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- [00:00]
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- [00:30]
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- [01:26]
Alice
Juliet hi, I'm Juliette Cowley, a retired FBI profiler and host of the True Crime podcast the Real FBI Profilers. If you're fascinated with true crime and criminal profiling, then join us as we discuss real cases and examine the behavior exhibited before, during and after the commission of the crime. You can listen to the consult wherever you get your podcasts. It's as close as it gets to being in the room with the FBI's Behavioral Analysis Unit.
- [02:05]
Brett
I'm brett. And I'm alice and we are the prosecutors. Today on the Prosecutors, we continue our look at the case of the Isdale Sam. Hello everybody and welcome to this episode of the Prosecutors. I'm Brett and I'm joined as always by my deathly co host, Alice. And in this case, it might be deathly ill. How you doing Alice? You making it great?
- [03:12]
Alice
Couldn't be better. It was I'm so deathly that when I laughed I just ran into the microphone. So if you heard a bang, that was me running into the microphone.
- [03:21]
Brett
So great Alice's commitment to this podcast. She is here, she's ready to record. You know Will she make it through to the end? We don't know, but we're about to find out. Right?
- [03:33]
Alice
Okay, you know what? It's either me or Isdale Woman.
- [03:35]
Brett
That's right. Okay, well, today, you know, I thought we might finish this episode. I'm now not so sure because we got so many great emails from people. We have all this stuff we want to share with you. Of all the things we've done, of all the cases we've done, this is the one we've gotten the most feedback on. And. And I feel like this is just. You guys are wonderful. It's just wonderful to have all of you out there and you've provided so much insight. It's crazy.
- [04:00]
Alice
So I'm just going to best use of crowdsourcing.
- [04:02]
Brett
I mean, seriously, it's just great. Like, I'm really. Some of these stories and insights are just incredible. Anyways, so we got several different listeners who wrote in. We're just going to read what they wrote. I'll start with one of the first ones. I'm not going to use names because, you know, you just never know if people want their names mentioned or not. So we'll keep it anonymous. Okay. So this first one has an awesome family, by the way. Like, what a cool life she must have had growing up. And already too. My father was an archaeologist, and in the 1950s, before I was born in a taxi cab during a dig at King Midas tomb, which is already. I mean, awesome.
- [04:38]
Alice
That was an awesome. I don't know if that's literary or actual. I think it's actual. That was a really good way to just kind of put it in as a parenthetical.
- [04:45]
Brett
Sticking in there. Yeah, I feel like this person could write a book anyways. My mother, an artist, accompanied him on excavations. If my recollection is correct, she often used modeling clay to make impressions of artifacts. The clay did no harm to these ancient finds, and she could use the molds later to sculpt and draw the pieces accurately. My mother no longer went on excavations after I was born. I think my unconventional arrival might have had something to do with that. But she continued to her archaeological drawings. So it's likely my father made molds of the objects and brought them back to facilitate her work. Not only did the molds capture details in the objects that a photograph couldn't, they also showed the image in relief. One of my mother's drawings hangs in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, where it accompanies an artifact from one of my father's expeditions. He was, for Decades. The curator of Near Eastern art at the Met, which just already. That's awesome. That's so incredible.
- [05:35]
Alice
Like, we don't even have to talk about Isda woman.
- [05:37]
Brett
This is just really neat. Anyways, so she keeps going. This memory naturally made me think that the molding clay in the suitcase was most likely used to to make molds. And if we run with the idea of the Isdale woman having been a spy, my mind goes to keys. A mold could quickly and easily be taken in modeling clay, and then a key made from the mold. There are, of course, a number of reasons to make copies of keys. She stayed in many hotel rooms, and maybe she or someone else wanted access to these rooms in the future without asking for a key. Perhaps she made copies of other room keys or suitcase keys or things other than keys. She also had a scalpel, which sounds like an artist's tool for working with clay. The spoons too, could have been used in this process. My mother made our baby handprints in clay, and you can see our fingerprints in them. However, my understanding is that the Isdale woman didn't have a large amount with her. So if not keys, perhaps coins, official seals, or any other smallest objects with raised images would be good guesses. I can hardly be the first person to have thought of this, but maybe it will open another way of thinking about this or make sense of something else. Thank you so much for what you do and especially how you do it. Takskall Duha, which sounds like, you know, should be like pledging your loyalty to an ancient Egyptian deity, but it's actually how you say thank you in Norwegian, so we'll go with that. But it really interesting. And you know, the modeling clay, there's so many aspects of this case, and we talked about this throughout, there's so many aspects of this case that are intriguing and that make you wonder and that make you think about what's going on here. And just all those objects that she had in her suitcase, the modeling clay is one of them. And so I thought this was a really interesting email and I wanted to read it to you. So there's that. Alice, do you have any thoughts on modeling clay before I move on to the next one?
- [07:23]
Alice
Yeah. So when I heard of the modeling clay, my initial thought, of course, is, oh, keys. But it almost seems too obvious. And instead what she said in her email here was really interesting. The whole seals and not so much coins. But remember, she is seen talking with like Navy men, people who. And there's maybe some question about whether she's in these same cities while super secret military operations are happening, where insignias that are very detailed can convey a lot but mean nothing to anybody else. And one detail off could give you away, right? Like the number of stripes. It's not a language, so you can't find it in encyclopedia, but it could give away whether you're supposed to be somewhere. And so she's meeting with these people for brief periods of time in public places, say for dinner in a public restaurant, why they're not talking. Perhaps she's just pressing a seal into a mold and that's all she needs it for, for whatever reason it may be. But that seems to me like, oh, okay, there's a lot of detail needed very quickly for whatever purpose. And she is seen with these people often not talking. And I always thought it was strange that she would be meeting with these people if it were for spy purposes in public places. But a public place would actually draw less attention to you because you're not going into a room necessarily and staying together for hours while she sculpts, you know, this insignia, but rather a brief hello over dinner, press the seal, go on their merry way.
- [08:48]
Brett
And if it was something that you needed some sort of copy of or some detail of, the advantage is you can have the object, make the mold of it and then replace the object. And so the person who owns the object or controls the object, they may never even know that you did it, right? Whereas if you stole it, obviously they would notice that it was missing. So I think that's a really interesting thing. And obviously we can't know what she used it for. There's tons of speculation. Maybe she's just an artist and she's just traveling around Europe looking for beautiful things to make small clay sculptures of. I don't know, it's possible.
- [09:26]
Alice
But the interesting thing is, of course, that it's not like she's found with a bunch of sculptures, right? Her little figurines that she sees with. In fact, she's found with only the clay. And then that would make sense if she's doing it, passing it off to a third party. Because if in fact she is transmitting private information, it's usually a string of people who transmit the information so that you don't get caught with the ultimate thing. And the spoon thing she mentioned in the email is really interesting because it's so weird that she's walking around with like a whole set of spoons, but not necessarily the number of forks to match it. How many spoons can one person eat with On a trip, right? Like maybe bring your favorite spoon, but like a whole set, unless it's used for some sort of molding clay art purpose.
- [10:10]
Brett
And you know, the fact that she has only a little bit with her, like why would you only have a little bit of clay? You know, if you needed the clay, it seems like you'd have a lot of clay. But she only has a small amount. Well, it could be because she is making these molds, passing them off to someone and her amount of clay is sort of dwindling over time. Right. So anyways, that's the clay. This is a good example and you're going to see, Morgan examples of why we love hearing from you. If you guys have thoughts, please send them to us. So that's the clay. Now let's talk about watches and let's talk about clothes. Because the first insight this person had I just thought was interesting. But the second insight they had actually may speak to the case in general. So the first thing, this person was in the jewelry business for nearly four decades and they said manual watches like those sold in the 70s and before, they would always set the dial to 150 and they called it the happy face. And this sort of goes to what we were talking about, like what would be sort of the optimal or the best or the most attractive or the most pleasing setting for a watch. Well, I guess in this person's case it would be this happy face. 150. So interesting. Doesn't really tell us much about this case, though it does indicate that the setting maybe is less likely to have been the store setting, you know, 1231 or whatever it was. This, though I thought was pretty interesting. It was quite common in the 70s and 80s for clothing in secondhand shops or outlets to have the tags cut or removed. A practice often associated with clearing out inventory or protecting brand images. In that era, and particularly in Europe, this happened for several reasons. Brand protection and outlets. Manufacturers often sold overstock, past season or slightly imperfect items to discount retailers or wholesalers to ensure these cheaper items were not returned to high end stores for full price. Interesting. And to protect the brand's reputation, the labels were cut, marked with a black pen, or completely removed. It also prevented resale fraud. Labels were sometimes cut to prevent people from buying low priced secondhand items and attempting to sell them as new. Privacy and personal use. Individuals often cut tags out because they were itchy or to hide personal information, such as names written on labels for schools or care facilities. Cultural stigma in the 1970s, buying second hand was still Heavily associated with poverty. Removing the label helped disguise the origin of the garment. While some collectors today see this as frustrating, finding cut label Clothing from the 70s is a hallmark of how clothing was recycled, discounted and sold during that period. So that's fascinating because we've assumed, or I've assumed Alice pointed to a few possibilities on this, that the reason you would cut this off is to prevent people from, from knowing where you got the clothes. And there certainly seem to be things that she did to conceal her identity. We've been through some of that, but maybe the clothing itself is not as important a factor as we thought it was.
