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Generation In-Between: A Xennial Podcast
Xennial co-hosts Dani and Katie talk about their analog childhoods, digital adulthoods and everything in between.
Generation In-Between: A Xennial Podcast
True Crime of the 1980s: A Xennial Deconstruction
CONTENT WARNING: This episode includes descriptions of violence and even murder. Please use caution when listening.
What were the real-life true crime stories that sent a shiver down your spine during childhood? When you think "serial killer," do you think of movies like Silence of the Lambs?
If you grew up in the era of stranger danger and the Satanic panic, you might be a Xennial. And we are too.
Join us for Part 1 of our True Crime series.
Katie, our resident true crime aficionado, and Dani, who usually prefers fictional horrors, revisit some of the most notorious crimes of the 1980s and talk about why crime was on an uptick during the decade.
For more information on the crimes discussed in this episode, Katie suggests listening to:
The Murder of Adam Walsh via Crime Junkie
The Preppy Killer / Murder of Jennifer Levin via Crime and Coffee Couple
The Attack on Theresa Saldana via True Crime Podcast
The Atlanta Child Murders via Atlanta Monster Podcast Series
The Night Stalker Richard Ramirez via Morbid
The Central Park Five via True Crime Obsessed
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Email us at generationinbetweenpodcast@gmail.com
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Do your foundational memories about crime revolve around the war on drugs?
Dani Combs:Were you scared to go to New York City, specifically Times Square, as a young person because of its crime-ridden streets?
Katie Parsons:If you avoided taking candy from strangers, unusual white vans and getting in vehicles with anyone who didn't know your family's secret code word, you might be an 80s baby and a Xenial, and we are too Hi, I'm Katie.
Dani Combs:And I'm Dani and welcome everyone to Generation In Between, a Xenial podcast where we remember, we revisit and we sometimes relearn all kinds of things from our 80s childhoods and 90s teen and young adulthoods.
Katie Parsons:Yes, and today we've got part one of a two-parter for you on true crime of the 80s and 90s, starting, of course, with the 1980s. Dani, how excited are you for this two-part series? Well, what's the scale?
Dani Combs:well, what's the scale? Are we doing? Zero to ten? I'm at a five guys, because I am not a true crime junkie like katie. We know katie loves some true crime. I don't like it, as y'all know. I've mentioned that before on past episodes, because it's real life. And now I'm saying all this as I just spent part of today watching pet cemetery and then I also last night, when I couldn't sleep which we'll get into that in a minute I was watching on YouTube, um, old episodes of tales from the crypt. We also watched the shining a few nights ago. So I, I like scary stuff. I just don't want it to be real. Okay, I just I don't want it to be real. So I'm a little nervous Actually. Um, I do. We'll tell you what we're doing, how we're recording, in just a moment. But I actually have a glass of wine while we're recording. Do not worry, it is seven, 24 at night and she at home located on Florida's East Coast.
Katie Parsons:we didn't see a ton of destruction, of course you know some people still did, but it threw off the schedule of everyone all week, as natural disasters do.
Dani Combs:Yeah, facts and yeah, so our schedule is all wonky. Plus, katie's studio doesn't have power currently. We don't know, it should come back on soon. Question mark. We don't know, it should come back on soon. Question mark.
Katie Parsons:Yeah, I, I'm told any moment. Now I been checking the Florida power and light site because it'll tell you, like, if your power has been restored and not yet. And that's normally where we record. And recording at either of our homes was not really an option, because our kids have like a six day weekend at this point because of the hurricane and indigenous people's day on monday, so they've got um. So there's many of them and friends, and especially at katie's house, that's, and mostly at my house. I um so okay.
Katie Parsons:So hopefully, even if you're listening where you normally listed, you should go check out our youtube, because we said we're going to post this on our YouTube no matter what. So that's just Generation In Between podcast. If you just look us up on YouTube, I'm going to put it in the show notes too. This will be on there and hopefully we'll have at least the audio from other episodes going up soon and maybe more video coming, video coming. But, um, I am in my bathroom and you can only see from, like I don't know, my rib cage up, and so, danny, was like are you sitting on your toilet?
Katie Parsons:it totally looks like you're. I laugh and it's so hard.
Dani Combs:I am not, but I could see why she would think that it's also like super white behind you, so she looks like she's on a toilet in heaven. Plus. Plus she's wearing like a headset, like I was like. Oh, you look like a nice gamer, yeah, we're we are a mess right now.
Katie Parsons:I have my hoops behind the gamer headset. You do.
Dani Combs:I am not prepared. I have a hair appointment tomorrow. Um, you know priorities after uh, and my hair looks bad. I'm sitting in my. I'm sitting in my little chair. I have in my bedroom that is a reader's corner. Um, if you're on YouTube, you can see. I'll give you a little peek at my, my little books right there. That's just some of them. So I'm in my nice little grandma chair, but the lighting is terrible.
Katie Parsons:So if we end up doing anything like this in the future, we have an idea of how to record simultaneously on our phones for video, maybe in the studio with some ring lights, so that may be coming. But if we end up doing any more like this, um, we'll have to figure out um mics and lights and all of that. But this is just our like hey, we're just gonna go for it.
Dani Combs:And here we are we don't want to mess up and not have an episode. So here it is exactly, exactly um.
Katie Parsons:So whether you are looking at this on youtube or you are listening, normally, we're glad you're here. If you were in Hurricane Milton's path or Hurricane Helene, I hope you're well. Hopefully you have power and a home, and if you are dealing with anything like flooding I know our listener, candy, had some flooding before the hurricanes like unrelated In her house, oh, oh no so she's been like you know how it is to like, yes, gut and renovate.
Katie Parsons:So she's been dealing with all of that and then we've had like back-to-back hurricanes. But, um, I just talked to her earlier. She, she seems to be doing okay. They were out of power for a little bit. It's back. So, um, we're thinking of you guys and hopefully you are in a good place and, if not, um, we're sending our good vibes to get back to that good place soon yes okay, so back to the topic at hand, which is true crime of the 80s.
Katie Parsons:So we are 80s, I know, I know, it's okay, look I had to boil it down.
Katie Parsons:I had had to boil it down and I think you're really going to like the discussion component. I think you're going to have a lot to say. It's not all. Here's what happened to people and here's the crimes. There I do have some, but it's kind of more of like a cultural look 80s, which then will feed into the 90s, but kind of where it's all coming from. So we're 80s babies. I was born in 82. Danny was born in 80. So, like a lot of the crime that was happening in the 80s I wasn't necessarily noticing in real time. Like there are things I remember hearing about as I got older or, of course, now there's like true crime podcasts, of which I am a listener, and documentaries and all of that but as a kid I don't really remember like thinking about a lot of these things. Um, so I've heard some of these cases I'm going to talk about today, but I don't remember hearing about them as a kid. But Danny, what about you?
