← MrBallen Podcast: Strange, Dark & Mysterious Stories
MrBallen Podcast: Strange, Dark & Mysterious Stories
Shiny Veneers (PODCAST EXCLUSIVE EPISODE)
00:35:06
Today, we have three stories about people who went to great lengths to make themselves look good. But in each case, this completely backfired.
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Today, I'm gonna share three stories that are all about people who went to great lengths to make themselves look good. But in each case, as you'll see, it completely backfires. But before we get into today's stories, if you're a fan of the strange, dark and mysterious delivered in story format, then you've come to the right place. Because that's all we do. And we upload two, three, even four times every week. So if that's of interest to you, the next time the follow button is really excited to see a new movie, make sure you tell them the ending of that movie right as they're sitting down to watch it. Okay, let's get into our first story called Juanita. Been Sitting on a Business Idea. My advice? Don't overthink it. Just take that first step and make sure you have the right tool, a robust selling platform like Shopify to help turn your idea into something real. Shopify Checkout takes just one click so it helps more of your customers finish their purchase and when they come back, their details are already saved. With Shopify, nothing stands between your idea and a real business. So go make it one. If you're ready to stop putting off your business and start hearing Cha Ching, then you're ready for Shopify. Start your free trial@shopify.com MrBallin today. You heard that right. Start your free trial today@shopify.com MrBaulin Again, that's shopify.com MrBaullen for the military and their families, change is a constant. That's why USAA makes it easy to keep all your coverages in one place. Bundle your USAA auto and renters insurance together and save big. Visit usaa.com bundleautoproproperty to see how much you could save. Multiple product savings do not apply in all states or to all situations. Savings subject to change restrictions apply. Membership eligibility and product restrictions apply and are subject to change. USAA means United Services Automobile association and its affiliates San Antonio, Texas One afternoon in late February of 2023, a 26 year old man named Julio Bermejo walked toward a park in the city of Puno, Peru with his girlfriend Juanita. They were on the way to the park to meet Julio's two best friends who he was finally going to be introducing Juanita to. To this point, they knew he had a girlfriend, but they had never actually met. And this in and of itself was actually kind of odd because again, these are Julio's best friends and Julio and Juanita had actually been together for a while now But Julio had sort of always been a little hesitant to introduce her to his friends because he knew, you know, Juanita was just a little bit different. You know, she was. She was odd. And he knew that his friends might, you know, pick up on that and maybe even make fun of him for it. He didn't know. He just. He was worried that it would cause weirdness amongst the friends if they had a chance to interact with his girlfriend, and so he just kind of kept her secret. But his friends knew he was dating Juanita, and they just really wanted to meet her, and so they kept pressuring him and pressuring him, and finally, he's like, you know what? We'll just go to the park. We'll meet up. I'm sure it'll be fine. And in order to ensure that this meeting would go as well as it could, Julio had also brought along with him as they're walking to the park, he had this. This big red cooler, and inside of it was all this rum and some cups and ice and stuff that they could drink while they're at the park. And for what it's worth, you're not allowed to drink in public in Peru. And Julio knew this. And so he was sort of weary of the fact that he's lugging this, you know, obvious case of drinks out to a public park, and he was gonna be drinking in public, but he felt like it was worth the risk. He would go out there, they'd have a couple of drinks, his friends would meet Juanita. It would all be fine. Eventually, Julio and Juanita reached the edge of the park, and up ahead, Julio could see his two friends waiting by this crumbling wall within the park. So most of Puno was covered in all these old ruins because there was this ancient civilization called the Incas, who had lived there hundreds of years ago. And so this crumbling wall that his friends were sitting on was quite literally like an artifact, a remnant of the past. But it was sort of so commonplace in this area that people didn't even notice them. It was just sort of part of the landscape. And so Juanita and Julio and Julio's big red cooler full of rum, they lumbered their way through the park dodging different, you know, ruins that were jutting out of the ground all the way over to the wall where the two friends were. And they actually hadn't seen them approaching. And so it was only when they kind of just were standing right in front of them that the friends looked and saw Julio. Saw Juanita and Julio right