← Books With Your Besties
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- [00:02]
A
Hi, I'm Emily.
- [00:03]
B
I'm Ashley.
- [00:04]
A
And this is Books with your besties.
- [00:09]
B
Yeah, we're ready. I have it right here.
- [00:14]
A
Hello, besties. This week we are talking about a wonderful book that we just finished, Ashley. What's it called?
- [00:23]
B
It's called you better watch out by James Murray and Darren Wearmouth.
- [00:27]
A
I'm so excited to talk about this book.
- [00:30]
B
I am so excited, and I'm not gonna lie. When I first saw the COVID of the book, I wasn't sure what to think about it. So if you haven't seen it, the COVID has a knife wrapped in red and white polka dot wrapping paper with a gold bow. And it's just not the kind of COVID I'm used to.
- [00:49]
A
I know. And the back has a bloody knife.
- [00:52]
B
Yeah. And one of the authors is the guy from Impractical Jokers, James Murray. So I just didn't know what to expect out of him for a thriller slash horror book.
- [01:04]
A
Okay, before we get into the book, which we'll do full spoilers. So if you haven't read the book, you should go read it. It's a super quick, fun read and then come back. But I will tell you something about the COVID that's funny is I took this book with me a few places because I always take whatever I'm reading to go do things. So I took a bunch of kids to the rock gym to climb and it was so busy and I had that book and I kept hiding it under my jacket because I didn't want to just set it down like, oh, hello of the people in the area and children, here's my knife killer book. I should have taken off the dust jacket, but I wasn't very smart.
- [01:37]
B
So Durham walked in when I was reading it one night. And, you know, my kids are completely used to the things we read, the things we listen to. They're just like, who killed who in your book? What's happening? And a lot of covers for some of the books you read are kind of obscure and leave you thinking, I wonder what this is about. But Durham was like, whoa, that one looks scary just because it has a knife with blood on it.
- [02:00]
A
Yes. Okay, well, it was scary. Did you think it was scary? I.
- [02:06]
B
So you and I talked yesterday. You finished it first. And I didn't find it scary like, I can't sleep, but I found it scary like I would have to close the book for a second and just look away.
- [02:17]
A
Yeah, okay. See, I found it scary like I did not want to be reading it at night right before bed and Just a tiny bit more of that like life fear consideration at nighttime, like, oh no, someone could come and kill me. Which I don't have very often. But it just definitely, I think the, the killing and the, the gore in it freaked me out.
- [02:43]
B
I was glad I read a little disclaimer beforehand because a lot of people em, were like, this is my favorite book of the year. They absolutely went crazy for it. And I was glad that I read some reviews that said, yeah, but it's a little bit more horror and a little less thriller. So I felt like I kind of had a tiny heads up.
- [03:01]
A
Oh, that's good. It's both. I thought it was really fun. I mean it is a thriller. It's not fully a horror book, although there's some of that in there. It's just not like. And it has the thriller whodunit aspect to it. I really enjoyed it. I thought it was super fun.
- [03:17]
B
Well, let's talk about how it opens because I was so confused for the first, I don't know, 15 to 20 pages about what was happening and where the hell these people were.
- [03:27]
A
Yes. And I love that.
- [03:28]
B
I did too. So it opens and we are introduced to a handful of different characters, all of whom end up in the same place via some form of violence being knocked out. And they wake up in this town and they don't know why they are there or how they got there, but they're there with other people.
- [03:45]
A
Well, and it's a, it's an abandoned town that they live in, like Old Forge, except there's nobody there. So they, they figure out pretty quickly it's like a replica, like a set town, which is cool. I kept thinking it was going to be like a movie set or something, but obviously it was like a created crafted town.
- [04:10]
B
I thought it was also going to be a movie set that kind of had the same twist as the end does, that someone was using this as their kind of killing field and that they had created this entire place. But we knew really quickly this is not a real town because there are no other people and there are no roads and no cars.
- [04:30]
A
Right. I just had no idea. Okay. I did, I did think and get the concept that this was they were taking bad people. Like pretty quickly you're like, okay, they were taking a thief, someone who had done drugs or whatever. Like drug, not done drugs, like sold drugs. Some, you know, people who were like scourge on society, problematic that this was like they were taking them to this place to kill them. And I got that, but I really had no idea who.
- [05:00]
B
Oh, I had no idea who was killing these people or why. So it had me thinking a little bit. And this is a spoiler about a book called Everyone is Watching by Heather Gudenkopf. But I did think these people have been picked because of their past choices, and basically this is why they're here and why someone is going to off them. But, Emily, the way. The way these people were killed one at a time was absolutely horrific.
- [05:30]
A
Horrific. That's why it scared me. It was horrifying thinking about even the things they talked about. Okay, this is all of the trigger warnings that ever existed. Here they are, all of them. But if you read this book, you know, when Eddie, the main character, was even envisioning ways he might be killed, he's like, maybe they will skin me and put salt all over my body and watch me suffer. Maybe they will. I was like, I can't read this. Like, it's so much to have in my brain.
- [06:02]
B
And I felt like the. The authors did such a good job taking real fears that I have, and I think you have of ways you can die and bringing those to life. Like Eddie drinking acid and just dying.
