Breaking Badder - Mason City, Iowa

Summary

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Small Town Murder

Episode: Breaking Badder - Mason City, Iowa
Hosts: James Pietragallo & Jimmie Whisman
Release Date: November 6, 2025

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Overview

In this episode, James and Jimmie dive into the tangled, chilling true story out of Mason City, Iowa—the “Breaking Badder” saga. It's a tale of small town meth, a double life, and a series of cold-blooded murders that shockingly parallel the plot of Breaking Bad, but with even less redeeming figures (and no chemistry teacher protagonist). With meticulous research and their trademark irreverent humor, the hosts untangle how ambitions, informants, and a web of bad decisions led to five brutal deaths—including two little girls. As always, they balance dark true crime with biting, comedic commentary.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Small Town Profile: Mason City, Iowa

• Location & Vibe:
  • “Middle of nowhere... About two hours from anywhere.” (05:02)
  • Known for musical heritage and Prairie School architecture—lots of overhangs, think Japanese buildings (07:10).
• Local Reviews:
  • Ranked “#31 best place to retire in Iowa.”
  • Mixed resident reviews—some tout “big city” amenities, others call it “Hell would be nicer!!!” (13:06)
  • “Murder, arson, abductions, bestiality, gang killings, meth labs, panty thieves... Stay away.” —Host reading a local review (13:12)
• Demographics:
  • Population ~27,000; predominantly white and Lutheran.
  • Described as a place for “old people to come and drive around and do nothing.” (11:38)
  • Median income lower than national average, cheap real estate, lots of rental properties.
• Crime:
  • Property crime one quarter above average; violent crime half the national average.
  • “Except for your Victoria’s Secret… that’s gone.” (22:41)
  • Main problem isn’t murder: “It’s drugs, because it’s the Midwest and there’s nothing to do.”

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2. The Murder Case: Timeline & Characters

Laurie Duncan and Family: “A Classic Small-Town Mom”

• Single mom, two daughters (Candy, 10 and Amber, 6), Navy veteran.
• Known for “finding the good in everyone.” Deeply trusted.
• Let Greg Nicholson move in—“He’s been in rehab, says he’s clean, and has nowhere to go.” (33:58)
• Hosts note, “Questionable decision—don’t bring in a guy with a meth history when you have two little girls.” (34:13)

Dustin Honkin: Iowa's Walter White—But Dumber

• Small, nerdy, “stereotypical nerd: freckles, thick glasses, into math and science.”
• Dreamed of being a pharmaceutical lawyer.
• Father was a “drunken lunatic, actual bank robber... initiated sons into a life of crime.” (39:42)
• After college chemistry class and needing money, decides: “I know chemistry. I know people. I should make my own [meth].” (45:10)
• With best friend Tim Cutkomp, moves to Arizona, sets up meth lab, starts trafficking to Iowa using trusted mules (Terry DeGeus and Greg Nicholson).

Angela Johnson: The Deadly Accomplice

• Honkin’s eventual partner and mother of one of his kids.
• Horrific, abusive upbringing—emotional abuse, exorcisms, molestation.
• “Every man worse than the last... abusive, criminal drug addicts.”
• Becomes a key player: lures, manipulates, and ultimately helps carry out murders.

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3. How the Bloodbath Began: From Snitching to Slaughter

• Nicholson (the houseguest) flips after being busted: wears a wire, gives up Honkin and Cutkomp, triggering a spiral of paranoia and revenge murders.
• Laurie, Nicholson, and the girls vanish July 1993; note left to neighbor: “Had to leave on short notice, will be in touch shortly.” (38:00)
• Nicholson forced, on tape (in Laurie’s living room), to recant all snitching, then vanishes—at the same time as Laurie and her kids.

How the Murders Unfolded (Confessed Years Later by Angela Johnson):

• Johnson poses as lost Avon lady to enter Laurie’s home.

• Duncan and Nicholson forced to make video recantations at gunpoint, bound and gagged with Laurie’s daughter's green socks. (114:31)

• Johnson “took the two girls upstairs, told them to pack for a surprise trip—so they were excited.” (115:20)

• Everyone driven to pre-dug grave outside town.

• Duncan, Nicholson shot first; then the little girls—“each shot once in the head.”

  • "Amber was still wearing her swimsuit from slip and sliding.” —(124:30)
  • “Can you fucking believe... she came home all excited from slip and sliding... It’s fucking horrible.” (124:37)

• All four buried together.

• Weeks later, Johnson lures other dealer, DeGeus ("G-man"), to his death under pretense of sex; he is beaten, tortured and shot (126:49).

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4. The Cover-Up, Investigations & Downfall

• Meth operation rediscovers footing, then implodes again after another partner is exposed as an informant.
• FBI and DEA flip multiple members; Honkin, neurotic and high, plans to bomb evidence warehouses, discusses killing prosecutors and witnesses on tape, brags in jail about killing all the "rats" and their families.

Witnesses and Taped Confessions

• Honkin’s cocky bravado is his undoing; wears wiretaps, talks of the “electricity of killing.” (80:15)
• In jail, “admits to anybody who will listen... to killing witnesses” (86:07)
• Plots escape with hacksaw and rope—caught when he fails to make a proper Shawshank-style hole.

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5. Break in the Case: The Jailhouse Snitch & Maps to the Dead

• Angela Johnson bonds with lifer (McNeese), who tricks her by offering to “take the rap if she’ll just write out the details and make maps for him” (112:15)
• She confesses—detailed notes, hand-drawn maps, gives up everything.
• Authorities unearth the bodies: "Nicholson, Laurie, and both girls in one hole... Amber still in swimsuit... Each girl shot in the back of the head." (124:30)
• Discover DeGeus nearby—badly beaten and shot. “He died hard.” (126:57)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Mason City:
  • “Hell would be nicer!!!” (13:07)
  • “Panty thieves? Well, when it’s 90 plus degrees, you start to lose your mind and steal panties apparently.” (13:51)
• On the case's similarity to Breaking Bad:
  • “So dude just copied this story and made Breaking Bad.” (45:20)
• On Johnson’s ethical failures:
  • “She could have just left those kids upstairs and gone... Instead, she told them, 'We're going to go on a surprise trip, pack your swimsuit.'” —James (115:20)
• On cowardice of the murderers:
  • “The kids knew shit and wouldn't know shit... They're not even reliable witnesses. You could've easily had them go in a fucking room and shut up.” (118:11)
• On Honkin’s stupidity:
  • "This is like Breaking Dumb is what this is." —James (92:32)
  • “Ocean’s 11 is a more realistic plot you could actually pull off compared to this.” —James, on Honkin’s fantasy escape plan (133:01)
• On victim impact:
  • “There will be no more talks, no more playtime, no more adventures for Candy and Amber. Your selfish act of slaughtering innocents got you a place in hell forever.” —Victim impact statement (152:42)

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Key Trial & Sentencing Segments

• [140:05] Security at Trial: Extensive security, judge escorted, anonymous jury, Honkin in a stun belt and shackled to the floor.
• [149:04] Defense Summary: "Just a young man infatuated with drug manufacturing. Basically a nerd. Nerds are harmless, you know that."
• [155:45] Victims’ Relatives Speak: Most demand the death penalty; all describe deep, unending loss.
• [158:40] Honkin’s Statement:
  • "Some of you came today hoping to see me squirm... Sorry, but you’re wasting your time."
  • "I've committed wrongs both known and unknown... But never have I taken another’s life. Thought it, yes. Verbalized it, yes. Done it, no."
• [158:54] Sentencing:
  • “You, sir, may fuck off. Death penalty.”
  • Angela Johnson receives the death penalty as well, but later has it reduced to life without parole due to mitigation errors at trial.

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Execution & Aftermath

• [175:19] Last Meal: “Dinner from Pizza Hut... Large pepperoni pizza, 2-liter Coke, breadsticks. $33.11.”
• [178:00] Final Words: Recites "Heaven-Haven" by Gerard Manley Hopkins, ends with Hail Mary.
• [180:25] Newspaper Summary:
  • "Reads like a made-up thriller with a cast of characters drawn together by drugs, money or pure bad luck... A plot too outrageous for real life."
• [172:41 & 173:08] Judge’s Take: The judge, personally against the death penalty, says, “If anyone deserves to be executed, it’s that motherfucker right there, that squirrely little nerd asshole.” —Mark Bennett

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• 05:02 – Geographic/character overview of Mason City
• 13:06 – Infamous “Hell would be nicer!” review
• 38:00 – Laurie Duncan’s disappearance and “We’ll be in touch shortly”
• 45:10 – Honkin’s “Walter White” meth business origins
• 80:15 – On tape: “Once you go a certain distance, there ain't no turning back.”
• 114:31 – Angela Johnson’s detailed confession: the Avon lady ruse, forced videotapes, and murders
• 124:30 – Discovery of the burial site; heartwrenching details (“Amber still in swimsuit”)
• 140:05 – Details of trial security; Honkin shackled during proceedings
• 152:42 – Victim impact statements
• 158:54 – Verdict: Death penalty
• 175:19 – Execution day, last meal, final poem

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Tone & Takeaways

• Language & Mood:

  • True to the hosts’ style: dark, unsparing, and bracingly irreverent, but never at the expense of victims or their families (“Why is that, James?” “Because we’re assholes. But we’re not scumbags.” — 04:27)
  • They combine deep research with scathing, often cathartic jokes about the killers’ stupidity, selfishness, and hubris.

• Core Message:

  • The story isn’t just about meth—the real horror is how multiple adults’ bad choices and cowardice ended the lives of truly innocent people, especially two little girls.

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For Listeners Who Haven't Heard the Episode

This is not the story of cool, criminal masterminds—it’s a tragedy about small-town ambition running off the rails, monstrous self-preservation, and families left with nothing but grief. The hosts peel back every layer of lies, cover-ups, selfishness, and tragedy, lightening the load where they can with comedy directed only at the perpetrators and never at the victims.

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Listen for:

• The jaw-dropping similarities to Breaking Bad (and why this is “breaking dumb,” not bad).
• Scathing take-downs of dumb crooks, self-serving informants, and failed “big ideas.”
• Chilling depictions of the cost of crime on small town families—and the justice system’s slow, imperfect attempts at closure.

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Memorable Quote:

“Would you believe this? The only thing he ‘broke bad’ at was being a meth kingpin—he couldn’t stay out of jail for more than six months at a time.” —James (92:32)

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If you need more Small Town Murder:

• Head to shutupandgivememurder.com for show dates, merch, and Patreon.
• Bonus: Their Patreon episode on the history of the death penalty gets a shout-out during the show.

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Closing Note:
“Until next week, everybody… it’s been our pleasure.”

Transcript

[A]

Morning Zoe.

[B]

Got donuts.

[A]

Jeff Bridges, why are you still living above our garage?

[B]

Well, I dig the mattress and I want to be in a T mobile commercial like you teach me. So Dana.

[A]

Oh no, I'm not really prepared. I couldn't possibly at T Mobile get the new iPhone 17 Pro on them.

[B]

It's designed to be the most powerful iPhone yet and has the ultimate pro camera system. Wow, impressive. Let me try. T mobile is the best place to get iPhone 17 Pro because they've got the best network.

[A]

Nice.

[B]

Je free.

[A]

You heard them. T mobile is the best place to get the new iPhone 17 Pro on.

[B]

Us with eligible traded in any condition. So what are we having for lunch? Dude, my work here is done.

[A]

The 24 month bill credits on experience beyond for well qualified customers plus tax and 35 device connection charge credit send and balance due if you pay off earlier Cancel Finance Agreement. IPhone 17 Pro 256 gigs 1099.99 A new line minimum 100 plus a month plan with auto pay plus taxes and fees required. Best mobile network in the US based on analysis by Oklahoma Speed Test Intelligence Data 182025 Visit T mobile.com this week in Mason City, Iowa, a smart young man has a very illegal idea to make some money. But all of this spins out of control leading to the cold blooded murders of five people in a game of finger pointing that can only be sorted out by secret recordings and midnight confessions. Welcome to Small Town Murder. Hello everybody and welcome back to Small Town Murder. Yay. Oh yay indeed Jimmy. Yay indeed. My name is James Petregallo. I'm here with my co host.

[B]

I am Jimmy Wisman.

[A]

Thank you folks so much for joining us today on another absolutely crazy edition of Small Town Murder. We have a wild one for you today. Just a real web of horrible people and things and it's creepy stuff. We will get to that. Before we do though, get your [e-mail] I think there's a couple left for Philly still. If you want to go to Philly in December and you can still get your tickets for the virtual live show happened last week but you can still do it. Oh it was such a fun show. So do it wherever in the world that you have Internet you can get this show. We dressed up in costumes and it was a great story, really wild and a lot of fun and very funny too. So get your tickets there. Shut up and give me murder.com. also listen to our other two shows, Crime and Sports and you'd stupid opinions which are very funny shows. You should listen to those then get yourself Patreon. You want patreon. Patreon.com CrimeInSports is where you get all of the bonus material.

[B]

So much.

[A]

Anybody $5 a month or above, you're gonna get everything we put out. First of all, hundreds of back episodes you've never heard before. All bonus episodes you'll get immediately upon subscription. Binge away on those. Then you get new ones every other week. One crime in sports, one small town murder and you get it all this week. What we're gonna talk about for crime in sports we're gonna talk about when teams relocate and the drama that that causes. Cause it's really funny how very upset people get about this. And teams sometimes sneak out. It's like ending a marriage. It's horrible. Like you have to sneak out in the middle of the night in a U Haul. It's nuts. So we'll talk about all that then. We are going to talk about the top haunted place in every state and see which ones sound ridiculous and see which ones might actually sound a little bit spooky. So we'll check all that out and more. That is patreon.com crimeinsports and in addition to all of that, all those episodes, you also get all the shows crime and sports, you, stupid opinions and small town murder all ad free with Patreon ad free. And you get a shout out at the end of the show as well. So I'll give you everything we have there. That's all we can give. You want a kid? I'll bake you a pie. I don't know what else to do. Patreon.com CrimeInSports is where you get all of that and more. Disclaimer time. This is a comedy show, everybody. But the murders are insanely real. There is nothing made up about these stories. Nothing that is embellished for comedic effect or anything ridiculous like that. This is insanely researched. And also gonna be some jokes there. That's how we do it. But what we do make it nice is we never make fun of the victims or the victims families.

[B]

Why is that, James?

[A]

Because we're assholes.

[B]

But.

[A]

But we're not scumbags. See how that works? It's real simple there. So if you think that true crime and comedy should never ever go together, this might not be the place for you. But it might be. Maybe give it a shot. Give it a shot. Because the stories are so crazily. They're good. So tell them and. And we'll tell them to you, and you make up your own minds. But either way, no complaining later.

[B]

No complaining.

[A]

No complaining later. That said, I think it's time everybody to sit back. What do you say here? Clear the lungs and let's all shout. Shut up and give me murder. Let's do this, everybody. Okay, let's go on a trip, shall we? We are going to Iowa this week. Yeah, let's do it. Mason City, Iowa. Oh, yeah, Mason City. Yeah. This is in north central Iowa in the middle of nowhere. It looks like it's about two hours to Des Moines. About two hours and 15 minutes to Cedar Rapids. So, yeah, it's two hours from anywhere, really. It's about the same to, like, Sioux Falls over in the other direction. About 3 hours and 10 minutes to Bellevue, Iowa, which was our last Iowa episode. That was Death of the Dog Lady. I remember that one. Remember, she had the dog grooming place and. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. That was a crazy episode. Wow.

[B]

It's been a minute.

[A]

Yes. This is in. I believe it's. I'm gonna pronounce it the way it should be pronounced. Who knows how they pronounce it in Idaho, but Cerro Gordo County. Did I say Idaho? I do that every time. Iowa.

[B]

It's your favorite thing to mix up.

[A]

Yeah, it is. I'll throw Ohio in there. I'm sure at some point, too. C E R R O G O R D O. Cerro Gordo. Correct. Yeah, yeah, we're going with that. I know it's probably something different there.

[B]

But it's a native word and it's very difficult to do.

[A]

We don't know area code 641 nickname here. River City. Even though in the eastern part of the state, there's, like, actual big rivers. But they're gonna go with River City here. Cause I believe it's the. What is it? The Winnebago river or something goes by here? Yes, the Winnebago river and the Kalmas Creek converge here. So obviously, a little bit of history here for Mason City. It is known for its musical and masonry heritage.

[B]

Oh, really?

[A]

And big. As far as. There's a huge collection of a certain type of building here in architecture. The Prairie School style of architecture. Do you know what that is?

[B]

I'm a big fan of architecture. So I read up on this stuff, Mosaic. You know, I mean, there's.

[A]

This is what Prairie School looks like.

[B]

Yeah, I mean, that's very obvious.

[A]

It's just a lot of overhangs.

[B]

It looks like a fucking be. Looks like a Beach umbrella.

[A]

It kind of. It kind of looks like one of those, like, Japanese buildings. Like. Yeah, yeah, yeah, like that. Have, like a roof on top of a roof. Yeah, a lot of roofs and a lot of overhangs and things like that. That's. Yeah, they. They describe it thusly here. Marked by horizontal lines, flat or hipped roofs with broad overhanging eaves, windows grouped in horizontal bands. Integration with the landscape and solid construction and craftsmanship. It reflects discipline in the use of ornament, which is often inspired by organic growth and seen carved into wood, stenciled on plaster, colored in glass, veined marble. Prints, paintings with a general prevalence of earth, earthly, autumnal colors.

[B]

What you just said sounds like historical Japanese to me.

[A]

It's a lot of roofs, put it that way. That's all it really is. The town here, the first settlement in this area was around 1853, at the confluence of the Winnebago river and the Kalamas Creek. The town had several Freemasonic influence names. Shibboleth, Masonic Grove and Masonville, until finally Mason City was adopted in 1855 in honor of a founder's son, Mason Long. It was just the guy's name, Mason, that wasn't. He had nothing to do with Mason. Shit. Reviews of this town here, because we've never been there. First of all, on niche, it is ranked the number 31 best places to retire in Iowa. So not.

[B]

There's so many better places in Iowa.

[A]

Not 31st in the country and not 31st best place in Iowa. Best place to retire in Iowa. It's number 31. It's the 467th best place to retire in the United States, I guess. Who knows? Yeah. That is crazy that they like tout that as a thing. We're the number 31 place to retire in Iowa.

[B]

In Iowa.

[A]

Any more specific you want to be? Wow. So here's some reviews. Here's five stars. I live there my whole life, and everyone is a little dramatic when it comes to the flaws of the town. A little dramatic here. Every place has flaws. I think Mason is the perfect combination of big city but still local. It is not a big city, by the way.

[B]

I've never heard of it.

[A]

It has. Exactly. They think here. They literally call it the city here. Like, it's. It's crazy. It has events for all ages going on all year long, but especially in the summer, you know, when it's not freezing out there isn't much crime, and most people are nice. That's one idea of it. Some people say it is like it's like 1920s Chicago with like Al Capone gunning people down in the street. Oh, it's crazy here. You have no idea.

[B]

He's just around the corner.

[A]

It's basically like South Africa here. It was a Cape Town where like you get robbed stepping out of the hotel. Places like that. Three stars. Mason City is a small town that's always been small. That's better. The other person's got the big city. Who knows?

[B]

Small town that's always been small.

[A]

Always small.

[B]

It wasn't once a sprawling metropolis.

[A]

One time it was huge. Basically. It used to be Chicago, then they changed up. The local government seems to want to keep it that way. Do they? Okay. I don't think they're the ones keeping people out of Mason City, Iowa. I think it's just they don't know it exists unless they're retiring and they've gone through 30 other places and they end up here. There's been numerous companies that have tried to locate to this town but have been shut out.

[B]

Okay, you guys are keeping progress from happening, is that what you're saying?

[A]

That's what the accusation is. There are plenty of jobs for the unskilled worker. The selection of restaurants is fabulous. However, the array of shopping choices is nearly nil.

[B]

Oh, you got no shopping, but all.

[A]

The food, that's three stars, I guess. Three stars here.

[B]

That's a mall. Just a food court. No shopping.

[A]

No shopping. Yeah, they shut down all the stores and left the food court open. Three stars. Been living here since I was born. Two now. Okay.

[B]

Born and raised motherfucker.

[A]

Lived here my whole life. That is a terrible way to put it.

[B]

Up to now.

[A]

Up to now. I was born. I'm still here as a teenager. Mason City is a good place for old people to come and drive around and do nothing. There's almost nothing here for me or others to do. Maybe go to one of the 55 churches or try the art museum. Downtown is nice looking, but that's about it. Everywhere else are run down looking houses and untrimmed lawns. Schools are good. I guess I just wish there was more businesses and other recreational things to do for everyone so that I would like to go outside. You'd be better off going to some other town. Poor teenager.

[B]

You just seem a small town in Iowa to me.

[A]

Yeah, that a teenager lives in. That's why teenagers go. I can't wait to get out of this town.

[B]

I hate it here.

[A]

There's nothing to fucking do. That's why you leave and you'll come back later and you have three kids. You'll go, let's move back to that nice quiet town I have so my kids can be bored like I was.

[B]

How many times can you do Glow in the Dark bowling?

[A]

Yeah, it's boring. Two stars. A lot of crime in this town. Hopefully it gets better. But the killing is really close. The killing. The killing.