away. He sort of trying to gauge their reaction to Juanita and to this whole situation. But pretty quickly, his friends were, you know, just pretty cool, and they were interested in Juanita, and, you know, they quickly wanted to learn more about Juanita, and it was just, like, kind of easy. And Julio, he opened up the cooler right away. He got the cups out. He's filling them up with rum and soda. And all the friends are drinking. You know, they're having a good time. And Julio's like, man, I was worried about nothing. My friends, they think Juanita is great. Yeah, she's different, but they think she's great. This has gone as well as it could have. And also, definitely, the rum was helping. And so for a while, all four of them were just sitting around this crumbling wall, you, know, drinking their rum. They're having a good time. And then at some point, Julio, who was facing his two friends, his friends, they sort of looked up, and they had this look come over their face, like they were worried about something that clearly was behind. Julio sort of gasped when they saw it. And Julio, he's like, oh, no. Like, is it the police? Because they're out here drinking publicly, and they're getting a little bit drunk and a little bit rowdy, with the exception of Juanita, you know, she had drank the least of the group, perhaps to maintain some level of decency, perhaps. But, you know, the two friends and Julio, they were pretty drunk and being loud. And so Julio, he turns around, and his stomach just drops because, yeah. Yep, here come the police. There are two officers coming over, and he's thinking the jig's up. They're gonna clearly see that we are drinking in public. We can't even hide it. And so the officers, they walk over, and, you know, the friends are sort of panicking. They're putting their cups down, and Julio, he's just sort of resigned to his fate here. He's gonna get in trouble. And the officers that come over and they see the cops, and they can clearly tell this group of people is drinking. But when they looked into that red cooler, that big red cooler that Julio had brought along, when they saw what was in there, they backed up, and they told Julio to stay right where he was. So Julio and Juanita had actually been together for years, and despite his insecurities about her, about their relationship, he was ultimately pretty eager for his friends to finally meet her. But taking her to the park that day turned out to be a really big mistake, because when the police arrived on the scene and they looked in Julio's red cooler probably expecting to see alcohol, because that's very likely why they approached them in the first place. They did see alcohol, but they also saw Juanita. So Julio was right to be on edge about how his friends might react to seeing his girlfriend, seeing Juanita, because she was so different. Right? That's his concern. And she was. She was very different than your sort of average girlfriend, let's say, because Juanita was actually an 800-year-old mummified man from the pre Hispanic era, the period when the Incan civilization ruled the area. Julio's father had acquired Juanita, this mummy, decades ago. So Juanita had actually been a fixture in Julio's life since he was born. Now, Julio's best friends, really, all of his friends, knew that, you know, his family had this mummy, but they didn't take it seriously when Julio referred to the mummy as his girlfriend. Again, this is an 800-year-old mummified man, you know, that he calls his girlfriend. They thought it was a joke. But, you know, when it seemed like it wasn't a joke, when it seemed like Julio apparently had a real relationship with this mummy, the friends begged him to bring Juanita out. They wanted to see this amazing artifact, but they didn't realize that that request when they finally pushed Julio to come out to this park with Juanita in his cooler, because that's how he transported her, that that would actually destroy their friend's actual love life. Because Julio was not joking when he called Juanita his girlfriend. He had very real, very deep feelings for this mummy. He'd even convinced himself that she was, like an active participant in their relationship and sort of kept him in line. You know, according to Julio, he said that Juanita would. Would hold his hand and would. Would poke his feet whenever he misbehaved. And so when those two officers in the park came over to Julio and his friends and they looked in the cooler, they saw, you know, Juanita, this mummy, partially inside of this cooler, along with the rum. And so right off the bat, Julio and his friends, they're getting in trouble for that alcohol. But also, Julio was arrested and charged with the illegal possession of a historical item. But as of 2023, there's been no update on this case. As for Juanita, like the actual mummy, it was confiscated by the ministry of culture for research purposes. And that means very likely that she and Julio will be separated forever. The story of Southern New Hampshire University started in 1932 above a small storefront. Almost a century later, SNHU offers over 200 degree programs online. There are no set class times so