Faithful Politics

"A Death on W Street: The Murder of Seth Rich" w/Andy Kroll, Author & ProPublica Journalist

• William C. Wright • Season 4

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In the early hours of July 10, 2016, gunshots rang out and a young man lay fatally wounded on a quiet Washington, DC, street. But who killed Seth Rich? When he was buried in his hometown, his rabbi declared: “There are no answers for a young man gunned down in the prime of his life.” The rabbi was wrong. There were in fact many answers, way too many.

In the absence of an arrest, a howling mob filled the void. Wild speculation and fantastical theories surfaced on social media and gained traction thanks to a high-level cast of provocateurs. But it wasn’t until Fox News took the rumors from the fringes to the mainstream that Seth Rich’s life and death grew into something altogether unexpected—one of the foundational conspiracy theories of modern times.

A Death on W Street unravels this gripping saga of murder, madness, and political chicanery, one that would ensnare Hillary Clinton and Steve Bannon, a popular pizzeria in northwest DC and the most powerful voices in American media. It's the story of an idealistic twenty-seven-year-old political staffer who became a tragic victim of the culture wars, until his family decided that they had no choice but to defend his name and put an end to the cruel deceptions that surrounded his death. 

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Chec...

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

hey welcome back faithful politics watchers and listeners i am your political host will write and i'm joined by your faithful host josh bertram has a going josh

[josh]:

doing well doing well how are you

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

good and we are joined again by andy crowl who is an investigator journalist at pro publica and he is the author of the book a death on w street the murder of seth rich and the age conspiracy and we just want to welcome you back to the show andy

[andy_kroll]:

it's great

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

m

[andy_kroll]:

to be back thanks for having me guys

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah i no no problem and you know

[andy_kroll]:

oh

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

that your

[andy_kroll]:

yeah yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

your book i will i

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

will say um is is a

[andy_kroll]:

oh

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

excellent read it reads almost like a crime or m it's it's not like it's not a difficult read which isn't like a bad thing it's just

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

like it's easy to kind of just pick it up and just keep reading and not want to put it down and for what it's were your bet your book beat out confidence man by maggie haverman because i dump i got both books about the same time and i was like i would read some of like maggie's book in the morning and read yours like at night

[andy_kroll]:

m

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

and i end up finishing yours and not maggie so for for what it's worth you know

[josh]:

there you go

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

if only in this space your book beat com it's man then i would consider it a win

[andy_kroll]:

i will take that

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

victory i appreciate that i mean everything you just said i really do means

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

a lot

[josh]:

have you ever watched your development

[andy_kroll]:

of course

[josh]:

confidence

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

hm

[josh]:

man

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[josh]:

one and confidence man

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[josh]:

too or whatever they got

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[josh]:

you can be confidence man now

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

uh

[andy_kroll]:

yes i feel i've joined an exclusive

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

h

[josh]:

y

[andy_kroll]:

club that maybe i don't want to be in

[josh]:

yes

[andy_kroll]:

but i probably should be in

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

well i guess to start us off is you know so why why did you why did you write this book and you know what sort of the significance of w street in the time

[andy_kroll]:

um in my line of work as an investigative reporter i usually start a project because i got a tip from a source or

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

something interesting in a document popped out at me and i thought i've got to chase that down

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

or

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

i read something in the news that day and it's

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yes

[andy_kroll]:

arks some kind of idea or reporting thread for me strangely my first book this book did not come from any of those avenues the name on the front of the book not mine but the other one seth rich you know was a young guy in his mid

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

twenties who was living and working and wash t d c when he was killed in the summer of twenty sixteen and he and i ran in similar social circles it was a personal connection that actually sparked the idea for the book he and i were not friends i wouldn't overstate because that wouldn't be accurate but we had a lot of friends in common yeah played on a crappy beer league

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

sucker team on the weekends um it just sort of ran in the similar rat pack of a certain age here in d c i mean d c is lousy with young people in their twenties who which i was a long time ago

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

who care about politics and you know are here for whatever reason so when seth is murdered the intersection of flagler and w street in northwest d c which is why i chose to

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

put the street name in there you know it's it's a it's a tragedy that ripples through that social circle that that we are both in here in d c it is you know a classic case of there before the grace of god go on i mean seth had been out at the barn saturday night was walking home probably later than he should have who among us has not on that i mean i certainly have i probably have him from the same bar that he did because i

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

uh

[andy_kroll]:

used to live just down the street

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

h

[andy_kroll]:

from it and myself people i knew those friends that we had in common that i mentioned we absorbed this news as again sort of senseless crime a tragedy someone who now was really destined to do i think great things in politics or beyond politics whose life had been cut short and we thought that the story would better or worse end there you know his family would have a chance to have a funeral they would grieve maybe they would start scholarship and his name something like that and would move on and that you know as happens with these kinds of things but that is of course not what is not what happened i mean i've written an entire book

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

about what did happen and it really was this unbelievable story that plays out over five or six years after seth is killed and at some point a year or two after he had been killed really just about a year actually i took off my you know my normal guy d c guy hat

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

uh

[andy_kroll]:

my d

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

h

[andy_kroll]:

brow hat and i

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

m

[andy_kroll]:

put on my reporter

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

m

[andy_kroll]:

hat and i said you know there's something going on here that one i don't understand and two seems to speak to all of these bigger themes issues problems changes

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

that i've been writing about in my day job but i'm seeing it through the personal ends these things kind of collide it's at that point that i okay i've got to i've got to dig into this thing i've got to understand why this happened how it was allowed to happen

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

what it says about politics and online culture

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

american life in the twenty first century that

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

this story played out the way in

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah you know i noticed that like the seth rich conspiracy is like a through line that you see

[andy_kroll]:

yes

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

from i mean like everything i mean

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

like like so so whether it's like pizza gate or russia or i don't know like a number of different just con troversies seem to all kind of intersect to this