Dani Combs:Well, as I've talked about before, I was a scaredy cat child. Um, my sister was so funny. I was talking to her on the phone before the storm hit. She was calling, cause she lives in Oregon now. She used to live in Louisiana, she made it through Katrina, so like, anyway, she also gets storm anxiety, but now she's away from them. So she called me and we were chatting. She was like um, she's like I was talking about you at work today because I was telling them how nervous, like how anxious you are. And they were like oh well, that's probably because of Katrina. And my sister said no, Danny just came out of the womb with anxiety. She's right, they just change sometimes.
Dani Combs:But as a kid I feel like I did I was aware of crime stuff because my grandma was around a lot and my dad also watched the news. They were big news watchers and so I did know, because my ears would perk up because I was scared, Right. So like, of course you're scared, You're like extra aware of things that are going on. Of course I can. I can think of some in my head, but I'm not going to say them until I'm sure you'll probably talk about them. So mostly, though, what I remember true crime stuff was 90s, because that's when we were a little older.
Katie Parsons:Right, yes, same Same. That's when we were a little older, right, yes, same same. In fact, I had to look a few up because I was like I think that was 90s and most of the ones that came to my mind immediately remembering as I was growing up, are in the 90s. So yeah, those are coming. And just a note about true crime.
Katie Parsons:I totally understand what you're saying, danny, and I think there is and this is not you, by the way but I know there's a school of thought that, like, true crime can be kind of like kind of exploiting victims and that sort of thing, and there is some of that that certainly goes on, like people talking about these terrible stories for their own like sake. I try really hard to cultivate content that kind of goes beyond that. You know, prime Junkie is a huge one. That's arguably the biggest true crime podcast out there, and it started because its host was a member of Crime Stoppers and was trying to like help solve cold cases and things like that, and all the money they make goes back into these organizations that actually fight for victims' rights and to change laws, and they fund organizations that do open cold cases and try to get answers for people. So I really try to think of it like what can we learn from these things for our own safety?
Katie Parsons:But also, there might be families out there that are still looking for answers that they couldn't get in the 80s or the 90s or the 70s or whenever, but now the technology exists but nobody's got the money to do it, and so some of these advocates for that, you know, are who I try to follow. There's an organization called Season of Justice, which is just that, that like we're in a season of justice now, where we have the tools to solve a lot of these, and it's a nonprofit that funds those types of things. So I just wanted to say that, like there is a whole like oh, my God, like, oh you just listened to that because of whatever, like it, I don't know, it's salacious and and and it is, you know, which unfortunately makes it kind of interesting. But there's also a side that, like these are real people, and some of them are, some of their families are still looking for answers.
Dani Combs:Yeah, I think that's part of it too for me is that you know, I, you can't separate. Like I always tell my kids, like you can't ever separate somebody's humanity. So, like, even though you're hearing a story, it's very easy for us to trick ourselves to think like to separate. Do you know what I mean? Like, when you're hearing a story, you want to separate, but I just cannot do that. Like I can't, like I always will think of like the victim and their family and like what was going on.
Dani Combs:And you know, with serial killers and all of that, I have like some friends who are like obsessed with like serial killer stuff which I don't know why. They are movies. I just think about all these victims that are just thrown into a movie for two seconds and then you know that's it for entertainment purposes. I can't. I think that's why I have a hard time too. I can't separate Like I just I just think of the loss, especially when it's children, or like violence against women. I just have a real aversion. But I'm a big girl and I'm going to make it through today.
Katie Parsons:Yeah, I mean every point you're making is is totally valid. I know when the most recent Dahmer documentary came out, or?
Dani Combs:it wasn't.
Katie Parsons:I don't even think it was a documentary.
Dani Combs:It was more of like a mini series. It was a movie they did. The guy who was in American Horror Story the first season, that guy Great actor, yeah, there was some stuff.
Katie Parsons:There was some stuff with that, where the victim's families weren't notified, they weren't compensated. You know, imagine that was your family back in the 70s and now it's 2024. If you're still living and like fighting for this person.
Katie Parsons:So you know, I, I, there's definitely some things around that that are problematic a hundred percent, so I would like to acknowledge that, because that does exist. Um, and I think in general we can do better, and here we are doing one. But don't worry, I'm going to try to actually drop some knowledge on you today and not just talk about crime.
Katie Parsons:So, I'm here for the knowledge. I'm here for the knowledge. Let's start there, right? So I think we need to look at an overview of what crime in America really looked like in the 1980s. Of course there was crime everywhere. I'm just mainly going to talk about America here.
Katie Parsons:The 80s actually saw a very significant rise in crime rates, particularly violent crime in the US. So FBI data found that crime, violent crime, increased through the 1970s, through the early 1980s, peaking in 1980, right. So it kind of went as high as it could go in 1980, tapered off a little and then, once 1990 hit, it actually really dropped and has not gotten back to those levels. So I think that's just like important to note that we're actually statistically safer today than we were in 1980 as far as being average citizens. So, um, so the we have to mention. I mentioned the war on drugs in the uh intro, but, um, there really was a crack cocaine epidemic. Now how we attacked that as a nation, right, uh, is questionable, but there was a lot of that happening. And because of the sale of it and just you know how people's brain states are altered when drugs are involved homicides did double between 1985 and 1990. And in 1990, that year murders peaked in New York City. 2,245 people murdered in New York City alone.
Dani Combs:Do you think that's because the population was rising as well there in New York at that time?
Katie Parsons:Could be. Yeah, I mean, those things could definitely be related.
Dani Combs:I wanted to ask when you mentioned a few minutes ago, you said that there was an increase in violent crime. Is that the definition of a violent crime, like when it involves a weapon?
Katie Parsons:So violent crime includes murder, rape or sexual assault, robbery and aggravated assault.
Dani Combs:Okay.
Katie Parsons:Most of the time that will include a weapon, but it doesn't have to Okay. Generally aggravated assault does mean there's a weapon, but it doesn't have to. Okay, generally aggravated assault Does mean there's a weapon, otherwise it's just assault, like different degrees of assault. So in general it would include a weapon, something like a knife or a gun, but not always.
Dani Combs:Okay.
Katie Parsons:Because you can commit violence without a weapon.
Dani Combs:With just your two bare hands. Or if you're a cat, what do you mean? Because I just watched Pet Sematary.
Katie Parsons:Sorry.
Dani Combs:Oh oh. Like what.
Katie Parsons:Oh my gosh, a cat no sorry, You've never seen it right.
