Tony Kiritsis, Richard Hall, and the True Story Behind Dead Man’s Wire: A Conversation with the Makers of Dead Man’s Line

Summary

Podcast Summary

Murder Sheet

Episode: Tony Kiritsis, Richard Hall, and the True Story Behind Dead Man’s Wire: A Conversation with the Makers of Dead Man’s Line
Date: January 15, 2026
Guests: Alan Berry & Mark Enox (Directors, "Dead Man's Line")
Hosts: Anya Cain (Journalist) & Kevin Greenlee (Attorney)

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Episode Overview

This episode dives deep into the infamous 1977 hostage crisis involving Tony Kiritsis and Richard Hall, which shook Indianapolis and captured the country’s attention. The case, recently dramatized in Gus Van Sant’s film Dead Man’s Wire, is given rich historical and personal context through a conversation with Alan Berry and Mark Enox, the documentarians behind Dead Man’s Line—a documentary that brought renewed focus to the true story. The hosts and guests explore Kiritsis’s background, the events of the crisis, law enforcement and media response, the complicated aftermath, and the process of documenting and adapting this dark, bizarre Indiana legend.

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Main Discussion and Insights

1. Introducing the Case & Context

• Tony Kiritsis: An Indianapolis man who, on February 8, 1977, took Richard Hall hostage over a mortgage dispute and engineered a "dead man's line" rig—an improvised shotgun device wired to Hall’s neck.
• Media Spotlight: The event became a national sensation, partially due to Kiritsis’s insistence on involving the press and broadcasting his grievances.
• Recent Adaptation: On January 9, 2026, Gus Van Sant's Dead Man's Wire (based on these events) premiered, prompting a comparison to the documentary Dead Man’s Line by Alan Berry and Mark Enox.

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2. Background on Tony Kiritsis

[04:26–09:32]

• Early Life: Hard-working, ex-army, managed family trailer park, prone to volatility and violence, felt underappreciated by his family.
• Family Conflict: Fired gun at his brothers in 1965, took sister hostage in 1968 over disputed compensation, ultimately paid $50k to leave family business.
• Ambition & Grievance: Used settlement to buy land and sought to develop it—took large loan from Meridian Mortgage (run by ML Hall); grew convinced Hall sabotaged his prospects.

“He was one of these guys that is very loyal to friends... But if you crossed him, you are dead to him and he's going to do whatever he can to make your life miserable.” – Alan Berry [12:05]

3. Family & Psychological Complexity

[10:06–14:36]

• Difficult Upbringing: Abusive father, idealized mother—her death devastated Tony.
• Incidents of Loyalty and Violence: Known for generosity to community members, yet capable of severe aggression if crossed.
• Blurred Lines: Kiritsis was both well-liked and feared—a blend of pro-social and anti-social behaviors.

“His mom was clearly the greatest good influence in his life and when she passed, it destroyed him...” – Mark Enox [13:50]

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4. Who Were the Halls?

[17:49–20:16]

• Dick Hall: Son of ML Hall, former Air Force, mild-mannered, became the unintended victim.
• ML Hall: Real estate mogul with a checkered history (including federal fraud conviction in 1953), viewed by Tony as a mentor turned betrayer; suspiciously absent during the crisis and refused to negotiate for his son’s safety.

“ML and his wife are in Florida for the winter. And most of us who have kids, if something like this happened, we, we would fly home..." – Mark Enox [18:15]

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5. The Hostage Crisis: February 8, 1977

[26:14–35:20]

• The Setup: Kiritsis entered Meridian Mortgage expecting to find ML Hall but found Dick; rigged shotgun with “dead man’s line” (wire triggering the gun if tension was applied).
• Negotiation and Tension: Tony led Dick (and a parade of police/media) through downtown Indianapolis in freezing weather, with the threat that any interference would be fatal.
• Innovation of Threat: The "dead man’s line" concept seems original—likely inspired by TV, as discovered later.

“He puts a steel cable...over Dick's head. That wire then runs to this sawed off shotgun and through the trigger guard...Dead man's line is the term Tony used…” – Mark Enox [26:26]

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6. Police & Media Response

[35:20–41:12]

• Law Enforcement Unprepared: No precedent or policy for such an event; FBI and psychologist Patrick Mullaney called in to advise.
• Media as Negotiator: Tony insisted on communicating with Fred Heckman, a respected WIBC radio journalist. Heckman’s calls calmed Tony, enabled him to air grievances, and served as negotiation.

“Fred airs [the call] mostly uncensored...Fred Heckman was able to come in and be that kind of trusted negotiator, even more so than the police or the FBI.” – Mark Enox [37:52]

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7. Surviving as a Hostage

[41:12–43:35]

• Dick Hall’s Composure: A stoic, religious man; relied on faith and emotional restraint to survive the ordeal.

“The only thing he found useful was his personal relationship with God. That he would turn this over to God and if he would just be still...God would save him.” – Mark Enox [42:30]

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8. Release and Aftermath

[46:17–49:14]

• Resolution: Police negotiated with promises (immunity, settlement, and an apology letter) that were never truly enforceable or honored, but convinced Tony to release Dick.
• Legal Outcome: Kiritsis was found not guilty by reason of insanity. The case spurred changes in Indiana law, shifting the burden of proof for insanity defenses.

“He’s found not guilty by reason of insanity...After this, the law is changed so that...the burden now falls on the defense.” – Mark Enox [48:10]

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9. Public & Cultural Aftershocks

[51:01–55:49]

• Folk Hero or Villain?: Split public opinion—some saw Tony as a working-class champion vs. the “big banks”; others saw only violence and trauma.

“Some people do say [he's a hero]...But I think a lot of those people probably didn't know the full story and they were, they were mirroring themselves...” – Alan Berry [51:58]

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10. Making Dead Man’s Line: Documentary Process

[56:02–66:57]

• Origins: Project chosen due to vivid memories and the abundance of archival footage.
• Production Challenges: Built trust with interviewees; worked with minimal budget; spent five years on the project while maintaining day jobs.
• Distribution Struggles: Difficulty breaking into film festivals, trouble with aggregators, struggled to generate awareness in a crowded market.

“Our biggest cost was time and filming the people that didn't live here...We just slowly built it up...” – Alan Berry [62:57]

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11. Hollywood Adaptation & "Dead Man’s Wire" Journey

[71:12–83:19]

• Multiple False Starts: Optioned by multiple teams, endured industry flakiness and false promises, but ultimately connected with writer Austin Kladney, who scripted the Gus Van Sant film.
• Uncredited Influence: Provided archive materials and became historical consultants for Dead Man’s Wire.
• Reflection: Expressed pride in the documentary’s historical accuracy; bittersweet feelings about lack of financial reward but satisfaction in seeing the story reach a wider audience.

“It was a ten $12 million picture. Everybody made money off that, right? Yeah, we haven't made a penny...But I think at the end of the day, what we really want is people to see our work.” – Alan Berry [81:38, 83:48]

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12. Postscript: What Happened to Kiritsis and Hall?

[92:29–97:10]

• Kiritsis: Remained in mental institutions until 1988 after refusing further psychological evaluations; died in 2005; never re-integrated into society.
• Dick Hall: Suffered lifelong trauma, lost job and family stability, struggled with PTSD and alcoholism, never fully recovered.

“Dick Hall...He loses everything. ML dies within a couple years, and then a Meridian mortgage goes under. Then Dick gets divorced...He paid for it with the loss of almost everything that he had in 1977.” – Mark Enox [92:29]

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13. Takeaways & Reflections

[96:08–98:08]

• Mark Enox: “Family is incredibly important and it can, in the case of Tony, it created an explosive device way, way back when he was a kid...”
• Alan Berry: “I have empathy for all of them, but most of all Dick Hall, he's the one that got the worst of all this.”

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14. Media Inspiration for Crime

[98:24–100:09]

• Kiritsis's “dead man’s line” may have been inspired by an episode of Hawaii Five-O, confirming the power of media in criminal innovation.

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Notable Quotes & Moments

• [12:05] Alan Berry: “He was one of these guys that is very loyal to friends...But if you crossed him, you are dead to him...”
• [18:15] Mark Enox: “ML and his wife are in Florida...if something like this happened, we would fly home.”
• [26:26] Mark Enox: “He puts a steel cable...over Dick’s head...this is the dead man’s line...”
• [37:52] Mark Enox: “Fred Heckman was able to come in and be that kind of trusted negotiator...”
• [42:30] Mark Enox: “The only thing he found useful was his personal relationship with God...”
• [48:10] Mark Enox: “He’s found not guilty by reason of insanity...After this, the law is changed...”
• [51:58] Alan Berry: “Some people...thought he was a hero. But I think a lot of those people probably didn't know the full story...”
• [81:38 / 83:48] Alan Berry: “It was a ten $12 million picture. Everybody made money off that, right? Yeah, we haven't made a penny...But...what we really want is people to see our work.”
• [92:29] Mark Enox: “Dick Hall...He loses everything...He paid for it with the loss of almost everything that he had in 1977.”

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Key Timestamps

• [04:26–09:32]: Tony’s early life, family dynamics, roots of conflict
• [17:49–20:16]: The Halls’ background, ML Hall’s action (or lack thereof)
• [26:26–35:20]: The hostage taking—dead man’s line rig, police & media response
• [37:52]: Fred Heckman’s role as intermediary
• [46:17–48:10]: Crisis resolution, legal aftermath
• [51:01–55:49]: Folk hero debate and public reaction
• [56:02–66:57]: Making "Dead Man's Line"—process, challenges, independent production
• [71:12–83:19]: Hollywood adaptation journey, industry realities
• [92:29–97:10]: Aftermath for Tony Kiritsis and Dick Hall
• [98:24–100:09]: Origins of the “dead man’s line” device

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Conclusion

This episode provides a deeply human and thoroughly researched chronicle of the Tony Kiritsis hostage crisis, its legacy, and the media’s role in shaping public memory. The firsthand perspective of the documentarians adds rich context to both the historical event and its modern retellings, raising questions about justice, mental health, the media’s role, and what happens to those left in the wake of extraordinary violence.
For listeners interested in true crime, journalism, and the reality behind Hollywood adaptations, this is an essential, evocative listen.

Watch the full documentary, Dead Man’s Line, on YouTube.
See show notes for direct links.

Transcript

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[Kevin Greenlee]

Content Warning this episode contains discussion of mental illness and violence.

[Anya Cain]

The images sear themselves into your brain. One man is holding a sawed off shotgun. He is angry, crying, elated. At times he's desperate for revenge and attention. He feels he is the true victim.

[Kevin Greenlee]

The other man stoic, his hands cuffed before him. His neck is wired to the shotgun. One wrong move and he's dead.

[Anya Cain]

Behind them follow a phalanx of police officers and a gaggle of reporters.