learning fits around your schedule and courses are career focused to help strengthen your skills. But the best part of the story SNHU's online tuition rates are some of the lowest in the entire country. This could be your next chapter. Visit snhu. Edu mrbalin Today, Adobe Firefly is the all in one creative studio with AI powered image and video generation for today's creative process. Built for creators of every kind, Firefly helps you generate, edit and experiment fast because the asks aren't getting smaller, the budgets aren't getting bigger and the timelines. Ugh. Yeah, still tight. With all the best creative AI models in one place, Firefly brings your ideas to life. Unlock a better way to make with Adobe Firefly. Chime is banking built for you, not the 1%. They have thousands of fee free ATMs because why pay to get your own money? Plus with the chime card, get travel perks like airport lounge access and 5% cash back on things like gas or groceries. Upgrade to America's number one choice for banking with a Chime checking account. Chime is not just smarter banking, it's the most rewarding way to bank. Join the millions who are already banking fee free today. Head to chime.comballin that is chime.comballin it only takes a few minutes to sign up. Chime is a fintech, not a bank. Banking services for Chime Card provided by Chime's bank partners. Optional products and services may have fees or charges. Stated cash back for Chime prime only. No minimum balance required. Checking account ranking based on a J.D. power survey published October 20, 2025. For more information on travel perks, go to Chime.com disclosures. Our next story is called unit 85. One afternoon in 1984, a man named Dmitri carried a cardboard box down the hallway of this high rise apartment building in the city of Kramatorsk, Ukraine. And this building was basically brand new. It was one of a bunch of developments that had been built right before the Moscow Olympics, just four years earlier in 1980 as part of a push to show the world that the Soviet Union was a very successful and prosperous place, so very much by design. Everything that they had built was very shiny and very modern and impressive like this apartment building. And pretty much everybody in the area had been really desperate to get one of these new apartments and Dmitri had lucked out. So a few weeks ago, Dmitri had been notified that one of the units had suddenly opened up and he jumped at the opportunity to move in. He and his family had never lived in a place this nice before. I mean, there were brand new appliances, and the building had thick concrete walls with great soundproofing, so they didn't have to listen to their neighbors chat or watch TV like they had in many other places they lived before. Like, this was a huge upgrade. So today, Dmitri and his wife and two sons had basically spent the entire afternoon hauling their furniture in and getting situated, because they're like, we want to move in here as fast as possible. His family was inside the unit now unpacking basically everything else. And Dimitri was bringing up one of the very last boxes. But as he headed down the hallway toward his apartment, unit 85, he saw a neighbor open up her door right up ahead. And the neighbor looked out at him. And as Dimitri got closer to this neighbor, he noticed that this woman looked incredible, incredibly sad and just kind of tired, like life had beaten her down. She was also really pale and very thin and gaunt, and she had bags under her eyes. And she was watching Dimitri with this strange expression on her face, almost like pity for Dimitri. And Dimitri, you know, despite this initial reaction to what she looked like, he doesn't know her. And this is his neighbor, after all. So he was about to stop and introduce himself to her, but right as he was about to, she suddenly went back inside of her unit and closed the door. The whole thing was just very weird. And Dimitri, after the door had shut, he just stood there for a second, wondering if he should knock and ask the woman if there was some kind of problem, like, was she okay? But in general, Dimitri was naturally kind of a quiet, introverted guy, and he very much preferred to mind his own business about pretty much everything. So. So he decided he would just leave the woman alone, which was pretty clearly what she wanted anyways. I mean, she's the one who shut the door and disappeared on him. So after a minute, he just walked the rest of the way down the hallway. He went inside of his unit, and he carried this cardboard box that he had lugged up here into the bedroom that his teenage sons were going to share. And when he got in there, he saw his boys were standing up on one of the mattresses, trying to hang a decorative rug on the wall behind their beds to kind of, you know, freshen up the place. And Dimitri, he was glad to see that it seemed like his sons were, you know, leaning into to making this space their own. And so Dimitri, he set the box down and looked around their room. And with all their stuff there, it was already starting to feel like home. And he was sure that, you know, despite the weirdness with his