True Crime Obsessed

On November 22, 1963, John F. Kennedy, President of the United States, was assassinated in broad daylight in front of hundreds of people--at least 55 of whom were filming or taking pictures. And yet we still don't know what happened. Lee Harvey Oswald was the prime suspect. But then he too was killed in the middle of the day in front of almost 100 people.  Was it a lone gunman? The CIA? Fidel Cast...

On October 17, 1974, 12 year old Jan Broberg was kidnapped by her next door neighbor and parents’ best friend—a man they all loving called “B.” B, unbeknownst to them, was a pedophile who had become obsessed with Jan and would stop at nothing to have her. This story is so full of of jaw-dropping twists, you really do have to hear it to believe it.  OOH! It's important to note that Jan today is ali...

EVERYONE BE COOL, KATHLEEN ZELNER IS IN THE HOUSE!!! Before she became a household name with her work on the Steven Avery case in season 2 of "Making A Murderer," Kathleen Zelner used her brilliant, no-nonsense bad-assery to exonerate Ryan Ferguson. Ferguson had been convicted in 2005 at the age of 19 of a murder he didn't commit. There was no physical evidence, the "eye witnesses" were unreliable...

In 2015, NYC Police Officer Gilberto Valle was convicted of conspiring to kidnap and eat young women. YES YOU READ THAT RIGHT: KIDNAP AND EAT. Valle argued it was all a fantasy; the prosecution's narrative convinced jurors otherwise. Valle was facing a possible life sentence when filmmaker Erin Lee Carr began visiting him in prison to make this film. There’s no way around it, you guys, this one is...

THIS EPISODE IS RIPPED FROM THE HEADLINES, YOU GUYS! In 2013, James (Whitey) Bulger, the South Boston mobster, was captured after 16 years on the lam. He was finally brought to justice for a murderous reign of terror that inspired books, films and a saga of Irish-American brotherhood and brutality. Last month (October of 2018) he was found beaten to death in a West Virginia prison. He was 89. This...

This week we're revisiting one of our most popular episodes!  A decade after making the documentary film “Aileen Wuornos: The Selling of a Serial Killer” about serial killer Aileen Wuornos, director Nick Broomfield was subpoenaed as a witness for Aileen’s final appeal in overturning her death sentence. When he became a participant in Aileen’s legal fight, Broomfield decided made this new documenta...

In 1975, the Lutz family moved into the old house at 112 Ocean Avenue in Amittyville, New York. The house was beautiful, nestled in the heart of an affluent neighborhood, it had a pool and a dock, and best of all, the family had gotten it at a staggeringly low price. The only catch—a family of five had been brutally murdered there the year before. According to the Lutz family, for the 28 days they...

Welp, throw “Killer Legends” on the stacks of Halloween-ey docs we’ve hated! Having skimmed the Wikipedia pages and doing a combined 14 minutes of research, filmmakers Josh and Rachel head off to discover ‘the truth behind four of our most terrifying urban legends’….or whatever. Josh is overeager, Rachel is over Josh, and the city of Chicago is over the both of these fools asking if anyone is afra...

There’s no way around it, you guys: There is definitely a PORTAL TO HELL under the basement stairs in a crappy rental house in Gary, Indiana. It’s definitely definitely real, and I know this because that bro The Travel Channel--the one with the ghost hunter show or whatever-- said so. And so did the 12-foot goat-man who haunts his dreams. And he has NOTHING TO GAIN BY MAKING THIS WHOLE THING UP! O...

YOU GUYS!!! A few weeks ago we got the chance to sit down with "Tower" director Keith Maitland for full interview about the film. That interview is now live on the Patreon feed. We chatted about how he made the film, how he tracked down the victims and won their trust, how he learned about the tower shooting as kid and why is stuck with him for decades before he finally made the film, and how it w...

You guys, we've covered A LOT of garbage on this podcast, but somehow THIS insanity is the first one to warrant an actual trigger warning. So here's the head up, THESE BITCHES think abortion, sexual assault, rape, incest, school shootings, racism, homophobia, hate speech and AIDS are HILARIOUS! So they talk about it a lot. IN THE LEAST. SENSITIVE. WAY. POSSIBLE.  So now, welcome behind the scenes...

First things first, you guys…WE HAAAAAAAAAAAATED THIS MOVIE….which is good news because we have SHIT. TO. SAY. In the mood for a great movie about a suuuuper scary exorcism? GO WATCH THE EXORCIST AND SKIP THIS GARBAGE ALL TOGETHER (but don’t be a monster, listen to the episode.) So whatever, the guy who directed The Exorcist gets invited to witness and record an exorcism. He fakes a lot of the aud...

In 1930 4 SUPER grumpy people moved to the Galapagos Islands’ most deserted, most isolated, most remote outpost (that is Patrick you’re hearing having the GAYEST panic attack at the thought). Not only did the all HATE each other, they were bored to death. Enter the Baroness and her two….boyfriends? Gay best friends? Slaves? Nobody really knows, BUT WHO CARES BECAUSE THEY WERE FABULOUS AND FUN AND...