[andy_kroll]:

hm

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

this conspiracy in one form or another and um and we're going to get to to all of that hopefully the time that we got but but you know one of the things that i thought was interesting was you know whenever we think of like the set the rich conspiracy with at least for me any ways maybe just i'm a democrat like i tend to think of like republic and republican media culpability but that's not necessarily the case with seth rich you mentioned in your book two instances of you know democrats kind of having a um some some blame for perpetuating this conspiracy one dealing with burney sanders and one dealing with hell clinton so i was wondering if maybe maybe you can talk about you know how how that how the set rick store ties into each of those two politicians

[andy_kroll]:

yeah yeah it was one of the more interesting revelations that came out of the reporting you know when i first decided that i was going to really investigate what happened here it was about a year after seth had been killed and so we're talking about the summer of twenty seven ten and by that point fox news head had really you know blasted the story out to the masses as i write in the book sort of act two of the book fox is part in the story shawn handy le dobbs all of these other conservative there's roger stone had already come along and taken this this tragedy and tried to use it for his own game and so i like you thought okay maybe this is so more you know just this happened in conservative media far right online culture but actually it didn't start there it started the opposite side on the far left as i discovered during the reporting i mean within it's incredible even even now thinking about it but within you know ours of seth's murder being announced to the world the d n c put out a statement saying that this had happened you saw these theories start to surface online on twitter and read it and other online forums and it was not conservatives it was not trump supporters was not roger stone at that point it was actually supporters of pretty hard core supporters of berry sanders who of course was the underdog candidate in twenty six ten for the democratic nomination and it was supporters of the green party canada jill sten there's a blast from the past for you they were the first to say hum guy work for the d n c maybe he was a whistle blower or maybe he he could expose or what had wanted to expose wrong doing it the d n c because you remember and this this is instructive i think is with people spinning together a theory but something they're often drawing on things that they already believe feelings they already have allegiances that pre exist whatever this thing that just happened so in this case seth had been killed and supporters of bertie sanders were already prime to believe that the d n c had screwed him over in twenty six ten they did do a little bit of that not as much as some people said but they did a little bit that

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

m

[andy_kroll]:

and so immediately the mind jumps to there's this

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

m

[andy_kroll]:

dot they know and this dot that they believe and so they connect

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

hm

[andy_kroll]:

them maybe

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

hm

[andy_kroll]:

this young d and c stafford was going to expose that thing that we think is true um m so yeah it starts on the on the left end of the political spectrum and you know i hope people who read the book come away understanding that's not a figure pointing out just fox news or just burney sanders people anything like that i mean this kind of conspiratorial thinking this jumping to conclusions is a feature of extreme politics polarized politics and that is not unique to one side or the other that is a fixture of the left and the right

[josh]:

yeah that makes a lot of sense you

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[josh]:

know it was funny to two things we did you know our first interview with you andy and i didn't at the time but the netflix documentary

[andy_kroll]:

hm

[josh]:

series that has his that has his story in it i watched it the media kills or it was something like about the media right and i watched and i didn't even think about how you and i had just interviewed someone who knew this guy at some level and i was like wow that's a really interesting story and my wife was like didn't just didn't

[andy_kroll]:

uh

[josh]:

you just interview the guy and i'm like oh wait yeah i did i was like i totally i think i watched it either like like two days later

[andy_kroll]:

ye

[josh]:

or something like that it was just it was just funny so are you as the next flix document of your series going to be about you

[andy_kroll]:

oh i mean

[josh]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

i hope not because usually if you're the subject of

[josh]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

a netflix

[josh]:

that's

[andy_kroll]:

documentary

[josh]:

true

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

you're you're either a british royal or something bad has happened to

[josh]:

you

[andy_kroll]:

you on

[josh]:

definitely

[andy_kroll]:

the internet

[josh]:

do not want to be the subject of a documentary in

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[josh]:

your life most likely

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[josh]:

not a netflix documentary

[andy_kroll]:

no no no but i mean i think

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

a

[andy_kroll]:

i mean

[josh]:

or

[andy_kroll]:

i

[josh]:

a

[andy_kroll]:

watched

[josh]:

hol

[andy_kroll]:

it

[josh]:

documentary

[andy_kroll]:

no

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

no no no no i want the

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

h

[andy_kroll]:

like soft focus you now sunday morning cvsumor

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yes

[josh]:

yes or p b

[andy_kroll]:

the opera interview there

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

uh

[andy_kroll]:

we go

[josh]:

yes

[andy_kroll]:

nothing

[josh]:

um

[andy_kroll]:

goes wrong with opera

[josh]:

m

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[josh]:

exactly so i i just thought that was funny but

[andy_kroll]:

m

[josh]:

an you're reflecting on this you know like it feels like seth rich must have been like you know like democratic royalty or like the top of yeah food chain

[andy_kroll]:

m

[josh]:

or like one of the most important people

[andy_kroll]:

oh

[josh]:

in washington

[andy_kroll]:

oh

[josh]:

with the size of this size his conspiracy theory what you know what exactly did he do that made him so like that made them even gave it like enough gunpowder so to speak for something to be this big of an explosion what what exactly did he do what what gave him like the position to have this kind of story even be plausible come out

[andy_kroll]:

it comes down almost entirely to the place where he worked the democratic national committee he was not a senior democratic official he was not a party big wig he didn't make very much money he had very little seniority in fact he worked on a team out the d n c that was all lawyers and he was the only one who wasn't apart from the interns so i mean it's one of these things that you in the aftermath when the conspiracy thinking takes hold all of a sudden you see him you know his seniority grows his power starts to just know multiply that has actually no connection to what he really did mean he worked in and on a team there was trying to get more people registered to vote was trying to find ways to push back against voter suppression voter strict voter i d laws or closing polling places things like that and he had the word a in his title and then you know when the conspiracy evolves it goes on to oh this guy must have given all those stolen email to wicky leagues i'm sure we'll get to at some point um you know the term data in his name which had nothing to do with it or mputers or servers but was like literally names and addresses voters and spread sheets you know data becomes stretched

