542 - Dracula Ambitions

Summary

My Favorite Murder – Episode 542: "Dracula Ambitions"

Release Date: July 23, 2026
Hosts: Karen Kilgariff & Georgia Hardstark

Overview

This episode of My Favorite Murder is a “scam spectacular,” celebrating the launch of the new Exactly Right limited series podcast Royal Swindle about two infamous Aussie con women. In line with the scam theme, Karen and Georgia each tell a true crime story centered on epic frauds: Georgia covers the explosive Roslyn School District embezzlement scandal, and Karen delves into the nearly unbelievable saga of Gilded Age con artist Cassie Chadwick (née Elizabeth Bigley), the self-proclaimed illegitimate daughter of Andrew Carnegie.

With the usual blend of dark humor, personal asides, and keen-eyed commentary, the pair dig deep into what makes a scammer, how systems let cons flourish, and the human impulses that drive greed and subterfuge.

---

Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Pre-show Banter & Setting the Stage

• The hosts chat about adulting (or not), press-on nails, being perceived as having your “shit together,” and people’s bizarre assumptions based on looks.
  • Memorable exchange on how people with big tits or good looks get treated differently in life.
• Brief personal recommendations and life tidbits including a shoutout for the podcast Bone Valley and a breakdown about public school funding and privilege in America.
  • “The poor schools just never get the money.” – Karen (14:35)
• Themed episode announcement, honoring the new podcast Royal Swindle and introducing today’s focus: favorite scam stories.

2. Story #1: The Roslyn School District Embezzlement Scandal

[10:32–44:11]
Told by: Georgia Hardstark

Setting and Background

• Roslyn, NY: Affluent Long Island suburb famous for its public schools and high property values.
  • “It’s more of a quintessential New York suburb…a lot of doctors and lawyers…great public schools, and these people are obsessive about their children’s education.” – Georgia (11:37)

Main Players

• Frank Tassone: Superintendent, “beloved, flashy dresser, no kids, drives a Mercedes” (16:01)
• Pam Gluckin: Assistant Superintendent for Business, “well-liked, jokes about how hard she works, but somehow has three homes, boats, lavish vacations” (20:00)

The Scheme Unfolds

• Pam uses district credit cards for personal purchases (homes, renovations, vacations); initially red flags are missed due to trust, affluence, and social norms.
  • “It seems like…it’s within her budget. People don’t seem to know a ton about Frank’s personal life.” – Georgia (18:08)
• Discovery begins with a local Home Depot clerk noticing supplies delivered to a Hamptons address (23:12).
• The district initially opts to quietly remove Pam (“let her resign,” don’t call the DA) to avoid scandal and damage to reputation (25:00).

Quote:

• “We shouldn’t press charges…It will make the school budget harder to pass. But if she resigns and promises to pay back the money…the district will take less of a financial hit.” – Georgia, relaying Frank’s logic (25:00)

Escalation and Massive Cover-up

• The true scale of the theft emerges when an anonymous letter circulates among administrators, parents, the DA, and media, suggesting much more money is missing and implicating Frank as well (27:26).
• A student journalist, Rebecca Rombaum, publishes about it in the school paper (32:16). Parents catch on; press coverage snowballs.
• Investigations reveal:
  • Lavish personal expenses covered by district (trips, luxury weight loss clinics, questionable vendor charges).
  • Payments to a phony pamphlet company linked to Frank’s Manhattan address (37:07).
  • Hidden Vegas house and open relationship details (39:26).
  • A total estimate of $11.2 million stolen—modern equivalent: around $20 million (41:20).

Quote:

• “This makes it the largest embezzlement from a school district in American history. So if you’re gonna go big, kids, go to Vegas.” – Georgia (41:46)

Aftermath and Impact

• Pam and Frank, plus family members/partners, are sentenced, but actual prison time is short compared to the crime.
  • Frank repays $2.2m, collects a $173k+ pension, and keeps his rent-controlled apartment. Pam repays about half her $4.3m theft, rumored deceased or vanished.
• “The Roslyn Effect” leads to public mistrust in school budgets across Long Island (43:52).
• The true sender of the anonymous tip letter is never identified.

Notable Quotes:

• “If you want to watch Hugh Jackman make out with a really cute twink, definitely watch Bad Education.” – Georgia (44:34)
• “If you’re going to go big, kids, go to Vegas.” – Georgia (41:46)

---

3. Story #2: Cassie Chadwick, Gilded Age Grifter

[48:01–78:08]
Told by: Karen Kilgariff

Setting and Background

• 19th–early 20th century, Canada, Ohio, and New York City.
• Elizabeth Bigley/Cassie Chadwick: Born poor in Ontario, becomes the “Queen of Ohio” and self-proclaimed illegitimate daughter of Andrew Carnegie.

Early Scams

• As a young woman, Elizabeth tries swindling pawn shops (fake mustache, fake identities), then advances to promissory note frauds and fortune telling (“Madame Ler de Vere”).
  • “The best way to get money was to be a man.” – Karen, describing Elizabeth’s logic (51:20)
• Multiple marriages (hustling debts onto husbands), fleecing family (borrowing on sister’s possessions), and feigning illness (fake coughing blood by picking her gums) to extract charity.

The Carnegie Con

[Narrative Peak, 68:57–74:00]

• Marries Dr. Leroy Chadwick, Cleveland society elite.
• When Leroy restricts her spending, Cassie creates a new con: she claims to be Andrew Carnegie’s secret daughter, forging stacks of promissory notes and “proof” documents.
  • “She shows him more paperwork, purportedly showing proof of the stocks and bonds she’s been gifted by her rich father.” – Karen (70:13)
• Leverages lawyer James Dillon to spread the story (“please don’t tell anyone!”), knowing he’ll gossip.

Quote:

• “You’re betting on the behavior that everybody exhibits. Because who among us doesn’t…when someone is like, please, I have to tell you something…tell four other people?” – Karen (71:08)

The Ponzi and Collapse

• Secures massive loans from banks (“never less than $10,000…largest is reportedly $800,000—$31 million today”).
• Creates a pyramid scheme: borrowing to pay off previous loans, spending wildly to keep up the heiress act.
• Buys jewels, pipe organs (“Dracula ambitions”), even hands out pianos for Christmas.

Downfall & Shockwaves

• When debts can’t be repaid, the scam unravels—Oberlin, OH bank collapses, students lose savings (reimbursed later by Andrew Carnegie himself).
• Arrested with $100,000 (~$3.8m today) in a money belt.
• Sentenced to 10 years, but dies after one from “a total nervous collapse.”
• Estimated lifetime take: $630,000 (over $23 million today), but likely higher due to male victims’ reluctance to come forward.

Notable Quotes:

• “Female fraudsters like Anna Sorokin and Elizabeth Holmes dominate the news, but neither perfected the grift like Cassie did. She truly earned the title of the world’s greatest woman swindler.” – Karen (77:13, quoting historian Quincy Balas)
• “She has Dracula ambitions.” – Karen (68:57)

Enchanting the Audience

• Holmes asks: who would you cast as Chadwick? Karen says Holly Hunter in Raising Arizona—unassuming, desperate, and magnetic: “Where you’re suddenly doing what she needs you to do because she needs that baby high and you want to help her.” (78:31)

---

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On School Funding:
  • “The poor schools just never get the money.” – Karen, on the inequities of US public education (14:35)
  • “That is the definition of corruption…how bad is a thing to be a career-ender or reputation-destroyer.” – Karen (26:15)
• On Cons and Human Nature:
  • “You’re living in a fantasy world and then it ends.” – Karen, on scammer psychology (44:32)
  • “She hypnotizes the parole board somehow.” – Georgia, marveling at Chadwick’s gift for persuasion (66:18)
• On Gilded Age Outlandishness:
  • “She buys a $9,000 pipe organ…today that would be $330,000.” – Karen (68:31)
  • “Everybody gets a piano!” – Georgia, on Cassie’s Christmas spree (74:00)
• On the Scam Impulse:
  • “If you’re going to go big, kids, go to Vegas.” – Georgia (41:46)

---

Timestamps for Important Segments

• Banter & episode purpose: [02:34–10:06]
• Intro to scam theme/Royal Swindle plug: [10:06–10:32]
• Roslyn embezzlement story begins: [10:32]
• Discovery of the fraud: [23:12]
• Pam’s quiet resignation: [25:00]
• Unraveling of the scheme via anonymous tip and student reporting: [27:26–33:12]
• Scale of fraud revealed / Final reckoning: [39:26–44:11]
• Karen's Cassie Chadwick story starts: [48:01]
• Early frauds and marriages: [51:20–60:19]
• Carnegie con and bank fraud: [68:57–74:38]
• Collapse and sentencing: [74:38–77:17]
• Casting Chadwick, episode round-up: [78:08–79:02]

---

The MFM Vibe and Takeaways

True to form, the episode weaves heavier true crime with irreverence, personal confessionals, and sly social critique. The hosts illuminate the blurred moral edges of scam stories—how systems and human frailty alike enable grifters to thrive, and how even the most “respectable” institutions often prefer silence over accountability.

Final thoughts:

• Scammed or scammer, anyone can fall prey to the right pitch delivered with enough charm.
• Sometimes the desire to avoid scandal or the embarrassment of being conned helps the scam keep growing—until it explodes.
• And as always: “Stay sexy and don’t get murdered.”

Transcript

[Karen Kilgariff]

This is exactly Right.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

Two Aussie lesbian lovers touch down in 1990s London and become the toast of British high society. One of them touts an exclusive investment opportunity and soon the money is rolling in. Rich businessmen and England's horse loving elite fall under their seductive spell. They even meet Queen Elizabeth. But the millionaire duo are concealing a dark past and dastardly intentions. From USG Audio, Blanchard House and Exactly Right Media, this is Royal Swindle. New episodes drop every Thursday. Listen now on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Calling all amateur detectives and podcast obsessives.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Virgin Voyages second true crime voyage sets sail March 20, 2027 for a five night escape to Grand Turk and the Beach Club at Bimini as part of

[Karen Kilgariff]

the On Air at Sea collection. This immersive sailing brings together fan favorite podcasts including Disgraceland, Buried Bones and Wisecrack for live recordings, behind the scenes access, exclusive meet and greets and crime themed programming that you won't find anywhere else.

[Georgia Hardstark]

All aboard our award winning kid free ships.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Head over to virginvoyages.com truecrime to secure your spot.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Goodbye.

[Karen Kilgariff]

There's always a point in the day when your feet decide they've had enough.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Luckily, there's Ryf.

[Karen Kilgariff]

You may know Ryf for their ridiculously comfortable sandals, but they aren't stopping there. The women's Neptune has everything you could ever want in a sneaker.

[Georgia Hardstark]

The Neptune is a lightweight everyday slip on shoe with a crushed back heel so you can wear it traditionally or step on the heel and wear it like a slide.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Lightweight, breathable and easy to wear. The Neptune is the everyday shoe your feet have been waiting for.

[Georgia Hardstark]

The Neptune makes me so freaking happy because my whole life I've been yelled at for crushing the heel of my foot because I want every shoe to be a slide. Every shoe and they actually make them that way and it makes me so happy. Plus they're super comfortable, they're light and they're really cute.

