← Stuff You Should Know
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- [00:00]
Podcast Host/Announcer
This is an iHeart podcast.
- [00:04]
Odoo Advertiser
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- [00:38]
Josh Clark
Hey everybody. I want to tell you about Now Foods. They're committed to providing the best quality at the best price because quality is Now's healthy obsession. Now performs 31,000 quality tests each month to ensure their supplements are of the highest quality, purity and potency. And now B12 shots provide a full spectrum of B vitamins, including a 10,000 microgram blast of vitamin B12. And convenient on the go packets. They're sugar free and vegan in a delicious mixed berry flavor. So visit nowfoods.comstuff to learn more. The bombing of Harvey's casino in Lake Tahoe, Nevada is one of the great overlooked capers. It's kind of nuts how anything like the Harvey's bombing could ever be forgotten, considering the outcome. This episode has it all. A great plot, incompetent criminals, an amazingly well designed bomb, and a huge explosion. And it's made even cooler somehow because it takes place in 1980. Plus no one dies. Which makes it okay for me to call this episode kind of charming. Enjoy.
- [01:45]
Podcast Host/Announcer
Welcome to Stuff youf Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio.
- [01:54]
Josh Clark
Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh, and there's Chuck. And Jerry's here. And this is Stephen. Stuff you should know. The true crime edition where nobody gets hurt. Isn't that amazing?
- [02:05]
Chuck Bryant
Yeah. I think this falls into our sort of caper edition.
- [02:09]
Josh Clark
Yes, well put, well put. Do we have any other capers?
- [02:14]
Chuck Bryant
Yeah, like the Chowchilla kidnapping. And I think any non murder crime podcast I think would fall under this. Like D.B. cooper.
- [02:24]
Josh Clark
Exactly. And before I forget, Chuck, that was definitely a caper. Good call. This was a request which, like you said last time, we've been doing a lot of these lately, but this one was requested by Nick Hales and I say good request, Nick. Thanks for that. And I totally Spaced on Shouting Out. Neil Stevens from the UK for Georgia Guidestones episode. He requested it and gave me the idea to do it.
- [02:49]
Chuck Bryant
All right, Nice work. This one was so familiar to me that I was sure that we had either touched on it or that I saw. What I really thought was that I saw a documentary about it, but I hadn't. Cause I don't think there's been one. I don't know what it is. It was really familiar with some other true life thing that I saw.
- [03:10]
Josh Clark
I don't know. I don't know. But the fact that there's not a movie about this is insane. Yeah.
- [03:16]
Chuck Bryant
I don't know if it's movie worthy.
- [03:18]
Josh Clark
Oh, really? Yeah. Oh, man. Just like the pork chop sideburns alone I think would warrant a movie. But because I said pork chop sideburns, of course, we're talking about 1980, right, Chuck? August 26th.
- [03:33]
Chuck Bryant
That's right. And on August 26th, 1980, very early in the morning, a couple of delivery dudes would be delivery dudes, wheeled a big piece of equipment, had a cover on it, said IBM, into Harvey's Resort Hotel in Lake Tahoe, Nevada. Shout out to our buddy Aaron Hagar, representing Lake Tahoe. Oh, yeah, he's got it made out there in Tahoe.
- [03:59]
Josh Clark
Nice.
- [03:59]
Chuck Bryant
Except for the bears and wildfires.
- [04:02]
Josh Clark
I'll bet he's heard of this story then.
- [04:04]
Chuck Bryant
I bet you he has. We'll hear from him on this. But anyway, they wheeled it in there up to the second floor offices and dropped it off and basically skedaddled. After that they had a guy waiting in a van outside and drove them the heck out of there.
- [04:18]
Josh Clark
Yeah. So it's kind of weird, 5am to drop off a piece of office equipment not waiting around for anybody to sign it. Kind of odd. And within an hour, the oddity behind it kind of became really apparent. A slot manager, I believe, or maybe the night manager in general, he noticed this piece of office equipment that was kind of randomly placed on the second floor offices. And he saw that there was a note by it and he gathered some other employees and they were all kind of hanging out reading the note. And one of the details I love, that I saw in Adam Higginbottom article on the Atavist was that one of the people reading the note was leaning up against the machine while they were reading the note.
- [05:00]
Chuck Bryant
All right. The note said, should we read the note?
- [05:04]
Josh Clark
Yeah, because then it makes the whole thing about somebody leaning up against it really hilarious.
- [05:08]
Chuck Bryant
All right. Stern warning to the management and bomb squad in which case, I would have been out of there. That's all I need to hear, right?
- [05:16]
Josh Clark
Exactly.
- [05:17]
Chuck Bryant
Do not move or tilt this bomb because the mechanism controlling the detonators in it will set it off at a movement of less than 0.01 of the open end Richter scale. So let's confuse people. Right out of the gate is what this note is what this guy's thinking.
- [05:32]
Josh Clark
Sure.
- [05:33]
Chuck Bryant
Don't try to flood or gas the bomb. There's a float switch and an atmosphere pressure Switch set at two numbers, 26.00 to 33. Both are attached to detonators. Do not try to take it apart. The flathead screws are attached to triggers and as much of a quarter to three quarters of a turn will cause the explosion. In other words, this bomb is so sensitive that the slightest movement either inside or outside will cause it to explode full stop.