Look, the specifics of this story are confusing AF. BUT at the heart of it, we’re dealing with a murder, a wrongful conviction, a false confession and A. WOMAN. NAMED. SHAWN. (She’s garbage, but we’re obsessed with the gender swapping name situation.). With his execution just 48 hours away, Anthony Porter's life was saved by a Northwestern University journalism class. Their re-investigation of the...

We hate to insult garbage by calling Anthony Weiner garbage...but we can't think of another word. DING! Anthony Weiner did a lot for the people of New York as a Congressman from 1999 - 2011. HOWEVER it all went off the rails when he started SEXTING women WHO WEREN'T HIS WIFE (A quick timeout: his wife is Huma Abedin: brilliant woman, close adviser to Hilliary Clinton, and human-who-will-not-stand-...

YOU GUYS! It’s our final installment and all our friends are here! Boring Jane! The Lawyer Who Can’t Stop Crying! Bagwan(shhhhhhh)! And SHEELA! Hey Girl! Basically, everyone goes to jail, The Lawyer really needs to seek psychiatric attention or at the very least hydrate because HE LITERALLY CAN’T STOP CRYING, Lunny Press Relations gets poisoned, Boring Jane abandons her kids, and Sheela has a secr...

The lawyer is still crying, The Australian is still boring, Sheela is still not to be messed with. This episode, which covers episodes 3 & 4 of the Netflix series, is jam-packed with guns, poisonings, voter fraud, enraged homeless people, attempted assassinations, and, of course, THE HOLLYWOOD CROWD. Oh my God, you guys, The. Hollywood. Crowd. LOOKING FOR MORE TCO ? Check out our bonus episode...

YOU GUYS!! MAJOR LIVE SHOW NEWS! CLICK HERE FOR INFO AND TICKETS!! Another bonkers cult-doc, you guys! Attend the tale of Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, a guru who rose to prominence in India in the nineteen-seventies, and collapsed into infamy in Oregon the decade after. But actually forget about him because everybody knows this shit is actually allllllllllll about his Lieutenant, er personal secretary,...

This one has it all, you guys: Garbage Cops, False Convictions, And An 80s Home Perm Gone Seriously Wrong (oh AND two IDIOTS riding a TANDEM BIKE in CENTRAL PARK at 10 PM in 1989. whatever, we'll get there.) In 1989, five black and Latino teenagers were arrested and charged for brutally attacking and raping a white female jogger in Central Park. News media swarmed the case, calling it "the crime o...

The working title for this one was: “Three Gays Rob a Bank”. And we have an idea for the sitcom version. In August 1972, John Wojtowicz attempted to rob a Brooklyn bank to finance his lover's sex-reassignment surgery. The act resulted in a fourteen-hour hostage situation that was broadcast on TV. Three years later Al Pacino portrayed his crime in DOG DAY AFTERNOON. Directors Allison Berg and Frank...

WHY. ARE. THEY. ALL. HOARDERS? Heads Up! This episode of TCO covers parts 3 & 4 of the Netflix series. To hear our coverage of the first two episodes of the Netflix series, go here! In this episode, we watch Marjorie just berate the soul out of her lawyer via Skpye, learn that the filmmaker’s unhealthy (and possibly unethical?) relationship with Marjorie is off the rails, we learn who the mast...

Let us paint a picture: The weirdest bank robbery in history, a collar-bomb, a cane-gun, three dead men, and two homes so hoard-ey they required hazmat suits. Ladies and gentlemen, we give you “Evil Genius.” In 2003 in Erie, Pennsylvania, a robbery gone wrong and a terrifying public murder capture the nation's attention, and a bizarre collection of Midwestern hoarders, outcasts, and lawbreakers pl...

There are no two ways about it, Harvey Milk looked great in a T-Shirt.  Happy Pride, everyone! Let's talk about some gay stuff! (don't worry, this one is super true-crimey too.). In 1978, Harvey Milk became one of the first openly gay elected officials in the US when he won a seat on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors. 11 months later Milk and Mayor George Moscone were gunned down in their off...

Happy Pride Month, Everyone! Now let's talk about a gay club kid who was super mean to people, became addicted to drugs, and murdered AND DISMEMBERED a fellow club-goer, shall we? Did I mention that he stuffed the body in a box LIVED WITH IT IN HIS APARTMENT FOR A WEEK, and then threw it into the Hudson River? No? Ugh, we'll get to it.  Glory Daze follows the rise and fall of club kid Michael Alig...

You Guys, I Swear to God this is what this movie is about…. In 2004, John Wood had his left leg amputated after a single-engine plane crash that left him badly injured. He somehow convinced the doctors to let him keep the leg (!!!!!), he mummified it—yes MUMMIFIED IT—and eventually put it in a storage locker. In 2007 Shannon Whisnant unwittingly bought the leg when he purchased the contents of Joh...