- [06:17]
A
That was Tank. That was Tank.
- [06:18]
B
That was Tank. Also, none of the people died, quote, unquote, alone. Like, not only were these people dying, everyone else witnessed these unbelievably horrific deaths.
- [06:30]
A
Well, but that's because they. They were. It was all facilitated for them all to be there because Jess wanted to watch them all.
- [06:37]
B
Yeah.
- [06:37]
A
Oh. So it. It's. It was sick. All those deaths were sick. And I. I hated reading about them. But I also loved the book so much, and I couldn't stop. Can we talk about the sickest minds out there? These two authors, they're just like us. I love them. They're so sick, though. The Ferris wheel death, that was sick. That was gross. I said sick 40 times, but, wow.
- [07:08]
B
I had that written in my notes and I was like, I don't even know how to describe this death. Like, the propeller or whatever just keeps going around chopping off his body, like his ankles, his calves, all the way up to his torso. I'm like, why am I reading this? Why am I reading this? But I had to keep reading it.
- [07:25]
A
Eddie. Eddie was such a good guy, ultimately, to. To care about trying to save these people so much that he witnessed this amount of trauma when, of course, he wouldn't be able to save them in most of these instances.
- [07:42]
B
At some point, I. I thought, just sit where you are. Stop trying to escape. Stop trying to problem Solve. But that's not human nature. And also just sitting where they are. When it got down to what, negative 10 degrees. They're like, we'll die if we just stay out here.
- [07:57]
A
Well, that wouldn't have been a very fun book.
- [07:59]
B
So that's a true story. I thought the worst death was when Trinity was stuck basically in like a cage and fro and water was being like shot onto her and it was so cold that she basically died because she came became like a human ice cube.
- [08:19]
A
Yeah, that was. That was a tough one.
- [08:22]
B
That one was awful.
- [08:24]
A
But the. But seeing a person chopped into bits I think would traumatize me more. I don't know. I think all the trauma is there for. For all of it.
- [08:36]
B
I'm actually still confused. Did we figure out how to one of the other deaths, how they got a grizzly bear onto the property?
- [08:46]
A
Oh no, but I mean that I can believe. I can handle that there was a grizzly bear that lives on the property and somehow they feed it or something. But here's my hole. Okay. Here's the hole that I can understand. Somebody strung up the guy Damien Hurst onto the Ferris wheel. We never found out who that was, right?
- [09:12]
B
No. And then the guy that's face was smashed in next to the tree trunk.
- [09:17]
A
Yeah. Never found out who that was either.
- [09:19]
B
No.
- [09:19]
A
But even if the smashed in face guy was just like a previous dude. Who's the helper? Who's the helper? Who strung him up for Jess? Was that the dad? Did the dad come and string up this guy?
- [09:34]
B
I'm glad we have them coming on for an interview because we can ask them. And then the book was left. There could be a potential sequel to the book. Right. Because for sure, in the epilogue it's like they kind. The police force kind of starts to figure out people are going missing around this town every year.
- [09:50]
A
Yeah, it's the FBI because the police force are in on it. That are local police. But so it's the FBI though is like, look at all this. These missing people. We. We have a serial killer on our hands. Speaking of serial killers. So it was Jess. So I looked up female serial killers because that's so rare. And I cannot tell you how rare it is. Listen, everybody knows one name, Eileen Wuornos, right? And there was a movie about Eileen Wuornos. We've all heard about Eileen Wuornos. But what she did anyway was she killed. She was a prostitute. She killed John's. Several of them. But it was totally out of trauma, fear, self defense initially, like this Reactionary. I mean, at first, at least, she was defending herself and keeping herself safe. And then it maybe turned into something where she was just killing these men. But it was clearly not like Joy killing like Jess was doing. Like, she wasn't like, ooh, I love to kill. I blood thirst, you know, it was not the same thing. So I was looking, were there any of those? I will tell you what. There are so few women serial killers. They are mostly discussed from like the 1700s. You know, we're talking about. Let's look back at the 15th century. This is the first one on record like that. So I. I picked the one and only who seemed to be really operating as a serial killer, not like killing their spouse and stuff. That is more recent day, and that is Dorothea Puente. Have you ever heard of Dorothea Puente?
- [11:24]
B
No.