[josh]:

it's kind of like the assistant manager and then the assistant to the manager

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[josh]:

and

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[josh]:

he was

[andy_kroll]:

exactly

[josh]:

like he was like the assistant to the assistant to the manager

[andy_kroll]:

his boss

[josh]:

just

[andy_kroll]:

he worked for a team of lawyers who they had a boss who then their boss reported to i think one more person and then the boss i mean he did good work and

[josh]:

no doubt no

[andy_kroll]:

it

[josh]:

doubt

[andy_kroll]:

was important work but it was he was not a master mind he was not a a political svengali he nor was he a expert or a edward snowden for instance no i mean he was he wasn't any of those things but again all you need is the kernel of something if you want to blow it up into a big story and again seth's case is just sets story is just the clearest example of that where it's when he worked with the d and c must have been trying to expose the den's supposed wrong doing he had data in his title he must have been a te expert who could secretly hack his own employer while he worked there at the same time and then you know i mean it just it doesn't make any sense but it doesn't need to make sense it just has to have that tiny cornel plausibility somewhere to then take off and become something totally different

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah you know and even though

[andy_kroll]:

m

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

the book you know primarily

[andy_kroll]:

m

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

focuses on seth ridge um you know as i stated to earlier like it really does it really does seem like it it's a braw a commentary of the entire conspiracy eco system you know and and one of the reasons why i think that you know folks like yourself and the work that you do is so important because as a reporter for pro publica you know i'm i'm taking it on good faith that you value quality

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

over over clicks

[andy_kroll]:

correct

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

non and the birth of this conspiracy three really seemed to take off you know on just click bait

[andy_kroll]:

m

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

and specifically the reporting by the fox news or melia zemramen so i was wondering maybe maybe you can tell us a little bit about who melia is and and what was the story that a really kind of launched this into sort of the conspiracy ecosystem oh

[andy_kroll]:

she was a reporter who works for fox news not someone you would have seen on air all the time like a talking head or a host like a handed or a tucker cross in laura and grim but she worked for fox news dot com which employed its own reporters to go out and report stories with that sort of fox spit on them or a fox angle to that story and sometimes you know the t v shows would promote those stories but a lot of times they didn't but still it was this news room within fox was less known but still you know part of the fox news overall operation what i found so interesting about her story and what i learned in the reporting about how fox came to publish this story about seth was that fox has long been critical of main stream reporters for saying they're biased they know what they want to say and they just go out and self select the facts or the voices or the experts to confirm something that they already believe is true they're not out searching for facts and data and important information we need to basically have a democracy they're out there just sort of cherry picking stuff to you know confirm what they already believe what happened with this fox news story that's really one of the the the inflection points of this whole story is exactly what fox has accused everyone else of do for years what happens is this reporter has it in her head that seth rich stole emails from his own employer the democratic national committee and gave them to julian a sage and wicky leagues in twenty sixteen you'll remember that weekly leagues published a bunch of stolen ocuments

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

m

[andy_kroll]:

emails reports

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

h

[andy_kroll]:

throughout the

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

m

[andy_kroll]:

twenty sixteen campaign the most famous ones are john pedestas emails

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

h

[andy_kroll]:

which you can still

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

m

[andy_kroll]:

search for on like leagues website before that there was this huge tro tens of thousands of emails taken from the d n c itself and so this reporter i should add as well that almost immediately based on the work of civersecurity annalists the intelligence community the f i the i mean the whole breadth of the law enforcement intelligence community d c says all the evidence is that this is a foreign state attack this is not an edwards noting that this is not any other kind it's not like a cypercriminal or something of criminal it's a this is a foreign adversary of ours trying to mess up the election in this case the russian intelligence uh military intelligence agency

[josh]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

fox this reporter gets it in

[josh]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

their head that no this was set rich this

[josh]:

m

[andy_kroll]:

russia story is not real despite all the evidence says that it is and it said it was this young guy who worked at the d n c and as i show in the book you know fox actually has the story written i had of time saying that this guy tethrich was this insider and then in these emails you see fox reporter a sort of source contact of hers and then another guy a former d c cop and pi all talking about okay here's the story how do we confer that this is true

[josh]:

m

[andy_kroll]:

we need sources to say that this is accurate

[josh]:

m

[andy_kroll]:

which is not how journalism works is certainly not how journalism works at pro publica

[josh]:

right

[andy_kroll]:

so i just thought that this you know he machinations leading up to this story's publication which was in may of twenty seventeen really shine to light into how fox operated in this case the

[josh]:

m

[andy_kroll]:

lack of fact checking the lack of betting the way that

[josh]:

m

[andy_kroll]:

a story was sort of preconceived and then reporters and sources went out and said okay how do we prove that this is true it's not really how this works but it is how it worked in this really

[josh]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

explosive case you know on are the

[josh]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

big journalistic screw ups in fox's history

[josh]:

it's amazing like is hearing it it's so easy to want to make things like it's so easy to want to have a hypothesis right and then find only confirming

[andy_kroll]:

m

[josh]:

evidence for your hypothesis and we all do that but it's that's why you have like that's why you have a method that you used to correct for that so that you're not just using you know confirmation bias all the time but you know speaking of confirmation bias and this isn't going to be a good connection at all but i've heard that com at ping pong or whatever i s called that pizza shop is pretty good pizza at it and was that one of seth seth's favorite shops or what's the connection there

[andy_kroll]:

oh

[josh]:

something about piz comment pizza

[andy_kroll]:

ah

[josh]:

and seth and john podesta i don't know if we had like connect the dots connect the dots for us and then throw in hillary clinton too