[Karen Kilgariff]

So check out the Neptune on reef.com and redeem 15% off your first purchase.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Goodbye. My favor.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Hello and welcome to my favorite murder.

[Georgia Hardstark]

That's Georgia Hartstart, that's Karen Kilgariff, and

[Karen Kilgariff]

here we are podcasting once again.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Here we are.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Well those are pretty nails.

[Georgia Hardstark]

I know they're adults nails that I've somehow put on me magnetic. They're like gel X so they're like not my nails and suddenly I feel like this and dresses I feel like are the trick to making people think you have Your shit together.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yeah, that's right.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Boom.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Are you not point things out like this?

[Georgia Hardstark]

I'm definitely talking with my hands a lot more pointing things out. But 10, 15 minutes ago, I was eating an uncrustable in the car wash, so. Yes, still me. Didn't get me on my dress.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Not so classy that it changes you deep down.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Exactly.

[Karen Kilgariff]

That's good.

[Georgia Hardstark]

How are you?

[Karen Kilgariff]

I'm good. I'm still working on the same manicure I had two weeks ago.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Try these gel X. They're gel and they're like press on, like Lee press on nails.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Oh, okay.

[Georgia Hardstark]

And you just suddenly feel like an adult.

[Karen Kilgariff]

All right. I'm not that interested in being an adult, though.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Looking like one. People mistaking you for one, so they treat you differently.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yeah, but I don't. Like, suddenly I put those on and people are asking me for tax advice. I don't have time like that.

[Georgia Hardstark]

It's what I think. Like, if I had nice big tits, like, it would be like if that. That's like what girls who have nice big tits experience in life, you know?

[Karen Kilgariff]

I have bad news for you.

[Georgia Hardstark]

What?

[Karen Kilgariff]

Someone with medium big tits?

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

Come on.

[Karen Kilgariff]

It's not that great.

[Georgia Hardstark]

People give you a little. They're, like, a little nicer to you.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Oh. I mean, I get into restaurants, I get. Always get a table.

[Georgia Hardstark]

I never get a table with these A's.

[Karen Kilgariff]

What a way to look at the world.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah.

[Karen Kilgariff]

I've been ripped off with my small breasts.

[Georgia Hardstark]

It's the thing of, like, people who were pretty when they're kids. You're like, you don't know what real life like since they've been kids, they've been pretty.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

Yes.

[Georgia Hardstark]

You don't know what it's like.

[Karen Kilgariff]

You've never been.

[Georgia Hardstark]

People don't treat you the way they treat everyone else.

[Karen Kilgariff]

You've never had somebody turn around and go, oh, you're here, Right? Oh, my God.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Or go, oh, you're here. It's more like that.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yeah. Or go, oh, you're here.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Or go, oh, you're here.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Oh, oh, you're here. You're trying to put the accent on the O.

[Georgia Hardstark]

You're here.

[Karen Kilgariff]

It's scene study with Karen in Georgia.

[Georgia Hardstark]

And.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And you're here.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Scene. And you're here. Okay. I have a true crime podcast, Bone Valley, which. Wow. Hey, they just went for that.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Where does this take place? Hell.

[Georgia Hardstark]

But that's the podcast's name. And then they have seasons. The season I just started listening to, I had never heard of it is season five called the Devil's Quarry. The podcast Bone Valley is about wrongful convictions and miscarriage of justice in the U.S. so the Devil's Quarry Season 5 is about this 12 year old girl who was murdered in the 1980s. And just the complete that happened with this guy going to jail for 20 years. And you know all the things you hate about that, but he figures a way to get himself out. But then there's a psycho who actually probably killed her, who isn't? And so it's this kind of awful story. But it's really interesting and important to tell. Yeah, that's great. I highly recommend it. Paul Solotaroff is the host. He was a Rolling Stones contributor. It's just good.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Rolling Stone, the magazine.

[Georgia Hardstark]

The magazine. No, the band. He was in the Rolling Stones.

[Karen Kilgariff]

You said it plural.

[Georgia Hardstark]

It's not.

[Karen Kilgariff]

He's a Rolling Stones contributor. He's like, ooh, ooh.

[Georgia Hardstark]

I couldn't even have told you if it was or wasn't. Right. That's it.

[Karen Kilgariff]

What about you scraping my brain for anything?

[Georgia Hardstark]

You don't have to have anything new. We did it. We talked about nails, talked about tits. We talked about true crime.

[Karen Kilgariff]

This is what ladies care about.

[Georgia Hardstark]

This is what you've come to expect.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And now how to get our bodily autonomy back.

[Georgia Hardstark]

No, don't be silly.

[Karen Kilgariff]

God damn it.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Okay, well, let's get into it then. We have a podcast network called Exactly Right Media.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Correct.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Here are some highlights.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Explosive diarrhea alert. All caps.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Oh, Jesus. Oh, they're doing it. I love it.

[Karen Kilgariff]

That's right. This week on this podcast will kill you. Our experts, Erin and Erin are both doctors and they're putting out an emergency episode to talk about the current cyclosp. That's right, the explosive diarrhea outbreak that is happening across this nation and is real. So Erin and Aaron break down what's happening, what you need to watch out for. And they list off every single vegetable that you no longer have to eat.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Have to eat.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Whoops. That you are not allowed to eat.

[Georgia Hardstark]

And then, over on Dear Movies, I Love youe, Millie and Casey revisit the cult classic Romy and Michelle's High school reunion. I gotta watch that again. Plus, Casey shares all the highlights from his recent 20th high school reunion.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Themed out then on Disgraceland, Jake tells the story of Dolly Parton.

[Georgia Hardstark]

So good.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Hear how the country icon narrowly avoided becoming the tragic heroine of one of her own murder ballads.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Ooh. And then in Merch Corner, finally, we have some brand new arrivals. So exciting. Check out the new Call youl Dad collection.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Oh, pretty goddamn Great.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Especially look stoked.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Look at this T shirt.

[Georgia Hardstark]

I love it.

[Karen Kilgariff]

You're an occult. Call your dad.

[Georgia Hardstark]

And then we have a popsocket, pop

[Karen Kilgariff]

socket and a sticker.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Come on, you guys.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Something for everyone.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Check that out. And we also have the MFM Collegiate unisex T shirt.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Here it is.

[Georgia Hardstark]

So I love that. So it's the red flag. Unisex. Looks like you go to my favorite murder university with a red flag. I love that one so fucking much.

[Karen Kilgariff]

It's so cute.

[Georgia Hardstark]

What size is that? I'm going to give it to Vince.

[Karen Kilgariff]

This here is a medium.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Amazing. Both of those are designed by our graphic designer, Vanessa Lilac, who's so talented. And then also we have. This was our tour logo.

[Karen Kilgariff]

It's like the design template kind of.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah. With the panther. It's really fucking cool. It's designed by Daphna Sabane. It's inspired by our 2025 tour shirt. So check that out, man. That's so cool.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

Yeah.

[Karen Kilgariff]

If you have FOMO for missing out on the tour in any way, you can still get a piece of that art action.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Pretty great.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Love it. Head to theexactlyrightstore.com to shop for our merch. All of our merch. Now.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

Two Aussie lesbian lovers touch down in 1990s London and become the toast of British high society. One of them starts touting an exclusive investment opportunity. And soon the money is rolling in. Rich businessmen and England's horse loving elite fall under their seductive spell. They even meet Queen Elizabeth. But the duo are concealing a dark past and dastardly intentions. Evil.

[Georgia Hardstark]

They were.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

Bad.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Bad people.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

As bad as evil.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yes, definitely.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

Before long, a small town detective gets wind of the duo's exploits and vows to stop them. Them?

[Georgia Hardstark]

She was a thieving scumbag.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

Only problem is these two are exceedingly hard to catch. Decades later, one of them is finally ready to tell all.

[Georgia Hardstark]

I sold my soul to the devil.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

From USG Audio, Blanchard House and Exactly right Media. This is Royal Swindle. New episodes drop every Thursday. Listen now on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Karen Kilgariff]

So this is a very special episode. This is a themed episode, right, in honor of our newest limited series podcast release of Royal Swindle.

[Georgia Hardstark]

That's right. Royal Swindle is the unbelievable true story of two Aussie con women who charmed British high society. We love a good con in a tale of greed, lies and spoiler alert horses. The first two episodes are available right now. Wherever you get your podcasts. Please go check that out.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And to celebrate the kickoff of Royal Swindle, we will now tell each other scam stories.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Hell, yeah.

[Karen Kilgariff]

We love a scammer.

[Georgia Hardstark]

We do. And there's just so many.

[Karen Kilgariff]

You go first. Okay.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Okay. Have you heard of Rosslyn, New York, in Long Island?

[Karen Kilgariff]

Long Island.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Long Island.

[Karen Kilgariff]

I've heard of Long Island.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Okay, so there is a town called Rosslyn in New York, a Long island suburb. It's on the island's north shore in Nassau county, which you've heard of. Past stories that have taken us to Long island that we've covered have been, of course, the Gilgo Beach Killer and the Amityville Horror Story. But both those took place in towns that are on the south shore and farther out on the island, where the vibe is more maritime and maybe a little more blue collar. Mm, not today. Rosslyn is more of a quintessential New York suburb. If you remember the suburban towns in Uncut Gems and Meet the Fockers or Meet the Parents, whatever, that's the kind of place you can picture. So I looked it up, of course, to see what famous people came from. Rosalind. Michael Crichton.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

Oh.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Author Michael Crichton. A man named Arthur Egatston, who is the author of the South Beach Diet.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Oh, hell yeah.

[Georgia Hardstark]

And fashion designer Lily Pulitzer was born in Rosslyn, New York.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Okay, we're getting the sense here.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah.

[Karen Kilgariff]

There's a little bit of carb cutting, some affluence. There's some ballet slippers that match the little sundress you're wearing.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Right. Your daughter has the same matching outfit. There's a lot of doctors and lawyers, the ones that, you know, commute to Manhattan. And there's one main reason New York professionals choose to live in these towns, and that is because they have great public schools, and these people are obsessive about their children's education. It's something that you and I don't understand, except I read it in books about how cutthroat getting your children into schools and good schools and public good schools is. Right.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And in la, I've had friends that are like, the child is a year and a half, and they're already talking about what kindergarten they will go to.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Totally. Totally.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And then I just internally fall backwards out of the universe.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Same. This is the story of a swindle that rocked one of Long Island's most prestigious school systems. And as it unraveled, it just got bigger and bigger. It's probably a testament to the quality of the district and its ambitious students that the Story was first broken by a student at this school in the school paper.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yes.

[Georgia Hardstark]

And its alumnus later wrote and produced an HBO movie about it called Bad Education, starring Alison Janney and Hugh Jackman

[Karen Kilgariff]

that was based on a true story.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah. And I'll say it's a bit of a stretch, but they're such great actors. We don't care.