[B]

The killing fields of Iowa.

[A]

That's what I mean. They make it sound like it's in Cambodia over here. This is insane.

[B]

This is crazy.

[A]

Khmer Rouge is happening then. This is my favorite review of all time. This person hates this place and it's so. It's so much vitriol that it makes me like the place because it's ridiculous. The title of it is Hell would be Nicer.

[B]

Oh, shit.

[A]

With three exclamation points. Hell would be nicer.

[B]

Hellfire and the devil. That's what I'm looking forward to.

[A]

Well, this is a wild review. Where to begin? You just let it fly. And he does here. Murder, arson, abductions, bestiality, gang killings, meth labs, panty thieves. Panty thieves, high utility bills, no jobs, corrupt police, evil judges. Minus 40 below windchill, 90 degrees plus in high humidity all summer. Vandalism, slum lords, religious freaks, backstabbing busybodies. Horrible, bland, tasteless food. Stay away.

[B]

And the panty thieving.

[A]

Panty thieving. Well, you know, it's 90 plus degrees out. You start to lose your mind and steal panties apparently.

[B]

Well. Or maybe with that hot. Your mom just misplaced them.

[A]

Yeah, Eric is a bad fucking. He hates it here. My God. Not happy. He just named off all the bad things. Okay. People in this town. 27,385. So.

[B]

Okay, so it's very small.

[A]

Not a big city. Yeah, it's just a small city. It's a nice little. Nice little size city. More women than men. About 51.2% women here. Which is pretty high for good sized city. Median age is a little bit higher than the national average. It's 42 and a half family here? 50. 50 is the usual for married here it's about 52%. A lot of people with kids. It's that kind of place. A lot of come here and do that and have kids and raise a family and hopefully nobody steals their panties. You never know though.

[B]

So crazy. That's the first time that's ever been mentioned.

[A]

Never been. We've never seen that in a review. And we do this show, we do your stupid opinions, which is a show about reviews. Never heard that one before. Panty thieving race in this town, 89.5% white, 2.1% black, 1.2% Asian, 5.6% Hispanic. Religion in this town, 67.6% religious. Wow, 50, 50 is the norm. So very religious. And the top religion here is Lutheran.

[B]

Yeah, I would have guessed that.

[A]

Yeah. The mild Lutherans over there. Yeah, got some Methodists, even keeled. Yeah, got some Methodists, a Presbyterian or two over here. You know, only a few Baptists, that kind of thing. There you go. Unemployment here is just below the national average. So there's jobs to be had. Don't know if they're good, but they're there. There's something. Median household income in the rest of the country, it's about $69,000. Here it is $56,009. So not terrible the place. And we'll find out if it's maybe the cost of living here is also a little bit. It's lower than other places. So that helps a lot here. And if we've convinced you that the only place to be for you is Mason City, Iowa, we have for you the Mason City, Iowa real estate report. Average two bedroom rental here goes for $840.

[B]

More affordable.

[A]

That's very affordable. 400 less than the national average. Here's a house here. Two bedroom, one bath, 668 square feet. Small house built in 1940. I'll show you a picture here. Kind of looks like it's falling apart. There is.

[B]

Looks like a weekend getaway.

[A]

Yeah, I don't think you want to spend your weekends at 9086 Street Southwest in Mason City, Iowa. I don't think that's your big hotspot Southwest. And there is no pictures of the inside. So you know, it's nice in there. Oh, it's. Yeah. They want to keep it a secret to keep the people so that from bum rushing it. You know what I mean? Getting in there and causing a bidding war.

[B]

All the allure you're getting out of this place.

[A]

The listing says some of the demo has already occurred. And now you can put your. It's falling apart is what that means. And now you can put your own touches on this one newer roof. Bring your tools and make this home a gem again. Bring your tools. 50,000 bucks for that.

[B]

$50,000 and 10 grand in tools.

[A]

That's it. Here is a three bedroom, one bath, 1200 square feet. Built in 1921. It's a nice, you know, front porch.

[B]

It's adorable.

[A]

It's a nice little house. Decent 1200 square feet. Not terrible. Not a big yard. It's only 6,500 square foot lot. Not terrible. 124,500 bucks for that.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

And then finally, you've been doing well for yourself here. We have a five bedroom, three bathroom, 5,004 square foot, big old house.

[B]

Rich.

[A]

Yeah. 1.91 acres on a lot. So not bad. The house, if you look at the picture, looks like it's 3/4 garage.

[B]

Yeah, it is. Three cars, right?

[A]

Three car garage. That's a three car garage. And then the house, which is like the same width, but it's a big place.

[B]

The house looks like it has ears. What is that?

[A]

I don't know. There are two chimneys.

[B]

Oh, okay.

[A]

Fireplaces.

[B]

Right above the door too, looks like.

[A]

Yeah, different room. I don't know what. Or maybe they have them like you walk in the door, you're surrounded by fireplaces on both sides. Not sure. 600, 5000 bucks for that though.

[B]

Holy shit.

[A]

Which in anywhere else. That's a very expensive house for 5,000 square feet. And it's brick too, like.

[B]

And two acres too. That's lovely.

[A]

Yeah. Two acres. Yeah. It says it offers spectacular lake views and a lifestyle designed for entertaining and relaxing.

[B]

Yes, sir.

[A]

Bad. Yeah, I'm into it. Things to do here. Okay. We have the North Iowa Band Fest.

[B]

Oh, boy.

[A]

Yeah, this. This one's not going to have ludicrous and Nelly at it, though. This is for local bands. Unfortunately, Ludacris tried to get in this one and they wouldn't let him. They're like, listen, man, county fair only for you. This is local event. We can't have you in here. The theme for the 86th North Iowa Band Festival is the sounds of Iowa, celebrating the heart and soul of our great state. A lot of soul in Iowa. Mason City's signature summer event, the North Iowa Band festival celebrated its 86th weekend hosting the largest free marching band competition in the Midwest. Oh, boy, that sounds like a nightmare. One guy, one fucking band. Competitive they go. Next one comes up.

[B]

Playing Lily Louie.

[A]

All night, over and over. Same shit with that tuba.

[B]

Is it free marching band or they're just free marching bands?

[A]

Free to attend.

[B]

Okay, that's what the.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. They have the John Adams Middle School band. We'll kick off the event. That's what I want to see. A bunch of 12 year olds playing a band, followed by who Aren't My Kids. Especially followed by. Yeah, the Mason City Municipal Band. The whole city's band. Then the quote, the talented Mason City High School orchestra will Perform great. The Mason City High School Jazz Band will be there. On the main stage will be Will Barnett and company. And headlining the night will be trophy dads at 8pm they don't sound like a school band on Saturday. You have a lot going on too. You got an awards ceremony. Noah Harris will get the music started on the main stage by three. Followed by of old magic. At 4pm BYO brass will make their band festival debut. Bring your own brass, everybody. And Not Quite Brothers will take the stage at 8pm to close out the evening.

[B]

Four stepbrothers.

[A]

Four stepbrothers or four white guys, either one who aren't related. They also have the festival king and queen which has got to have that there. The perennial marching band powerhouse Lake Mills High School claimed the Meredith Wilson Grand Champion Award which is awarded to the high school marching band with the highest overall score.

[B]

Fucking powerhouses, man.

[A]

Wow. And apparently if you get invited to this, they reimburse all your travel and all this type of thing. Your whole band can come for free basically. Here. Yeah. NSB bank took home first place for the Quote Mr. Toot Award. Mr. Toot Award, which I believe you won that just for your gas output one year, didn't you? Wasn't that a. That's on your shelf, I believe.

[B]

I showed up with a case of eggs and I was like, I'm crushing all of you. And they were like just cocaine, man.

[A]

Leveled, brother. The Mr. Toot award which is presented to the entry with the most originality, artistic quality and well crafted design. Okay, okay. Crime rate, what we're interested in now. Remember, panty thieves, gangs, bestiality so bad you can't let your kid outside. He'll be gone in three seconds and be hung upside down, skinned in a tree before you know it. With her panties missing before you even know it. Crime rate in this town, the property crime is a little bit high. It's about one quarter above the national average. So there's some property crime that's panty thieving. Now. Violent crime, murder, rape, robbery and of course assault. Murders are getting close if you remember. About half the national average.

[B]

It's incredibly safe.

[A]

It's very safe here. You guys are out of your mind.

[B]

Except for your Victoria's Secret. That's gone.

[A]

Yep. The problem they have here mainly is drugs. Because it's the Midwest and small towns, there's nothing to do. Remember that teenager talking?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

What do you think he's going to do to try to find something to do? He's either going to get out of Here or do drugs. One of the two. So that said, let's talk about some murder here. Okay, we have a wild one here. We have to go back in time first of all, to Sunday, July 25, 1993. Okay. It is 3pm On a nice Iowa summer day. It's not a real, real hot day, but it's cloudy on and off. Might rain. Never know. Now, by the way, July 25, 1993. What do you think the number one song on the Billboard charts is that day? Jimmy?

[B]

Was it Voice to Men?

[A]

No, it wasn't.93.

[B]

It wasn't, was it? There it is.

[A]

No, no, no, that was later. That was like 96.

[B]

That was later.

[A]

Yeah. This is Can't Help Falling in Love by UB40. Oh, wow. God damn them. Yeah, I know all their songs. And then they did them again. Just do them again. By the way, I think that's what Diddy's idea. He saw UB40 and he was like, okay, if a bunch of white dudes with red hair can do remakes of reggae songs and do it into reggae, I can do anything. I can remake a Led Zeppelin song and make money off. I can do whatever the fuck I want. Sting coming for you. I think you figured it out.

[B]

The kind of remakes, a Jamaican swing with their accent too, right.

[A]

They're like the house band at some bar in the Florida Keys. That's what they are. A bunch of non threatening red haired dudes playing steel drums and fucking pretending to be reggae. I can't help falling in love with.

[B]

You yeah, they said we with you.

[A]

Yeah, he like. He's a Same thing. It's all reggae shit.

[B]

Yeah. Why did they do that? That's not sing.

[A]

Nope. And so around this time also you had Janet Jackson, SWV and Mariah Carey all had number one hits too. In the theaters. I just find this interesting in the theaters. Number one movie that week was in the Line of Fire.

[B]

What was it?

[A]

In the Line of Fire. Wow. Harrison Eastwood special Secret Service movie.

[B]

Is that not Harrison Ford?

[A]

No, I think maybe. I'm thinking this is the one where Clint Eastwood's the Secret Service agent. I think. Okay. And Jurassic park number two.

[B]

Oh, yeah. Yeah. That's a good one.

[A]

Cliffhanger, Last Action Hero, Incentive. A woman in there too.

[B]

What a time to be alive.

[A]

Wow. You got Schwarzenegger, Stallone, Al Pacino, dinosaurs and Clint Eastwood.

[B]

What a time.

[A]

That's wild. Now back to the day. We're talking about Jeff Goldblum. July 25, 1993. Back to now. Nice summer day. Like I said, there's a woman named Marge Millbrath. Old Marge here, she's driving to the grocery store and she drives by her daughter's house.

[B]

As you do.

[A]

As you do. Her daughter's name is Lori Duncan. She's 31. Lori's a single mom, got a couple little girls, got a 6 year old and a 10 year old. And as she's passing, as Marge is passing by, Laurie smiled and waved and said, hi, Mom. She said hello and went on to the grocery store. Now, Laurie, we'll talk about her. The daughter here who has two young children. She. Her parents are Marge and David. Laurie was in the Navy. She's a Navy veteran. Oh, honorable discharge and all that sort of thing. She's got her two little girls now and she's a single mom, just into raising her kids. That's what she likes to do. Just likes to raise her kids and concentrate on her kids. She works and, you know, raises her kids and that sort of thing. And she's from Mason City. She's born and raised in Mason City.

[B]

Well, she was born and then stayed here up till now.

[A]

Well, yeah, absolutely. Well, yeah, she went in the Navy at first. Um, she's a big fan of Elvis, loves Elvis. That's her shit. Elvis is her favorite thing in the world. And she's known for always finding the good in people. She can always find something good about somebody, which is a nice quality that I wish I had. It's very, very nice.

[B]

Well, you can find it in them, but you just don't.

[A]

That's after I've already buried them in the bed. Who they are.

[B]

You've already murdered them in your head.

[A]

Yeah, it's not good. Now she has two daughters. One is Candy, with a K and an I, by the way. Not your traditional. Not the traditional Candy spelling.

[B]

Not at all.

[A]

She is 10 years old at this point and she's in fourth grade. Super into kittens and stuff like that. Like a fourth grader. I like kittens and playing outside. Easy. She goes to Hoover Elementary School. And then there's another little girl she has who's six, named Amber. And she's known as very outspoken and energetic. Everyone calls her a spitfire. That's the word that keeps coming up. She's real into riding her big wheel, as we all are. If I had a big Wheel, I'd be into riding it too, right now.

[B]

I'll do it today.

[A]

Fuck today.

[B]

Yeah, I want one. They've been putting motors on them. I kind of want to do one.

[A]

Well, that's so awesome. That would hurt, though, if you're going over three miles an hour. Any rock would be like, oh, God, my spine. Jesus. Things just sit on the ground.

[B]

Yeah, I'm gonna pinch a nerve every time I ride.

[A]

Oh, man. I swear, any back problems we have now can be attributed to big wheel usage at 3 or 4.

[B]

Really? Any cycle that I rode, terrible. Up until I was 14.

[A]

Totally. Now, Laurie, on this day, she has a picnic planned for the kids. Now, Amber, who's 6 years old, is playing across the street at a friend's house. Right here. Just right, you know, you can see her right there. It's small town, little street. And so she's got a picnic planned. Now, there's another person who lives in this environment, in this house who just moved in. Just moved in this week. Basically, that is Gregory Nicholson.

[B]

Is this a love interest?

[A]

He's 34 years old. Well, it kind of starts out that way. Yeah. Where it looks like it's kind of like her boyfriend, but he just moved in. Not based on the fact that they're, you know, so far in their relationship that he needs to move in. They've actually not known each other very long at all. Hey, everybody. Just going to take a quick break from the show to tell you how to be Safe with SimpliSafe.

[B]

SimpliSafe.com S I M P L I Safe.com.

[A]

Absolutely. SimpliSafe is the home security system number one that we use and that we trust. Homes, studios, everything is trusted to Simplisafe because they do it right. And now they're having this amazing Black Friday sale, the early access Black Friday sale. It's so good. That's the thing. Security. What is it? Security? Normally it would be someone breaks in a loud thing, woo, woo, woo. Then they steal all your stuff, murder your whole family and leave.

[B]

Now we gotta check it.

[A]

Great. And it's going woo, woo, woo. Still, who cares? You're hoping someone calls. No, that's not what it is. What they do, it's a different thing. They're stopping crime before it starts. They are proactive with Simplisafe, this is how you do it. There is a way you can stop someone from actually entering your home. Because Simplisafe, they will. They have active guard, outdoor protection, AI powered cameras that detect threats while they are still outside your home and alert real security agents. This is huge. They take action while the intruders still outside. Number one, they yell at the guy, get out of here. Go. What are you doing? You're Good. I'm calling the cops right now. They let them know they're being watched on camera. There's cops on the way. And even sounding off a loud siren, triggering a spotlight if needed. This is how you do it. This is how you stop people from doing this. If you listen to small town murder, you know you got to stop it before it starts. Once they're in, it's way too late. So I'm telling you, you got to get simply safe. There's no long term contracts. That's wonderful. That's huge. No hidden fees. You can cancel anytime. Named best home security system by U.S. news and World Report for five years running.

[B]

Unbelievable.

[A]

Because it's that good 60 day money back guarantee. So you can try it and see the difference for yourself. And they know you're going to like it. Tell you that right now. Don't miss out on Simplisafe's biggest sale of the year. 60% off. Right now our listeners can save 60% off on a SimpliSafe home security [e-mail] Small that's SimpliSafe S I M P L I safe.com Small there's no safe like Simplisafe.

[B]

Now back to the show.

[A]

Hey everybody, just going to take a quick break from the show to tell you a little bit more about quints.

[B]

Oh, quints.comq u I-N-C-E.com Absolutely.

[A]

Quite great place to buy your clothes, man. They're, they're such good stuff, such a great price. And we're getting into the cooler times here now. I mean, fall is going to be turned into winter here. You know, you want stuff, you want good stuff, but you want it to be simple and easily accessible. Stuff that looks good, feels good, things you'll actually wear. Quints is how you do that. And quints, they're so good. Quint's pieces make great gifts too, for the season coming up here. This season's lineup is simple but smart and Easy with quints. $50 Mongolian cashmere sweaters that feel like an everyday luxury. Wool coats that are equal parts stylish and durable. They have denim that nails the fit for everyday comfort all at a fraction of what you'd expect to and what you think you should pay. You almost feel like you're, ah, you're getting one over on them. That's how good the prices are they, what they do here, how they do that. They partner directly with ethical factories and technologies, top artisans. And then Quince goes and cuts out that middleman so you get the premium quality stuff at half the cost of other higher end brands. Great stuff. So you can give luxury quality pieces without the luxury price tag. We buy some from Quint's all the time. Just got a cool leather jacket that I wore out to dinner the other night. It was good stuff. I know you got your linen. Go to Quint's. It's really great stuff for really great price. You gotta go there, update your wardrobe, get it cooking. Guys, let's do this. Give and get timeless holiday staples that last this season with quints. Go to quince.com smalltown murder for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. Now available in Canada too. That's Q-U-I-N C-E.com smalltownmurder free shipping and 365 day returns. Quince.com smalltownmurder now back to the show. Well, Laurie knew that Greg had dealt drugs before and been had a drug problem before.

[B]

Oh.

[A]

But he said he's in rehab and he's trying to be clean. He's trying to lead a better life and all that. And he has nowhere to live. So Laurie lets him move into the.

[B]

Home with her and her baby.

[A]

Which is a questionable decision from Laurie. Yeah, I mean she's a good mom and she wants to find good in people. But you got a guy who has been busted and stuff and does drugs and has dealt drugs and now he says he's in rehab. You don't bring that person in with your two little girls. That's tough.

[B]

Yeah. Generally when you're rehabbing, it's more than just weed and it's a pretty serious problem if you've got, if you need adult help.

[A]

Well, not only that. Yeah, it's, you need, you need a lot of. Well plus you just don't know how, you don't know this person.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So you don't know.

[B]

It's severe. It's a severe drug addiction that he needs to be guided through it.

[A]

Yeah, he needs to be in rehab. And it's just, it's a lot. So I mean it's, it's fine to help people too. Someone's at rehab, they're trying to turn their life around. That's great. But I'm just saying if you have two little girls, you might want to say, okay, you rehab out there and when you're clean for a couple years, let's talk, let's talk and we'll talk about it then. But you know, she's trying to help a guy which Is nice, you know, it's a nice thing to do. She's trying. Now, Amber, the six year old, she spent a lot of time outside. She plays with a neighbor named Brittany across the street. And she's hanging out with her all the time. They play with Barbies and ride the big wheels and do all that kind of thing. So on this particular day, they were splashing on a slip and slide. So you can't get any more. Small town America.

[B]

Small Town, 1993.

[A]

Little Girls on a slip and slide out in the yard in the middle of July while mom has a picnic across the street waiting. Like, this is so small town America. And there's a guy recovering from a meth problem living in the back room. This is small town America, Everybody. So about 3pm Comes around and Amber runs home across this little alley, excited for the picnic. She goes home to mom, she goes to her house, goes in the house, and Brittany waves goodbye to her. And that's that. So that's how this goes. Now, the next day, you figure the kids must have had a great night. Yeah, yeah, Nice picnic, nice evening, summer night, you know, Nice cool summer evening as the sun goes down. But the next day, Marge, Laurie's mom, drives by the house again and says that the drapes were drawn, which they're never drawn. So, like, why the hell are the drapes drawn in the middle of the day? And the cars near the house were parked, as she put it, chaotically. They weren't parked, lined up straight. Which is very unlike her daughter. Her daughter's a military person. So the beds are made and the cars are lined up correctly.

[B]

They're always parked correctly.

[A]

She likes symmetry, you know what I mean? So she said maybe she was in a rush and came in and was in and out. Who knows what she's doing? So she left it alone. She said, later on, though, now Marge and her husband drove by and everything was the same. And they're like, okay, now, this isn't right. Still chaos, still chaotic. Drape still drawn. Looks like nothing's moved. Which is not the way it happens in this, you know, Lori's got stuff to do, kids have places to go. So now they're convinced something was wrong, so they decide to let themselves in. They have a key.

[B]

Okay, yeah.

[A]

They go up, they let themselves in, they open the door. Nothing in there, no people, no people.

[B]

Everything's fine.

[A]

There's no. It's not like you on this show, you expect. They open the door and there's an arm swinging around the ceiling fan and there's, you know, somebody's brain is on the kitchen. Yeah, no, it's just quiet. There's no. No people are here. No Lori, no Amber, no candy, no kids. No kids. All the stuff is in the house. Nothing's moved, nothing's been touched. The, you know, stuff's remote controls on the coffee table. And, you know, everything looks fine. Food in the fridge.

[B]

You're small, kids. And everything's still where it goes.

[A]

Everything's still where it goes. Yeah. So there's. There's no signs of anything. There's no, like, nothing's broken, knocked over. There's no blood. There is a dinner, unfinished on the kitchen table.