- [13:15]
Alice
And by the way, as soon as this person said this, it pinged in my mind that like this still happens, except usually the tag is not cut. If you go to like Nordstrom's rack, for example, if you buy name brand clothes, oftentimes the tag will have like a black marker through it. I didn't ever know what the reason was for, but that would make sense. So you don't return your Coach bag to like the Dillard's or something for full price when it was being sold at the Nordstrom rack or I guess Nordstrom proper because of that. So that definitely makes sense because you'll see this a lot on like Poshmark. Poshmark is a resale online store and you'll see a lot of people, I think what they do is go buy a bunch of nice clothing but discounted and sell them for nearby full price or close to what you could get them in store. But if you look at the pictures, a lot of the tags all have like a black permanent marker through them indicating I didn't know this, but that they're coming from like a, you know, less expensive after season, we made too much stock sort of sale. But what this says about her, if in fact this was not her removing the tags, but rather she's buying secondhand, is that it may be she's trying to dress in a higher society than she actually belongs in. And so she may not be able to afford the fur coats and the fur hats and the fur scarves, who can, by the way? But she needed to dress in those societies to blend in. And so in order to afford those, she had to go buy them from more less expensive places.
- [14:47]
Brett
And this kind of fits right with how she presented herself and how she was described by people. She was described as elegant and well dressed and well put together. But she's not staying at the nicest hotels, she's staying at mid range hotels. So Nice hotels, but not really nice hotels. And when she would go to those mid range hotels, she would ask for the cheapest room they had. So it may be that she really is trying to present too much of the world as though she is of sort of a higher class than she belongs to for whatever her reason, whether it's she's a spy, she's a fraudster, she just wants people to think she's high class for whatever reason. I mean there's all sorts of reasons one might do something like that. So I thought that was interesting.
- [15:33]
Alice
I mean in the 1970s or today, I would think that people who are perceived to be in a higher class may just have access to places that quote unquote commoners can't. Right? Maybe access to certain clubs, certain eat dining places. So if she's having to meet like officers, they may not just let in any riff raff from the street. But if you look the part and you're a woman, maybe they're not going to ask too many questions like ma', am, do you belong here? But if you have a fur coat on and you're walking in to meet a captain, maybe they won't ask why you're there. If you look like you belong. Okay, we have even more. This is so great. Crowdsourcing at its best. Like I told you from another listener, this person said they were just listening to episode two of Isdale Woman and the maps that all have 166 on them. This person says it's a price, most likely UK pre decimal currency. So that price would be 16 shillings and 6 pence. In other words, you'd say 16 and 6 decimal currency came in 1971 in the UK. So before you had decimals like we have today, you had the slash. So 16/6. I was thinking it was like stainless steel grade. But this person back in 1970, that's actually how the UK wrote out its currency amount.
- [16:44]
Brett
And I'm going to say this person, this is from Liz. I want Liz to know that, you know, we're acknowledging this is from her. And this piece of information is so critically important to me. When I read this, it changed my entire perspective on this case. I'll get into that more once we get into our theories. But yeah, I mean when we first saw this, we thought this is some sort of date for some reason June 16th is written on all these. And that doesn't really make any sense because it's all these different maps. But what would make sense is a bunch of maps bought from the same place have the same price on them. And these are all these maps she had of Scandinavia and of Norway. They all had 16, 6 written on them. Now, I want you to take a moment and think about what that means. That means if that's true, if this person is right and this is an English pricing thing, which the timing is perfect for this. Right. If that's true, then that means that when she was getting ready to go to Norway, when she was planning this trip to Norway, to all these different places, she wasn't planning it in France or Germany or Belgium, she was planning it in England, because that's where she bought the maps. So she would have been in England buying the maps for the trips she was going to take to Scandinavia, which makes you think when she decided to go to Scandinavia, that's where she was. She was in England. And this is the first time that England has really come into this. We've talked about how she spoke some English. Right. But England as a. You know, this is where she was for some significant period of time. This is the first time we've seen it. So to me, this could be a huge piece of information giving us some background on this woman and some more detail about her travels that we didn't have before.
- [18:43]
Alice
And also the fact that if this is the price and they're all coming at the same time, this would suggest that home base before everything happened would be the UK as well. Right. Because you don't need the maps after you've been somewhere, you do it in a planning state. And it also indicates that this was a well thought out path. If all these are bought at the same time, you knew the countries you were going to go to ahead of time. And it's not like you go to Norway and think, ah, I need to go to France. So this was a well thought out path and schedule.
- [19:13]
Brett
Yeah. And I got all sorts of thoughts about this as we get into this, but I really think, I mean, for me, and maybe she's wrong. I mean, this, this person.
- [19:21]
Alice
How much is 16 shillings and 6 pence? Is that about the price of a map? I was trying to look that up.
- [19:25]
Brett
I have no idea. I don't know what a shilling In a pants is.
- [19:29]
Alice
60.
- [19:30]
Brett
How many shillings are in a pound?
- [19:32]
Alice
How 100 shillings was a map in 1970?
- [19:37]
Brett
Yeah, ask Groff.
- [19:38]
Alice
I'm just curious because if it's like much, it sounds Right. Right. So in 1970, an Ordnance Survey map in the UK cost a few shillings, following decimalization, around one pound or slightly more. That's really Interesting that they say the decimalization.
- [19:55]
Brett
So there are 240 old pennies to the pound, and a shilling was 12 old pennies. So, I mean, whatever. Whatever. The crown was five shillings, I guess.
- [20:06]
Alice
So here, there are some maps that cost a few shillings. 16 could be a few, right?
- [20:11]
Brett
Oh, yeah.
- [20:11]
Alice
16 is not a down payment on a house, in other words.
- [20:14]
Brett
Correct.
- [20:15]
Alice
So it would make sense that this falls within the spectrum in the realm. If you have math from the 1960s and you have prices on them, let us know how much they are. I'm really curious, but generally 16 shillings sounds like it could be in the realm of how much a map would cost.
- [20:28]
Brett
And if you're in the UK and you're listening to us, let us know, is this person crazy or does that make sense to you that 16 and 6 is the price of these maps? Now, the other possibility, it could be that she bought all the maps together and so whoever was selling them wrote down the total price on all the maps and then she gave them 16, six and got. I mean, that's a possibility. Yeah, because they're written on there, right? I mean, they're written with like a ballpoint pen. So. But you could imagine somebody's doing that who's just selling it out of a stall or whatever. Selling some maps. They're buying these maps.
- [21:02]
Alice
So, and here's another. Here's another thought too. When you go get maps, I guess you could go to, say, a bookstore. But maps are not just sold where you are every day. Right. It's usually not at your corner grocery store. Maybe it's at a newspaper stand. Although I think you have to go to a train station, so you have to go somewhere. So it's possible that it's where things started, but still not home. Home base.
- [21:26]
Brett
Yeah, true. Hard to say, but I think this is. I haven't seen this anywhere else. And I think this. And this is why we go through all these seemingly, maybe even innocuous details. Right? Because you just never know what's going to be something that's going to trigger somebody. So anyways, interesting thought. Would love to know people in England. Does this seem consistent to you with. With what the prize would be at the time?