- [11:26]
A
So Dorothea Puente, according to Sydney Contreras and Joe Dismanowich. This is a article from 2023 that does a great job outlining it and we can provide the link for you. Dorothea Puente lived in Sacramento, California, which is near where I grew up. And in the 1980s, she was running basically a boarding house. It was unlicensed, but she had like a three story house. Her husband had died and she started taking in tenants. And she took in a lot of tenants who had sort of difficult histories like drug abuse or they were disabled or something like that. Right. They had been in, in and out of jail for different things. So they were sort of less desirable as tenants in boarding places. And people started to go missing. So she had a first husband she ended up marrying four times. So her last husband left her after only a week of marriage, essentially in 1968. She had married someone for a green card. So she had these lots of marriages. She, I don't know, show some signs of somebody who's potentially antisocial a little bit in terms of her personality, because she also got caught forging checks. She was sentenced to five years probation for that. She was in trouble for running an unlicensed boarding house at one point, but continued to do that. She was stealing from her clients as a caregiver and she was caught in 1982. She served five years in prison. And she was diagnosed with schizophrenia at that time. Okay, so this woman has like a history. Right. Okay. So while she was running this boarding house, as she was cashing Social Security checks of the people who were living in this two story Victorian. It's this beautiful Victorian house in Sacramento, because she was cashing those checks, people thought that people were alive so she had taken in Alvara Montoya, who was a mentally disabled transient, and he'd been reported missing. They came to search for Montoya and dug up seven bodies around the boarding house property. They later found two more bodies. And Puente had had. Dorothea Puente had had this boyfriend, Everson Gilmuth, who came and lived with her. And at some point she hired a handyman to come and build her a special box for storage. And he built her this box. And then she convinced him to take the box and whatever was inside to the river and dump it, the Sacramento River. And he went and he dumped this box for her. And they. The box was reported as suspicious and found. And there were the human remains of this boyfriend, Everson Gilmuth. And the remains had been in there long enough that it was hard to identify him. We'll say that. So these were the ways she got caught, essentially. And so they found all of these bodies, and she had been cashing their Social Security checks and burying them in her yard.
- [14:57]
B
I just looked up a picture of her, and she just looks like an everyday grandma.
- [15:03]
A
I know. I actually, when I teach a section of class that I teach for social psychology on basically automaticity in our social processing that we, like, make automatic snap judgments about people. I put up pictures of people and I ask them all kinds of questions about them, like, who do you think is a Nobel Prize winner and who do you think has 12 children and stuff like that? And Dorothea Puente is one of them. No one ever thinks she's a serial killer.
- [15:29]
B
Really?
- [15:30]
A
Huh.
- [15:31]
B
I. I mean, I wouldn't. She literally looks like just my grandma.
- [15:36]
A
Yeah, she's just like an old grandma lady.
- [15:39]
B
And she was preying on, like, the most vulnerable populations that she was.
- [15:44]
A
Yes, she was.
- [15:46]
B
I. I will never just take a box from someone and throw it in a river. Maybe for you, but not for anybody else.
- [15:53]
A
Okay, this is also. Can I just tell you why I said also that I think she has some, like, sociopathic kind of tendencies besides all of the murdering and the forgery and fraud and whatnot when she was in prison. So she was convicted of three of the murders in 1993, and she received two life sentences and also a 15 year to life sentence for those three. So she was in prison for the rest of her life. She wrote a book called Cooking with a Serial Killer containing a bunch of her recipes. And they. It also includes the other author, Shane Bugby, hit like phone interviews with her.
- [16:40]
B
I just saw in an article on. From the Oxygen Network that they did a two Day like a two part special on her called Murders at the Boarding House. So now I know what I'm doing tonight.
- [16:53]
A
Yes, everyone should. We'll link that too. Let's link that with our show notes also.
- [16:58]
B
Oh, and it looks like she had a really difficult childhood from what I can see. Also, which does not obviously mean you can kill people, but man, what a life.
- [17:09]
A
I know. That's the interesting thing. You know, women only comprise 10% of all murders, but serial killer killers even fewer than that. So serial killers have to kill multiple victims. Victims and there's cooling off period in between them. So it can't be like a mass murder is when all of the murders happen at one time. Spree killers are what are when people go and they kill like on a spree. So there's like maybe a little bit of time between each one, but it's at the same timeframe. So for example, the D.C. snipers who killed a bunch of people in like two days, that's a spree killing. So like a mass killing is just one incident. Spree killing is like a bunch of little incidents right in a row. And then serial killers, there's, there has to be that cooling off. It's so rare for it to be women. It's so rare.
- [18:02]
B
I just saw too in this same Oxygen article about it that she had two of her own children and she gave one of them up for adoption and gave another one of her ch children to a relative.
- [18:15]
A
Yes. She just doesn't seem like warm and fuzzy.
- [18:18]
B
No, she, she, she doesn't. Jess obviously is a character who appears to be one of the potential victims with the other four people she's with. And then at the very end, the biggest twist is she's talking to Eddie and she's like, you know, my issue is that I'm an addict. And she doesn't say what she's addicted to. And he's like, you know, if you get out there are different ways you can treat addiction. And she says, well, I don't want to treat my addiction. So you're thinking, what addiction do you have you don't wanna treat? And that's when she says I'm a serial killer and stabs him.
- [18:52]
A
Right.
- [18:54]
B
And well, she says that at the.
- [18:55]
A
Same time that she doesn't wanna treat her addiction at the same time.
- [18:58]
B
Might not be at the exact same time, but close enough together that she says her addiction is being a serial killer.
- [19:03]
A
Yeah, I did think it was interesting that when she said addiction, he didn't press her further. Although I'M sure he assumed just some kind of hard street drug, right.
- [19:15]
B
That she didn't want to. She just said, it's not something I want to get rid of. Like, basically the way she was saying it was like, it's something I have found that I can live with and I enjoy it and I don't want to treat it. And then it turns out it's because she's a serial killer, facilitated by her parents who want her to keep fulfilling her dreams of being a serial killer in a contained environment.
