Podcast
Forgotten Felonies
Hosted by Forgotten Felonies Podcast · EN
Forgotten Felonies revisits historical crimes that were forgotten—or remembered incorrectly. It’s tempting, looking backward, to fill in the gaps with conclusions that feel obvious now. But that isn’t how history works. Through original newspaper reporting, period advertisements from the years the crimes occurred, and a blend of forensic psychology and genealogical research, each episode restores context to cases history left behind—asking not only what happened, but why.
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21episodes
Episodes
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William Hooper Young: Murder, Madness, and the Morris Canal
3d ago01:33:04Tap to summarizeSend a message to Monica and Olivia!In September 1902, the body of Annie Pulitzer was discovered in New Jersey's Morris Canal, weighted down and hidden from view. The investigation quickly led police to William Hooper Young, grandson of famed Mormon leader Brigham Young and a man whose increasingly erratic behavior had alarmed those around him.In this episode, Monica and Olivia follow the case from the streets of New York's Tenderloin district to a lavish rented apartment New York City, where investigators uncovered a trail of bloody evidence and a trunk that became one of the most memorable pieces of the case. Along the way, they explore Annie's life, the sensational newspaper coverage that gripped the nation, and the fierce battle over whether Hooper Young was a calculating murderer or a man descending into madness.More than a century later, it remains one of the most fascinating and forgotten criminal cases of the early twentieth century.
Transcribe →The Tragic Affair at 2305 Brookside Avenue - A Fun-Sized Felony
2w ago00:25:48Tap to summarizeSend a message to Monica and Olivia!Dr. Charles M. Clayton was having a great day... until he came home for lunch.Over the next few months he would shoot a man, face a murder charge, suffer a nervous collapse, accidentally hit a teenager with his car, paint the inside of a jail, and listen as a very nosy neighbor revealed what she'd been watching through their kitchen window... day, after day.Sometimes one bad day really is enough.Join Monica for the bizarre and tragic story of The Tragic Affair at 2305 Brookside Avenue.
Transcribe →Jack Vincent: Professional Bummer of the Western Frontier - A Fun-Sized Felony
3w ago00:30:50Tap to summarizeSend a message to Monica and Olivia!Jack Vincent was a stagecoach driver, prospector, practical joker, hotel deadbeat, prison escapee, alleged murderer, and—according to one newspaper—a professional bummer.In 1882, Vincent shot his brother-in-law, steamboat mate John Westfall, twice in the face during a saloon argument in Toledo, Washington Territory. Westfall survived for nine months before dying from his injuries, setting off a murder prosecution that would leave jurors struggling to decide exactly what happened.This Fun-Sized Felony follows the strange life of Jack Vincent and the tragic death of John Westfall, a case filled with steamboats, stagecoaches, saloons, and one very unforgettable frontier character.
Transcribe →Ellsworth Kelley and the Jones-Murray Gang - Part 2
3w ago01:52:07Tap to summarizeSend a message to Monica and Olivia!By 1925, the Jones Brothers Gang had changed. Dewey Jones was no longer part of the outlaw life, Milam Jones had vanished, and Oregon Jones was back in the Oregon State Penitentiary ready to cause more trouble. After the deadly prison break that would make headlines across the Pacific Northwest, newspapers began calling the group the Jones-Murray Gang—a nod to the growing influence of escape artist Tom Murray, who had become the mastermind behind their latest plan.In Part Two, Ellsworth Kelley, Tom Murray, James Willos, and Oregon Jones put their most ambitious escape attempt into motion at the Oregon State Penitentiary. Within minutes, two guards were dead, another was gravely wounded, and one of the escapees lay dying beneath the prison wall.This episode follows the deadly prison break, the desperate manhunt that stretched across Oregon and Washington, the capture of the fugitives, and the courtroom battles that would ultimately send two men to the gallows. Along the way, a more complicated story emerges—one involving brutal prison conditions, conflicting testimony, loyalty, desperation, and young men willing to risk everything for a chance at freedom.
