From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or learn the stuff they don't want you to know. A production of I Heart Radios How Stuff Works. Hello, and welcome back to the show. My name is Matt, my name is Nol. They called me Ben. We are joined as always with our super producer Paul Mission controlled Decon. Most importantly, you are you, You are here, and that makes this stuff they don't want you to know. We get. We get a lot of letters. Who received a lot of correspondences over the years, and occasionally people have written to us and said something like, gee, thanks fellas, now I can't sleep at night, right, Yeah, it's pretty common. Actually, yeah, stayed up till five am on one rabbit hole or another. And conversely we get messages every once in a while to say, wow, you guys really help me fall right to sleep. I love that way. Also five stars. Whenever I can't sleep, I turn on stuff they don't want you to know. Today's episode hinges on a couple of a couple of things that may seem on the offset unrelated, but they're very much related. We're talking about insomnia, the the physical phenomenon that people encounter. We're talking about true crime, unsolved murders in a way that gets dark very very quickly, and we're talking about a show Monster Presents Insomniac. This is out now. It's available now, and please listen to our show first because we have a special guest today, a longtime friend of the show, personal friend of ours, returning to stuff they don't want you to know. Conspiracy Realists Welcome, Scott Benjamin. Well, thank you very much for having me. I appreciate it. Hey, guys, just to break the fourth wall here for a moment. I am an executive producer on this show, and we've been getting some reviews on iTunes that discuss how they can't believe this could ever be real, the stories that are put in here. And you know, that's one of the big reasons we wanted to talk to Scott to to actually have just a conversation where we discuss what's actually affecting you and how real this truly is. Yeah, let me tell you everything. Everything that you hear on that show is real. It really is. It did truly is it? What what happens to me? What happens in the horrific stories that we tell. It's all real, too real. No, I've often said, Scott, full disclosure, you and I worked on a show together for the better part of a decade. Uh, I've often said about you, and I hope this doesn't offend you that Scott Benjamin has two great fascinations cars and crime. True and and when we were when we were hosting Car Stuff, one of the first house Stuff Works podcasts, people would be surprised. I think how how an occasion old episode would morph into a true crime story like the Dale Car right. Oh, absolutely, yeah. We we love to kind of delve into some of the darker history of automobiles and you know, some of the the lesser known corners of of that. Uh I guess that whole experience, you know, like you know what what it was all about. And um, this kind of some surprising things that people had no idea we're going on behind the scenes. So for many people, Monster Presents Insomniac is a surprising turn, right for people who have only known you through Car Stuff, for instance, Could you tell us a little bit about the inspiration for this series and and give us a sense of what insomniac. Sure. Can I first tell you though, that, um, this is a complete um ninety return from you or a hundred eighty return for me? Really, um speaking in car parlace exactly. I I just am not one to really ever come forth with any kind of personal information, you know, any kind of uh um information that you know. Let's the listeners really know a lot about my personal life. I mean, we kind of touch on some things that really aren't all that important. But when you're talking about your sleep and you're talking about kind of your mental well being, uh, that gets very personal very fast. And you know your relationship with your family, and um, you know how I interact with people here at work and all of that is. So it's it's really really personal story and it's uh, it's been tough for me along the way. But um, you asked about the the inspiration for this, and the inspiration really goes back decades. I've been a true crime fan for probably thirty plus years, maybe thirty five, maybe even forty years. I don't know. I can't remember when I began. But UM, my father has always been into true crime, and he he takes full responsibility for this. By the way, my my addiction to this because um, he has always been into, you know, the same types of things that I have as far as reading, and I picked it up from him, you know, grabbing some old books off the shelf, you know, they allowed me to borrow or something, and um, just kind of reading through whatever he had, and then, um, you know, eventually I started reading this stuff on my own. When I had some free time. I'd do it, you know, on vacation, I do it on an airplane, or you know, reading at night before going to bed or something. And it was always kind of fun. It was it was a you know, a way to pass time, and and I never really internalized it the way that I have in the past several years. I guess, you know, I want to ask you about that. You said your dad a lot of times in the show. You talk about how your dad would right in the margins of a lot of the books and try and solve the crimes. Yeah. Yeah, And and we kind of got into a little bit of why people are so into true crime or what that fascination is. What would you say that is? Oh, gosh, I think that it's just because it's so much more fascinating than fiction. It always has been to me, and I think the true crime readers will agree that you can't make something up that's better than a true story. I mean, when you really consider that this is this is really happening to someone, has happened to somebody, or um, you know, you're just you're able to see both sides of this whole thing, and you know