- [19:38]
A
Well, the problem is, can you even fix that? That's the question, right? Like, could you treat a serial killer to have them stop killing? I don't think so.
- [19:47]
B
No, I don't think so. This also goes back to, obviously, a way, way worse situation, but the conversation you and I have had a million times about what would you do for your kid, like, if you knew your kid was X, Y or Z? If my kid's a serial killer, that's a no brainer.
- [20:04]
A
Yeah. I don't think I would do what Jess's parents did. Okay. I'm not gonna go ahead and allow my child to keep killing people. Do I think that they can be rehabilitated? I should back that up a little bit. I think Eileen Wuornos could have been rehabilitated. I think there are people who have become serial killers who could be rehabilitated. But mostly, no. What would I do? I really think I. I just. I go back to it. Like, if my kid accidentally hit someone with a car, like Trinity did, and killed them, would I help my child? Yeah. I think people make terrible mistakes and errors in judgment that can result in horrible outcomes and are devastating. Would I help my child if I find out they were a serial killer? No.
- [20:56]
B
No. Especially in the way they were facilitating helping her.
- [21:03]
A
Yeah. I mean, I'm sorry, but I'm reading, you know, this, but I'm reading Saving Noah right now by Lucinda Berry, and I'm halfway through. And anyone who has read this, it is about, what decisions would you make if you found out that your child, your teenage boy, was maybe a pedophile? How would you help your child? And I am. I can't pass judgment on this. It's so hard. Right? Like, this is a really hard read because I'm not sure, but would I do what Jess's parents did? I'm going to say unequivocally, no.
- [21:43]
B
Hard. Agree. We could finally, finally, we agree on something.
- [21:48]
A
I mean, I do think, I do think at some point your kid is like, your kid's a serial killer, like, brutally murdering people. I would. I would think, I want you safe behind bars. Like, I. I want you to go to prison and be safe and not a die or be. Continue murdering people.
- [22:12]
B
Right. Like, it doesn't mean I don't love you as my child. You can love your child and have them held accountable for their actions.
- [22:19]
A
Right.
- [22:20]
B
Okay, I want to talk about one thing. And then, and then I want to know. Did you actually know? Let's talk about this first. Did you think the police officer was actually going to help Eddie, or did you think you should not have gotten in that car?
- [22:32]
A
No, I did not think so. But I also remembered the whole time him saying, we've had no crimes. And so I knew he must have been in on it, like, right away. Once the twist was revealed and these were Jess parents, I was like, oh, no, don't. Not a cop. Don't get in the cop car. The cop's in on it. The cop's gonna protect them. The cop is grateful. And in fact, the cop. I remembered too, that the cop said in the convenience store, I have to go deal with a crime happening across town. Like giving them license to do what they needed to do. Yeah.
- [23:09]
B
I immediately was like, do not get in that car. There's no way this guy is just here to help you.
- [23:15]
A
I just can't believe the sad, sad ending of that. They just put him back inside, and poor Eddie got tortured to death again.
- [23:24]
B
I got such goosebumps when he was there, back with the parents and Jess, and she was like, you have 24 hours. Because that's literal, like cat and mouse. You know, you're gonna die, but she's gonna give you a day to try and get away like that. To me, that was the most fucked.
- [23:40]
A
Up part of the book. But he knows there's zero percent chance he can get away at this point. That's the thing, is he knew he would die for sure.
- [23:47]
B
Right. You're just like, how? How is it gonna happen?
- [23:49]
A
Right. So maybe in a sequel, maybe he would have somehow convinced her to keep him alive for love. And it would be something about Eddie living there, playing this game all the time to be kept alive.
- [24:07]
B
So one of the bigger themes of the book was basically that each of these people were brought here because they had committed crimes in their past. Right. Ranging from financial crimes to hitting and killing a child, which is a bigger theme of vigilante justice. Like, part of Jess maybe thinking, I'm getting rid of people who have hurt other people that led me down A rabbit hole of other people who have taken justice into their own hands. So can I tell you about a few of them I found?
- [24:39]
A
Yeah.
- [24:39]
B
Okay. So according to a website called the Top Tens, there are a handful of the most famous vigilante killings. So they listed the 10 most famous. There is a guy named Pedro Rodriguez, also known as Killer Lil Pedro. And he is who Dexter, if you watch that series, is based off of. So he and a couple other serial killers, but mainly him. So he was a Brazilian serial killer, spree killer, vigilante and YouTuber. He was known for pursuing and killing exclusively suspected criminals as a teenager between the ages of 14 and 19. And in particular, he killed an entire gang in the response to the murder of his pregnant girlfriend.
- [25:25]
A
He.
- [25:25]
B
So I have a bigger question when this is over, I. I have to ask you about. But he was officially sentenced for 71 murders, but he claimed to have killed over 100 drug dealers, rapists and murderers. He served 34 years in prison, and then he started a YouTube channel and got this huge cult following from people who were interested in the crimes he committed. Vigilante justice at the age of 14 was when he first shot the mayor in front of city hall because the mayor fired his father, a school guard, over accusations of stealing food from the school kitchen, preventing him from gaining new employment. So the interesting thing, thing about this is that when he was interviewed, he said that he felt the urge to kill for the first time at 13 years old when his cousin pushed him into a sugar cane press and almost killed him. So the question I wanted to ask you that I'm thinking about now is if he already had the urge to kill at 13, was the first time he killed at 14, just his first quote, unquote excuse or reason to kill someone who had hurt his father. Like, are people nature, nurture? Was he born to be a serial killer and just kind of needed a trigger or. Do you know what I'm saying?
