Unsung Murder Ballads
This is a True Crime podcast that focuses on murders, solved or unsolved. We will occasionally break our own rules when that catches out fancy and cover something that may not exactly be a murder.
We would like to warn anyone listening that we do cover sensitive content and it's usually presented to the co-hosts with little to no knowledge of the case details so that their responses and reactions are genuine. And we tend to do all this with some dark humor. So, if this doesn't work for you, we understand. There are a lot of other podcasts out there for you to enjoy. However, if you think that might be your thing, please give us a listen, interact with us on our social media pages, and get to know us.
Hosts: Janus Dead & Joyous Dead, with an occasional special guest.
Unsung Murder Ballads
Episode 170: Sharon Kinne
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In this episode Janus and Joyous discuss the roller coaster of a case that is the life of Sharon Kinne. A bored housewife and mother that somehow learned that lies and murder were the ways to getting what she wanted.
Unsung Murder Ballads is a true crime podcast, and as such, we will be discussing topics that are disturbing, graphic, and often violent in nature. So this is not for children under the age of 13.
SPEAKER_00But you know this because you did start playing this episode. So here are some things you might not know about us.
SPEAKER_02We are going to be critical of mistakes made by both criminals and law enforcement.
SPEAKER_00We're going to express our views on things that you might not always agree with.
SPEAKER_02We will occasionally go on an off-topic tangent.
SPEAKER_00And we're going to use dark humor to express ourselves now and then.
SPEAKER_02So if you're easily triggered, this might not be the podcast for you.
SPEAKER_00However, if this is your cup of tea, then raise your pinky finger while you sip and join us for this week's horrific case, you sick bastards.
SPEAKER_02Hey everybody, welcome back to Unsung Murder Ballads. This is episode 170. I am Janice Dead.
SPEAKER_00And I'm Joyous Dead.
SPEAKER_02All right. So normally right now we would be doing a for Joyous as information because it's episode 170. And in fact, that's what I said we were going to do last week, but I've changed my mind.
SPEAKER_00You did say that.
SPEAKER_02I did, but I've changed my mind.
SPEAKER_00Well, I guess uh what are we doing?
SPEAKER_02Well, here's why we're not doing it. I realized, and we sort of talked about it, I think it was after we stopped recording, but most of these cases are for your information. You know, like there's nothing like I'm granted, there are a few big ones like the Black Dahlia and the Zodiac and you know, uh Chickatillo from Russia. There's a few others that everyone would argue should be on the list. But there's no reason I couldn't just randomly do those. You know. So I've decided to kind of let loose, let's not worry about the structure of, you know, just because it was a famous case and you've never heard of it, we should do it on every 10. Mainly because some of them are kind of boring. I hate to say it.
SPEAKER_00I mean, some of these famous ones, they're really they're doing all the same kind of shit.
SPEAKER_02Well, and that's exactly it. I sat there and I was working on the zodiac, which is what I was going to do tonight. And don't get me wrong, I will do the zodiac, but I want to do it in a different way. And if I do it straightforward, and I know there are going to be some zodiac killer enthusiasts out there, and I apologize, but it's pretty standard and straightforward as an unsolved case goes.
SPEAKER_00Unsolved? It's Ted Cruz.
SPEAKER_02That's funny, but no.
SPEAKER_00Everybody knows that.
SPEAKER_02Everybody knows that you're right. So I see you've ruined my.
SPEAKER_00But I also I don't actually know if that's just like a goofy like internet thing or if it's actually.
SPEAKER_02No, it's it's a goofy internet thing. I I mean, I suppose it's possible. We don't know who the zodiac is, right?
SPEAKER_00Um, we don't know it's not Ted Cruz.
SPEAKER_02Exactly. So, but no, so I decided to mix it up, and I I just sat there and I was like reading through my notes on it, and I was like, I really don't want to do this. Like there was something that was dragging me down about it, and I decided I'm not I'm not gonna do it this week. We'll we'll I'm gonna rewrite it because there's a different take I want to do, and yeah, that's how so I decided fuck it. We're doing our it's our podcast, we're doing what we want.
SPEAKER_00All right, well, whatever it is, now you've really set it up, it's gotta be an interesting one.
SPEAKER_02This one is far more interesting. In fact, I almost did this as one of those I email you the script right before we hit record and have you present it, but decided no, so it's shocking and appalling. It's not not exactly, but it's it's not, yeah, you'll see.
SPEAKER_00Those are typically the ones you make me read and you make me uh laugh at the horrible things that I'm saying because I wasn't expecting that.
SPEAKER_02This one, this one doesn't have those like really standout moments, but it's still fucked up. Alright. Alright, so with that said, here is your teaser. Sharon Kenny called a woman by the name of Patricia Jones and told her she wanted to meet with her because she had information about her husband. So Patricia decided to go ahead and meet with Sharon, and they got into a car together, and they were having a conversation. Now, according to Sharon, she was telling Patricia that her husband was having an affair with Sharon's sister. Bad news, my friend. But then Patricia disappears and is found dead a day later by Sharon and a guy she was seeing.
SPEAKER_00Whoa.
SPEAKER_02It's really, yeah, exactly. So that's your teaser. We're gonna leave it right at that.
SPEAKER_00Alright. My my reaction to that is what the fucking hell is going on here?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, it's I was trying to choose a moment, and I'm like, you know what, this one's gonna be real brief, but it's got a lot of flavor to it.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_02So Sharon Kinney was born Sharon Elizabeth Hall on November 30th, 1939 in Independence, Missouri, to her parents, Eugene and Doris. When she was young, her father hurt himself on the job and became unemployed. From there, he started drinking heavily and paid very little attention to his children. When Sharon was 14, the family moved to Washington State due to rumors that Sharon had secretly married an unnamed man who allegedly died when his truck plunged over a cliff in Idaho at Fort.
SPEAKER_00So we're moving because of this weird ass rumor.