[Karen Kilgariff]

You don't care.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah. This is the story of the Rosalind School district embezzlement scandal. Ooh. The main sources for this story are an article in New York Magazine by Robert Kolker and reporting from the New York Times and Newsday, which is Long Island's local paper. The rest of the sources can be found in the show notes. And I watched half of Bad Education, but it's not. It's like they take liberties. It's not even, like, true. But it is a fun little, you know, flick. Okay, who says that? My mom. It's a fun flick.

[Karen Kilgariff]

It's a fun flick. How would you know? You didn't watch it.

[Georgia Hardstark]

I watched all of half of it. How dare you? How dare you.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

All of half.

[Georgia Hardstark]

You and your big tits. Put them away.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Get your big tits out of my face.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Okay, so it's the fall of 2002. Remember that? And the Rosslyn School District has been rapidly ascending towards the top of the top public districts in America. For any non American listeners and people who don't have children and don't understand this.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Bonjour. Bonjour.

[Georgia Hardstark]

American public schools are controlled on three levels.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Lunchtime vibes, reset, cheerleader vibes and cheerleaders.

[Georgia Hardstark]

So the first is very loosely by the federal government, which can give or withhold some state funding and can create policies that should protect students, constitutional rights and rights to education, or create policies that roll back these rights, Guess which one happens more often?

[Karen Kilgariff]

Number two.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah. And on the state level, there is much more oversight into the curriculum, policies and standards. The state administers standardized tests and funding can be awarded or withheld based on these scores.

[Karen Kilgariff]

I think it'd be interesting to have a teacher here right now to tell us their opinion.

[Georgia Hardstark]

It's abysmal.

[Karen Kilgariff]

The poor schools just never get the money.

[Georgia Hardstark]

No, they don't matter what the money that they need the most, they make up. Yeah, there's a whole fucking episode.

[Karen Kilgariff]

I'm going to stop and lecture you every time I have the opportunity.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Great. I barely graduated high school. However, the vast majority of school funding comes from local taxes on a district by district basis. This is why if you look at a list of best performing public school Districts in America, they will without fail be some of the country's richest suburban communities.

[Karen Kilgariff]

So the rich get richer.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Right.

[Karen Kilgariff]

The escalator that they're automatically standing on goes all the way to heaven.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Exactly. And I was educated at one of those too, so I can't.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Did Janet move you there? Like to be at a good school?

[Georgia Hardstark]

Janet wouldn't let us move to LA before I graduated because it was a good school, which is like. I appreciate that of her.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yeah, that's right. To keep you there so that you could.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah. I probably would have gotten into even more trouble if I had gone into Fairfax. Yeah, exactly.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Oh, my God. Can you imagine being in the city?

[Georgia Hardstark]

I would have the most fun. Yeah. Appreciate that. So good schools drive up home prices too, which I hadn't considered. Makes obvious sense, making these communities even more inaccessible over time. And I did look at the Redfin like house and I didn't see one for under 1.5 million.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

Wow.

[Georgia Hardstark]

And some of the higher ones were like 6 million.

[Karen Kilgariff]

So it's a fancy area.

[Georgia Hardstark]

And they're very like. They all look a little Sopranos. Ish.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yeah. Kind of a little new.

[Georgia Hardstark]

New builds.

[Karen Kilgariff]

A little octagonal, maybe.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Central staircase, Lots of tile instead of hardwood, you know.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Right.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Which depresses me. So. A large chunk of the credit for the ever improving quality of the Roslyn school district is given to the school's superintendent, a 10 year veteran of the district in his late 50s named Frank Tassone. And that's who Hugh Jackman plays. I'll show a real photo of him, actually.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Oh, there's Frank.

[Georgia Hardstark]

He's making a face. That's Hughes Jackman's character. You can see it.

[Karen Kilgariff]

You can see a little Hugh Jackman in there.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah.

[Karen Kilgariff]

He looks like a great dancer, this man. And proud. So proud.

[Georgia Hardstark]

You know, his shoes are nice.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Look at that. How hot that cameraman is back there. Did you notice that guy?

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah, he is a little bit.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Looks like Ryan Gosling.

[Georgia Hardstark]

He does.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Faking being the cameraman.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Hey, are you the cameraman? He looks like Ryan Gosling right in.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And then that journalist is like, excuse me, the cameraman's my boyfriend.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Right.

[Karen Kilgariff]

That's why we move in packs like this. Sorry, sorry, sorry, guys.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Over the years, Frank has spearheaded ambitious projects. So he's a really good superintendent. I want to say super Nintendo because of the Simpsons. Well, super Nintendo Chalmers.

[Karen Kilgariff]

He's the best super Nintendo Chalmers that anyone's ever seen.

[Georgia Hardstark]

But he is really good. He has spearheaded ambitious projects like elementary school foreign language classes and high school community Service requirements, which is pretty great. That makes everyone proud of the district. And the hard stats are always improving, too. Every year, the school's average SAT scores go up and the list of college acceptances becomes more and more impressive. And Frank spearheads a lot of community outreach as well, involving Roslyn senior citizens in school events to, like, help do old people things. Tell stories, probably, but oftentimes those are complain about children. Yes. Today, yes. Oftentimes, though, these events happen shortly before the town budget votes. But, like, he's still doing it, right? Frank is a former English teacher who still gives public lectures on classic literature. He is beloved. He's also a flashy dresser. Brooks Brothers suits. And he drives.

[Karen Kilgariff]

He seemed like an incredibly flashy dresser.

[Georgia Hardstark]

He is. He drives a Mercedes. He makes around 250,000 a year. So that was in 2002. So in today's money, 750, 466. Yeah, but close.

[Karen Kilgariff]

I always go too high.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

Yeah.

[Georgia Hardstark]

I was like, you're never gonna believe this. Like, no, no. So he makes, you know, 250 a year, but he has no kids. So the fact that he spends a lot of money and has nice things seems like it's within his budget. People don't seem to know a ton about Frank's personal life. He has on his desk an old timey wedding photo, like in the movie Bad Education. It looks like it's from the 80s, maybe of a woman in a wedding dress. And he says that was his wife who tragically died of cancer many years earlier. His ring on in the movie. I don't know if it's true. People know he lives in Manhattan in a rent stabilized building. So that's more of a reason for them not to question his. Seems like he's spending a lot.

[Karen Kilgariff]

For one moment I was like, I wish this story was about how that building got rent stabilized and like how much it cost and who lives there. Because that idea that in like modern day, even LA or New York, that

[Georgia Hardstark]

you had to be grandfathered in at some point.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yeah, right. And you're like, oh, I pay 1,500 for my 3 and 2.

[Georgia Hardstark]

My old place that we used to record at was like 1250. It's insane.

[Karen Kilgariff]

God.

[Georgia Hardstark]

I know. That's not what this story is. Sorry, that's next week. That's your story. So other than this one mystery about his private life, which he doesn't discuss much, Frank is outgoing, he's friendly. This is probably why the school board is inclined to follow his lead in 2002 when it comes out that his assistant superintendents for business, the person who signs the checks for the district, a woman named Pam Gluckin, has been stealing money from the district. So Allison Janney is who plays her. And here is what she actually looks like. Pam, she looks like a woman you'd see in the office of your school.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Absolutely right. A woman who literally, those readers are glued to the end of her nose like that.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Right. And she's always rushing around and she always smells like coffee and you know,

[Karen Kilgariff]

but she knows everyone's name. She knows everyone's mom's name.

[Georgia Hardstark]

She's always busy.

[Karen Kilgariff]

She knows exactly what's going on.

[Georgia Hardstark]

She knows everyone's name. Yes, she does. Exactly. They show that in this movie. So she's well liked, she's outgoing. She often jokes about how hard she's working and how late she stays. But it seems like it's true. She is kind of like his right hand and knows everything. And while she makes decent money as a high up administrator in a wealthy district, it's maybe a little suspicious with her that she can afford to have three homes. One in Belmore, which is a working class Long island town, one in Florida and one in the Hamptons. But she also has boats, she takes lavish vacations. She has fancy cars and nice jewelry. So it's a little more sus.

[Karen Kilgariff]

It's just funny to me.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Maybe it's her husband who makes the money, you know, like, yeah, she could

[Karen Kilgariff]

have had a rich aunt.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Credit, credit.

[Karen Kilgariff]

She's just really good at paying off her credit card every month.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Good or bad? We don't know.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Or really bad. But my thing is, why can't people just not spend the money just for

[Georgia Hardstark]

a little while, Keep it on the low profile.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Just go to CVS and treat yourself once a month.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Listen to us tell you how to cheat. I knew when I was 19 if I stole clothes from the Melrose clothing store I was working at. Don't wear them to work.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

Yes.

[Karen Kilgariff]

You know, and pick your one thing and then go for three years with like, at least cover your tracks in some way. But that idea, it's like, hey, wanna go try my ski doo? Let's go out this weekend. And they're like, maureen, come over.

[Georgia Hardstark]

I'm having a party at my Hampton's house. Disclaimer. I never stole any clothes from the Melrose.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Disclaimer. I never stole $20 from my cafe job and justified it by saying everyone's mean to me.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Never happened. And statute of limitations can't prove it.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yep, didn't happen.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah, it's a little suspicious, but no one really bats an eye at this because a lot of Rosalind families have homes in other locations. They don't ask questions. That said, it's still a shock to everyone when the board realizes that Pam has been using a district credit card to make personal purchases.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Trackable.

[Georgia Hardstark]

So trackable. But she's the one who does the tracking or, like, the approving.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yeah. So two sets of eyes, it seems like.

[Georgia Hardstark]

I'm sure she started slow and then knew she was never gonna get caught and just kind of went, you're all in. At that point, whether for $10 or a million dollars, you're gonna get fired and gonna get caught, so you might as well do the million.

[Karen Kilgariff]

So then you're like, totally. That just makes me think of the early days when you and I had. Were sharing, like, American Express cards, and then if I would do the thing where suddenly I don't have my card on me, and I would just text you and be like, I just bought $80 worth of lip liner at CVS. Just so you know, before, when we were still handling.

[Georgia Hardstark]

I know. I know.

[Karen Kilgariff]

So crazy.

[Georgia Hardstark]

I believed you every time.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Well, it's true.

[Georgia Hardstark]

I know. That's why it's a good thing I believed you. I know. It is. There'd be, like, a six. You'd call it tax me. Like, I just spent 625 at Chipotle, and I didn't have my card, so I used our car.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

Yes.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Like, o.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Did it all the time.

[Georgia Hardstark]

You don't have to pay it back.

[Karen Kilgariff]

I know, but it's. But it's also that kind of thing where I think that at least we always had that.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Where it's just like, you're not gonna steal money from me.

[Georgia Hardstark]

No, totally.

[Karen Kilgariff]

You're not. That's not how you are.

[Georgia Hardstark]

No, that's, like, very important in a partnership.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Here comes the big reveal.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Actually, wait.

[Karen Kilgariff]

I do owe you. Didn't you give me $100 in cash one time?

[Georgia Hardstark]

Recently, I gave you $20. Cause I didn't have a 5. And said, you have probably done this for me many times in the past. Yes. We're even.

[Karen Kilgariff]

So we're even.

[Georgia Hardstark]

We're absolutely even.

[Karen Kilgariff]

You heard it here, folks.