- [21:51]
Alice
Okay, so if you remember, episode two really was chock full of seemingly inane details, but it's getting all these people to think about different things. So this is from someone who's a listener in Bergen. They said from your part two of the Isdale Woman. You asked about the notes on the maps. She had Giello Hagastol, Ustaseut, Fins Myrdal are all train stations between Oslo and Bergen. And the numbers are indeed meters above sea level. We had speculated it was, but now these are actually train stations.
- [22:24]
Brett
And let's just stop here for now because. Why would that be important? Because it's not like it's not 5,000 meters. It's not like she's in the Himalayas and is is marking down the tallest mountains in the world. Right? I mean, these are relatively low elevations, but she's writing them down for all these train stations that she's on between Oslo and Bergen.
- [22:46]
Alice
I mean, who's she meeting with? Navy people. Right. I don't know what that may have anything to do with it, but the people she's seen talking with are like Navy people. Fishermen see her. You remember last time we ended with some fishermen saw her at the docks talking to some navy folks. Well, perhaps that has something to do with where the sea level is and what it must be for maybe detonation of certain types of bombs.
- [23:10]
Brett
I mean, who knows, right? Like, I don't know. It's just sort of a weird thing that it could have been a code, who knows? And it may be noted them nevertheless.
- [23:22]
Alice
So I'm pulling up Oslo to Bergen. It certainly is mapping out a path. So it's possible that something needed to happen between them and the conditions had to be correct. And so there's the path in between. It may not matter which of those cities it was if the conditions were right.
- [23:44]
Brett
Yeah, could be. I don't know.
- [23:46]
Alice
Okay, the Bergen listener continues. Fince, I think is also where they shot one of the Star wars movies, if I'm not mistaken. Beautiful, by the way, those of you who've been listening, we are deep in our Star wars phase of childhood right now. So this resonates deeply with me. But what that says, by the way, a lot of topography, a lot of you can imagine, like hideouts, right? Like tunnels, mountains, sea going in the ocean. If you can imagine what Star wars looks like, that similar type of topography. Norwegian Coastal Express KR 183 is an amount of money and okay, it usually refers to it as Kroner or KR for short. So that Coastal Express got several stops at cities along the coast going up north. So I don't know if the difference in the amount of money could be for which city she wanted to go to. Not really sure if it went all the way up north back in the 1970s. The other option I would think had to do with the cabin a bigger Or a smaller one facing out with a view or inside the cabin.
- [24:48]
Brett
Yeah. I mean, some of this could just have been sort of she was traveling. It doesn't necessarily mean anything. It doesn't have some big meaning to it, but it is all very interesting nevertheless. I got to think these trains are, like, incredibly scenic. Like, I want to take these trains. Maybe they're not, but they just go to some beautiful places. I would think that'd be an awesome train trip. Maybe we'll go to Norway to investigate this case.
- [25:13]
Alice
That would be amazing.
- [25:14]
Brett
And we grabbed our taxes.
- [25:16]
Alice
There you go. Now, remember in episode two, we talked about how it was just an interesting fact. There was that Italian photographer there in Norway. But the Italian photographer had taken these pictures made into the postcards, and that the Isdale woman had one of these postcards. So this listener said, the Italian photographer with the postcard. I find more likely he was selling his pictures around the fish market to fund his living or traveling in Norway. Not far from the hotels the Isdale woman stayed at was the fish market. Back in the days, that was the main thing in Bergen. And I would think it more likely she met him there and bought the card from him to support him, a fellow foreigner. So maybe just so innocuous in that he likely was selling in, like, the most touristy area and she was staying near the touristy area.
- [26:04]
Brett
And we know that she would go down to the docks, so that. Isn't that outside the realm of possibility that she did just run into this person on the docks and decide to support what he's doing?
- [26:18]
Alice
Okay, remember in, I think, one of her journals, she had written candle Stomp S T O M P And we were, like, not really sure what that means. This Bergen listener says candle stomp is most likely misspelled or a mix of English and a local dialect. Interesting, because it may tell us a little bit about where she's from and why she may have gotten a word wrong. Right. Like, it's not a word. So why was she writing this? Was it to trying to communicate with someone who doesn't speak this language? Is she just got it wrong? Is this. You know, English is unfamiliar to her?
- [26:57]
Brett
Yeah. I mean, who knows?
- [26:58]
Alice
But good to know that Google was right. We don't actually know that's not really a word, but it is a misspelling. She goes on to say, my city does not have a lot of random crime, and it never has. I've always felt safe even walking home in the middle of the night alone. Usually it's targeted or Mental illness or a combination of both. I think she would have stood out back in the day as she was not speaking Norwegian. Not everybody in Norway knew English back then like we do now. We have dark haired people too, especially along the coast. I've heard because of trading boats coming in at ports. It seems to me like she preferred to speak English over German. But I would think quite a bit of people here would know German just as well as English.
- [27:38]
Brett
And she kind of went back and forth. I mean we've seen her speaking both English and German, we've seen her ordering in German, we've seen her speaking English to store owners, you know, we haven't seen her speak French. I don't think, you know, she writes in more of a French style people have said. We talked about how she mentions Belgium a lot. Belgium obviously has all three of those languages, has Dutch, German and French and then English if she has some connection to England. Or it could just be that a lot of people speak English. I want to point out two things I've been looking at while Alice has been talking. Number one, I went back and looked three maps of map over Norway, all of them with 166 written on them which makes me think that is the price. And I asked Chat GPT which is right about everything. And according to Chat GPT, at least 16 shillings and 6 pence is absolutely plausible for England in 1970 for a detailed touring map. So according to ChatGPT, that sounds right. I mean I, I'm pretty convinced but I'm, I'll hold out for our, our friends from England if they have other thoughts.
- [28:44]
Alice
And one thing to note here, so one thing to note here about someone who actually lives in Bergen now maybe back in the 1970s, I don't know how old you are, is that they said that it's a safe city. I think that's worth noting because we had speculated that maybe she didn't feel safe which is why she would stay one night in a hotel, check out and then go to another hotel, stay another six or seven nights. Right. Maybe she thought she was being followed. So if she felt unsafe or she felt like she had to change around, it wasn't for the purposes of this being a high crime city. It had to do with whatever was happening personally specific to her. Not just because for example, when I go to Manhattan now Manhattan is different than it was when I went in college, I am a little bit more cautious when I'm walking around at night, things like that. Right. So she's noting that Birkin is a really safe place. And she would have stood out, but that wouldn't have made her a target for crime, necessarily.
- [29:40]
Brett
Yeah, yeah. I think if this is a crime, it's not a random crime. You know, if she was murdered, it was somebody who knew her, somebody who's with her and had some sort of connection. It wasn't just that she was, you know, she was walking through the beautiful park and someone decided to rob her. So. And I think that just confirms it. This is highly unlikely that that's what happened. Not. Which is not to say that just because you live in a safe place or the area safe that you can't have that you can. Obviously happens, but I don't think that's what happened here.
- [30:08]
Alice
And this makes sense too, right? Like, she was found by two young girls, and they're like preteens just having a hike. Like, this is where people go, this is totally, totally idyllic and beautiful. So thank you, listeners. Please continue to write in as we're saying this. If you think, oh, you know what, that little detail. I think especially if you have a detail that may point to a language or a location, we want to hear it, guys. A lot of skincare looks good on paper, but it just doesn't really deliver results. Or even worse, you're sold on the idea that you need 10 different products to have an effective routine. That's why Oneskin really stands out. Their products aren't about hype or fancy packaging. It's real science. And you know what we think about real science. We like to run towards it. This brand was founded by longevity researchers who asked a simple question. If visible skin aging is driven by damaged senescent cells, what if you could slow that down instead of just covering it up? That research led to OS1.1 Skin's proprietary peptide. It's the first ingredient to switch off those damaged senescent cells, actually slowing skin aging directly at the source. This is serious science that fits easily into my existing routine, which is incredibly busy. I have four kids, multiple jobs. I only have a few minutes to take care of my skin each morning and each night. But with one skin, they know where it's at. It's in one bottle, and I can reach for it every single time because I know I am giving my skin a clear signal to repair damaged cells, support collagen, and strengthen my skin barrier. What really caught my attention were that this is not just some flashy new brand. Rather, it's been developed over time by female PhD scientists who were rooted in rigorous science and research. And I heard about it over and over from my friends who used it and said this is different, it's not covering it up. I actually feel my skin regenerating and I love that I'm able to reach for all of their products and know that it's grounded in science. Oneskin's products are backed by extensive lab and clinical data, including four peer reviewed clinical studies to validate their efficacy and safety on all skin types. Plus They've got over 10,000 five star reviews and have been recently featured by Bloomberg and as a leader in skin longevity. It really shows you don't need a complicated routine to achieve healthier, younger looking skin.