- [26:52]
A
Yeah, I don't even know if he needed a trigger. I mean, if you look at our true serial killers that we. You can study, I mean, they have personality disorders and mental health disorders that I. That they are driven to kill. It's not really even about, like, having a moment. Like, he was probably going to kill either way, right?
- [27:13]
B
So, like, in this instance also, he was raised in a home of extreme violence. Like, he was born with a dent in his goal because his dad kicked his mom in the stomach when she was pregnant. But is at times vigilantism. Is that how you pronounce it is. It used as an excuse to kill people.
- [27:32]
A
Oh. I just think he channeled his killing into something more positive than. Than some people do.
- [27:41]
B
Right. Like he was probably going to kill regardless, but he channeled that into killing people who really had hurt people in his circle that he loved.
- [27:51]
A
Well, that's. That's Dexter. I mean, that's. That's exactly Dexter. Right. He was going to kill either way. So he just channeled that killing to be somehow maybe a community service.
- [28:04]
B
Yeah. And he. Pedro was murdered in 2023, and they still haven't caught the two people who killed him in a drive by shooting.
- [28:12]
A
Oh, my gosh. I know.
- [28:15]
B
So a handful of others. And you may have heard of some of these. I had not. But there is a man named Leon. His name is pronounced Plosh. He was an American known for publicly killing Jeffrey Doucet. Have you heard of him?
- [28:33]
A
I don't know. I don't think so.
- [28:35]
B
So he was a child molester who kidnapped and raped Ploucher's son. He shot and killed Doucet as he was being escorted through an airport by law enforcement to face trial for what he had done.
- [28:49]
A
Wow.
- [28:50]
B
He received no prison time. He got a seven year suspended sentence with five years of probation and 300 hours of community service.
- [29:00]
A
Wow. It's really interesting, the vigilante idea, because if. If you watched Dexterity, and we talked about this with Ellie Nestler, but if you watched Dexter, you rooted for him, you didn't want him to get caught, and you were like, good job. Way to kill the scourge of the earth. So there's sort of this thing. And I guess, you know, something that we should talk about is current events. Let's talk about the killing of the CEO of United Healthcare a couple weeks ago or a week ago.
- [29:34]
B
The vigilante justice aspect of that. Yeah, yeah. Can I tell you about a poll I saw yesterday in the Washington Post that was done.
- [29:43]
A
Please do.
- [29:44]
B
So there was a poll done by YouGov, and Washington Post reported on it. The poll surveyed more than a thousand people, and it showed American adults under 30 are evenly split on whether they view him as favorable or unfavorable. About one third held each view. Adults aged 30 to 44 leaned only slightly negatively toward him.
- [30:08]
A
Wait, can you. Can you clarify? Toward who? The health. The CEO, or towards Luigi Mangione, who killed him? Okay, and we should back up because what we're referencing is, okay, Luigi Maggione, young, educated American man, walked up in broad daylight to the CEO of United Healthcare. And is that what it's called.
- [30:35]
B
Yeah.
- [30:36]
A
And shot and killed him on the streets of New York City and he eluded police for a few days. But UnitedHealthcare is one of the health insurance companies, like many of them, that deny claims that don't cover life saving procedures that have done things for capitalistic intent that are harmful to the good of the people. And so people are very torn on whether or not this is a vigilante type of killing, that by killing him he was responsible for the deaths of many people who were denied insurance.
- [31:18]
B
The reaction the next day across social media platforms in various comments on TikTok and Instagram for some people felt icky and uncomfortable, but for other people felt very justified. Comments like, oh, I hope he was pre authorized to take care of that or oh, like you know, people were coming on saying my child didn't get treatment for cancer because of X, Y or Z. Like you denied claims and these people just died a slower death than the death that you deserved at the hands of Luigi. There was not a lot of sympathy or empathy among a lot of people who have been victims of our healthcare system.
- [32:00]
A
Yeah. And it, it's extending even further from what I've seen in, in multiple comments on news articles and social media. It's being extended to other multi, multi, multi millionaires and billionaires. That no one should be a billionaire. It's irresponsible and that people are just dying on the streets. For example, Elon Musk I know in the last week just surpassed $400 billion in wealth and people were making the point that there are 2 million homeless children in the United States. And here we have somebody who's worth $400 billion.
- [32:45]
B
Total sidebar. But this was talked about yesterday on a podcast all link that I listened to saying there's a certain amount of money you can have that does help with overall happiness and health. And then there's a certain amount that does not benefit you in any way. And if there was a way to give a small percentage of that to the population you're talking about, Emma, people who really need it, the greater good it would do for literal humanity is pretty crazy to look at that. It would raise happiness levels for nearly everyone. Just creating wealth in a more effective way to help the world. Said 1 in 5 younger American adults can see themselves signing off on what Luigi did instantly in a poll. Just said, yeah, I can. That's something I'm okay with. And I can sign off on that.