[Kevin Greenlee]

This of course is the case of Tony Kuritsis.

[Anya Cain]

He was a man from Indianapolis, Indiana who shocked the Hoosier State and the world on February 8, 1977. That was the day he went into the office of Meridian Mortgage and wired a sawed off shotgun to Richard Hall's head.

[Kevin Greenlee]

What ensued was a 63 hour hostage.

[Anya Cain]

Crisis on January 9, 2026, a movie based on that event, directed by Gus Van Zant and starring Bill Skarsgrd, Dacre Montgomery, Carrie Elwes, Colman Domingo Mahala, and Al Pacino, came out. That's called Dead Man's Wire. It's gotten some good reviews so far.

[Kevin Greenlee]

But before that, there was Dead Man's Line. This is a 2018 true crime documentary that brought attention back to the case. It was directed by Alan Berry and Mark Enox. Mark and Allen were kind enough to take us through this disturbing moment of Indianapolis infamy.

[Anya Cain]

My name is Anya Cain. I'm a journalist.

[Kevin Greenlee]

And I'm Kevin Greenlee. I'm an attorney.

[Anya Cain]

And this is the Murder Sheet.

[Kevin Greenlee]

We're a true crime podcast focused on original reporting, interviews, and deep dives into murder cases. We're the Murder Sheet.

[Anya Cain]

And this is Tony Kiritsis, Richard hall, and the true story behind Dead Man's Wire, a conversation with the makers of Dead Man's Line.

[Alan Berry]

It.

[Anya Cain]

First of all, guys, thank you so much for joining us today on the Murder Sheet.

[Mark Enox]

Thank you.

[Anya Cain]

So I want to. Before we go to the events of Tuesday, February 8, 1977, which is when this sort of extraordinary story unfolded, I want to go back a little bit and talk about Tony Kiritsis and who this man is. So in your work, in your journalism, in your documentary focusing on this man, what can you tell us about him and just who he was as a person?

[Mark Enox]

Tony Kiritsis is a hard worker. He's somebody who. He spent some time in the army in the 50s, and he came out of there and started basically being the property manager for a trailer park that his family owned. He worked at a used car dealership at one time, but he's very, very focused on his job taking care of the property, and he starts to exhibit some tendencies toward violence while he's there. In 1965, he got into a verbal argument with his brothers Tom and Stephen, and he ended up taking a shot at them. He fired a weapon at them and the police were called, and that was his first. I believe. I believe he was arrested for that. And a year later, he. The police came out again when he saw some utility workers on the property doing regular maintenance, and he told them to get off the property and brandished an axe. And then in 1968, a huge thing happens. And this is not so much in our documentary, but this is very central to the whole thing. He believed he had not been compensated fairly for all of his property management work at the trailer park. This was owned by the family, and Mainly his older sister Effie. And Effie had multiple sclerosis. He's been arguing with them, and he goes to her house one evening and he's got a piss pistol. And he takes her hostage, locks up the house, and she's trapped in her bedroom. The police are called, but also his family. Jimmy Kiritsis, who is in the documentary, was Tony's only trusted brother after a while, although he did maintain contact with his half brother George Ergo, too. Jimmy gets out there and is able to talk Tony down. Tony is arrested for that. That never goes anywhere. That court case gets drawn out for a year, and eventually a judge throws it out over an inadmissible affidavit. But the way they settled this, Tony releases his sister on the condition that he will be paid what he believes is what he's earned. And it's around $50,000. And they pay him and he leaves the trailer park. And after that, he only speaks with his brother Jimmy and his half brother George. Tony takes that money, and it's a little convoluted in how he ends up owning it, but he gets the 17 acres out in Speedway, and he wants to develop that into a strip mall or to have a grocery store come in as an anchor. And to do that, he knows he's going to need some additional money. And in 1973, he goes into Meridian Mortgage and takes out a initial loan for $110,000. ML hall is the president of Meridian Mortgage. He's the chief there. And Tony looks to ML as a father figure. You know, Tony has never developed land like this with what he thinks is going to be a huge payoff at the end.

[Kevin Greenlee]

So.

[Mark Enox]

So he's leaning on ML to help him find potential buyers. But after three years, nothing has changed. No one's bought. And Tony still doesn't have a way to pay back that $110,000 loan. He renegotiates up to 130,000, and that sets his due date to pay it back on March 1, 1977. Tony knows he can't pay it back, and he also is. He believes that ML hall has been intentionally steering away prospects for a while. He. He thinks about just killing ML hall with a gun from a rooftop above this. This little diner place that they would always go eat. He scopes it out, but he. He decides, no, I don't want to do that, because the minute I shoot him, I'll probably be killed. Tony has a story that he wants told, and he decides that the best way to do that is to Take ML hostage. Because if he's got him hostage, everyone's gonna have to listen to him.

[Anya Cain]

It's remarkable that this whole hostage crisis had a. It played out before. And in your. You guys have, like, been so immersed in this story. And what about Tony, I guess, what planted those seeds of violence and this sort of almost grievance collecting where everyone's out to get him, people owe him stuff and they're not doing it. So he's going to inflict violence on others. I mean, I guess. Was there. Do you believe that there was mental illness here? Was it something about his personality or his experiences?

[Mark Enox]

As with so many people, his childhood wasn't great. And his father was physically violent, verbally abusive. He was an alcoholic. There was a. They used to. At one time, they owned a ice cream stand and all the kids had to work at it whether they wanted to or not. And the dad, would he just be very brutal at times about, like, why didn't you do this? I told you to do this. There's one incident where they had these paper cups that they would put the ice cream in. And Tony's father wanted. He wanted all those paper cups collected after the people consumed their food. And one of these cups rolled into the street and got run over by a car. And. And Tony's father, George, went after Tony for that one, beat him for that one. The father eventually leaves, but there's like another incident when his mother dies. The father comes back in and gets into a physical altercation with several of the brothers. So there's a huge family issue. And again, that's why I think Tony looked to ML hall as a mentor. He'd been searching for an appropriate father figure for a long time. But Tony and Alan, please step in here wherever you want. Tony's also well loved by especially the people living in the trailer park. And when he ends up at Crestwood Village in the apartments, he goes out of his way to help elderly residents with groceries or whatever. A lot of people really respected and loved him. He had an incredible number of friends who were in law enforcement. And he knew these people not because of his arrests or anything like that. He knew them because they were always in the diners that. That Tony would go into. And he's very, you know, articulate, talkative guy. So a lot of these guys knew him too. But. Yeah, Alan, you want to add anything to that?

[Alan Berry]

So, I mean, I guess the first thing I want to add is Mark is more the historian than I am. He has great recollection of all the Stuff we learned where I kind of forget it. So I'm on more of the documentary. So, you know, he's best spoken it. But I think you nailed it, man. I mean, he was one of these guys that is very loyal to friends, very loyal to the people he liked. But if you crossed him, you are dead to him and he's going to do whatever he can to make your life miserable. And my gut tells me is a lot of this does stem from his childhood. And he was. You know, Mark, correct me if I'm wrong here, but we don't know exactly what happened with his army career. There's no. We couldn't get his dd who 14 I think they are. As far as was he honorably discharged or was he kicked out? Mark, is that correct?

[Mark Enox]

Yeah, we don't know why he left, but I believe he did not serve a complete like four years.

[Alan Berry]

Right.

[Mark Enox]

He complained at. At some point about he got into stupid arguments with a lot of people he was enlisted with. And you know, you can see that. I mean, he shot his mouth off. Other people shot their mouths off. So something didn't work out. And to tell you the truth, I'm kind of surprised he was in the army because he just doesn't strike me as a team player. He's more of an individual.

[Anya Cain]

That's one way to describe it for sure. And it's so interesting, the different kind of experiences people had that he could be this helpful, pro social person while also having some of these tendencies in other situations. I guess, you know, everyone's complicated, obviously.

[Alan Berry]

So I want to pick Mark Spring here because I can't remember the exact story, but Mark, what was this? What was the deal with when his mom died? And the blood?

[Mark Enox]

Oh, yeah, according to Tony, when his. His mom was clearly the greatest good influence in his life and when she passed, it destroyed him. And he tells this story at her funeral and he takes off his ring. Was it his. Was it his army ring?

[Alan Berry]

It might have been.

[Mark Enox]

He takes his ring off and he places it in the. In the casket with her. And then he. He cuts himself and makes a cross, I think on the wall, like a blood cross, promising that he was something to the effect of, I will, I will. I'll always place family first.

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[Mark Enox]

Quince.com msheet and, you know, and I miss you and all that, but. But I promise you, Mom, I will always place family first. And this is probably mid-50s.

[Anya Cain]

That is wild. So, I mean, I mean, it's remarkable the kind of singular character that he was in many respects. Before we talk about the hostage crisis, I do also want to focus on the other, I think, two central figures in this story, which are the Halls. And I was wondering if you could kind of set them up, tell us a little bit about their personalities and their dynamic and their role in what happened.

[Mark Enox]

Okay, so Dick hall is the guy who gets taken hostage. He is the son of M.L. hall. He also works at Meridian Mortgage. Dick hall is like a high school football player. He was in the Air Force. He's mostly very mild. You know, he's not a guy who gets violent and argumentative. For the most part, he's says very little. He's got a wife and two kids at home, and he seems to have taken the job at Meridian Mortgage just like some of his other siblings did, too. It's a family thing. But I never got the impression that Dick hall particularly loved was just a job. ML hall, he. He started construction company back, I believe, in the early 40s. He's been into real estate his whole life. He is probably the most mysterious person in this whole incident because ML never gave an interview and any talk he had with law enforcement was not recorded. The police, the FBI, and even Dick hall pleaded with ML to get on the phone with Tony and say whatever he could to calm Tony down. And ML just refused. He refused, which is, you can see some of this in Dick Hall's book. He talks about it. He also, you know, when this is happening, ML and his wife are in Florida for the winter. And most of us who have kids, if something like this happened, we, we would fly home, we'd want to be here. I would want to trade places with Dick if you really want me. He didn't do that either. And, you know, just to clarify, Dick hall was not Tony's target. ML was his target. But Tony didn't realize that ML would be gone when he went in there that day. But he goes in there and he's not going to back down. And Dick's there. So he's like, well, I guess this is how it's going to go.

[Anya Cain]

To me, that is. I think you just described the central mystery in this is the. Is ML's reaction. And that was something that really struck me. Watching the documentary was just like, you'd think a lot of parents would have done things very differently.

[Alan Berry]

Yeah, hall too, that really talks about his character. Besides that, Mark, do you want to talk about the Veterans Administration?