Dani Combs:Sorry, I shouldn't have said that is the one I have.
Katie Parsons:Oh, you have seen. You have seen that one I had, but then I got the ending completely wrong when we were talking about it with hunt. But um, I have seen that one. I thought the cat came back.
Dani Combs:So I mean, I don't know he does, he does, but he's the first one thing to come back anyway.
Katie Parsons:So that's what it was, sorry okay, yeah, listen, listen to our Stephen King episode. All right, so we kind of already touched on homicide. Rates were going up. Okay, violent crime, which we just talked about, did peak in 1981. The statistic is 596 incidents per 100,000 people. I did not do the percentages on that, but apparently that's pretty high.
Dani Combs:I'm interested to know when it's documented crime right, because obviously it has to be documented crime correct To have these statistics yeah.
Dani Combs:Yeah right, I'm curious to know. I'm always like, whenever we have numbers for crime rates in metropolitan areas where there are people of various income levels, etc. Etc. I'm always like how accurate are they and how many people were wrongly, um, arrested or whatever? Not that, not that there wasn't stuff going on, because I don't know, I wasn't there, but I always and I'm not questioning your research, I that's just something that always pops into my brain when I was like I wonder, I always wonder that with any number related to our criminal justice system and our police force.
Katie Parsons:I mean it's a great point. It's got to be more nuanced than just like the number of arrests for oh yeah things. Oh yeah, and and to your, there's so many unreported right. So we're saying we're safer now because in 1980, like all these things were reported. But for one, sex trafficking is a way bigger problem now than in 1980. And a lot of that we don't even know the extent of it because they're not finding these people and arresting these people and breaking up these rings.
Katie Parsons:So that's like one example where it's like, oh, we're safer, but is there just all this crime sort of happening? And then where they're just arrest. There is some of that in the 80s, for sure, you know quotas, things like that, trying to clean up the war on drugs, that kind of padded, some arrests, right. So you're right, it's more nuanced than just the numbers on the page. For sure, property crime also was pretty high in the 80s. So that's you know, burglary, motor vehicle theft. There were over 5,300 property crimes per 100,000 people. So that's about eight times as many as violent crimes were property. That's a lot, yeah, that's a lot. So anyway, it's kind of just giving you a picture, at least based on, like the public records available to us then and now. It was much higher in the 80s than it had been in the 50s, 60s, 70s, and then it actually tapered off some in the 90s. So there's lots of different things we'll get into as to why that might be. So there's lots of different things we'll get into as to why that might be. Some we already touched on. Potentially it wasn't any higher, it was just being reported at a higher rate.
Katie Parsons:So in my notes here I have serial killer part, because I'm not going to talk about any particular serial killer, but I think we can't talk about 1980s true crime without mentioning serial killers. Okay, the idea of a serial killer, or you know, a person who thrives on murdering people and like more than one person, that idea wasn't born in the 1980s, right? So serial killers have been around for all time, of course, but in American culture they really became a conversation piece beginning in the 1970s-ish, due in part a lot to the Ted Bundys of the world. He wasn't the only one, but, as I mentioned earlier, his crimes took place he only over the course of four years, which is wild to me, course of four years, which is wild to me 1974 to 78, and then he was arrested and tried and all the things died in 1990 in prison.
Katie Parsons:So the term serial killer is generally attributed to a former FBI special agent named Robert Ressler, who he popularized the phrase serial homicide in the 1970s to describe a pattern of multiple murders committed over a period of time with a cooling off period between killings, and this basically kind of took off from there. So serial homicides turned into like the crimes of serial killers and that's the concept we understand today. So I think a lot of people think like you go on the killing spree, but it's actually for true serial killers. It's more calculated than that and this cooling off period is a part of it, which is kind of scary because terrified like I, it's terrifying I don't know what my face looks like because it's in a tiny box at the top of my screen that I can't see.
Dani Combs:But if y'all are watching youtube, I don't know what my face looks like because it's in a tiny box at the top of my screen that I can't see. But if y'all are watching YouTube, I don't know, like Katie's like giving this definition in my face, I feel it go like oh no, let's go, we don't need to.
Katie Parsons:I'm like we can't talk about this without talking about serial killers. And Dan is like, yes, we can actually. I mean, we can actually we could I?
Katie Parsons:mean I brought it up, though to be fair, I did bring it up. See, there you go. So there were definitely more serial killers coming to light in the 80s, for sure, I think. Um, I read quite a few articles and commentary on on this particular thing and, like the Ted Bundy situation was in most American people's minds an anomaly like a freak thing kind of like, and I mean it was.
Katie Parsons:But it was kind of in the 1980s that as more of these types of criminals came to light that it became less of like a wow, that's a wild thing. That's never happened in the history of time to oh no, like these people live among us and it happens more than we know, right, like more than we realize, and certainly we have a concept of that today for sure. But in the 80s is where that was really coming about. So I found one stat that said in the 80s there were at least 200 active serial killers in the United States alone 200. That they were trying to find had similar patterns caught. Some of them didn't catch other ones. However, there's some good news there was a downward trend over the next two decades in that.
Dani Combs:Because they got better at it, see. Maybe, See, that's where my brain goes. If you have an anxious brain, that's where your brain goes is because they learn from people's errors and they're like also, Hollywood also does that when you watch what was that movie with um Brad Pitt and they were tracing, it was seven. It was seven. That was the name of it. Seven yeah okay, when I think of serial killers, I think of that movie and I think of Silence of the Lambs yeah, scary. I just can't, and that's not even real.
Katie Parsons:But oh yeah so you just touched on something like the media situation which is a component of what I was the next part I'm going to talk about.
Katie Parsons:I found this really good piece on the atlantic that delved into the why of the rise in serial killers, particularly in the 80s into the 90s. There there's a lot to deconstruct, but they interviewed some criminologists and there was this guy, james Allen Fox, from Northeastern University in Boston, and in this article he said the rise in the serial killings in that era had a bunch of roots. Right, but first was that rise in violent crime right? Even if you weren't part of it or you weren't a victim of one, it was becoming a bigger part of American fabric because it was there and you were hearing about it and, whether it was more or not, the feeling that this is just a part of life was kind of happening in everyone's brains. They were witnessing and hearing more about it in everyone's brains. They were witnessing and hearing more about it. So there's that People were becoming more mobile and this happened really 60s, 70s, 80s.
Katie Parsons:But they weren't staying in the city where they were born and raised. More people were moving other places and moving more than once or twice or whatever. You have a military family, so maybe the military has always been doing that, but citizens were doing this more often. It was easier to do. There were more established suburbs throughout the country, so a lot of times people just didn't know each other as well. Right, you could have a neighbor who just moved in. You don't know where they came from. And when you couple that with the next thing, I'm going to say horrible. Not horrible, it's just. The technology didn't exist. There was no databases talking to each other.