neighbor, that this has got to be the beginning of a really just amazing, you know, new, exciting chapter for he and his family. But Dimitri quickly realized that not everything in this building was as amazing as he thought it was. I mean, he'd already had that weird run in with his neighbor. It would turn out that was just the tip of the iceberg. Even though, you know, his apartment and this whole building was undeniably nice and beautiful and modern, basically all of their neighbors were not nice. It was not just that one woman who appeared to be quite rude on that first day there. It was like every single person Dimitri ran into in this entire complex was quiet and sullen and grumpy and definitely not interested in talking to Dimitri. And then more than that, you know, you have all these people that clearly didn't want anything to do with Dimitri and his family. But it was almost like all the time, the entire place was just silent. I mean, there was good soundproofing in this building, no doubt, but every time he walked down the hallway, it was like it was just silent. Like nobody was making any noise in any of the apartment buildings. It was like this weird vibe that sort of hung over this whole place. Like a sense of gloom and doom sort of persisted everywhere, and Dimitri just couldn't explain it. Like, of all places to have that feeling be so present, why here? This is such a nice place. But Dimitri and his family, they stuck it out. They stayed in this apartment, and despite how weird it was, and it continued to be as weird as I've described here, pretty much the whole time they were there, Dimitri and his family, they tried to make the best of it. But a couple of years after they had moved into unit 85, Dimitri's older son started feeling unusually tired and weak, sort of similar to how the people in the building all seemed to act. And at first, Dimitri thought his son was just stressed with school or his social life or something, and maybe he just needed more sleep. But his son's symptoms just kept getting worse. And when Dimitri and his wife eventually took their son to the doctor, they found out that, unfortunately, their son had leukemia, which is a blood cancer. Now, this was obviously a total shock to the family because, you know, this whole time they'd been chalking it up to, you know, he needs more sleep, right? But to find out it was something so serious, I mean, they didn't even know what to think. And on top of that, I mean, Dimitri's son, who had the Leukemia. He had always been, like, a really active, healthy kid. So this just felt like it came out of nowhere. But now he had to undergo cancer treatment and spend most of his time resting in bed. And despite doing those things, he just continued to get worse. A few months after Dimitri's older son got sick, Dimitri was sitting inside of an exam room at the doctor's office with his younger son, who was now also sick. He had a lot of the same symptoms as his brother. So Dimitri had taken him for blood tests right away, fearing, you know, he could have leukemia, too. So now they were waiting for the doctor to come back with those blood test results to see if that was the case. And when the doctor did finally come back into the room, Dimitri could tell by the look on the doctor's face that whatever they were going to say was going to be bad. So the doctor, he sat down and. And said that Dimitri's younger son did also have leukemia. Dimitri was shattered. I mean, he was in complete disbelief. Here. He asked the doctor, like, how is it possible that both of my children could develop the same type of cancer in the same year? And the doctor said, well, there is an answer for that. This was hereditary. The whole family had a genetic predisposition to leukemia. That afternoon, Dimitri brought his youngest son home and told his wife and his older son the terrible news. And Dimitri just couldn't help but feel incredibly guilty, like this was all his fault for passing his bad genes onto his kids. So once, you know, everybody had begun to process the news and the sons were both in bed, Dimitri, you know, just who didn't know what to do with himself now he felt so terrible. He just decided to go out for a walk to clear his head. And so he did that. He went out, he walked around, and it didn't really work. He still had so much on his mind, so many bad thoughts passing through his mind. But when he got back to the building after his walk, as he approached the main entrance, he saw one of his neighbors sitting out on the steps smoking a cigarette. It was actually that woman that he had first seen when he had moved in, the one who had poked her head into the hallway and then quickly closed the door without saying hello. Since that day, Dimitri had never spoken to her. He hadn't even tried to talk to her. Like it was clear she didn't want anything to do with him or anyone else, for that matter. And certainly tonight was not the moment he was gonna go, you know, talk to this woman. But very much to his surprise, as Dimitri walked right past her and began walking up the steps to go inside the building. She actually turned and looked at him and