[Mark Enox]

Oh, yeah. So in, in 1950, El Mal and his associates are procuring houses for veterans. And to do that, there's a lot of regulations you need to adhere to from the Veterans Administration. One of them is, is the VA determines the value of a property. They say what it costs and that's all that it can cost. But ML and his associates were adding additional fees on top of that. 400 bucks here for this, $1,000 here for this. And it happened with multiple families where they then brought him to trial. This is a federal offense. This is a huge, big deal. And in 1953, AML and his associates were convicted of fraud. And this is massive to me because it's not just local, it's veterans. I mean, this is right after World War II, right. Is the Korean War starting? I mean, it's kind of despicable. And so, you know, there's other things he did real estate wise over the years that are questionable, but this one is a clear wrong. And you just have to go, well, if he would do that, why? What would stop him from manipulating somebody like Tony, somebody who is a novice about real estate development? Because Tony's, he. His thing was he always thought ML was purposely telling clients to not deal with Tony with this sort of wink of, hey, he's going to default on his loan and we'll probably end up with this land anyway. And we are much more stable to deal with. So, you know, Tony accused ML of steering away Osco Jewel and stuff like that.

[Anya Cain]

Yeah, no, I mean, it is what you said exactly with the past fraud case certainly does lend some more credibility to what Tony was complaining about. And I guess that does kind of. That was one of my central questions for, for you all was do you think that Tony had legitimate grievances or he was a grievance collector who had unrealistic expectations? Or is the truth perhaps somewhere in the middle?

[Alan Berry]

I would say somewhere in the Middle we, we looked for factual information that ML hall did something against Tony that would, could be deemed, you know, illegal or wrong, etc. We could never find actual factual information other than hearsay and what Tony, Tony was saying. But of course with ML Hall's background, a man that wouldn't come to the defense of his son kind of says yeah, he probably did do some shady stuff, but I don't think any of it would have held up in court. And none of it rises to taking somebody by, you know, tying a shotgun around their neck. So my feelings on it is, is what you said. The truth is probably somewhere in the middle. He probably the, the dad probably. Maybe he did say some things, but nothing rising to what Tony was railing about. Mark, what do you think?

[Mark Enox]

Yeah, I mean you sign a contract to pay back alone, it kind of cut and dried. ML perhaps did do things that was shady, that steered people away. Maybe did but you know, caveat emptor. I mean I just, I can get why he feels wrong. I can get that and under. And I can identify with that little guy being squashed idea. I definitely identify with that. But there's never a point where I'm like, you great plan. Yeah, way to go. It's, that's how you work things out.

[Alan Berry]

Yeah, right. And just to be clear, Mark and I, we're not fans of big banks at all. Like, you know, like, like this is not a defending of them. But in this situation, what Tony did was wrong.

[Anya Cain]

Yeah. No, and I don't think you have to be a fan of big banks or predatory financial practices or even ambiguous financial practices to, to not like hostage taking. Right. I mean, and so one question I had was just with, with Dick hall you mentioned, you know, he wasn't really the one that Tony was dealing with. So was he involved in any of this at all? Was he ever implicated in any shady practices?

[Mark Enox]

This is interesting. There is absolutely nothing that suggests Dick hall did anything illegal ever in his life. He was pretty much a straight and narrow guy. In fact, when it came to Tony getting the loan at Meridian Mortgage, Dick did go to his dad after Tony had been in the office a few times. And you only need to meet Tony once to kind of get an idea of what he's going to be like. Dick was like, I don't think we should loan him money. I don't think we should do this because he's just kind of, he's unstable and volatile. It just seems like a real pain in the ass dad. Why, why should we do that? I don't think we should, but l. Mel was like, nope, let's. No, I like this. Let's. I like this guy for whatever reason. So Dick was the most innocent in this.

[Anya Cain]

That is so. That is what makes it such a tragedy, in my opinion, is that it just, you know, but like, if you want to look at it in any way, he was certainly the one who was not to blame in this situation and maybe even was a bit prescient in saying maybe we shouldn't do this, you know.

[Mark Enox]

So.

[Anya Cain]

February 8, 1977, you mentioned that Kritzis is very much expecting ML hall to be there. And that's not what happens. Can you take us through the sort of initial hostage taking?

[Mark Enox]

He walks in to the building, gets up to the fourth floor and finds out that ML's gone. But the receptionist says, hey, but, but his son will be in here just a few minutes. And Tony's like, awesome. Tony has come inside carrying two boxes. One of them is like a department store box and the other is like a rolled up blueprint tube. He has his arm in a sling. He has no overcoat, just his shirt and T shirt and the arm in the sling. He had claimed while inside Meridian Mortgage in months before this, that he had hurt his arm clearing stumps on his land and that he was going to have to get an operation and would probably have his arm in a sling. Which is all, it's all, that's all a ruse. None of that, none of that's true. So he get Dick comes and he takes him into his office and he, you know, Dick is messing with some papers on his desk. And when he looks up again, I mean, Tony first says, do you mind if I adjust myself? My shorts are riding up on me and I don't want to do this with the door open. Can we close the door? They close the door, door. Dick is messing with his papers. And he looks up, Tony has a pistol, 38 pointed at him. And Tony very quickly says, you going to turn around, take your coat off? And I'm, I'm putting this, this thing on you. And the thing was a steel cable. It was like a noose. He slipped that over Dick's head. That, then that wire then runs to this sawed off shotgun and through the trigger guard. And then there are two different ways Tony would do this. Sometimes he would put a loop over his own head around his neck. Other times it was a ring on his finger. So this is the dead man's line. And dead man's line is the term Tony used the New movie uses dead man's wire. The idea of this thing is like, it's like a dead man switch. For example, in subways you will have a motorman drive the subway and the dead man switch there is that if their foot comes off an accelerator, the subway will stop. That is a fail safe mechanism in Tony's contraption. If you pull on it, if you apply pressure to the wire, it's going to hit that trigger and it's going to kill Dick Hall. Fail deadly, that's the total opposite of fail safe. So he coerces Dick into doing this and he immediately, once he's got them all hooked up to the shotgun, he calls the police. The 911 was still relatively new at that time. And he gets through to a dispatcher and it takes quite a while for the police to understand what exactly is going on. Who are you? Where are you calling from? Who did you. Why? This call goes on for over 40 minutes and eventually Tony hangs up and he's like, okay, I guess we need to go meet the police. And they go downstairs, they go outside and there are police everywhere, there is media everywhere. And it's, it's odd because when Tony comes out of that building, you would expect him to go to his car, which wasn't parked that far away, but he doesn't. And this has been another confusing point for decades. According to Dick Hall, Tony told him that he accidentally broke his car key in the ignition when he was getting out to go in, which, which is the only thing that makes any sense to me because why else wouldn't he plan this out? I mean, he parked where he wanted to park, he knew how far away. I mean, why abandon that idea? Well, if he broke his key but he doesn't stop, that's again, not a reason for Tony to stop. Let's keep going. And he just starts wandering with Dick and a whole bunch of cops behind him. He goes into a parking garage thinking, maybe I can get a car here. And he actually sees somebody he knows in the garage. And he's like, hey man, will you loan me your car? And this acquaintance very respectfully and politely says, I can't do that, Tony. I mean, you've got police all over you. So they leave the parking garage, they go down to Washington street, which is the main, a big main street in downtown, and they just keep walking. There are, there's one big incident that happens there where they're walking down the street and Tony is very agitated and he's, he keeps turning and he's pushing and pulling Dick around. And one of these times where he pulls Dick back to yell at the police, Tony loses his footing on the ice. He starts to go down. And the only reason I believe that Dick hall doesn't die right there is because Dick hall is. He go. He crouches down as well so that. That, that cable doesn't get pulled. And this has just started. So Dick is in a different place than everybody else. He's thinking, I've got to stay as close as I can to. And whatever Tony does, I have to do because I have to believe that this shotgun is for real. Amazingly, the shotgun doesn't go off. But when they're down on the ground, Tony starts to panic and he pulls out the pistol from his front of his pants. And when the cops see that pistol, now they know that there is a second weapon and that weapon could be pointed at police. So police right there have to exercise extreme self control and not fire or do anything else. Tony puts the gun back away, goes on down the street. But for about 30 seconds, there it was. It was just insanely intense.

[Alan Berry]

What about when they were coming down the stairwell? Didn't they give him the safety?

[Mark Enox]

Yeah. When? Yeah, Tony had already showed this to Dick. He's. He's like, you know what? I'm holding my hand. And Dick's like, no. He's like, that's the safety of this shotgun. There is no safety in there, man. And when they're coming down the stairs, there's a couple of IPD police officers there. And he hands one of them the safety, says, that's the safety, man. Check out my rig. You do anything, he dies.

[Anya Cain]

My God. Just the immense intensity. So immediately and then, and just to qualify for people who may not be from Indiana, this is all happening in just the middle of downtown Indianapolis. Is that right?

[Mark Enox]

Yeah, yeah. Actually, yes. The Meridian mortgage office was very close to the circle, and they walk all the way to the west side of the city, and Tony just commandeers a police car that's out in the middle of the road with the engine running.

[Alan Berry]

The other thing that day was it was nine degrees. I mean, that was just kind of crazy too, because it's 9 degrees and neither one of these guys have the coats on. I mean, that was the least of their worries. But that was part of the spectacle too, was how cold it was on that particular day.

[Anya Cain]

God. So in your reporting on this, in. In the documentary you made about this, what were you able to find out about police response? Because obviously this is not like a usual day for the Indianapolis Police Department to deal with something like this. So I guess, like, what did you find about how they reacted and their preparations for dealing with this?

[Alan Berry]

Well, real quick, Mark, speculatively on my side, I think he threw them for a loop because he starts naming police officers that he knows. So I don't know if the. If the person that took the call was also trying to get those people too, down to the scene.

[Mark Enox]

Some of the guys he named and asked for weren't on duty at the time. And so it was. It would have been difficult for them to actually contact him and get them there. And even if they had gotten there, I don't know what difference that would make because Tony doesn't want to talk with his friends who are police. Tony wants to broadcast his message of grievance to everyone. Frosty Airways, it should be noted, too.

[Alan Berry]

That the police department is like maybe a five minute walk from where they're at.

[Mark Enox]

Yeah.

[Alan Berry]

But they don't start to come out. I think they're. I don't think it's anything against the police. They just didn't know what to do.

[Mark Enox]

Yeah.

[Alan Berry]

Because this had never happened. And when Tony's. Tony tells him on the phone call that he. He explains the rig to them and he says he's got a dead man's line attached to it, My guess is a lot of them will be like, well, what the heck is that? When we search, when we research the phrase, there's no other. There's no other time in history where dead man's line is used. So we believe he actually came up with that verbiage, too.

[Anya Cain]

Wow. And. And you know, we've heard of hostage crises, and there certainly had been hostage crises prior to this, But a situation where you have a guy rigged to a shotgun and being paraded around the city streets, that is pretty singular.