Dani Combs:For real.
Katie Parsons:Yes, so if you move from Utah to Florida, nobody in Florida can like run anything on you to find out what you did in Utah. Could law enforcement make phone calls? Of course, but if?
Dani Combs:you don't give any reason for that.
Katie Parsons:Why would they? Why would they? And so there were a lot of quote unquote bad people that could move around undetected and commit crimes, and people in the new place wouldn't necessarily know. That's a lot harder to do today Still possible, but a lot harder. And then, on top of it, dna evidence was in infancy, like that people couldn't figure out, based on finger, maybe fingerprints, but any sort of like bodily DNA, who had been where. And even if they kept those things knowing, okay, we might be able to use this at some point. Again, there's no database to run that against, which is wild.
Dani Combs:Because you think about, like I don't know, the 80s was 40 something years ago, right, like. But in reality that's not that long a time ago because and you think of all the technology, all the things that exist now related to crimes, like you said DNA testing, the database I didn't even think about that till you started talking about it, like not having that electronic database, you had to have paper files that you would fax to another place. Um, it was. You know what else I thought of, too. It was a lot easier to forge things, um, because you didn't have the, the barcodes and the holograms and the things. Like I was talking to somebody the other day about, like, when I was in college, I had like three fake IDs because it was so easy, like I never got in trouble. You know, don't do that, children.
Katie Parsons:That's the dumbest thing in the world don't learn from your auntie, danny, but you can't do it anymore anyway.
Dani Combs:You really can't. There's no way. I mean, there are ways, I'm sure, but it's not. It takes a lot more legwork. You know what I mean? Yeah.
Katie Parsons:It's very hard nowadays to fly under the radar.
Dani Combs:Oh, yeah, for real. Even if you want to, as a normal person.
Katie Parsons:That's what I mean. Obviously, I have no reason to do that, but if you think about it, you're, you're really documented everywhere you go, then if you have a phone on top of it, then if you're checking in on social media or you have life 360 or find my iPhone or anything like that, it is really hard to and bank cards and ATM footage, like if you really wanted to not be able to have anyone find you. It's almost impossible, almost impossible, which was not the case in the 80s, definitely not in the years before that either. And another reason that these criminologists say there was a rise of serial killers in the 80s, particularly and I hate to do this to blame the media, but there was that which you've touched on Sensationalism, this fascination and a snowball effect from that Right. And also the United States had had an interstate system long before the 80s. But the continued development of, of serial killers but it's certainly part of a lot of their stories, right and people using the interstates to get places, it's, you know, it gave them, these serial killers, more space to roam and kind of be not noticed. So anyway, there was one interesting theory. I'm interested to see what you think.
Katie Parsons:So there's this other criminologist in that piece. His name's Peter Voronsky and his hypothesis is this he thinks that the North American serial killer boom, or whatever, of the late 20th century right so 70s, 80s, 90s can be traced to World War II, and that has something to do with the children of the men returning from the battlefields of Europe and the Pacific. And he says that this was a quote from him, that it was a war that was far more vicious and primitive than we have ever been able to acknowledge, far more vicious and primitive than we have ever been able to acknowledge, and that these men came back with all this trauma and baggage and a lot of them were prone to violence more than was reported, and so it kind of just had this sort of, I guess, snowball effect. From there the way they interacted with their children.
Katie Parsons:Not even necessarily the soldiers themselves fault Maybe some of that is what he's saying but just the war itself, that it kind of opened up this whole realm of understanding of violence and warfare that really took hold in that next generation of people that were born after that. What do you think?
Dani Combs:Yeah, I mean that makes sense to me, because wartime is, there's no way to not have trauma If you have served in any kind of wartime effort, whether you are on the ground, in the air, on a boat, in a hospital, there's no way, and I will tell you firsthand, it counts. I mean, I wasn't in a wartime zone, but my husband was a couple of times. And the military does not tend to your mental health. Okay, like effectively, uh, they're getting better, but it's still. Especially, you know, the higher up you are in the military. They don't want you to have any red flags, and so a lot of things get overlooked. And we're talking this is, you know, 2024.
Dani Combs:So, to think back to world war II, when we didn't even have words like mental health or trauma, you know, in related to military service members, I can't even imagine. Because you, you have these emotional wounds that you're told to just deal with and ignore, and they're, if you don't tend to a wound, it's going to keep festering, so, keep festering. So you know, on one hand, it's like, well, if you don't have the tools or even the awareness to know what you're going through, you're gonna lash out, you're gonna have things, and then that's going to affect your kids, because we do know with research that if you are susceptible to lots of violence and trauma and abuse in your childhood, you are more susceptible to inflicting that on others when you get older, if you, if you have not been again treated or addressed or whatever. So I think that he's probably. I mean, I'm no psychologist, I'm no psychiatric expert, but I think that makes sense to me. I mean, generational trauma is a thing too, you know.
Katie Parsons:Yeah, I think we tend, even nowadays, to try to blame whatever bad thing is happening, to like what's immediately surrounding it, right, like even with kids. Now it's like, oh well, parents are just letting them be on their phones, or like whatever. Or or everyone has depression now, because you know, all these kids have depression because they see it on TikTok or whatever, instead of like taking a step back and going well, that didn't just happen overnight.
Dani Combs:Right.
Katie Parsons:Like maybe we should look at this, go back a bit, and this guy went way back to like the 40s, but it makes sense because those kids were born and were in adulthood and committing these crimes right during that time frame well that also makes me think of, like vietnam and maybe some, and that war you know we won't dig into the weeds there, but and the emotional trauma that people had coming back and the things they were doing.
Dani Combs:And you know, I think of that too because, yeah, I mean, you can't, you don't have a language for what you're experiencing. If nobody's giving you the language and the awareness, how can you fix it? How can you?
Katie Parsons:exactly, yeah, vietnam's a good point. I I don't want to like speak out of turn because I didn't research that specifically, but I would guess if I looked into the serial killers of this era, um, there's some, yeah, some people who fought in vietnam included in there. There probably have to be with that age group anyway right, that's what I was thinking in my brain as we were talking like oh yeah, like world war ii.
Dani Combs:if your parents were in world war ii then you would have been, you know, because, like my was uh, my dad was a conscientious objector during Vietnam and then he dated my mom, who her dad was an army officer. So he was not thrilled when he found that out. So anyway.
Katie Parsons:How did that go?
Dani Combs:Not well at first, but anyway.