- [06:01]
Josh Clark
Yeah. And you can guess the person leaning against the machine stood up and moved away from it, Right?
- [06:06]
Chuck Bryant
That's right. And basically they said, I love that part. No one can detonate or no one can deactivate this bomb. Not even I, not even the creator can diffuse this thing. So it is going to go off at some point. Your best hope of not getting hurt is to pay a $3,000 ransom and you're going to receive instructions on how to move it out of here so it can explode somewhere else.
- [06:32]
Josh Clark
Yeah. And it would have been a bargain for three thousand dollars. It was actually a three million dollar ransom.
- [06:36]
Chuck Bryant
Did I say three thousand?
- [06:38]
Josh Clark
You did. I think you were being optimistic.
- [06:41]
Chuck Bryant
Yeah, three million dollars.
- [06:41]
Josh Clark
But it was a big fat ransom. And the bomb itself, I mean, if you just look at the ransom note when it's talking about the bomb, that's a pretty amazing bomb. And it actually became pretty legendary with the FBI. So much so that I saw that they still. I don't know if they still do today, but for many years they used it as a teaching model for bomb technicians. And the FBI considered it very sophisticated. And they said it was unlike anything any bomb technician had ever seen before. No one had ever made a bomb like this.
- [07:16]
Chuck Bryant
Yeah, Very good bomb, if there was such a thing. It was a couple of stacked boxes lined with metal and rubber that through conventional methods, you couldn't separate, of course, without it going boom. And so the FBI did what they do in this case. They come in, they start taking pictures, they X ray it, they sweep it for fingerprints. Obviously they don't move it. They find out that it has about 1,000 pounds of dynamite inside and they can't find a way to. Like, basically they're saying, this note seems to be right on the money. Like, we can't find a way, at least right off the bat, about how to diffuse this thing safely.
- [07:56]
Josh Clark
Yeah. And very famously, the bomb technicians in the room started running around in aimless circles saying, oh, my God, oh, my God, oh, my God. And they did that for a good three hours, I think, before somebody stepped in and stopped them. But that ransom note also showed a lot of planning, not just the bomb. Like, this bomb was amazing, just full stop amazing. One to really be proud of if you were a bomb maker. But the actual heist itself had like a real shot at extorting this $3 million successfully. And it started with they knew what they were doing out of the gate. They said, we want $3 million. And in used bills, hundred dollar bills already used, not marked, not bugged. Don't even try to chemically treat them. And we want you to fly a helicopter to Lake Tahoe airport, have the pilot land by the payphone and wait by the payphone for instructions. Are instructions going to come from the payphone? Who knows? They could also come by taxi. They could also come by carrier pigeon. I'm making that last one up. But they were just trying out of the gate to confuse them so that they couldn't plan for everything. And I think it was a really well planned heist.
- [09:09]
Chuck Bryant
Yeah, I mean, they basically said no one involved from this point that you meet up with, like, anyone that might deliver a note, someone that might drive a vehicle that's involved, like, no one's gonna know anything, so don't bother. And I think I believe that that's probably true. They said that I, the creator of the bomb, I'm not gonna be a part of this money drop. I'm not going to be around. Nobody that's a part of any of this exchange of money is going to know anything about how to defuse this bomb. Like, if this thing is going to go off and there's nothing you can do to stop it again, the only thing that you can do is follow what will ultimately be six sets of instructions to safely get this bomb out of there. After I get my loot.
- [09:56]
Josh Clark
Yeah, after he gets the loot. Or they. So the first set of instructions was going to be given to the helicopter pilot. The rest of the instructions would arrive through the local post office, which is putting a lot of faith in the usps. But then there was another demand, too. That was probably the most ridiculous demand of all. They said that all News media, local or national, was to be kept ignorant of the heist until the bomb was successfully removed, Right?
- [10:23]
Chuck Bryant
Yeah, that was impossible.
- [10:26]
Josh Clark
Totally impossible. Because the first thing the cops did when they realized, like, this is for real, which they figured out pretty quickly. I think the thing was discovered before 6am and by 7 or 8 at the very latest, they were rousting hotel guests at Harvey's. Many of them from sleep, telling them, like, nope, you don't have time to grab your belongings. You gotta go. And not only did they evacuate Harvey's, a thousand pounds of dynamite can do some real damage. They actually evacuated Harrah's across the street from Harvey's too.
- [10:56]
Chuck Bryant
Yeah, so they said, you're all gonna go to this nearby high school. And of course the media, it's a. It's a big thing when that happens. When people are being like massively bust out in their bathrobes and stuff. So basically, within a few hours, like, all the media knows this. They cordon off the area. There's people hanging out, there's. There's gawkers, there's reporters, there's. Before you know it, of course, because there's casinos around there. They're taking bets, of course, like over under. On whether this thing's going to detonate. And not only did they not keep the media out of it, but it became like. I mean, call it a sensation indicates that it drug on. It was like a day and change. But it was a crazy day and change for the media for sure.