[B]

Just one.

[A]

Just a dinner is set up.

[B]

Oh, okay. Okay.

[A]

Got it. A dinner plate. Yeah, yeah. Not a plate of dinner.

[B]

An event of dinner is unfinished.

[A]

Yeah. Dinner has happened, but they don't know if it's that day's dinner or what if they, you know, left it. They said, you know, it looks like they go into Lori's room. It looks like maybe a couple of things are gone. It looks like she packed to go for a night, maybe, or something. That's it. And then there's a note to a neighbor, and it said, phyllis had to leave on short notice. Will be in touch shortly. Love, Laurie.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Okay. So now they're like, why wouldn't she tell us that she's leaving? Why is she leaving a note for Phyllis? Why didn't she call her mom? She knew I'd be worried. This is crazy. So she says, oh, I guess they left. I don't know. I guess she'll be back soon. According to her note, it's in Lori's handwriting and everything. So she goes, all right, well, that seems legit. And there's that. The problem is they never come back.

[B]

Not soon.

[A]

They never come back. No. The mom, Marge, she ends up putting her missing persons report because they can't just disappear into thin air. They left. We'll be back shortly, and they never come back. So very strange stuff.

[B]

Just commercials all day now.

[A]

Milk cartons everywhere. That's how it works. Now, let's talk about a young man now, here, Dustin Lee Honkin. H O N K E N. Honkin.

[B]

That is Honkin.

[A]

He's honking. All right. Now, Dustin's 24 in 1993. He is originally from Britt, Iowa, which is outside the Mason City area. Out in the more rural area, there's pretty small town. He has an interesting background, Dustin. His father, Jim, is a fucking drunken lunatic.

[B]

Oh.

[A]

And I mean a drunken Lunatic who's a criminal and does wild shit. Not even your basic criminal, like, you know what I mean? He's not like a guy. He got busted with drugs. He robs banks and shit. He's nuts.

[B]

Oh, wow.

[A]

Totally different type of deal. He has two sons. He's got Dustin and he's got Jason. Jeff is another son here and he's got a sister also named Alice Nelson. That's a sister's name. One word.

[B]

That's the first name.

[A]

A, L, Y, S, N, E, L, S, O, N. Alice Nelson. Couldn't decide between Allison and Nelson. So you're Alice Nelson.

[B]

Wow.

[A]

Yeah, real weird. Now Dustin is the younger brother and he is a fucking nerd.

[B]

Really?

[A]

Oh, boy, is he a nerd. I mean, he's a little skinny blond kid with freckles and big glasses and loves books. Yeah, he is like the kid who got attacked by fucking bees in that My Girl movie. That's what he looks like. He's a goddamn nerd, this kid. He's skinny. He's real skinny, too. So he's really just a lanky kid. Everybody says he looks like. He is, like, getting ready to try out for, like, Revenge of the Nerds into the Next Generation. Like, that's what he looks like. He's like a stereotypical nerd, basically. Freckles and big glasses and the whole deal. So. He's also very smart, too, which, if you're gonna look like a nerd, at least get good grades. That's the worst.

[B]

Yeah. Just.

[A]

Yeah, those kids who look like nerds and have big glasses and are skinny and goofy and are dumb. They have. That's not fair, man.

[B]

Goddamn thing. I'm cheating off you, you fucker. Figure it out.

[A]

I saw the glasses. I figured you knew what you were doing. What the hell? Yeah, I just have bad eyesight. I'm not smart.

[B]

That's what the Howdy Doody cosplay. If you're not smart, you son of a bitch.

[A]

The shit together, asshole. So now he's into math and science and was a pretty good writer too. But math and science are his main deals. When he graduates from high school, he earns a scholarship to the North Iowa Area Community College.

[B]

That's all. Say that again.

[A]

North Iowa Area Community College. This is the community of the North Iowa area. That's what this is. That's 1991.

[B]

There's a lot of towns.

[A]

That's a lot of stuff there. He dreamed of being a pharmaceutical lawyer, which I didn't know was a job.

[B]

Is that a job?

[A]

I guess you'd have to. A lawyer for a pharmaceutical company.

[B]

How many lawsuits is he figuring? They're getting so specific.

[A]

I don't know. It's not like he had Google to look it up and go, ooh, pharmaceutical lawyers, they make a lot of money. He must have pulled that out of his ass. Now, the family business is a little different than pharmaceutical lawyering or math or science or anything like that. Well, this is interesting. His father. After Dustin graduates high school, his father convinces him some. I don't know if Dustin got like a part time job there or if he knew somebody and could kind of get around the building and be comfortable, but he convinced Dustin to steal a key to the local bank and copy it. Dustin then his father robbed the bank using the key?

[B]

Yeah, that's how that works.

[A]

Well, he just wanted to go in and decorate for Christmas.

[B]

He like, just in case you get locked in, son, you can call me and I can get you out.

[A]

He want to go in and decorate the tree a little better. That's all. He's like, this place, they don't go all out and I'd like them to. I'm going to fill up the Hanukkah thing.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Putting a menorah up too, just so everyone feels included. Now the second bank robbery that happens. Because that's the first one.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Wow. The second one. The second time his dad robs a bank, his dad gets busted and ends up in prison for bank robbery where he would. His sons would visit him all the time, Jeff and Dustin. And he would tell them, oh, man, you just give them stories of his criminal exploits. And this is what I'm doing in here. And I got a scam set up over here. I got a scam set up here. I got something going on the outside.

[B]

What is it? 1843, on the dusty trail. And you got stories to tell.

[A]

That's what he does, though, this guy, he brags to his sons about how much of a criminal he is.

[B]

What the fuck is that?

[A]

Obviously it's not like he's saying, do as I say, not as I do. He's having them steal keys for him. So he's just. And copying them, initiating them into a life of crime, which is ridiculous.

[B]

Making them an accomplice.

[A]

Yeah. And he's saying, and if you look up to your dad and your dad's telling you, this is what I'm doing and it's great, you go, well, maybe I should be doing that now. Before he starts at the North Iowa Area Community College, he needs money. Yeah, because his dad's in jail and he's doing all this stuff and this shit ain't free. He starts selling a little bit of weed and a little bit of coke on the side here, which is. I can understand that. Just a little subsistence just to get by, pay the rent. Yeah. And he's starting to build a list of customers as he goes, because he's also a nerd. So he's pretty efficient at doing shit like this, which is interesting here. Then he goes to a year of his community college, very into chemistry. That's his main deal. Got an A in chemistry. All about that. And he has an idea.

[B]

He's like, huh, Sudafedin, battery acid.

[A]

I know chemistry and I know people who like drugs and will buy them from them. I should make my own.

[B]

This is the very first Breaking Bad.

[A]

I was gonna say this story, by the way. I didn't want to give it away. But this story, when you hear the whole thing, you're gonna go, so dude just copied this story and made Breaking Bad.

[B]

That's crazy.

[A]

Basically, essentially. And put cancer into it instead of this. What's going on?

[B]

But I mean, gave him a reason to do it.

[A]

When you. Yeah, to make him a protagonist instead of just a drug dealing asshole. Yeah. When you hear the whole story, you're gonna go, oh, my God, this is Breaking Bad. That's what happened. It's crazy. So he said, yes, I can do this. He goes, and I can manufacture and distribute. I don't have to buy it for.

[B]

A, you know, no middleman.

[A]

No middleman. Especially by the time the drugs get to Iowa, the price has been jacked up quite a bit. Sure. It's not like you're waiting on the dock for them or something. So he said, I can do this and why work for somebody else? I could be my own boss. This is great. Dad always told me, be your own boss.

[B]

You know, get out there and be somebody.

[A]

Don't make somebody else's profit.

[B]

Don't be Frontline, be CEO.

[A]

Absolutely. So he's got a friend named Tim Cutkomp. C U T K O M P Cutkamp. That is his best friend since childhood. Dustin's best friend. Now they decide after a year of college and chemistry, let's move to Arizona to make meth. And then we can sell it back here in Iowa and get rich.

[B]

Yeah, it's very easy to do that out in the desert of Arizona.

[A]

And that's what they do. They get a place outside Tucson, which, if you know anything about Arizona, you Can do anything you want out there. No one cares. There's nothing going on. They've been best friends since the first grade, by the way. Now he is, I guess, Dustin as kind of nerdy and he's kind of a temperamental guy as well. Cut Comp looks up to him with wide eyed admiration. He thinks that Dustin's like a tough guy and someone who'll always protect him and have his back.

[B]

Well, how much of a pussy is he?

[A]

How much of a nerd is he? That's what I mean. This is crazy. So either way, they're in this endeavor together. They share the profits and everything else, but everybody knows that Dustin is in charge, period.

[B]

He's the guy.

[A]

He's the leader of the crew here, no matter what. Kingpin, James Kingpin. Well, to get started, he borrowed $5,000 from his brother Jeff, Dustin does. And they bought chemicals and equipment and started working and experimenting in his brother Jeff's kitchen on making methods.

[B]

Holy shit.

[A]

I mean, imagine you were gonna like make jarred soup. You'd really have to experiment for a while and, you know, try different methods and batches. And this one needs more sugar and this one needs more sudafed.

[B]

The brewery until you get the recipe perfect.

[A]

You perfect. And you do that in your garage. You know what I mean? You don't just start mass producing the shit.

[B]

Right.

[A]

So within a year, they move to a secluded house south of Tucson. Out in the desert somewhere.

[B]

God dang. South of Tucson?

[A]

South of Tucson, which I was like, that's Mexico. There's nothing else. Yeah. And that's. Yeah, I guess that's sort of south. But it's also off. It's a mess Anyway, so they get together a sophisticated meth cooking setup and they produce several pounds of methamphetamine at a time. They're doing well here, which they would send it back to northeast Iowa and have it sold there. Sure. They have two mules that do this for them that take the shit to Iowa and sell it for them. Guys they can trust. One is a guy named Terry De Geese or De Guise. D E G U E S. So you're De guess De Guise. Whatever it is. He's 32 at the time. He's a heavy equipment operator who works for his father and also runs meth back from Arizona to Iowa.

[B]

Sells it and probably has a pretty good addiction. Yeah.

[A]

Yep. Sends back the profits. The other is a guy named Greg Nicholson. Now, Greg Nicholson is the man that Laurie Duncan allowed into her home because.

[B]

He had a pretty good meth problem.

[A]

He had a meth problem and was in rehab. So that's where he comes in. Greg Nicholson. Now, he is the other guy who goes back and forth. Now. Dustin is really into this. He looks at this business like he started a real business.

[B]

Yeah. Because he did.

[A]

He might as well have started, like a barber shop or something where he's like, no, no, no. The chairs are. We're gonna have magazines and then we're gonna. Screens. We'll have screens like in the mirrors built in. You ever been to a hotel room in the bathroom? They got screens in there. That's what we're gonna do. It's gonna be awesome. That way the guys can watch stuff. Red vinyl.

[B]

In the vinyl.

[A]

You never know. You never know. Just. But it's red with the glitter. That's how you do it. Just so they know it's fancy. Fancy. Yeah.

[B]

It's gotta be like a 50s.

[A]

Ooh, ooh. Shave, shave, shave, shaves. We gotta do close shaves, straight razor shaves. We'll get foamy shit. Foamy lather. We'll foam the guys up. Hot leather. Ah, that's it. Hot lather, hot leather. That's what he's doing, though. Cause he's also on meth. So he's studying chemistry textbooks at the local library, reading science journals. He keeps, like, very good business records. He could open a real business. That's what's so annoying about this. This is unnecessary. So he keeps really good records. He makes plans to expand his business onto the Internet when. The Internet. Because this is the very beginning of the Internet.

[B]

He thinks that there's just gonna be meth sites.

[A]

He's right. There is.

[B]

Is there a meth site?

[A]

Absolutely. Dark web, you can buy anything you want on there. He knows that. And especially back then, I thought you.

[B]

Just meant, like, no.

[A]

No chat rooms. And obviously they can't have a, you.

[B]

Know, can't have a meth site.

[A]

No. Like that. But I mean, there was a way to do this on the web. And he was thinking about it in 1993, when all people were doing was, you know, chatting in rooms and trying to fuck each other and jerking off.

[B]

Figuring out how to.

[A]

How to word this properly on Craigslist before Craigslist. He's like, dustin's list I need to make. And then I can put ads up for whatever I want here. Yeah, this is that kind of time. So he is making plans to do that. He's even mulling over whether to write a how to book on producing and selling meth in America. Oh, sir, what are you doing?

[B]

No.

[A]

Why would you want other people? Okay, I could see if you could sell 10 million copies of it, then that's your new job. But how many people are like, ooh, I'd like to buy and sell meth in America. How many people are gonna buy this.

[B]

Book, you know, Apple, and have the wherewithal make this iPhone, and then we don't have to buy them anymore?

[A]

It makes no sense here. But I mean, what's the market for a how to book on producing and selling meth? What's the market for that?

[B]

I don't see anybody wanting that unless they have enough addiction. And then they don't want to steal it.

[A]

Yeah, well, and then they just steal it anyway. They're still not gonna buy it. No one's gonna buy this shit. So a few runs just to Iowa, back and forth, nets them hundreds of thousands of dollars.

[B]

Really?

[A]

They're making big money because the meth is free, basically. And then they're taking it to the middle of the country where it's expensive and offloaded and they have tons of buy. They can't make the meth fast enough to sell.

[B]

This is before the restraints on cough medicine.

[A]

And so they can make as much as you want.

[B]

They can make as much of this shit as they want.

[A]

Plus, if you're in Tucson, you can just go to Mexico and get it for half the price. Which is why they're in Mexico, why they're in Tucson. So they can get shit cheaper in Mexic.

[B]

Smart.

[A]

So they can do that. Yeah, it's cheaper than having to, you know, go to Iowa. So the problem is he's also super into meth. As he gets it going, he starts doing a bunch of meth, which is an issue. And that makes him really obsessive about the whole business. Not unreliable, obsessive. Oh, his detail orientated nature becomes psychotic. Psychotic and detail oriented. And he's just, everything needs to be perfect. He wants success. And if we're doing it this much, if we did it this much more, we could make even more money. All right, he starts getting obsessed here. And on one of the trips back to Iowa, he meets a woman who shares his entire ambition. Love of meth and love of money. And also lack of compassion for anything else. Here, this is Angela Johnson. She's 29, so a few years older than him. They're gonna hook up here eventually. They're gonna have a kid together and everything. Now, a little bit about Angela's background because it is wild. Okay? She's got a mom named Pearl. She's got four siblings, Wendy, Holly, Jimmy and Jamie Jo. Jamie Jo, they got a Jimmy and a Jamie Jo.

[B]

Jamie Joe is a. I've never heard that one.

[A]

Me neither. I feel like they had to add the Joe just so they wouldn't mix up Jimmy and Jamie all the time. Well, they were called Jamie Joe. Jimmy, get over here. Did you say Jimmy Joe? Maybe. Who knows? Yeah, I don't know if it's a boy or a girl. Jamie Joe. Oh, right.

[B]

Yeah. Goes for both, I suppose.

[A]

That's. Yeah, it works. Now, she's from Forest City. She's a nice looking lady. As you know, dark hair and big lot of hair. She is very attracted to him. I'm not sure if she's attracted to Dustin because he's got just a house full of meth or not. But either way she was dating De Geace or De Guise or whatever his name is. When Dustin meets her, that's her boyfriend.

[B]

Oh.

[A]

So we'll talk about that. But Johnson grew up in a very interesting environment. We'll talk about here. Raised single parent by Pearl, who was extremely emotionally unstable. Mom was subjected the kids to fasting practices.

[B]

That's starvation.

[A]

That's weird. Long periods of abandonment and physical detachment. Occasional physical abuse and not good. Basically the things they do. There's even more. But eventually Angela ends up just having a string of awful men that she goes. Every guy she goes out with is worse than the last one. They're abusive, they're on drugs, they're criminals.

[B]

She had a terrible mother.

[A]

Oh, it gets worse. Oh boy. She was psychologically abused the most, more than physical. Although she was physically abused when she was a child. When she was bad, her mother and other adults would sit her down and engage in exorcisms on her exorcisms. They would torture a child because they said that she's got the devil in her because she's misbehaving. They would cast out spirits and do other weird religious practices to her. She was also molested at one point here. I guess her family went to spend time with this other family in Kansas when she was nine years old. And she was sexually abused and fondled by a guy named Ted Dillo. Ted Dillo? That's what she claims. Her grandparents were even more religious than mom and they were known to hold her down, wave bibles over her and speak in tongues as well. So imagine if you're a kid and your grandparents are holding you down telling you you're possessed by demons and they're speaking in tongues, screaming at you.

[B]

And that's a happy Saturday because at home there's people that are molesting me.

[A]

Yeah, well, no, that was one summer. This is all the time. Yeah, that was one visit to Kansas got her molested. But this is a whole other time. Either way, this is horrifying. That's a lot. But now she gets into the whole meth thing here and said at first it was about the money, but unfortunately later it turned into wanting methamphetamine.

[B]

Oh, boy.

[A]

That's what it is now. March of 1993, everything's going great for Dustin and his. You know, he's got a whole operation. Yeah, it's going great. The problem is that neither he nor his buddy there who's working for him, neither he or com cop or whatever his name is, neither of those guys know that there's somebody in their team got busted and has been informing on them.

[B]

Oh, shit.

[A]

Which is not good.

[B]

One of the dealers, they didn't even take that into account as a possibility.

[A]

Never thought about it. No, they thought, everything's going great. One of them had turned on him and wore a wire even to a meetup with them and recorded Dustin making a $3,000 deal for a future meth pickup. So the cops end up going to Dustin's Mason City helm, which is at 1104 16th Street Northeast, which I looked it up. Here's a picture of it. It's one of those houses that looks like it's always having a yard sale.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Because all of their shit's outside.

[B]

Doesn't look positive. How much is that?

[A]

It is a two bedroom, one bath, 832 square foot house for $66,000.

[B]

Okay. Yeah.

[A]

And it's. It's what it looks like. And there's way too many cars for how big it is. There's two bedrooms and six cars. It's too much.

[B]

A lot of shit outside.

[A]

Lot of shit outside. Furniture and weird stuff like that now. So they end up. Dustin and Cutkamp end up getting arrested in March of 1993 on what is at first state drug charges. But it's gonna expand to a federal charge when they realize it's not just in Iowa. The police arrested him and in Dustin's pocket they found a note listing money owed to Dustin. He's keeping his fucking. His tally with him. Wow.

[B]

Just on his person all day.

[A]

And these were individuals referred to as G Man and T Man, which is Terry and Greg Nicholson.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

There's two dealers.

[B]

What happens when he meets a Guy named Todd, that's all.

[A]

Well, Todd doesn't work for him if.

[B]

He hires one, you know what I mean?

[A]

Well, then he's. It's got to be T O and T E, man, at that point.

[B]

What a pain in the ass.

[A]

A receipt for the purchase of chemicals was found in Cut Comp's pocket as well, which is not good either. After Dustin was arrested, the brother Jeff disposed of items from Dustin's drug lab that he had kept in one of Jeff's storage sheds. So he had like backup drug lab shit there. Oh, this is my backup meth lab in case something happens to this one. So Jeff throws all that shit out so he doesn't get arrested too.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Now, while preparing for trial. This is like the Wire. Remember in the Wire, I think it's season two when they bust Avon and he's got all that weapons and grenades and shit around him. And fucking McNulty puts the warrant in front of his face and he goes, this give you something to think on here? And it says the informant, it says Russell Stringer Bell on there. And he's like, oh, shit. That's what he does here, basically. They show him the warrant and they go, look at that. Doesn't that. That tickles you a little bit, doesn't it? And they said the prosecution source for all this is Nicholson, his dealer and Laurie's new housemate.

[B]

Oh, fuck.

[A]

Yes. So Nicholson testifies before a federal grand jury in April. And the grand jury indicts Dustin for conspiracy to manufacture methamphetamine. And the state charges are dismissed. And now they are federal charges.

[B]

Oh, no.

[A]

Which carry way more time and are allowed way worse. A lot easier to get convicted on. Nicholson had agreed to cooperate with law enforcement and told agents that Dustin had supplied him with several pounds of methamphetamine over a period of 10 to 11 months, for which he paid Dustin a total of approximately $100,000.

[B]

Wow.

[A]

On 3-21-93, Nicholson met with Dustin to deliver drug proceeds. During their conversation, which was monitored by police because Nicholson was wired. They discussed past and future deliveries of meth. Just expose the entire operation in one conversation so that here, now, when he sees this, Dustin sees, oh, shit, my main guy ratted me out. He tells the judge that he's gonna plead guilty to the drug charges. I'm obviously fucked. You have my whole operation. He's not stupid, Dustin. He knows that he's screwed here. If they have Nicholson testifying, he's done.

[B]

Yeah, and you've got a lot more than you're going to tell me you have?

[A]

Yeah. So during June and July of 1993, he's out on bail. So he and Angela Johnson go looking for Nicholson.

[B]

Oh boy.