- [32:39]
Brett
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Alice
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- [37:01]
Alice
So let's talk about the Isdale woman's behavior. So the people who encountered Isdale all said she presented herself as elegant, sophisticated, and reserved. She was said to seem as though she had a purpose and an agenda. At her final hotel, the staff noticed that when she was in her room, she left a chair outside the door. And when she'd leave, she'd put the chair back in the room. Maybe kind of like a sign to something.
- [37:26]
Brett
That's what it seems like, right? Like, why would you do that? It's one thing if you were put in the chair. Like, I think you've talked about doing this, or somebody talked about doing this. Putting a chair up against the door when you're in a hotel room so that, like, if somebody breaks in, it gives you, like, a warning or whatever. Yeah, well, that's not what she's doing. She's literally putting it outside her door. So if you're walking down the hallway, number one, you would know what room was hers without having to ask, Right. And number two, you would know that she was there. So.
- [37:52]
Alice
And it's a little bit strange, right, because you would think if you were in the room and you had guests, you would think you'd use the chair, right? So it's not even like, oh, I'm gonna save some room and put a chair outside. It seems like if she's in there and someone's in there with her, she would keep the chair in. So it seems very much like a sign of her being in the room. Now, she did leave the do not disturb sign up at all times, though. Cleaning staff learned to enter when the chair was not present to clean the room. Because she did stay in some places for an extended period of time. During her final stay, she was often seen going out wearing her rubber boots. When she returned, they would be muddy. So she was going somewhere where her boots would get muddy.
- [38:32]
Brett
And I. I'll just say, I don't think that was her first trip to the Isdale Valley. I think she. Or is Dalen Valley how you pronounce it? I think she'd been out there several times. I think this is evidence of that, that she was going out there. Now, why? It's hard to say. I mean, she could have been meeting someone. Maybe she was on a hike. You know, maybe she was on a vacation. There's all sorts of possibilities for this,
- [38:54]
Alice
that maybe she was leaving things out there. Maybe she was, because there are so many we've talked about. This, there are a lot of things that she left behind, but there are a lot of things missing from it. If in fact she's visiting lots of places, right? Maybe the molds, maybe her like toothpaste, Right. She had toothbrushes, but not toothpaste or something like that. You know, certain things. Maybe she's like creating the environment.
- [39:19]
Brett
I mean, look, well, we're following all the way down the spy rabbit hole here. Spies have drops, right? I forget the guy's name. He was the FBI. He was the FBI agent. He was a spy. He had like a specific park bench where he would leave information that then the Russians would come pick up, right? So it could be that this is an area, it's innocuous, it's a place people go, but it's also a place where if you left something, somebody's probably not just going to come across it. It's not that well traveled. So maybe you could have something like that. That's pure speculation, but hey, we're sort of in the speculation business at this point in this story, so maybe that's a possibility.
- [39:58]
Alice
Okay, so the age old question, where was she from? During her stays, the Isdel woman would describe herself as French or more commonly as Belgian. Though she used a term on one card, belgish, that just isn't correct. She wrote in German, but her German was in some ways idiosyncratic and betrayed errors that had led many German speakers to suspect that German was actually her second language. Although others have said this could have come from breaks in her education early in life. Some described her as oriental looking. But in Norway at the time, like we said, this just might have meant that she wasn't blonde haired and blue eyed. She smoked long cigarettes that were not available in Norway. They were however common in France, Germany, Austria and Switzerland. Now I'm curious where they come in the uk.
- [40:44]
Brett
I know it's a good question. I mean, I don't know, I feel like the UK was the kind of place where you could get a lot of different things. So maybe that's a great question. Now we know that she went to all these different places. I mean, I think we placed her all of these places except maybe Austria. I think we placed her in Switzerland at some point. She had some Swiss francs. She was obviously in France, she was in Paris at some point. Germany seems like somewhere she had been. So she could have just picked these cigarettes up in any of those places.
- [41:13]
Alice
Someone does make a really good point though. Like why? And we've said this before, even decades later, people Remember this woman? And so, first of all, why did people remember her so well? And second, if she was, in fact trying to be a spy or fly under the radar, she failed because everybody, like, noticed her.
- [41:31]
Brett
She's James Bond. If she spies, you know how James Bond, he just go. Everywhere he goes, he's like, james Bond is going to infiltrate the secret layer. And what does he do? He shows up in, like, a tuxedo. And when somebody asks who he is, he's like, bond, James Bond. It's like, well, okay, well, we know who's here now. It's Mr. Bond. Right? Like, so, like, James Bond is not the Bourne Identity. Right? He is always just the Identity as he can be. So maybe she wanted to be like James Bond. I don't know. But she was as flashy as she could be. Now, look, that could be in some ways a cover. Don't underestimate that. Just think about, like, the noisy, rude American, right? If you're in Europe, you've all seen, like, the noisy, rude American who stands out because they're wearing their hat backwards and their sunglasses and their shorts and their tennis shoes and they're, like, getting drunk and doing all this other stuff. You don't actually notice that person you say. I mean, you might remember them, but you would never think.
- [42:30]
Alice
You think about them.
- [42:32]
Brett
Yeah. And so that can be a cover. Now, in this case, it does seem like she really stood out. Now, a couple things to point out. Woman Traveling alone in 1970. Unusual. Still unusual to some extent today, but certainly in 1970, unusual. She does look different. She is wearing nice ish clothes, though. Maybe they're secondhand. She is not attempting to blend in. That is definitely true. For whatever reason she's doing it, she's attempting to stand out. And she is.
- [43:01]
Alice
And then one other thing. If she's going to a drop place, interesting place to pick where it would be muddy. Because if it's muddy, you leave prints or draw prints. So in other words, I don't think you would pick a drop zone where it's, like, marshy. But perhaps you had to go there. We've been talking about the Navy or something. Maybe she had to go there for that purpose or to do her measuring or whatever she was doing. Which indicates to me that it was not her choosing, but somewhere she had to be.
- [43:30]
Brett
Okay, let's talk about her teeth. One of the most striking things about the Isdel woman is her teeth. And we talked about this before. She had a number of root canals. She also had a number of gold fillings I think this tells us a few things. Number one, it indicates that she had some poor dental hygiene at some point in her life early on. You know, it almost seems like, if you're thinking about the path of her life, and this goes with, like, the language, too, in sort of the idiosyncratic German, you can imagine somebody who, at a young age, going into maybe her teen years, Maybe even her 20s, she's unstable. She's moving around a lot. She doesn't have access to good dental care. She has a lot of issues with her teeth. And then at some point, she's able to get past that, she comes into some money or something happens, and she's able to get all this dental work that she was never able to get before. And so she was able to get all these root canals and she was able to get all these fillings right. And that was sort of a turning point in her life. Now, what's interesting, gold fillings. Gold fillings are almost unheard of in Norway, and they were pretty rare in Western Europe at the time. As you moved east, though, through Europe, they would become more and more popular. Starting sort of in Germany, you would start to see them and growing more prevalent in Eastern Europe and into Russia and the Middle East. These are the places you would see a lot of gold teeth. One reason for this, which is kind of striking to me, is the further east you went, the more unstable your finances became. Like, you might have money today, but the government might take it tomorrow. And so a lot of people would sort of convert their wealth into gold that they would put in their teeth, because the government's probably not going to take her teeth. Right? And so this was actually pretty common in Eastern Europe. And this has led some people to wonder, is this a sign that she was from Eastern Europe? Maybe as far as Russia. Which ties in obviously, to this spy theme that keeps popping up. Also just sort of her general sort of physiology, right? The dark hair, the dark eyes, the olive complexion, the darker skin. You know, you're thinking more Middle Eastern, Eastern European, Slavic, Greek, Jewish. I mean, just sort of all these different ethnicities that you might see more in Eastern Europe than you would in Western Europe, particularly at the time. And it's not just the teeth supporting this was the hat the woman was seen to have worn. We talked about this hat, this fur hat, and it was one that people who saw it described it as unlike anything they saw in Norway. So Norwegians know about fur. They know about keeping warm. They know about hats with fur hats with the fur Right. But this was a hat that looks strange to them. And some of them described it as like a Kazakh style hat. And in fact, when this hat was described to various investigators, they were able to say this was the type of hat that was more popular in the Stans region of the Soviet Union. So Kazakhstan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, all the Stans. Right. Afghanistan. So that's interesting. Now it could just be that she really liked the hat, picked the hat up somewhere in her travels and wore it. But it sort of ties into this. Maybe she is from this more sort of eastern part of the world. We also know that she had an accent and people talked about this, but it wasn't a definable one. In fact, some people described it as very strange. You remember the banker who said when he listened to her talk, she spoke in a way that almost made him laugh. Like he, he almost like found it comical just the way she spoke. And we didn't know if that was intentional, if it was part of sort of a cover up or if maybe it was just she has this sort of strange accent. Now the thing about it is people in Norway would probably recognize a heavy accent from someone born in a Slavic country or the Soviet Union. There was sort of some interaction there. So it makes you think that whatever the accent is, it's probably not that. It's not that she was like from the Soviet Union, she was Russian. The people Norway would have recognized that. They wouldn't have described it as strange, they would have described it as Russian. So that is sort of an interesting point.