[Georgia Hardstark]

That is provable. Okay. District credit card. One of those credit card purchases finally raises the alarm because someone used it to buy a bunch of renovation supplies at a few Home Depots around Long island outside of Rosslyn. The clerk. Okay, here's the snitch clerk at a Home Depot in a town called Selden. Which is about 35 miles east of Rosslyn. And everyone knows everyone in Long Island. It seems like you're not gonna get away with shit. People know whose kid. You people know whose cousin you are. Like, where you're supposed to be, where you're not supposed to be.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Oh, yeah, you remember Vicki Ernst, one of the producers on our TV show?

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Vicki's from Long island, right? And she knows every single person on her block. And anytime she sees anybody, like, it's about community, right?

[Georgia Hardstark]

Gossip. Good, bad, everything, you're in it.

[Karen Kilgariff]

You're in it for life.

[Georgia Hardstark]

So basically, the snitch. I'm not putting him down. Good for him.

[Karen Kilgariff]

This person.

[Georgia Hardstark]

This person. So don't call him a snitch. Is that what you're saying?

[Karen Kilgariff]

Well, I don't know.

[Georgia Hardstark]

You're right. He recognized the person who was using the credit card as Pam's son. And she's like, that's weird. He is a contractor. But why was he buying supplies for the Rosalind School district on their card, but not at the Home Depot in Rosslyn? In a different town? And why did those supplies get delivered to a home in the Hamptons and not to the Rosalind school?

[Karen Kilgariff]

Red flag. Red flag.

[Georgia Hardstark]

And, like, the son's being lazy at this point in the movie. She, like, beats the shit out of him for doing that. It's very. Allison Janney is so good.

[Karen Kilgariff]

She's so good.

[Georgia Hardstark]

She's so good. So this clerk contacts the school board and tells them when the school's auditor finishes his work, just looking into it, he finds that $250,000 have been stolen in today's money.

[Karen Kilgariff]

250. And this was 2003.

[Georgia Hardstark]

2002.

[Karen Kilgariff]

2002.

[Georgia Hardstark]

You want to know how much the other one was? Oh, it was the same amount.

[Karen Kilgariff]

It was four something.

[Georgia Hardstark]

It was the same amount.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Oh, 450.

[Georgia Hardstark]

466. Okay, so today's money about 466. The board convenes in a meeting with Frank, our guy, to figure out the next steps. They're all just so pissed off and upset. And he surprises all of them by saying, we shouldn't turn her in. We shouldn't go to the D.A. we shouldn't press charges. Let's not raise the alarms. Instead, let's let her resign quietly, and we'll inform the state licensing board so they revoke her school administration licenses. He doesn't want to totally throw the book at her. He points out that if Pam is prosecuted, the district will have to keep paying her until the case is settled and possibly More importantly, it'll make the district look really bad when it becomes a huge news story. It will make the school budget harder to pass. But if she resigns and promises to pay back the money, the district will take less of a financial hit, or really no hit at all if she pays it back. Basically, they want to avoid scandal. They look really good. They also were like, if colleges see Roslyn School District on applications and know that it is like a tarnished school, it's going to affect.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yeah.

[Georgia Hardstark]

And they don't want that to happen. They've worked so hard. It's only $250,000. Let's let her go.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yeah.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Makes sense.

[Karen Kilgariff]

I mean, and that is the kind of definition these days feels like. Of corruption in that way, because that's exactly what happened with Dr. Death, where it's like, we can't. The insurance won't bring this against these doctors because it's so small and it ends everything. And it's like that kind of thinking of, like, how bad is a thing to be a career ender or a reputation?

[Georgia Hardstark]

You'd hope hurting and killing people would be the limit, but guess what? It's not.

[Karen Kilgariff]

It's never money. It's money.

[Georgia Hardstark]

So the board takes Frank up on this idea, and Pam plays ball and she goes quietly. About a year and a half pass without incident. And in that time period, Rosalind has been ranked by Wall Street Journal as the sixth best school district in the nation. Which in today's best school districts in the.

[Karen Kilgariff]

No.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Exactly. And the parents, school board and administration, they're so thrilled about this. Basically, like, Brent can't do anything wrong. Every Rosalind homeowner is also thrilled. Since more demand for the school system means higher home prices. Everyone's happy with him.

[Karen Kilgariff]

It's all frothing. But the camera cuts back to that wedding picture on his desk.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Right.

[Karen Kilgariff]

For me.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Right. Then it all comes crashing down. You're right. In February of 2004, an anonymous letter is sent to the members of the school board, some school administrators, the district attorney, and several local newspapers. So we never find out who sent

[Karen Kilgariff]

this letter, but they sent it to everybody.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Everybody. It claims that Pam Glucken had stolen much more than $250,000 that the school's auditor had initially reported, which some of these people didn't know about that at all, and that Frank both knew about it and had embezzled funds himself. The letter says, quote, we believe that Dr. Frank Tasson participated in this embezzlement scandal so as to support his lavish lifestyle with the help of Ms. Gluckin, he submitted his personal credit card statement bills for personal vacations and trips and various household bills and included them in the COVID up. End quote. Just realized I don't have my glasses on. There now. Now I'm there.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Now you can read. You're like the sinking of the Titanic.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Oh, shit. This is blank.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

Two Aussie lesbian lovers touch down in 1990s London and become the toast of British high society. One of them starts touting an exclusive investment opportunity and soon the money is rolling in. Rich businessmen and England's horse loving elite fall under their seductive spell. They even meet Queen Elizabeth. But the duo are concealing a dark past and dastardly intentions. Evil.

[Georgia Hardstark]

They were bad. Bad people.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

As bad as evil.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yes, definitely.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

Before long, a small town detective gets wind of the duo's exploits and vows to stop them.

[Georgia Hardstark]

She was a thieving scumbag.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

Only problem is these two are exceedingly hard to catch. Decades later, one of them is finally ready to tell all.

[Georgia Hardstark]

I sold my soul to the devil.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

From USG Audio, Blanchard House and Exactly Right Media. This is Royal Swindle. New episodes drop every Thursday. Listen now on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Hey, it's Ryan Reynolds here from Mint Mobile. Now I was looking for fun ways to tell you that Mint's offer of unlimited Premium Wireless for $15 a month is back. So I thought it would be fun if we made $15 bills, but it turns out that's very illegal. So there goes my big idea for the commercial. Give it a [e-mail] switch upfront payment

[Karen Kilgariff]

of $45 for three months, $90 for

[Georgia Hardstark]

six months or $180 for a 12

[Karen Kilgariff]

month plan required $15 per month equivalent taxes and fees.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Extra initial plan term only greater than 50 gigabytes. Me slow when network is busy. See Terms. The Hulu original series Furious is coming to Hulu and Hulu on Disney plus on July 27.

[Karen Kilgariff]

From Liz Meriwether, the Emmy nominated executive producer of Dying for Sex and the Dropout comes. A gripping psychological thriller starring Emmy Rossum.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Furious follows Alice Black, a rookie FBI agent on the hunt for Catherine, a mysterious and calculating female serial killer.

[Karen Kilgariff]

It's Alice's first case on the job and she's already bitten off more than she can chew.

[Georgia Hardstark]

While Alice believes justice is achieved through law enforcement, Catherine has lost all faith in the legal system.

[Karen Kilgariff]

She's taken it upon herself to terrorize the rich and powerful men of New York. In her pursuit as Alice and Catherine's

[Georgia Hardstark]

twisted game of cat and mouse unfolds. The lines between good and evil and right and wrong begin to blur with

[Karen Kilgariff]

shocking crimes, tangled relationships, and secrets that change everything. Alice discovers there's a thin line between hunter and prey.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Watch the Hulu original series Furious on

[Karen Kilgariff]

July 27, streaming on Hulu and Hulu on Disney plus for bundle subscribers. Terms apply.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Goodbye. So it gets sent to all these people, but Frank gets a lucky break because one of the letters is returned to sender. But for some reason, whoever sent the letter used the district office as its return address. So he got ahold of a copy of it. Meaning, I wonder, it's probably someone in that school who sent it in the first place. Right. Like a teacher or someone else in the office.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Right. Cause they would need to maybe access that mail slot if there was mail back.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Right. Like, why would they put it back back there? Exactly. So it winds up on Frank's desk. He freaks out, launches into a preemptive strike. He calls a meeting with the representatives from every part of the school staff and the PTA to present the letter and say that the allegations are not true, but that he's going to call back the auditor to go through the finances and clear it all up. He's gonna look through every single little thing. At first, people go along with this and praise him for being so forthcoming. But at the end of the month, an editor for the school newspaper. So a student, the senior girl.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

Yes.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Name? Rebecca Rombaum, which, like, you use that name in good health. It's so cool. She gets a copy of the letter somehow and writes an article in the school paper about it. Yeah.

[Karen Kilgariff]

This is one of.

[Georgia Hardstark]

She's like. Yeah.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Sitting down. Cri. Cri.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Crick. Crick. Totally.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Revenge is mine.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah. I mean, and I looked her up and I'm like, she better be like a famous journalist now. And I don't know, she might work for a school district. I can't tell what she does. But she lays low.

[Karen Kilgariff]

She's a genius and just out there amongst the people.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah. It runs in the paper's March issue. In the article, she gets a quote from Frank explaining why he didn't come forward with the allegations against Pam when they first. She's fucking going for it.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Jesus. She's kind of on the record.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And she was wearing a wire when she asked those questions.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Right. He says, quote, I think the reputation of the school district was at stake. End quote. And that's why he didn't come forward. Rebecca later writes in the New York Times that the student response to the article was underwhelming, because, of course it is. They don't give a shit about the school paper. Did you ever read your school paper?

[Karen Kilgariff]

We didn't have one.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yes, you did.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And you just didn't know it was. No one was aware. But also just that kind of thing of, like, to have lived as the girl that always thought she was doing, like, justice and, like, fighting the good fight and then turning around and no one's ever behind you.

[Georgia Hardstark]

You're just like, mm, okay, that sounds right.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yeah.

[Georgia Hardstark]

She says, quote, during school that day, I watched for reactions to the story, but the students as a whole were not as receptive as I had. We don't have formal circulation numbers, but by the number of papers still lying around school at the end of the day, I would say that our April Fool's Day issue was much more widely read because the kids don't give a shit about a fucking.

[Karen Kilgariff]

They see embezzlement, and they're like, that's an adult problem. That's like, we don't balance the budget.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah, my day's going fine.

[Karen Kilgariff]

But I think if we had written the headline more of like, do you still want that pizza shaped like a square? Well, guess what? The embezzlement issue is. Is taking it away from you.

[Georgia Hardstark]

That's right. And this is no April Fools. There was interest, however, at the next Board of Education meeting because at least a few issues of that newspaper had made it home to parents. So the parents were interested in the embezzlement issue.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And it turns around, it's Walter Cronkite is reading this student newspaper.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah, he's the dad.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Here we go.

