, like, why do I need to watch it? But she convinced me and so we watched it and it was really, really good. It was a, a good series. I think it's like four or five episode.
Chris:I would imagine it would be, I am that. That's just it. I am fascinated by things like that and the maybe things that you didn't know that come out and, and just the approach to those things. Yeah. You know, you knew the facts maybe, but how did they get to the way they presented it or make the decisions that they did? I think all of that's fascinating.
Jeff:Yeah. It.
Chris:Yeah. And particularly because it's all so deeply based in psychology, you know, it's not just about did this happen, did this not, do we, can we say this or can we not? It's, how do we say it? Who are we saying it to? You know how they pick the jury that they want to be saying it to. It's, it is fascinating.
Jeff:Yeah, it is. And not to go down this whole rabbit hole of the OJ trial. But the people versus OJ Simpson is a book by Jeffrey Tuban. You remember him? No.
Chris:Oh
Jeff:wait. He was the CNN guy who was on a Zoom meeting and then whipped out his Oh yes. Dick in the middle of it, or he thought it was over, or, I don't remember what it was, but the other people were like, holy shit. Are y'all watching this?
Chris:Yes. I forgot his name.
Jeff:Oh man. Yeah. Anyway, aside from you can't recover from that. No, no. There's no coming back from that ever. No. But pre redoing that, he would write a lot of books and him, he's, he's a really good author and, and commentator just doesn't use the best judgment on Zoom meetings. Evidently, clearly
Chris:you know, they make, um, shields on cameras. To be sure you're not whatever showing what you don't want to show. They got lights on cameras. Yeah.
Jeff:Damn. Anyway, the people versus OJ Simpson is a really good book also, and that's what the series is based on, but he goes into a lot of background at the beginning to give you context of African-American's distrust of. LA police and the whole background there, and that I did not know back in 19 94, 95, when all that was going down, but it makes sense for now what we know about Johnny Cochran arguing what he did. And then Mark Furman, you remember that guy? Yep. Uh, claiming that he had never used the N word. Right. And then they play it for the jury. It's like, is this you not good? Yeah. Yeah. I love
Chris:seeing that kind of stuff on videos now, people posting TikTok, Instagram, whatever, and somebody saying, you know, I don't do this. I don't know why people think this, whatever. And then all they do is play a video of what that person has done somewhere else. It's like, this is you. Right?
Jeff:it reminds me of Bill Clinton. I did not have sexual relations with that woman. Monica Lewinsky. And then somebody shows a clip. In fact, I did have an inappropriate relationship
Chris:so, yep. Um, in, when was it? I think it was 2000. Kenny G released a song and the song was. Um, something about the millennium or whatever. And anyway, he had a bunch of different audio clips of things in that song and there was a part of that where they played, it was played back to back of Clinton, said, I did not, and then he says, in fact, I did
Jeff:That's great.
Chris:I was watching that deposition live. Oh, were you When he said it depends on what the definition of
Jeff:is, is, is. Yeah. Kenny G I think, I don't even know how this is possible. We need to look this up. He holds the world record for note held the longest with any instrument, and it's like 45 minutes. No minutes. Yeah. Yes. I don't know how that's possible. I know you're giving me a weird look, but we'll look it up and if I'm wrong, then I'm just gonna edit this right out. it never happened. Air brush it right out. Yep. Yeah, yeah. I remember hearing that. I'm like, how do you hold a note for 45 minutes? That's crazy.
Chris:Yeah, I don't know. I tell you what, he is sure. A good saxophone player I haven't heard much about or from him in a long time. I don't know if that's just not exposed to him,
Jeff:but he was sure good. I find the saxophone mostly annoying. I would not
Chris:generally listen to a saxophone, but you know, since his music was getting played, Like mainstream radio stations, so you're exposed to it. I just happen to like his music and I can at least say he is really good at it. But yeah, I would prefer, you know what I really like as a piano, I love, yeah,
Jeff:piano music. Yeah. Seems like so many times people play the saxophone. It's just loud and shrill. It. That's true.
Chris:You know
Jeff:what's really bad is bagpipes. Oh, that's the worst. That is terrible. I don't know how anybody can listen to that. I think it sounds good. It reminds me of the friends episode. Do you remember that when Ross is playing the bagpipes? I don't remember why he was doing it. Somebody wanted it at their wedding or I don't know what it was, but he's playing it. At the end and Phoebe starts trying to match the notes with it. Yes. That's funny. But if you look at the bloopers of it, it's even funnier cuz they can't keep it together. It's just Oh, I'm sure. Yeah. Great. That's hilarious. All right. See how our brain works? People? We started out with a murder and all of a sudden we're talking about saxophones,
Chris:Holy shit. There it is. In 1997. A Guinness World Record was set for longest held musical note. Kenny G used circular breathing. I don't even know what that is. To sustain an E-flat on a saxophone for 45 minutes and
Jeff:47 seconds. Oh my God. That's crazy. It is. Wow. That's insane. Yeah, it is. He couldn't make it an hour though. What a loser. All right. If you like this kind of stuff, as I've said many times before, you are our kind of people and we would love to have you follow us on whatever platform you listen to podcasts on. That way you will get new episodes delivered automatically. You don't even have to do anything. And while you are there, go ahead and rate us. We would be ever so grateful if you would rate us by giving us five stars and leave a review. Uh, it doesn't matter what you. Just say anything. That way it makes it easier for people to discover the show. If you want to tell us that you've had a not guilty verdict or if you want to confess if you've got a not guilty verdict, double jeopardy, they can't prosecute you again. So feel free to spill your guts and your review. It's all right. Uh, you can go to our. That is Subpar Talks dot com. You can email us, leave us a voicemail. If you have a suggestion on a topic or topic you'd like to hear us cover in the future, go ahead and leave that there. You can follow us on social media on Twitter. We are at Subpar Talks on Facebook. We are Subpar Talks. You can all also follow our personal Twitter accounts if you want on there. I am at@independentjeff and I
Chris:am at Chris Bradford tx.
Jeff:And finally, get the word out about Subpar Talks. Share this with your friends, family, colleagues, whoever. Share this on social media. Talk to people about this. The more people we have listening to this show, the easier it is for us to get content to you each and every week. Have we given people a blueprint now for how to get away with murder? Well, I hope not, but I hope not too. I don't want anybody to get away with it. Well, Well it's, it's all relative. It depends on who it is. It depends on who it is and who gets killed. There you go. I'll say that. But generally speaking, no. We don't want people to get away with murder. You could
Chris:be nice about it too. You know? Don't put their head in
Jeff:a vice or something. Oh God, no. Don't do that. No, no torture. All right. Very good. That is it for this week, and we will be back next week. Until then, so long.