[A]

Who? They can't find him. He is not in any kind of protection or anything. They just can't find him because he has moved in with Laurie Duncan and they don't know Laurie Duncan, so they don't know where to find him, which is why he's living there. He's hiding, basically. So they're searching for him often asking Angela Johnson's friend Christy to babysit Johnson's daughter while they looked. We're gonna drive around, we gotta look for a guy who's ratting on the meth empire that we have going on. We're gonna go kill him and then we'll deal with our kid here or my kid. On July 7, 1993, Angela Johnson purchased a 9 millimeter handgun about 5 miles from her house as well. She has no criminal record or anything. Angela, now Laurie, back to Laurie Duncan. She had no idea that Nicholson A, was still involved in drugs at all, or B, that he is hiding out in her house after informing on his meth suppliers to the federal authorities.

[B]

See, I was. I felt a little beside myself about Lori allowing him there because she's got the two kids. But he should feel like a piece of shit for allowing himself to stay there with two children in the house.

[A]

I don't think morals are really his big deal. He's a meth dealer.

[B]

Touche. I'll allow it.

[A]

Hey, I don't want to. I don't want to come down. I don't want your kids to have a bad childhood. He's a meth dealer, for Christ's sake.

[B]

He should certainly consider that though, being that these little girls had nothing to fucking do with this and people might be willing to hurt him.

[A]

He's considering I'm using people, so I don't. Yeah, you know what I mean? I'm ratting on my friends and then hiding out here, putting these people in danger. I don't care. I'll sell people poison. I don't give a fuck. Doesn't matter.

[B]

That's a great point.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, whatever. He doesn't care. It's funny. Hey, everybody, Just gonna take a quick break from the show to tell you how to be Safe with SimpliSafe.

[B]

SimpliSafe.com S I M P L I safe dot com.

[A]

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[B]

Now we gotta check it.

[A]

Great. And it's gone. Woo woo woo. Still, who cares? You're hoping someone calls. No, that's not what it is. What they do, it's a different thing. They're stopping crime before it starts. They are proactive with Simplisafe. This is how you do it. There's a way you can stop someone from actually entering your home. Because Simplisafe, they will. They have active guard, outdoor protection, AI powered cameras that detect threats while they are still outside your home and alert real security agents. This is huge. They take action while the intruder is still outside. Number one, they yell at the guy, get out of here. Go. What are you doing? I'm calling the cops right now. They let them know they're being watched on camera. There's cops on the way. And even sounding off a loud siren, triggering a spotlight if needed. This is how you do it. This is how you stop people from doing this. If you listen to small town murder, you know you got to stop it before it starts. Once they're in, it's way too late. So I'm telling you, you gotta get Simplisafe. There's no long term contracts. That's wonderful. That's huge. No hidden fees. You can cancel anytime. Named Best home security system. Best Buy US News and World Report for five years running.

[B]

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[A]

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[B]

Now back to the show.

[A]

So, Lori, no idea about this. Earlier in 1993, Mason City Police found nearly 150 grams of pure meth and $5,000 cash in Nicholson's house. That's how this all started. They busted him. They said, we'll put you back out on the street if you wear a wire for us. He said, no problem.

[B]

Easy.

[A]

So he's facing a lengthy prison sentence. That's why he cooperated. Now, according to his ex wife, Greg Nicholson became extremely paranoid. His ex wife, Leslie, said that he would not let her go outside or even stay too long near the windows because someone might see her or someone might shoot her because they're after him even though they didn't know he flipped. But he's on meth and paranoid, and that's what happens. Now, she knew. She said that she knew her husband occasionally used drugs, but she didn't realize that he was selling them and using them every day. That's what she says. She thought that Dustin and Greg were discussing instruments or equipment for her husband's band. They're just gonna play in a band. They're talking about, like, pickups for the guitar and shit like that, you know? What kind of pedals are you using? Do you get a good, like, out of that, or is it more like a high pitch? How's it work there? Like, that's what they're talking about. What kind of drum heads do you like? You know, I prefer the Zildjian, but a lot of people like the.

[B]

You know, like those Evans are real nice.

[A]

That's what I mean. You know, you never know here. I mean, the crash, the ride, you go, only Zildjian. That's the thing. And you gotta go 18 inch, dude. 22 if you can get it, honestly. So that's what's going on. She thinks that they're. When standing outside fucking talking to each other all quietly in the driveway, that that's about musical instruments, not about meth deals. I don't know if I believe her. Anyway, she said Dustin told him that if he needed to, he could have Greg or anybody else taken out for 50 bucks.

[B]

50 bucks?

[A]

50 bucks is all it would take. Probably in some meth, I would say, get him good and methed up, and then 50 bucks and more meth. Now, this woman breaks up with Greg right after Greg is arrested, Nicholson. So that's why he has nowhere to go, which is why he ends up at Laurie's house.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Now, July 24, 1993, the day before Laurie and the kids disappear, Dustin and Angela Johnson ask the babysitter again to babysit Johnson's daughter. And they also borrow this woman's car so that they could go search for Nicholson. This is on a daily thing. You watch the kids and they go out and just drive around and look for Greg Nicholson. He's got to be around here somewhere. Now, they would normally return about midnight from these expeditions, but on this occasion, they didn't come home till about five in the morning. Wow.

[B]

Night.

[A]

Long night of looking. Absolutely. That is July 24th. They took him and came back that night. Now, July 25th is the night, is the day that Greg, Laurie, Amber and Candy all disappear. Oh, the next day, a few days later. By the way, this is at the July 30th. This is the day that Dustin is supposed to plead guilty Based on the information Greg gave. He shows up at court and says, I don't think I'm gonna plead guilty anymore.

[B]

I think I'm just gonna go ahead and fight this.

[A]

He said, I don't think you have the witnesses. He told his attorney that there was a rumor that Nicholson had taken off and skipped town. So he doesn't think he's gonna be testifying against him. Then he gives his attorney a VHS tape.

[B]

Oh, Washington.

[A]

Yes. On this VHS tape is Barney's Greatest Hits. He's like, why are you showing me this? He's like, well, it's 1993. I really feel like you should know this. Do you have kids? No. He gives him a VHS tape of UB40's greatest hits. That's what Red Red wine. Red Red Wine's on it and everything else. Fucking. It's Nicholson. A tape of Nicholson saying Dustin was not guilty of these charges against him and that he had made up everything he said to get himself out of trouble. It's a recanting of all that he'd done before. It's a videotape of Nicholson sitting in his living room giving this. In Laurie Duncan's living room, giving this speech. Okay, not guilty. Now, the judge has no. After a while here, there has no choice but to. They don't have a case anymore. They have one witness. That's the case. And they need him to verify everything. You gotta have the witness. So that's kind of in limbo. Now then, on November 3, 1993, Terry de Guise or De Guise or whatever, their other drug dealer here, he's reported missing on November 5, 1993. So they basically had. The government was still looking into dust and trying to find avenues to get in without Nicholson as a witness. But now they were turning to De Geese and trying to bust him, basically, and get him to flip. Dustin had told his friend Cut Comp. That he was worried about De Geese testifying against him.

[B]

Oh.

[A]

Dustin believed De Geese had been subpoenaed to appear before a grand jury. Just like Nicholson was. So on this day of November 5th, De Geese drops his 10 year old daughter off at his mother's house and told his mother that he was going to meet his former girlfriend, Angela Johnson. Oh yes. De Geese said he would return shortly to pick up his daughter and he never came back. But we know that he was supposed to go out and meet Angela Johnson like in the middle of nowhere somewhere.

[B]

So weird.

[A]

Okay, now, early 1994. Okay. While cleaning a bedroom closet, Gabatz is the woman's name. She's the woman who that Angela Johnson keeps leaving her kid with and borrowed her car and does all that gobats now, she discovers a large black handgun with an attached silencer in a cosmetics bag belonging to Angela Johnson. Her makeup bag.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

I was looking for that blue eyeshadow I love so much, but I found this instead.

[B]

I found my 9 millimeter with a suppressor silencer. Is that legal there? It can't be, right? That's federally legal, illegal.

[A]

I don't know. Who knows? Silencers? Yeah, I don't.

[B]

Iowa, right?

[A]

I doubt it. Not outside of a range, probably, unless.

[B]

You have a tax stamp.

[A]

But something. I don't know how it works. 93, especially 90, we still had, we still had gun laws. Like you still. You couldn't buy a machine gun in 1993. No, no, we had assault weapons bans back then. Yeah, yeah, yeah, they, that's, that's when they put them in that Brady bill was passed and all that shit. So Gabat's calls Angela Johnson to say, you gotta get this gun out of my house. I don't want this gun in my house. Johnson said, hey, don't worry about the gun. Dustin will take care of it.

[B]

Oh really?

[A]

Yeah, I wanna put him involved in this too. So just so you know, now that winter, Dustin went to Cut Comp and the two of them destroyed a large black pistol. They used a torch to cut and melt the gun into a number of unrecognizable pieces, which they drove way out to the middle of nowhere and threw pieces in different ditches along county roads hours away in the middle of Iowa, never to be found again. Just a hunk, irrecognizable hunk of metal sitting in a ditch somewhere. No one cares.

[B]

Fascinating.

[A]

It's a wild way to do it. March of 1995, the drug charges against Dustin are dismissed because Greg Nicholson cannot be found and recant. Yeah, that's it. Dismissed. So that's against Dustin. And Cut Comp are dropped. And so they said, awesome, let's rebuild our meth empire.

[B]

Sure.

[A]

Let's do it. So they did it. They landed a job packing. This is a crazy thing. It sounds like a joke almost. It sounds like I'm saying they're packing fudge, but they're not. They're packing pudding. They're making pudding cups, I think. Yeah, that sounds awesome. I want to make pudding cups.

[B]

Packing pudding.

[A]

Oh, they're packing some pudding at a local factory. And they would also, at night, cook meth. Sure. They had a garage lab that they set up now. I guess it was cut comp's idea to restart the drug business, according to Dustin. Dustin says this. Later on, I had a good job and everything. I had kids to think about. Which, by the way, by now, he's got a kid with Angela Johnson.

[B]

Oh, Jesus. Of course.

[A]

Of course. Of course he does. I had kids to think about. I just didn't want to get back into it. But Tim's sitting there saying, I need the money. You know, I need the money back out of this. And I'm his best friend, so I. You know, and I know it was a huge mistake, but I said I'd help him out as much as I could. So Dustin agreed to set up the meth lab in the garage of his home at 1104 16th Street Northeast, Mason City, which is the same place that he had done it before. Yeah. Now, February 7, 1996, cops execute a search warrant at his home and seize the lab again. Oh, they know you're doing it. Stop. It's a small town. Stop cooking meth there in the same house that you cooked it before.

[B]

They know what you're doing.

[A]

You fucking.

[B]

They're on to you.

[A]

Yeah. So how'd they find out about this meth lab? Besides, there's a guy named Dan Cobean. C O B E E N. And in early 1996, Dan Cobin they took on as a third partner. Now, they didn't know that at the time. Cobine was currently. At the time they took him on cooperating with the government and its investigation of Dustin and Cutcom. That leads to the raid of the home and everything else. And Cutcom said they both tried to destroy evidence located at the home of Honkin's two different girlfriends as well of Dustin's girlfriends. Now, Dustin, he says, you know, they didn't know Cobain was a confidential informant, but he said, I didn't want to make that stuff. Dustin said, no, no, it was bad. It's evil, man. I don't want to do that. He said, I Can honestly say that. And that's why Mr. Cobin came into the picture. I figured he could help Mr. Kumcoff, cut comp, take over my part. Tim was upset, meaning Cut Comp. I mean, really upset. He didn't trust the guy, but it was the money that made him upset. We were going to go 50, 50, and with three guys, it would be a third and a third and a third and a third of a third. So three guys, you get a third. I finally told Tim that Mr. Cobine could have half of my share. So it was going to be 25, 25, 50, and Tim was going to get his 50% cut comp, right?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So that's the way it works. February 7, 1996, is the search of the meth lab of Honkin's house. There they seize a methamphetamine laboratory with chemicals and equipment as well as paper notes and books on manufacturing drugs and books on how to bind and gag prisoners as well.

[B]

Oh, weird.

[A]

Mixed in with the, you know, with the how to make meth shit and stuff like that. Chemistry books. Now, April of 1996 is when they are officially arrested Cut Comp and Dustin Honkin for meth trafficking. This is from. They said from 93 to 96. So it's. It's after they arrested them the first time to now, because those charges are all gone, because whatever. So this, by the way, the arrest comes on the same day that the White House announces a national strategy to fight meth. So I think this might have been a federal. We're gonna do a bunch of stuff today. So they're arrested and charged in federal court. Dustin said he believed that Cobain was not the confidential informant at the time. He was telling Cut Comp, it's not him, it's somebody else. He said, I just kept saying, it's not Cobain. It's not Cobain. I'm telling you, it's not him. Just chill out. He was telling Cutcomp. Yeah, he said. So Cut Comp's detention hearing was a couple days before mine. And he comes back and he says, I told you it was Cobean man, because then they have to reveal the source. He said, I felt awful. I'm the one that brought him in and Tim didn't want it. And now he's the one that's the confidential informant. So he felt like I brought the.

[B]

Whole real Donnie Brasco and left it to him.

[A]

You are fucked. Yeah. You're the one sitting there going, oh.

[B]

No, what did I do?

[A]

Yeah, I got cancer to prick. It's in the record books. Yeah, Cancer to prick.

[B]

Leave my rings and at home.

[A]

Now I gotta leave my rings and all my jewelry at home? What am I gonna do with that? Ah. Donnie boy, what are you doing to me? Ah, come on. So they. They.

[B]

Yeah. Yeah, I'd buy.

[A]

Yeah, I'd buy a boat. Yeah. Who doesn't want a boat?

[B]

Why you keep talking about the boat? Leave me alone about the boat.

[A]

Forget about the boat. So they make bail. But Cutconf is weighing his options. Is he gonna be as lucky this time as he was last time?

[B]

Yeah. Can it be?

[A]

Is someone gonna fucking just, you know, disappear? And then he doesn't have to do this. So he starts worrying that Dustin's gonna link him to the missing informants. He's like, dustin could flip on the whole thing and say, it's all me.

[B]

No.

[A]

Then I'm fucked. Yeah. So he's like, huh? And he said, this isn't good. So he turns state's witness and wears a wire while they're out on pretrial release. Oh, and this is the last guy that Dustin suspects. So he doesn't. He's not suspicious at all. Throughout hours of tape, Dustin would compare the electricity of killing to the excitement before a rivalry football game.

[B]

Really?

[A]

How exciting it was at one point he said, quote, once you go a certain distance, there's no turning back. Or, quote, there ain't no turning back. Sorry. That's what he said. He fantasized out loud about destroying evidence, buying a gun, and eliminating and killing the investigators. And we have a list of the ones he wants to kill. Oh, also Dan Cobine, a work friend of his, and somebody else that he called a rat as well.

[B]

Yeah. Just kill the whole town.

[A]

Yeah. He said, quote, I've climbed far bigger hills than that little hill. Even if I'm in prison for 15 years, whatever. When I get out, he's still dead. So it's fine. I can wait. I'm patient, man. Yeah, it's all good. When Cutkamp expressed concern over killing witnesses, you know, Cause it's an FBI. He's wired, so he can't be like, yeah, let's do it. He said that Dustin said they had, quote, we put ourselves in, or they put themselves in that position. The people we need to kill, hey, it's not our fault. They're. They're rats. He said, quote, they made me choose between my family and them. I'm sorry, but that ain't no choice. You kill them.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

Wow. When Cut Comp asked Dustin. If that bothered him, he replied, quote, nope, never, never think about it, never. Never dream about it, never nothing. Thought I'd have nightmares, but never. Don't give a fuck.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Don't come. Yep. The affidavit of a special agent of the DEA includes analysis of tape conversations between Timothy Cutcomp and Honkin. Obviously, Cut Comp was cooperating. According to the affidavit, Dustin told Cut Compton he'd be able to get Cut Comp off and eliminate some of his own charges by killing witnesses or. Or by eliminating evidence. Dustin said he planned to circumvent electronic monitoring and told Cut Comp he had a quiet weapon. A quiet weapon that fired 1420 armor piercing rounds of ammunition per minute.

[B]

That's a lot.

[A]

That's like the Jesse Ventura Predator gun. Like those Gatling guns.

[B]

Yeah, you gotta have a. You gotta. It's gotta be belt fed to shoot that many.

[A]

That's what I mean. Belt fed and on a constant. You know the electronic ones where you go and they spin and take down the whole forest.

[B]

That's what you need so much.

[A]

That's not quiet. No armor pierce. No, that's not quiet. He said it's a quiet. Various sources cited said that they alleged that Dustin also made death threats against an informant. Also against a former DEA agent, an Iowa Department of Narcotics enforcement agent and two government chemists who are working on the case. Basically anybody in his court document that he saw was involved, he threatened to kill. He want to kill all those.

[B]

They're all dying. Yeah.

[A]

If you kill all of them, they have to dismiss the charges. In conversations in the affidavit here, Cut Comp told Dustin that he worried about what happened in 1993 because Cutkamp helped dispose of a gun. He told an agent with the Federal Drug Enforcement Agency that Honkin asked him to help destroy a gun. In late 1993, after the disappearance of De Geese, their friend there, Cutcom drew a picture of the gun which he said had been purchased in July 1993 by Angela Johnson, which we know happened. The affidavit indicates that the drawing closely resembled the type of gun purchased by the girlfriend. And when the two men were granted a pretrial release, Dustin began trying to destroy evidence that the government had seized in the raid. He believed. Dustin believed that seized chemicals were being held at a Bondurant hazardous waste firm. So he's gonna break into the police evidence and destroy the evidence against himself?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

That is while he's arrested, right? Yeah. He's on pretrial release on Bailey.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So he's gonna break into an evidence lab and steal all of his shit back. This is meth thinking is what this is.

[B]

But that's where they keep everything that's against me. So if I get in there, I can just erase it.

[A]

I can just destroy it all and then they'll have no case and everything's fine. If I kill everybody and break into their evidence building and steal all the evidence, then they can. Like, this is childish meth thinking. This is crazy.

[B]

Pretty nuts, yeah.

[A]

This is insane behavior. So he testified or later on will testify that that's what he wanted to do. Cutkampf said that Dustin developed a plan to break into the place and destroy the evidence. He had a plan. But Dustin also believed that the evidence may have also been held in a Chicago warehouse. Oh, shit. So that's gonna be even harder.

[B]

It may not be there, but.

[A]

So he said, but no, I got a plan for that too. He goes, I can't break into the Chicago warehouse because it's a lot bigger and has better security. But there's a way still. Okay, this one, I'll just break in. It's small time. I'll steal my shit. But he said I'd have to destroy the entire warehouse in Chicago. There's no way to get into it. So he cut comp. Said, quote, Dustin said we could make a bomb similar to the Oklahoma City bomb.

[B]

Oh, shit.

[A]

Which had the bombing that just happened the year before or whatever.

[B]

Yeah, right, right, right.

[A]

A Timothy McVeigh bomb.

[B]

We're talking about a rider truck packed with horseshit.

[A]

Yeah, we can park it outside, blow the building up. Then all the evidence will be gone.

[B]

Everything's gone.

[A]

So based on all these tapes, the court revokes Dustin's pre trial release, obviously, and sticks him in the jail in Sioux City, Iowa. Sitting here stupid and fucking stew for a while while incarcerated. Dustin, who's a skinny little nerdy dork, has to tell the other. He has to brag to the other prisoners so they don't think he's a punk, you know what I mean? So he's gotta brag.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So like an idiot, he admits to anybody who will fucking listen to him in there that he kills witnesses to avoid charges.

[B]

He said that?

[A]

Tells everybody in jail this. All sorts of people with charges pending that they love to get out of. He gives them shit to say he went into great detail about murders he's committed to kill witnesses. He also began planning in front of people the murders of Cobean and cut computer telling a Fellow inmate to kill Cut Comp and providing directions to his house because he was getting out soon. So he tried to hire this man. Here's directions. Go kill him. Together with another inmate, Dustin then attempts to escape the jail.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

By breaking a hole in the wall of a cell and arranging for Angela Johnson to deliver a hacksaw and a rope to him.

[B]

Yeah. Is he gonna put a paper mache head in this?

[A]

Put a poster over it is how it works. Yeah. The jailers discover the hole and the whole thing gets. He didn't get it all completed first before it got discovered.

[B]

He didn't put a picture of Jacqueline Bassett. Who was it?

[A]

I can't remember. The poster. Yeah, it was some movie poster. So the tapes that they have definitely imply that Dustin is involved in the disappearance of Greg Nicholson, Terry De Geese, Laurie Duncan, Candy Amber, everybody. He's also heard discussing how he can beat his surveillance. Electronic surveillance methods and methods to make sure that key witnesses, including cobean and government agents, wouldn't testify. When asked about the tapes later, Dustin said, quote, pretty damaging stuff. I agree.

[B]

Doesn't look good for me. Yeah.