[Georgia Hardstark]

It's only after this meeting with the Board of Education and after Rebecca's article that Newsday, Long Island's local paper, picks up the story. And that's when everything starts to fall apart for Frank. Over the next few months, the D.A. the school's administration, and Newsday are all combing through the school's expenses and running every last receipt down. And very quickly, two things become apparent. Pam had stolen far more than $250,000. And there's just no denying that Frank had also stolen money and was involved. Investigators find multiple kinds of questionable expenses. There are real payments to vendors, but the amounts these vendors were billed and received is far less than had been documented. Meaning they're like, we've paid this vendor $500. And the vendor's like, we only asked for 200. We only got $200.

[Karen Kilgariff]

You know what I mean. Yep.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Boop. Pocket the rest.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Beep. Let's go to Red Lobster.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Exactly. There are line items that have never been questioned before but now look very suspicious once they start actually looking. The district had paid for two trips to London. Okay. And here's what we were talking about. Like, be chill and don't be flashy on the Concord. Just get first class.

[Karen Kilgariff]

First class is amazing.

[Georgia Hardstark]

It's amazing.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Plain old one trip and insanely expensive.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

Yeah.

[Georgia Hardstark]

One trip on the Concorde. It was 20 grand, and another was 30 grand, bro.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Cause she had to get there fast.

[Georgia Hardstark]

I think it's him.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Oh, that's what he did.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah. Good lord. Yeah. Like, lay it out, sir, please don't. You know?

[Karen Kilgariff]

Have you never been to Las Vegas?

[Georgia Hardstark]

Have you never lied? And the district had paid for multiple trips to Las Vegas. So funny. Good job. Some for actual conferences and some seemingly just for fun. And he'd, like, bring a bunch of the school board members who I don't think were aware of what was happening. He had used over $56,000 in school money to pay for treatments at a Manhattan weight loss clinic.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Oh, just don't do that. Not when the south beach diet's right there.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Exactly.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Come on.

[Georgia Hardstark]

In today's money. 56,000. A little more would have been more than. Do you want to.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Three hundred thousand.

[Georgia Hardstark]

A hundred thousand. Someday we're gonna get it again. In 10 years, we're both gonna do it again. While this is going on, Frank just keeps going out of town. While they're looking into it. He's just like, I'm out this week. I'm out this week.

[Karen Kilgariff]

I'm out this week. I sprained my ankle.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Exactly. I sprained my everything. He spends March and April going to Las Vegas, Puerto Rico, then California, Florida, and Vegas again. Every time a new weird charge is found, Frank isn't around to explain or discuss it.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yeah.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Then there are sketchy charges from companies that appear to not exist or be very, very sketchy. So in early June, a school administrator realizes that over the years, the school has paid close to $800,000 to a company called Word Power, which purports to make pamphlets.

[Karen Kilgariff]

So $800,000 on those real good pamphlets, though.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Nice stock.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Real shiny and slick.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah, yeah, those ones. In today's money, that would be 1.5 million. This is a lot of money for pamphlets.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Scamplets.

[Georgia Hardstark]

That's right.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Sorry. This latte is not helping me at all.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah, this coke that I'm. That I'm snorting. But the weirder thing is that the company is headquartered. This pamphlet company is headquartered from an apartment in Manhattan. Frank's address. The company's CEO is listed as a man named Steven Signorelli. And it becomes clear over the course of the investigation that he and Frank live together at the same time. And right around the same point in the investigations, investigators noticed that Frank had purchased a house in Las Vegas with another man. This one a good bit younger than him. This man. Investigators also noticed that Frank had sent multiple FedEx shipments on the District's account. Meaning, like he just went and printed up a FedEx, which we've all stolen a fucking stamp or two from work.

[Karen Kilgariff]

The FedEx account at work is the place where you can get a little. You can take some liberties because it's already going out. It's all business.

[Georgia Hardstark]

But now they know what address it was sent to. Yeah, if you hadn't done that, they wouldn't have been able to track the address.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And didn't they use the money to buy the house in Vegas?

[Georgia Hardstark]

I don't know about that.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Probably like it's all in the mix.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah, exactly. So he sent multiple FedEx shipments to this address in Las Vegas. It's never uncovered what was in these shipments. God, I wish I could see. Seems like the working hypothesis is that it might have been just cash.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Just a ton of posting cash.

[Georgia Hardstark]

And he's like in the movie. It's not true. But they show the younger man as an ex student of Frank's who's also an exotic dancer. I think that part was correct at some point, but it's not true. So he could have been like laundering cash. Las Vegas, there's no better place. Yes, Everyone just remember that.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And the idea that you just like fill up a box with some bands. Totally go for it.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Totally. So now it's apparent that Frank has been in romantic relationships with men. That's the thing that he had been keeping from everyone. And Rosslyn's a pretty liberal town, so people are mostly a little sad that Frank felt that he had to hide his sexuality. But at the same time, it's 2004 and a high ranking, openly gay school administrator is not common. And I'm sure some parents would have clutched their pearls.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Oh, yeah.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Frank will later say that he and Steven, his partner, who lives at his Manhattan house, had an open relationship. Steven knew about the other man in Las Vegas. Like he wasn't being deceitful in that sense.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Do you believe that?

[Georgia Hardstark]

I do, yeah. Why not? I don't know. I don't hate him.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

Right, right.

[Georgia Hardstark]

He, he made some really stupid decisions and trapped himself and we've all made stupid decisions and luckily we've gotten away with a lot of them.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yeah, I mean, it would be a much more infuriating story if he was stealing from kids from low income areas.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Right.

[Karen Kilgariff]

But it's just like you're basically skimming the cream off of the cream of the crop.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Well, you know what, and they kind of hint at this in the show where, you know, like all the parents of the students that he's helping to succeed in their lives and get into good college and have good careers and get paid well, are making so much fucking money. They have so much money. Meanwhile he's being paid 250 a year and eventually that doesn't seem like it's fair to him, right? So he just starts skimming, starts taking a little words like they won't even miss it because they're so fucking wealthy. Like, I get how that mindset could happen to someone.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yeah. Well, it's easy to rationalize things like that because all you have to do is say, I'm being ripped off. And then you can do kind of anything you want.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Right. It's a. How dare you. That rationalizes it.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And then suddenly, how dare you. Builds you a bridge, too. Free money in Las Vegas.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Amen. Amen. So when all these revelations finally come out in early June of 2004, Frank resigns. When all is said and done, it appears that between Frank and Pam, there's like six people total who end up kind of being implicated in this. Including Frank and Pam. Around $11.2 million has been stolen from the school district.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Fucking a. Today's money, 11.2. I'm gonna go ahead and stick that right into the area of 185,000.

[Georgia Hardstark]

20 million.

[Karen Kilgariff]

What?

[Georgia Hardstark]

You just went the wrong way. You just went down.

[Karen Kilgariff]

I have to say, as I was talking, I started to panic and I forgot what the base number was.

[Georgia Hardstark]

20 million. Yeah, I've done that before.

[Karen Kilgariff]

There's so much pressure.

[Georgia Hardstark]

I know, I hate it. I hate it. But we gotta give them what they love.

[Karen Kilgariff]

We got to. This is what people come here for.

[Georgia Hardstark]

That's right. So almost 20 million. They just fucking went for it.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And my sister has to buy crayons every year herself.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Right, right, Exactly.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

Yeah.

[Georgia Hardstark]

This makes it the largest embezzlement from a school district in American history. So if you're gonna go big, kids go to Vegas. In all, six people, including a son and a niece of Pam Gluckin and the domestic partner of Frank Tassone plead guilty in connection with the thefts from the Roslyn schools. They're actually the maximum they could have received was 15 to 20 years for that.

[Karen Kilgariff]

God.

[Georgia Hardstark]

But in 2006, Frank, who pleads guilty to stealing about 2.2 million, is sentenced to four to 12 years in prison. He's released for good behavior in 2010 due to a loophole in the New York state pension law. He still collects $173,495.04 a year.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Holy shit.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Uh huh.

[Karen Kilgariff]

So he basically is still fully employed

[Georgia Hardstark]

with a great job and hopefully still his rent control department.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Oh, dude.

[Georgia Hardstark]

And he'll get that money for the rest of his life. Loopholes. He does repay the district the entire 2.2 million.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Oh, wow.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah. Which, you know, it's more than that though. There's no way they got it that close, right?

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

Yeah, yeah.

[Georgia Hardstark]

All the money that like they couldn't track down, I'm sure it's millions and millions more. Pam Glucken admits to stealing 4.3 million and is sentenced to three to nine years in prison. She ends up serving five. As of 2011, she had repaid about half the money she had stolen. I can't track her down at all. I saw one article that said she passed away in 2017, another that she worked in Manhattan somewhere. If she's still alive, she's probably paid back more since 2011, but I can't track her down. In the years since, all over Long island, school districts have had a much harder time getting residents to pass their bus. Not surprisingly, while towns used to faithfully vote yes on school budgets year after year, voters have been less likely to do so in the aftermath of the scandal. After all, the school district now seems to do just fine, using significantly less than its allotted funds. So for someone not skimming off the top, they don't need as much money.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yeah.

[Georgia Hardstark]

And they're calling it the Rosalyn Effect.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Well, and also, can't we just take that and put it back down into where it is truly and desperately needed?

[Georgia Hardstark]

Right. You'd to have hope.

[Karen Kilgariff]

One would hope.

[Georgia Hardstark]

The author of the anonymous letter that led to Frank's undoing has never been identified. And that is the story of the Roslyn School embezzlement scandal.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Wow. Well done.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Thank you.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yeah, I've never heard of that. I never saw that.

[Georgia Hardstark]

That education.

[Karen Kilgariff]

I just really the idea of just like when you get away with something a little bit and then you keep going to the point where you're handing out cards and doing all those things,

[Georgia Hardstark]

like multiple members of her family have like annex or whatever cards.

[Karen Kilgariff]

It's just you're living in a fantasy world and then it ends.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Totally. If you want to watch Hugh Jackman make out with a really cute twink, definitely watch that education.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

Two Aussie lesbian lovers touch down in 1990s London and become the toast of British high society. One of them starts touting an exclusive, exclusive investment opportunity. And soon the money is rolling in. Rich businessmen and England's horse loving elite fall under their seductive spell. They even meet Queen Elizabeth. But the duo are concealing a dark past and dastardly intentions. Evil.

[Georgia Hardstark]

They were bad.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

Bad people. People as bad as evil?

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yes, definitely.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

Before long, a small town detective gets wind of the duo's exploits and vows to stop them.

[Georgia Hardstark]

She was a thieving scumbag.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

Only problem is, these two are exceedingly hard to catch. Decades later, one of them is finally ready. Ready to tell all I sold my

[Georgia Hardstark]

soul to the devil.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

From USG Audio, Blanchard House and Exactly Right Media. This is Royal Swindle. New episodes drop every Thursday. Listen now on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Georgia Hardstark]

The Hulu Original series Furious is coming to Hulu and Hulu on Disney plus on July 27.

[Karen Kilgariff]

From Liz Meriwether, the Emmy nominated executive producer of Dying for Sex and the Dropout, comes a gripping psychological thriller starring Emmy Rossum.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Furious follows Alice Black, a rookie FBI agent, on the hunt for Catherine, a mysterious and calculating female serial killer.

[Karen Kilgariff]

It's Alice's first case on the job and she's already bitten off more than she can chew.