SPEAKER_02Because of this rumor, her whole family packed up in move state.
SPEAKER_00So is it a rumor or is it an allegation?
SPEAKER_02Well, there's no evidence to indicate whether these rumors were true or not. However, in the future, when Sharon does eventually marry, she lists herself as a widow on the marriage license. How do you get married at 14? That's what I want to know. Like where I understand.
SPEAKER_00I mean, it's legal in almost every state.
SPEAKER_02At 14?
SPEAKER_00Yep. And this is like actually, I thought you said 16. At 14, legal in some states.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, at 14, but this is back in the at this point, it might be the early 50s.
SPEAKER_00Oh, then it was probably legal in every state back then.
SPEAKER_02Fucking weird.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. I hate it, and it's still legal in a frightening amount of places now.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. So, widowed or not, the Halls ended up moving back to independence, Missouri, a year later when Sharon was 15. So apparently the rumors must have died down enough. Yes, the weird.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_02In the summer of 1956, Sharon met 22-year-old James Kinney at a Mormon church function.
SPEAKER_00James Okay, we're hanging out with the Mormons. Interesting choices.
SPEAKER_02James was instantly attracted to then 16-year-old Sharon.
SPEAKER_00Hey, good sign.
SPEAKER_02And he did not wait long to call on her, and they soon became inseparable. So with college coming up, because it was the college semester was about to start, and James was a student, Sharon began to worry that if he went back to campus, another girl might take him away from her. So Sharon sent him a letter that stated, quote, The sins of the summer have produced a child in my womb. But don't worry. Yeah, right? But don't worry. I don't expect you to sacrifice your education and return to independence. I'll handle the situation. Unquote.
SPEAKER_00Handle the situation. Now to me that means something.
SPEAKER_02To me, that would sound like abortion. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that's what that sounds like to me, but uh Well, however, Sharon I guess we don't know.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, right. Well, Sharon's not really pregnant here.
SPEAKER_00Ah, a liar.
SPEAKER_02Yes. Now, James, having been raised in a strict Mormon family, he he didn't believe that a woman could ever lie to him about something like that. So he so he came to the only conclusion that he could come up to, which was he should marry her. Which is precisely what they did.
SPEAKER_00Oh. Oh, and this is this is probably what he's she's trying to get out of him.
SPEAKER_02Exactly. So James and Sharon moved into a small house next door to his parents, which kind of gave them a place to live. Right? And he's not too far from support. But of course, she at least. Right, but Sharon, of course, was constantly talking about how much she hated living next door to her in-laws, who she felt looked down on her.
SPEAKER_00Now for the record yeah, girl, where's the baby?
SPEAKER_02Well, we'll get to that. Um for the record, her her f his father did not particularly like Sharon. He thought she was manipulative and kind of saw through her bullshit.
SPEAKER_00Well, it sounds like he was right.
SPEAKER_02He was. But her mother always his mother always gave her the benefit of the doubt. So that's kind. So Sharon continuously mocked his family for their conservative ways and their deeply held religious beliefs.
SPEAKER_00Girl, why'd you forcibly marry into it then?
SPEAKER_02I don't think she knew what she was really getting into.
SPEAKER_00I think my sympathy for this woman is not very high.
SPEAKER_02It shouldn't be.
SPEAKER_00I hope it doesn't come back to bite me again. It didn't you tricked me.
SPEAKER_02I love doing that to you, I'm not gonna lie. Uh, it didn't take long for Sharon to start filling her days by spending all the money that James was making, which wasn't really a lot.
SPEAKER_00Oh dear. So just ruining everyone's life.
SPEAKER_02But as a result, she actually had to find a job of her own to subsidize her constant need to shop and spend money.
SPEAKER_00Now, report girl.
SPEAKER_02Right?
SPEAKER_00Calculated.
SPEAKER_02Well, reportedly, she was very good at every job she tried. She worked in a print shop. She was a babysitter, a legal secretary, and a hotel receptionist.
SPEAKER_00She's so good at them. Why'd she have to keep switching jobs so much?
SPEAKER_02It's my next line.
SPEAKER_00Every it didn't take long.
SPEAKER_02It didn't take long after starting each job for her to get bored and decide to quit.
SPEAKER_00Oh, well, that tracks. Yeah, fair.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Now, even when she was making money, she insisted that that money was her money and not part of the family income.
SPEAKER_00Interesting.
SPEAKER_02However, she continued to spend money recklessly and often charging some of that to James's account as well as her own. So she's still spending his money. Yeah. Oh yeah, she's a full-blown scammer. And then after several months of settling back into their lives in independence, she grew tired of the pregnancy hoax. Probably because she's running out of time.
SPEAKER_00All this all this happened?
SPEAKER_02In the first few months.
SPEAKER_00That's crazy.
SPEAKER_02So one day, James came home from work and he found Sharon in a panicked state. She told him that earlier that morning after he left for work, her body began to reject the baby and she had a miscarriage. Now, he was confused because he's like, Why'd you wait all day to tell me? kind of thing. But she claimed it was because she couldn't reach him at his job because where he worked was a high security job for a company called Bendix Corporation that had too many barriers in place for her to reach him. She actually made him feel bad about it.
SPEAKER_00That's awful.
SPEAKER_02And then, of course, because the universe loves a good twist. In January of 1957, Sharon learned that she was actually pregnant.
SPEAKER_00Well, ain't that the universe working the way it does?
SPEAKER_02Yep. So she soon gave birth to their first child, a daughter named Dana. Now, initially, from the outside, Sharon seemed like a devoted mother. She was always doting on her daughter, and she even started to go to church with the rest of the family. But in typical Sharon fashion, she soon got bored because life as a homemaker didn't really do it for her, and she went back to her excessive spending.
SPEAKER_00She's made some interesting choices in this life, I'll say.