[A]

But he said he was worried that his pretrial release would be yanked if he reported his conversations with Cut Comp to the authorities. So he's like, yeah, Terry was bringing stuff up. Cut Comp was bringing stuff up. And, you know, I was just going along with him and, you know, I was worried that, you know, I wasn't the one that was meanwhile, yeah, he's being set up. You're being set up, dummy. Certainly he's trying to say he was just worried and didn't want Cut Comp to be mad at him. So he was just going along with it. He said, I was real worried that Tim was going to do something to Cobain if he really flipped. If he's really flipped out and he goes off and kills someone, I mean, they're going to get both of us. It's my charge too. He said, I was just pacifying him until that chemical report came back because I knew our lab was not big time by any means. So at a detention hearing, prosecutors attempt to link Dustin to the disappearance of De Geese earlier to try to establish that he is a danger to society. If you let him out, he's gonna try to tie up loose ends here. Now, in June, Angela Johnson's home gets searched. Chemicals used to manufacture meth are seized from a storage shed at her house as well. So she's been holding stuff so they can arrest her for that. Now, June of 1997, Dustin is going to plead guilty to conspiracy to manufacture and distribute methamphetamine. He's got no choice. They got him dead to rights.

[B]

That's a problem.

[A]

So 1997 is his federal sentencing and they bring out shitloads of people to testify against him. Twelve witnesses called in one day. Seven of them were co workers at Kraft General Foods. You know, where he was packing pudding before and after his 96 arrest and drug raid of his home. A number of the people employ, a number of these employees said that Dustin attempted to purchase a gun while on electronic monitoring bracelet after his arrest. And they also said that Honkin wanted to give the gun or wanted the gun for a girlfriend who was moving to Des Moines. You know, he moved to Des Moines. You got to be packing. Obviously.

[B]

Gotta watch out. It's dangerous.

[A]

Oh, man. Tough up there in Des Moines. One guy said, Dustin asked me to buy a pistol for him for his girlfriend. And he said he bought a pistol and told Dustin he could pick it up. But Dustin never picked it up. This guy said, Dan Cobain also is there. This is a lot of. This is a guy who was involved. He's the third partner. He was also a confidential informant the whole time. And he said, quote, this is Cobein. He had heard I was trustworthy and a little on the crazy side. That's. He said why he was approached for the drug business because he said, you know, I thought I could protect him and shit. Under questioning though, Cobein admitted that he had only seen a gram total of methamphetamine when he was with Dustin.

[B]

A gram? That's it?

[A]

Yeah. Hadn't seen a big pile of methamphetamine in a big giant lab work.

[B]

It's about a gram's all right.

[A]

Yep. And Cobain said that he did not claim $7,000 on his tax income form in 1996, which is what he was making from them. The money was given to Cobean by federal agents who were concerned for his safety after Hankins arrest and pretrial release. So they just gave him money to go hide, basically. And he didn't claim that on his taxes, which he was supposed to. Are you really? I guess. Well, you could probably put in expenses also. Maybe you could write off like a hotel bill or something. I don't know how that works. Yeah. Because I guess it's technically like pay for this government at that point.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Now, another prisoner here. The judge hears testimony from a prisoner named Dean Donaldson, a man who claimed that Honkin had hired him to kill Cutkamp, he said. He came to me and said if he got out, he'd pay my girlfriend twice the money back that his bail was. So Donaldson painted an entirely different scenario in court, saying that Dustin wanted him to purchase a night scope for a rifle, go to Cut Comp's house in rural Brit, kill him, then wait for Dustin to get out to pay him up to $10 million from future drug proceeds.

[B]

He is real.

[A]

Kill this guy. Yeah, yeah. And I'll pay you 10 million over time with all the meth I'm gonna sell.

[B]

Really valuing his company very high.

[A]

Yeah. And it seems like he's never been in the meth business for more than six straight months without getting busted.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So he doesn't know how to do that part of it.

[B]

How are you gonna sell $10 million worth of meth and eat a sandwich over that time?

[A]

Yeah. This is like breaking dumb is what this is.

[B]

Yeah, yeah. Breaking bad ideas.

[A]

Yeah. It's bad stuff. So Terry testifies too. Here he says, I'm sorry, Tim. When I say Terry. Jesus Christ. Yeah. He says this quote. Asked how long he'd known Dustin, he said, since the first grade. We were best friends. He told the judge that Cut Comp here that he had joined with the two brothers, Dustin and Jeff, in Arizona in 1992, and they began manufacturing amphetamine. Cutkampf said, my role was to manufacture it. Jeff provided the money, and Dustin did the selling and the researching of how to make it. Early days of their drug operation, they managed to manufactured the drugs out of Cut Comp's residence, and Dustin would deliver the drugs to Nicholson and De Geese to sell in northern Iowa. He said for the next four years, Honkin and Cut Comp were in and out of the drug business because they had legal problems back and forth and all that shit. Cut Comp said Dustin and Greg Nicholson would have been the key witnesses against us. Or Dustin said Greg Nicholson would have been the key witness against us. In July, Dustin contacted me, asked to get together. He told me that Greg hadn't shown up for his court hearing and was missing Greg Nicholson for most of the next 45 minutes in court. Cutkampf tells the court how Dustin dropped hints that he had been responsible for the disappearance of Nicholson and De Geese, both their partners in the summer of 93. Cutkampf said that Dustin asked him what he thought of a scenario in which people were kidnapped, forced to make a videotape exonerating someone of a crime, and then killed. What's your opinion on that.

[B]

What do you think?

[A]

I got an idea. And all the times we're, like, hanging out, driving, doing whatever we're doing. Imagine if I said I'd like to know your thoughts on something. Okay.

[B]

Let's force these people to make videos for us after a kidnapping.

[A]

Suppose somebody's got some dirt on us. What do we do?

[B]

We would obviously acting. Yeah.

[A]

Yeah. Force them to make a statement on videotape. We'd have to make it convincing. So someone's gonna have to know how to edit a little bit. And then. Yeah, then kill them, obviously. Right.

[B]

We don't have to let them go to go recant what they said. We'll just kill him and then just kill him.

[A]

It's easy.

[B]

Word is bond.

[A]

Word is bond, my friend. They said six months later, Cut Comp said that Dustin told him he had a tape in which Nicholson said Dustin wasn't involved in the drug business and that he was sorry for turning him in. That's the videotape he gave his lawyer. But Cutcom testified that he had never seen the tape. Over the next two years, Dustin had asked Cutcom questions ranging from how deep did farm equipment dig down into the earth? To how much it would cost to rent or buy excavating equipment. He said he wanted to continue the drug manufacturing so he could purchase a backhoe or rent one so that he could take care of loose ends. Which is what he told me. Bury shit deep. Cutkampf also testifies during this that he's serving. This is what Cutkampf got for his part in all this. This is in for possibly murders. Definitely lots of Methodist production. All this shit. Four and a half years he got.

[B]

Wow. Sweetheart.

[A]

Four and a half years. As long as he testifies. He admitted his sentence had been cut by at least 60% because of his cooperation with the government's investigation. Yeah. Now, the sentencing options are way different here than it would be for the state. The federal process gives a lot of options here. And just to go through them quickly because this is the type of shit people are curious about here. They said the fact that Dustin's sentencing hearing will last longer than one day is not unusual. Yet the length of the hearing. Yet the length of the hearing that started Monday is they said, quote, this is a US Attorney. Said, this federal court is different than state court. They said this is much different. They're just talking about. He said that judges determine the levels obtained by a man like Dustin when passing a sentence. They have this chart. It was in the newspaper where this chart where you were like, basically like, okay, there's this and that and check this and that. Then you add it all up and see what the sentence is going to be. It's not just out of a whim, like, this guy pissed me off. 40 years. It's very specifically, you can find sentencing.

[B]

Guidelines and do the math and figure out what it's going to be.

[A]

Yep. The more levels, the stronger the sentence. This prosecutor said these levels can be determined by the quantity, obstructing justice, tampering with a witness, the use of a firearm, what role a person took, Was he the leader, was he in charge, things like that. It's all in the chat.

[B]

Got it all with the math formula. And you can figure it out just.

[A]

Like you're making meth. It's a big formula. You put it together and now you're.

[B]

Get your own sentencing recipe.

[A]

Yeah. So the government's trying to establish the dust and assume leadership of a drug manufacturing business that began in 92. And he's involved in not only the distribution of drugs, but disappearance of five people, including two key witnesses and two children. In short, they said the attorneys are trying to show that Dustin would do anything to stay out of prison. But Dustin's attorney elicited testimony that appears to discount the government stand from witnesses. So basically, they always can poke holes in these people's story because everybody testifying against him is a crackhead with their own shit to hide their own deals that were all of these drug things. It's very hard. You can say, yeah, what they're saying is true, but everybody's getting super big deals with decades being cut off their sentences. It's hard to believe somebody at that point that has so much reason to testify, you know, that they're just doing it at the kindness of their heart is a little bit hard to think. So Dustin, during this federal sentencing, he has to talk too. Got him.

[B]

Oh, really?

[A]

Yeah, no choice. He is going to, like I said, plead guilty to one count of conspiracy to manufacture and distribute. Distribute methamphetamine, one count of attempting to manufacture the substance on June 2, 1997 is when he pleads. He said he's willing to do the time for those crimes, but only those crimes. Yeah, he said, quote, I did not lead the operation, nor do I consider it majority. My conduct wasn't right. And I agree that and I regret that. I regret it terribly. But all I'm saying is I should pay for the crimes I committed. And that's all he said. I have nothing to do with the disappearance of the Five people that have been brought up. He said, I never talked to any of them after March of 1993. Well, yeah, because three of them were dead.

[B]

Gone.

[A]

Yeah, dead for four of them. He said, look at both those guys. Look. Both those guys had a lot of reason to run. Meaning Nicholson and de Geese. When talking about the Duncan girls, Laurie and Candy and Amber, he they said his voice rose and was filled with emotion. He said, quote, I'm not a killer. I don't want my kids to ever think that their daddy would do something like that. I did not kill those people. I did not have anything to do with their disappearance. Hey, everybody, Just going to take a quick break from the show to tell you a little bit more about Quince.

[B]

Oh, Quince.com, q U I N C.

[A]

E.com absolutely great place to buy your clothes, man. They're, they're such good stuff, such a great price. And we're getting into the cooler times here now. I mean fall is going to be turned into winter here. You know, you want stuff, you want good stuff, but you want it to be simple and easily accessible. Stuff that looks good, feels good, things you'll actually wear. Quints is how you do that. And quints, they're so good. Quint's pieces make great gifts too, for the season coming up here. This season's lineup is simple but smart and Easy with Quint's $50 Mongolian cashmere sweaters that feel like an everyday luxury. Wool coats that are equal parts stylish and durable. They have denim that nails the fit for everyday comfort all at a fraction of what you expect to and what you think you should pay. You almost feel like you're ah, you're getting one over on them. That's how good the prices are they, what they do here, how they do that. They partner directly with ethical factories and top artisans. And then Quince goes and cuts out that middleman so you get the premium quality stuff at half the cost of other higher end brands. It's great stuff so you can give luxury quality pieces without the luxury price tag. We buy some from Quince all the time. Just got a cool leather jacket that I wore out to dinner the other night. It was good stuff. I know you got your linen. Go to Quint's. It's really great stuff for really great price. You gotta go there, update your wardrobe, get it cooking, guys. Let's do this. Give and get timeless holiday staples that last this season with quints. Go to quints.com smalltown murder for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns now available in Canada too. That's Q U I n c e.com Smalltown Murder Free shipping and 365 day returns. Quince.com Smalltown Murder now back to the show. Yep. He said, I pleaded guilty. And I decided to plead guilty because I'm tired of fighting and I'm determined, even though I could have got given the government a difficult fight at trial, that it was time for me to accept the responsibility for my actions and get on with my life. Yeah, that's right. So that's what he's talking about. He also said I was just naive when I got here. Meaning what about all the people in jail that you told you killed everybody and doing all that? And he said I was just naive when I got here and people just took advantage of that naivete. You know, meth dealing murderers are very naive. You gotta hold them walking through shit. Yeah, you could scam them real easy. I told people what I was accused of and they just ran with it. Yeah, right. You weren't trying to act tough in jail. He said, I mean, think about it. He said, who in their right mind is gonna kill someone, not get paid for years, and then think he's going to get 10 million way down the road after I supposedly set up a drug lab again? Come on, no one's that gullible. No, the point is you thought they were because you're on tape saying it, dummy. You fucking idiot. He was just as adamant that he never planned an escape, even though he was caught with a hole in his cell and a full plan of escape. He said, I have two children, and the fact is, if you escape to make it work, I would never be able to see them. He said, yeah, I'll do life before I leave my children. That's what he said. They go, well, maybe not life, but we got something else for you. You, sir, may fuck off. 24 years in federal prison. Oh. Later extended to 27 years in federal prison.

[B]

Really?

[A]

Yeah. Due to his cooperation. Cut comp, got four and a half years. Okay, now that's just for the drug distribution, though.

[B]

Okay, Then what?

[A]

There's more now in prison. Wow. Jesus Christ. When he goes to prison, he said, you know what I'd like to do? Because there's an article on him in the paper. He said, I'd like to continue my education, you know, in prison.

[B]

Really?

[A]

He said, I don't know if you know this, but I was on the dean's list at North Iowa Area Community College. So I'm pretty. He literally said that they have a dean. A dean. It's just a. That's not his title. It's just a guy named Dean. Yeah. And the students call him Dean. They don't even call him like Mr. So and so. He's a yo Dean. And he's like skateboarding by and he's like, what up, man? Kegger tonight. And they're like, right on, Dean. They give him devil horns and everybody parties.

[B]

He had six or seven favorite guys and I was on that list, you know.

[A]

He said that. He said although his career goals have changed, he said at the time he thought he was gonna be an attorney back in the day. And now he said, quote, I think I've had enough of law. Hahaha. Fucking idiot. But he didn't laugh when asked about his children. The basis of the only conditions he had on granting the interview was whatever. He agreed to the interview on the condition that his children's names and pictures would not be published. He said that the mothers of his three year old daughter and four year old son bring them to Sioux City as often as possible for visits, but that prisoners are only allowed 40 minutes of visitation per week. He said, it's tough. My kids come and it's just like it is today. I sit here, they sit there and there's this window between us. I can't even give my kids a hug. Oh, gee, that's awfully sorry for you there.

[B]

That's what happens when you go to prison usually.

[A]

Now, speaking of people who can't. Kids who can't get a hug, they're still missing posters and people looking for Greg and Laurie and Amber and Candy. So people are still looking for them. And there's people who still hope they're alive, which is crazy. Laurie's grandmother, I'm sorry, the kid's grandmother, I think the father's mother said she kept their bedrooms and their dolls and dresses just like they left them. In case they come back.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Meanwhile, it's been years now and they'd be like old enough to whatever, but still just keep it all there. They can do what they want to do. Investigators are very sure that Dustin is involved. There's too many coincidences, but they can't find anything or they don't know anything. So September 11, 1997, based on a tip, they excavate a property in Hancock County. Looking for people. They dig up this whole thing. Fucking property, man. It's like a farm.

[B]

Yeah. Cause he was looking for how deep can you dig with they destroy this.

[A]

Place, they find nothing.

[B]

Nothing.

[A]

Not a goddamn thing. Then summer of 2000, okay, Angela Johnson, we remember her, she's in some trouble. The cops hear that. Johnson feels knows that the law is closing in on her, so she's about to skip town. So the cops indict her with charges of aiding and abetting in the murders of Nicholson, Duncan, Candy Amber and Terry De Geese, her ex boyfriend. They said they had enough evidence to believe she had something to do with the murders, but they don't think she obviously was the trigger man or anything. But she must have had something to do. She's a member. But they at least needed the bodies. This is right now, it's no body, no crime. Yeah, because they don't even. They're not positive they're dead, so.

[B]

Yeah, and they're not ne. I mean, the girls and the mom are pretty well reliable, but a flighty meth head?

[A]

You don't know two flighty meth heads, who knows where they are?

[B]

Yeah, yeah, and that's the problem.

[A]

And you might be able to convince a jury that maybe this woman and her two children ran off with this guy that has her all smitten and he needed to get out of town. She said, we'll come with you. They could be in Mexico right now. You never know. So you can't really charge it. It's too hard.

[B]

Guy alone looks suspicious sometimes. But you got a gal and two girls. That's a family is what that means.

[A]

That's all. Maybe they're down there just having. Drinking milk with dinner, going to church.

[B]

They're just taking a trip down to Cabo right now.

[A]

That's it. So October 2000, okay? Now, Angela Johnson has no criminal history and doesn't know shit about jail. And now she's in jail, okay? So she really could use a friend to help her with the finer points of prison and what to do. Luckily for her. Now, I don't know what kind of jail this is. I know it's a federal facility, but they apparently have men and women housed in the same cell blocks next to each other.

[B]

Really.

[A]

Which seems really like a bad idea, right?

[B]

20, 25, that's happening.

[A]

Or I guess 2000. Yeah, 2000s going on.

[B]

That's too late for that.

[A]

There's a guy in the cell next to her named Robert Jean McNeese. Bobby McNeese. Which is. That's the rejected song title of janis Joplin. Bobby McNeese. No, that doesn't sound very good, does it? No. We'll fix It. I'll fix it later. I don't know. Tentatively, me and Bobby McNeese, we'll figure the rest out later. So she needed. I guess. And she said, you know, what can I do to get through all this and everything? And he said, oh, I'll help you. Sure, no problem. Now he's a career criminal doing a life sentence.

[B]

That's who she talked to.

[A]

Yeah. Attempting to import $5 million worth of heroin and morphine. He got busted doing this while he was already in prison on bank robbery charges.

[B]

International smuggling and bank robbery. Yeah. All right.

[A]

He's in prison, he's like, I could use a legal fund. Here's what we do.

[B]

I'll bet you he makes a kick ass Doritos pizza in prison.

[A]

Oh, so well, so good. He knows how to fucking. He knows how to make a water. Knows how to make a hot plate out of some wires coming out of the wall. He's got it all. Now. The thing is, that was. And he gets busted for those two. Then after he gets sentenced for that, apparently he has friends in the New York mafia who. Wow. They wanted to run a something taking drugs from New York to Cedar Rapids and have a big drug thing. So they contacted this guy for help, and he gets busted for that too.

[B]

Holy shit.

[A]

My Christmas.

[B]

So can you do anything and get away with it?

[A]

Apparently not. Not from jail. It's really hard to do shit from jail and get away with it. They monitor all of your shit so it's.

[B]

He could get away with it out when it was a freeman.

[A]

Fuck no. He gets caught for everything, this guy. So jail officials catch on and they're like, dude, we're gonna put you under the jail. Like, what are you doing? So he decides to cooperate. Yes. Now he's gonna cooperate. Okay. So apparently he shouted, said through the cell wall, hey, how you doing? I'm so and so. What's your name? We're in here together, we might as well talk. And they would pass notes through the food slot in his door. Him and Angela striking up a friendship. They talked about just being locked up and stories of their childhood just getting to know each other. Real casual. He wasn't asking her like, so how many people did you kill to get in here? Small talk, small talk. Now, at first, Angela was reluctant to talk about her crimes, but when she got closer and closer to McNiece here, knowing that he's a lifer, he's got nothing to gain from this. Whatever. So she's like, huh, that's interesting. It's interesting. So he said, okay. Also, he offers her something. He says, listen, I'm in the drug business and I did all this. I'm in here for life without. I'm fucked up. I am going nowhere. Yeah, I'm going nowhere. Why don't you tell me what you did and I'll take the rap for it. Oh, you tell me what you did and I'll go to the cops and say, I had people do that.

[B]

I did that. It's crazy.

[A]

Yeah. You need to tell me all the details, though, so I can tell them what I did. Oh, yeah, and transfer those details to other people. That way you'll get out of here. And what are they going to do to me? Nothing.

[B]

I'm already here forever.

[A]

I'm already fucked. So she said, that sounds great. Let me tell you all the bad.

[B]

Things I did, you dumb bitch.

[A]

You fucking dummy. And this is through stuff. So he's writing down notes as she's talking because he needs to have it to memorize it in his mind. He's like, I need to memorize this stuff so I can tell the cops. I got to write it down. There's also recorded conversations where she details everything. Details how all five people were killed, what they were wearing and where they were killed. Okay. She said in the summer of 93 that Dustin had borrowed a friend's car to drive around to look for Nicholson, who was the turn informant guy. They found him in July. They said they knew where he was in July. They knew he was at Laurie Duncan's house. They were just trying to get him alone. So after a few attempts to get him alone and with the hearing coming up in five days that he would have had to plead guilty at Dustin, he said we had to do it. So Johnson posed as a lost Avon lady. Yeah, she had a big cosmetics bag with her, dressed up real nice. Knocked on the door and said, God, Laurie Duncan answered. God love it.

[B]

I'm just lost.

[A]

Gosh darn it. Can't find my client. She's waiting on some rouge and I'm lost. This is terrible. Poor lady, she knocked on the door and said, do you mind if I take a look at your phone book so I could look up this lady's address to make sure that it's right. Make sure maybe I have the wrong address. I might have taken it down wrong over the phone. And she's carrying a demonstration bag with the cosmetics and all that and really seems like an Avon lady. And she said, I have an appointment to give a demonstration. I'm uncertain of the Address. I don't want to blow this client off. And Laurie said, of course, come on in. You can come in my house. She comes in right behind her, hiding off to the side. Dustin bursts into.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

Okay. Now, once the door is open, they say that both of them now dropping the ruse. Angela also springs into action, and they start taking over this house. Um, the plan was to force Greg Nicholson to make a videotape statement exonerating Dustin, which they did, as we know, because she gave. Gave it to his goddamn lawyer there. But apparently Johnson helped bind the two adults, gagged them with a pair of the girl's small green socks. The detail she gave then. This is sick. This is fucking sick. This fucking asshole lady. This. Angela Johnson took the two girls upstairs. You could have taken them upstairs and said, Mommy said, you guys have to play up here for a while.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And then left and left them there. You could have done that.