- [33:38]
A
I mean, I don't know that I'm okay with murder. And I'm, I don't think I can say I, I like could condone that. I think it's awful. And he had a family and was a person and if you want to value life, you know, you should value life. But, but sometimes if there's a revolution, it starts with violence. And I do think that billionaires need a wake up call.
- [34:07]
B
I unfortunately. Was it Yesterday m or 2 days ago that there was of course another school shooting?
- [34:14]
A
Yeah.
- [34:14]
B
And quickly following it was Luigi's arraignment. And we'll link articles to all of these. And he was being arraigned on a number of charges and instantly people were like, it's incredible how quickly he can be arraigned and we can talk about how justice is going to be served when he killed one billionaire. And these school shootings are happening weekly. And we're taking. Anyway, this could be a whole podcast for another day. But we're taking no action. But God forbid one billionaire is a victim of a gun crime.
- [34:48]
A
Well, this is what's crazy is that, is that I think the government has done a really good job of making this a gun control issue. When. Okay, let's say it's not about gun control. Let's say that you're not for gun control. You're like, well, it's mental health. It's people need support. It's okay, where's that? Where's that? They're not doing anything. Any of the ideas that we have are not being increased to the extent that they need to be in order for this to be prevented.
- [35:21]
B
Right. You can't say it's X, Y or Z and not help either X, Y or Z. You have to do something somewhere.
- [35:28]
A
Something, somewhere. So I don't know. Oh, the frustration at the old government. We digress because really this is about the book. But I think it's interesting to think about the vigilante justice part of it. And does that make it better, what she's doing?
- [35:46]
B
Well, and the one, the first vigilante killing that came to mind for me was, and I think you'll recognize this name right away, Christopher Scarver, who is the prisoner who killed Jeffrey Dmer.
- [36:00]
A
Oh, interesting.
- [36:02]
B
Okay, so obviously he was already in prison for crimes that he had committed, but took it upon himself to do what he thought was for the greater good and kill Jeffrey Dahmer.
- [36:14]
A
Is that why he did it?
- [36:16]
B
He killed both Jeffrey Dahmer and Jesse Anderson? The three inmates were on a work deal detail together in the prison gymnasium, had a confrontation while unsupervised he had a concealed metal bar that he used to beat and injure both of them. It doesn't look like he ever said if that was the reason why, but he went out prepared to. To kill him.
- [36:39]
A
Yeah, I mean, I suppose that is a vigilante justice or also just prison.
- [36:45]
B
Right.
- [36:46]
A
Murders. So I don't know. I don't know if that one counts in my book that much.
- [36:51]
B
Like, he.
- [36:52]
A
He did us some great favor. The dude was behind bars already. Like, that's not that helpful. I think if. I think if somebody killed, I think of vigilante justice being more, I don't know, questionable when it is somebody who's gotten away with it that, you know, did it, but they got away with it.
- [37:12]
B
Yes, absolutely. I also think the thing I found in researching all of these vigilante killings was, and we have talked about this, that oftentimes people will side with the vigilante killer if it is a position they could see themselves in. Like, yes, if you sexually abuse my child, I'm going to kill you. So when a jury is deciding on punishment for someone who has done something they can see themselves doing, it seems like the. The punishment is less.
- [37:47]
A
Here's the interesting thing about the court system is the court system allows for vigilantism. We may not think so, but it does. So we don't have to be encouraging people to go out and murder folks to be a vigilante. Right. If somebody commits a crime and they go to a courtroom and a courtroom says, that's okay with us, we don't care. Yeah, you did commit murder, but we're fine with it. There's something called jury nullification. Jury nullification is the process by which a jury can literally say, sure, we understand you meet the criteria for murder, but we don't want to punish you for it. We're good with it. Not guilty. They have that right. Juries have that right. They are not informed of that right in the courtroom, but that is the right of the jury.
- [38:36]
B
Wow.
- [38:37]
A
So for. I'll give you some examples of when this was used in really negative ways historically. The problem with jury nullification and why it is not in juror instructions is because only white people could be on juries. Some white people murdered or lynched black people, they go to court for murder. And the white juries were like, it's coup with us. Didn't care.
- [38:58]
B
Right.
- [38:59]
A
So fucked. Oh, excuse me. Screwed up. Are we allowed to say fucked up? I don't think so.
- [39:03]
B
It's our podcast. We can say whatever we want.
- [39:05]
A
Okay, so that's. That's historically, but it has really good utility in other circumstances. So there's a case, and I can't remember the name right now, and this is all just coming obviously off the top of my head, but of a young man who ended up a quadriplegic. And so he was in a wheelchair and he was just not happy and he didn't want to live like that anymore. And he begged his brother for a long time to kill him. Begged him and for. For years begged him. And finally his brother shot and killed him with a shotgun. And the jury said, yeah, we understand that's murder, but it's cool, you can go free.
- [39:44]
B
Wow.