- [47:50]
Alice
So maybe that was the like comical nature where if she does have an identifiable accent to cover it up in some way, like if you had a Russian accent but you put a French accent on top of it, that would sound comical right?
- [48:05]
Brett
Now on the other side of all this, some people have said if somebody in Norway saw a fur hat, they automatically thought Soviet, they automatically thought stands. So maybe it wasn't actually that, it was just sort of a prejudice. Right. And that these hats were actually fairly common in central Europe, which is further east. I mean, we're still talking eastern Europe, communist bloc countries, but maybe not as far east as some people have suggested. But I will say this, the gold teeth, the hat, maybe even the accent seem to push her further east. Whereas other things we've seen, her style of writing, her German seem to push you further west, seems more Belgian German and you know, Alsace and Lorraine region of France, which went back and forth between Germany and France and had sort of a weird German and half French and you could imagine someone who grew up there, maybe. So you've got what's interesting about her, and this goes to what we've talked about so much in this case, is the more you learn, the more confusing it gets. You know, you see these divergent pieces of evidence pushing you one way or the other when you're trying to discover where she's from, which is a critical piece to knowing who she was.
- [49:27]
Alice
And finally, DNA. So DNA was extracted from tissue samples after a preserved jaw proved unuseful. It was run through databases, but no hits came back. And mitochondrial DNA, however, gives us some general information. It gave us her maternal lineage, which was most commonly from central and south southern Europe and the Mediterranean Basin. This line is incredibly common in Central Europe. It's possible to do genetic genealogy, but there are a few problems. One, Norwegian law is very strict, and uploading her information would require some sort of legal change. Second, because she was likely born during World War II and likely a refugee of some sort, the relevant genealogical databases are uneven with massive gaps. So given everything we know, her most likely origin is, like, southern Germany or Austria.
- [50:21]
Brett
And let's look at her teeth again. Because we look at her teeth again, it's going to push us more in that direction. So in 2017, investigators had her teeth and jawbone analyzed using isotope analysis, which is a form of DNA analysis, chemical analysis, basically how your teeth form the isotopes in your teeth, various other things. And I'll say something, one thing about this, which is fascinating. So this kind of analysis is super accurate if you were born after the 1950s. And the reason for that is because of all the nuclear bombs that were tested. So this is a rabbit hole you can fall down. Once we detonated a nuclear bomb, we changed the isotope structure of the world, basically. So, like steel from ships that sank before we detonated a nuclear weapon is incredibly valuable because it doesn't have the isotopes from these. Nuclear blast. Right. Same thing for your teeth. Your teeth. You know, sometimes people, I'd say things like, we're all stardust, right? Because, like, the various chemicals that make us up are from stars. We're also nuclear bombs. We have inside of us these atoms and isotopes that are created that are only created when you detonate a nuclear weapon. So you can use that fact to, like, date people really easily with these isotopes. If you go before the first nuclear detonation, not as accurate. You can still do it, but not as accurate. This was done on the Isdale woman, and it did give investigators this huge insight into her background. Recall the Autopsy said that she was probably born around 1940, which would have made her 30 when she died. Well, that's not what her teeth told us. Her teeth told us that she actually probably was born more like 1930 or maybe shortly thereafter in Nuremberg, Germany, because these isotopes are more prevalent in certain areas. So when you see this, you can say, okay, this person was probably born in a certain area. So she was probably born in the early to mid-30s in Nuremberg, Germany, which would make her somewhere between the ages of, say, as old as 44, because she could have been born in the 20s, as young as 36, because once again, this is not a perfect process, as she could have been born later in the 30s. But this pushes her birth back into just the most unstable, insane period you could possibly be born. Because what happened in 1933, the Nazis came to power in Germany. Nuremberg was their spiritual home. The Nuremberg rallies and the Nuremberg Laws were important things that were going on in Germany at the time. And if you were of a certain background, say several backgrounds, which might lead you to be darker, complected, for instance, Romani or Jewish, or maybe you're just a political dissident and you're in Nuremberg in 1933 when the Nazis come to power, you might consider doing something like moving west with your child, who is going to start off in Germany and then move westward as sort of things develop throughout the 30s. I'm going to read to you how this isotope analysis is described. So the isotope analysis determines the chemical compounds of some very specific elements, Strontium and oxygen. These two elements are absorbed by the enamel in the teeth from what the person was eating or drinking during the time when the teeth were formed. Because the teeth were formed in both her early childhood and her teenage years, the expert can actually tell that the Isdale woman relocated at some point during this period. So they see in the bones the teeth that are formed in early childhood. They see Nuremberg. But what they see from the later, from the teenage years, they're seeing the border areas of Germany, they're seeing France, they're seeing Luxembourg, they're seeing Belgium. And in fact, if you look at the map of where these various isotopes were present, they were also present in England. And that brings us back to what we were saying earlier about that map. So it seems like Isdel woman starts in Nuremberg, and then as she gets older, she is moving west. And I think it is not an insane thought to think that the reason she is moving west is because the Germans, the Nazis in particular, are eventually also moving west. And it seems like she may have been part of a population that wants to get away from what the Nazis are doing.
- [55:25]
Alice
And her complexion certainly suggests that she may be on the not side of the Nazis. Right.
- [55:32]
Brett
She does not seem to be a part of the master race. No. So I think. I think it is.
- [55:37]
Alice
That's fascinating.
- [55:38]
Brett
I know, isn't it?
- [55:40]
Alice
The isotope thing is fascinating, especially being able to see as she grows into her teenage years. And it's. It's important to note that it doesn't appear that she's the one doing the moving. It's likely happening as she's still a child with her parents. And so this is something about her parents and who they may be. They likely looked like her and maybe they were dissidents moving further to protect her, but also themselves or perhaps their jobs forced them to do that.
- [56:07]
Brett
And it also, like, why is it, how is it that someone like this who is put together, who's elegant, who seems to have some resources, can disappear and die in a foreign country? And the police are utterly unable to find any record of her. Like, there's no missing persons report anywhere. There's no family looking for her. Well, if she's part of this group, this refugee group, it may well be the case that her parents didn't make it. You know, there were a lot of people who found themselves stuck in Germany and sent their kids west. They could not go west, but they would send their kids west and they would put them. And there's all these. This period of history is just insane. But there's all these stories about these, like, kids who would hug their parents goodbye and go west and basically be orphans during World War II. And some of them never saw their parents again. Some of them reconnected with their parents after decades. So it's quite possible that either as a result of this or could be something more prosaic, there is no one to look for her. Like, she doesn't have a family that notices her when she's missing. Okay, so let's talk about her handwriting and then we'll wrap up for today and we'll come back next week and we. Absolutely. Unless you guys send us a whole bunch of new stuff, we will finish next week. But honestly, I want to do another week on this just because I want to see if you send us anything else. You know, this is so often we're so far ahead that we don't get this kind of, like, as we're doing it, feedback. So we're going to do another week on this and Frankly, I don't even care if you are interested in this. I'm totally fascinated by this case. Like, I am totally into this at this point.
- [57:53]
Alice
Who is is still woman.