[andy_kroll]:

oh man this is a whole podcast no just

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

so oh

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

after the twenty six ten election this theory forms online and it is a theory that kind of mutates from the ooze of the internet in part inspired by these leaked emails that week leagues published from john podesta who had run the clipton campaign and the theory holds that there is a pizza place in north west d c called comapingpon that is secretly the hub of this child sex trafficking operation presided over by podesta and hilary clinton and other democratic elite the even for this is one that john podesta talked about going to this pizza place in his emails and it's a well known popular delicious place in washington d c i've been there number time i even had my book party there just to have a little fun and the online sloths see these references to pizza and food and other things and potestas emails and decide that it must be code for sinister things like again child trafficking and other vile stuff so come pinkpom becomes the focus of a new conspiracy theory called pizza gate that you know in the basement of this pizza restaurant which actually doesn't have a basement there is this sinister operation happening these vile things are taking place down there the connection to seth actually is there are the multiple connections to one is that seth had helped show the world that you know these through leaking emails that there's no evidence that he leaked that democrats were you know corrupt doing evil things behind the scenes the gate was yet another instance of that and then the same people online by the way the same sleuths who are saying seth rich really was the leaguer he's like a new edward snowden they're the same ones who after the election pivot to oh wow now seth warned us about this stuff but now these other emails that are warning us about a new thing and so they know it's the same kind of online weird detectives who focused on seth for a while and then after that election start focusing on this pizza place it's their

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

new cause um now other one of these connections was the lawyer a fellow i write about in the book a name mike coley who helped the owner of common pink pom sort of pushed back against pizza gate

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

would go on to help represent

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

seth's older brother aaron when aaron got sucked into the whole conspiracy theory industrial complex in part because mike got le

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

ah

[andy_kroll]:

i had done this work for comment had kind of seen how this world works had figured out some tools some tactics a play book and then said as well i've got to help other people now that i have some experience doing this work and when i met mike and he told me you know that he was you know doing this work for air and rich at the time said well you know i learned some of these things from working for comment that was one of these little prickle moments when i was

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

h

[andy_kroll]:

thinking

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

m

[andy_kroll]:

oh wow like there are more connections here than i realized or there are care there's in this story who have multiple touch points along the way um you know there is a really compelling story to be told here whenever there is character character there are not just some bad people but people that you can root for as well who are trying to defend the truth and people's reputations all at once so it's s like pizza gate is kind of like in the same marvel synematic universe

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

m

[andy_kroll]:

as as the south rich story and then when an n comes along q and on is like whatever the whatever that last marvel movie was when all of the characters come together in finity or whatever

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

in game

[andy_kroll]:

game there you go

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

then it's like end game and on is where you pull all these things together and you know you have the end game marvel line game version

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

of an online is there is a theory

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah yeah it's so weird because i know that that you you were on or you were interviewed by by mike rough child

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

and we we had him on the show to talk

[andy_kroll]:

m

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

about canon and and it was like i mean one is just our

[andy_kroll]:

yes

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

minds were just

[andy_kroll]:

uh

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

like blown you know but people would

[andy_kroll]:

h

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

believe the stuff that they believe but but you know what tell you was that like one of the things i really liked about your book was that you really i think did a good job presenting kind of the human element of of what happens when these conspiracy theories

[andy_kroll]:

oh

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

start affecting your life so whether

[andy_kroll]:

ah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

that you know the the pizza shop owner or aaron or now mary and joel like like you really did a good job humanizing them where you you felt bad like like you wanted to just jump in the book and just like give

[andy_kroll]:

m

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

them give them up hug or

[andy_kroll]:

m

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

something because you're like you poor people you know like here you were just living your life and then now you've got like you know jack pulled pazabeic i don't

[andy_kroll]:

pazobiyeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

know how to say so you know like like coming into your your pizza parlor

[andy_kroll]:

oh

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

with like cameras and

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

just perpetuating this thing and it's just like it's just so so sad but but you did bring up at

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

um

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

got le and i and i and he's one of the don't i'm not sure if calling him a hero is the right word but he's he's one of the good guys i would say kind of in the story and so so two questions is he related to scott got leap

[andy_kroll]:

i don't believe so

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

okay

[andy_kroll]:

i i think i asked him at one point because the pandemic coincided with the story and i

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

hm

[andy_kroll]:

don't i don't believe he is

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

okay it's a very unique last name so i just figured that maybe there's some kind of another connection you

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

know

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

but but you know so he was one of the good guy lawyers but your book

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

talked about a number of different

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

lawyers both good

[andy_kroll]:

h

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

and bad and i was wondering

[andy_kroll]:

m

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

if maybe you can kind of give us who are some of the players

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

both good and bad and you

[andy_kroll]:

a

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

know some of the lawyers that we're kind of jumped into this probably with their own careers you know in mind not necesarilly trying to get to the bottom would happen you know then there are others like like me so so maybe you can kind of you run through who are some of the legal players in this

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

conspiracy

[andy_kroll]:

yeah i mean lawyers pop up all over this book

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yah

[andy_kroll]:

on the side of

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

m

[andy_kroll]:

i would say truth in integrity and reputation and all of that and on the other side as well and you know it was a

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

ah

[andy_kroll]:

useful reminder to me

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

maybe when i didn't necessarily need but that you know you can use a law degree in a barrow license in a lot of different directions sometimes in the defense of truth and justice and sometimes in other directions that maybe aren't necessarily in service of those values then i feel like a lawyer should be defending i mean i think one character who to this day i still remain fascinated by a fellow named jack berkman berkman is just this one of a kind washington d c creature he is a lawyer but at the time he comes into this story more of a lobbyist i mean he is he's a register lobbyist at the time but maybe when your listeners think of a lobbyist they think of someone who it is representing big companies or wealthy individuals they are you know the leading lobby to town for some the airline industry or the distilled spirits council of america whatever one of my favorite laban groups um call them big whiskey but berkman