- [39:47]
A
So, yeah, you don't have to murder people to be a vigilante. You can be like, hey, that's a justified killing Ellie Nessler in the courtroom for killing your child's abuser or whatever, and let them go for like the example you gave of the vigilante who never served prison time. Yeah. And you know what the other thing is? There's really prosecutor prosecutorial discretion here anyway. The district attorney has 100% the right to determine what is filed in court and what is not. They have all of the power. So you can know that somebody and have evidence that somebody murdered somebody else. But if you know that the community is supportive of it. The community. There is nobody who wants to see this person go to jail, that this is not the kind of crime, that it may look a little like self defense or may look a little like righteous. The district attorney can theoretically decide to not file charges in those cases.
- [40:53]
B
My gosh, I have goosebumps. I knew that, but I didn't know it.
- [40:56]
A
So there's your versions of vigilantism.
- [41:01]
B
All of this makes me think about total aside. Did you see the movie A Time to kill with Matthew McConaughey? Yes. Love Baxon.
- [41:09]
A
Yes. Yeah.
- [41:10]
B
I mean, obviously that was a huge theme of that movie. It's one of my favorite movies.
- [41:17]
A
That's good. Yeah.
- [41:19]
B
Yeah. All of the other vigilante stories I could find on that top 10 site were ones that. It seems like em, from what you're talking about, people would feel like we're justified. Like you really are taking someone off of the earth. That is a true danger to mainly children. Most of the stories I could find were about people hurting others who had hurt children.
- [41:43]
A
Totally. Well, and in prison, you know, there's prison culture where pedophiles are not respected, they are not safe. Like you kill a pedophile in prison, that's everybody pats you on the back. Yeah. And the guards can get in on that. I actually listened to a story firsthand from someone who was formerly a prisoner, so spent three years in. In a state penitentiary. And in that time, he said there was this spot that prisoners. This line that prisoners couldn't cross. And the guards had their computers, like, on the other side of that line. And a guard pulled up a. Like the papers, they called him. So people walked around with their papers, their papers said what their crimes were. So he was there for like, burglary. So he would show people and have proof that he was. He had done burglary. Because they're sniffing out for pedophiles. And some of the racial groups also are like, against crimes against women or things like that. Right. So. And it's not. It's its own little culture. It's its own world. Right. In prison. I have not spent time there. I have toured a maximum penitentiary, maximum security prison, which is a very rare thing to get to do. But I've gotten to do that because of my profession. And I have had lots of contact with former prisoners. And so I listen to their stories and have talked to those folks. So anyway, he said people would walk around with their papers. Well, a guard pulled up this guy's papers who had come to prison, and he was a sex offender, he was a pedophile, and walked away from his computer so that the prisoners didn't have to cross the line, but could see the computer.
- [43:39]
B
Oh, my gosh. Wow.
- [43:44]
A
Prison vigilantism.
- [43:46]
B
Seriously.
- [43:47]
A
And Jeffrey Dahmer was a pedophile who killed who, you know, assaulted and killed children, like teenage, young teenagers. And so that. That's why I was asking if did that guy actually say that or was it just like a prison fight or what?
- [44:04]
B
Right. Wow. So back to the book.
- [44:09]
A
Yeah, I'm just full of, like, joyful facts today. Also, should we talk about anything else disturbed? Let me think of something else to upset people to say for a little bit.
- [44:19]
B
It's. But it's why we talk about the books, right? The more we. So this book on its just as an initial read, you're like, oh, it's a fun thriller. Like, it's fun, it's horror, it's gory, it's gross. But then the more you think about it, the more you really are. Like, A, do most of us want to be judged on our worst mistakes?
- [44:38]
A
Totally.
- [44:39]
B
B, what would you do if confronted with one of these people and you had the chance to what, do what you thought Was like, make the world a better place. And then, see, I just feel like this book gets at your core fear of knowing you're in danger, not knowing how to get away from it, and feeling claustrophobic and terrified. I mean, you just felt like these people know they're going to die and they're just waiting for it.
- [45:08]
A
Oh, yikes. Give my heebie jeebies.
- [45:11]
B
I think it's a must read, and I can't wait to talk to the authors. I know.
- [45:15]
A
Okay. I have to just talk about one other thing after all this law talk. Okay. So this district attorney that came to my classes and spoken my class a lot, I was thinking about Trinity's crime and the vigilante justice there, that she drunk drove and killed a child who was playing in the street. Right. And how sad that story is and how young people, especially without their fully developed brains, because our brains don't stop developing until about 25, make really bad decisions, and those decisions could ruin your whole life. Right. You killed a kid. And so I'm so pleased with the authors that they also made her then just, like, a horrible, horrible person who was like, blaming the kid for playing in the street and blaming the parent for not watching the kid. Because I was like, okay, I'm on board with this being a vigilante thing for this person, but the. The drunk driving thing. So the district attorney that came to my class to talk about this a lot, he said he thinks of drunk driving as an. Like, an unforgivable crime. And he said it's because as a da he's had to go to drunk driving crash sites, and. Because that's. They're going to prosecute this drunk driver. Right. So they go to the scene, and he has seen things I shouldn't even say out loud, like he has seen a child's brains on the seat next to him, you know, and he's like, that is a violent crime. Drunk driving is a violent crime. And so it really. It gave a lot of perspective, people who've had to be on, like, the front lines of that kind of thing to see it, how harmful that is. I know you know that too.