- [57:55]
Brett
I know. We need shirts. Yeah, it's wild. Okay, let's talk about her handwriting because this ties in with what we've been saying.
- [58:05]
Alice
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Brett
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Alice
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- [59:34]
Brett
Her handwriting was used to track her essentially around Europe. And it was formal because remember, they're finding these cards with different names on them, but they're able to tie them together and say, this is the same person. It was very formal, it was stylistic, it was elegant. At least until the last hotel she checked into. This handwriting was different. And you can pull these cards, they're available online, just Google Isdale woman hotel registration cards. And you'll see all these cards and you'll see this beautiful handwriting. And then you pull the very last one. And it's different now, not so different that experts couldn't spot the match, though they didn't have to because we know the last hotel she checked into. But it was done in a way that those same experts believed that she was intentionally attempting to disguise her Handwriting, it's blocky. It's capitals. It's just different. It's not like the handwriting from before. But if so, why? Why, after using the same handwriting all across Norway, in France, all these different places, would she suddenly, at the very last hotel she stayed in, intentionally, it seems, change her style of writing? Why would she do that?
- [60:50]
Alice
Makes you wonder, like, you know. Well. Well, I mean, so it could be that she's getting closer to something or someone's closing in on her, and maybe that's how she met her end. Right. It may not have been her last hotel intentionally. It was just her last hotel because whoever was on her tail was closing in.
- [61:05]
Brett
Very good point. The other thing about her handwriting is it indicated that she was educated in France. There are various things about her handwriting, including, like, double crosses on T's that indicated that this was the way you would be taught to write in France, possibly in Alsace and Lorraine region. And this might account for some of the idiosyncratic German. Remember, we have the isotope analysis which indicates she was born in Germany, perhaps near Nuremberg. Then we have the analysis that indicates she moves to the border of France. And she may have done this in the early 30s. And recall, this would have been a child growing up in a very difficult world, particularly if it's her, you know, by herself. Like, imagine her parents did send her west, right? So she doesn't have the influence. Most of us. It's crazy. You listen to kids speak and you hear their parents, like, you hear the little things. Like, I'm sure my kids will pause strangely and say interesting and everything else. Right. And it's because they grow up around me and they're learning how to speak around me. And the fact that they go to school, learn how to speak correctly, it's not enough to overcome the fact that they listen to me. Right. That's just part of it. Well, if you have somebody who initially learns to speak German and then moves west and learns a different language and is taught in a different language, I mean, you can imagine, even if it is their first language, they have some, you know, syncretic. I thought there was, like, a tease that you could add on the end. Idiosyncratic tease. Idio. Idiosomethings. Yeah. I'm sounding more idio as I go now. One thing I'm interested in is I speak one language, not really English. It's some version of English. That's the only language I speak. Alice, of course, along with her many talents, is multilingual. And I'm just curious. Alice I mean, you've obviously, you grew up, you spoke Mandarin in the home, you've been back to Taiwan, you've been back to China. Has anyone ever commented on the way you speak as opposed to people who grew up in those places?
- [63:12]
Alice
Absolutely. So it's really interesting because I'll get a few people are like, I certainly don't have the dialects of like Shanghai and Beijing where I've visited, because those are very thick like dialects that you have. Anyways, I can make myself sound like it, but because I have almost no accent, it's the lack of accent. It's like I learned it in a sterile environment, which I did, that everyone kind of turns their head and they say, where are you from Here? Because my Mandarin is good enough that they're like, you're from here, but I can't place you because I can't place your dialect because it's so sterile. And then vice versa. Taiwan knows that I'm not from China because my dialect is not from China. But they, this is really interesting. They know that I'm from the United States based on how I look. So haircut, the way I dress rather than the way I speak. And so when I was younger and I would spend like all summer in Taiwan with my cousins, I would start to look like them, right? Like I would wear their clothes, I would get a haircut there. So I started to look like I lived there. And then people would still look at me and think, there's certainly something slightly off with the way I spoke that they couldn't place it. And so yes, the answer is yes. Here's the other thing. I don't know if this is the same for other pockets in the United States of people who grow up speaking another language, but in like an American speaking country. So I went to school with a lot of ABCs, American born Chinese. So we all spoke Mandarin in the home and we spoke it pretty fluently. We all went to Chinese school together, some more fluent than others. But like, we definitely spoke Mandarin. And sometimes to like annoy our teachers or our other friends who didn't speak Mandarin at school, we would speak Mandarin to each other just for fun. I always noticed, and I don't know if I also have it, but I don't think I do. But my friends who are all Americans who grew up speaking Mandarin in the home and speak English fluently, we definitely have an accent in English that I can hear someone talk and know that they're at abc, that they were born here, English is their first, second language, whatever Simultaneous language. So it's not like they have bad English, but the way they say things I can recognize as a fact that they speak Mandarin in the home. I don't know if that's the same for other pockets. Mandarin is obviously so different than say a Romance language as compared to English. So I do wonder if other people have that and we can all look at each other and know it. I would be like, because, you know, a lot of Asian people, we could speak different dialects. So it's not. I can't tell if you speak any other Asian dialect. Korean, Filipino. This is specific. There's a lilt if you speak Mandarin.
- [65:56]
Brett
And I think or the thing that I've become convinced of is that if this were anywhere other than Norway, we probably would know where she was from.
- [66:08]
Alice
Ish.
- [66:09]
Brett
Right. And what I mean by that is if you live in Belgium and you hear two people speak German, one of them who is from the German speaking regions of Belgium and one of them who is from Germany, I think someone in Belgium can tell the difference. They would say, oh yeah, the reason that person sounds different is because they're from the Belgian part that speaks German. Right. And same thing for like someone who is German or someone who's from Switzerland as opposed to Germany and speaks Swiss German or whatever. Right. Or French. And Paris is probably different from French once again, in Belgium or in Luxembourg. Right. But I feel like if you're in Norway, you have experience with the languages with German, with French, you have experience with those languages because people that speak those languages come to you and come to your country. Right. But you probably don't have anywhere near as much experience as those people in those countries. Much like someone in Taiwan, when they heard you speak and they saw you and everything else they would know. Well, she's not from China. Right. She's probably from the United States. And I feel like the Norwegians were particularly if. If she did have this very unstable background. The Norwegians were in a particular disadvantage because they're already listening to someone speak a language that even if they understand it is not their native tongue. Right. And is a very different language. Norwegian is different from German is different from French is different. You know, it's. And so I feel like one of the reasons they were so struck by how she spoke is because it wasn't like people who tended to speak German and French that they had experienced before spoke. And it was because she did have this weird background. And that explains a lot of these strange accents. Some of them described it as her having a lisp like, people described it in different ways. But the one thing that was common, everyone said she spoke in an unusual way. That was a commonality, even if the way it was unusual and the way they described it as unusual was different. Everyone said she talks funny, essentially. Right. That's what they're saying. And I think that just goes back to this notion that this is someone who, in their formative years, really was in an unstable situation. Okay, well, we've got some more stuff to talk about when we get back with you guys next week. We have my personal theory about why she smelled funny, which I'll be interested what you guys think about that. We'll talk about the passports. We'll talk about some sightings of her that we haven't discussed before, that whether or not they really fit anywhere. And then we'll talk about our theories. And obviously, if anyone rides in with anything, we'll talk about that as well. And this case is incredible. I mean, this one is on my Mount Rushmore now. So I've got Dyatlov Pass, the dialogue Pass is on my Mount Rushmore. This one is now my Mount Rushmore. Probably got a couple more spaces. But this case, the more we talk about it, the better it gets. So please keep it coming. Let us know what you think. Give us your theories, your thoughts, your ideas, your insights. Your insights have been incredible. So blessed to have you guys. I mean, seriously, like, I almost wish we were doing Dyatlov Pass next week because I think probably you guys would have had incredible insights about Dyatlov Pass if we'd been covering it when more than like 10 people listened to us. So if you have any thoughts on Dial Off Pass, feel free to send it to me.
- [69:35]
Alice
I'm actually like, the next iteration, you know, who knows? We may be on our way out in terms of, like, popularity, but the next thing really is to just get on a plane and go to all these places and talk to you guys. Talk to you in Oslo.
- [69:47]
Brett
Love it.
- [69:47]
Alice
I know, right?
- [69:49]
Brett
So great.
- [69:49]
Alice
Bergen's right on the coast, man.