SPEAKER_02You know, I hate to say it. She it's a it's like a gold digger back before gold diggers really had a lot of mining, you know what I mean? Like before men had a lot of the resources they do today, I guess.
SPEAKER_00Right. She's she's gold digging someone who ain't got no gold.
SPEAKER_02Exactly. So in 1959, she gave birth to their second child, a son named Troy. And the family moved into a new home with the new baby, and that new situation occupied her attention for a bit.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it seems like she gets bored quickly.
SPEAKER_02She does, very much so. And when we have a bored Sharon, we have a problem.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, we got danger.
SPEAKER_02And of course, her preoccupation with the new baby and the new house and decorating it, whatever, she it allowed her to be less abusive towards her husband, James. Because she was very verbally abusive to this man. That's awful. But the baby also gave her a new reason to spend more money.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. And as those things are expensive.
SPEAKER_02Yes, they are. And as a result, James took on a higher paying shift at work, which basically was the second shift, the night shift, and that left Sharon alone with the children in the evenings and put more emotional distance between the two of them.
SPEAKER_00That's tough.
SPEAKER_02So with James working in the evening and the children going to bed, Sharon found herself with a lot more free time than she had had in years. And she decided it was time to reconnect with an old high school boyfriend named John Baldeez. I'm assuming that's how you say it, Baldees, but I don't know. I could be wrong. It's spelled.
SPEAKER_00I don't know, I can't see it.
SPEAKER_02B-A-L-D-I-Z-S. Yeah. Yeah, Baldees.
SPEAKER_00Baldees, why not?
SPEAKER_02Well, her relationship with John was exciting because it was forbidden fruit. And she actually enjoyed the thrill of the infidelity of it all. She's bored. Yep, that's exactly it. By 1960, life in the Kinney House was deteriorating to a breaking point. It seemed to James that Sharon was never home, which was mostly fine by him, except that she was not being a wife or a mother to her family. She was absent from the children and they were being neglected on a regular basis. Literally, the kids' needs were being met by their babysitters.
SPEAKER_00Ugh.
SPEAKER_02James That was not good. James realized that she was cheating on him, but because of his religious beliefs, he knew he couldn't divorce her, that it would be discouraged by everyone in his community. Oh yeah. And he was right. When he brought up the subject with his parents, his mother literally encouraged him to work out their problems for the children's sakes. Which sucks. Yeah. Finally, in mid-March of that year, he actually did bring up divorce to Sharon. And she agreed that she felt their marriage had reached its inevitable end. And she was willing to go, she was willing to go along with the divorce, but only if James gave her the house, their daughter Dana, and a thousand dollars. She didn't even want their son. She didn't even want their son.
SPEAKER_00That's so fucked up.
SPEAKER_02Now James argued that splitting up the children was out of the question, and he refused her offer.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, absolutely. That's so fucked up.
SPEAKER_02But then she started to think about it and realize that those terms didn't really work in her favor either, as a thousand dollars was not enough to live on for very long. For her, she felt it wasn't going to be a win. So she came up with a different plan. On Saturday afternoon, March 19, 1960, the Jackson County Sheriff's Department received a frantic call from Sharon Kinney saying that her husband had had a heart attack and she needed help.
SPEAKER_00Well, how'd you give him a heart attack?
SPEAKER_02Oh, just wait. When the sheriff's deputy arrived at the Kinney home, however, that's not what they found. James Kinney was lying on the couple's bed, a pistol on the bed next to his pillow, and he had a large hole in the back of his head.
SPEAKER_00Now, Queen Heart attack. Now amazingly literal smoking gun is there.
SPEAKER_02Amazingly, he was still alive, but he did die on the way to the hospital. Now, Sharon told officers that she was in the bathroom, getting ready to go to church when she heard their two-year-old daughter, Dana, ask, quote, How does this thing work, Daddy? Unquote. And then she heard a gunshot.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Something tells me that's not what happened.
SPEAKER_02In their statement to the press, Sergeant Herman Davis of the Kansas City Police told reporters the bullet had entered near the rear of his head and lodged under the skin between his nose and his right eye.
SPEAKER_00And he's surviving. That's incredible.
SPEAKER_02He can Davis continued that this was consistent with the position of the gun, which was, quote, lying on the pillow when it discharged, unquote. And it even left a crease where it cut the cloth as the bullet went out of the gun and into James. There were also powder burns on the pillowcase. Now, James, and this is something that Sharon tells police, that James always had a fascination with guns and would take them apart to clean them. Which for the record, that's how you have to clean a gun. You take it apart. Right. But she said that he was also forgetful and careless with them, and he would sometimes leave them lying around the house.
SPEAKER_00That's really not good.
SPEAKER_02Well, that statement of hers was confirmed by James' parents as well. They said that he also did that. So, obviously, his death is suspicious. Investigators wondered why James Very much so. They wondered why he would lie down to take a nap with a loaded pistol right next to him. Unfortunately, there wasn't much evidence to prove or disprove Sharon's claim. The twenty two caliber pistol found on the scene, it was so covered in gun oil, which is used to clean a gun, that it was impossible to get any fingerprints off of it. The lab technician didn't test either Sharon or Dana's hands for gunshot residue. In fact, the only test that was done on the gun was to determine the pull pull or strength necessary to fire the gun. Then knowing that the pistol required 3.25 pounds of pressure to squeeze the trigger, they went back to the kinny house with a similar unloaded pistol to determine if two-year-old Dana could ac actually had the strength to pull the trigger.
SPEAKER_00Doubt it.
SPEAKER_02She did.
SPEAKER_00Oh.
SPEAKER_02And not only did she possess the strength to pull the trigger, she also showed them that she knew how to release the safety on the gun.
SPEAKER_00What the fuck?
SPEAKER_02In my opinion, the next thing is so bizarre because investigators never actually asked Dana if she had fired the gun or not.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, also, I'll call it CPS. Why is your kid know how to operate a gun?