[Mark Enox]

Yeah. I don't even know that IPD had any kind of policy about hostage situations. Mike Grable was an IPD officer who had very limited experience with negotiating. He was essentially their hostage negotiator. But I mean, he. I think he'd only attended a seminar or two. Something, you know, just like, here's the high point. So there wasn't any policy, which is part of the reason Chief Eugene Gallagher makes a call to Patrick Mullaney, a special agent, FBI. Again, we didn't have negotiators here, but Gallagher was like, but I went to this seminar by this one guy and he talked about profiling. And profiling is almost unheard of at this. And Patrick Mullaney is a big deal with the FBI and the behavioral unit. He's a pioneer of profiling and how you can figure some things out about body language and what they say and their high points, both when they're euphoric and when they're insanely angry, but also depressed. And so that whole morning, what do you do? How do we intervene? And every officer who got close enough to Tony to look at the. The rig was like, I mean, maybe he's bluffing and it's not loaded. But I don't see any way we can go in and, like, test that theory. I don't see a way for us to. I mean, what you would try to do is take the. The. The gun stock and point it down so the barrel points as up as it can. But it's a shotgun. That stuff's going to come out and became very apparent to police. It's like, we can't. We can't mess with this. I think we have to let him keep walking. What. What else do we do?

[Anya Cain]

Yeah. Otherwise Dick hall dies. And. And so, you know, you mentioned Tony wanting to air his grievances, telling a story, I think you mentioned earlier, like, he wants his story told. How is he able to go about trying to get that done in this instance, using Dick Hall's life as leverage?

[Alan Berry]

Well, it starts out with Heckman, with Fred Heckman, with getting on the radio with him.

[Mark Enox]

Fred Heckman, big deal in Indianapolis, wibc. He is the Walter Cronkite of local news. Trusted everybody listened to WIBC back then. He's somebody that everyone would know. And WIBC is that megaphone Tony wants, even more so than TV initially. So he calls Fred at the station they put him through, and Fred records that conversation, that first conversation, it's in the documentary. It's crazy. And Fred airs it mostly uncensored. And that right there was very unusual because it's just loaded with profanity. And that's generally not something that you would want to air. But Tony, then he calls him several more times because the police by then have shut down Tony's phone so that he can't be called from anybody on the outside. And they're only allowing him to get in touch with Fred. And Tony, Tony goes with that. And his story is just that simple. These are bankers, these are rich guys. They've done me wrong. And Fred is just a great calming force in this because, A, Tony respects him, and B, Fred doesn't try to judge Tony. This is news. I'm reporting it, and you're One side of it. So tell me. And I'm very concerned about both you and Dick Hall. I don't want anyone to get hurt here. So there were just several occasions where Fred Heckman was able to come in and be that kind of trusted negotiator, even more so than the police or the FBI.

[Anya Cain]

That's fascinating because you could look at a situation like this on the outside and say, like, oh, the media is trying to get, you know, you know, piece of this crazy story. But it also seems like, you know, Heckman was definitely, like, a calming influence and sort of making sure that things didn't spiral. So I guess, do you think in this case, the media handled this pretty well in terms of trying to keep everybody safe?

[Alan Berry]

Fred Heckman definitely did.

[Mark Enox]

Yeah, he did.

[Alan Berry]

There's no question about that. And the other reporters and photographers, et cetera. I mean, there. This is kind of the moment that they're like, what are they. What are they supposed to do? Not cover it? Like, I think that they. They had to cover it. Think that the biggest question when it came to the live press conference was, do we air this live? Because if they kill. If he. If Richard hall does die live on tv, is that something that you want everybody to see in their homes? So, in my opinion, I think that that was probably the biggest thing to try to decide is do we keep airing this live or not? But the covering part, that's their job. They should have done that. And I think it seems like most of them did it pretty good. So all of our memories fail us. And what Mark and I would always go back to is the news reports from back in the day and 99 of the times. That's what ended up being right versus what some of the people would say today from the record recollection. So as a documentarian, I'm so thrilled they covered it as. As in depth as they did.

[Anya Cain]

Yeah. I imagine the archive you guys were able to work with on this was incredible. And in terms of going to the center of this, we talked a little bit about how ML hall was not cooperative as far as, you know, talking to Tony or kind of really getting involved in this situation. What were you able to find out about how Dick hall was able to survive this? I mean, like, the. The concept of having a shotgun strapped to your head is terrifying. I mean, that should be terrifying to anybody. And to have to kind of be so present, to not be doing anything to set off your captor, like, without going crazy. Like, I mean, what were you able to find about, like, how does a person, I guess, like, go through that without completely losing their mind?

[Alan Berry]

So I think one of the benefits of. Of for Richard hall was that he was naturally stoic, meaning that he wouldn't just talk back or speak up or be emotional. That was his natural demeanor from everything that I could see. So in my. That was probably his best attribute, was he was naturally calm like this. But they did get into it some, right, Mark? Like, about religion. Didn't they get into it about religion? Because. Because Richard hall is. Was a devout Christian.

[Mark Enox]

There were a couple different times where there were some arguments. And religion is interesting because in Jake Hall's book, Hall talks about how the only thing he found useful was his personal relationship with God. That he would turn this over to God and if he would just be still and not fight and not argue that God would save him. Because really, there was just nothing else. I mean, he couldn't talk with his family very much. He wasn't. He couldn't talk with police. So, I mean, he was completely isolated and kind of frozen in that position.

[Anya Cain]

Absolutely. As. As time went on, as the hours ticked by, you know, what were you able to find out about how Karitsis and how his behavior, you know, evolved as he's getting all of this attention, as he's being able to tell his story, sometimes getting very angry as he's telling his story. What kind of rollercoaster can you describe him being on throughout this whole long or deep.

[Mark Enox]

It's crazy because he hits almost every emotional state you can. There are times where he is. He's crying, he's depressed, he's clearly upset. There are times where he's yelling profanities. There's times where he's almost euphoric, like, look at this $5 million I just stole. Everything's gonna work out. And then there's other times where he's kind of quiet and humble. With Fred, he's. Look, you know, Fred, I'm sorry for the way I talked to you. I really appreciate you, you know, listening. Tony's all over the place and continues to be all over the place all the way through the end of the event. And if you watch the press conference, you will see he's both. He starts, you know, firing brimstone. But then there's a couple times where he starts to cry. And the police are just super nervous about that, because every time he starts to get sad, they're like, he's. He's gonna kill him. He's gonna shoot him. Which is interesting. The police did have A contingency plan there, Chief. Gallagher had a. Had a gun, his. His service revolver in one pocket and he had a handkerchief in the other pocket. And what he was going to do was it looked like Tony was going to shoot Dick. He was going to pull that handkerchief out and that was a signal to some other individ Tony to point that shotgun up. And Eugene Galler would have put his pistol to Tony's head in the back of his head, because that would. They'd gone to a hospital and a doctor said if you want to instantly neutralize somebody, you have to shoot them right in here. Three times that handkerchief starts to come out and each time Gallagher decides to. Wait, wait, wait, hold on. Maybe we can. Maybe this will still play out. Okay. And then eventually they do go into that model apartment and Tony, you know, releases Dick and miraculously no one gets shot.

[Anya Cain]

That's perhaps the most extraordinary piece of this extraordinary story. And, and just to give people a sense, so that he walks him out from downtown Indianapolis and they go to the west side to Kritz's apartment. Is that right?

[Mark Enox]

Yeah. Yes, In a police car, followed by dozens and dozens of police car and media.

[Anya Cain]

I mean, it's like a. It's like a really obscene parade almost, but it's, it lasts for like 63 hours. It goes across the city. I mean, the scope of this is extraordinary. Why do you think ultimately Karitsis released Hall and that this didn't end in bloodshed?

[Alan Berry]

Because, because they, they sold him a bill of goods. They told him he was going to get his $5 million. They told him that he's going to be having immunity. And then one of the biggest things that he wanted was an apology from Meridian Mortgage. And he had already gotten that. So, so Tony thought he, you can watch him react. He truly believe, he really believes that he's getting all these things. His lawyer at the time, Mark, correct me, Ruckelshaus, was his lawyer. Right. Or representing him, basically told him, yeah, Tony, you're getting all this.

[Anya Cain]

Jesus. So I want to get into the aftermath of this a little bit, but then I want to get into the documentary you guys made because it was awesome and it has. I mean, we're kind of getting the high points of this, but I would really encourage everybody to watch the documentary because you're going to just get those insights from people who were there in the archives and it's really. It comes alive. So what are the, what are the legal ramifications of what happens here and how, what is the outcome of that I guess he's.

[Mark Enox]

He's in trouble because unlike many other cases at that time, this whole thing was filmed. There is just an incredible amount of evidence saying, he did this, he should pay. So he ends up with a. Attorney, Nile Stanton, and he also has Richard Kiefer. And they begin to pursue a insanity defense. And the really important point here is that in 77, the burden of proof for an insanity defense is it's going to fall on prosecution. And that that means the prosecution has to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Tony was sane during the entire crime. Well, just watch some of the footage.

[Kevin Greenlee]

Do you.

[Mark Enox]

Does that look like sanity? Also? Niles Stanton was very good. He had all these index cards of questions to ask Tony while he was on the stand that would agitate Tony or make him cry. So, I mean, it was difficult for prosecution to contend with that and for the jurors to understand because, you know, there's. There's defense psychiatrists and there's prosecution psychiatrists, and they both are saying things, you know, like defense is saying, yeah, he's insane, and prosecutions. No, he's saying, you know, what he did. Well, the jurors don't know how to sort all that out. And after this, he's. He's found not guilty by reason of insanity. After this, the law is changed so that. That burden now falls on the defense. So if defense. And this makes more logical sense, if a defense pursues a insanity approach, then they have to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that their client was insane.

[Anya Cain]

Just. Do you two, as documentarians who were so into this case and sort of have seen all of this footage, have kind of immersed yourselves in this story, do you think that he met the true legal definition of insanity while he was committing this crime?

[Kevin Greenlee]

I do.

[Alan Berry]

I mean, because it is insane. Who, Who. Who straps a shotgun around their banker because they feel like they were wronged in a contract? I think only an insane person would do that. Now, was Tony insane 247 all of his life? No, I don't think that he was. But when he committed this crime, I think, like, what rational person would do that? I mean, I wouldn't want to let the guy off without any, like, you know, like, not being in any trouble. But how could you not say he was insane? In my opinion, Mark.

[Mark Enox]

Yeah, I mean, the insanity defense to me has always been about far more identifiable conditions, mental conditions. And, you know, Tony looks and talks and walks like a regular person. He's just real pissed off, and he's super violent. Was he insane? Yeah, at Times probably. I mean when you're watching him. Yo yo. Between the emotions is like that doesn't seem stable. But it's a gray area in some, in some respects like how. What kind of crazy does he need to be to say he's crazy?