Katie Parsons:My dad. I remember asking him when I was a kid. I was like were you in Vietnam? But he is deaf in one ear, so he was disqualified, he said. When he was a young man he was like really bummed about it, but like, as he got older he was like okay, that was probably all right.
Dani Combs:Like yeah, Anyways.
Katie Parsons:Anyway.
Katie Parsons:Okay, okay that was probably all right, like yeah, anyways, anyway, okay, okay, so I have brought five true crime cases from the 80s. Each of these and I know this because I've listened to podcasts on them could have a whole hour to two on their own. These are ones I'm relatively familiar with and I did a little, you know, more research for today, just to make sure I knew what I was talking about. So you can ask questions. If I know the answer, I'll let you know. I'm also going to link in the show notes the best true crime podcasts for each of these that I've found one and you're like, oh, I remember that and you want to hear more of the details. Or if you're like I don't remember that at all and you want to hear about it, I'm going to link those in there. So if you want further listening, friends, all right. So the first one, which I'm sure you've heard of 1983, the kidnapping and murder of Adam Walsh.
Dani Combs:Right, so in 19. Is that the one whose dad founded america's most wanted? Yes, okay, yes, sorry, did I just go?
Katie Parsons:no, that's okay. Most people are probably thinking that that's why this case is so famous, partially so.
Katie Parsons:In 1979, to go back a few years, um, there was a disappearance of a six-year-old named etan pots, um, and he's. That's still unsolved. Nobody knows who took him, why. Whatever, I believe in that story. He, he was walking to the bus stop and he, it was the first day he'd done it by himself. So can you imagine being this boy's mother? He was like can, can I please? I'm big enough, I'm old enough. And he never made it to the bus. And of course, back then. And then, of course, back then, the mom thought he was at school all day. Oh my God. So they don't even start looking for him until and the school thinks he's sick or whatever, they don't even start looking for him until five o'clock at night or something. Yeah, so that was in 79. So then in 83 was a kidnapping, murder and unfortunate Sorry Danny Decapitation of Adam Walsh, who was also sick.
Dani Combs:Yes, yes. Okay, I'm already like writhing, I do not know this. Yes, okay, I'm already like writhing. I can't.
Katie Parsons:Yeah, so we'll just get through this quickly. We'll just get through this quickly and get to the not silver lining I don't want to call it that but get to like the little bit of good that's maybe come out of this. He was in a department store with his mom I do remember this. Yeah, yep, so he had you know, you know how kids are Like wandered off for 30 seconds and ended up. They did find and convict someone of this crime, otis Tool, who had basically coaxed him out of the store with him somehow and then, once they were like out the door, grabbed him, took him all the things. So, anyway, there was all sorts of things, but it the first thing it inspired was a TV movie called Adam.
Dani Combs:I remember that.
Katie Parsons:And this ended with a roll call of photos, descriptions of missing children. Right Over the course of the three broadcasts. Adam ended up. Adam movie reunited 37 children with family members who were looking for them. Yeah, 37. That's amazing. And so his father, john Walsh, became a very active, outspoken victims' right advocate in the wake of his son's death. And in 1988, it translated to him hosting and helping launch America's Most Wanted, which was on Fox, dedicated to bringing criminals on the lam to justice, and it ran for 25 seasons and reportedly led to the capture of over 1200 fugitives.
Dani Combs:That's yeah, I remember that movie, I remember, okay, I remember this case, like because, like I said, I was a scared cat, a scared cat, scared cat. I mean, that's true, I was a scared cat, a scared cat, scared cat. I mean, that's true, I was a scaredy cat, and the thought of disappearing when you're with you think you're in a safe spot terrified me. Yeah, you know, you're at a department store with your mom, like that. You're not scared, right?
Katie Parsons:So yeah, yeah, that's a rough one and some other things have come out of it too. I know there's like Adam's law, which basically improves how we look for missing children, how much information families can have access to, because there was a lot of that in that case too, and I don't think it was negligence on purpose, I just think that the procedures weren't properly in place yet for how these things were handled. And then there's like an Adam alert, which is different than an Amber alert, so an Adam alert happens like at a physical place if a kid's missing. So I want to say it's not an actual law. I really I should look this up. Don't worry, listeners, I will follow back.
Katie Parsons:But it's something stores and corporations can adopt and it's basically like how you would operate a lockdown if that happened, how you would lock down the store until the child is found and reunited with their family. How you would lock down the store until the child is found and reunited with their family, potentially the parking lot, things like that. I know Disney, walt Disney world, for example, has a version of that in place. So just kind of having this way that people can immediately mobilize to find missing children is due in big part to Adam Walsh's family, which good for them. Like man, I don't know if I could or would. Now, his mom has never been very public, right Right Like. She obviously supports all of the things that have come out of it, but she's not been the face of it and I don't blame her, you know.
Dani Combs:Yeah, that's what I again. As we're talking, my stomach is like turning. I have my like cup of wine here right in front of my face now because I am so stressed out Like not, and that's a trauma. Laugh right there. That's not laughing at this case or anything. That's just how I handle things.
Katie Parsons:But yeah, yeah, and you're right about the ones with children are really hard. Um, I often won't listen to one of one about kids or if it has to do with children hurting other children, like bullying that led to something like a death or a suicide, I won't listen to those. I just can't. Even though they're real and they matter, it's too hard and all lives matter. Of course, I mean that outside the context of bumper sticker phrases.
Katie Parsons:Every single person who has a crime committed against them matters, but of course it's hard to hear about kids and kids committing crime I think it's a lot more difficult to swallow, yeah. But speaking of that, we're gonna move on. Okay, here we go. 1986 have you ever heard of the preppy murder? No, like, I might not like this one, but you might be like, because of the title, okay. So here we go. Like, wait you really. But you might be like, hmm, because of the title, okay.
Dani Combs:So here we go, Like wait, you really thought I was going to like something that was a real life murder story. No, ma'am.
Katie Parsons:I just thought you would like the title.
Dani Combs:All I thought was Heathers. As soon as you said it, I thought Heathers.
Katie Parsons:That's what I think of, too, I think of like the schoolgirl outfit, like the plaid skirt, the little tie and the blazer. Seriously, though, that's not far off. So after a night of underage drinking in August 1986 at a popular Manhattan bar so these kids have money Robert Chambers, 19, fatally strangled Jennifer Levin, 18, during a bout of what he described he described as rough sex in Central Park. Ooh, however, he didn't like go tell anyone or do anything, he just left. So a jogger discovered Levin's semi-nude body and police quickly apprehended this Chambers guy because he was like like the last one seen with her. They were seen walking in the park, people saw them leave the party together, whatever.