- [11:41]
Josh Clark
And it was over the week before Labor Day weekend. So Tahoe was crawling with people. And this was 1980, right? Just 36 years before the first casino was opened on the south shore of Lake Tahoe. And it was opened by the same guy whose hotel now had a bomb in it, Harvey Gross. His first thing was Harvey's Wagon Wheel saloon and gambling hall, which I saw described as a cabin that had six slot machines in it. And at the time in Tahoe, Chuck, there was no phone, no water, no sewer, no power lines. The roads would close at like the first sign of snow. And it was like a real podunk area. But gambling made it, actually put it on the map.
- [12:30]
Chuck Bryant
For a second there, I thought you were going to say not a single luxury.
- [12:34]
Josh Clark
Oh, man, I really should have. I wish I had. I'm not on my game today.
- [12:39]
Chuck Bryant
Like Robinson Caruso, there were what, primitive as can be, right?
- [12:43]
Josh Clark
That's what they said. But it was the 60s, you wouldn't say that anymore.
- [12:49]
Chuck Bryant
So things go great for Harvey and his little Wagon Wheel Cabin. You know, it's on the state line of California. So that's a pretty smart thing because you get those out of staters, those richies from California throwing down some money.
- [13:03]
Josh Clark
Yeah. And it was so on the state line. It was in a town called State Line.
- [13:06]
Chuck Bryant
That's very Nevada.
- [13:08]
Josh Clark
It's very on the nose. Nevada. I'm so nervous about us saying it the right way because those people will email you like gangbusters.
- [13:17]
Chuck Bryant
Oh, it's Nevada. But I always say Nevada.
- [13:20]
Josh Clark
Okay, but they say it Nevada.
- [13:22]
Chuck Bryant
Yeah. Everyone outside the state of Nevada says Nevada. And that drives them nuts, Drives them crazy.
- [13:27]
Josh Clark
It's really something.
- [13:29]
Chuck Bryant
So Harvey. No, let's wait on a break. So Harvey was doing great with this little tiny casino in the 40s through the 50s. Makes a lot of dough. And by 63 had expanded and upgraded to Harvey's Lake Tahoe, which at the time was the tallest building at 11 stories. Which is, you know, that's a pretty tall building for that area of the country.
- [13:53]
Josh Clark
Yeah. Less than 20 years. He went from a cabin to an 11 story casino resort.
- [13:59]
Chuck Bryant
Yeah.
- [14:00]
Josh Clark
And I believe it was at that same 11 story casino resort that this bomb was placed in 1980, 17 years later. And Harvey himself was like, I mean he was a casino owner in Nevada. Like he had, I don't want to say checkered past, but he had a past. Like he'd been hauled in front of the IRS for tax evasion. There was he. He had been given an honorary name by the Nevada Inner Tribal. Did I say it right? Nevada. No, by the Nevada.
- [14:31]
Chuck Bryant
Yeah.
- [14:32]
Josh Clark
Inter Tribal Council. He was called Chief Hunai. And there was an article that was written back I think 1980 that said that it meant the man who runs the game and takes a percentage of the bets.
- [14:44]
Chuck Bryant
I don't know if that's a joke or not. I can't tell.
- [14:46]
Josh Clark
I don't either. Cause that's definitely like that era kind of joke. You know, you can see that on like a tiki napkin.
- [14:55]
Chuck Bryant
But the long and short of it is he was. He'd had his little run ins with the IRS and stuff and the gaming board, but it wasn't anything unusual. He wasn't like some bad guy like mafioso type. He was like, you said he owned a casino and there's, you know, he's going to be brought up by the IRS at some point. But all of this to say he wasn't like some, some big mark because of like all his dirty dealings in his past. Basically.
- [15:23]
Josh Clark
I saw him actually Referred to as a good guy by some people.
- [15:25]
Chuck Bryant
Yeah, it sounds like it.
- [15:27]
Josh Clark
Like, he. He was well known to have put off expansion. Like, he didn't want to expand to other towns. He basically said, I'm. I'm making enough money. He had a quote that he would refer to as. I have a nice little business. How many steaks can I eat? Which is to say, like, he had everything he needed. And this was fine. He was happy with his business where it was.
- [15:49]
Chuck Bryant
That's right. But it was the 70s and into the early 80s. Which was just sort of the golden age of all this kind of stuff. Of kidnappings and ransoms and hijackings. And it just seems like all this kind of hijinks. There's still stuff like that happens occasionally, but not like it did back then.
- [16:12]
Josh Clark
I think it's because, Chuck, the police state hadn't evolved enough. That they would catch you no matter what.
- [16:18]
Chuck Bryant
Yeah. Cameras everywhere now.
- [16:20]
Josh Clark
Right. And leaded gas had been around long enough. To really have the effects on a whole new generation of brains. So you put those two things together, you have everything converging on the 70s. For people trying all sorts of heists and kidnappings and stuff like that.
- [16:35]
Chuck Bryant
Yeah. And that happened back then. Around there even. I think as far back as the early 70s. There were kidnapping conspiracies against gross ransom things that had been uncovered. In the late 70s. There were smoke bombs with ransom notes. Found at other casinos around Tahoe. So I don't know about that. It was what, the smoke bombs?