just asked him, is everything okay? And Dimitri was so caught off guard by this that he found himself just suddenly, very emotionally sort of blurting out everything about his son's illnesses and how it was all his fault. And as his neighbor listened to him, she didn't seem surprised at all by what he was saying. And when he was done talking, she didn't ask a single question about it. In fact, she just nodded her head like, yep, that's too bad. As if she knew this was already going on, even though there was no way she could have known this stuff. And so when it was clear their conversation wasn't really going to go much further than Dimitri just sort of vomiting out all this information and her nodding and that was sort of it. Dimitri was going to go back into the building, but she stopped him. And she did ask him a question. She asked him, do you know anything about the tenants who lived in your unit before you? He said, no. All he knew is that somebody had lived there, you know, and then apparently they had left, that created the opening, and he had jumped at the chance to move in. That's all he knew. And so she told him that, well, actually, there's a story behind why this cleared up, why that unit cleared up. She said the previous tenants were a mother and her two teenage kids, and they had all died within two years of moving in. That's why it opened up and they had died from leukemia. After hearing this, Dimitri couldn't help but feel like, okay, this doesn't seem like my kids got leukemia. Leukemia, because this is hereditary. It feels like something else caused my kids to get sick. That very likely is happening in my apartment. Like, how is it possible that both my kids got leukemia and the previous tenants who were in this unit also got leukemia? Like, there's no way that's just coincidence. No way. And so Dimitri became absolutely obsessed with this idea that he was gonna get to the bottom of whatever was going on inside of them apartment. And so over the next year, Dmitri made multiple serious efforts to get an inspector to come out and look at the apartment. He wanted them to check for a gas leak or toxic chemicals or something in the soil. But when he talked to building management, they just insisted that they'd already looked into all those things and everything was fine. Like this. This is just hereditary. It's just coincidental, like, you know, drop it. But Dimitri couldn't look. And he kept pushing, asking anyone he could to Just try to help him figure out if there's some external factor that's causing his family to become ill. But it all went nowhere. Basically, people just started ignoring his requests, and Dimitri felt like there was nothing he could do. By 1987, only a few years after Dimitri and his family had moved into unit 85, Dimitri's older son passed away from the. And Dimitri's younger son continued to get sicker. Meanwhile, a rumor began to spread around the apartment building and also just across the whole area, that unit 85 of that apartment building must be cursed. Two years later, on a cold morning in 1989, Dimitri came home from the hospital where his younger son was being treated to grab some clean clothes for himself and his wife. He and his wife were now spending virtually all their time at the hospital. It felt like they were, at this point, just waiting for their second son to die. That was the direction this seemed to be going. And so, of course, this is like a really miserable, awful time for Dimitri and his wife. And so when he got back to his apartment and after he got those clothes, instead of just immediately leaving and rushing back to the hospital, which was just so awful, you know, Dimitri just wandered into his son's bedroom and just took a minute for himself. He sat down on one of the beds, and he stared at that decorative rug that was hanging on the wall, which had been there since the first day they had moved in. The sons had put it up there. And when he looked back at that day, he remembered how excited and how hopeful his sons had been and how he and his wife had been for their new life here. Like this felt like such an amazing opportunity. But that day, that move in day, felt like a lifetime ago. Ever since then, nothing had gone the way they had expected. And so Dimitri wondered if maybe the rumor was true, that unit 85, where they lived, maybe it really was cursed. And while he was thinking about that, something on the rug, the decorative rug on the wall caught his eye. And so Dimitri, he got up and he walked over to this rug to get a better look. And at first, he couldn't even tell what he was looking at. But upon closer inspection, he knew something was wrong here. And it was wrong enough that he actually ran out of the room, picked up the phone, and called emergency services. So when Dimitri had moved in, he'd been so excited that he'd basically overlooked a lot of red flags. He never asked why the previous tenants would leave behind such a great apartment. He didn't know it was because they died after living there for A very short amount of time. But he didn't ask. And he also didn't ask about why basically everybody on the premises just