Katie Parsons:But here's the thing about this robert chambers. He was very good looking, was he white? Oh yeah, they both were. They both were, um, he so like even like I've looked back on some articles from the time he was described as having movie star looks like all this crazy stuff and the fact that he supposedly was very good looking. It's hard to even like care about that. But this is what was referenced and the crime went down among these young prep school graduates from these very influential families. Newspapers and news outlets dubbed it the preppy killer and the name stuck around forever. And then, yeah, so it was kind of like him saying it went like this, but then the evidence didn't connect Right, like, without getting into too many details, there's like a rock involved that she was hit with and all these things that he really couldn't explain away, you know like. So another totally 80s thing that has to do with this. Part of the reason this became so sensationalized is because did you ever watch a current affair?
Dani Combs:oh, oh yeah.
Katie Parsons:It was just starting and they picked up this story. Oh stop. And so this was one of their big, like debut cases.
Dani Combs:So we should tell people what that is. Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Katie Parsons:It's an Americanized version of this Australianralian news show that's specialized in like lurid and sensational stories yeah, it's like it was almost like what I think of like a video version.
Dani Combs:It's kind of like tmz, like you know how tmz is like sensationalized or like the national inquirer, even though some of that is like totally made up. But it was very, very sensationalized and very what's the right word I'm looking for it was. It was kind of cheesy Like. It was like it was very Glamorized crime, if that makes sense. Yeah, anyways, so they picked up this case. Ok, they picked up this case, got it? Yeah, they picked it up and they they picked up this case got it?
Katie Parsons:yeah, they picked it up and they they covered it for almost a year. Oh, wow it was like going on, like in between other things that they covered um, so essentially he this chambers guy, robert chambers ended up being convicted of manslaughter, not murder, yeah, for like accidentally. So essentially they like believed his story.
Katie Parsons:Even though things to say. Yeah and there's more background on this, I will link to a longer show about it but he had like a history of violence against women and things like that. So he did serve 15 years, but he was like 20 when he was sentenced. So he's been out of prison since he was like 35 yeah, okay, so you're saying he was rich number one.
Dani Combs:If y'all don't think that capitalism don't affect our criminal justice system, you are mistaken. So he had money. Uh, he also was white, so and he was male, so he had lots of, lots of privilege. Plus, you said he was extremely good looking, right? So people always think that good looking people like they're always so amazed that good looking people are do evil things Like why is that?
Katie Parsons:It's weird, right? I think that's weird but, it's true, bizarre.
Dani Combs:I find that very bizarre because I can think of plenty extremely attractive people that are the not nicest. I mean, they're not, I don't, I don't think that they're out there killing people, but they're not the nicest. You know what I mean. Like, of course, I know plenty of extremely attractive people that are the kindest, lovingest people, of course. But um, oh, katie has somebody coming in her bathroom and I had it locked, but it's okay.
Katie Parsons:It's okay, listeners, we're good. It was Deegan, my little one. She's gone, gone. He wants to go to walmart. She actually wanted to pee and I am in the bathroom, so I just told her to go to a different one.
Katie Parsons:so we're okay, okay, um, so what you're saying about him is so, so true, like about the capitalism of it all, so, but this might make you feel a little better. He got arrested again in 2007 for selling drugs out of his apartment. So for nothing violent, but because of that he was actually sentenced to 19 years in prison.
Dani Combs:Oh dang, which think about this? I know.
Katie Parsons:An 18-year-old girl literally died at his hands, and he served less time for that than finding drugs in his apartment I cannot like huh, and he's actually already out on that. He got out early on that charge so he's walking around, walking around the earth. He's walking around the earth somewhere hopefully not our neighborhood, but yes, so that was the preppy killer. That was a big one, mostly because of our jam current affair. Okay, have you heard of this one, teresa Saldana, 1984. She was an actress attacked by a stalker.
Dani Combs:Oh yeah, there was a Lifetime movie or something about that, I think.
Katie Parsons:Yes, definitely, definitely. Okay. So Teresa Saldana, she was in films like I Want to Hold your Hand, 1978, and Raging Bull, 1980. Oh right, so she was on the rise, brooklyn-born, you know, from New York City. There was this guy, arthur Richard Jackson, who stalked her and almost fatally attacked her. So she did not die, dani, they're not all murders, don't worry.
Dani Combs:I knew that. I knew that because I know there's a movie about it. I know it. I'm going to Google it as we're talking.
Katie Parsons:What was her name? Teresa. It's the T-H version Teresa Saldana.
Dani Combs:Okay, keep talking, I'm going to look, yeah, so here's what happened on March 15th 1982.
Katie Parsons:Jackson Arthur Richard Jackson was a 46 year old drifter their language 46 year old, about town Okay, and he lunged at her outside her West Hollywood apartment building in broad daylight, stabbed her 10 times with so much force. The blade of his knife bent, but delivery man I don't know how many people were around, but a delivery man intervened, intervened and subdued him and she survived after intensive surgery and a long period of recovery. Gosh, yeah. So that's another one where she took what happened and has turned it into good. She founded the support group Victims for Victims, which is just what it sounds like, right, like a support group of victims, and she starred as herself in the TV movie Victims for Victims, the Teresa Saldana story.
Dani Combs:Oh, that's what I just looked up.
Katie Parsons:Okay, yeah, yeah. And then she also in 1991, hosted Confessions of a Crime, which was a cable TV series that featured an episode based on the real fatal attraction murder, which was a 1987 Kansas incident involving legal secretary Linda Culbertson and her boss Don Pierce. Um, so she kind of like talked about some other things on on that show as well okay, yeah, well, okay, okay.
Dani Combs:I'm glad she was okay me too me too.
Dani Combs:I I really like know TV movies were a big thing back in the day. Kiddos Like, and I feel like there were so many true crime ones Like. That was like most TV movies I can think of from like and my mom would watch them because they were dramas. You know, I remember the Adam Walsh one and I remember I guess I didn't know I remembered this one, so we started talking about it and I wonder if you're going to talk about the next one. So I won't say anything yet.
Katie Parsons:So okay, maybe I have two more. Okay, um, this next one we won't spend a lot of time on because it's very sad, um, but it does speak to what you were talking about with the preppy murders um as it relates to race and socioeconomics and capitalism in the criminal justice system.
Dani Combs:Is this a central park? Five, no, oh, that's a good guess, we'll talk about that in a minute.
Katie Parsons:Okay, yeah, these, this is called the Atlanta child murders. This was 1979 to 81. Um, so it's a series of them Between 79 and 81, at least 28 children, mostly young Black. That as well. With that many of them. Eventually Wayne Williams was arrested and convicted for two of the murders and the authorities did link him to the other ones, but he was never formally charged because they didn't have enough evidence and the case has left lingering doubts and debates since then about whether justice was truly served if they caught the real person.