[Georgia Hardstark]

While Alice believes justice is achieved through law enforcement, Catherine has lost all faith in the legal system.

[Karen Kilgariff]

She's taken it upon herself to terrorize the rich and powerful men of New York in her pursuit of vengeance.

[Georgia Hardstark]

As Alice and Catherine's twisted game of cat and mouse unfolds, the lines between good and evil and right and wrong begin to blur.

[Karen Kilgariff]

With shocking crimes, tangled relationships and secrets that change everything, Alice discovers there's a thin line between hunter and prey.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Watch the Hulu original series Furious on

[Karen Kilgariff]

July 27, streaming on Hulu and Hulu on Disney for bundle subscribers. Terms apply.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Goodbye.

[Karen Kilgariff]

There's always a point in the day when your feet decide they've had enough.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Especially if you've been running errands, traveling, or my favorite, just standing around.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And where Reef comes in.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Reef has been known for comfort since the 1980s. While many people think of their sandals first, they now make comfortable everyday shoes as well.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Like women's Neptune, a lightweight everyday slip on shoe with a crushback heel. So you can wear it traditionally or step on the heel and wear it like a slide.

[Georgia Hardstark]

It's lightweight and breathable, which makes a noticeable difference if you're on your feet for long stretches.

[Karen Kilgariff]

You know, we got some of these shoes.

[Georgia Hardstark]

I know, they're so cute.

[Karen Kilgariff]

They're super cute. But they are really lightweight. You don't think about that sometimes when I'm wearing like this heavy running shoes. They weigh your feet down and these reef ones are like super kicky and comfortable.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Check out the Neptune on reef.com that's R E E F and redeem 15% off your first purchase.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Goodbye. Goodbye. Okay, so mine begins in 1902. Oh, you know when that was?

[Georgia Hardstark]

1902.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Turn of the century. Oh, and in New York City.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

Ooh.

[Karen Kilgariff]

So it's the gilded age. There's a well dressed woman in her 40s sitting in the lobby of a luxury hotel in Manhattan. She scans the ritzy crowd until she sees the man she's looking. He's a lawyer and also a dear friend of her husband's from back home in Cleveland, Ohio. His name is James Dillon. The woman pretends she doesn't see James sitting there alone. But as she walks past him, she brushes up against his arm. He looks up. He's pleasantly surprised by seeing a familiar face. Oh, it's the lady from back home. My friend's wife. He asks her what she's doing in New York. She explains that she's here for a private family matter and she cannot speak anymore on the topic. Please do this.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yes.

[Karen Kilgariff]

You may not ask me any more questions, but can I have a ride in your carriage to my father's house?

[Georgia Hardstark]

Okay.

[Karen Kilgariff]

So he was like, of course. They set off in his carriage and they arrive at a towering fifth Avenue mansion. James watches as she hops out of the carriage, knocks on the mansion's front door and goes inside. He's shocked, of course. The woman's husband has never let on that his wife comes from Somalia. So he waits there for her, which made me laugh when I realized that was what was happening. So she goes in, does her business. When she comes back out about a half an hour later, she's carrying a large envelope under her arm. She gets back into the carriage. She reminds James this is a private family matter and she cannot tell him anything that's going on.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Got it, toots.

[Karen Kilgariff]

I can't show you what's in this envelope.

[Georgia Hardstark]

I didn't ask.

[Karen Kilgariff]

But then she lets it slip okay. She suddenly says, listen, the reason I'm here on this family business is because I am the illegitimate daughter of steel magnate Andrew Carnegie.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Oh, shit.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And I've just gone into his house and collected this envelope, which is all the paperwork proving that he has given me a small fortune. Take a little peeky poo at this.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Calm down.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And she shows him.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Okay.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And of course, James is shocked, but he totally buys it. And he's not the only one who does. The story this woman will tell about this inheritance and who she is is so convincing that she fools almost everyone around her. And it enables her to live like an heiress for years and years. She's the embodiment of the very gilded age value, that appearances are everything. She's one of the America's most prolific con artists, known best by her alias, Cassie Chadwick. This is the story of Elizabeth Bigley, the Queen of Ohio.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Hell, yeah.

[Karen Kilgariff]

The sources used for today's story are the book the Imposter Heiress by Annie reed and a 2012 Smithsonian Magazine article by Abbott Kaler entitled, the High Priestess of Fraudulent Finance. And the rest are in our show notes. So this all begins in 1857 in Ontario, Canada, with the birth of a little girl named Elizabeth Bigley. She comes from a hardworking, salt of the earth household in a very small town in Ontario. Her father works for the railroad, her mother's a homemaker for the family's eight children. And according to writer Annie Reed, quote, the Bigleys passed without much comment in their quiet corner of Ontario until Elizabeth came along.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Oh, shit. She's fucking. What's this? She's doing this.

[Karen Kilgariff]

She's got the lasso over her head. Even as a little girl, Elizabeth becomes known for getting fixated on things, particularly the very pretty dresses and jewelry that she sees the ladies in town wear. And over time, those fixations become obsessions. Elizabeth will do anything she can to get what she wants. When she's 21 years old, she goes into a local barbershop. She asks to have all of her hair cut off, and then to have a fake mustache made of that hair. What? Huh. So then journalist Annie Reed writes, quote, elizabeth walked out of the shop a mustachioed young man. It had become obvious to her that the way to get what she wanted was money. And the best way to get money was to be a man. End quote. Right? So that same day, Elizabeth, with her short hair and her mustache, takes a watch she'd recently pilfered off an unsuspecting man down to the local pawn shop where she attempts to pawn it under an invented male name, but her disguise isn't convincing enough.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Fake mustaches. It's never going to look legit.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Just all, like, weird and sitting there. And also, it's like her first day trying to do this, essentially. The clerk immediately calls the police. They take her into custody. Elizabeth is eventually, her father has to go down and get her from the police station. And they take a long walk of shame home together with her still wearing her little mustache and dressed like a man. Legally, it seems she only gets a slap on the wrist for this, though.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Do you have pictures of.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yes. So here's Elizabeth in the classic turn of the century portrait sense.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Okay. Cute.

[Karen Kilgariff]

That's the name she later is known by, which is Cassie L. Chadwick. You know, when someone has a middle initial like that that they use irregularly, that.

[Georgia Hardstark]

What about them?

[Karen Kilgariff]

They're a fraudster.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Okay.

[Karen Kilgariff]

For sure. They're trying to pass a bad check on to you.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Okay.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Heads up.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Good to know.

[Karen Kilgariff]

So a few months after all of this happens, Elizabeth walks into a general store and grabs a bunch of stuff. She grabs combs and ribbons and fabrics. Anything she can get her hands on. She takes it all up to the clerk. The clerk tells her it's gonna be about $250. And Elizabeth goes through her purse and hands the man a card identifying her as, quote, an heiress to $18,000.

[Georgia Hardstark]

You can just make a card that says that.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Let's go ahead and read this.

[Georgia Hardstark]

I'm gonna want one of those, right? Please. It's like sending your kid to the market with cigarettes. My mom says I can have this. My mom says I'm worth $18,000.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Hey, do you mind selling my son a pack of Marlboro Lights? So basically, her quoting that she is an heiress to $18,000 in today's money would mean how much money is she gonna get?

[Georgia Hardstark]

236.

[Karen Kilgariff]

It's a little bit higher.

[Georgia Hardstark]

331.

[Karen Kilgariff]

It's $600,000.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Holy shit.

[Karen Kilgariff]

In today's money.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Wow.

[Karen Kilgariff]

The assumption here, Maren, is pointing this out that the $250 is already scaled to today's money. Because if she went and did $250 in turn of the century money, that would be.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Right.

[Karen Kilgariff]

She would have bought $8,000 worth of stuff.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Right. Which is, like, hard to do back

[Karen Kilgariff]

then, so don't think it's that.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Okay.

[Karen Kilgariff]

But anyway, after she explains, her inheritance is gummed up in the legal system at the moment, and she. She doesn't have access to it right now, but she's going to. She would like to pay with a promissory note. And that's basically a formal iou. She hands a promissory note over that appears to be signed by a wealthy farmer from the area. It's unclear how much this is wor. But it's more than the $250 bill that she's just rung up.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Okay.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And of course, as you may have suspected, this promissory note is fake. Elizabeth created the card out of high end card stock, opted for a tasteful typeface, and forged the signature of that farmer that is on it.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Okay.

[Karen Kilgariff]

There is no $18,000 inheritance. I'm sorry to tell you my heart. I know. I hate to be the one. That basically is the quote that's meant to ease the clerk's mind, convince him she's good for the money. This is an era where it would not be unusual to accept a promissory note as payment and give the difference back to the customer. Kind of like cashing someone's check.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Right.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And that's the scam, and that's what this clerk does. And by the time he actually tries to cash the promissory note, either they're not sure, either down at the bank or directly with the farmer that his name is on it, Elizabeth is long gone. And all her ribbons and combs are gone too.

[Georgia Hardstark]

It's giving me a paper moon.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yes, exactly.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Paper moon.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Just hold yourself over until you get out of town.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah. Yeah, I love that.

[Karen Kilgariff]

I gotta see that movie again.

[Georgia Hardstark]

It's one of my favorite movies of all time.

[Karen Kilgariff]

So she gets away with it and of course then is emboldened to try it again in nearby towns. But just one year later, in 1879, she's 22 years old, she gets caught, she gets arrested, and when this case goes to trial, the jury seems very sympathetic. So this is that kind of thing where it's just like she looked right, she sounded right. She was a charmer, she. She was probably a sociopath.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah.

[Karen Kilgariff]

She was good at doing this and conning. Deceitful. Yeah.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Good for. No.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Well, it's just that she had the charm, which is something I like, where it's just like she clearly told people stories either they wanted to hear or she was good at doing it right. And there is a kind of magnetism to those people.

[Georgia Hardstark]

And sometimes the stories that, like, made the other person feel good about themselves in a way that made them not question what's going on.

[Karen Kilgariff]

I can't tell anyone. I'm going to tell you, like all that kind of stuff. Yeah. So the jury's on her side. They see her as troubled, basically, but not a hardened criminal. So in the end, she's found not guilty by reason of insanity and she's released back to her parents.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Whoa. They're like, crazy bitch, get the fuck out of here.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Just go home.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Hey, you crazy bitch.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Right? This was fun. You crazy bitch. It's not your birthday for a month. Stop it. So now it's the early 1880s. Elizabeth is in her mid-20s and she decides she's getting out of Canada for Cleveland, Ohio.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Sure. You know, glamorous Cleveland, Ohio.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Next step up out of Ontario, straight to Cleveland. Her older sister Alice lives in Cleveland with her wealthy businessman husband. And his name is Standish, Milton York.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Wow.

[Karen Kilgariff]

So she gets to move right into that house. They live in an affluent part of town. The house is gorgeously decorated. There's expensive furniture and decor everywhere. Elizabeth basically gets set up for a new life and she is supposed to be there working toward an honest living and starting over. But that's not our girl. That's not what Elizabeth does. She starts using fake names to take out loans on her sister's belongings.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Girl, she can't shitty.