seemed so sad and lifeless all the time. Like, everybody acted that way. He never asked about it. And so ultimately, Dmitri's opinion of this place, of unit 85 in this building is that, you know what? There can be nothing wrong with living here. I mean, this is a modern place. Everything's so new and beautiful. Like, it has to be a safe place to live, right? But it would turn out being brand new and modern was actually what made. Made this apartment building so dangerous. When this building was constructed, the Soviet government had been in such a rush to show off how wonderful and rich the country was in time for the Moscow Olympics that they'd made a terrible mistake. During the construction of this whole apartment building, the crew had lost a very small but very important piece of equipment. It was a capsule on a machine that measured the density of soil which they used at the quarry where they were carving the stone that was used to build the apartments. Now, work had been paused so the crew could find this capsule. But the government also really didn't want there to be a big delay here because they wanted to show off this amazing place, you know, in time for the Olympics. So after a week, even though the capsule was still missing, they just called off the search and resumed construction, figuring the capsule must just be somewhere in the quarry. But the capsule was not in the quarry. It ended up embedded into the stone walls of unit 85. And this was a big problem, because that capsule contained a substance called cesium 137, which is extremely radioactive. And so for the next eight years, the people who lived in that apartment building, in particular in and around unit 85, were receiving constant radiation exposure. That's why all of Dimitri's neighbors seemed sad and pale and lethargic. And that's also why Dimitri's family and the family before him who had lived inside of unit 85. It's why they got leukemia. Dimitri discovered the awful truth in 1989 when he was in his son's bedroom and. And he was looking at the rug hanging on the wall. What he noticed on the rug was there was what appeared to be a burn mark. And when he looked more closely, he realized that the burn was coming from the wall itself, that the rug was pressed against, like there was something in the wall causing this rug to burn. And so, not really having any idea what that was, but knowing that, you know, something odd has been going on here, he suspected for many years and no one's really looked. This seems really odd. At better call call the authorities. Well, when he did, the authorities came out and they inspected the apartment. And when they cut into that wall behind the rug, what did they find? The missing capsule. In total, six people who lived in this apartment building died and 17 more were disabled, all because of the radiation in unit 85. However, despite that being sort of hard facts, nobody was ever held accountable for the steadily incident. Everybody learns a language for different reasons. Maybe you just want to watch K dramas without subtitles or you want to talk with family members but in their native language. Your life is unique so your language learning should be too. I remember trying to learn a new language before a trip and most of the systems that I tried felt pretty generic, but with Rosetta Stone it was completely different. It adjusted to how I was learning, so it felt more like I was actually preparing to use this langu, not just learning how to regurgitate it. Rosetta Stone Sapphire is designed for personalized learning, helping you go beyond generic lessons and focus on the topics that matter most to you. If you want to take your language skills to the next level, don't wait to try Rosetta Stone Sapphire. Mr. Ball and podcast listeners can get 20% off their Rosetta Stone Sapphire subscription when they sign up today. You'll get unlimited access to all 25 Rosetta Stone languages plus all the new Sapphire learning tools. Visit RosettaStone.com MrBalin to redeem your 20% off. Again, go to RosettaStone.com MrBallin and start learning a language for real. Summer is a great opportunity for kids to review challenging concepts, strengthen core skills and head into the start of the school year feeling more prepared. And this is where IXL can help. A couple of things that I like about IXL is that it's really easy to fit into my kids busy summer schedules and the instant feedback helps them understand what they missed instead of just moving on. My kids also like how engaging it is, which makes a big difference because they actually want to use it instead of it feeling like just another assignment. IXL is an award winning online learning platform that helps kids truly understand what they're learning. IXL is used in 96 of the top 100 school districts in the US and studies show kids who use IXL score higher on tests proven in all 50 states. Make an impact on your child's learning. Get IXL now and Mr. Ballin podcast Strange, Dark and Mysterious Stories. Listeners can get an exclusive 20% off IXL membership when they sign up today at ixl.com mrbalin Visit ixl.com mrBalin to get the most effective learning