Katie Parsons:That's just kind of a brief one, but yeah, interesting, like I hadn't remembered that one. I guess this was before I was even born, but I feel like the preppy murder, I kind of knew adam walsh, I kind of knew, but here's like 28 children of color and I'm like, oh, I've never heard of that. You know, it just kind of speaks to the way information is presented, right, and that's partially why we revisit all these things, because, yeah, and I don't know much else on that one. That was just kind of that. So the last one I have, and then you can, we can talk about the central park five. Um, have you heard of the night stalker, richard ramirez?
Dani Combs:you don't know about this one oh, okay, okay, great it sounds super great, so let's just do it Okay, 1984 to 1985.
Katie Parsons:So short-lived at least. And we do know who he is Richard Ramirez. His reign of terror began in 84, when he went on a brutal killing spree in Los Angeles and San Francisco. He broke into homes at night, sexually assaulted, murdered and often mutilated victims. His crimes seemed random. They couldn't connect like any of them like age, gender, ethnicity, other than like geographic location, which has made him sort of this puzzle of serial killers in modern history. He was captured in 85 after being recognized by residents who beat him down until the police arrived. He was sentenced to death, but he ended up dying of cancer in 2013 while on death row and they never did really again. I'll link to like a longer episode on him Like figure out why.
Katie Parsons:This guy was weird too. Like he would like separate, like he would break in where there were couples. So you would think he would just break in where there's like a woman by herself or something, but he would deliberately go where there were couples and like split them up and like in one case, like put dishes on a guy and was like if I hear these move at all, she's dead. And like take the woman and do something else. Very weird they found like sandwiches he had eaten in people's kitchens, like just weird stuff, very odd. Yeah, that was my fifth one. Your face is saying so much, oh my.
Dani Combs:God. Well you know, this is um, not our most lighthearted fair, but of a podcast. While you were talking, I was remembering. I actually know someone who is a true crime survivor from the eighties. She was abducted as a college student. It's actually horrible. She was actually on a tv show called I survived on I think you know what. I don't know what channel that's on I've heard of that before.
Dani Combs:Something, yeah, or identity tv or id tv or something yeah yeah, not like a few years back, and I'm not going to say her name because I don't. I'll send it to you personally, but I don't. I mean she's very vocal obviously in her story because she is was on a on a network show about it.
Katie Parsons:Right.
Dani Combs:But I met her. She actually she speaks to, she works for a lot of um, victim abuse like rights groups and stuff, and she shares her story. A lot Um and and basically she was, she was coming home from a bar, she was in college to her apartment and three guys followed her, abducted her in a truck, brought her to an abandoned barn and abused her All the things you could think of, left her for dead. And she ended up getting out and surviving. But it was just to hear somebody that you know personally that like went through something that you only have read about, seen on TV. Man, yeah, Like.
Dani Combs:I hadn't thought about that in a while, Cause she's not a close friend where you know, we're just acquaintances and I haven't seen her in a few years. But as you were talking, I was thinking about that, about the guy following it.
Katie Parsons:I don't know.
Dani Combs:This is why I can't do true crime, because it's real, it's all real. I know it is.
Katie Parsons:I tried to grab like a combination of of things. Obviously, if you were just to google like true big, true crime stories from the 80s, you would get like way more than five right. But I was trying to sort of touch on right like this whole stranger danger child abduction thing, which I think we can kind of make light of now especially and be like oh yeah, like even in the intro I'm like are you scared of people in vans and candy? But like literally this actually happened. You know, and the statistics you know show that most people, most children, are abducted by people they know. Often it's a family member, often they're not in danger, it's still not right.
Katie Parsons:But there are cases like this where it's random and it does happen and it doesn't matter if it's one in 100,000 or 200,000 or 300,000, whatever the stat is, which obviously I don't have, I'm just making it up. It doesn't matter because that's one Right and you know who could that be. So I think I was trying to kind of touch on that. And then this preppy murder, like the preppy good looking person that could commit a crime. I mean going, taking it back to Ted Bundy, people like oh, he was kind of good looking and yeah, well, and Jeffrey Dahmer too. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And then you know this being attacked by a stalker sort of situation, missing children, that you know somehow this number got to 28 in.
Katie Parsons:Atlanta and they still couldn't figure it out.
Dani Combs:And then these kind of like tertiary wild serial killers, right Like that, also exist, as rare as they may be. To go back to the Atlantic case you were speaking of, can you imagine the frustration of those parents and family members trying to say this is something's happening to the children in our community and you are not listening until 28 of them are gone? Like I cannot, there's no excuse for that. Like there's just not. Like I just, it just makes me sad. And now that we're we're continuing to talk about that, has there been a movie done about that?
Katie Parsons:case, not that I know of, not that I know of. Why is it?
Dani Combs:ringing a bell to you. It is, it is, and I don't I'm not sure what I mean. I used to be very heavily involved in like social justice. You know groups, social social justice, you know groups, and that sounds like maybe a case that was discussed, and probably racism in the judicial system.
Katie Parsons:And you know, I don't know, but anyways yeah yeah, well, since you mentioned the central park, five, um, I have it pulled up here, but what is your recollection of that?
Dani Combs:well, and I won't. We don't have to go too far into the weeds with this, because it's a whole, very long story. Um, there is a jogger, a lady um, a female jogger, who's, who was assaulted in central park, um, and they wrongly arrested and convicted um five, I think it's. It's five young men um teenagers. They were teenagers one was like, I think, 12 or 13, like they were so young, um, and they were in jail for decades before they were exonerated, decades. And they have a, they have a movie about them. Uh, it was like a series, I think, on. I think it was on netflix. It is so hard to watch. It is so hard to watch, um, but have you seen it? Do you know what I'm talking?
Katie Parsons:I haven't seen it okay. Okay, I know the case, I know it ended up. You know they put the five away and then later a single guy, a serial rapist, confessed and they were able to use evidence DNA, whatever because so much time had passed, yeah.
Dani Combs:To prove that. Oh wait, it was just this one guy. Yeah, it was what they did to those kids, because they did not know who did this to this woman. Um, they tricked them into signing confessions. I mean, they're young kids, they're terrified. They were in the wrong place at the wrong time. They were at the park hanging out.
Katie Parsons:I mean they're kids in a city where you're going to.
Dani Combs:You know what I'm saying. Where are you going to go? Yeah, and you know, they were five black teenage boys and when I tell you that racism played a huge part obviously in why they were wrongly convicted is so sad and I just they were. I mean, anyway, we don't have to go into that whole story. But when you were talking about that I thought of that case.