- [16:57]
Josh Clark
Yeah. What is that? You might as well say, like, there's a box of sparklers in your. In your lobby. Give me 500,000 simoleons or else.
- [17:06]
Chuck Bryant
Give me 35 cents.
- [17:08]
Josh Clark
I know. To pay me back for the smoke. Bones.
- [17:13]
Chuck Bryant
So it was a time where if you owned a casino that brought in, I think he made about 4 million profit. But brought in, like $70 million a year, like his did then. That simply just meant you were a mark by virtue of that fact alone.
- [17:27]
Josh Clark
Right. The thing is, though, is the FBI found out as they started investigating the case about a year after. That it actually was a personal vendetta against Harvey himself or Harvey's casino. That led to that bomb being placed there in August of 1980.
- [17:44]
Chuck Bryant
That sounds like a great cliffhanger for a break.
- [17:46]
Josh Clark
Thank you. Thanks, man.
- [17:47]
Chuck Bryant
All right, we'll get back to it right after this.
- [18:00]
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- [18:29]
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- [18:59]
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- [19:13]
Josh Clark
Where do you see the business actually heading?
- [19:15]
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- [19:21]
LG XBoom Advertiser
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- [19:24]
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- [19:40]
Chuck Bryant
All right, so we're back in action here at the bomb site. The FBI's bomb squad is working hard trying to figure this thing out. They have another team working on a fake ransom drop. Special Agent William Jonkey basically told Harvey, hey, listen, why don't we drag this thing out as much as we can? We'll do a fake payoff arrangement. Maybe we can just sort of put off this bomb going off long enough for us to figure it out either how to stop it or how to catch these people, like the bomb is gonna go off no matter what. And once Gross heard that, he was like, well, I'm not paying anything if this thing's going off no matter what. You can use my. By God, you can use my own helicopter for the drop even. And that's what they did. They used his own personal helicopter. But the pilot was fed, and there was another fed with a gun hiding behind the pilot's seat with a suitcase full of mostly fake money.
- [20:36]
Josh Clark
Yeah, I think a few grand is what I saw. And just like the ransom note said, the agent flew the helicopter, Lake Tahoe Airport, landed next to the pay phone and got there just in time, from what I saw, for the phone to start ringing, although I suspect they were being watched. And the phone rang. And rather than giving them instructions over the phone, I think it's hilarious that they said, look underneath the phone. There's instructions taped beneath the phone. And then I guess hung up.
- [21:03]
Chuck Bryant
We didn't want to tape it to the front of the phone booth.
- [21:06]
Josh Clark
Right. So he checks out the instructions, and it says, okay, this is what you're going to do. You're going to fly west along the highway for 15 minutes from the airport, and you're going to turn. There's some compass that they told him to turn toward. I never found which one. And then after a certain amount of time, he should start looking for a beacon, which is going to be a strobe light in a field. He should land there, and that's where the money drop would happen. And so the pilot took off, and he did exactly as the thing instructed, as the ransom node instructed, and there was nothing. He flew around for 45 minutes, just waiting, hoping, I guess, probably came close to running out of gas. And then he flew back to the Lake Tahoe airport and went back to the payphone in case they called to say, like, what the heck's going on? And they. They never did call, actually. So the money drop never happened.
- [21:56]
Chuck Bryant
I wonder. The Fed takes off, and he's got the other Fed behind him hiding with a gun, and he's like, hey, how do you think this guy knows how far we're gonna be in 15 minutes? And the other Fed went, beats me. And that's exactly what happened. And it's at this point in the story where we will introduce you to the guy behind the whole thing, and we'll learn more about him later. But his name was John Waldo Burgess, Sr. And that was one of the key mistakes he made. He kind of botched this money drop because he should have said miles, like fly so many miles or fly to this destination. He'd have said fly for 15 minutes. And I don't know if he put at an average rate of speed for your helicopter.
- [22:44]
Josh Clark
Right.
- [22:45]
Chuck Bryant
But the long and short of it is they didn't know after he had flown 15 minutes, exactly where he was going to end up. And they were like, well, that stinks. And this is after they had forgotten the battery to the strobe light.
- [22:57]
Josh Clark
Right. They left it in Fresno.
- [23:00]
Chuck Bryant
They eventually got one. Yeah. They left it at their place. They eventually got one. They tried to break into an auto parts store to get one and got chased off and then got one at a Shell station. So they had the strobe, but by the time all this happens, they don't even know where the helicopter is.
- [23:16]
Josh Clark
No. And that Shell station also has its own hilarious story, because the gas station attendant they were trying to buy the battery from basically was like, why no, you need this kind of battery for the Volvo that you have parked outside that you're driving. They're like, it doesn't matter what kind of battery it's for. He's like, well, yeah, it does, because Volvo won't take any battery. And they finally, I guess convinced them to just sell them a battery and, and he's like, fine, I guess you're going to find out yourself that it's not going to work. And they finally drove off. That's how they got the battery. But they made it to that drop point which was 25 miles away from the airport. And they sat there and waited and waited and waited and waited and waited. No helicopter, no helicopter came. And the reason why is because they were separated. Separated by so many miles they couldn't even hear the helicopter where it was, it was so far away from where they were at the drop site.