[B]

Yeah. You have to watch the new Disney movie on tape. Yeah.

[A]

You need. You got a Little Mermaid in there. Perfect. Did fucking Aladdin come out yet? 93. It's just about to come out of it.

[B]

It's pretty close. Yeah.

[A]

Lion King is that era. It's all that time. So the watch in the Line of Fire, it just came out here. Just sit down and watch that Clint Eastwood. He plays a grizzled Secret Service agent. I think you're gonna like it.

[B]

Enjoy. Cliffhanger. It's the worst movie that's ever been in. But just sit still.

[A]

Oh, he's hanging off a mountain. It's gonna be great.

[B]

And a helicopter.

[A]

She takes the two kids upstairs and tells them, hey, kids, we have so much fun. We're going on a surprise trip with mommy and everything, so pack some stuff. And the kids are like, oh, yay. And they're packing clothes. And bring your swimsuit. Don't forget they're bringing their swimsuit. This is going to be so much fun. We're going away. We're going on a surprise trip. So that she actually made these girls pack some shit. And then everybody got out. Everyone's forced at gunpoint into the car. Angela and Dustin drove the 10 minutes from Laurie's house to a wooded area outside of Mason City. Jesus Christ. So they're bound and gagged. At this point, I would think Laurie is just thinking, how do I get them to let my kids go? Probably. What else? And why am I even. What's going on is also the other thing. I don't even know who the fuck these people are.

[B]

What happened? Yeah.

[A]

Yeah. How did this happen? So this is fucking crazy. Apparently it's just Dustin and Johnson and these four people. So apparently Dustin gets Mom, Laurie and Greg Nicholson out of the car first, leaves Angelo with the kids in the car. And Dustin walks the two adults into the woods. And Johnson hears gunshots. And then this is what Johnson said. Then he came back and got the children and walked them away. And she heard more shots, by the way. There was an already dug grave out there.

[B]

How big?

[A]

Big enough for all four of them.

[B]

All of them? Ah, Jesus.

[A]

They bury all four of them together, one on top of another. But this is how much this was planned. They went out, dug a fucking grave, then went to their house with the cosmetics bag, dressed up in a fucking, you know, business suit and all that shit. This is insane. This is the most premeditated, sickest. And with two little kids that know nothing about anything.

[B]

Over nothing.

[A]

Over nothing. Nothing. The kids knew shit and wouldn't know shit. And they're not even reliable witnesses. You could have easily had them go in a fucking room and shut up. Even if you wanted to be me. Stay in here. Laurie didn't know shit either. She didn't even know she. Greg wasn't telling her the truth.

[B]

Right.

[A]

Greg wasn't telling her the truth. She wouldn't let her stay there, wouldn't let him stay there. She's a good mom. She's not gonna let this fucking meth shit.

[B]

Yeah, maybe Greg is a decent method. It's probably just like I'm not telling or anything. That'll just endanger.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, which he should have not gone near anybody.

[B]

Probably should have let her know, by the way, I'm endangering the fuck out of your children just by being here.

[A]

Yeah. If you're Steve Martin and the Jerk and the cans are exploding all around you, you don't say to someone, hey, come stand next to me. Like, that's bad, you know, Bring your kids over here. Bring your kids. Let them stand in front of the oil cans. So that's disgusting. So they are all shot and fell right in the grave like. Like the. Like the fucking Chinese army disposing of dissidents. Like, it's hideously disgusting. So a few weeks later, Angela Johnson lured De Guise, who's her ex boyfriend, out to a country club, saying she wanted to get back together with him.

[B]

What's her fucking deal, man?

[A]

Dude, she is. She's just as evil as he is. He found the perfect fucking accomplice. Someone who doesn't look dangerous, who can put an Avon bag In her shoulder and get into somebody's house. Someone who can.

[B]

She seemingly enjoys this shit.

[A]

If she doesn't, she really has a weird way of showing it because she keeps doing it. So she, I guess, met him at a country club and said she wanted to get back together. Then they drove to an abandoned house where she said they were gonna go. Wanted to go have sex there.

[B]

Oh, Jesus.

[A]

And guess who's at the house waiting for them.

[B]

Who's there?

[A]

It's Dustin. Where he beat, tortured and shot de Guise and buried him. Wow. They said. She said this is the informant in the next cell. She said she had helped him kill these people and she always helped him get whatever he needed done. Why? What does this guy have on you?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Other people have meth, right?

[B]

What's he getting? Is that all it is, is he's getting her meth? That's got to be the whole thing, right?

[A]

At first it was meth, but, like, it's. It's been years. What are we doing? Yeah.

[B]

Now it's sex and accomplice. And she's. She's got to be having fun at this. She feels dangerous.

[A]

She does. Also, I don't know if she feels. One thing Dustin seems to know is how to manipulate people.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So I wonder if he can tell what her background is and exactly how to manipulate her.

[B]

Yeah, she's easy to see.

[A]

You always act like you're gonna protect her and she'll do anything in the fucking world for you.

[B]

Pull these strings, babe.

[A]

Yeah, protect me. Make sure nobody tries to do an exorcism on me and I'm yours forever.

[B]

She did go through all that, so.

[A]

That'S what I feel like. Especially if she was, you know, abused sexually and everything like that. All he has to go is, I'll protect her. You.

[B]

Nobody will ever hurt you again.

[A]

No one's ever going to hurt you again. Not while I'm around.

[B]

Right.

[A]

And I think that's what she gets into. I mean, I'm not a doctor, so maybe not. She might just really love meth. This is.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

He might wear just the right amount of Drakkar noir in the 90s. That makes her. Makes her drip down her pant legs the closest. I don't know. I just know I'm thinking 90s Colognes.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Drakkar or Paco or one of those fucking things. So now, Cut Comp here, after Dustin Hankins arrest, Cut Comp talks about, first of all, in the court documents, they know that they were discussing killing Cobene, killing law enforcement Agents killing everybody. Cut Comp also tells the court that Dustin was reluctant to involve Angela Johnson in any efforts to kill Cobean because she was, quote, a hothead and just wanted to go or just wanted to go. Do it. Just do it.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Apparently Angela's the one wanting to kill everybody, according to. And this is like said behind the scenes, not for the, you know, cops or anything like that. He told his friend, Jesus, I don't even want to involve her. She gets too crazy.

[B]

She loves this.

[A]

She's fucking bloodthirsty.

[B]

Calm down, honey bunny.

[A]

Yeah, that's what they are. They're beginning a fucking pulp fiction. So anyway, it's crazy shit. Now the authorities now, by the way, there's maps drawn. Based on what they're told, they draw maps. The guy basically the guy in the jail cell has Angela Johnson draw maps so he can't confess to it. Unless he knows exactly where the bodies are. They're not gonna believe him. So now he has hand drawn maps that she drew to the bodies.

[B]

Oh, boy.

[A]

Couldn't have more evidence against these people. Now searching for the bodies here, cops use sonar technology and dogs obviously to dredge the area that is indicated on the map. But it's such a big area. It still took them three days to find anything.

[B]

Wow.

[A]

And they finally found they had to one spot. They had to remove tires, tree roots and a huge opossum burrow underground. A big fucking tunnel under there to get to what they finally find are Nicholson, Duncan, Laurie, Duncan and Candy and Amber all in the same hole. This is also. There's livestock remains buried nearby. So pretty obvious the livestock remains were.

[B]

To throw off the dogs and such.

[A]

Yeah. They start digging like, oh, there's a cow here. That's why we smell that. Moving on to the next area. But no, they weren't. They find Nicholson on top. And beneath him in the hole were Laurie. And then the two daughters were at the bottom of the hole. This is horrifying. Put them in first. Everyone had been shot at least once at close range, execution style. Back of the head. Amber was still wearing her swimsuit from slip and sliding.

[B]

No way.

[A]

Can you fucking believe? And the. The meal on the table was the picnic that mom prepared.

[B]

Dirty.

[A]

She came home all excited from slip and sliding with a fucking little bathing suit on. And fucking all happy and, you know, hair wet. That is disgusting. She had a T shirt pulled over her face and Candy was wearing her sundress that she loved. And so still in the same clothes. The adults had been bound and gagged. And shot multiple times each. The girls had each been shot once in the back of the head. Imagine that. Imagine who could walk two little kids out to there. First of all, how could you walk them out there? That was enough for me. I couldn't do it then being like, okay, look over there, kids. And then shooting them. But that's just one of you with one gun. So you shot one and then the other one knew that that happened. Then you had to shoot. That is horrible. It's fucking horrible.

[B]

The first one didn't.

[A]

I can't think of worse.

[B]

But the second one saw in the hole. Yeah, saw.

[A]

They saw their sister get shot and then go, oh, no. And then it's coming for me. That's just hard. At least they didn't fucking gag and bind the girls to scare them. At least they probably didn't know it was coming. Except for one split second before it happened with one of them. Fucking hell, that's good. At least they didn't torture the girls. That's helpful. But the adults were bound and gagged and dragged out there. And poor Laurie. What if you're Laurie and you're sitting on the edge of a fucking hole and someone's about to shoot you and you're bound and gagged with your crackhead fucking boyfriend and you know, your kids are in the car back there. What do you think's gonna happen to your kids? You might think maybe they're gonna let the kids go. Who knows? But.

[B]

But they got the kids second and they were on the bottom of the hole. So those kids saw two dead bodies.

[A]

They saw two dead bodies. Or maybe brought them not near the bo. Who knows? Cause it's easy to move a four, a six year old. So maybe they killed him over here. I. Because that would probably freak the kids out. And then you. Then you'd end up having to shoot moving targets. And that's gonna be difficult. So very small ones, Very small moving targets, which. Good luck. So. You know, this is disgusting. Then they keep looking. And about a half mile away, still in this area, they keep going using sonar and all that. They find de Geis as well.

[B]

Oh, he's there too.

[A]

He's there too. Buried separately. And they said at first quote, he died hard.

[B]

What is. Oh, like a beating and then a shot.

[A]

No, he took his shoes off and lost all of his hair and walked on some glass. He died real hard. And so, no, he. Yeah, he fucking. He had a lot done to him. A lot done to him. They discover, wow, that he's also been Shot. And now Nicholson and Duncan were bound gags. Shot multiple times, including once in the head. De Guise. The kids were only shot once each. Single bullet to the back of the head each, I guess. De Geist was found face down in a shallow hole. He'd been shot more than once. His skull was severely fragmented, requiring significant reconstruction to figure out what the fuck happened to him. He was beaten and tortured and shot. The guy's probably saying, what did you tell them? To try to get information out of him. I'm sure he was tortured for that. Now, Johnson, Angela Johnson, this all comes out. That everything you've been telling the guy next door, every details of your crimes is now public fucking knowledge, basically given to the prosecutors. She hears this, she doesn't find out from like police or from the court or from her lawyer. She sees it on tv. Oh, that the kids were found through an informant that fucking talked to Angela in the jail.

[B]

Oh, that's fucked up.

[A]

As soon as she sees that, she goes into her cell, tears a bed sheet, ties it to a railing and attempts to hang herself.

[B]

Oh, not successful.

[A]

I'm fucked. Yeah, they find it and they find her trying to hang herself and they untie her and they go, no, no, stupid. We'll take care of that for you.

[B]

Breathe, Breathe all the air. Breathe.

[A]

We got that. We'll take care of that later. Don't worry. You fucking killed kids for money. This is disgusting. Like, you can't be any grosser for money, though. Profit.

[B]

For what money? The whole thing is so gross.

[A]

Yeah, for this, like, theoretical meth empire that you might build if you didn't get arrested every three days. Because that's the problem. You can't. You're idiots. So July 2001 indictments charged both Dustin and Angela Johnson with federal murder charges. Because this is all in the covering up of a federal drug thing. This is a big deal. Dustin is sent to Florence, Colorado.

[B]

Oh, big one.

[A]

To that penitentiary where this. Cause he's already convicted for the drug charges Supermax. Where he became convinced that he's gonna be charged with the murders. And he is. Pretty quickly, he said that he planned to call his associates as witnesses in Sioux City. This is wild. If tried for the murders, he told somebody in jail, this here's my plan. This is what I'm gonna do. They're gonna have to bring me back to Iowa. Right? We're gonna go to Iowa. I am gonna have my lawyer put a bunch of my boys on the witness list. Okay.

[B]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[A]

So they're all gonna Come to court to be on the witness list, and they're subpoenaed. They have to be there. But what we're gonna do is I'm gonna have them overpower the guards, kill them, and then we'll all escape.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Totally doable, right? Totally doable.

[B]

This has not ever been considered ever. No.

[A]

How many action movies does this guy watch? And he's like, yeah, yeah, that'll work. That could. That could work.

[B]

I'm going to do this. I'm going to put all 13 of oceans on there, and then. And then just have them all come on the same day and assume that.

[A]

They'Re also going to be, like, this perfect ninja fighting force together to kill multiple armed people, Many armed especially with, you know, a federal charge and murder and all that. They're gonna have more than one guard there. It's not just gonna be some old guy with a big fat belly falling asleep with an old dog next to him in the back of the room.

[B]

It's guys that are gonna be super cool with breaking out with the key on the wall. Yeah. Kidnapping, baby murderer, meth chef.

[A]

Yeah, totally.

[B]

They're gonna love me. Yeah.

[A]

Yeah. Well, those are his boys.

[B]

He said they all want me out and they can't wait for me to get home.

[A]

I'm so picturing the old west sheriff there with some guy with a broomstick trying to get the king, you know, ring off, keyring off the wall while.

[B]

A dog barks at him.

[A]

Basset hounds on the ground just watching you.

[B]

Holy. And they're never gonna have a problem with him ever. They're gonna love him.

[A]

No. So, yeah, he's gonna overpower them after escaping. Then he's gonna kill all the murder witnesses, including someone being held in federal custody. The guy that witnessed Angela's shit. Kill all the cops. And if that's not all the cops that have investigated this because they have information. And just to make sure, kill that damn pesky federal prosecutor who's also prosecuting me. Let's kill everybody.

[B]

Federal agents. Now we're. And. And. Yeah, yeah. Government employees. We're going to get them all, dude.

[A]

John Gotti didn't think to do all this. We can't fucking do that. That's crazy.

[B]

I think I'm. I think I'm gonna die in here.

[A]

I think maybe we'll just get a juror to fucking, you know, vote not guilty. Right. That probably be easier, I think. Right? This is fucking crazy. I'm gonna break out. Do I. He actually had guys willing to do crazy shit for Him, I don't know how many. This guy doesn't have associates willing to murder federal prosecutors for him. That's crazy.

[B]

No.

[A]

So to prepare for their escape, because this wasn't just on a whim, he was actually planning on doing this. This was a real thing he wanted to plan. Dustin and his associates practiced retrieving an officer's weapon, learning how to remove handcuffs with minimal tools, like off of your.

[B]

Hand, like keys and such.

[A]

And he had these guys train in martial arts scenarios encountering centered around encounters with armed people. So if you're next to a guy who's walking with you and he has a holster, this is where you want to attack to get away from literally planning how to break. Dude, this is crazy. Ocean's Eleven is a more realistic plot that you could actually pull off compared to this.

[B]

This is so stupid.

[A]

This is the dumbest fucking thing in the world here. So. Wow, this is Ocean's IQ. 11 is what this is. This is dumb. Now, April 2002, the US judge rules that any evidence found as a result of the informants maps, the maps that that guy made, based on what Angela Johnson told him, is inadmissible against Angela Johnson. So they can't use the map, therefore can't use the bodies that were found. They can only use her statements, which. That sucks. Now, February 2003, the federal prosecutors are arguing that, no, that guy in jail was not a government agent when he obtained the maps. He was just a guy in the fucking cell working on his own to try to get his own shit resolved.

[B]

Okay? Not deputized or anything. We were just allowing him. Yeah, yeah, he just came to us.

[A]

So let us use the maps now. Also, a federal judge that same month denies a request to release the remains of the five victims to the families, saying that they're evidence, which is horrible. You have been. Suppose you're Laurie Duncan's mom. You waved at her one day, then the next day drove to the house and she's gone. And you still haven't fucking seen her yet. You still haven't seen your grandkids yet. And then it's 10 years later and they've been taken out of the ground and held by them. For years, they've been wanting just to have a funeral. For years they've known they were dead and haven't been able to have a funeral. It's horrifying. Can't imagine what that family's going through. That's fucking disgusting. But they said they're evidence and we can't release them. We have to be able to do testing and shit. December 2003, a court of appeals, the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals, rules that prosecutors can use the maps and information from the informant as evidence as well. So now Angela is fucked. Fucked, fucked, fucked. Double fucked.

[B]

It's all coming.

[A]

Yeah. Double fucked. Like a double stuffed Oreo in deep shit. Thick in the middle. June 2004, the remains are finally released to the families here. Finally released. They had to wait all this time, by the way. Nicholson had children and he had life insurance. These children had to wait till now to collect life insurance on him.

[B]

Oh, sweet Jesus.

[A]

Can you imagine? Till June of 2004. He's been dead for 11 years. That's fucking crazy, because with no body found, they said he might not be dead. Obviously. Candy's father, by the way, this is fucking horrible. The kids had two different dads, I guess. Candy's father, at the time she was killed, was in the hospital in a coma.

[B]

From what?

[A]

Doesn't matter. I don't know. Who cares? But he's in a. That just means. I don't know. Yeah, probably car accident, something. But he was in a coma. So he went into a coma with a daughter, came out of a coma. And one of the first things they had to say was, your daughter's missing and has been missing. And we suspect that something bad has happened to her. How long was I asleep for? What the fuck? You know what I mean?

[B]

Back under.

[A]

He said that he'd never get to hug his little girl, never walk her down the aisle. It was horrible. Obviously, they end up having a funeral for Laurie and her two daughters. They bury them all. They have one casket for all three.

[B]

Oh, really?

[A]

Burying them all together. They're just bones at this point, anyway. So they're just kind of putting them all together because they said because they were putting that hole together, they wanted to keep them together, basically. And they thought that Laurie would want to have her kids with her, essentially. So this time, all three are placed in a white casket. There's relatives there. They have a very big, big service at the church. And they play Elvis's Peace in the Valley as they take the bodies out of the church. Because that was her favorite and that was what she wanted at the grave site. She's a veteran, remember?

[B]

Right.

[A]

So then, if that wasn't sad enough, now they do the 21 gun salute, the ceremonially folded flag, which is also very sad stuff.

[B]

They do that.

[A]

I hated that. That's. I mean, it's nice, but it's always something extra sad Yeah, I remember when my grandfather died, them doing the flag thing for my grandmother and being like, ah, I don't like that. I mean, I like it, but it's sad. It's. Yeah, it's sad.

[B]

It's the horn, it's the music being played while that flag is. That's fucked up.

[A]

It is. It's the whole thing and it's the solemnness of it, the way how quiet they are. If they were like, hey, you got the other red. Hey, flip this. Hey, you fucking idiot. It wouldn't be a sad.

[B]

And if they folded it like a beach towel or like it would be.

[A]

Fine, like a big shit. But it's like very efficiently where it's like, I don't like this at all.

[B]

With their white gloves and all that shit.

[A]

Yeah, it's again, don't like it. Cause it's sad. Not because it's not a nice thing to do. It's just sad. They're playing taps, for Christ's sake. It's just sad.

[B]

Tears at your heart.

[A]

So September 2004, Dustin goes on trial. Yeah. He's facing 17 counts ranging from, you name it, witness tampering, murder, everything in between, basically. Now there's some strange points to this case here. The judge, because they found out he wanted to have people come and spring him and kill everybody and go on a murder spree. The judge, U.S. district Judge Mark W. Bennett, receives round the clock protection. He's like escorted into the court. Also, they fear that Dustin might try to escape or harm jurors or their families as well. He'll do anything they said to get out of this. So they enacted other extensive security measures here, including sealing jurors identities and picking them up at a secret location before busting them into the courthouse. So no one knows who they are or where they come from, which is crazy. So there's an anonymous jury. Also, he has to wear a stun belt, a shock belt under his clothing, like Lori Valo did. Same thing. That's very common. It's under your clothes so it doesn't look like whatever.

[B]

She's the first one I've heard about with it. That's amazing. Like a fucking invisible fence.

[A]

Oh, it's great. Yeah, like a dog. She's gonna accept. Not mean, because this is a murderer. So yeah, not as cruel. It's a dog. They can't help what they're doing. Leave them alone.

[B]

But this yike might be comical.

[A]

Well, what's even more comical is he's also bolted to the floor, which is hilarious. So I'd love to see this guy try to run. He takes one step, the chain goes, he falls, they shock him. He's convulsing on the floor. This would be hilarious.

[B]

He just basically got to rig that chair to where it's the remote. And if it gets to zero weight in the chair, fucking start shocking. Right?

[A]

There's a guy with a button.

[B]

Yeah, okay.

[A]

There's the button guy. Yeah, I remember the Lori Valo had a button guy.

[B]

Yeah, that's awesome.

[A]

He's the button guy. So this is all very. This is not normal for trials, all of this stuff going on here.