SPEAKER_02Well, it's the 1950s. It's Missouri. I don't know. Fucking weird.
SPEAKER_00You said she's two.
SPEAKER_02She is two, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Barely talking.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and she knows how to you know release the safety and has enough strength to pull the trigger of a small handgun. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Great. It's like, does she even know how to use a fucking fork yet? And she can use a gun.
SPEAKER_02Apparently she does. Yeah. Yeah. So the autopsy was completed, and the cause of death was listed as accidental.
SPEAKER_00Huh, okay.
SPEAKER_02So Sharon was free, and she was able to collect on various life insurance policies that had been taken out years before James's death.
SPEAKER_00With his it doesn't even look that suspicious if they've been there for years.
SPEAKER_02Exactly. And I mean, what are you gonna do if a two year old accidentally shoots her father? Which is where they're going with this.
SPEAKER_00Right. Well, yeah, what are you gonna do?
SPEAKER_02Do so fucked up. To me, the number one, the number one red flag is my husband just had a heart attack.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, when he just got shot.
SPEAKER_02Like, that's weird.
SPEAKER_00It's very weird, and we need to be interrogating that.
SPEAKER_02Right. And I understand that asking a two-year-old if she pulled the trigger that killed her father, maybe they thought that was extreme.
SPEAKER_00Because yeah, and like, how do you how do you get a reliable like confession from a two-year-old?
SPEAKER_02Right. Like what? And without re-traumatizing her, you know.
SPEAKER_00Right, and that's like, what's what's the value of the word of a two-year-old? I wouldn't put stake in it.
SPEAKER_02No, not at all. Which is why, do you remember the the Susan Cox Powell episode? This is the one who she disappeared and then the husband killed the children and the fire in the house.
SPEAKER_01Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_02She, when after she disappeared, the police were trying to ask her four-year-old for information, and even he couldn't keep shit straight, saying they took an airplane to get to this camping trip kind of thing.
SPEAKER_00So and he's twice her age.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Crazy. So with James dead, the balance on their mortgage for their house was wiped clean and then transferred to Sharon. The balance was wiped, I guess, from the from the I'm assuming from the insurance, yeah, because otherwise that's weird.
SPEAKER_00And afterwards, strangely generous from a bank.
SPEAKER_02Right. And afterwards, she received roughly $29,000 from remaining life insurance policies, which today would be about $300,000. She was she wasted no time spending that money.
SPEAKER_00She's real good at that, huh?
SPEAKER_02She is. She went down to a car dealership on April 18th, 1960, and she was helped by a man named Walter Jones. Walter was a handsome guy with a friendly personality and all the charm and persuasiveness you'd expect from a car dealer. Lord. He quickly and easily talked her into trading in her husband's car, her dead husband's car, for the car she had always dreamed about. Soon she was making regular visits to that dealership. And it turned out, and as it turned out, Walter may have been a good car salesman. He wasn't a very good person. Walter had married his high school sweetheart, Patricia, and he began having an affair with Sharon soon after they moved. He had gotten married right out of high school. And basically soon after they got married, he enlisted in the Marines and they relocated to California. After he was discharged, they went back to Missouri. But by then their marriage was pretty much already doomed. Because he started having an affair, started having affairs almost immediately after they got married.
SPEAKER_00What a fucking nightmare, dude. Don't get married. Well, outside of that, if you're just gonna cheat on somebody, don't get married.
SPEAKER_02That too.
SPEAKER_00Go fuck her out if that's what you want to do.
SPEAKER_02Patricia chose to stay with her husband because of their two children. Which we've horrible reason to stay together.
SPEAKER_00Yes, but also understandable if she can't provide for them.
SPEAKER_02Right. And it's the 1950s.
SPEAKER_00It's tough.
SPEAKER_02So Walter's mar sorry, this is 1960, but still, it's not like it's any better. Walter's marriage.
SPEAKER_00She probably can't get a job.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, it's I mean, maybe, but it wouldn't be a very good job.
SPEAKER_00She's like literally not allowed to have a bank account.
SPEAKER_02Is that true in the 60s? I don't even know.
SPEAKER_00I think the thing is it was like in the 1970s that women have the right to have a credit card in their own name.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, that was the feminist movement, but I thought maybe before because they were working. They were working in during World War II, so it's possible. I'm pretty sure they had to have.
SPEAKER_00Well, they could be on their husbands.
SPEAKER_02That's true. That's true. Well, we'll have to look that up another time. Well, Walter's marriage, of course, was a source of frustration for Sharon. So in May of that year, she told Walter that she was pregnant.
SPEAKER_00Of course she did.
SPEAKER_02And she demanded that he end their marriage, his marriage.
SPEAKER_00Yikes, Queen.
SPEAKER_02Well, Walter just started to reconsider his relationship with Sharon as well as his own marriage.
SPEAKER_00Now during the Yeah, maybe maybe both of these are bad.
SPEAKER_02Well, during the week of May 27th, Sharon went away on a vacation. And as a result, Walter spent more time at home than he had previously. And he realized that he did kind of miss his wife. And he decided that he was going to end the affair and repair his marriage.
SPEAKER_00I see where this is going.
SPEAKER_02But unfortunately, he would never get that chance. On the evening of May 27, 1960, a man by the name of John Baldees called the Jackson County Sheriff's Department to report that he and his lady had taken a drive out to a Lover's Lane area and they had made a horrible discovery. Baldez told investigators that the couple had initially thought the woman that they could see in their headlights had just fallen asleep over there in this wooded area. But as of getting out to investigate, they saw that she had gunshot wounds to the head, stomach, and shoulders. When investigators arrived on the scene, they found very little evidence to work with. The woman, who, surprise, surprise, is Walter's wife Patricia. She had been shot four times, and at least one of those shots had been fired close enough to leave powder burns on her skirt.
SPEAKER_00Aw.