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

uh

[andy_kroll]:

sort of alobbius for these sort

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

of weird fringy type companies and people and he is obsessed with attention he's obsessed with the limelight he sees the story of seth's murder and believes that it is a chance for him to inject himself into this tragedy and try to get the name jack barkman out to the world he offers a reward he kind of ingratiates himself with the rich family and then takes his own spin into conspiracy world at one point going on alex jones's show in fo wars the riches cut him off berkman never gives up the case and you don't want to totally spoil it the sort of berkman climactic moment for for your audience if they do read the book but you know there is this coin brothers s moment involving jack berkman a disgruntled associate of his

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

in a parking garage and our lington virginia just across the river there may or may not have been uh wounds suffered to the

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

uh

[andy_kroll]:

buttocks area

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

h yeah

[andy_kroll]:

for jack berkman that's how that's

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

how it is aline kind of ends um and again it was just another word his moments where it's like i cannot believe that this is

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

real that this actually happened and indeed you know berkman is such an outlandish character that even when the washington post and other local news let's reported this

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

incident in the garage we'll just call it that

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

m

[andy_kroll]:

i thought to myself like i've got to vent the heck out of this thing

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

so i filed a public records request with the arlington police department and i said i want the entire case file the jack workman garage incident

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

m

[andy_kroll]:

and lo and behold

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

it's like fifteen hundred pages long

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

and like the documentation in or you know like the

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

color of the cones in the parking garage

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

you know what what there was a woman

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

i believe who was staying at the hotel connected to the parking garage ah who heard burke when they were running out of the garage after this incident had taken place i mean every possible detail you can imagine is accounted for in this huge police report for this very bizarre incident

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

so that i so i put it in the book and you know in fairly good detail because the police collected

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

ah

[andy_kroll]:

all that detail so berkman you know is just one of these he's one of these characters who you know if they ever make this thing into a television or show or something i don't know

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

who they'd get to cast who they cast as him but i think that they would have fun with that challenge

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

you know and and you you bring up the level of detail and you know i i was just impressed with like i mean like you you read these things or you read the book thinking that you are

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

somehow like a fly

[andy_kroll]:

uh

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

on every wall you know

[andy_kroll]:

h

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

on all these stories and and i know like with with the bergman situation the you know there was an ink outer that you described with you know

[andy_kroll]:

oh

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

he was flirting with some of the you know female staff at the mariot and like he gave his number in the the staff threw his number in the trash and i'm just thinking like like how do you even know that like like like do you interview the staff at the mariater or is this sort of part of you know when you did the records quest like this is this is the level of detail that they had in the report

[andy_kroll]:

this was from the police report i mean unfortunately the key bridge mariot where all of this took place

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

i

[andy_kroll]:

it

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

has been closed down and

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

fri

[andy_kroll]:

i couldn't go in and find out employ because the whole thing boarded up at this point but that that employe had given a statement to the police very funny statement because he's

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

okay

[andy_kroll]:

like this clown comes in

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

all the time and he always does the same thing he comes up to the desk you know he flirts with the receptionist this time he gave me his phone number like

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

uh

[andy_kroll]:

the disdain is just

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

h

[andy_kroll]:

like dripping off the page

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

in this statement i mean so that you know that's it's why i enjoyed telling the story and having the space to tell it in a book because you know sometimes those details it cut when you're writing a shorter story and it's fire because people's attention know people's time is limited but with a book you can kind of you know put those little easter eggs in there hope people notice and hope people find and also you know this is a heavy book for sure and at times you know it's it's it is you know pretty emotional stuff for sure so i did try to when possible and within reason put some lighter stuff in there some some

[josh]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

some cheeky stuff just so that maybe you get a little bit of a laugh in between the like heavier stuff about seth's family the investigation and all that

[josh]:

yeah that i'm glad you did that i know it is such a such a heavy subject and and then the way in which it just blew up far beyond what anyone would ever ever think you know what what is the current and let me give a little

[andy_kroll]:

oh

[josh]:

context what's the current um state of

[andy_kroll]:

m

[josh]:

this conspiracy

[andy_kroll]:

m

[josh]:

in the conspiracy either out there i guess one thing i'm thinking is that correct me if i'm wrong that fox news came to a settlement with the rich family so they came to a well like millions of dollars or something like that they came to like some seven figure

[andy_kroll]:

hm

[josh]:

settlement right with rich family and you figure that that would say okay well this news agency retracted the story they had to shell out millions because of this story you would figure that if they had truth normally fox news doesn't just like shelling out millions to people

[andy_kroll]:

right

[josh]:

is my guest what does that say about the truth of this story and how people take it what kind of what what do people say about it now that it's all just that's what they want you to think they did it to cover it up or what do you think

[andy_kroll]:

yeah in the case of seth rich the theories about him reached such a high volume and such a large audience that based on everything i can tell there is no way to put them to bed forever there is no way to pardon the cliche put that genie back in the bottle even after fox retracted its story in may of twenty seventeen the story that miliazemerman had written even after they had settled with joe and mary rich in november of twenty twenty and even after erin had received an apology a retraction um and and resolved his own lawsuit law suit that was separate from his parents because he had his own specific claims this thrice conspiracy theory lives on there are people out there who take it this is an article of faith that he is who they believe he was that he did what they believe he did which is that he was this this leak or whistle blower person from the twenty six teen election you know the volume of the chatter about setthritch in certain places online twitter read it telegram whatever you know it ebbs and flows it's something will sort of spark it up and you'll see mentions of his name increase a little bit and then it will die down a bit but it will never go away it will never you know you just you can't can't and people from mentioning his name and at some point you just can't take that idea out of people's heads even in the face of all the contradictory evidence you could possibly marshal i mean in some corners you will find people as i've seen say fox must be in on it you know they were obvious they were some one put pressure on them to retract the story or they got weak need and they just wouldn't stand their ground and stand up for what really is the really is the truth truth and quotes um but these things just don't go go away unfortunately and i think that's that's one of the hardest things for joel and mary rich seth's parents i think they wish people would just stop talking about him certainly stop talking about him in this way accusing him of something that there's no evidence he did but now it's been it's been a six year