- [24:09]
Chuck Bryant
All right, so this is botched back at the bomb site at the casino, a full on party is going on because it's a casino and people are just out of their minds at those places. So the barricades are set up, people are selling T shirts. I got bombed at Lake Tahoe. I had a dynamite time at Lake Tahoe. That's how quickly this thing was moving. And the bomb squad team said, all right, here's what I think we should do. Like they call this. And they said if we flip switch number five, then it'll buy some more time because this thing isn't playing out quite right. But I don't know if I trust that no one volunteered to flick that switch. Like they felt basically we should go on our own, like with our own gut feeling on how to do this, which is to basically blow this box apart, but do it so quickly that it severs the relay switch like before the signal can reach the dynamite.
- [25:06]
Josh Clark
Yeah, which is pretty fast. And it was possible they had some of like the greatest minds in the United States who knew about bombs working on this problem. And they designed a charge especially for this. And it was built and brought to the site and put up. And they said this still has at best a 25 to 30% chance. But we talked to the engineer, one of the engineers at Harvey's, and he said it probably won't bring the whole building down, so let's give it a shot. And so almost 35 hours after the bomb had been discovered, around 3pm the next day, a guy named Danny Daniel was the person who volunteered to go take the charge, put it on the bomb exactly at the angle he was told to put it at and then walked out and started the countdown for the remote triggering. And remember, there are hundreds, if not thousands of people that throng together to watch this to see if it worked. And when they finally did, apparently they. They broadcast the radio, the countdown on, like, local radio, Chuck. And when they finally set it off, that charge did not work the way it was intended.
- [26:14]
Chuck Bryant
No, it set off the bomb. The entire thing went off. And it was, like we said, it was a thousand pounds of dynamite. It created a 40 to 50 foot hole in the ground in the middle of this casino, shooting shrapnel everywhere, obviously shooting cash and chips everywhere, which is obviously problematic. They said there were TV sets swinging on cords, toilets hanging by the pipes. It was a huge, massive explosion in the middle of a casino. And because it's a casino and because it's Tahoe, it was not very long afterward that the surrounding casinos got right back to business. And it didn't take too long. A couple of days before Harvey's got back to business with what was left of the casino. They put glass around it and was kind of like, hey, come see the bomb hole and gamble some and watch.
- [27:07]
Josh Clark
The FBI work on this crime scene that just took place. So one of the other great details of this story for me is that the bandits didn't know that the bomb had been detonated. And so a few minutes after the bomb went off, they called the local sheriff's office and said, we'll be calling back in one hour to arrange another payment drop.
- [27:28]
Chuck Bryant
He said, whatever.
- [27:30]
Josh Clark
Yeah. Can't you imagine, like, the person who took the call being like, oh, yeah, great. Okay, we'll talk to you in an hour.
- [27:35]
Chuck Bryant
Yeah, yeah. So that didn't matter. Harvey Gross was very sad. He just cried when he saw the damage. $18 million worth of damage. And, you know, we'll tell you what ultimately happened later. But they got back to business, like I said, and I guess we should talk a little bit more about who this mastermind was.
- [27:58]
Josh Clark
I agree, Chuck. And I say before we start talking about the mastermind behind the plot, we take a break.
- [28:03]
Chuck Bryant
All right, let's do it. You can make a difference in someone's life, including your own, with a job in home care. These jobs offer flexible schedules, health care, retirement options, and free training. They also provide paid time off and opportunities for overtime. Visit oregonhomecarejobs.com to learn more and apply. That's oregonhomecarejobs.com stop settling for weak sound. It's time to level up your game. And bring the boom. Hit the town with the ultra durable LG X Boom portable speaker and enjoy vibrant sound wherever you go. Elevate your listening experience to new heights because, let's be real, your music deserves it. The future of sound is now with LG XBoom. And for a limited time, save 25%@LG.com with code fall25. Bring the boom XBoom.
- [29:13]
Variety Podcast Advertiser
There's a lot going on in Hollywood. How are you supposed to stay on top of it all? Variety has the solution. Take 20 minutes out of your day and listen to the new daily Variety podcast for breaking entertainment news and expert perspectives.
- [29:27]
Josh Clark
Where do you see the business actually headed?
- [29:29]
Variety Podcast Advertiser
Featuring the iconic journalists of Variety and hosted by co editor in chief Cynthia Littleton.
- [29:35]
Chuck Bryant
The only constant in Hollywood is change.
- [29:38]
Variety Podcast Advertiser
Open your free iHeartradio app, search daily Variety and listen now.
- [29:54]
Josh Clark
So we already revealed who it was. A guy named John Burgess Sr. And his son wrote a book later that I saw, he called the publisher to find out how many copies had been sold at the time, and they told him zero. But in this book, he depicts his dad as not a very nice guy. He was an abusive husband, physically abusive, a really terrible dad. He liked to emotionally blackmail his family by threatening to take his life by suicide. And he was an actual Nazi. Like a genuine Nazi, just to. Just to put the cherry on top of everything.