SPEAKER_02One thing that stood out was the lack of blood at the scene. So it appeared to investigators that Patricia had been killed elsewhere and dumped in the woods. The next morning Walter was brought into the sheriff's office for questioning, but he claimed that he hadn't seen his wife the previous morning when he went to work. And in fact, he had even filed a missing persons report when she failed to return home that night, the night before. And he even offered to take a polygraph test, which again, 1960s, people still bought into that.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, 100%.
SPEAKER_02Investigators soon learned that Baldez's girlfriend was Sharon Kinney, who Walter had admitted he had been having an affair with.
SPEAKER_00Wow, he's just being straight up with it.
SPEAKER_02Well, he we're gonna get into it a little bit, but he has reason to be to throw it out there. Now Sharon Kinney to them, she they they were still suspicious of her because of the death of her husband. Which is which had literally only happened a few months before.
SPEAKER_00Girl. She can't give it a rest.
SPEAKER_02Right? Now through She didn't give anything a rest. She's fucking nuts. Abort Sharon Kenny is terrifying.
SPEAKER_00Yes.
SPEAKER_02Through various witness statements, police learned that Sharon had lured Patricia out by telling her Walter was having an affair with her sister and thought she should know.
SPEAKER_00Ugh.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_00Fucked up.
SPEAKER_02It's so fucked. Fucked up.
SPEAKER_00That's so against girl code.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, well, I hate to say it when it comes to jealousy, girl code, even guy code goes out the window. It's true. The autopsy determined that Patricia's cause of death was a gunshot wound to her head, obviously. But that they placed the time of death around 8 or 9 p.m. on the 27th of May, hours before her body was discovered. And although the physical evidence was weak, the circumstantial evidence against Sharon Kinney at this point was quite substantial.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, for sure. It does not look good.
SPEAKER_02No, she had been having an affair with the victim's husband. She was the last person to be seen with Patricia, and that goes on to there are witnesses that saw the two of them together, which I didn't really get into.
SPEAKER_00She found the body.
SPEAKER_02Exactly. She's one of the ones that found it, right? Apparently there was a moment where she had tried to get the gun back from police that killed her husband, and they wouldn't give it back to her. Right? So that's another thing they're adding.
SPEAKER_00Weird behavior.
SPEAKER_02And after she made her statement, she refused to give them a sworn written statement and refused to submit to a polygraph. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Okay, dig your hole, queen.
SPEAKER_02So on the evening of May 31st, Sharon was taken into custody and charged with the murder of Patricia Jones. She was held on a $20,000 bond, which again, we established earlier, that's probably about $250,000 today.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that's a ton of money.
SPEAKER_02However, friends and relatives quickly pulled together, and she was released that next afternoon.
SPEAKER_00That's fucked. I don't know if my friends and relatives could pull together $250K.
SPEAKER_02That's crazy. I mean, even $20,000. It's a lot of money to ask you people.
SPEAKER_00That's crazy.
SPEAKER_02Just in case, you know, no.
SPEAKER_00For your relative who's sus as fuck, you're gonna lose your money.
SPEAKER_02After the arraignment for Patricia's murder, the Sheriff's Department filed charges against Sharon for the murder of her husband. The biggest issue for prosecutors was the lack of forensic evidence connecting Sharon to both murders. Now Sharon's trial for the murder of Patricia Jones began on June 12, 1961. The defense had a simple strategy. Rather than trying to prove her innocence, all they needed to do was undermine the flimsy evidence.
SPEAKER_00Right.
SPEAKER_02On June 23rd, 1961, the jury went into deliberation, and after just an hour and a half, they returned with a verdict of not guilty.
SPEAKER_00Essentially, unfortunately it doesn't sound like there was much evidence.
SPEAKER_02Yes, essentially reasonable doubt.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, there's reasonable doubt. It's not a ton of it, but there is reasonable doubt.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, there I mean you don't have a lot of real evidence. Yeah, sure it's all really coincidental and nobody would buy it, but there's a chance she didn't do it. Mm-hmm. She then entered her next murder trial, and she was confident that a similar lack of evidence would lead to a similar verdict. And that was scheduled for January 8th, 1962.
SPEAKER_00But why did this end up being later?
SPEAKER_02Because they filed the murder of Patricia Jones first and then filed the murder of her husband. Because at first it wasn't considered like you know what I mean?
SPEAKER_00Right, right, right.
SPEAKER_02Right. So the prosecutor contended that Sharon had killed James in order to get rid of him and cash in on the various life insurance policies. The defense maintained the initial conclusion that it was an accidental shooting. Sharon received a life sentence for the murder of her husband.
SPEAKER_00Wow. Crazy.
SPEAKER_02I mean, really, when you go back and you think about the likelihood of a two-year-old shooting her father with a gun he left randomly laying on the bed next to himself.
SPEAKER_00Right, and also having the strength to pick up a whole ass gun.
SPEAKER_02Which she proved she could do.
SPEAKER_00Right, but it's like, eh, did they prove she could take her arm and point it all the way up? I don't know. I'm I'm suspicious.
SPEAKER_02Well, according to what they initially said, the gun went off in the position it was on because there were there were evidence on the sheet itself that the gun had gone off.
SPEAKER_00That is true. Okay.
SPEAKER_02However, the ongoing coverage of that trial helped win Sharon sympathy from the sub and support from the public, which prompted a re-evaluation of her trial. And when the case so and when the case reached the state Supreme Court in early 1963, those justices ordered Sharon to receive a new trial.
SPEAKER_00I could see it. It's like there is evidence, but it's still like, I don't know, it doesn't seem totally proof.
SPEAKER_02It's I know it's so fucked. You don't want her to get out, and yet here we are.
SPEAKER_00And yet our justice system relies on proof, and I'm glad it does, but right.
SPEAKER_02But here we are.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_02So in July, she was freed again on a $25,000 bond. And over the course of 1963 and 1964, the prosecutor's office retried Sharon twice more, both of them resulting in a mistrial.