[Anya Cain]

Exactly.

[Mark Enox]

The criminal, you know, I mean, not just a angry dude with a gun.

[Anya Cain]

It's really, really. It can be hard, especially with sometimes I think our legal definition of insanity is a lot more narrow than like what we would see as someone who's really disturbed or unwell.

[Mark Enox]

So I always go back to the.

[Alan Berry]

Way the law was at that time. The jury came up with the right verdict and if I was on that jury pool I would have come up with the same thing because the. Beyond a reasonable doubt, right. And I just, I, I think that the jury came up with the right verdict for the information that was presented to them and the law at the time.

[Anya Cain]

In terms of one thing we've heard from people who were alive at the time or even you can kind of sometimes see it on social media to a certain extent, is that it seems like Tony took on the kind of role of a bit of a folk hero in the Indianapolis area and maybe even beyond. And I guess, you know, we've heard things like after the verdict was. Was reached, people were cheering in like stadiums. What were you able to find out about that? And do you think that Tony deserves to be considered a folk hero for what he did?

[Alan Berry]

So I can relate it from more in modern times from just via the comments that are put on the videos on YouTube and it seems to be mostly a 5050 split. Some people do say this and then. But then you'll have somebody else come along and say no way. So it seems to be 50 50. I had a guy the other day post and say that this is a. That since he's never heard of the story. That must mean that the big banks have paid everybody off to not tell this story. So I guess, I guess my thought is, is that yes, there was definitely people that thought he was a hero. But I think a lot of those people probably didn't know the full story and they were, they were mirroring themselves because everybody probably has a story how they think that they got a railroad a little bit from a banking or high interest rates etc. So that's. So I think it's 50 50.

[Anya Cain]

So I, I guess the big banks forgot to send you guys your check to make you forget about it.

[Alan Berry]

And that's right, that's. That's what was my reply. I Was like, are you nuts? I was like, I've been trying to get people to see this film for five years, you know, so it's like, yeah, I wish they paid us off.

[Anya Cain]

That's amazing. People, people are so conspiratorial these days. But you can see where, you know, the, the little guy, the David versus the Goliath. But you can also see where people are, you know, like he, I mean, he, he obviously had some severe issues and, you know, Dick hall did not deserve to have this happen to him.

[Alan Berry]

And then Mark was the. Correct me if I'm wrong, but what you're talking about cheering at a stadium that was at Market Square Arena. Was it a hockey match?

[Mark Enox]

Yeah, it was a minor league hockey game. It was the Check Racers. Yeah, the Racers before the Checkers. Yeah. So it was a while back and you know, they, they broadcast in between play that this. That he'd been found not guilty. And quite a few people in that audience did cheer.

[Anya Cain]

Yeah.

[Alan Berry]

But of course we should say that was hearsay, right? We never found that to be like. We never found a fact on that.

[Mark Enox]

No, I don't think we found anybody who was actually there. And, and usually it's miss. It's misidentified that usually they say it's a Pacers, an Indiana Pacers game, and.

[Alan Berry]

It wasn't, you know, so I guess we don't have any there. There is. I'd have to dig it up, but I do have a news report from at that time where they did talk to like 10 different people. And if I remember correctly, they're all different walks of life and it was split even then. So I, I just think that a lot of people that see that empathize with Tony. It's mostly my guess is they're thinking about themselves when they've been somewhat wronged by a big bank or an insurance company or whatever, which is totally relatable. But when you look at the facts and you just dig down deep, I don't know anybody who could justify this that makes sense.

[Anya Cain]

It is hard. I mean, it's pre. It's ruthless, you know, it's ruthless. And it's pretty messed up what he did. And it's not the kind of feel good, working class stiff, you know, getting revenge story, really.

[Mark Enox]

It.

[Anya Cain]

It might seem to some people on the surface.

[Mark Enox]

In the documentary, there is a part where local TV interviews a Lieutenant Joe Collins on, on the Crestwood Village property. And I always found this interview interesting because Collins knows Tony and the reporter is saying, you know, what is this about. We don't understand exactly what it's about. What's he angry about? And Collins goes ahead and explains it and sounds very much like Collins is on Tony's side. He's like, it's a big bank. They ripped him off, so you know he's gonna go do something about it. So even amongst law enforcement, you know, there was huge difference in good guy, bad guy.

[Anya Cain]

It's fascinating.

[Kevin Greenlee]

I'm curious as to your backgrounds and how you came to be aware of this story and how you decided to make a documentary about it.

[Mark Enox]

So we had done a couple of documentaries before this. The one right before it was A Day in the Life of Mayor Greg Ballard called Behind the Sash. And once we completed that, we wanted to find a new project, something based, something having something to do with Indiana. So our family and friends got together, we all came up with ideas and suggestions, and then we voted on them. And the one that won was Karitsis, which also was my choice. That was the one I put in. And it's purely because I remember seeing the coverage on tv, not of the event. I don't remember that. I was seven at the time. I remember them replaying the footage of Tony walking Dick hall downtown all that summer. I mean, I was a kid at home. We'd watch some shows in the morning and usually leave the noon news on. And at that time, there were psychiatric evaluations, There was grand jury selection going on. And every time they report, they would show that footage. And that's what stuck in my head. And I hadn't thought of it in a long time. And then we started looking and it's like, there's got to be a lot of. I mean, there's no footage all in one place. There's a bit here, there's something here. There is no total story.

[Alan Berry]

I just real quick want to say, Kevin, and to. To relate it back to you. The Burger Chef murders was on the list.

[Mark Enox]

I was about to ask that.

[Anya Cain]

Yeah.

[Alan Berry]

And so. And because I always found that fascinating too. But for me, one of the deciding. I, Mark brought up the critics case and I was like, yeah, what was that? Because I. I was the same age and, and I had a vague recollection of it, but I really just wasn't sure. The Burger Chef mers, for some reason, always stuck with me. For me, the deciding factor was is, oh, wait, there's footage of this, Karitza's case. You know, the little bit that was out there. Maybe there's more. And it was on wibc. That means it was probably recorded. Maybe there's more. Whereas with the Burger Chef murders, I just, you know, there was some. But there was. There definitely wasn't footage. So me being more of a video guy, that's what really sold me was, oh, wow. We can. We can if we can. If we do our research right, we'll find this footage, unearth it, and photos. And we got so much more than you could ever imagine. Like, we're. I'm still sitting on stuff that I don't know if enough people care about the story or what, but we have a ton of images, et cetera. But. Yeah, so I just wanted to bring it back to you, Kevin, That Burger Chef was considered the Burger Chef.

[Anya Cain]

I want to say you guys had such a wonderful archive to work with, and it really, like, shows in the documentary. I did want to ask Kevin, though, because you're, I think, around the same age, did you remember the Kiritsis case? Seeing that on tv? I did growing up, and I'd never heard it about it before, before moving to Indiana. I'm from New York originally, but. But when you. When you come here, people. I mean, it was kind of one of those, like, infamous indie crimes that people definitely talk about and remember to this day.

[Kevin Greenlee]

And of course, you're absolutely right. When you do a documentary, you need to have an archive. You need to have visual things. And for the Burger Chef murders, there's really not anything like that. Certainly not like you had in this case.

[Mark Enox]

You would have to film dramatizations, which is a whole other complicated approach that maybe doesn't make it as intense as it was. You would also be like, Burger Chef murderers. You would be trying to find people who are still alive who had anything to do with it and interview them. And that was the problem that we ran into in a couple spots where, you know, like, Fred Heckman had already passed away, Tony had already passed away. But we were able to really find a lot of people who were still able to give us some. Some chunk of the story.

[Alan Berry]

And I'm glad we did, because now when you look at our interview list, I would say at least 50% of them have passed, too. And you're right, most people that lived outside of Indiana had never heard of the case. But also now anybody under the age of maybe 40, 45 probably don't know about the case either, with the exception of the new movie coming out, which kind of spreads the story further and wide. And the other thing I want to add to, you know, we've lived here our whole life and, etc. But the main reason we wanted to make an Indiana story is because we have no budget. We're just doing this on our own. There's nobody funding it. Right. So. So if we wanted to do something that was out of state, then it would just financially would have been impossible. And when you're talking about recreating something, the cost of doing that production, unless you're going to do it cheesy, no pun intended, with Burger Chef, but unless you're going to do it cheesy, you know, it's very, it's very costly too. So those are some of the factors that played into it.

[Kevin Greenlee]

So how do you do something like this with no budget and create a documentary and get it distributed?

[Alan Berry]

Well, so I think that, I mean it was, it was just starting from scratch one, right. Like, so let's put our first, first foot forward. So the first thing that we discovered was Jack Parker. Jack Parker was a guy, was a WTT Channel 4 videographer. He probably has one of the most seen clips from the Walking of Downtown. And he was still around. So, you know, I tracked him down and reached out to him and just a super friendly, nice guy, more than happy to provide the footage for us to use. And I. And, and crazy, crazy stories here is in the 70s, the TV stations didn't hold on to their footage. It was just taking them space or we could record over it. So Jack had, at one point, Channel 4 threw out most their archives into the literal trash bin and Jack crawled into it and pulled out his footage. Lucky for us, but by meeting Jack, we had good rapport with him, etc. He opened up the doors to our next few interviewers or interviewees and we built on it. So we would meet, you know, this person and then they would say, well, you should really talk to this person. We said, oh yeah, could you, could you introduce us to them? Yeah, yeah, yeah, we will. And then that person would kind of vouch for us. Right? So that's how we just slowly built it up to where towards the end we had a long list of people that trusted us to do this story, that we got kind of more and more people to be okay with it, including like the judge, the judge that was in the case. I don't think Judge Dugan would have spoke to us the first year we did it. But by the fifth year, and we say, well, we've talked to the prosecutors, we've talked to the defense team, we've talked to the jury pool, you know, how about you? Oh, okay, yeah, we'll do it then. I'm sorry, what was your question? I don't know if I answered your question.

[Anya Cain]

No, you did. How do you do this? Because you guys, you had such access and you had such an archive.

[Alan Berry]

The money thing. So the money was, is that it was cheaper because it was just Mark and I. Right. So Mark would do the interviews, I would do the camera work. And so it was just. And I'm in the video world, so I already had cameras. So we're just basically using what we already had. So there wasn't too much of a cost there. Our biggest cost was time and filming the people that didn't live here. I know now it seems pretty normal to hop on a call, on a video call, etc. And, you know, lots of documentaries do it that way, where they just kind of zoom in and they use that footage. But it really wasn't secondhand in 2014, 2015. So when we had to interview Niles Stanton in Morocco, I tracked down a camera person and an audio person there, hired them, and then had them do the filming part while we use this new thing called Skype and conduct the interview that way. So that was some of our biggest costs, was just hiring outside people to actually film it.