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

ah

[andy_kroll]:

process for them trying to get to a place where

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

ah oh

[andy_kroll]:

they can be they can co exist in that world they can be okay in a world where that they know that that chatter is happening somewhere out there and they don't know

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

you know i'm curious like kind of connecting the story to two

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

today um or today's time anyways

[andy_kroll]:

oh

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

with you know with elonmustakin over

[andy_kroll]:

yah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

twitter some of the

[andy_kroll]:

ah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

twitter accounts that you mentioned in your book specifically like at couch um you

[andy_kroll]:

yah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

know like now he's back on twitter

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

um and and you know connected to that is you know alex jones just had this huge a law suit you know thing that was settled and you know hundreds of millions of dollars that he would have to pay for deformation

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

because of the sandy hook comments he's made on a show like what what impact you know do you think both you know sort of the resurrection of some of these really really horrible twitter accounts coming back online and you know defamation law suit and sandy hook do you think plays into you know the seth ridge story end or closure for for mary and njole

[andy_kroll]:

yeah yeah i think that you're describing events that are sort of pulling in opposite directions

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

okay

[andy_kroll]:

i think that elon musk time running twitter so far seems to be marked by a belief that

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

por

[andy_kroll]:

more aggressive content moderation more enforcement of terms of service i mean belief that a private social platform should police that platform around harmful this information that that is not a priority possibly not even necessary at all i think that's why you're seeing folks like couches back he had been suspended for i think ovid related this information but tons of other accounts i mean andrew england you know one of the foremost no notis in america back on to twitter eventually um clearly twitter is moving in a direction where there is less oversight and policing of harm all distinformation and so you will see things like the sethrich series covidmisinformation pizza gae mean you name it you will see that stuff grow in volume grow in number twitter and it's just that's just a fact that there's been some early research suggesting that this information has seen an uptecintwitter but it's pretty pretty early right now to have a clear sense of that so you have the musk era on twitter pulling in one direction but i think you do on the other hand pulling in th other direction are these law suits that are in some cases just concluded are still under way in the other that i do think have a determined effect on people out there who think that they can say whatever they want about other individuals even if it defames them harms their reputation so on the alp jones cases i mean he's at this point i think facing more than a billion dollars and potential you know damages that he has to pay and that could change as the cases get appealed or those settlements get ironed out but that's a pretty big price to have that's a pretty big penalty for telling harmful lies which what alex jones did i think you have the fox news dominion case in the fox new smarmatic case under way where those voting machine companies have alleged that fox defame them by seeing crazy conspiracy theories on

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

on air how those play of it as well

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

so you know

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

a

[andy_kroll]:

i think that these cases not to mention joan mary's case in erin's case i do think that that they send a signal

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

two people out there

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

someone is watching and there

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

m

[andy_kroll]:

could be accountability

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

if you spread these conspiracy theories about people that have no basis in fact and that damage their reputation

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

damage their livelihood so you know it's a it's a it's interesting time for looking at these questions reporting on these questions feels like positive movement in one realm and backsliding in another

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah it's funny you mentioned dominion and there was a

[andy_kroll]:

oh

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

there's a belief i forgot who was promoting that in your book but you said that like

[andy_kroll]:

m

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

dominion was accused of being a part the south rich conspiracy

[andy_kroll]:

patrick

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

here

[andy_kroll]:

burn yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

said that i mean again it's another one of these these connections like what josh was seeing earlier and i think it just speaks to how

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

okay

[andy_kroll]:

sadly the theories about seth the baseless theories about seth have risen to this level where it's like yeah we'll just you know we'll pull him in for anything voting machines to g q and on whatever you

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

know mean i wouldn't be surprised if someone had some covid theory that somehow pulled seth in because his name has become just sort of not a shorthand but it just has to be it's just right there for people who are already swimming in this conspiratorial soup something that they can just grab on to easily because they already believe that he's part of this world

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah you know so so one probably one of the most interesting

[andy_kroll]:

m

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

characters that i thought that

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

you had in your book was a character by the name of deb sins and

[andy_kroll]:

yep

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

i'm curious if you can maybe explain a little bit about who she was or is um you know the relevancy and and why why you chose to incorporate her in kind of the broader story

[andy_kroll]:

the first reason i wanted to bring her in was i wanted to see how well the obvious one is i wanted to have some element of the actual homicide investigation threaded into the book we have the sort of story line of the rich family we have the story line of the conspiracy theories themselves and how they evolved i wanted someone who could be the law enforcement character for lack of a better way to put it you know there was a detective who worked on the case for a while i tried to get to him but was was unable to do mention him in the book um guy named dela camera but signs i realized head but by the time i was sort of deep into the reporting the book she had retired because she was a veteran homicide prosecutor er in d c and then retired so i thought okay well maybe i can get to her she's retired she should be able to talk about this case hopefully she will i wrote her a letter by hand

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

uh

[andy_kroll]:

and mailed it to her hoping that that gesture

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

would

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

you know engender some kind of interest good will trust and thankfully she in the end did end up talking to me and and we we talked quite a lot for the book and and of course once i got to know her she is you know she's like an amazing character