program out there at the best price. Our third and final story of today's episode is called A Bone to Pick. On the evening of September 17, 1896, a detective named John White dug a shovel into the ground outside of a home in Evanston, Illinois. So Detective White worked for the Evanston police, and that morning, the owner of the home that he was currently digging in front of had come in to report that he had found bones buried on his property. So White had been sent out there to see if they were human or animal. Now, White had actually already stopped by the home earlier to inspect a few of the bones the homeowner had pulled out of the ground. And his initial thought was they were likely just from a deer or some other animal. So he was not expecting this to be human bones. However, he had still come back to fully excavate this yard, because this property was only a quarter mile from the former home of the infamous serial killer named H.H. holmes, who had been caught just two years earlier. And H.H. holmes had confessed to 27 murders. But the police believed that there were dozens or even hundreds more that they didn't know about. So if any of the bones that were found on this property were human, it was then very likely they were connected to this serial killer. And that would be a huge find for Detective White at a time when he desperately needed a win. Because just a week ago, a reporter from the Chicago Chronicle had published a very unflattering story about Detective White, about how he had bungled a case which had made White sort of like the laughingstock of the police force. It had been very embarrassing. But more than embarrassment, I mean, Detective White cared a lot about his reputation. He cared about being a good detective. So he had been looking for a way to sort of get that story out of everybody's heads. And he thought, like, what better way to do that than to be the detective that finds these missing bones, these potentially missing bones of these victims that had never been found. And so White, who. He's out here, you know, part of this bigger excavation of this property, he takes a shovel, and he begins to dig. And at some point, he hits something hard in the ground. At that point, White took a shovel away, and he reached down and he carefully brushed away the dirt from whatever he hit. And eventually, when he revealed what it was, it was clearly bone. But more than that, it was clearly human bone. It was an entire human skull. And so White, I mean, he was thrilled. I mean, this is, like, in some ways, the best thing he could have found. I mean, this is undeniably human remains here. And that was sort of what he was hoping he would find. And there also wasn't much decay or discoloration on the skull, which suggested it had not been buried for very long, at least not more than a few years, which also highly suggested it was connected to H.H. holmes, who had been caught two years ago. And so, White, he's feeling really good. Like, he's got the big find here. This is exactly what he hoped would happen. He knew the medical examiner would obviously have to look things over and confirm some things, but certainly seemed like he had effectively struck gold. And it also seemed like this was going to be White's chance to really stick it to that reporter who just a week earlier had written that horrible article about him. Now look at White. Look what he was doing. Now, nobody would remember that terrible article, and everybody would remember this. And so White, he stops digging. He wraps the skull in a blanket, and he heads back to the police station. And when he went in there, who was already inside talking to another officer? None other than that very reporter who had written that embarrassing article about White a week earlier. And so White, he's thrilled. Like, this is the best case scenario for him. He's got that skull that's wrapped in a blanket. And he made a point of. As he walked down the middle of the aisle of this big room full of all the other officers and desks, and the. He made a point to really indicate that he had something important in his hands, and he was walking with a purpose here, but he really wanted to get the reporter's attention. And so he walks down the aisle. He's got his skull, and the reporter, he notices and stops what he's doing. And he turns and he looks at White, and he's like, hey, what do you got there? And so White, he turns to this reporter and, you know, he stares at him like, I know who you are. I know what you wrote about me. But what he does is he unfurls the blanket and reveals the human skull to the reporter. And the reporter's looking at it like, what in the world? And White's like, yeah, you know, he's kind of gloating as he's doing this. He's like, yeah, I was digging up over at that property about a quarter mile from where H.H. holmes lived, and I think I found another victim. A victim that nobody knew about. Yep. Here it is. So there you go. And the reporter, he's staring at the skull. He's hearing what Detective White has said. And White could see the gears are turning in the reporter's head. Like, this is a huge story. And the reporter's