[Kevin Greenlee]

How long did it take from the time you decided to pursue this story to the time you have the completed documentary?

[Alan Berry]

It was about five years altogether.

[Anya Cain]

Wow.

[Alan Berry]

Now, I. I love saying that figure, but I mean, to be fair, Mark and I are both working day jobs too, during this. So it wasn't like we were doing this 10 hours a day. There were some days that were 10 hours, but we're also. We had to make a living too, so this was a lot of weekends and, oh, I can take some PTO time on this day to go talk to this person. Etc. Now, did you want me to talk about. You said something about distribution. Did you want to talk about that or.

[Kevin Greenlee]

Yeah, that'd be interesting.

[Anya Cain]

Yeah, we. I mean, I think we respect what you guys do so much because you're independent folks like us who are, like, in Indiana telling these stories. And what you produced was such a professional, like, well done documentary. And the fact that you managed to do it all basically by yourselves is awesome.

[Alan Berry]

Now, first of all, you guys deserve way more credit. You have so many more stories. We've only done this one, so I appreciate that. But you guys are on a different level. You guys are continuing to do it, and I'm hoping that you found a way to monetize this, because that was probably our biggest weaknesses that it was never really greatly monetized, but the, the. So what happens is, is in 2017, we've got a copy that both of us like, yeah, this is good. Show it to friends and family. Yep, this is good. We feel solid about the doc. All right, now it's time to put it out. Okay, well, and a lot of this was, okay, what do we do now? And then we just kind of dig down and try to figure it out. So in 2017, the next Pro step was usually film festivals. So I thought, okay, well, let's, let's do film festivals now. Again, there's money involved. You got to pay a film festival a couple hundred bucks just to submit it. You have no idea if they're going to watch it. You have no idea if you're going to enter. And even if you get to the, even if you get accepted, that doesn't mean a distribution company is going to pick you up. And these are things that we learned, right? None of this was automatic, but we thought, all right, let's take the gamble. The, the thing that was where I started to be like, you know what I need to start moving on with my life was we submitted to Heartland Film Festival. And I'm thinking now, by now we had a couple critics review it and I, I don't want to sound ego filled here, but it was, it's a good documentary, right? So we thought, man, Heartland is a no brainer. We're from Indiana. The movie's about an Indianapolis, you know, it's Indiana topic. Heartland's at local film festival. This is, we're gonna be golden. And then we got the, the email or letter said, sorry, but you know, we appreciate you doing this, but we're gonna go with other directions. And at that point I was just like, man, what do we do? Why are we submitting these film festivals if we can't even get into the local one? Now, there was one exception. The East Lansing, Michigan Film Festival, something like that.

[Mark Enox]

East Lansing, Yes.

[Alan Berry]

Yeah. And we actually won. We won best documentary. So that was the one glimmer of hope there. But by that point, we'd already been told by Heartland, no, thanks. So I was already kind of like, I'm done with this. So I'm thinking, you know what, let's skip the, the film festival because one, we don't have the money. We've already spent, you know, probably 500 or a thousand bucks trying to get it into places. And again, I go back to, you have no idea if they're going to watch the film. If You're a big name producer, big name director, you're almost guaranteed a slot at these film festivals while the, the young, young directors, etc, they are kind of footing the bill for all of it. So, so I was like, let's move on, let's get it to the people. Because I believe if we get to the people, it'll be seen, people will watch it, people will like it. So you then start to think and remember this is late 2017, 2018. People were still doing itunes, Google Play, they were doing some vod. But Netflix was really starting to take over the subscription based. Watching films from home and not paying for a VHS tape or a dvd, you know, not doing rental. It was starting to shift. But the way that you get into these places is through a video aggregator. Because places like itunes, they don't want to deal with 10,000 different filmmakers. They just want to deal with 10 or 15 aggregators. Well, the way you get into the aggregators is you got to pay them. So there was another couple thousand dollars. And what they guarantee is we'll get you on the platforms. You got to figure out how to get people to watch. I was like, fair enough. So we pay a couple grand, we're on all the platforms. And the challenge then and now for the indie is cutting through all the noise. You may have the best product in the world of the best video, the best album, but if you can't get it to people to like, let them know about it, then it just sits there. And that kind of happened with ours. I tried to do like Facebook ads, but then Facebook would say, we can't do this ad because it's violent. And I found that with Google Ads too. Because when you're trying to sell a documentary about a guy tying a shotgun around another man's neck, how do you sell that without bringing up the shotgun? Well, just the word shotgun alone will raise up flags.

[Mark Enox]

So.

[Alan Berry]

And hopefully this doesn't sound like me whining saying, oh, nobody would watch our film. But that was kind of the case. So somewhere along this lines, the, the aggregator that we are with goes bankrupt. Now how the aggregators work is they hold your money and then like four times a year you get paid out. So this aggregator, we just become another collector and, you know, we never got that money back, et cetera. So then I'm like, well, what are we going to do? Well, lucky for us, a little bit lucky, Amazon at the time was, was actually dealing. They had changed it since we, when we had started, they were actually working with independent filmmakers and so I submitted and they're like, yeah, so there was like a six month period where our film was on Amazon prime and it got washed like millions and millions of minutes watched. Now with Amazon prime you're talking about a nickel every million or whatever. So it still wasn't a lot of money, but it got out there and this is what kind of led us to where we are today with. It was up on Amazon Prime. People are watching it. All of a sudden I get an email from Tina Fey's producer. I'm like, holy cow, do you want me to go into this next part?

[Anya Cain]

Yeah, we really do because I, I'm also appreciate what you're saying so much because I mean again like we, we feel like we have a certain kinship to you guys because we're doing this independently too. Sometimes you kind of get hit with the criticism within true Crime of like you guys are making documentaries or podcasts or books for money and it's like hahaha, not. No, like it's very difficult to, you know, I mean like everything's dominated by the really big players. Right. And that's the same in podcasting. It's the same to a certain extent in publishing. And so we, we relate to this. But yeah, tell us about your work on the, the dramatization of the, the movie that that's kind of coming up and can you go into that?

[Alan Berry]

Okay, so you want the long story, right? Since this is a podcast. Somewhat long story, please. Okay, so we're, so we start getting reached out to and like even this guy named Dante Ross, which was, he was part of Eminem's camp, is reaching out. Somebody from Tina Fey's camps reaching out. Talk to the, I don't know if you know the film company, is it Pegasus or was it Mark the flying? What is that? The Indiana production company? Okay, there's, there's a, I'm. If this guy hears it, he's gonna yell at me. But there's, there's an Indian, there's a Hoosier based film company that does everything in Indiana. Anyways, so we're talking to all kinds of different people. Not all kinds, but a few different people, a couple big names and then this one producer director team. This Hollywood producer director team. They have been a part of some huge films. I'm not going to say their names because I'm going to trash them. But when they reached out we thought, all right, this is it, right? Because now, oh, I should, I should step, step back and think. We liked our documentary and all that. But if you watch it, it's like, man, how is there not a movie like. Like, how is there not a big film telling the story? And so when this producer director team came along, we're like, all right, here it is, right? So, you know, we have a couple calls with them. They bring up the names Paul Giamani and Sam Rockwell as being particular, as possibly being interested. They said that both of them had seen our documentary, loved it, and things look good. Now, I should clarify that. I have no idea if Paul Giamani or Sam Rockwell has seen my documentary. But according to this producer director team, if you look at their list, they're definitely connected to them and it made sense. So Mark and I like, yeah, let's do it. So we sign an option with them to. For them to make the film. And basically it gave them like a year to come up with funding. And meanwhile, we're not selling our scripts to anyone. And so like, I went back to Tina Fey's producer and was like, we're going to go, you know, this route. So we are locked in now. We didn't get any money for this. We're. We're just fools. When I look, in hindsight, we're just kind of foolish. We didn't make them pay us anything. We're like, okay, this is great. Let's just do it. And a few months into that, they start ghosting, they start flaking, and Mark and I's guts are starting. Wait a minute. I don't think these guys are going to do anything. I think they were just. Just full. Full of talk and doesn't seem like it's really going to go anywhere. So we're kind of like, all right, whatever. And then somewhere during the same time, this guy reaches out and wants to know if he can buy Tony kis.com for me because I own that URL. And if you know anything about URLs, you can look up who owns them. And we're like, oh, really? Why? Why? His name is Austin. Mark. How do you say his last name?

[Mark Enox]

Kladny Austin.

[Alan Berry]

Sorry, I always say it wrong, but so Austin reaches out to us and we was like, hey, let's hop on a call. So we start talking. The young guy out in California, he writes. And so we just kind of build a friendship and super great guy. And I think Mark and I, not only is he a nice guy, but Mark and I, it's like, here's somebody that's really. He was really interested in the case. Like, he was passionately involved, like just talking about it. And so once he's the producer, Hollywood producer, director team, it's obvious to us they're flaking. We start to team up. We're like, hey, you know what? Let's. You know what about the three of us, right? You, Austin, you write the script. We'll give you access to our entire archive, and, you know, we can talk about it and help you. I don't want to say help him with the script, because it's his script, right? I don't want to take any of the credit away from him, but we definitely got on calls and talked about different parts of it. It was his decision to do whatever he wanted. So this goes on for about a year or so, and. And Austin comes back and is like, yeah, so what do you. You know, here's the script. And. And mar. Wow, this is. This is great. Now, so. So us, we've teamed up with him at this point.

[Kevin Greenlee]

We're.

[Alan Berry]

We're a trio, and we're gonna go try to sell this film. Now, out of nowhere, I get an email from the Hollywood director team, and they're coming back into the picture. Like, hey, you know, we're sorry about all this. And I. And Mark and I, you know, we called him out and, like, you know, you guys ghost this. Why would we want to do anything with you, right? This is. We don't think that this is a good fit or whatever. But then they start mentioning Jeremy Strong, the. And what was the other. Who's the other person they mentioned?

[Mark Enox]

Jaya LaBeouf.