Transcribe →Ellsworth Kelley and the Jones Brothers Gang - Part 1
May 2401:19:19Tap to summarizeSend a message to Monica and Olivia!Ellsworth Kelley became tangled up with the notorious Jones Brothers Gang — a crew of young outlaws, including the elusive Oregon Jones and 20-year-old escape artist Tom Murray, whose lives became a cycle of burglaries, highway robberies, prison escapes, freight-train rides, manhunts, and violence across the Pacific Northwest during the 1910s and 1920s.This story follows hidden loot, prison tunnels, the infamous Oregon Boot, repeated escape attempts from the Oregon State Penitentiary, and a gang of young men who seemed incapable of staying behind bars.But beneath the sensational headlines and outlaw mythology lies something far more tragic: boys who grew into fugitives, prisoners, and condemned men while spending years trying to outrun prison walls.
Transcribe →The Curious Disappearance of Frank E. Clark - A Fun-Sized Felony
May 1500:08:40Tap to summarizeSend a message to Monica and Olivia!In the fall of 1910, husband and father Frank E. Clark vanished from Oakland, California without a trace.His wife was left stranded in a city where she knew no one. Newspapers across California carried the story of the missing husband, while neighbors and the Catholic Ladies’ Aid society stepped in to help feed Mrs. Clark and their 5-year-old son.Had Frank abandoned his family? Met with foul play? Started a new life somewhere else?The answer, when it finally came, was far stranger—and far more ordinary—than anyone expected.This is the forgotten story of Frank E. Clark.
Transcribe →Alfred Knapp: Five Murders and a Confession
May 1001:33:34Tap to summarizeSend a message to Monica and Olivia!A woman’s body floats more than 150 miles downriver before finally being recovered near New Albany, Indiana. By the time she is identified as Hannah Goddard Knapp, her husband—Alfred Knapp—has already confessed to murdering her.But Hannah wasn't the first—Not by a long shot.In 1903, Alfred Knapp shocked the country with confessions involving multiple women and children across Ohio and Indiana. Newspapers called him insane. Doctors blamed brain injuries, “brain fever,” and hereditary degeneration. His family insisted he could not control himself. Others believed he was simply evil.This episode follows the life, crimes, confessions, and execution of one of the most infamous killers of the early 1900s—the very man who later fascinated child murderer Jesse McClure.Vintage ads for:Dr. Charles Flesh Food, (1903)and Tonsiline. (1903)
Transcribe →Bertha Boronda: the Mistress of Mayhem - A Fun-Sized Felony
May 200:21:44Tap to summarizeSend a message to Monica and Olivia!Bertha “Bessie” Boronda attacked her husband, Narciso "Frank" Boronda, in the middle of the night in their San Jose home in 1907.The newspapers called it a violent, deliberate mutilation. The court charged her with mayhem—a crime defined by the destruction of part of the human body.But no one ever said exactly what she did.Over time, the story became more specific, more certain... and more sensational.But, when you go back to the coverage of the case in 1907… that version of the story isn’t quite there.
Transcribe →Frank Caruso and the Murder of Dr. Casper Pendola - A Fun-Sized Felony
Apr 2300:11:05Tap to summarizeSend a message to Monica and Olivia!In February of 1927, a Brooklyn father watched his six-year-old son struggle to breathe as diphtheria tightened its grip. Desperate for help, Frank Caruso called for doctors, begged for treatment, and clung to the hope that his boy might survive.But when that hope slipped away, something else took its place.Within hours of his son’s death, Frank turned his grief into blame—and his blame into violence. A physician who had come to help would never leave the apartment alive.What followed was a case shaped by language barriers, fear of modern medicine, and a courtroom battle over whether this was cold-blooded murder… or something far more complicated.This is the story of Frank Caruso—a devastated father—and the moment everything broke.
Transcribe →Jesse McClure: What Sarah Didn't See Coming
Apr 1801:08:09Tap to summarizeSend a message to Monica and Olivia!Years before this double homicide, there were already signs—clear, documented, and deeply concerning. Sarah saw them. Sarah lived with them. Sarah warned the authorities that he was going to kill her.But Jesse didn’t kill her.Even Sarah didn’t see this coming.When he couldn’t reach the person he wanted, Jesse McClure made a different choice—one that ended in the deaths of two small boys.This case takes place in Tipton County and Grant County, Indiana, at the end of 1903.
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