[B]

You gotta have a real relaxed guy there. Somebody that doesn't drink coffee and doesn't smoke. I would accidentally hit him.

[A]

Can't have his finger hovering over the son of a bitch. You know what I mean? So they said that shackling a defendant during a trial raises two main constitutional concerns. One, these shackles could impede in the defendant's ability to participate in his case. And two, the shackles could suggest to the jury that the defendant's guilty. Yeah, it's the same reason why you don't go to your trial in jail. Clothes. Why do they gotta get him a suit? Well, because otherwise he looks guilty and it's not fair. That's why they have to get him a suit. So they have to go down to ross and pay $80. Trust me, it's nothing compared to what they have to pay for the rest of this shit.

[B]

Don't they usually have just, like a thing in the back room? Like. Like a closet full of suits and dresses and shit?

[A]

No, absolutely not. No.

[B]

They ought to.

[A]

Lawyers probably do, I would think, maybe as a couple. But normally, no, you have to have something bought for you. Because I remember hearing about the Sarah Boone case.

[B]

Right. Yeah.

[A]

They went to Ross and bought her clothes because she didn't have clothes. And they bought her the worst outfits possible.

[B]

She looked like dog shit.

[A]

Didn't help her. It made her look guiltier somehow. It was weird.

[B]

And then they took Casey Anthony over to the murdering whore mother shop.

[A]

That's. Yes, they do. Well, they walked her down a hallway and they said, the dresses are down here. And she came to a dead end. And they were like, never mind. Sorry.

[B]

I guess pantsuits and not this way to keep her.

[A]

How's it feel, jc? How's it feel to get lied to? They're actually in a hole in a swamp. Is where you put your clothes buried in plastic. How about that?

[B]

Pantsuits and a bib.

[A]

Yeah. This is where we keep the pizza boxes that smell really bad. You know how old pizza smells like dead corpses, obviously. So, yeah, that's. They don't want the people to look guilty because if you look at someone and they're in jail clothes shackled, they look like a prisoner who's guilty of something. Whereas if they're not and in jail clothes, they look like normal people. So that's the whole point. So they found, though, that they needed to shackle Dustin arising from his prior escape attempts and threats against witnesses, law enforcement and prosecutors and the judge. They said he was head of his drug empire. He was a detail oriented, thoughtful, cool under pressure guy. His lawyer said he was very involved in the factual analysis of his case. He was perhaps one of the most inquisitive clients that I've ever had. Yeah, he's very smart, but he's dumb as shit. So in this trial, they put up a parade of criminals to testify against him. It is awesome. Hilarious collection of fucking society's dregs here. Yeah, A band of prisoners. This is the newspaper, this is the Des Moines Register, which, by the way, did a lot of great work and a lot of good reporting on this case. You don't see a lot of good investigative reporting anymore. They just take whatever the press release is and print that and that's it. The only investigative reporting you see is never in print anymore. It's in videos and shit. They were still doing good print work back then and they said they described it thusly along with all the information they'd already collected. The state paraded in a band of prisoners, cutthroats and hog thieves whom Honkin had met at a handful of correctional facilities. Sounds like he's got a crew of pirates that are going to come in and testify against him. Oh, my God.

[B]

They didn't trust the panty thieves to talk.

[A]

No, no panties. The hog thieves. Yeah, they stole big panties. The hog thieves. That's what they do. They each asserted that Dustin made incriminating statements about the murders. One inmate claiming he killed rats and quote, children raised by rats.

[B]

Oh, okay, that's not true.

[A]

You know, Lori's a rat, so her kids would have been rats too. Like the old Goodfellows thing. He would have been a rat. His whole fucking family's rats. Yep. A murderer named Fred Tokars testified that in 1998, Dustin described strangling Laurie Duncan and Greg Nicholson. And because he did that first and killing the children because, quote, they could have been witnesses.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Wow. An inmate named Ron McIntosh who this is crazy. Whose convictions include, quote, air piracy.

[B]

How do you. That's. That's hijacking, isn't it?

[A]

Yeah, but piracy means, like you came on another. What did you hop on off of your plane onto their wing. How the fuck did you.

[B]

Skydiving to another plane?

[A]

Like, I don't know how that works.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Wow. That is crazy. He said that Dustin told him the kids were murdered, not because they could be witnesses. And this is even more disgusting. It's one thing to say, listen, I'm cold blooded business and I'm all business, I don't care. He said because, quote, they wouldn't be quiet or they wouldn't shut up.

[B]

Yikes.

[A]

Gee, maybe cause you kidnapped them from their fucking house and tied up their mother and stuffed them in a fucking car. I wouldn't shut up either. If I was 6. I would have been like, what's going on? This is terrible.

[B]

Why are you. Gee, mister, you're not gonna hurt us, are ya?

[A]

Wow.

[B]

Kill these kids. They won't stop asking.

[A]

Fucking Jesus Christ. Shut the fuck up. Jesus Christ. If only they had an iPad. Their lives could have been saved back in the day there. Just put fucking bluey on and shut up. This is horrible though. Dennis Putsier, a criminal with a penchant for crack smoking and swine stealing, as the paper puts it. I just picture him like smoking it up and then going, I gotta steal some fucking hogs now where are the hogs? I gotta go steal hogs. And then just like that's when he steals hogs. Only when he's fucking cracked up.

[B]

I got a craving for some pig feet.

[A]

Oh, I shouldn't have done that inhaling thing. Just fucked my mouth up. Jesus, that's annoying.

[B]

Yeah, right?

[A]

You gotta supposed to do it. Sorry, everybody. I had fucking big sticks, all my wisdom teeth taken out. All sorts of shit. And it's still healing. It's so hard to talk. There's stitches everywhere in my mouth and I just did like that crack smoking noise, which is what you're not supposed to do at all.

[B]

The position of your jaw.

[A]

Yeah, well, you're not supposed to suck through a straw. And I just did this whole thing, so I hope I didn't fuck something up there. Anyway, I think it's okay. I'm not spitting out blood at the moment, so that's good.

[B]

No, you don't look like you're. Nothing's dripping. You're all right.

[A]

That's good. Just dripping out of my mouth. Hold on, we'll finish the show. We're Almost finished.

[B]

So check your lips on.

[A]

Yeah. Oh, yeah, there we go. So the crack smoking swine stealer named David Putzier struck up a conversation through cell blocks with Dustin Honkin in 1996. He said Dustin had bragged that in 1993 some people, quote, disappeared and that he had drove out to the country and shot them.

[B]

Jesus.

[A]

During a cross examination of this parish, the defense attorney asked why a smart man like Dustin would confide all of his crimes, quote, and a couple of crackheads who steal hogs for a living.

[B]

Crackhead hog thieves. Wow.

[A]

He wouldn't do that. And then he described to the jury, the lawyer described all this parade of dipshits as, quote, they are people who have no future. How can they be believed? Now, the defense lawyers focused during the trial on the fact that no forensic evidence tied Dustin to any of the crime scenes. No forensic evidence, didn't find his hairs or anything like that. But jurors did hear audio tapes of him plotting to kill other witnesses in a drug case from night when. Remember when his partner wore the wire back in the day? They hear that shit. So he's like, we shouldn't have even allowed that. That's ridiculous. Because you don't have any evidence in this case. You have old evidence from other things, not even to do with these people and fucking, you know, no physical evidence. So obviously he's innocent. You should let him go. In the closing, they say there's lack of DNA evidence, the defense says, and other physical evidence linking him to the crime scene or the bodies. He countered the state's painting of Dustin as a cold blooded killer, telling jurors he was, quote, just a young man infatuated with drug manufacturing. Basically. Basically a nerd. Nerds are harmless. You know that. Imagine being described that way. Just a young man infatuated with drug manufacturing. Like it's just his hobby. That's all it is. Like he's infatuated with infatuated girl on girl porn or something. He's infatuated with titties at the strip.

[B]

Club, learning all the statistics of the Charlotte Hornets because that bomber jacket is so fun.

[A]

He loved it. That fucking teal was the shit. He couldn't help it. Basically a nerd.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So he can't have been a murderer. He's a harmless nerd.

[B]

Nerds don't murder.

[A]

Nerds don't nerder. That's right. He's a nerderer. So. Wow. The jurors here informed the court that they were ending their deliberations early one day and that they would not be deliberating the next day. We're taking a day off. Isn't that nice? Before leaving the building, juror number 523 asked a court employee for an excuse from work for the remainder of that day and the following day because, quote, her boss had been making inappropriate comments to her about the trial. And she's not supposed to hear anything about the trial.

[B]

Right.

[A]

The district court immediately investigated the allegation, questioning juror 523 that same day. Now, this juror informed the court that her boss had made comments as he walked by her desk, such as, guilty, guilty, guilty. As he walked by, like I'm hearing shit you don't know about. Guilty, guilty, guilty. That's the greatest thing of all time. He's fun. Yeah. Guilty, guilty, guilty. Just goes by and keeps going, hey, there's pizza in the break room. Guilty, guilty, guilty, guilty. That's incredible. Guilty, guilty, guilty. And then the time she, quote, when are you gonna burn him?

[B]

He's like, it's like Pauly Short and jury he is.

[A]

What do you think? That's hilarious.

[B]

Ah, so fun.

[A]

At no time did juror523 respond to any of her boss's comments. Okay, she never responded. She just got them put at her. Juror 523 also told the court that she had the impression that before she was picked for the jury, the company hierarchy wanted her to get out of jury service because her boss told her, quote, she should have stood up in court and said to hang him.

[B]

Rotisserize that motherfucker.

[A]

That's right. And he's mad at her. So she should have tried to get out of jury service cuz she's not willing to yell in court that he should be hanged before he's even convicted. This is insanity. So the court, this is boss.

[B]

Ever.

[A]

This is boss. He sounds like a good time, I'll tell you that much.

[B]

Not helping her is a party.

[A]

Oh, absolutely. That yearly picnic is.

[B]

Oh, he's going to get fired for something inappropriate coming. There's no way he's sticking around long enough to retire, but boy, is he fine.

[A]

No, he figured he fingered a secretary while she was trying to change the copier toner. Absolutely. Without a doubt. You know, it happened. So the court. Oh yeah. So the court questioned juror 523, focusing on what she may have said to other jurors about her boss's comments. Juror 523 said she had voiced her concerns about the jury's decision not to deliberate that day, saying she wanted to get her life back. And explaining how hard it was for her to switch gears and go back to work. Like, can we get this over with because I gotta get back to work one of these days. She acknowledged telling some other jurors that her boss had said, guilty, guilty, guilty. At the conclusion of questioning, the parties and the court agreed to remove 523 from the juror deliberations and replace her with an alternate. Which is fine. They said she didn't poison the whole jury pool enough to yank everybody, but she should probably go, even though I don't think it matters. But the verdict comes in. It's a ten woman, two man jury. Imagine those women all had to sit and think about, what if my kids were in a fucking car while I was being blindfolded and led out to a fucking hole? They all had to think about that.

[B]

Absolutely awful.

[A]

Not good for him. He is convicted of all 17 charges relating to five murders and witness tampering and threats and everything else going down here. Now, during sentencing, there's a whole lot of victim impact and deservedly so. One person here. Wow, this is just horrible. This is one of the uncles, one of Laurie's uncles. I believe because of Dustin Honkin. There will be no more talks, no more playtime, no more adventures for Candy and Amber. Your selfish act of slaughtering innocents got you a place in hell forever. And the deal you made with the devil is about to be paid for forever. And then said to somebody else, this is Deguys, sister. Death is what they deserve. An eye for an eye. But Dustin won't die five times. He'll only die once. Is that fair? Well, I mean, it's kind of all we have at this point.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

What do you want to do?

[B]

You want to revive him?

[A]

He's only one person. That's like, it's raining and you're going, this isn't fair. There's more drops than I'd like. Well, how do you fix that? It's not fixable. Another sister of de guise said, he's in denial. He just wants his mom to think that he didn't do it. Is he saying he didn't do it? Now, Terry de Geese's father said about this. He's very short and sweet. He talked about Dustin and said, he's too smart. He's too smart for his own good, that one. He thought he could get away with everything. And that's the problem. Laurie Duncan's father believes that Dustin should get the death penalty if convicted. He said, we really, really Want this case to be resolved in our favor. The death penalty would be in our favor. Anything less just isn't right. Anyone who can harm children deserves it. Children are completely innocent. And it's hard to argue with that. I mean, two little girls especially. Jesus Christ. If it was two little boys, it'd be horrible. But for some reason, less horrible in my book. I don't know why that is. Why is that?

[B]

It's because, I don't know, maybe as.

[A]

A father, there's something about a little girl.

[B]

You feel like you can relate with that. And you can. You feel like maybe you could have gotten out of it. You were a ragtag little shit. Maybe you could have, you know what I mean? As little girls. Especially fucking 6 and 10. Those are defenseless little girls. They're not going to win any fight.

[A]

True. Well, also, if you like, we both have a boy and a girl as kids.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Even if they're equally everything, you just, for some reason, you try to protect them. The girl, more physically, emotionally, for some reason.

[B]

Three ninjas, home alone. Boys are fine.

[A]

Boys are fine. Well, there's a. With a boy, there's a lot more. Walk it off.

[B]

Yeah. And if they can't walk it off, they'll figure it out.

[A]

Walk it off. Fucking heat up the doorknob, you know what I mean? Put a fucking bucket of feather up there. Set this man's face on fire. What are we talking about here? Get your shit together.

[B]

Make a man stab his own toes.

[A]

Line up the Matchbox cars, dude. Now. Oh, Christ. Now Dustin's gonna speak as well. He rose to speak. Wow. They said that his statement in the Des Moines Register said his statement was so articulate and expressive, even the victim's families noticed how eloquent it was, which at that point makes you even madder, like, oh, you're not even stupid. I really want to strangle you now.

[B]

Yeah. You're actually very smart. Yeah.

[A]

You actually could have made just a normal living and not killed anybody. Fuck you. So he turned to his mother first, Dustin does, and apologized. He said, quote, were I as a perennial, I would bloom for you next year. So you could smile. Okay. Then he made it clear from this that he would not be apologizing at all. He said, quote, some of you came today hoping to see me squirm, tremble in fear or beg for mercy. Sorry, but you're wasting your time.

[B]

Oh, boy.

[A]

Oh, man. He knows what he's getting, and he doesn't want to be. Yeah. He acknowledged that the families had suffered a senseless Destruction of a human life, but insisted, quote, your vengeance toward me is misguided. He insisted that he only learned of the killings after the fact and that no story currently circulating about the murders is true. He said jurors only had a keyhole view onto what happened. He acknowledged concealing the evidence, but said he did so to protect Angela. That's why he was doing it, because she was the one who did it, he said. Also, he refused to testify earlier because he did not want to harm her. Trial felt bad. He said, Everybody has principles until it costs them something. I'm willing to pay with my life for those that I have. In other words, to save Angela from her bullshit, even though they have a kid together, maybe saying, you know, I want to save the kid's mother. He said, I was convicted because of passion, not hard evidence. I had committed raw passion. Of the juror wanting to hold someone responsible for dead kids, he said, I've committed wrongs both known and unknown, he said, but never have I taken another's life. Thought it, yes. Verbalized it, yes. Done it, no. Wow. He also praised some of the prosecution team for dealing with him fairly, but referred to half of them as magicians and tricksters.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

He ridiculed U.S. district Judge Mark Bennett for failing to give him a new trial and urged Bennett to, quote, skip the speech and just pronounce the sentence. It speaks volumes by itself. I don't want to hear your fucking lecturing. Which, guess what? You don't have a choice.

[B]

Sorry, bud.

[A]

If I was the judge, I'd get real comfortable and be like, well, I'd sit back because I got a whole lot to say. Motherfucker. I was going to just sentence you, but now I really have to tell you. So the judge says, no problem. You, sir, may fuck off. Death penalty. Oh, how's that?

[B]

That's great.

[A]

Federal death penalty. Eat dicks. He says to him. Now, the death penalty in Iowa hasn't happened very often. The last federal execution was Victor Harry Figure Figure, who was a drifter who was hanged at the Iowa State Penitentiary on March 15, 1963, for kidnapping and killing a Dubuque doctor. He was the 41st person legally executed in Iowa and the first person executed under the 1932 federal kidnapping law. So the last federal execution of an Iowa person was in 1963.

[B]

There's no way it's happening.

[A]

Wow. And then Congress, the federal law. Congress revived the federal death penalty in 1988 with a narrow law aimed at murderers by drug dealers. In 1994, 40 crimes were declared capital offenses still figure was the last to be executed by the federal court system until Timothy McVeigh was put to death on June 11, 2001 for the Oklahoma City bombing. Now, Iowa itself abolished its death penalty in 1965. It is one of 12 states at that time that didn't have any capital punishment, including Alaska, Hawaii, Maine, Massachusetts, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, North Dakota, Rhode Island, Vermont, West Virginia, Wisconsin. And we went over this in our history of the death penalty Patreon episode. They had very specific reasons for doing that. They were all, listen to that episode. It's very good. So May of 2005, Angela Johnson finally gonna go on trial.

[B]

Okay, great.

[A]

Okay. Federal authorities described her as a ruthlessly ambitious woman who slept her way to the top of high honkin's. Meth business started with Terry Deese, pushed him aside, and then got with the leader of the whole group.

[B]

She queen pin trying to get to the top with her queen poon.

[A]

Jeez, that was terrible. That was a bad pun.

[B]

That was bad something.

[A]

What this is just. There's no corporate structure here.

[B]

What are you gonna do? There's no how do.

[A]

There's no I want that CEO's golden parachute time that he's going to get. This is ridiculous. With my fucking queen poon. I don't like it. So, yeah, she's actively slept her way to the top. Prosecutors acknowledged that it was Dustin who pulled the trigger in all five shootings. But simply being the shooter doesn't mean you're more culpable. Especially if you're her who fucking did the ruse to get the house. And also went up with the kids and said, pack up, kids, we're going on a surprise trip. Fuck you, you're just as responsible. So basically, it's all the same evidence that they had against Dustin, except against her. They even have all the shit from that cell, the guy next door, the maps she drew, and everything else. So the jury deliberates for seven hours before finding her guilty of five counts of conspiracy to commit murder as part of a drug conspiracy and five counts of committing murder while engaging in a continuing criminal enterprise. Okay, the. The jury here comes out. During her sentencing, she continued to blame Justin and said, I regret I wasn't strong enough. She called Dustin a sociopath who will never admit to what he's done. Wow. Now, the judge said, quote, I am troubled by the lack of certainty in the record concerning the precise involvement of Angela Johnson in these crimes. However, by federal law, he is bound to the jury's decision. And he says, you ma' Am may fuck off. Death sentence for you too.

[B]

Oh, what?

[A]

The jury brought back the death sentence.

[B]

Very rare.

[A]

The judge did not agree with it. The judge said, I'm troubled by the fact that he basically set it up so she's gonna get off on it on appeal because he said there's not an. I wouldn't have given the death penalty because I don't see enough precise involvement and evidence of precise involvement to give her the death penalty.

[B]

But then on appeal, it just goes to resentment.

[A]

Exactly. Yeah. It would still be guilty. Just that now. 2007, she appeals. The United States Court of Appeals of the 8th Circuit upholds the conviction, finding sufficient evidence to conclude that she had participated in the murders. She asserts that the murders could not have been committed in furtherance of a drug conspiracy because the conspiracy had ended in late 1992 or when cut Comp left Arizona and Dustin told his brother he was going to stop producing meth. That assertion is incorrect, though, despite what Honkin may have told his brother and despite Cut Comp's move to Iowa. I think cunt comp is a better way to put it. The evidence included. The evidence of the events culminating in Honkin's March 93 arrest demonstrates that Honkin and Cutkamp had in fact continued their methamphetamine related activities. Johnson also suggests that the conspiracy terminated no later than March 93, when Hankin and others were arrested and Nicholson began cooperating with the authorities. A conspiracy may persist, however, even if the participants and their activities change over time and even if many participants are unaware of or uninvolved in some of the transactions. She said. Also, there should have been mitigating factors that you guys thought of. Even though she's guilty as an aider and abettor, her participation was relatively minor compared to Dustin Honkin. She doesn't have a criminal record. There's a strong maternal bond between Angela Johnson and her daughters, Alyssa and Marvia, and that this mother daughter relationship will continue to survive and flourish if Angela is sentenced to life imprisonment without parole rather than death. They said another person, Dustin, is equally or more culpable in the murders of the whole family. They said that two of the victims, Greg and Terry, consented to the conduct methamphetamine manufacturing and distribution, and that significantly contributed to the circumstances of their death. Like they put themselves in bad positions, which, yeah, if you're in a meth dealing empire, yeah, you are putting yourself in a bad position. She also demonstrated that Angela did that she can lead a productive, worthwhile life in prison. Through her kindness and helpfulness to other inmates, her interest in Bible study and religion, her artistic endeavors, and furtherance of her education by obtaining a GED while incarcerated after having dropped out of school in the ninth grade to begin with. In spite of her problems with drugs, men, and her own depression, Angela has always held a steady job and consistently worked to provide for the care and comfort of her daughters, Alyssa and Marvia. Although she is guilty of these murders, Angela Johnson was pregnant by Dustin with her daughter at the time of the murders, and as a result, was in a disadvantaged position to resist him, leave him, or turn him into the authorities. Okay. She's always been a good mother to her daughters. She communicates with them regularly, stays as active as possible in their life, and attempts to pass on the values and beliefs that will help her daughters avoid her fate. There are other factors in Angela Johnson's background or character that mitigate favor of a life sentence, imprisonment without possibility of parole, and against the death penalty. They say tough shit. Still, death penalty affirmed. He appeals in 2010, raising dozens of objections and arguing that his sentences should be overturned, not just.