SPEAKER_00Damn, get it together, guys.
SPEAKER_02The first mistrial was because of a jury member's undisclosed conflict of interest. Not sure what that's about, it's undisclosed. And the second one was because of a deadlocked jury, which was actually leaning towards acquittal. Wow. So despite that jury leaning towards acquittal for the third trial, the prosecutor's office was still intent on trying her a fourth time.
SPEAKER_00Damn.
SPEAKER_02So after all these years in courtrooms and jail cells, this entire process had become quite exhausting for Sharon. She had been splitting her time between her trials, her children, and part-time jobs when she could get them.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that's going to court. That's a lot of work. Yeah, especially trying to keep a job and provide for children as a woman in the 1960s.
SPEAKER_02Exactly. So in a moment of impulsivity, she quit her job, thinking it would allow her to spend more time with her kids, allegedly.
SPEAKER_00And I'm sure she's burned all the money. Well, on defense attorneys.
SPEAKER_02Right. So she went down to the unemployment office to apply for benefits. And it was there in August of 1964 that Sharon met a man named Frank Peglisi. Come on. He was sitting there in the office struggling to understand how to fill out the paperwork that he had been handed.
SPEAKER_00And she said, Oh, you look like a chump, I'll take you.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, well, she started helping him out. Peglisi was a blue-collar guy who dropped out of high school at 16 and had been drifting around the Midwest for years, taking random jobs where he could find them. Now Frank also had a criminal history of petty crimes and had just recently gotten out of jail, which is why he was there trying to get unemployment benefits. She really does. Well, of course, Sharon helped him fill out this paperwork, and soon the two of them started dating. Sharon and Frank dated the rest of that summer and into the fall, but the problem was that her trial was set to begin in early October. About two weeks into September, Sharon went to her lawyer's office and explained that she and Frank were in love and they wanted to take a vacation to Mexico before her trial began.
SPEAKER_00That's not something you can just do.
SPEAKER_02Well, given that she was out on a $25,000 bond pending the trial, there was some question as to whether or not she could travel. But her lawyer explained to her that as long as she was back in time, it was okay with him for her to go.
SPEAKER_00I guess it depends on the conditions of bond.
SPEAKER_02I guess. That's fucking crazy.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it is.
SPEAKER_02So on the afternoon of September 12th, 1964, Sharon made multiple trips to a local Safeway grocery store, each time writing bad checks to get cash for her trip. For his part. Nuts. For his part, Frank fell back on his old ways and stole food, cash, and other supplies from associates and friends and anywhere he could get them.
SPEAKER_00Wow, what a pair.
SPEAKER_02Frank and Sharon were able to borrow kids are somewhere safe. We'll get there. Frank and Sharon were able to borrow a car from a friend, and later that afternoon, with cash in hand and a carload of food and supplies, Sharon dropped her kids off at her ex-mother-in-law's, and she and Frank took off to Mexico.
SPEAKER_00Hey, at least they're somewhere safe.
SPEAKER_02Right, right. They drove almost nonstop for two days until they reached Laredo, Texas, which was the last stop before crossing into Mexico. Unfortunately for them, without the proper paperwork and registration proving they owned the car, the border agents refused to let them through in the car.
SPEAKER_00Oh, oh, so they get out and walk?
SPEAKER_02So they ditched the car at the border and took a bus into Mexico City.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, they're they're ditching. She's not getting back for that trial.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I don't think she ever intended to. No. I mean, writing bad checks right before a trip like this is a huge red flag. Although they made it pretty easily to their destination, neither of them spoke Spanish, which made communication a pretty big problem for them.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, especially back then.
SPEAKER_02On September 14th, they checked into a hotel called Gin, G-I-N, like the drink. And they chose it because they thought it was a quaint name. And they soon found out that that hotel was anything but quaint.
SPEAKER_00Oh dear.
SPEAKER_02There were roaches climbing the walls, rats and mice running from one room to another before disappearing into holes. Sharon felt that the neighborhood was unsafe. Sharon felt the neighborhood was unsafe, so she kept a pistol and a hatchet by her bed.
SPEAKER_00Jesus.
SPEAKER_02After a few days, Frank and Sharon were running low on money, and they were both sick from their excess of food and alcohol. Which is probably more drinking the water back then than anything else, but hey.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, they probably have food poisoning.
SPEAKER_02So on Friday, September 18th, Sharon left the hotel in search of a pharmacist to give them something for their stomachs. And of course, she brought her pistol for protection.
SPEAKER_00Of course. I mean, she doesn't go anywhere without it, I don't think.
SPEAKER_02A local man directed her to the Del Prado Hotel, which catered to American tourists, basically kind of implying that she would find someone who could speak both English and Spanish to help her out. The first person she encountered at that hotel was Francisco Perez Andanez, or Donnaz, a Mexican-born resident of California who was in Mexico visiting family. Sharon was fed up with Frank and the frustrations of running low on money. Oh my God. So she welcomed the opportunity for male attention.
SPEAKER_00Oh my fucking God.
SPEAKER_02Sharon Kinyman.
SPEAKER_00She's crazy.
SPEAKER_02You can see why I almost sent you this script.
SPEAKER_00Yes. This is crazy.
SPEAKER_02Well, she did not hesitate when Francisco suggested that they go back to his room for a few drinks.
SPEAKER_00Lord. I hope it's not the same hotel.
SPEAKER_02It is not.
SPEAKER_00Okay, it's the same. We're drinking with the roaches.
SPEAKER_02Well, according to Sharon, after two or three drinks with Francesco, she got tired and laid down on the bed to take a nap. She claimed that she was woken up around 3 a.m. when he tried to sexually assault her.
SPEAKER_00Oh no.
SPEAKER_02She said, believing herself to be in danger, she drew her pistol from her pocket and fired twice into his chest, killing him. The noise drew the attention of the hotel's night manager, Enrique Rueda, who ran to the room to find out, you know, what the fuck is going on. And what he stumbled upon was a woman standing there over a guy who's laid out on the floor. When she saw when she saw him, he moved to try to contact police, but she raised her gun and shot him in the back.