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

an actual character

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

you know she's she's chain smoking foul mouthed

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

where's chuck taylor's to the office

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

you know she listens to

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

fifty cent before a trial to

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

get pumped up for for you know her opening testimony i mean like she is you can't make this kind of thing up she go to a character um and you know the other thing that that that i hope comes across is in the form of her character in her story was she had investigated tons of homicides high profile cases you know doubles triples quadruple homicides politically sensitive cases but you know this is one of the first cases she'd ever done where this whole world of online conspiracy theorizing collided with the very tangible physical world of homicide investigations and i thought that that was an interesting and a new kind of collision was how those online theories not just intersected but actually made it more difficult for her got in the way her work trying to solve this homicide which in the end she didn't do she didn't solve the case the case is on going to this day but that was something i thought you know we hadn't really seen that other stories at this point to that collision i really wanted to get across

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah you know i was i was thinking i think her her character would would probably be be well portrayed by like joe foster or like a sagorny weaver or something

[andy_kroll]:

oh she yeah science would love that to hear you say that yeah she would she would be she would be i think flattered

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

by any of those people

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

but

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

the reason i had asked you you know why why you included her

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

which which which

[andy_kroll]:

oh

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

i'm glad you did was you know there

[andy_kroll]:

m

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

was there was a change and kind of like the tense that you wrote the book and when it got to describing like your last interaction with her

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

it was very very first person kind of oriented and this might just be like inside our baseball stuff like was that an intentional you know like change

[andy_kroll]:

oh

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

of tense and

[andy_kroll]:

ah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

narrative like

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

was it personal like to you

[andy_kroll]:

yeah good question that chapter or that i can't emer if it's an entire chapter if it's part of a chapter but was not there in the first draft of the book that i had written um m i think the way the way i sort of ended her story line initially was with her retirement you know she bit basically she has a meeting with robert muller's two people from robert muller's team who were investigating the russian interference in twenty sixteen and you know she has a meeting with them to just kind of give them an update on this high profile case that she had and then she he basically rides off into the sunset she retires and you know unfortunately the case is not solved she calls erin she tells him you know i'm sorry that i couldn't this thing over the finish line but i'm exhausted and it's time for me to go and i ended it there and i think it was my agent david who was like this is you can't end it here you can't this is like it's either to you know our sure needs one more beat or you know we need to hear from her one more time at least leave the reader with the clearest sense possible of like what did she think happened she investigated this case with more tools at her disposal than anyone else the murder specifically i'm talking about we need like one more beat with her one more scene with her where she just says like this is now this is what i think happened and i thought to myself like don't i don't really have anything other than like when i down there when i went when i went down to visit her to interview her and david was like okay well what was that like like well you know i got there and it was like midday and we went out and sat by her pool and she started smoking a cigarette and asked me if i wanted to take a shot of jack daniels it was like eleven thirty on a

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

tuesday or something and david was like yeah i'm pretty sure that's your that's your last scene with her right like taking a shot of daniel's and then

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

talking about the case i think you probably should include that okay

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

uh h

[andy_kroll]:

i really didn't

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

h

[andy_kroll]:

want to include much of myself in there obviously that the prologue is you know it's me because i've kind of

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

hm

[andy_kroll]:

and to establish the like why you're about to go on this journey early on

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

m

[andy_kroll]:

and the little the little personal connection there and i was reluctant to put myself back in but in the end that was that was the best thing i had and um you know and there's a little bit more obviously there's there's me me with her and then me meeting with joe and mary in new york so you know and i thought okay you know like salt with cooking you know if you use it sparingly and in the right places it's okay but if you start dumping it over everything

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

unnecessarily

[josh]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

you've ruined your you've ruined

[josh]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

your dish

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

h

[andy_kroll]:

so i thought a little bit of first person at the end i could get away with hopefully

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

a

[josh]:

yeah that makes sense you know to bring that variety i know that as you know the pastor preparing talk every week there is much more that

[andy_kroll]:

m

[josh]:

i research then include and the actual final

[andy_kroll]:

oh yeah

[josh]:

product and i'm wondering

[andy_kroll]:

yah

[josh]:

what did

[andy_kroll]:

ah

[josh]:

you not include what didn't make it into the book that you maybe wished could have but for limitations that it couldn't

[andy_kroll]:

yeah my tons of stuff just you know

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

as you my experience is very similar to what you just described and it's a mix of material too that didn't make it you know there was some pretty interesting stuff about the week that elapsed between when fox news published malia zimmerman story about seth and when they retracted that same story a week later this is all in may of twenty seventeen and this is you know probably one of the main climactic moments of the book m certainly when the set thrice conspiracy the he's reached their highest volume by far um you know there's a week of sort of internal chaos and scrambling and trying to understand what happened how this story the fox had published almost immediately begins to crumble because everyone involved in saying it's not true now i got some material on the inside there and i had some you know some some some second hand material as well that i really tried to confirm or tried to to nail down um as accurately as possible and i just honestly ran out of time i couldn't i couldn't you know some time my editor was like you you can't keep reporting like the book is has to be what it is right now that one hurt that on definitely hurt because i would have loved to have that stuff in there including some stuff about sonanity you know there there was i would have liked to have included more about seth um as his personality his his world view i mean i have you now just so many stories dozens and does and dozens of stories that i thought teased out some piece of his personality of what made him unique what made him him and you know you just can't do that i mean the book is not a biography of seth and i really had to be brutal with myself about picking the anecdotes picking the quotes from friends family et cetera that i thought could bring him to life as as quickly as possible in the book because then the story had to progress it had to move on from there and you know again probably had like fifty pages worth of stuff seth but i couldn't put fifty pages of that in the book you know they think a reader would say okay i get it like where does the story go from here so that was that was tough as well

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

i would say probably i would probably those two those two are the hardest

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

to

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

to to leave out now

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

well so my my last question for you is you know revolves around mary joll and aaron who who play you know or actually say play that