- [30:30]
Chuck Bryant
Yeah, he flew for the Luftwaffe and spent eight years in a Soviet prison camp before coming to America and becoming a multimillionaire. So it kind of ended up okay for him. He had a landscaping business in Fresno that apparently did really, really well. But he also liked to gamble a lot and lost a ton of money over the years. I think about $750,000 they'd estimated that he lost, I think at Harvey's alone. Right.
- [31:00]
Josh Clark
I think that was the whole shebang. But most of that was at Harvey's. That was my take on it.
- [31:06]
Chuck Bryant
Okay. And we do need to put a pin in something else, is that years before, he had a business, a restaurant that was pretty clear that he burned down for the insurance money, got $355,000 from that and gambled that away.
- [31:24]
Josh Clark
Yeah, he was that kind of guy. Right. So the heist itself, it was an attempt to make back some of the money that the house had taken from him over the years that he felt bitter about. But also the reason that he targeted Harvey's, they later found out, was that on some New Year's Eve a year or two before, he had been given the high roller suite that's how often he gambled at Harvey's. Like he was well known there, but he had amassed such a debt that they actually took him that evening out of the high roller suite and put him in a regular room.
- [31:58]
Chuck Bryant
That was why he did it, man.
- [32:00]
Josh Clark
Much to his great humiliation. Yeah, I mean, that was pretty much why he very least why he targeted Harvey's. He considered that quite a loss of pride because I guess he was with a date and the date was like, I thought you said you were big time. Which didn't make it any better. So that's why Harvey's got targeted in particular.
- [32:19]
Chuck Bryant
That's right. And they put Aaron Hagar in that suite instead.
- [32:23]
Josh Clark
They did. And everything was right with the world.
- [32:26]
Chuck Bryant
That's right. So actually Aaron's. He's about my age, so he would have been a kid back then. Or maybe they did.
- [32:32]
Josh Clark
He could have been high rolling.
- [32:33]
Chuck Bryant
Maybe he was like a 9 or 10 year old, like running the show in that gambling room.
- [32:37]
Josh Clark
I could totally see it.
- [32:40]
Chuck Bryant
So we mentioned he was Burgess Sr. There was a Burgess Jr. He had a couple of sons, John Jr. And Jimmy, who were 20 and 18 respectively. And then Jimmy, or wait, was Ella Williams the senior's girlfriend.
- [32:55]
Josh Clark
Yes.
- [32:55]
Chuck Bryant
Okay, so he had a girlfriend named Ella Williams who were also in on it. And these two numbskulls who delivered the bomb named Bill Brown and Terry Hall.
- [33:04]
Josh Clark
The FBI later said after they caught Bill Brown, they described him or no, it was from a report, like somebody who witnessed the bomb being delivered. They said one of them was. Was a hayseed, a real goober type. That's how they described Bill Brown. And it's sad for Bill Brown and Terry Hall, Chuck, because they got a total of 2,100 bucks. But it wasn't until after they were driven away early that morning that they were told what they'd just done. They did not know that they were delivering a bomb until after they delivered the bomb. Isn't that terrible?
- [33:37]
Chuck Bryant
Yeah, I mean, they. They were probably just sold. Here's some money. Go deliver this thing. That was a lot of money.
- [33:42]
Josh Clark
That's exactly right. Yeah. And John Burgess Jr just totally misled him, which is another mark against that guy.
- [33:49]
Chuck Bryant
All right, so spinning back a little bit. When they hatched this plan, the first thing they did was go out and get all this dynamite, which they stole from a power plant in California and stashed it in their walk in freezer in their garage and started building this bomb. And no. 1. That's kind of one of the mysteries of this Case is it was such a sophisticated device, and no one still really knows how this guy managed to build this thing. If he had help, if he was just this bomb genius that no one knew about or was just super smart and did his research, but no one really knows how he managed to build such a sophisticated bomb.
- [34:30]
Josh Clark
I mean, it's still not clear. I don't think anybody will ever know he just did it. And what's crazy is John Burgess might have gotten away with the whole thing. The FBI did not. They were not on him initially. They interviewed something like 500 suspects in the whole case. And there were two things that seem to have brought Burgess down. One was a hotel owner who was the night manager of the hotel that Burgess, Brown, and Hall stayed at before they planted the bomb. Her name was Nancy Domenico. And she found those three suspicious enough that she wrote down their license plate on their van. Make, model, color, and the license plate number and just kept it on file just in case. And it turned out that that would become really important later on. And then the other factor was John Burgess Jr. Had a really loud mouth, it turns out.
- [35:24]
Chuck Bryant
Yeah. He had a girlfriend leading up to the event, and he would just brag all about this thing. They break up. You never think about the breakup side of things when you're spilling your innermost thoughts.
- [35:37]
Josh Clark
Yeah.
- [35:38]
Chuck Bryant
And she has a new boyfriend. Tells him all about this guy I dated before you that told me all about this bomb plot. The new boyfriend calls in the FBI tip. So now they have a couple of tips pointing to these dudes.
- [35:52]
Josh Clark
Yeah.