that it really happened. You can look up court documents or police documents that that back everything up and say, like, oh my gosh, this this really happened this way, and it's it's far and I'll say I'll say greater. And you know, if I say greater or better or anything like that, I don't mean it in any offensive way. When you're talking about, you know, the death of somebody, that's awful, but it is this, This does seem like these are greater stories than fiction. I also, I've always thought that something might have to do with the fact that people like to feel better by comparison, or it's like, at least my life is not this screwed up, or at least you know, I'm not this, you know, psychopathic serial killer. Absolutely, it does, you know, in a in a horrific way. Horrible way. It makes you feel better about yourself. You're right, and that well at least you know, at least this isn't happening. Maybe what I'm dealing with right now isn't so bad. I can get through this. When we talk about these kinds of stories on stuff that I want you to know plenty, but the ones that are in your show are a little more off the beaten path. They're kind of something you maybe you haven't heard of, but are just as horrific as say, like a Jeffrey Dahmer situation. Well, absolutely, and that's what we were going for in this is And I knew right from the very beginning when I wanted to do a true crime show years and years ago, I knew that I wanted to tackle some of the ones that have really gotten much much less pressed than anybody else in any of the other stories. So you know, you can go anywhere and here about Gaycy and Dahmer and you know Ed Kemper and all those guys, and and they're fantastic stories, but you've pretty much heard just about everything you can about these people. But this at this point, uh, there's you know, relatively few little bits and pieces that you can dig up that are that are kind of new to you. With these stories, hopefully most of it, if not all of it, is brand new to the listener. And uh, and I think you'll find that they're equally as uh, you know, awful at the same time entertaining and uh and just kind of intriguing as you go through and you listen to each of these stories, which are they're they're told in two parts each one and it's a ten episode series, and uh, I don't know. I think I think that you're gonna find some surprises in here, some some real surprises. And I don't necessarily keep a PG. Thirteen it kind of it delves into our rated territory pretty quick. So I don't think this one's exactly for you know, young listeners, but I'll leave that up to uh, everybody out there. Again, when did you start reading the true crime books? Right? So we're drawing in several threads here. One thing that's fascinating about true crime is that crime itself often often becomes an inherent conspiracy. Right, we conspire to rob a bank, we conspire to kidnap or murder, not we not four or five of us, but you get the point. Let's let's before we delve into some of the specifics, because there is one case that I know Matt and Noll are very, very taken with. Now, before we dive into the specifics, let's talk a little bit about insomnia itself, because Insomniac does address something that you touched on earlier. It's something that doesn't get talked about very often in the world of true crime, which is the effect the shows can have on the people creating them. And it's always sort of a joke behind the scenes here when at at how stuff works, we say, you know, don't take your work hold with you. Everybody does to some degree. So when did you start, well, first, what is insomnia? And when did you start experiencing it? Was in the course of creating this show. It really was in the course of the of the show. And uh, and I think I've kind of pinned down exactly what triggered this in me, and I'll tell you about that as we as we get to it. But um, yeah, I've had some awful, awful sleepless nights and uh. And it goes on for days at a time sometimes where you know it's not it's not where you're awake continuously for ninety six hours or something like that. You know, it's like where you might be awake for forty hours at a time and then get two hours of rest and then have to function for a full workday and get home somehow, and then you know, you get to three hours of rest again, and then you're back again at work and it just kind of goes on and on and on like that, and you never feel like you can catch up. And uh, and what that leads to is that, you know, during the day, you fall asleep at your desk. You know, inopportune times, you feel drowsy when you're not supposed to, you feel wide awake when you're not supposed to be awake. Uh. Your your cycle, your sleep cycle is just completely off. It's just there's there's no way to shut down your mind at night. There's no way to turn off the thoughts. And it's just kind of this like continuous stream of of worry and panic and paranoia and fear and all of this that all these thoughts are just going through your head and you cannot stop it. There's just no way to get around it. And it's it's miserable and I believe science is still trying to figure out the specifics of what causes insomnia because they're different. There there are different routes to the same condition. Correct, sure, yeah, exactly right. And uh, one other thing that I was kind of however, I have been, I guess, i'll say legged with during this whole thing, is that when I did fall asleep, I was having these horrific nightmares. And these nightmares were extremely realistic and like really really vivid dreams that we're making me think that during the day, whatever I had dreamt the night prior had really happened. So you know, if if I was like part of, you know, the cover up of some awful, awful crime or something like that, I felt guilty the next day. Um or if I was, you know, the one committing that crime, I felt even worse. And you know, there was just also