[Alan Berry]

And again, I know, but it's like, to us, it's like, okay, yeah, maybe, you know, and it seemed legit, and we got somewhat. Now we got fooled again. But we're like, but wait a minute. All right, if we're gonna do this with you guys, We've been working with this writer, Austin, and we think he's written a pretty good script. What about using his script? And the producer director team was like, okay, well, let's read it. So we pass it over to him, and just like within a day or two, the director comes back, nah, this really isn't up to snuff, you know, and he just kind of. He kind of crapped on it. And we're like, oh, wow, okay. Well, I thought it was decent. We're like, well, we want to work with him. And the director guy is like, well, I want to write it. I want to write and direct it. And we're like, oh. So it's around the same time Austin, I think, maybe via his manager, had got tied into some other producers. Now when I looked at these producers IMDb list, it just wasn't as glamorous as this Hollywood director team. But we felt very, you know, connected to Austin. We're like, all right, well let's meet with him. So we met with this team and one of the, one of the producers gave me a bad vibe. And overall it seemed like it was okay. But I kept coming back to man, this Hollywood director team, they've got a proven track record with huge films. This team over here doesn't. But we have a, we have a connection to with Austin and we don't want to screw him over. So how do we solve this? And what we came up with was he's like, well, Austin, what if we say we don't hold you lie, we don't hold you legally on any of this stuff. It's no longer you can go take your script and do whatever you want with it. Because if we were still tied to him, we would have got paid for the documentary being like this, based on Dead Man's Line and we would have got executive producer credits, etc, so we would have been part of the film. But by us saying, you go do your thing now it's Austin as a solo person and we're going to go over this Hollywood director team and you guys, if you make your film first, great. If we make our film first, great. You know, good luck. And, and Austin was fine with it and we were fine with it. And so it was, it was fair. There was no heat between the two camps. It was like, okay, we get it. But again, within a few months we, we realized that this, this director producer team flaked us again and they ghost us again. And me and Mark are like, damn, dude, we're in our 50s and we're still getting, you know, we're still getting bamboozled. Fast forward another six months and you know, we start to hear Werner Herzog is attached to direct Austin script. And we're like, holy sh. Can you cuss on this? Yeah, yeah, go ahead. We're like, Holy. Man 1. We're thrilled for Austin. You know, no passive aggressive. We're thrilled from. But in back of both of our minds is like, damn, we bet on the wrong horse. We messed up here because Warner Herzog, anybody knows is like, that is, that is righteous, right? And then Nicholas Cage is attached to it to play Tony. And my mind's just blowing here, right? It's like, this is just insane. You know, text to Austin saying, congrats, brother. Good for you, etc. Then a couple more months comes along and you. I don't know the exact reasons behind it, but in. Werner Herzog is the one that came up with Dead Man's Wire. Because that terminology never existed before now. And that's just a little trivia tidbit there, but Werner drops off, Nicholas drops out. Not for sure why. And then they bring in Gus Van Zandt and the rest of the cast, and then the last person was Al Pacino. Now, during all this, very happy for Austin, but still kind of, you know, licking our wounds. And now, as this is coming, this is April of this year, maybe May, Mark and I kind of grovel back to Oz, like, hey, man, you don't owe us anything, but do you think you could throw us out some credits or something? And lucky for us, he gets his producer on the phone and we talk it out, and they're like, yeah, what if we gave you guys historical consultant credits? And we're like, oh, that would be awesome. Thank you very much. And it wasn't a quip pro quo, but we did give them, the producers, our archive, too. And you see, I don't know if you've seen the film, but any of that archival footage that you see in there came from us. But. And they also. And I'm not for sure the legalities here, Kevin, maybe, you know, they also had to sign a contract saying that we were okay with them using Dead Man's Wire. The only thing I can guess is because it was so close to Dead Man's Line. Yeah. But it wasn't a big deal anyway, so. So that's kind of how we got connected there. Mark, am I leaving anything out?

[Mark Enox]

No, that's it.

[Anya Cain]

Jesus Christ. I mean, Hollywood. But I. But I'm. I'm glad you ultimately got credit because you deserve it.

[Kevin Greenlee]

I'm sorry you went through all that. That sounds incredibly frustrating.

[Anya Cain]

Yeah.

[Mark Enox]

Common, right? Yeah, because my thing was like, how the fuck do movies ever get made? Because there was so much. We're going. We're not going. We're going. No, we got to switch this part. Nope. Maybe it'll be there. I mean, like the Hollywood director, producer team, there were times where there'd be like, we've got another project, so we're going to have to shift over to that. All this time later, all those projects that he cited, not a single one has seen the light.

[Anya Cain]

It. It baffles my mind with what little we've seen of it, too. Not to the extent that you have.

[Mark Enox]

But it really is I mean, truth.

[Alan Berry]

Be told, it is frustrating. And this is nothing against the production of Dead Man's Wire because we did this to ourselves. But that was a ten $12 million picture. Everybody made money off that, right? Yeah, we haven't made a penny. And nor, I guess, nor should we. Right. We agreed to it. Those were the terms. And we're not, unlike Tony, we're not taking anybody with a shotgun around their neck. You know, there's a lot more bigger injustices done out there than what's happened to us. And I think Mark's right. This is a pretty typical Hollywood story, I would believe. The thing that really pains me is that how this Hollywood producer directing just suckered us more than anything.

[Anya Cain]

I'm so sorry. But it is. It is scary how much life imitates art in terms of, you know, larger, more predatory concerns taking advantage of people and, you know, not upholding anything. Yeah.

[Alan Berry]

But let's. Okay, now let's talk about the upside. The. The biggest upside is this. This. This young writer Austin has gotten the break of a lifetime. He's working with Gus Van Zandt right now. I don't know what other projects he's got coming up, but I'm sure his docket is probably getting filled up because of this, so. And he's much deserving.

[Mark Enox]

He.

[Alan Berry]

During the. During this process of. Before got funding and all that, Austin had a lot of. I don't want to speak for him, but there is financial challenges. You know, he's working at a zoo, which he loved because he's great with animals, etc, but he was able to go through that, and now his career looks pretty bright. So. So Mark and I's side of it. Yeah, whatever.

[Mark Enox]

But we're old.

[Alan Berry]

He's a young dude. He's got a lot of potential. And, you know, so there is an upside here. And then I guess the upside for us, one, we get to talk to people like you. Right. It's always great to connect to other independent creatives doing this type of things. But two is if the movie takes off, that it does what we originally wanted, which was just for people to see our work. That may sound selfish or silly or corny. It was never. I mean, could we use the money?

[Kevin Greenlee]

Yeah.

[Alan Berry]

But I think at the end of the day, what we really want is people to see our work. So I'm hoping that this. I hope people will see the. Our film. Now, it hasn't really taken off as of yet, and again, I'm not whining or complaining, but I think that goes to like algorithmic things, too. I'm still hoping that people will watch the film.

[Anya Cain]

I really would encourage our listeners to. I know we have a lot of Indiana people, but even if you're not in Indiana, this is a really insane human drama. And it's not something that is like a. We often talk about, like typical crime or, you know what I mean, what you were. This is so beyond the pale and so beyond any other hostage story.

[Kevin Greenlee]

And certainly if you watch the new movie, it's well worth going back and watching the documentary to get the full picture and get to see and hear from the real people involved in it.

[Anya Cain]

Yeah, I always think it's fun to watch the fictionalization, the dramatization, and then go back and be like, okay, what really happened? Maybe it's a little bit more nuanced or a little bit more wrinkly. It's a little bit like messier and frankly, more interesting sometimes than, you know, having to kind of put it within the confines of a traditional Hollywood movie story. And that's not knocking the fictionalized movie at all. It's just more of like, the documentary is going to give you those insights of like, whoa, that really did happen, or, oh, this happened a little bit differently. And you're going to have the fact based thing.

[Alan Berry]

Yeah, they serve different audiences and the same audience. Right. I mean, I think they both have their value just in different ways. And I think what you said is dead on, is that maybe people will watch the Hollywood version and then come over and watch our documentary version. That was always my hope, was that a place like Netflix or something would, would, would buy up both of them. They did that with. What was that Jack Black movie, Mark?

[Mark Enox]

Oh, Bernie.

[Alan Berry]

Yeah, Bernie. They released the Hollywood version with Jack Black, but then they also released the documentary at the same time on Netflix. But, you know, hey, those weren't in the cards. So. Yeah, I guess the other upside too is now that it's out, it's on YouTube, it should be there forever. But if people do take interest in this case, and it does, the views do seem to go up, or it does seem like people are still interested, we will dedicate ourselves with no monetary value to put out the rest of the archives. But for us, we've come to the point of, does it really make sense for us to spend our time on this if there's not a lot of interest in it?

[Anya Cain]

Yeah, no, that makes sense. But I. So people, if they are interested, if our listeners are interested in watching Dead Man's Line, where can they watch it?

[Alan Berry]

I just, I hope it doesn't sound like I'm begging here for people to watch.

[Anya Cain]

I mean, listen, we came out with a book in what August feels like 500 years ago. So all we've been doing is begging people to read it on the show. So I would do not feel self conscious. What you did was an incredibly quality piece of work, a piece of true crime documentary. And I think it's. I mean, I'm not just saying this. I'm not blowing smoke or trying to flatter you guys, but I think it's. I think a lot of it is a lot better than a lot of the stuff that is kind of the flashy mainstream stuff than the Netflix documentaries that everyone watches. I mean, like, like, like it's high quality, and I feel like you really learn about the case, and it's immersive and deeply unsettling, and you guys did a great job. You deserve to brag on it and you deserve to have people watch it. So please don't feel self conscious. I mean, I'm trying to bully our listeners, obviously, into watching it too, so.

[Alan Berry]

Well, please, to your listeners, don't just watch 30 seconds of it and turn it off, because that kills our algorithm. Watch the trailer first. If the trailer seems interesting to you, then watch the movie. Because the one thing that I did mess up on, I think that's changed, is the YouTube algorithm. So the intro to our movie, in hindsight, is long, and I should have cut it down because I should have got just like we talked about, offline. You got to get right to it from the beginning. No fluff at the beginning. And I think there's a little bit of fluff. Yeah. So if people want to watch it, it's on YouTube. It's pretty easy to. If you just throw in Dead man's line in the search, it'll come up. Or if you. I'm sure you guys are going to post the link.

[Anya Cain]

We are. So people check our show notes. You know, click on it. It's. It's really good, and I would really strongly recommend it.

[Kevin Greenlee]

Are there other projects you guys are working on?

[Alan Berry]

So this was. This was actually where I kind of just. I mean, for me personally, I was like, I'm. I'm not doing any more of these because it was five years. It never seemed like I could. I hate, keep going back to the heartland thing, but that just. It just kind of disheartened me about it. So instead what I did was I started a YouTube channel again. I hope I don't sound Like I'm bragging because I'm not trying to, but I've got about115,000 subscribers, like 15 million views. And I just started doing documentaries on Black Sabbath and Van Halen because those are the things that interest me. And I, I can, I, I don't suck up Mark's time for free. And if they don't make any money, which they don't, it's, it's okay. So know that there, there's no other projects in the work. Doesn't mean we wouldn't want to do them. It's just at our age, you can't justify five years of your life without some type of monetization. Not because you're getting rich from it, but because you have bills to pay. And it's hard for me to justify that to my wife that, oh yeah, we're gonna spend another five years on another project, Mark.