- [35:52]
Chuck Bryant
They track down the van that Nancy Domenico had reported as shady. And it was a van that was registered to the restaurant that Burgess Sr. Allegedly had burned down. So that's where that comes back into play.
- [36:07]
Josh Clark
Yeah. So they're like, okay, let's go interview John Burgess Sr. And John Burgess Sr. Says, oh, John Jr. Was driving the van.
- [36:14]
Chuck Bryant
Completely gave his son up immediately.
- [36:17]
Josh Clark
Yeah, I mean, like, that first interview said, probably said, here's his address. Hopefully at least called his son to give him a heads up. I don't know. But they went over and they interviewed John Jr. And he said, yes, I was around Tahoe at the time. Yes, I was with my van, but I was looking for places to plant marijuana. And, you know, that's true because I've just admitted to a crime to the FBI. Right, right. And apparently the FBI didn't. Didn't really buy it. They said, like, that story is awful. But he stuck to it. And they didn't have anything else they could get him on right then. But he was definitely on their radar from that point forward.
- [36:56]
Chuck Bryant
I thought it was a pretty good story to be put on the spot personally.
- [37:00]
Josh Clark
Well.
- [37:01]
Chuck Bryant
Well, it didn't work, but like, to admit to another crime. I was like, right, all right.
- [37:05]
Josh Clark
Not bad, I'll give you that Part, the part the FBI was like, you're kidding, right? He said the battery died, so I abandoned the van. Somebody must have taken it and used it in the crime and then brought it back while I was away from the van.
- [37:20]
Chuck Bryant
Right, well. Which is a long way of saying wasn't me.
- [37:24]
Josh Clark
Right, exactly.
- [37:26]
Chuck Bryant
So they, you know, they do what they do in the movies. They don't have enough hard evidence, so they spend a year getting that evidence, building a case.
- [37:34]
Josh Clark
And a montage with a great, like, upbeat song where they're putting this stuff together.
- [37:39]
Chuck Bryant
Right, Sure. I don't know why John Jr. And John Sr. Are still in the country. I would have been out of there so fast.
- [37:48]
Josh Clark
Where would you go?
- [37:50]
Chuck Bryant
I'd leave the country.
- [37:51]
Josh Clark
I know. Where would you go?
- [37:53]
Chuck Bryant
Oh, that's a really good question. Everyone just always talks about, like, who would you have over for dinner, living or dead? Like, mine would be, where would you go if you were guilty of a bombing blot?
- [38:04]
Josh Clark
I mean, it's gotta be a non extradition treaty country, right? So you're looking at like Venezuela.
- [38:09]
Chuck Bryant
I'd have to do my research then. But yeah, I would go someplace with a beach and like a very quiet life.
- [38:16]
Josh Clark
Okay.
- [38:17]
Chuck Bryant
Yeah. And then they just, you know, they eventually show up at the beach in the movie as well. So pull that Mai Tai out of your hands and your toes.
- [38:24]
Josh Clark
Exactly. Canada has beaches.
- [38:28]
Chuck Bryant
Sure. Lovely beaches.
- [38:29]
Josh Clark
Thank you.
- [38:30]
Chuck Bryant
Not quite the beaches I was looking for, though.
- [38:32]
Josh Clark
You're welcome, Chuck.
- [38:34]
Chuck Bryant
So the FBI is getting this evidence. They have rewards. I think like a half a million bucks is about as high as the reward went. And finally, about a year later, they arrest John Jr. And Jimmy and they say they dang a little carrot in front of their faces.
- [38:55]
Josh Clark
I'm so glad you said carrot.
- [38:56]
Chuck Bryant
How would you like to. How'd you like to turn on dad and maybe get a little leniency? And they went, that jerk. I'm happy to. And that's exactly what they did.
- [39:06]
Josh Clark
Right. And they turned on their dad. They arrested their dad. They arrested Ella Williams, Bill Brown, Terry hall. And from what we understand, every single person who had anything to do with that was rounded up in one fell swoop, basically. And the conviction started coming out. Ella Williams got seven years for her involvement and she hasn't factored in hugely into this podcast, but she was definitely an accomplice. She typed the ransom notes up. She. She did a lot. I think she dropped some people off at the. One of the. The landing sites. Like, she was very much involved. So she.
- [39:39]
Podcast Host/Announcer
Years.
- [39:39]
Josh Clark
But a judge later overturned her conviction, and I couldn't see why. But as far as I know, she did not do any time in prison, maybe beyond her trial.
- [39:49]
Chuck Bryant
Yeah, I think the sons did get that leniency. As for John Senior, he represented himself in court, cross examined his own sons, eventually got 20 years in federal prison, and then, I believe, life without parole in state prison.
- [40:06]
Josh Clark
Yeah, the big key to his defense was his sons had given him a Father's Day card that said, you're the best dad around 10 years before. Didn't work on the jury. Sorry.
- [40:19]
Chuck Bryant
How could I have done this? He served 16 years, died in prison of cancer. But then there's one final little potential twist here, right?