- [69:50]
Brett
We could just start recovering all our cases. Let's do them over again. I have thought about not recovering them, but re releasing them because I feel like so many people.
- [69:59]
Alice
Did you ever.
- [70:00]
NOCD Advertiser
Yeah.
- [70:00]
Alice
Did you ever cover JonBenet? Like, yes, but a long time ago.
- [70:03]
Brett
10 episodes on it. Yeah, but it is funny how many people don't list it. Anyways, side point, shoot us an email. Prosecutors, pod gmail.com if you have thoughts or insights on this case. If you want to request a case that is the best way to do it. I'm not being rude. If you send me a DM and I say, hey, email me, it's just, that's the best way to do it. So send those thoughts there. But do follow us on social media, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, which I hear is being decommunized. I don't know what the word is for it, but. So maybe we'll do more on TikTok. I'll actually get TikTok on my phone now that it's not like a direct line to the ccp. So yeah, follow us there. If you're on Facebook and you want to be a part of our fan run group, the Gallery, join the gallery, discuss these cases. Love to see you there. If you want to support the podcast, join Patreon. You'll get episodes early and ad free. And if you're one of the craziest people of all, you're with us right now. You can actually watch us record these live. You can see our faces while we do it. You can hear us, like, cough and sneeze and everything else we do when we're sick. It's amazing. You'll Love it. Only $3 a month. You can do that. All right, well, Alice, do you want to answer a question or do you want to go to bed?
- [71:21]
Alice
It's really up to you. No, go for it.
- [71:22]
Brett
You sure?
- [71:22]
Alice
I'm here for you, man. I am here for all of you guys. Even with my crooked frame, I tried
- [71:30]
Brett
to talk her out of this and she was like, I don't have much time left.
- [71:32]
Alice
I don't have much time left.
- [71:33]
Brett
So let's just record now.
- [71:34]
Alice
Let's do it. So I'm like, definitely on my way. Still down. It's not like I'm feeling better, so I think tomorrow will be worse. I just gotta say dedication.
- [71:45]
Brett
You remember how when Covid happened? Covid, like, came in early 2020. March was really when it broke in the United States. But then there were all those people who said, like, I got really sick in November or December and nobody knew what it was. You know, there is a disease going around and I don't know what it is, and I don't. It's not Covid and it's not the flu.
- [72:08]
Alice
I don't think something way worse.
- [72:10]
Brett
So many people have gotten it, including me, including my wife, including Alice. And it is a respiratory illness and it lasts for forever. Forever.
- [72:20]
Alice
It's the forever thing.
- [72:21]
Brett
And one of the things it does, which is so annoying, is like, you'll Wake up and feel good and think you're good, and then the next day you'll have a terrible day. Like, it's not like you get better.
- [72:32]
Alice
I mean, it messes with you.
- [72:34]
Brett
Yeah. It's like you get better and then you get worse and you get better and you get worse, and I don't know what it is, but so many people I know have had it.
- [72:42]
Alice
So everyone I know has, like, down for the count. I used to, like, get sick for like two days a day.
- [72:48]
Brett
No, this.
- [72:49]
Alice
I get sick for like seven days, ten days. I'm like, what is this? I don't know what it is malarkey.
- [72:54]
Brett
And like, it doesn't kill you like Covid did, but it's like it just does not.
- [72:58]
Alice
I feel pretty bad.
- [72:58]
Brett
Go. Yeah. Yeah, I felt as bad as I did when I had Covid, but even Covid didn't last as long. And just I still.
- [73:07]
Alice
You still. Even now I can't breathe deeply. Like, yeah, that's a weird thing. You know what I mean? Like, if I breathe too deeply, start coughing. Anyways, let's answer this question. I'm still alive today.
- [73:18]
Brett
How often? This is from Allison. Allison wants to know how often does your podcast life come up in your day to day life? Like, do co workers reference it? Does the grocery store clerk go, hey, the prosecution has arrived or something like that? Or is it so integrated into your life that no one outside of crime con or similar events even really says anything any more?
- [73:41]
Alice
Hey, here's the prosecutor. I wish they would say that to me. I get no special treatment in my life.
- [73:46]
Brett
Oh, do you? I mean, I don't know if I get special treatment, but it comes up regularly is my experience.
- [73:53]
Alice
So I've moved to a new city and I'm sure because I Google everyone. So I think a bunch of people googled me before I moved here. So more people here know about the podcast than actually where I lived previously because people already knew me when we started the podcast. So, like, I don't typically Google people that I am friends with already. So I think because I'm new here, everyone googled it. Most people will not say it to my face, but like I told you guys how my kids teachers on like the Meet the Teacher Day were like, so we hear you have a podcast. So that happened. And then someone else said it to me at a school event. I don't never know what to say though. Like, yes, yeah.
- [74:36]
Brett
Like, my kids and I were getting olives at the olive station at the grocery store and someone came up and was like, are you Brett from the prosecutors? I was like, yeah. And so we took a picture, which my kids got a huge kick out somebody randomly. And like, I'll be.
- [74:52]
Alice
Don't do that to me. Maybe because they're afraid they're going to scare me.
- [74:55]
Brett
Maybe I'll be at, like, various events, and I'll notice people sort of off in the corner this. They're always off in the corner, like, talking and looking at you, like, funny. And I was like, okay, I know what that is. Right? And eventually one of them will walk up and be like, are you Brett? Do you have a podcast? I'm like, yeah. So that happens. And, yeah, I mean. And I'll say this. So we didn't. We've said this before. We didn't tell anybody in our office. We're doing a podcast. We didn't tell any of our family. We're doing a podcast. It was totally. We're going to do this, and if it's terrible, we'll never admit we did it. We'll just deep six it. We'll never admit we did it.
- [75:30]
Alice
Exactly.
- [75:30]
Brett
Now everybody in the office listens to it. Like, every single person in our office listens to the podcast. One of them. One of them had to go to Arkansas for a case, and they texted me, and they're like, I'm driving through west Memphis, and I just feel, like, such a connection to this place. And I was like, yeah, you should stop and investigate while you're there. But, yeah, and then sometimes, like, I remember one time I was at this conference for, like, national security prosecutors, and somebody introduced themselves to me, and as soon as I opened my mouth, they were like, oh, my God, you're Brett for the prosecutors. And I was like, yeah, that's funny. So that's what's funny, because a lot of people don't recognize us by our faces.
- [76:09]
Alice
Faces, because we typically don't.
- [76:11]
Brett
Yeah, yeah, you open your mouth, but
- [76:13]
Alice
you have a more distinctive voice than I do. And I. People don't come up to me who have, like, no connection to me for the most part, before they did, like, at the pool. But, like, for the most part, someone will not come up to me at the gas station. Probably because they think I'm going to, like, poke them in the eyes. I probably would, because I'm like, stranger danger.
- [76:31]
Brett
I'm still waiting for the day that someone on a jury I know says,
- [76:38]
Alice
then we might have to hang up our trial.
- [76:40]
Brett
You know, either one of these lawyers. I'm just waiting for someone to be
- [76:43]
Alice
like, and then it's very esoteric. Like, what is? No, like, they probably know us really well, but I don't know.
- [76:49]
Brett
Yeah. So anyway, so that's the answer to that question. And it's fun. I mean, I'm sure it's super. Gets annoying at some point, you know, it does it?
- [76:57]
Alice
Because we're not that famous. If we were really famous, it'll never
- [77:00]
Brett
get annoying for us. But, like. Like, when I say John Taffer on the plane, which happens all the time, weirdly, like, I never stop and say, I love your show. Right? Because I'm sure so many people say that to him, and he gets sick of it, and he just wants to be left alone, so I just leave him alone.
- [77:15]
Alice
Right?
- [77:15]
Brett
And I'm sure, like, people who are super famous, more famous than we would ever be. We're podcast famous, which is, like, three people know who we are. Right? Like, I'm sure it gets annoying for them because they can't do anything. They can't go out. They can't have a pizza. They can't have a beer. Like, they can't do anything without people knowing who they are. We're, like, at the perfect place. People send me bourbon. You know, it's great.
- [77:37]
Alice
People send me gummies.
- [77:38]
Brett
Yeah, gummies. We got some candles recently. I got to give you your candles. People always send us stuff. It's great. You guys are awesome. It's like, the perfect thing. It's a perfect level.