[B]

Not just resentencing.

[A]

Commuted. Yeah. He argues that the use of a stunt gun belt interfered with his right to communicate with counsel and participate in his own defense. In support of his argument, he cites an 11th Circuit case which explains, although stun belts are not visible to the jury and are therefore unlikely to interfere with the presumption of innocence, the constant anxiety over the possible triggering of the belt interferes with the defendant's ability to follow the proceedings and participate fully in his defense. As long as the guy isn't, like, flipping the remote up and down in his hand and, like, playing with it and shit. And you know what I'm saying? Like, he's just dicking off with it. Standing there, it's looking. I picture, like, an Atari controller with a joystick. And he's just, like, screwing around with it a little bit, flipping it up and down, bored. Some shit like that, he said. Also contends because he was shackled and bolted to the floor, he wasn't going anywhere. And the use of the stun belt constituted impermissible piling on. The district court agreed the use of a stun belt should be subjected to close judicial scrutiny because of its potentially disruptive effect on the rights and fairness. He also contends the district court erred by placing juror 523 with alternate juror 425 during penalty phase deliberations and did not allow a substitution. Yada yada. Keep getting Fucked. You're out.

[B]

Doesn't matter.

[A]

Affirmed. March 2012. Angela Johnson. Another appeal, this time saying that her lawyers failed to present evidence about her brain and personality impairments that could have been mitigating factors. And the judge orders a new sentencing hearing for Angela. He then vacates the death sentence, citing the. A, quote, alarmingly dysfunctional defense team. And because they didn't, they didn't introduce a bunch of mitigating factors that any, any lawyer would have. So they say to her, you, ma', am, may now fuck off again. Life without. Okay, now she's going. Life without parole, but no death penalty. Damn it.

[B]

I was hoping to hear what a gal eats for the last meal.

[A]

Weird.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

What would they have? I'll just have something small.

[B]

I'll just have a light sour.

[A]

I'll just have a little of whatever Dustin's having. I'll have some of his fries.

[B]

I'll just have a bite of that.

[A]

Pick off of that. Get your own, Jerome. Goddamn last meal. So October 2013. That's amazing. A woman's last meal would be picking off someone else's plate after they said they didn't want any.

[B]

Let's see what's left of your salad.

[A]

It's fine. October 2013. Will his sentence get tossed here? A U.S. district judge writes that Dustin received a fair trial in 2004 and effective legal counsel at every step of the process. She said she saw no reason to, quote, disturb the jury's determination that the death. That death is the appropriate punishment for this case. So December 2014, prosecutors dropped their pursuit of the death penalty in Angela Johnson's case. They dropped their appeals to the appeal, leaving her to be sentenced with life without parole. Her lawyer said she was extremely relieved and grateful upon hearing of the decision. And she was re sentenced officially as that as part of this agreement, she agrees to drop all of her appeals as well.

[B]

Okay. All right.

[A]

She's gonna take it now. She's gonna take it. She's gonna take the life of that, which is what she wanted the whole time. 2018. Laurie's dad, John Duncan, who had been pushing to have Dustin executed for years, dies of stomach cancer before he gets a chance to say it. His lawyer said he was very sad when he knew he was passing because he wasn't gonna see this happen. And we assumed, or we assured him that we would be there for him. Now, these have been removed from online, but Dustin was blogging. Yeah, he was chronicling death row inmates lives. He wrote that he regretted every single transgression, adding that While he used to enjoy punishing a rival, now he just wants to be left alone in peace. Oh, after they kill you, you'll be very peaceful and alone. When these people finally get around to killing me, he wrote, they'll realize only the shell of me remains. The heart of me died long ago. I don't think anyone cares. You killed kids, and they just want to wipe you away.

[B]

I'm shocked that you had one.

[A]

Yeah, no shit. So the Justice Department announces that The July of 2019 Justice Department of the United States announces that the Bureau of Prisons has completed a review of capital punishment and issues surrounding lethal injection drugs, allowing the execution of five inmates. And luckily for Dustin, he's one of them. He hit the lottery here. To proceed. They're gonna let him go through. November 2019. A district judge in D.C. blocks the execution of Dustin and three other men because of the lethal injection procedure was not authorized by federal law. And, you know, they gotta let legal challenges play out. January 15, 2020. Supposed to be execution day in Terre Haute, Indiana, but it's postponed due to a preliminary injunction. By the way, he has his supporters. He stopped talking in public after he was sentenced, but maintains his innocence. Many in the faith community have expressed opposition to executing Dustin, including his spiritual advisor, Cardinal Joseph Tobin, and his current priest, Father Marco Keefe, who filed an injunction to delay the proceeding until after Covid's over.

[B]

He went Catholic, huh?

[A]

Yeah, he went Catholic in prison.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

He would be the first Iowa criminal executed since 1963. People also want him dead, though. Here is one relative of a victim said he does deserve what he's getting. I can tell you that he deserved it a long time ago. This is Laurie, Duncan's sister in law. She said she didn't know this woman. Said that Duncan didn't know Nicholson was an informant and she wasn't involved in drugs. She said that she was a very sweet, innocent person and what happened to be put in a bad situation is awful. Now, the judge who actually sentenced him to death said he deserves it. This guy, by the way, Mark Bennett, is on record as being opposed to the death penalty.

[B]

Oh, really?

[A]

He's not a death penalty guy, he said, but if anyone deserves to be executed, it's that motherfucker right there, that squirrely little nerd asshole. The fact that he's a nerd makes it worse. Yeah, you want to go, you fucking nerd? Get in that seat so we can stick you, you fucking nerd. Get over here, nerd. You just want to abuse him on the way out. As I say give him a fucking wedgie. On the way to the execution room, you stick his head in the toilet and flush it. Give him a nice swirly.

[B]

He's going to be tied down. Just piss on his face.

[A]

It's whatever it is, teabag him. That's what they used to do to nerds, right? Get like five guys from his high school football team to come over and teabag. They're like 48 now. Their balls are all smelly and dangling. After a whole day of H Vac and shit, they're gonna over there and teabag them good. Now this judge says that his crimes are reprehensible and that he had a fair legal process, including talented lawyers who did an outstanding job with virtually nothing to work with. The judge said I am not going to lose any sleep if he's executed. He said normally I would, but the evidence was so overwhelming. It's just horrific how they were massacred. Fuck em basically. July 13, 2020, the US Attorney General directed the Federal Bureau of Prisons to schedule the executions of four men here. That same judge in D.C. issued another injunction blocking the execution of those four men. At 2am though that day on July 13, the U.S. supreme Court ruled that federal executions could resume. So July 17, 2020 is execution day for him. By the way, there's an article about how much executions cost. It is obscene. The actual event of the actual event is hundreds of thousands of dollars because they have to find fly. They pay for everybody to come there. Everybody to come there, they pay for. They were talking about what it costs just to have individual bags of chips in the snack room.

[B]

Oh really?

[A]

Waters and bus rides and special accommodations for family members in wheelchairs. It costs like $700,000 to execute just for the act of doing it that day. It's really expensive. You could house them forever for the cost of just the execution. Never mind all the appeals.

[B]

The drugs that were, that are purchased too are very expensive.

[A]

Yes, they're expensive. The equipment, the people they have to hire, the actual tubes and needles and things, all that shit's expensive. So here it is, Execution day. Last meal. His last meal was. What do you think it is, Jimmy?

[B]

The pasta. Did he eat pasta?

[A]

Not pasta. No, he didn't actually.

[B]

A lot of these dicks love a steak.

[A]

Yeah. Dinner from Pizza Hut.

[B]

What? Why is that a thing too?

[A]

I don't know. Pizza Hut.

[B]

They love Domino's or Pizza Hut. Just bad pizza and steaks.

[A]

It's one of those things that maybe is nostalgic though. Makes you feel like you're 12 again. And innocent.

[B]

Yeah. You smell that?

[A]

About to be executed.

[B]

Cheap shitty pizza in the house. And you come home and you go, oh, it's pizza night.

[A]

Oh, wow. I'm not going to be executed tonight. Great. This is a large pepperoni pizza and a 2 liter bottle of Coke and a large order of breadsticks.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Total cost, $33.11.

[B]

35 bucks to feed this piece of shit.

[A]

This is what's kind of silly is what I'm saying here, what we do. A lot of people, because a lot of states have done away with the last meal because they say it's too expensive, but it costs them hundreds of thousands of dollars just to actually do the actual event and execute them. But they don't want to spend $40 on food for somebody that they're going to execute. You know what I'm saying?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Even back in the, like, brutal medieval times, you gave someone a last meal.

[B]

Yeah. Big target.

[A]

You put a cigarette in their mouth before you fucking shot them from the firing squad. Yeah. There's certain things that as humans we go, listen, don't care what they did. I'm not a piece of shit.

[B]

You're not getting out of this.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And I'm. I'm kind of on the hook for doing this.

[A]

We're going to treat some better.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So it's not a big deal to get somebody a fucking pizza after. You're gonna kill them the next day. Who cares? So anyway, they walk in. This is, by the way, a reporter that was there said. We walked in single file into the small cinder block room and sat facing two, four foot windows, each trimmed in dark green. The scene we'd all come to watch would play out from the other side of the windows like a perverse version of Picture Perfect. Or Perfect. Yeah. Picture picture from Mr. Rogers neighborhood.

[B]

Oh, yeah. Picture, Picture.

[A]

Yeah, I remember that. At 4:03pm the window's curtain raised, revealing a small tile covered chamber. That's the weird thing, too. It's like a theater. Like the show's on now, raising a curtain and the movie's starting. It's so weird. Yeah. Shut up. Let's go to the lobby. It's too late. Fuck the Raisinets. We're watching. This honkin lay on a gurney that was part Hannibal Lecter Dolly and part Dentist Chairman. His arms were in a low V at his side, two thick straps holding down each wrist and a light green blanket covering his body save for his head. The marshal stood directly in front of us near a black phone. A senior official wearing black gloves by Hankins head. And another senior official off to the side with his priest, Mark o'. Keefe. So he was executed. His final words were a poem. A poem. What? Heaven Haven by Gerald Manley Hopkins.

[B]

I have desired. Okay, he's gonna read somebody else's shit.

[A]

I have. He's not a poet. He's a nerd. Not a poet. I have desired to go where springs not fail to field where flies no sharp and sided hail and a few lilies blow. And I have asked to be where no storms come, where all the greens swell is in the havens dumb and out of the swing of the sea. And then he said, hail Mary, mother of God, pray for me.

[B]

He had all that time in there, couldn't write a whole poem.

[A]

An awful. No, that was a poem from somebody.

[B]

Yeah, that's what I mean.

[A]

He didn't write the poem. You're saying he could have wrote the poem? I don't think he has a talent to write a poem. I think he's a math nerd. Maybe math nerds don't write poetry. Generally.

[B]

Feels like 30 years poets are bad at all. You should be able to get something.

[A]

Poets are bad at math. I mean, that expresses it perfectly. Either way, this dipshit then had an awful terrible like heartburn Pizza Hut burp afterwards because that shit's brutal, I'm sure. And he was like, definitely execute me. This is never gonna go away.

[B]

Oh, this is gonna last 24 hours.

[A]

So Honkin's lawyer said that his client was redeemed because he had been repented for his crimes. He said there's no reason for the government to kill him in haste or at all. The man they killed today could have spent the rest of his days helping others and further redeeming himself. The Des Moines Register quotes it. This Honkin's brutal tale of meth and murder reads like a made up thriller with a cast of characters drawn together by drugs, money or pure bad luck. And a plot too outrageous for real life. There's Honkin, either evil incarnate or a man too smart for his own good, whose rough upbringing started him down a dark path. There's his girlfriend and partner, Angela Johnson, either a savagely ambitious woman who slept her way to the top of a meth empire, or a drug addicted young mother manipulated by a man who so craved money, power and success he'd stop at nothing to take down anyone in his way. And there are his victims, some casualties of the life they chose and some others who were innocents. Felled by wolves, preying on their young. Or Iowa nice culture. There you go.

[B]

Yeah. Is Iowa nice a thing?

[A]

That's what they say a hundred times in this episode. Iowa nice. Which. That's why Iowa and Minnesota hate each other. Because Minnesota's like, no, it's Minnesota nice. Yeah, we got hot dish. You're like, yeah, fuck you. We made corn and casserole, motherfucker. What's up with that? I'm nicer. No, you're nicer. No, I'm nicer. And they fight back and forth.

[B]

I've met people from both. They're both pretty nice. I've never met.

[A]

They're both pretty goddamn nice. Bring up the other, though. They don't get. They turn not nice real quick.

[B]

Oh, then that's when they're not nice.

[A]

They hate it. It's so weird. I think it's just college football, honestly. I think it's just we hate the Hawkeyes and we hate whatever the fuck Minnesota is. So I don't know. There you go. The Screaming Eagles. Minnesota State of Craig T. Nelson's coach, I believe, is what we're talking about. There is Mason City, Iowa.

[B]

It's a.

[A]

What a wild story.

[B]

It's really fucked up.

[A]

It's fucked. It's a fucked up story. If you enjoyed that story or like the way we tell it, we should say definitely get on whatever app you're on and give us five stars right now. It helps a lot. Helps drive the show up the charts. So thank you for doing that. Head over to shutupandgivememurder.com tickets for live shows are there. There's a couple left for Philly. That's it for live shows, but you can still get. There is still time to get the virtual live show that we did. It is available for whatever two weeks past October 30th is. It's available for that. It was a really funny, a great story. We had dumb costumes. Do yourself a favor and get it and relax so much. It was a lot of fun. So you can watch it a hundred times until it's done and do whatever you want with that. That's shutupandgivemerder.com follow on social media. We are SmallTownMurder on Instagram, SmallTown Pot on Facebook. Get yourself Patreon.

[B]

Please do.

[A]

Get it. Patreon.com CrimeInSports is where you get all of the bonus material. Anybody $5 a month or above, Huge back catalog of shit you've never heard before immediately upon subscription. New ones every other week. One Crime and sports. One small town murderer and you get it all, baby. This week, what you're going to get for crime and sports, we're going to talk about when teams relocate and it makes everybody really sad. And people, they sneak away in the middle of the night.

[B]

Frank's fun.

[A]

It really is. People are way too invested. And then for small town murder, we're going to talk about the top haunted place in every state and see which ones sound like bullshit and see which ones sound fun. So we'll talk about all that and more. Patreon.com crimeinsports and you get all shows crime and sports, small town murder and your stupid opinions all ad free with your Patreon. Anybody $5 a month or above. You get all that and you get a shout out at the end of the show, which is right now. Jimmy, hit me with the name of the people who, God damn it, we can't live without and who would never, ever, ever take our kids and shoot them and put them in a hole in the ground. Hit me with them right now.

[B]

This week, executive producers are Gary Howard in Mona, Nevada, Victoria Melson and Janelle Scott. Thank you all so much.

[A]

Thank you so much. Wonderful people.

[B]

Other producers this week are Peyton Meadows, Anthony Finnemore, Brittany Finimore, Brian Bender. Happy hour in Yuma, Arizona, Janice Hill, Ashley Taylor. Chainsaw with no last Name. I don't know if that's a reference to Newport Chainsaws. Possibly.

[A]

Yeah, Summer school. I just gave you a Frasier reference there.

[B]

Oh, what is that?

[A]

One of the Newport Chainsaws.

[B]

All right. Yeah, clearly. Yeah. Mr. Chainsaw Lagoon, I think.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

Tacos. That party. I don't know what that means. I don't know if they're tacos. The party. I don't know what that means. Melinda Jimenez. Tacos are always good. Tacos are rarely. They're. They might be more acceptable than bad pizza. You know what I mean?

[A]

Oh, for sure.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Much easier.

[A]

Taco Bell makes great tacos. So they're not good tacos.

[B]

It's just so fun.

[A]

Whereas the worst pizza is really bad.

[B]

It really is. Amanda Shady. Shady, perhaps. Rachel Jessica Peshing. Skin Key. What is that? Pashinsky. Trish. Trish Oviat Brandata. Sarah Byer. Laura. All right. Zibco. Nikki Fever. Laura Erickson. Vapor Glide. Julie Evans. Nicole McCollum. Jeremy Harwell. Margaret Woodruff. Brooks Phillips. Haley Arada. Our Rata, Tony Wolves. Mary with no Last Name. Crystal Hatfield. Conceionary. Nice. Not bad spots. Spot Show Jake Helland. Hell Land Thomas holbert, Jordan. Jordan McCollum. JB the letters J and B. James with no last name. Michelle. B.D. jameson with no last name. Melanie Marks. Relative reality. Reality. All right. Not realty. All right.

[A]

Pilar.

[B]

Pilar Gruenig. Rebecca with no last name. C. Webb, 13. Jackson Love, Sylvie Ray, Greg Chapman. Russell with no last name. Riley Hofer, Brit Allman, Rick Kevin Onifer. Haley with no last name. Jordan Hammer Monkey with no last name. Jay Lee, Tina Murphy, B. Ryan, Jeremy. Nope, that's Jerry Haggard, Merle's grandson. Kingsley Dwyer. J With no last name. Oscar Tyler. Nope, that's Tiger. Euro. Susan Hessen. Mark Iwanaki. Iwaniki. Samantha Fisher, Heath Fedor, Allison Webster, Janie Mintz, Crystal Corvada Brown, Diana with no last name. C and S. Slende Slined. Jared Redding, Tracy Currier, Jer with no last name. Cub fan for life. Kristen Dean, Casey Brockel. Brockle. Jermaine Barnes, Arden Gallonson Galinson. Jeremy Fisting Holy. Gavin Lindahl. Take it easy, Jeremy.

[A]

Try with the one at a time, Jeremy.

[B]

Aaron Maywood, Courtney. Courtney with no last name. Carol with no last name. Samantha Englin, Scott Velasquez, Sherry from Akron. Ashley with no last name. Mothman Farms. Laura Ansel Harless with no last name. Josh Staples, Ragnich Anguira, Michelle Ormand. What is this? Autumn sunset? Probably not Keaton. Unless their parents maybe were hippies.

[A]

It's possible.

[B]

Keaton Rosenbaum, Kelly Brockman, Lucinda Clark, Elena with no last name. Sophia Trujillon, Annabelle Aspero, Sa Spuro, Robert Burt, Abuge Abogu. One Abogue. I don't know. Rebecca Deardorf, Lil Punky D. Preston with no last name. Todd with no last name. Matt Stroop, Jess Cunningham, Amy Martin, Samantha with no last name. Mike Gingac. Gignac. What is that? Gignac. What is that? How do you do it? Gizhnack, Felicia with no last name. Doug with no last name. Derek Wilson, Richard Flores, Jill Billing, Julie with no last name. Jessica Bogus Bagoose, Daniel Corley, Elizabeth Reed, Tom Trulock, Brian French, Stephanie Henderson, Greg T. Matthias. Matthias Riddick. Riddish Graham Chase Cook, Antwin Beaks, Brett Stasko, Joe Anderson, Tiffany Cook, Sarah Morey, Quentin Lyon, Allen Hudson, Alicia Pander, Froshe, Robert Purdy, Mia Murray, Greg T. Lisa Tyler Cole Alvarado. Jamie Alfaro, Jaime perhaps Holly B. Jessica. Nope. Elizabeth Brandt, Dave Canfield, Aaron Murphy, Tyler Gerbut, Garbutt. Jesse Carbert, Megan Stanley, Nathan McDevitt. Uh, John Woodlock, Patrick Hazelwood. Valine. Valine, I don't know. Russ Mullins, Lily Van Sayak, Julie Schmitz, Bill Wysocki, Greg Peterson, Tyler Grimm Grady from Pittsburgh, Benjamin Horner. Fucking poor butt trying. Okay, Donovan Neese. Nice. Niesa. And all of our patrons. You guys are the best. Thank you.

[A]

Thank you so much, everybody for all that you do for us. We really do appreciate it. You keep the show going. You are the lifeblood of this bad boy. So thank you for everything that comes out there. Also, we have new tour dates for next year and some other exciting stuff coming out next year that we need to tell you guys all about coming up in December. Don't worry about it. We'll tell you all about it. But till then, keep coming back and seeing us. Definitely. If you want to follow us on social media, shut up and givememurder.com is the place to go to find out how to do that. Keep coming back and seeing us. And until next week, everybody, it's been our pleasure.

[B]

Bye.

[A]

Marketing is hard, but I'll tell you a little secret. It doesn't have to be. Let me point something out. You're listening to a podcast right now and it's great. You love the host. You seek it out and download it. You listen to it while driving, working out, cooking, even going to the bathroom. Podcasts are a pretty close companion. And this is a podcast ad. Did I get your attention? You can reach great listeners like yourself with podcast advertising from Libsyn Ads. Choose from hundreds of top podcasts offering host endorsements or run a pre produced ad like this one across thousands of shows. To reach your target audience in their favorite podcasts with Libsyn Ads, go to Libsyn ads.com that's L I B S Y N ads.com today.