SPEAKER_00Holy shit.
SPEAKER_02Leaving him in critical condition. Although he will not die. Despite his gunshot wound and eventually eventually being put in critical condition, he managed to lock her in the bathroom while he contacted police.
SPEAKER_00Wow.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, fucking badass right there. Sharon was soon arrested. And the problem police had after that was trying to figure out who the fuck she was.
SPEAKER_00Right, right.
SPEAKER_02Because when they arrived in Mexico, Sharon and Frank checked into the hotel as Mr. and Mrs. Frank. Puglisi.
SPEAKER_00Oh yeah, that's that's not her. So records.
SPEAKER_02Right, but her identification said Sharon Kinney. So of course they start researching her name, and eventually they find out that she had to be in court in just a couple weeks to stand trial for murdering her husband. Mexican authorities charge Sharon Kinney with the murder of Francesco Francesco, whom they believed she had murdered in an attempted robbery.
SPEAKER_00Oh, they think she was trying to rob him?
SPEAKER_02Yes.
SPEAKER_00Interesting.
SPEAKER_02On September 26, 1964, both Sharon and Frank were arranged on murder charges. Now later. In where in Mexico? In Mexico, yep. Later the charges against Frank were dropped and he was deported back to the U.S. Having learned of the shooting, authorities in Independence, Missouri contacted Mexico and requested the pistol used in the shooting so that they could test it. Mexican authorities declined this request, citing that it was an open case.
SPEAKER_00But they did agree to say they kind of got to test it there in Mexico.
SPEAKER_02Right, but they did agree to send the spent shell case shells to the detectives in Missouri. And when those shells were tested by a ballistics expert at a crime lab, they realized that those bullets were identical to those used to kill Patricia Jones.
SPEAKER_00Well, there we go. Now we have the evidence we need.
SPEAKER_02Unfortunately, Sharon had already been found not guilty in Patricia's murder. Double jeopardy and all that.
SPEAKER_00Okay, then why do we have why did she get a new trial of this other one? Why does she have four trials? I get the two and three were mistrials, but what about the first one?
SPEAKER_02So the first one with her husband, she was found guilty. So initially it was found to be accidental, so she wasn't put on trial. Then she was found guilty, and somehow, with public support, the state Supreme Court overwrote it and said, No, maybe that's what it is. So Sharon went on trial in Mexico in the fall of 1965, where she pled not guilty to a myriad of charges. Homicide, causing bodily injury, illegal use of a firearm, and possession of false documents. She was found guilty of simple homicide and sentenced to ten years.
SPEAKER_00So she's gonna spend I wonder if that means like ten years in Mexico or ten years anywhere.
SPEAKER_02Ten years in Mexico. So realistically, once she's done with that ten years, she should be returned to the U.S. where she will then go on trial for her husband's murders.
SPEAKER_00Oh damn, she can't even go on trial for ten years.
SPEAKER_02Crazy, right?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that is kind of crazy how that works.
SPEAKER_02Now, if it was another state, she could be brought to court in Missouri and then sent back to wherever, Texas to serve out those ten years and then would be returned to Missouri to serve out whatever she got there. But no, because it's a different country, that's gonna happen first.
SPEAKER_00There you go. Makes sense.
SPEAKER_02Well, on the evening of December 7th, 1969, after serving five years of her 10-year sentence, then 29-year-old Sharon Kinney attended a movie at the prison recreation hall. There are reports that the prison suffered a power outage that day as well. That evening, when guards were making their rounds to do bed checks, they discovered Sharon wasn't there. She was missing.
SPEAKER_00No fucking way.
SPEAKER_02Officials searched the prison and its ground all evening, but turned up no signs of Sharon Kinney. She had escaped.
SPEAKER_00That's fucking wild. She was probably bored.
SPEAKER_02I'm sure she was quite bored.
SPEAKER_00I'm sure she was very bored, and so she found a way to escape. You can't let her get bored.
SPEAKER_02While on the run, Sharon married her second official husband, James Thomas Glabas, in Los Angeles, California in February of 1970, only two months after her breakout from Mexico.
SPEAKER_00Another new guy?
SPEAKER_02Yes.
SPEAKER_00These crazy bitches pull like crazy, I swear to God.
SPEAKER_02The couple relocated to Canada in 1973, where they operated a hot a motel and later a real estate agency.
SPEAKER_00Nuts. Wow, pre-internet was the fucking wild west, huh?
SPEAKER_02Advertisements of the real estate agency showed Sharon's picture and were even printed in local newspapers.
SPEAKER_00Oh my god. It was so easy to get away with crime back then.
SPEAKER_02Despite her fugitive status, the details of how Sharon obtained legal documentation, you know, a travel visa, etc., remains unknown.
SPEAKER_00Right, yeah. How she got out of Mexico.
SPEAKER_02Well, getting over the border from Mexico to the US doesn't surprise me. Getting into Canada without raising red flags for her new husband surprises me.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, fair. It's like, hey girl, where's your passport? Yeah. She can't possibly have had that.
SPEAKER_02Right. Where, like, what did he know? You know, what did she tell him?
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. On August 11th, 1979, at the age of 38, her husband James Glabis died from complications related to diabetes and alcoholism. Sharon. Sharon was left. Sharon was left out of his will, which she did try to fight in court. She later remarried.
SPEAKER_00She later in Canada?
SPEAKER_02In Canada, yeah. She later remarried a third husband named William L. in nine in March of 1982. L, William L. would die on September 7th, 2011, at the age of 79.
SPEAKER_00He survived.
SPEAKER_02Sharon herself died of coronary artery disease on January 21st, 2022, at the age of 82. With Alzheimer's disease.
SPEAKER_00And he never caught her again?