- [77:48]
Alice
We're. We're not. We're not B listers. We're not C listers. We're like, B minus list. Exactly.
- [77:52]
Brett
But it's way down there.
- [77:54]
Alice
We could totally have our lives, and we still.
- [77:58]
Brett
And we still get to be like. Like somebody. I won't even say who it is, because I don't want to. I don't want to. Like, now we have Allison Sweeney, who was. He was DM'd me about Isdale Woman, and some interesting thoughts about Isdale Woman. You know, she's awesome. We had another actor who sent us an email, and it was so cool. I was like, this is so cool.
- [78:17]
Alice
Starstruck.
- [78:18]
Brett
And they were so, like, reverential about it.
- [78:21]
Alice
Like, they were like, I know.
- [78:22]
Brett
They're like, oh, yeah.
- [78:23]
Alice
It's so good talking to you. I'm like, it's great talking to you.
- [78:26]
Brett
And then they sort of, like, drop. They're like, yeah, you know, I'm kind of an actor. I do some stuff. And I was like, what are you talking about? You do some stuff? Like, I know you are what do you like? Anyways, so that's cool.
- [78:36]
Alice
Yes. I hope he comes on.
- [78:38]
Brett
He's gone too. He's already said he's.
- [78:40]
Alice
Well, he says he's going to.
- [78:41]
Brett
We gotta find places in his. He's a very busy person.
- [78:44]
Alice
I know, I know.
- [78:45]
Brett
So anyways. All right, well, thank you for that question. If you leave a five star review on Apple, you can write your question and we'll answer it. If you leave a five star review on Spotify, send us an email and we will answer it there. Actually, before we go, someone sent me and it's. I think it's a pretty straightforward question. Someone sent one today, so I'm just gonna go ahead and answer it. If you have a moment. Don't dial me yet.
- [79:08]
Alice
I'm not dead yet. Not dead yet. Not dead yet.
- [79:14]
Brett
Okay, let's. You want. You can tell a story while I'm doing this if you want to.
- [79:18]
Alice
I'm alive, there's life. You guys can help me straighten. I kind of like that. It's not straight now, look, I'm just proud of myself, okay? You should leave it.
- [79:27]
Brett
It's your. It's your style.
- [79:28]
Alice
Now I'll tell a story. See that red thing down there? Okay, those are left by Squanto. So this is my like office area. Right? Doesn't mean that he doesn't come in here. So what I found tonight, I left that by accident. But those are binoculars. And with the binoculars were handcuffs and also a bow and arrow. This is. This is what the life of a six year old boy is. It's very cute. So I don't know who he was spying on or shooting with arrows, but right there.
- [79:56]
Brett
Oh, here it is. So this person says in Landman Season 2. I'd forgotten this is what the question was. But In Landman Season 2, Cammy, played by Demi Moore. I didn't know that.
- [80:07]
Alice
I know.
- [80:07]
Brett
She was new, pours out an entire bottle of Pappy Van Winkle Family reserve on her husband's grave. I yelled no at the TV and my husband was so confused. So I had to explain how you taught me about its glory and its high cost. But my question is. This is a great question. If you were at the liquor store or the grocery store for Alice, what would be the first bottle you would grab to pour out on someone's grave?
- [80:34]
Alice
Wow.
- [80:35]
Brett
But then they say, so we're going to answer both these questions because they give a twist on it, not in someone's honor, but because you find the taste so repulsive.
- [80:47]
Alice
That's funny.
- [80:48]
Brett
So first of all, is there a bottle you would pour out on your homie's grave? Do you have anything on my homies?
- [80:54]
Alice
Did you just say homies?
- [80:55]
Brett
Your homies you got pouring out for a homies. Like, who would. Who would. What would you pour out for your homies? Like, let's say I can't.
- [81:00]
Alice
It goes against my immigrant mindset to waste anything like that.
- [81:05]
Brett
Say I died, you're gone. You don't need 67 years from now.
- [81:11]
Alice
You don't need pappies. I'm sorry. I'll water your. I'll water your grass.
- [81:15]
Brett
If you poured pappies out of my grave, I would haunt you.
- [81:17]
Alice
I agree with you. I would not do that. That's wasteful. That's so wasteful.
- [81:22]
Brett
Like, I don't think it's necessarily wasteful to pour out something for your homies. Right. But you kind of like, it's got to be a nice mid tier. Like, don't pour out like Jim Beam on my grave. That's like. But Pappy's. No, I mean it needs to be
- [81:37]
Alice
like somewhere in between. Somewhere in between. Maybe Four Roses give you a little Four Roses.
- [81:41]
Brett
Four Roses would be good.
- [81:42]
Alice
I'll do a Four Roses for you.
- [81:43]
Brett
Rowan's Creek, I think would be Rowan's Creek. Yeah, that would be good. What would you pour out on your enemy's grave, though?
- [81:51]
Alice
Not alcohol.
- [81:53]
Brett
Yeah, I wouldn't. Yeah. Unless it was like some real rotten.
- [81:55]
Alice
Not waste it. I mean, probably when I dump out like my kids, little potties. A chamber pot. Right?
- [82:03]
Brett
There you go.
- [82:04]
Alice
Seems like that's what you do.
- [82:05]
Brett
Used grease.
- [82:07]
Alice
Used grease.
- [82:08]
Brett
Cook something, you know, you got to put that somewhere. Might as well pour it on your enemy's grave. Seems like a good one. I don't know. I don't think, you know, there aren't many things that I hate that much that I would just want to.
- [82:20]
Alice
I. I just think that's wasteful. I really do. I think it's wasteful. I see you throwing some like compost on it. Be like, you know, it's already dirty. It might smell a little bit.
- [82:30]
Brett
That's like a ten thousand dollar bottle of bourbon that she poured out.
- [82:34]
Alice
I don't love or hate anyone that much.
- [82:36]
Brett
No, I don't either. Certainly don't love anybody that much. Okay, well, this has been great. Alice is dying, so we're going to go ahead and end this for now. Next week, last episode of Isdale Woman. So have your theories ready. Unless you guys send us a lot. I know we're getting through it next week, have your theories ready. We can't wait to hear what they are. All right, Alice, this has been a pleasure as always. We'll be back next week with a conclusion of this story. But until then, I'm Brett.
- [83:11]
Alice
And I'm Alice.
- [83:12]
Brett
And we are the prosecutors.
- [83:36]
Alice
All right, guys, I'll make it through it. I'll make it through.
- [83:39]
Brett
We're gonna get this can't. Can't be show on the road.
- [83:42]
Alice
I know. They're like, what is happening? Why are we starting on time?
- [83:46]
Brett
Alice is gonna die.
- [83:48]
Alice
I'm not gonna die. I'm just not gonna get better.
- [83:51]
Brett
Any minute, I'm gonna drop dead. So we said we need to do this so we can. I don't know that we're gonna get it done today anymore. I thought we were, but I don't think we will.
- [84:00]
Alice
It's an interesting info, though. I know. Okay. People have interesting things to say.
- [84:05]
Brett
Jason, good luck with this edit. Alice is sick. I feel like I'm getting and sick. It sucks.
- [84:10]
Alice
No, I know.
- [84:13]
Brett
All right, Sam, There's only 13 people here because they're like, oh, they won't start until.
- [85:13]
Alice
I know. 8, 30, 25. Yep.
- [85:16]
Brett
All right, here we go.
- [85:18]
Alice
Not gonna breathe too deeply.
- [85:20]
Brett
Don't breathe too deeply. Just. You can do it, Alice. You can do it. Oh, shoot. Sorry. Need a word for you. I forgot. Let's see.
- [86:14]
Alice
Pluto TV has thousands of free movies and TV shows.
- [86:18]
Brett
I swear, if I'm lying, I'm dying. This is the mindset.
- [86:21]
Alice
Free. This is the mantra.
- [86:23]
Brett
Free.
- [86:24]
Alice
This is the mindset.
- [86:26]
Brett
Mindset.
- [86:28]
Alice
With movies like Interstellar, Dreamgirls and Gladiator,
- [86:31]
Brett
why you not entertained?
- [86:32]
Alice
And TV shows like Survivor, SpongeBob SquarePants, the Fairly Odd Parents, and Ghosts, Pluto TV is always free.
- [86:40]
Brett
Huzzah.
- [86:41]
Alice
Pluto TV stream now pay. Never.
- [86:47]
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