- [40:28]
Josh Clark
Yeah. So John Burgess had talked to a reporter while he was alive, and he said, you know what? This wasn't my idea. I was a patsy. I was a rube. I got dragged into this by a loan shark I owed 60 large to. That's what you say when you're a gambler. And he recruited me to plant this bomb, and that really, the loan shark was working on behalf of Harvey's top executives and the Mafia who were conspiring to blow the place up so that they could collect the insurance money.
- [40:58]
Chuck Bryant
Looky there. Do you believe it?
- [41:01]
Josh Clark
Not at all. No.
- [41:02]
Chuck Bryant
Same.
- [41:03]
Josh Clark
No. And like, the. The. The. The thing that just, like, completely proves it is. Yeah, they used insurance money to rebuild. It's like. No, that doesn't prove anything. Of course you're going to use insurance money to rebuild. It doesn't mean there was a conspiracy there.
- [41:17]
Chuck Bryant
Right? Is that place still there? Any idea?
- [41:20]
Josh Clark
Yeah, it's still there. I think it's been updated even. Even more since then, but, yeah, as far as I know, Harvey's is still there.
- [41:27]
Chuck Bryant
Awesome. I don't know why, over the past two weeks, I never thought to look that up.
- [41:32]
Josh Clark
Me either. I'm almost positive. We'll have to leave it to Aaron Hagar to tell us whether it's there or not.
- [41:38]
Chuck Bryant
Sweet. It is. I'm looking at a picture of it. It's definitely been updated.
- [41:42]
Josh Clark
Well, while you're online, why don't you look at ebay and see if there's any, like, I got bombed at Harvey's T shirts still around.
- [41:49]
Chuck Bryant
Oh, wow. Well, if there Are. I'm not going to tell you. I'm just going to get you one for Christmas.
- [41:53]
Josh Clark
Fair enough. I like that a lot. That's a good plan. Well, since Chuck said what he's going to get me for Christmas and I realized, man, I've got to figure out what to get Chuck for Christmas. It's time for listener mail.
- [42:06]
Chuck Bryant
You just got me a great record.
- [42:09]
Josh Clark
Which one? Oh, the Bill Evans one. Yeah, yeah. You like it? Have you listened to it yet?
- [42:13]
Chuck Bryant
I love it. I mean, it's Bill Evans, but it's just. Yeah, it's good. Very evocative of the changing the seasons, which I think was the whole point for sure.
- [42:22]
Josh Clark
I'm glad you liked it.
- [42:24]
Chuck Bryant
All right. Hey guys. After listening to the introvert extrovert episode, I thought I'd reach out because Chuck at one point talked about finding ways to discipline his child by removing fun activities. I remember saying that and.
- [42:40]
Josh Clark
But I guess, oh, you were so mad. You were like frothing at the mouth. I've never heard you more angry.
- [42:45]
Chuck Bryant
We don't even really, really do that. So I'm not sure if I may have been kidding or not. Anyway, I'm a third grade teacher because this is like a tip here, so we got to read the tips. I'm a third grade teacher on a reservation and with 16 kids in my class, I have never had to use discipline. My classroom functions like a well oiled machine due to a type of behavior management known in the educational world as pbis. Positive behaviors and supports. It's a way to manage challenging child behavior solely. Solely through the use of using praise and rewards.
- [43:17]
Josh Clark
Wow.
- [43:18]
Chuck Bryant
It can easily be applied in the context of raising your own child.
- [43:22]
Josh Clark
Especially if you want to raise a psychopath.
- [43:26]
Chuck Bryant
This is a huge topic and one that is near and dear to my heart. I thought it might be incredibly useful for all the parents out there who, like Chuck, struggle to find a way to manage their child's behavior through convention discipline.
- [43:37]
Josh Clark
Man, this guy's scoring all over you, Chuck.
- [43:39]
Chuck Bryant
A little bit. This is Anthony. You guys rock. Thanks for all the wonderful knowledge and hilarious dialogue. Want to be super clear, Anthony? We don't struggle to find a way to manage her behavior. She's a good kid. And not to say that kids who have trouble behaving are bad kids at all. Everyone has their challenges as kids and parents, but it's not too bad. And I don't know that this PBIS would work necessarily in my household, but hey, I mean, we already do that kind of thing. But I'll ramp it up and see if that helps.
- [44:16]
Josh Clark
There you go. Run an experiment Chuck in true sysk fashion.
- [44:19]
Chuck Bryant
Sure. I'm curious though because Anthony didn't say if Anthony had kids. I will say that the way kids behave for teachers is not at all related to how they behave for parents a lot of times.
- [44:31]
Josh Clark
I can imagine for sure.
- [44:32]
Chuck Bryant
So yeah, I'm curious.
- [44:34]
Josh Clark
Yeah if you guys listening out there try this let us know if it works or what. And also Anthony, thank you very much for writing in Anthony. It was great. So if you want to be like Anthony you can write in too. To StuffPodcastHeartRadio.com.
- [44:52]
Podcast Host/Announcer
Stuff youf Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts My Heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Hey guys, it's Chiquis from Cheekis and Chill Cleaning today. Well, not exactly my idea.
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Josh Clark
Fun.
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Podcast Host/Announcer
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Josh Clark
Where do you see the business actually heading?
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Podcast Host/Announcer
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