[andy_kroll]:

oh

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

their stories are emphasized quite a bit throughout throughout your book and now

[andy_kroll]:

m

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

again it's like as a parent i could only i can't imagine what they had to go through through the several years and on going of the murder of their child so i mean like for you as the writer of the book um one like did you did you seek out their approval before the it was written or you know or did you sort of like circle back after it was written to kind of get their approval and like and what was that like because it's almost like even though you're you're telling the story

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

from sort of a investigative journalists viewpoint but you're also telling the story about a murdered child you know these parents and like i could it had to have been a heavy burden for you to make sure that you got it right um so so maybe you can talk a little bit about that process of kind of getting the family's approval to write the story

[andy_kroll]:

yeah i mean i would say i felt a tremendous responsibility and weight to

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

get the story right two again try to capture seth as best as i could and

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

a

[andy_kroll]:

you know to to do all of it to do all of this to write this book in a way that was um m at that sensitive to what they had gone through and you know didn't feel

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

exploitative i didn't feel like i was extracting their story for my own purposes and though in part that is what i do and that is what any story teller does when you go to someone and say you know can i tell your story i mean my i mean law since lost track of the number of times i've talked with joel

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

true

[andy_kroll]:

and mary

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

thank

[andy_kroll]:

and aron and you know i interviewed them all a number of times over a span of a few years i was always calling them in checking this fact checking this recollection i interviewed i interviewed joe mary together and i interviewed them separately and you know there was a story that joel told i would ask mary about that same story and a lot of the time she would have a slight different and in a few cases significantly different

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

m

[andy_kroll]:

take

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

h

[andy_kroll]:

on that same

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

m

[andy_kroll]:

story

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

okay

[andy_kroll]:

that's just you know it's good for the book because the story that the reporting is richer and more accurate um but that's also what reporters have to do you have to do your due diligence you have to see

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

a moment and anecdote an event from every angle that you possibly can because every person's

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

recollection of that event is going to be different when when i had a draft that was ready for fact checking i wouldn't say i sought out their approval or their sign off because you know they had signed off on co operating with the project and that that was what i would call

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

the sign off point but then when i had the draft you know i went to them and i said all right we're going to go through this in fact check every fact in this every recollection even the stuff for you know you said that you were feeling anxious at this point you were feeling furious at this point is that actually what you felt like can we double check that and the good thing about a really really intense fact checking process is not only do you catch things that weren't that weren't right and you fix them you know it also deepens the it deepens the story and improves the story because a lot of times someone like mary will say yeah you know now that i'm thinking about it there was this other thing that happened or this other conversation that took place that i forgot to tell you about but that my head is in this space i remembered it so it actually it's fact checking but it's even its own form of reporting and it's the same kind of thing that we do at pro public to be clear you know once we have the story then we go to everyone in the story and we say is this accurate is this you know framed correctly this is the kind of context in which it appears is that accurate is that favor you know it's a laborious exhausting process

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

m

[andy_kroll]:

but it's essential to making to making the story accurate and and compelling and fair and good

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

so we did all that before the book came out mary is kind of a night owl so i think one of our conversations she tested me like factchckin conversation she tested me like a leven she's like can

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

m

[andy_kroll]:

we do the call now and

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

uh

[andy_kroll]:

oh sure

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

okay

[andy_kroll]:

and i think we were on the phone till like five in the morning

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

m

[andy_kroll]:

just like line literally

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

oh

[andy_kroll]:

point by point

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

ah

[andy_kroll]:

by point by point by point going through these things from the from the draft of the book and you know and making sure it was all m completely locked down and then and then i sent them the book and you know i think that they said they really like the book they really like the parts of it about seth not surprisingly they said that they said that they're the that they felt like it was one of the first things written about this whole saga that didn't just sort of paint them as like the two dimensional grieving parents no

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

joan mary rich always always mentioned as a paring always kind of the same notes and and descriptions and i think that they appreciated that that that was the case here i will say i've given the name and some of the themes of this podcast you know one of the most revealing conversations i had about them and actually a conversation that really helped me see them as individuals and not as a joint unit was with their rabbi

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

m

[andy_kroll]:

out in omaha you know at one point i had a conversation with with him and great guy and really smart very very you know sort of a deep thinker pathetic guy and he helped me kind of understand the two of them as individuals and i think that that really helped with the book as well but but yeah the they've seen they said they really like the book and i think they appreciate it when people come up to them and they say they've learned something about seth i'm reading the book i think that means a lot joan marry as well

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

m

[andy_kroll]:

so you know that i feel good about that then i think that then i feel good about that too

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

that's that's really awesome i mean there's there's so much more we didn't even get into i mean there is

[andy_kroll]:

m oh

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

like you know

[josh]:

her

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

dr save the steve kalis connection

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

the like overstock so the julian i sang

[andy_kroll]:

yeah

[josh]:

oh

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

source i mean like really there's just so much involved and in so much like so much we could get into but for those watching listening you just have to buy the book

[andy_kroll]:

please

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

and ah and you know help help the book you know surpass the com and it's man um from ma maggie haber

[andy_kroll]:

i don't

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

man

[andy_kroll]:

think that's going to happen but

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah

[andy_kroll]:

you know i'm happy to be in the conversation with maggie yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

and

[josh]:

that's awesome

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

yeah and and thank you so much and for giving us ome

[josh]:

yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

of your time for writing the book it was

[josh]:

yeah

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

a pleasure

[josh]:

thank you

[andy_kroll]:

i always enjoy it guys thank you for taking the time to you know read the book and absorb what's in it and to talk about i really enjoyed this

[josh]:

yes

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

thank you and to our listeners we will see you next week so

[josh]:

see

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

take

[josh]:

you guys

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

everybody

[josh]:

next week

[will_wright__faithful_politics_]:

let's see you

People on this episode

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Pastor Josh Burtram (Faithful Host)

Host
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Will Wright (Political Host)

Host