- [46:58]
B
Well, I was just gonna say I. When I was hit by a drunk driver and my car was totaled, I was given the option when he was being sentenced to be in the courtroom or not. And I said, absolutely, I want to be there. And they asked, is there anything you want to say to him? And I basically said to him, I'm glad you hit me, and I'm okay. Like, hopefully, this is a chance for you to realize you could have hit a kid. You could have hit someone in a smaller car.
- [47:25]
A
You.
- [47:25]
B
You could have. And just laid out all the ways that his drunk driving could have easily, like, this was best case scenario. He hit me in a way that didn't kill me. My car was big enough that it saved my life, but it could have not been me.
- [47:38]
A
Right.
- [47:39]
B
Drunk driving for me is also. I think it's a horrendous crime because it's a choice you're making. I think there are so many ways today to not drink and drive. There are so many ways to not get in a car. Have all the fun you want. I mean, Lord knows, have all the fun you want, but do not get.
- [47:56]
A
Behind the wheel of a car. I know. I love to have a cocktail or wine or something. Especially, like, if I go out to dinner, I want to have, like, a drink or two. And I'm telling you that this sounds ridiculous, but I just knew as an adult, I always wanted to live walking distance to restaurants, because if I want to make that choice to go out to dinner and have drinks, I want to walk, then I don't have to Uber. Like. Like, I. I know that's a really privileged thing to say, but, like, everywhere I've lived, I've tried to live within walking distance of something so that I don't even have to. I don't. I don't have to be like, oh, no matter what, I'm gonna go drive and have drinks. I can be like, if I'm gonna go drink, I'm just gonna go drink at my local. One little watering spot.
- [48:43]
B
But again, in the book, he did a great job of making Trinity be like, well, the kid shouldn't have been playing in the street instead of taking accountability for her actions, which instantly makes you be like, okay, he's this terrible, terrible person.
- [48:55]
A
I know.
- [48:55]
B
Horrible human.
- [48:56]
A
Also, I was totally fine with the Damien Hurst being murdered. Oh.
- [49:01]
B
I mean, yes. That he's a rapist, a murderer. Yeah, absolutely. You can go, bro. You can go.
- [49:09]
A
He was all stoked and getting all, like, excited off of all the murders he was seeing and the bodies he was seen. And he was, like, wanting to do it himself and see it for himself. Okay. Yep. I was all the way fine with that. Go ahead, Jess. But I really would like Jess to pivot and not, like, go after thieves like Eddie. And I know Eddie killed somebody in. During a crime. That. That's not okay. But it also wasn't, like, a choice he made right does that make sense? There's those, like, degrees of. Degrees of horribleness. I don't know.
- [49:41]
B
Yeah, Just killing a murderer and rapist. I'm on board with that. Just killing somebody who maybe had a hard life and made some bad choices and could turn it around. Not cool with that.
- [49:52]
A
Yeah, same. Jess's parents all the way can go to hell.
- [49:57]
B
Jess's parents are very first.
- [50:01]
A
What fun. Great book. I definitely still have some bad visions in my head from it that caused me to lose a little bit of sleep, but I'll get over that.
- [50:10]
B
Yeah. And I think it's good for an. A quick entree into the horror. If you're someone who likes Thriller, this is a pretty light horror, right? Like, the gore scenes were pretty bad.
- [50:22]
A
Yes. Yeah. Quick and not. And it wasn't the whole book of just. Honestly, there is. There are other books that I have started that it's. They're gratuitous that I. I couldn't read. Like, I just. It's too far for me. It's too much. And they're not even, like, considered horror either, so I thought this was worth it. It reminded me of no Exit a little bit.
- [50:46]
B
Oh, I was gonna say that same thing.
- [50:48]
A
Yeah. Like, that level of violence, you know, maybe there's a little bit more creative violence in this one, but about the same, like, degree of it in the snow that, like, there's just the certain number of people. I just, I. I really liked it.
- [51:02]
B
And I like any cat and mouse story. I love when your people are chasing people and you just know somebody's gonna get caught and something's gonna happen.
- [51:10]
A
Oh, my gosh. I. I loved it too. I thought it was so fast and fun. Okay, so what are you reading now? Because I'm reading just Saving Noah, which is light and delightful.
- [51:18]
B
I'm just sitting in my house waiting for you to finish Saving Noah so we can talk about it.
- [51:23]
A
Okay, well, I'm about halfway. I. I'll finish it in, like, a day or two. Because it is the kind of read that I'm like, I need to know. I wanna know what's happening here.
- [51:30]
B
I'm actually finishing First Lie wins. I know. You've read that?
- [51:33]
A
Oh, yeah.
- [51:34]
B
Book club members love it. I made it halfway through. Had to start something else, so I'm going to finish that.
- [51:38]
A
Yeah, people really liked that. Not me, but other people did.
- [51:45]
B
I'll report back on if I'm more with you or other people.
- [51:49]
A
Okay, that sounds good. Okay.
- [51:52]
B
Thanks for listening.
- [51:54]
A
For more content, find us on Patreon. At the creepy book club.
- [51:58]
B
Happy reading.