SPEAKER_02Nope. With Alzheimer's disease being listed as a contributing factor on her death certificate.
SPEAKER_00I can't believe they never found her again.
SPEAKER_02Both her death certificates and her headstone falsely recorded 1940 as her year of birth. Sharon left behind one son from her marriage to Thomas Glabus, in addition to the children she had had in the U.S. Details about Sharon's movement after her prison escape remains largely unknown, minus what I just told you.
SPEAKER_00Right. However they had known, I would hope they would have got her.
SPEAKER_02Right. In December of 2023, the Jackson County Sheriff's Office and the Kansas City Police Department both received anonymous tips that Sharon had been living in the town of Tabor, Alberta, Canada, approximately 121 miles southeast of Calgary, under the alias Deirdre Glabis. Now under Canadian law, law enforcement agencies are allowed to obtain fingerprints from a deceased person with a criminal record. But because Deirdre had no criminal record, quote unquote, Deirdre had no criminal record, Canadian police were not able to provide fingerprints for U.S. authorities.
SPEAKER_00Wow. Fair. I get yeah.
SPEAKER_02Crazy. However, in a weird twist, the local funeral home that handled her funeral provided a service of preserving fingerprints as memento for loved ones. And they were processed and they were processed through a company that coincidentally was based in Independence, Missouri. Yeah. So they provided the fingerprints to U.S. authorities.
SPEAKER_00Wow. That's pretty roundabout and impressive.
SPEAKER_02It's crazy. And they were able to conclusively match those fingerprints to Sharon Kinney.
SPEAKER_00Damn.
SPEAKER_02So U.S. authorities publicly announced those findings on January 17th of 2025.
SPEAKER_00Wow.
SPEAKER_02Fucking crazy.
SPEAKER_00It took so long.
SPEAKER_02Fucking crazy.
SPEAKER_00No one was working on well. I feel like maybe things fell through the cracks because like she escaped from Mexican prison. Right. And they weren't talking to the U.S. very much, perhaps.
SPEAKER_02Possibly. Right. And she went from Missouri to Mexico to California to Canada.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. So I can understand why they couldn't find her.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, 100%.
SPEAKER_02Now, the first time I had ever heard of this, her escape from prison was the last we had heard. So I was like Wow. So I was excited when I started researching it and found out we had an answer.
SPEAKER_00So I was like, Yeah, this is like the kind of case you expect to end with, and she disappeared, and we don't know where she is.
SPEAKER_02Right, which is how it had ended up until last year.
SPEAKER_00Wild. Absolutely fucking wild.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, it's a crazy case. I couldn't wait to do it.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that was crazy. She is what a strange woman. She was really just happy to murder anyone in her way.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I'm telling you, we said it a hundred times. A bored Sharon is a scary Sharon.
SPEAKER_00Bored, scary, yeah, terrified. I'm terrified of Sharon if she's bored. And yeah, that's uh what blows me away. What a case.
SPEAKER_02What blows me away is she did spend five years in a Mexican prison, and then upon her escape, she presumably committed no more crimes.
SPEAKER_00Presumably.
SPEAKER_02Presumably. I mean, her husband's death after she moved to Canada is a little weird, but she did stay in that area. So it's tough to say, but overall, something scared her straight enough in Mexico.
SPEAKER_00She finally found a man she wasn't bored of.
SPEAKER_02Maybe. Or maybe she realized that she didn't have it so bad after spending five years in a Mexican prison.
SPEAKER_00Very well could have been. She was like, actually, I'm gonna be grateful for what I have.
unknownRight?
SPEAKER_02Fucking crazy. I loved your reaction though. Absolutely not. That was wild. When I told you she met another man in Mexico, your reaction was so good.
SPEAKER_00I was like, there's no way. There's no way, bitch.
SPEAKER_02You're like, this bitch.
SPEAKER_00This bitch. It's like, I don't even know if this guy we did say this guy like could speak English. Because I was like, if she's pulling in a foreign language that she doesn't speak, I I have no words.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah. I mean, I've seen photos of her. She and especially when she was younger, she wasn't a bad-looking woman. So I can sort of see how she could still pull people in a little bit.
SPEAKER_00Um, especially because she was yeah, I'm looking at pictures of her right now. She's not a bad looking woman.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I mean, especially if she's doing the damsel in distress thing. I can see like men wanting to help, kind of, you know.
SPEAKER_00Right. She just must have had the Riz.
unknownThere you go.
SPEAKER_00As they say, as the kids say.
SPEAKER_02I have never once used that term in any serious way, so yeah, sure.
SPEAKER_00I'm just trying to bring the youth into this podcast, you know.
SPEAKER_02There you go. You know, it's funny, is we have had some very young co guest co-hosts, and even they don't say that term.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I don't know if anyone does, but I'm 30 years old, so I say stupid things ironically now, but it's almost unironic.
SPEAKER_02No, I'm with you. I sometimes do, but yeah, not not typically. A term like Riz never really um enters my vernacular.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it's pretty dumb.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, there's a few of them. I'm more apt to make a joke about 6'7 than I am Riz.
SPEAKER_00So oh, absolutely. That one's those are funny.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, those are just stupid. Yeah, it's just like what? I mean, I'm it's not meant to be funny to my generation, so I get it. But I don't know.
SPEAKER_00What episode was it today? Oh, is it 170?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, 170, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Oh, never mind. I was like, what if it was 167?
SPEAKER_02Oh, that'd have been funny, but we still have uh we just passed it.
SPEAKER_00Huh. Tragic. We'll celebrate on 176 because it's backwards 6'7.
SPEAKER_02All right, it's on you to remember now.
SPEAKER_00And we know how that goes.
SPEAKER_02All right, well, thank you everyone for joining us once again. I'm Janice Dead.
SPEAKER_00And I'm Joyus Dead.
SPEAKER_02And we'll see you next week.
SPEAKER_00Bye.