[Karen Kilgariff]

She can't stop.

[Georgia Hardstark]

She can't help herself. She's a swindler.

[Karen Kilgariff]

True swindler.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah. Swindler's list.

[Karen Kilgariff]

So no, maybe when lenders show up at the apartment demanding the payment, Elizabeth leaves. Girl, Elizabeth leaves town and she leaves her sister high and dry.

[Georgia Hardstark]

That's shitty.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Alison Standish have to pick up the pieces after she basically sells their house out from under them.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Oh, my God. Don't burn the bridges that you're already on that are closest to you, that are stable. Burn other bridges, not that one.

[Karen Kilgariff]

These types of people love the close burns because that's where all like they. That's where all the excitement is. Are they going to find out that we're sitting at a dining room table? I already sold.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Oh, my God.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Okay. So she's now on the streets running away, in need of cash. So she actually turns to a profession that has long been a haven for con artists. Not everybody of her, but some. And that is the art of fortune telling.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Ooh.

[Karen Kilgariff]

She bills herself as a clairvoyant named Madame Ler de Vere. And she begins to steadily attract a middle class clientele in her day to day life. She calls herself Lydia Bigley. She tells people she's an Irish heiress, which that's a contradiction in terms right there. Unless it's Guinness. There's no Fucking way. So this is the identity she's using in 1882 when she visits a local doctor named Wallace Sprin, who, like most people, finds her incredibly charming. We don't know how old he is. What we do know is he was a Civil War veteran, which would put him, Maren says, her hunches. He's in his early 40s, while Elizabeth is still in her mid-20s. Dr. Springsteen, undeterred by the fact that she's much younger and a patient of his, begins to pursue Elizabeth, who's now going by Lydia the fortune teller. The two have a whirlwind romance because of course, every Earth 20 year old loves an old doctor to just hang

[Georgia Hardstark]

out with while he sweep them off their feet. But don't hurt your back.

[Karen Kilgariff]

No, no.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Easy, easy.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Watch out for the gout. She manages to conceal her dark past until the ink is dry on their marriage certificate. But then she makes one very sloppy move. And that is agreeing to have a wedding announcement. They always want the credit. Okay, so. And it's complete with a photograph. Oh, and it's published in the Cleveland Plain Dealer.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Okay.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And now all the lenders that know Elizabet that she scammed in the past and evaded, including her furious sister Alice. Yeah, they all come out of the woodwork right to the Springsteens door, demanding the doctor pay off his wife's debts.

[Georgia Hardstark]

So many rookie mistakes, starting with not leaving Cleveland.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yeah, you can't have all of it. You can't be there as the proud young couple and get away with all the scams. No.

[Georgia Hardstark]

It's so weird that she would do that.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yeah. So of course, finding out about his wife's debts stuns Dr. Springsteen. He immediately files for divorce. Relationship is over. 12 days after the wedding.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Oh, he went for it. Yeah.

[Karen Kilgariff]

He has to pay her debts. As her husband, he is responsible.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Shut up.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yes, and to the point where he actually writes a notice for a Cleveland area newspaper saying, quote, I hereby forbid any person from trusting or harboring my wife, as I will pay no bills of her contracting after this date.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Wow.

[Karen Kilgariff]

So it's so bad he has to go to the press and be like, no more.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah, holy shit.

[Karen Kilgariff]

We don't have the amount. But it's basically that period of time she can really churn it up when she wants to. So basically, him publishing this letter cancels Elizabeth's ability to swindle people in the Cleveland area. So she picks up and heads over to Erie, Pennsylvania, a place you love. She moves into a boarding house under the name Maisie Bagley.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Change the last name, girl. I know you're attached to it, but,

[Karen Kilgariff]

like, Bigly is the real name.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah.

[Karen Kilgariff]

So she's just doing little things. Little things here and there.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Okay.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Still. And soon after she arrives as Maisie, she starts hanging out in common spaces in this place where she got her apartment or her, you know, her room, and starts coughing and hacking uncontrollably, sometimes so violently that she coughs up blood. What's happening is that she tells the borders she's very sick. She's in need of immediate medical care and needs to go back. Back home to Cleveland. Everyone's so concerned with her that they pull their money. And these are just people renting rooms and they buy her the ticket to get back to Cleveland so she can get that.

[Georgia Hardstark]

It's a vintage Kickstarter.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Exactly.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Or what are they called?

[Karen Kilgariff]

It's a vintage Kickstarter from a person who is not coughing up blood. What she's doing is going to her room and picking at her gums.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Shut up.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Until when she coughs, blood comes out. Because she basically, like, picks out her gums.

[Georgia Hardstark]

I mean, it's smart. That is convincing. Like, how can she be lying? There's blood.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yes. And also, get her the fuck out of here. Cause she has consumption.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Totally. She's gonna make us all sick.

[Karen Kilgariff]

So they do that and then she's like, on the train, thanks so, so much. I'll pay you back when I get home.

[Georgia Hardstark]

She's waving her bloody handkerchief at them. Goodbye. Goodbye. Goodbye.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Two weeks later, a letter comes to the boarding house with the shocking and sudden news that Maisie is dead. So say goodbye to that 25 cents that broke you. For the next few years, Elizabeth lays low and sticks around, resuming work as a fortune teller now under the name Madame Larose. She's always changing it. She marries one of her regular clients. Great idea. They quickly divorce. In the late 1880s, she marries for a third time to another client.

[Georgia Hardstark]

What does she go? I see you marrying a fortune teller who's sitting in front of you.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And then she just starts doing all the shoulder work.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Her third husband, that's also a client, dies not long after they get married and she inherits part of his estate. She takes that money and she does what you or I would do. She moves to Toledo, adopting the excellent fake name Florida Blythe. And Florida continues her fortune telling work. In Toledo, she forges a particularly important relationship with a client named Joseph Lamb. And later, a reporter named Abbott Kaler will write, quote, joseph seemed willing to do any favor that she asked. He, along with numerous other victims, would later claim that she had hypnotic powers, a popular concept at the turn of the 20th century. Century, people believed that hypnotism was an acceptable explanation for adultery. Runaway teenagers, and the increasingly common occurrence of young shop girls fleeing with strange men they met on trains. End quote.

[Georgia Hardstark]

I wish it were true. That'd be fun.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Just being able to hypnotize people. Come on this train with me. Among the favors that Elizabeth asks of Joseph are that he cash some of her world famous promissory notes down at the bank. And again, again, these look totally legit. They have signatures from Cleveland businessmen. They're printed on the nice card stock. They're totally fake. And Joseph is able to cash them anyway. So Elizabeth ends up with this round of fake promissory notes making around 40 grand.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Holy shit.

[Karen Kilgariff]

In today's money, I'm gonna go 826. $1.5 million.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Damn.

[Karen Kilgariff]

The bank quickly catches on that the notes are fake. The two are caught, but the authorities know it's Elizabethan that's behind all of this. She's convicted on forgery charges and sentenced to nine and a half years in prison. But even behind bars, Elizabeth continues to claim she's a clairvoyant. When she does a reading for the warden, she tells him that he's A, going to lose thousands of dollars in a bad business deal and B, he's going to die of cancer. I'm sorry I'm laughing, but. I'm so sorry I'm laughing, but it's actually so daring of her to be like, and you're going to die of cancer.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Totally.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Both of those things happen.

[Georgia Hardstark]

No, because of her, though. Yeah.

[Karen Kilgariff]

She wills them to happen. No, no, no. She just kind. Like there's people who think she actually was maybe a little clairvoyant and that's why she went into that business. Maybe there's some truth to that. Either way, that gives her a little more credence. Yeah, and she's also spending her time writing letters, lobbying for her parole and citing her good behavior while she's been incarcerated. Somehow her powers of persuasion secure her release. In 1893, only a few years into her prison term.

[Georgia Hardstark]

She hypnotizes the parole board somehow.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yeah. She hypnotizes the then governor, William McKinley, who will go on to serve as our 25th president.

[Georgia Hardstark]

I knew that.

[Karen Kilgariff]

I mean, of course, now she's 36 years old, she's out of prison, she's heading back to Cleveland.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And she adopts the new name Cassie Hoover. She quickly finds a fourth husband. He's also a doctor. He's much older than the last one. He's recently widowed, he's very rich, and his name is Leroy Chadwick. Let's take a look. We have a picture of Dr. Leroy Chadwick. Okay, look at him. He's a little sleepy.

[Georgia Hardstark]

He's a little sleepy.

[Karen Kilgariff]

He's so tired of his wife lying all the time.

[Georgia Hardstark]

He's got her mustache on.

[Karen Kilgariff]

That'd be amazing if she made herself a big old bushy mustache.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah, okay.

[Karen Kilgariff]

That's what he loves her for. So his friends are stunned when he shows up with a new wife because she seems to have appeared out of midair or thin air. She came in a balloon, started up high.

[Georgia Hardstark]

What? That's why they're balloon wise. She's clairvoyant. That's crazy.

[Karen Kilgariff]

That's crazy. He doesn't want to talk to his friends about how he met. California. Sure.

[Georgia Hardstark]

That's always a good sign.

[Karen Kilgariff]

That's always great when you're like, how'd you guys meet?

[Georgia Hardstark]

Don't wanna discuss.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Don't look in my envelope. Can you give me a ride to my dad's house? He just has the explanation, the simple explanation, that she helped comfort the symptoms of his rheumatism by giving him therapeutic back massages. No big deal. No big deal.

[Georgia Hardstark]

That's how Vincent I met.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Just constant. Um, naturally, rumors spread. They met in a brothel and that she was the madam. Oh, good for her, right? Cassie, AKA Elizabeth, does not give a shit because she has just married into serious wealth. Her neighbors now include a Rockefeller, a US Senator, and other rich elites.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Wow.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And she now gets to spend her husband's money with abandon. So while living as Cassie, Elizabeth buys piles of clothes and jewels. She actually buys a $9,000 pipework.

[Georgia Hardstark]

In today's. Holy shit.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Today's money, it would be 450,000. Close. $330,000. But all of this spending comes to a breaking point. Leroy lets his wife know he will be reining in her spending.

[Georgia Hardstark]

That's again, like, don't go fucking crazy. To a point where people are like, suspish.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yeah, if it's the turn of the century. How about you get a pipe organ that's worth like a hundred dollars?

[Georgia Hardstark]

Can you even play the pipe organ?

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yeah. What's your pipe organ obsession?

[Georgia Hardstark]

It is a pipe organ.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Turn it off. It's too loud. Loud. It's like, dun, dun, dun. She has Dracula ambitions. Okay, so basically, this is where the story started. It's 1902. Cassie's 40 something. She doesn't like that her spending has now been limited. She's gonna take the matters into her own hands, as she likes to do. Okay, so she has just left the Carnegie mansion with her big envelope under her arm and getting back into her husband's friend's career, telling him she can't tell him anything, then telling him literally everything. And when she shows him what's in that envelope, James sees. And as a lawyer, he witnesses seeing two promissory notes. One is for a quarter of a million dollars, which today would be worth how many million?

[Georgia Hardstark]

22 million.

