Homocidal Tendency: A Queer True Crime Podcast

In the 1980s and 90s, the decaying shipping warehouses of Manhattan’s West Village were a world entirely of their own.  For thousands of marginalized queer youth, trans women, and outcasts pushed to the fringes of the city, the rotting timber and pitch-black labyrinths of Piers 45, 46, and 50 offered a vital sanctuary.  It was the cradle of the underground ballroom scene and a place of unapologeti...

A sprawling 40-acre estate in the Rhode Island woods. A disconnected phone line. Millions of dollars vanished into thin air. The only witnesses? A pack of 50 prize-winning dogs. ​This week on Homocidal Tendency , we are traveling back to the 1980s to unpack one of the most infuriating and heartbreaking cases of the decade. We explore the life of Cam Lyman, a transgender millionaire who built an is...

The Cleveland Torso Murders | The Butcher of Kingsbury Run ​ Episode Description: In the grip of the Great Depression, the soot-choked city of Cleveland was brought to its knees by a phantom. Between 1935 and 1938, a brilliant, meticulous monster turned the shantytowns of Kingsbury Run and the illicit vice district of the "Roaring Third" into his own personal slaughterhouse. ​This week o...

​There is a specific kind of thrill we look for in a dark ride. We willingly plunge into the pitch black, waiting for the jump scare, knowing that eventually, the track leads back out into the light. But on the freezing night of June 9th, 1979, the fake monsters inside Sydney’s Luna Park Ghost Train were replaced by a very real, lethal threat. ​This week on Homocidal Tendency , we head to the neon...

Episode 15: The Atlanta Hustler Murders ​ Episode Summary: The monsters aren’t always wearing masks in the woods. Sometimes, they are waiting in the exact spaces the rest of the world decided to ignore. ​In the mid-1980s, Atlanta was aggressively branding itself as the gleaming capital of the "New South." But just blocks away from the shining new skyscrapers, a perfect storm of systemic...

Imagine risking your freedom, your career, and your country for a forbidden romance... only to realize you don’t know the first thing about the person sleeping next to you. ​This week on Homocidal Tendency, we are stepping out of the shadows of Beijing and into one of the most bizarre, devastating, and theatrical true crime cases of the 20th century. In 1964, a lonely French diplomat named Bernard...

How does a killer commit a frenzied, brutal murder in the middle of a bustling university building in broad daylight, and walk away like a ghost?  This week, we are unlocking the doors of 1 Spadina Crescent a massive, 19th-century gothic fortress with a dark history to explore one of Toronto’s most baffling unsolved cold cases. ​In January 2001, beloved Fine Arts professor and brilliant queer arti...

What happens when a monster only hunts other monsters? This week on Homocidal Tendency , we descend into the subterranean basement of HMP Wakefield to unlock the terrifying, tragic truth behind Britain's most isolated prisoner: Robert Maudsley. ​For over 40 years, Maudsley has lived inside a custom-built, bulletproof glass cage. The British tabloids branded him "Hannibal the Cannibal&quo...

To the outside world, Christine and Léa Papin were the "perfect pearls" of Le Mans.  They were quiet, submissive, and kept the Lancelin household running with terrifying perfection.  But behind the walls of No. 6 Rue Bruyère, the silence was deafening, and a deadly psychological pressure cooker was whistling. ​On a rainy night in February 1933, a simple blown fuse triggered one of the mo...

In 1913, New York City was captivated by a horror story that seemed too gruesome to be true. A handsome, intellectual Catholic priest living a double life: performing Mass by day, and running a counterfeiting ring and a slaughterhouse by night. ​In this episode, Matt deep dives into the twisted life and crimes of Father Hans Schmidt —the only Catholic priest ever executed in the United States. Fro...

​ "Say goodbye to your friend Larry, because you won’t see him after tomorrow." ​It was February 12, 2008, inside a computer lab at E.O. Green Junior High in Oxnard, California. The only sounds were the clack-clack-clack of keyboards and the low hum of teenage chatter. ​In the front row sat 15-year-old Larry King , wearing his signature knee-high brown suede boots and makeup. He was bold...

San Francisco, 1974. The "Summer of Love" has faded into a gritty, neon-soaked reality. In the shadows of the Castro and the Tenderloin, a predator is hunting. But he doesn't use a gun or a mask. He uses a sketchbook. ​He is "The Doodler"—a serial killer who charmed his victims with charcoal portraits before luring them to their deaths in the dunes of Ocean Beach. He kille...

​"I wanted to know what it felt like to kill someone." ​In the winter of 1995, the quiet coast of North Wales became the set of a real-life slasher movie. Four men were brutally murdered in four months. The killer wasn’t a drifter or a gangster—he was a respected local businessman.  Peter Moore was the soft-spoken owner of the Focus Cinema, a man known for his love of teddy bear sweaters...

In August 1991, the curtain fell on one of St. Petersburg’s most colorful figures. Robert Gierka was a man of contrasts: a dedicated nursing assistant by day and a master of the "Sawdust Circle" by night.  When he was found murdered in his 40th Avenue home a residence known as the "Museum of Whimsy"police were met with a crime scene that was as surreal as it was brutal. ​In thi...

Hadden Clark was the "odd" neighbor everyone ignored—until the floorboards started talking.  A classically trained chef and paranoid schizophrenic , Clark didn't just kill; he processed. Using his professional butchery skills, he turned suburban Maryland into a private hunting ground, hiding a six-year-old girl in plain sight for 14 years.  From forced cross-dressing childhood traum...

Part 2 He was the most popular Santa in the city. Parents stood in line for hours just so their children could sit on his lap. But while Bruce McArthur was checking his 'Naughty or Nice' list, he was hiding a graveyard in the gardens of Toronto’s elite. ​How does a man hide eight murders in plain sight for nearly a decade? The answer isn't found in the shadows, but in the most trust...

Bruce McArthur didn’t just hide behind a mask; he hid behind a legend. While he was actively stalking and murdering men in Toronto’s Gay Village, he spent his winters as a Santa Claus at the Agincourt Mall. He wasn't a man in a costume; he was a man who had transformed himself into a symbol of ultimate trust. ​How does a man become a pillar of his community while simultaneously becoming its g...

​"He was a balding, overweight pizza delivery driver who walked with a cane and lived with his sister. To the locals, he was 'Miss Moped,' a pathetic wannabe drag queen obsessed with Patti LaBelle. But behind the closed doors of his Bayou Blue trailer, Ronald Dominique was something else entirely. This is the story of The Bayou Strangler —the man who murdered 23 men over a decade wh...