[Mark Enox]

Yeah, I mean we would love to do more, but we'd love to be paid for it. So a production company out there that sees this and likes that work, we're ready, we're ready. Contact us. This is great. But to just keep doing it like for nothing, that's a, that's a 20 somethings world. That's something a much younger person can do who has less responsibilities.

[Anya Cain]

Yeah, I think it's, I think it's terrible how a lot of this often seems stacked against independent creators who are often doing very quality, very in depth work. And you know, it seems like the, the people who get rewarded are, you know, either already big or kind of just doing sensationalized nonsense.

[Alan Berry]

Let me push back on that just a little bit. Oh well, no, I'm not disagreeing. I'm just pushing back lightly. So I think there's a lot of luck involved too.

[Mark Enox]

Right.

[Alan Berry]

So, and Austin is a, he, he's done similar what we did and, and he made it through. Right. Like he's so, so I, I don't think that there is a, a work ethic that you have to have. There's some luck involved and so I don't think it's always stacked against you. I just think sometimes the cards don't fall your way. Is it stacked pretty high if you're in Indiana? Yeah, a little bit. Because all the networking happens in California. That's where Austin lives. So if we lived in California, maybe it would be different because by now we would have built up networks where you could share these ideas. But when you're in Indianapolis, there's just not that many people to share With. So, again, hopefully I'm not pushing too hard back on. On what you said, but it can be done. I just don't know if we can do it in our 50s.

[Anya Cain]

It's interesting you said that because we were told at times like, oh, you know, you're writing a book about a case that happened in Indiana. No one on the coast cares about that. And we'd be like, there's like Reddit pages or whatever with like, thousands of people from around the globe who care about it. So there can be a bit of a strange kind of idea that. I don't know it.

[Kevin Greenlee]

We.

[Anya Cain]

We've kind of run into something like that too, I think.

[Alan Berry]

No, and that. That makes sense. But going back to Tina Face, I mean, just. I mean, if we didn't get connected with this other producer, director team, maybe that would have panned out and would have been completely different and we would be on this call saying, yeah, our new film's coming out, we made a shitload of money and this life is great. Right. So I. I think part the biggest thing is the ethic, the work ethic. And then. But there is some luck of where the cards fall.

[Anya Cain]

Yeah. Well, I'm so sorry you went through that, but I, again, I really, really do encourage people to watch. Watch the documentary. We'll be linking to it, but I wanted to finish up by asking before we go, just like, about the two central men in the story that you guys told. And that's, of course, Dick hall and Tony Kiritsis. What happened? I guess first, what happened to Tony Kiritsis after he's found not guilty by reason of insanity? And then I want to talk about Dick hall and the aftermath of all of this for him.

[Mark Enox]

So Tony, he's not guilty by reason of insanity. That means the court is accepting he was insane. Before he can be released back into the public, he has to be deemed harmless because he was just found insane and it involves a weapon and all this stuff. So Tony has to submit to a psychological evaluation, probably a few of them, so that they can say, yep, you're fine. We're going to let you go. He does not. He does not submit to these. He continues to say, no, you know, I'm not crazy. You said, I'm not guilty. And it's like, yeah, of insanity. You just have to. It's just a formality. All you have to do is you've already submitted to three or four of these things leading up to the trial. Just do it again. He refused. So he was incarcerated inside mental Facilities all the way up until 1988. He continued to try to tell his story. He continued all kind of the same thing. He gets out in 88, he's on the west side again. He has a couple of altercations with his neighbors over balls being thrown in the yard or water sprayed. And I mean, the police knew about him. We've heard that they had a policy to send no less than three police officers out to deal with anything about Tony. And then he peacefully dies in 2005. So in some ways, Tony's whole life was just uprooted. And he never was really like he was before. He spent all this time in a. In mental facilities where he also, you know, played his, his games in there. He manipulated staff, other residents. And there were times where he was, he was a ladies man, so he was doing maybe some inappropriate stuff with other, other patients, but nothing else really comes of that. Dick hall, he. He goes. He loses everything. ML dies within a couple years, and then a Meridian mortgage goes under. Then Dick gets divorced there. You know, some people like, yeah, he became an alcoholic. And it's like, well, yeah, I mean, I mean, what else do you do? He, you know, he maintained going to church. He tried to do counseling with his pastor, but that's not. To me, that's not really therapy. So, of course you're damaged, horrendously damaged. When he released his book a few years ago, he did a press conference at wibc. And you know, there he said, I still see Tony's face sometimes. And this was just a year or two before Dick hall himself dies. He's like, I still, I still hear him and I see him. I keep trying to say, no, that's. That's not real. That's not really. That's not present right now. But I mean, the call was messed up and paid. He paid for it with the loss of almost everything that he had in 1977.

[Anya Cain]

Did Tony Kritzis have any remorse for what he did to that man?

[Mark Enox]

Yeah, I mean, he says it in the documentary. Out one side of his mouth, he's like, I'm gonna kill him. And out the other side, it's like, this is terrible what I'm doing to this man and his family. I'm really sorry about this, Dick. I really don't like the idea of what I'm putting you through. Your wife, your children. But I'm still doing it.

[Anya Cain]

I guess, for both of you. And I'll kind of pose this to you both separately. What do you think for you as people who immersed yourself in this, in this kind of remarkable story. What's your biggest takeaway of what it all mean? What it all means? What it all is about?

[Mark Enox]

Family is incredibly important and it can, in the case of Tony, it created an explosive device way, way back when he was a kid. And it took all those decades for it to finally blow. But it's almost entirely about family for Tony, even his ideas later on, the trailer park where he felt like he wasn't being treated fairly and he actually goes to war with his family and then turns his back on him. Dick Hulsei is kind of family oriented too. Here's a guy who I think think went along with what his dad thought he should do for a profession and didn't want to think poorly of his father and maybe didn't want to see some of the things that ML was doing. And then because potentially of ML's actions, Dick is taken hostage and traumatized.

[Alan Berry]

I don't know that I have a walking away thought about it. I more have a walking away thought about the project itself than about them than about the actual case. But I'm sure once we hang up, I'll think of a great answer. Yeah, I mean, to me, just looking at the whole project, you know, overall it's. It was awesome. I got. So Mark and I have been best friends since high school and this was something we got to work on together for five years and create something that others get to see and hopefully enjoy. So I think that's, for me, that's the walking away that. That I guess feels good from. About Tony, though, I have empathy for the man in a way. His card was probably directed from the time he was a kid. I don't know that there was anything that was going to come along that was going to change that path. Not to justify his dad, but his dad probably got treated the same way. Yeah, I have empathy for all of them, but most of all Dick hall, he's the one that got the worst of all this.

[Anya Cain]

Yeah, yeah, Abs, Absolutely. Well, Alan and Mark, you guys have been amazing. Is. Is there anything. Did you want to ask anything?

[Kevin Greenlee]

No, no.

[Anya Cain]

Is there anything else that we didn't about that you wanted to mention or you think it's important to stress?

[Alan Berry]

Only if you want to know where the we're tone where we think Tony got the idea.

[Anya Cain]

Please.

[Kevin Greenlee]

Yeah.

[Alan Berry]

So we always wondered like, where is this Tony's contraption? Or is this like, where does this come from? And Mark, I can't remember how we came upon it.

[Mark Enox]

It was Don Campbell it was one of the police officers we talked with with.

[Alan Berry]

He.

[Mark Enox]

It was near the end of the interview and he's like. And I know where he got the idea. And we're like, okay, you know what? He's like, hawaii Five zero. I'm like, wait a minute, what? So we go and look and Alan finds it. He finds the episode. In fact, the guy plays Boss Hogg in the old Dukes of Hazzard is in that episode. And they're in a prison and this guy takes another guy hostage. So he's got some kind of little gun that he's made. And he gets a thing of masking tape. Not duct tape, masking tape. And he tapes this thing around this guy. And when you see it, I mean, it's. It's ridiculous looking. It's this big thing, but it's.

[Kevin Greenlee]

It.

[Mark Enox]

But it's like that's it. And we believe strongly Tony was probably watched Hawaii Five O and probably watched some other thing. He probably was influenced in some way by media.

[Alan Berry]

Yeah, well, he was. He even talked about he didn't want to get a lobotomy, which at that time, what was the Jack Nicholson One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest was pretty big. So we.

[Mark Enox]

Lobotomies weren't. But lobotomy was. That had already stopped being. That was not a technique anymore. But that was one. One of the reasons he said he didn't want to submit to any more psych evaluations because he's like, they're just going to cut my head open. I saw that movie.

[Anya Cain]

Wow.

[Alan Berry]

Yeah. So if you want to see the Hawaii. If you just. If you're on YouTube and you see the Karitza's videos, like there's a playlist. It's in there.

[Mark Enox]

We.

[Alan Berry]

We made a short video that shows it. So you can. You can see that there. But I just thought throw that out the end there.

[Kevin Greenlee]

That's very interesting.

[Anya Cain]

This is all Sorrel Brooks fault.

[Mark Enox]

That's right.

[Alan Berry]

That is insane.

[Anya Cain]

Well, thank you. I mean, thank you guys so much for spending so much time with us. This is again, could not recommend your documentary enough. We will be including the link to that in our show notes. Encourage everyone to watch. Check out Dead Man's Wire and then check out Dead Man's Line, the documentary.

[Kevin Greenlee]

So confusing.

[Anya Cain]

No, there's so many lines and wires. But they're all worth watching and I think it's all going to be really interesting for people.

[Mark Enox]

Thank you so much, so much for your.

[Alan Berry]

Your time too. We, we really appreciate the opportunity to come on here and tell our little story.

[Anya Cain]

Thank you guys so much. Awesome. Thanks to Mark and Alan for talking to us. We'd strongly encourage you to watch Dead Man's Line, maybe watch Dead Man's Wire and then go watch Dead Man's Line so you can get the true story and hear from some of the people involved. It's a great documentary. We'll include the trailer and the documentary link in our show notes, or you can just search YouTube for dead man's Line. We'd love to hear what you thought of it.

[Kevin Greenlee]

Thanks so much for listening to the Murder Sheet. If you have a tip concerning one of the cases we cover, please email [e-mail] if you have actionable information about an unsolved crime, please report it to the appropriate authorities.

[Anya Cain]

If you're interested in joining our Patreon, that's available at www.patreon.com murdersheet. If you want to tip us a bit of money for records requests, you can do so at www.buymeacoffee.com murdersheet. We very much appreciate any support.

[Kevin Greenlee]

Special thanks to Kevin Tyler Greenlee, who composed the music for the Murder Sheet and who you can find on the [e-mail] if you're looking to talk with.

[Anya Cain]

Other listeners about a case we've covered, you can join the Murder Sheet Discussion group on Facebook. We mostly focus our time on research and reporting, so we're not on social media much. We do try to check our email account, but we ask for patience as we often receive a lot of messages. Thanks again for listening.