Katie Parsons:I mean, the lady did survive, she did she did survive, yeah, and she didn't have any memory of the attack, so that was part of the problem. Yeah, she did. Yeah, and she didn't have any memory Right Of the attack, so that was part of the problem.
Dani Combs:Yeah, she did not have any memory. And again, you know, I don't remember if it was the late 80s or early 90s when this happened, but they didn't have the testing and all the things and the cops just wanted to put a name on it. They wanted somebody to name.
Katie Parsons:Well, and you figure, central Park, like you think of tourism and the capitalism there and all the heat. You know this happened in 89. And so New York City, particularly those touristy parts, Times Square, central Park, all of that Broadway area were really under fire for not being safe places to travel. And so the police, you know again I'm simplifying this but they just wanted to close the case and if you could blame this group that, like you said, wrong place, wrong time, there were also dozens of other people in the park at that time you know exactly, but they could just sort of do that.
Katie Parsons:And, like you said, I think even back then and we know a lot more now about false confessions than we did back then, you know we think like if someone says, oh, I did this thing, well why in the world would they say something like that if they hadn't done? It well there's a lot of reasons that, oh my gosh and you and they, these kids were.
Dani Combs:They were tricked into saying it because they wanted to go home, especially the young one and the horrible things they went through in jail. I mean is one I think died in jail. Um, anyway, if, if, you want a flashlight spotlight shown on not just our um justice system but also our, uh, prison system, you should watch that show. And they, they, the one, the surviving members, were um, they had a interview with Oprah after the movie came out, or the series came out, where she talked to them and it was heartbreaking because you could tell some of them were just damaged beyond, beyond beyond help.
Katie Parsons:Yeah, yeah.
Dani Combs:Yeah.
Katie Parsons:I had just pulled this up, the one, one of their last names is Salam. He became a board member of the Innocence Project, which is a huge criminal justice reform group, especially for juveniles, and he actually received the Lifetime award in 2016 from barack obama. I mean, like, at what cost?
Dani Combs:right, right, but he, he actually um won a seat on new york city city council too yeah in 2023 so just to swirl it back around to what we were talking about today, true crime is hard for me because it's. You know, these are real people Like. This is real, real life. So I can watch some cats being buried in a cemetery and then coming back.
Dani Combs:Well, they come back anyway, so it's fine, like whatever, like that is okay for me and I can watch the Crypt Keeper and his silly tales of horror because it's not real. But when you give me that real stuff, I just have a hard time. Like I don't know, I'm going to get off the zoom and I'm going to be like what was that?
Katie Parsons:Why did Katie make me do this? And I'm like I just make her talk about snorks. That's why I made you do this. I'm getting back at you. No, I mean, I think it's important.
Katie Parsons:I will say, like I, so we didn't talk about crimes in my house growing up. I have a story in the nineties that I'll a personal story, nothing that happened to me, but something that was in my purview growing up. That was a true crime story that we'll talk about in the 90s episode. But I my family, was very like didn't watch the news. I know my parents read the newspaper. They weren't like closed off, but they just didn't think that we should have that sort of negativity in the house and they didn't like to talk about stuff like that.
Katie Parsons:So as a result, like my whole worldview on like what crimes really happen, how to protect myself as a woman living in America, especially as a young woman when I was at college and then I lived by myself out of college, I've sort of had to build on my own and I think listening to true crime stories, particularly the places that do it really well, has helped me with my worldview, certainly like my humanity kind of understanding that, while no trauma that happens to you is an excuse to harm others.
Katie Parsons:It's sometimes a reason, right, and so I think understanding that that it's not just like good versus evil, that there's all these like very layered traumas and generational traumas and mental, mental health issues and war stuff, and like abuse as a child and religion in some cases, right Like that, it's really made me understand the world better. You know again at what cost, right. Are we having nightmares? Are we sad? I have trouble with the wrongful conviction things too, because, especially growing up in the eighties and nineties, you just think no bad people go to jail and if you're in jail you're bad, and then when you start to kind of go, no, that's not really how it works.
Dani Combs:No, not all the time.
Katie Parsons:Yeah, I mean, this is a very small example, but I have a family member incarcerated right now is a very small example, but I have a family member incarcerated right now and just to talk with this family member on the phone costs so much money.
Dani Combs:Yeah.
Katie Parsons:And it's through a private company. Yeah Right, so you put money on the card, but then there's like a 20% fee on top of that and then when they call you, they take X amount plus this and there's nothing you can do about it, because that's the contractor that got that bid. And I think, like I can call this family member because, even though I don't want to spend all this extra money on fees and things like that, I will and I'll put enough on there for them to call me or call others. Like think of all the people that can't oh yeah like, yeah, even incarceration.
Katie Parsons:There's no equality, right, so and and it's just really, I'm just always like what a racket. But there's no, oh, it is recourse no I know we could do.
Dani Combs:We could talk for hours on how our prison system in this country was even started and how, compared to other countries, we are so backwards. And what we do I mean prison is supposed to be a rehabilitation and so you can be reintroduced to society. Yes, you're serving time, but also it's not just supposed to be go sit in a cell. We're going to punish you, we're going to torture you and then we're going to release you Like that's not what it, that's not humane and that's not what is supposed to happen. In other countries do a much better job and guess what? Their crime rates are lower.
Katie Parsons:Yeah, anyway. It's true, it's so true. But yes, like you said, another topic, another topic. If you listened today, hopefully I don't know if liked is the right word, but you had some thoughts when we were having these conversations around these things, or maybe you remembered some your view of crime growing up or some of these true crime stories or others. We'd love to hear about it. Reach out to us, either on our socials or generation in between. Podcast at gmail that's on there too. Email ever ever ever.
Katie Parsons:Um, and if you're feeling heavy after this, look we have got 50 plus episodes that you can go listen to. If you haven't listened to our candy taste testing, go hit up that one If you like we should do a bonus episode after this one.
Dani Combs:That's just funny. Instead we can do our after show that we do for our patrons, but I think everybody might need something a little lighter. Yeah, all right, think of something. So something will be in our feed. That's short and you can just a palate cleanser if you may. I love it.
Katie Parsons:Yeah, I love it. Let's do it. We'll do that for you. So, on that note, we will have a part two, but don't worry, we'll have a palate cleanser for that too. Um, coming soon and spooky season will continue. We have some more special guests coming up, so those will be a lot of fun. And make sure you review us wherever you listen, share us with your friends. Join Patreon if you want. It's $8 a month. That's where you can get a lot of bonus content all of our after show, including our guests who stick around and join our after shows with us. And I think that's it, guys. So until next time, don't take candy from strangers, not even on Halloween.
Dani Combs:Bye guys, okay, bye.