like, oh, my goodness. Thank you. I gotta write about this. This is amazing. I can't believe you found this. This is incredible. And so White's like, this. This is the greatest thing. He's gonna write a new article. It's gonna feature me. I'm gonna be the hero. And also, how great is it that this article is going to be written by him? Like, the same guy who talked bad about me is now going to make me out to be some kind of a hero. This is perfect. The next morning, when White walked into the police station, he was greeted with all his fellow officers cheering and clapping for him, congratulating him on this huge breakthrough, the find of the skull. So that Chicago Chronicle reporter had immediately written a story about White's big find, about finding the skull in that yard. And it had been front page news that morning. And so all of White's colleagues, everybody had read the story. He was. He was the star. And to White's delight, I mean, the reporter even openly speculated that that skull might even belong to HH Holmes former wife, Minnie Williams, who'd completely disappeared a few months after they had gotten married, which was a huge revelation because nobody knew what happened to her. And it was like, wow, Detective White, you figured it out. You found her. And so Detective White had, like, the best day of his life. Like, this is redemption. Everything is great. Until that night, on his way home from work, Detective White stopped at this very crowded newsstand to pick up a copy of the evening edition. He grabbed a newspaper off the shelf and he looked at the front page. And unsurprisingly, you know, his story, the bone story, was still very much front page news. But as he read through the article, his stomach dropped. And then he heard a noise coming from all around him that made his blood run cold. It would turn out, other than the human skull that White dug up on that property, all the other bones that so far had been found on that man's property had been horse bones. And more than that, the skull did not belong to a murder victim. So unfortunately, White's big breakthrough was not a breakthrough at all. But Detective White, he actually knew that. He had known that from the first second he stepped on that property, ever since that. That embarrassing article had been published about White that week. Earlier, he'd become obsessed not just with fixing his reputation, but specifically with getting revenge on that reporter who wrote it. And this bone scenario had given him, in his mind, the perfect opportunity. He had come up with this elaborate plan to plant the human skull, pretend to find it, and then tell that specific reporter all about it, in hopes that the reporter would write a completely incorrect story and then get publicly humiliated exactly the way White felt like he had been humiliated. But White had underestimated this report reporter, because the reporter, after seeing the skull that White showed him and writing that big article about how this skull could be connected to H.H. holmes, you know, the reporter, he gets that story out the door that morning. It's this big hit after that. On that same day, the reporter went to the medical examiner to ask for more information about the skull. And quickly he learned about the other bones. And he learned that this skull very likely was not connected to H.H. holmes. And the reporter began to see that this looked like a setup he saw through White's scheme. And so that evening, a whole new article had come out about White and his big discovery. And basically what it said was White was a petty moron who tampered with evidence and thought he could pass off horse bones for human ones. And so White, after reading the story and realizing what a terrible position he was in now, that sound he heard all around him that made his blood run cold was the sound of the other people all around him reading this article and laughing at his expense. A quick note about our stories. They are all based on true events, but we sometimes use pseudonyms to protect the people involved. And some details are fictionalized for dramatic purposes. The Mr. Ballin podcast Strange, Dark and Mysterious Stories is hosted and executive Produced by me, Mr. Ballin. Our head of writing is Evan Allen. Produced by Jeremy Bone and Cole Locascio. This episode was written by Kate Murdoch and Kate Gallagher. Story editing by Evan Allen. Research and fact checking by Shelly Shue, Samantha Van Hoover Goose Evan Beamer Abigail Shumway Camille Callahan Alex Paul Ben Faciano Research and fact checking supervision by Steven Ear Audio editing and post Produced by Whit Locascio and Jordan Stidham Production support by Antonio Minotta and Delaina Corley Artwork by Jessica Claugston Kiner Theme song Something Wicked by Ross Bugden hi, I'm Angie Hicks, co founder of Angie. One thing I've learned is that you buy a house, but you make it a home. For decades, Angie's help millions of homeowners hire skilled pros for their projects that matter. Angie the one you trust to find the ones you trust. Find a pro for your project@angie.com Talk about regrets. 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