[Karen Kilgariff]

9.7 million. But still, basically, I'm worth $10 million here. The other is for half a million dollars, which is 19 million in today's money. And they're both signed by Andrew Carnegie. And then she also shows him more paperwork purportedly showing proof of the stocks and bonds she's been gifted by her rich father. Her stocks and bonds are valued around $5 million, which would be $194 million today.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Holy shit. She's really going for it.

[Karen Kilgariff]

She really is. I'm sorry to tell you. It's all fake.

[Georgia Hardstark]

What?

[Karen Kilgariff]

She forged all of it. When she knocked on the front door.

[Georgia Hardstark]

How'd she get in?

[Karen Kilgariff]

She basically said, I'm a very rich lady and I would like to hire my own lady's maid. Can I talk to the head of your household? To talk about how I could find help from my rich household?

[Georgia Hardstark]

Smart.

[Karen Kilgariff]

They're like, come on in, ma'. Am. She stays in for as long as she can. She talks to the head of their housekeeping for as long as she possibly can to make it seem realistic.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Oh, shit.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And then comes back outside. I would love to there just be like.

[Georgia Hardstark]

And then she went, shut the fuck. I got some privies to empty.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yeah, I gotta just scrub down. Surface. Elizabeth is betting on the fact that James will not be able to keep this juicy secret under wraps, of course. Which is just such a brilliant. This is what I do love about scams. You're betting on the behavior that everybody exhibits.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Totally.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Because who among us doesn't immediately? When someone is like, please, I have to tell you something. Please don't tell anyone.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Or I'm just like, I won't. Except for my sister and four other people.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Exactly.

[Karen Kilgariff]

So she's right. As soon as James gets back to Ohio, he blabs to everyone in their social circle that Cassie's real father is Andrew Carnegie. That she's the illegitimate child. She's actually loaded. The news makes its way all throughout Cleveland's most elite circles.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Remember, she's like, remember when y' all hated me? Cause I was up in the air. And now you fucking don't even remember

[Karen Kilgariff]

the balloon jealousy you felt toward me. Yeah.

[Georgia Hardstark]

And look at me now.

[Karen Kilgariff]

But here's the thing. All that gossip does not reach her husband. He was traveling throughout Europe. He got sick. He's been laid up. He's just been stuck over there.

[Georgia Hardstark]

It's probably rude to talk about something like that, too, to someone. You know what I mean? Like, you're not supposed to talk about money. The parentage is, like, shameful in those days, right?

[Karen Kilgariff]

Supposed to be shameful.

[Georgia Hardstark]

So you don't bring that up casually.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Not to the husband.

[Georgia Hardstark]

No.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Because that's basically you're talking about that you're judging her.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Right.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And that essentially the point of all of it is, wow, look how rich she is.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Totally.

[Karen Kilgariff]

So you're not supposed to be saying that stuff. So it's the perfect setup.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah.

[Karen Kilgariff]

The rumor mill is a buzz. Elizabeth, of course, plays coy. The story is believable enough that she is able to secure massive loans from a handful of. Of banks just based on who they think her father is.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Shut up.

[Karen Kilgariff]

The loans are never less than $10,000, which is almost $400,000 in today's money. And the largest is reportedly $800,000. $31 million today.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Oh, my God.

[Karen Kilgariff]

She went for it.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah.

[Karen Kilgariff]

That's all remarkable, considering at the time, most women could not get a bank loan by themselves at all.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Right.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And she's doing it all on these cards. She keeps passing everybody with men's signatures on.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Wow.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Much like the little mustachio that she got herself. She's like, how do I use the men to make that money?

[Georgia Hardstark]

Wow.

[Karen Kilgariff]

So she's getting away with what essentially is a pre. Ponzi. Ponzi scheme, because she pays off the last loan after she secures the next one, and of course, lives insanely, extravagantly, which then convinces the people in Cleveland she is who she says she is. Her husband Leroy, does not catch. He's old and rich and, I guess, sick. And so Elizabeth essentially buys $98,000 worth of jewels in one go.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Holy shit.

[Karen Kilgariff]

3.6 million today. So she just goes, hell of shopping.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Oh, my God.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Pearls that are valued at $40,000, which would be 1.4 million today. And enough clothes to fill dozens of closets. I want to look at it for Christmas 1903. She gives all her friends pianos.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Honey.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yep. Everybody gets a piano.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Everybody gets a piano.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And the Pianos are worth thousands of dollars.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah, that's what I'm doing this year for.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And required lessons right after school.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Everybody. Exactly right. Gets a piano this year.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And we want to hear hot cross buns by Valentine's Day.

[Georgia Hardstark]

You better fucking learn to play or we're taking it back.

[Karen Kilgariff]

So by 1905, everything is spiraling, spiraling out of control. When we get to free pianos and pipe organ area, it's just like there's no one's. There's no breaks. Elizabeth's spending is too exorbitant. She's no longer repaying any debts. That ruins the Ponzi scheme.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Her lenders are drowning. Leroy finally puts two and two together. He files for divorce. Elizabeth, who is now 50 years old, flees to New York, knowing she's in too deep. When she's tracked down by police, they reportedly find a money belt around her waist holding around $100,000, which would be $3.8 million.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Where is she staying? Like what hotel?

[Karen Kilgariff]

Like the Plaza or whatever. What would be there if.

[Georgia Hardstark]

I know.

[Karen Kilgariff]

I mean, right?

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah. It's not the fucking Holiday Inn. I guarantee. In Chinatown.

[Karen Kilgariff]

I guarantee you that is Hyatt on the west side. She is indicted on forgery and conspiracy charges for defrauding a national bank. That would be the Citizens national bank in Oberlin, Ohio, which declares bankruptcy as a direct result of this scheme.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Wow.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And because Oberlin is a college town, it financially devastates countless students who use that bank.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Okay, that's fucked up.

[Karen Kilgariff]

It's super fucked up. Their trial is a huge sensation. Of. Of course, it's covered globally in newspapers. Andrew Carnegie himself attends the trial.

[Georgia Hardstark]

He's like, yep, that's my daughter. Oops, dad.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And he eventually gets a chance to look the promissory notes that have his, quote, signature on them. And he notices typos throughout the documents. And he says, quote, if anybody had seen this paper and they really believed that I had drawn it up and signed it, I could hardly have been. Been flattered.

[Georgia Hardstark]

And ouch.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yeah. So you did some shit work. And everyone believed that I was going along with that, right? Carnegie winds up making donations to some of Elizabeth's victims, including fully reimbursing the Oberland students who lost all their money at that bank.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Wow.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And just for their trouble, he endows enough money to Oberlin College for the school to build a new library.

[Georgia Hardstark]

What a match.

[Karen Kilgariff]

In the end, Elizabeth Bigley is found guilty and sentenced to 10 years of. And immediately her health begins to decline, which is kind of like when the magic finally goes away. It's like the churn and the excitement and everything. And then once it's over, it's over. She basically ends up dying a year later after what's described in old reports as a, quote, total nervous collapse, but was more likely a heart attack. She's 51 years old at the time.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Wow.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Which kind of upset me when I heard that historians aren't exactly sure how much money Elizabeth Bigley defrauded from her victims and never repaid. But as Cassie Chadwick alone, it's estimated to be around $630,000, which is more than $23 million in today's money.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Shit. I mean, go big, right?

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yeah, she really did.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Or go back to Toledo or whatever.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yeah. Ontario.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Ontario.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Historians say that it's likely an even higher amount because many of her male victims probably would not want to admit that they had been scammed so intensely by a fortune teller. Or just a cute young 25 year

[Georgia Hardstark]

old, or a madam.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Just a woman at all. Today, Elizabeth remains one of the most prolific con artists in all of American history. Writer Quincy Balas reports for Ohio History Connection that, quote, female fraudsters like Anna Sorokin and Elizabeth Holmes currently dominate the news. But neither perfected the art of the grift to the extent that Cassie did. She truly earned the title of the world's greatest woman. So end quote. And that's the story of Elizabeth Bigley, the scamming queen of Ohio.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Amazing. Wow. What was she like in Per. Who would you cast as her?

[Karen Kilgariff]

Well, for something that intense, I would do like a Holly Hunter type of person. Oh, yeah. Where you suddenly are like, wait, why am I. I can't.

[Georgia Hardstark]

I'm transfixed and unassuming too.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yes, but like the intense pull Holly Hunter in Raising Arizona.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yes.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Right.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yes.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Where you're suddenly doing what she needs you to do because she needs that baby high and you want to help her.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Yeah.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Yeah.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Hi.

[Karen Kilgariff]

I gotta have baby.

[Georgia Hardstark]

I love him so much. Great job.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Thank you. I mean, hey, that's our tribute to Royal Swindle. Please listen to our newest podcast.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Listen. Subscribe. Like, leave a review. I don't know. What are kids doing these days?

[Karen Kilgariff]

Love share. It's a Blanchard house joint. You're going to love this podcast.

[Georgia Hardstark]

That's right. And thank you for listening to this podcast. Do all those things to this podcast too, if you feel like it.

[Karen Kilgariff]

I mean, we have a podcast too.

[Georgia Hardstark]

We have feelings, too. Stay sexy and don't get murdered. Goodbye, Elvis. Do you want a cookie?

[Karen Kilgariff]

This has been an exactly right production.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Our senior producer is is Molly Smith and our Associate producer is Tessa Hughes.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Our editor is Aristotle Acevedo.

[Georgia Hardstark]

This episode was mixed by Liana Squillacci.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Our researchers are Maren McGlashan and Ali Elkin.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Email your hometowns to my favorite murdermail.com

[Karen Kilgariff]

and follow the show on Instagram at.

[Georgia Hardstark]

My Favorite Murder Listen to my favorite murder on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Karen Kilgariff]

And now you can watch My Favorite Murder on Netflix.

[Georgia Hardstark]

And when you're there, hit the double thumbs up and the Remind me buttons. That's the best way you can support our show. Goodbye.

[Podcast Trailer Voice]

Two Aussie lesbian lovers touch down in 1990s London and become the toast of British high society. One of them touts an exclusive investment opportunity and soon the money is rolling in. Rich businessmen and England's horse love loving elite fall under their seductive spell. They even meet Queen Elizabeth. But the millionaire duo are concealing a dark past and dastardly intentions. From USG Audio, Blanchard House and Exactly Right Media, this is Royal Swindle. New episodes drop every Thursday. Listen now on the iHeartRadio Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Calling all amateur detectives and podcast obsessives.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Virgin Voyages second true crime voyage sets sail March 20, 2027 for a five night escape to Grand Turk and the Beach Club at Bimini as part of

[Karen Kilgariff]

the On Air at Sea collection. This immersive sailing brings together fan favorite podcasts including Disgrace Land, Buried Bones and Wisecrack for live recordings, behind the scenes access, exclusive meet and greets and crime them programming that you won't find anywhere else.

[Georgia Hardstark]

All aboard are award winning kid free ships.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Head over to virginvoyages.com truecrime to secure your spot.

[Georgia Hardstark]

Goodbye A burst pipe, a dead water heater, the AC calling it quits.

[Karen Kilgariff]

Who do you call?

[Georgia Hardstark]

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