some like incredible scenes where you know, I'm in this world where I could tell you every single detail about every single little thing, and it wasn't like a typical dream where, uh, you know, like my previous dreams I guess years prior, where you know, they're a little little vague, little little fuzzy around the edges these are crystal clear dreams, like I know everything about them. I know all the characters in them, I know everything about it. I can remember it the next day. Um, It's just it's it's terrifying the next day, especially, you know, if you're involved, like the worst case would be, you know, I'm involved in a crime and somehow in this dream whatever, you know, there's a there's a dead body, and I'm helping to hide this dead body. And you can imagine the guilt and the fear and the and the anxiety and the paranois and all that that goes along with something like that. I've never done anything like that in my life, obviously, I'm telling you I've never done anything like that in my life for real, Thanks Ben, No, but really I never have. And uh and I never hope to, of course. But you know, you get that that that awful, just gut wrenching feeling that you know you can't look anybody straight in the eye because you feel so guilty about whatever you've done in your dream. And I know people have other dreams that are you know, maybe maybe sex dreams. Maybe they're you know, just dreams that you've done something wrong at work or you've done something wrong at home or you know, something else like that. But uh, these that involve you know, the death of another person. Oh man, it's it's it's rough. It's really rough. I gotta tell you, Scott, I've had some recur dreams like that too, Or I've murdered a family friend and I wake up and I feel as though I've done it and that they're onto me, and that you know, like they're gonna they're gonna they're gonna know, everyone's gonna know, like I'm going to be found out. I almost you know, I know exactly what you're talking about. I did had no idea that you're going through that too. By the way, but this year ago. It hasn't been in a while, but I definitely that's a very distinct memory for me, as having that dream and feeling instant guilt when I woke up. Is it not true that you almost have to contact that person or look up that person in some way and and like reassure yourself that they're still around. Maybe it's I I had that kind of sensation to like they're like, how am I going to reassure myself that this was a dream? And it wasn't real because it's that it's that vivid, it's that realistic when it happens. You know, we're talking here about the edges of our consciousness. I mean, this is this is hitting on a ton of big issues like what truly is consciousness? What truly is a dream? I mean, I know it sounds um a little silly to go that big with it, but it really does surround, surround all of these things, because how how do we know for sure if we're having that vivid of a dream that it is a dream? Yeah right, I mean just the nature of of them themselves, of of sleeping and dreaming. Man, I want to bring up things like the matrix. I want to bring up things like uh yeah, yeah, exactly, just knowing who we are, where we are when we are having that sense and when you're going through a few state of having almost no sleep, I can totally imagine exactly what. I can't imagine what you're going through, Scott, but I can imagine what that would be like. Yeah. You know, I I mentioned earlier what may have triggered some of these and I think I I think I kind of have it narrowed down to Um, I had for family deaths that were, you know, people that were pretty close to me within a pretty short amount of time, um and aunt, both my grandparents on my dad's side, and my mother passed away, and you know, I it was during that time that these dreams became the realistic dreams that they were, I guess, and reading True crime kind of took a different turn, you know. It wasn't it wasn't. I wasn't able to disassociate myself with what I was reading so much as more like I had more empathy, I guess for the families and you know, the victims themselves, and you know, it kind of understood a little bit more of what you know, a deep loss like that meant to them. And uh and I don't know, maybe there was something there, maybe that's what did it, But it seems to kind of time out with with those losses, and you know, oddly, and I'll tell you that I lost two family pets along the way at the same time. And that alone is hard enough, because you know, you're talking about pets that you've had for fifteen sixteen years, you know, at a time, and that's tough on somebody as well. But when you lose these people that are really close to you. Um, and and you combine that with having having to kind of immerse yourself in this in this these gritty, awful, dirty crimes that we're talking about here, because it is something I had to immerse myself in. It's it was work, you know, I had to had to do this all day long, think about it at night, and come back in and do it all day long again. And uh and it did just kind of kind of wear on me. You know. Yeah, Well, I'd just like to relate this back to kind of us, um in the in the show really fast. I know, we've all dealt with our own sleeplessness at times what would generally be considered acute insomnia. Um, it sounds like what you're dealing with is what would be considered chronic insomnia. It's lasted for months now at this point, right, or it's not longer than that. Seems like maybe years at this point in some form or another. I mean I have had broken sleep where you know, I can't sleep for more than an hour at a time without waking up and then staying awake for half an hour at a time. And it's just there's a lot of variations to what I'm going through right now with sleep. Yeah, well, you know, for it for it to be considered chronic insomnia, it only has to happen three nights a week out of a week. Chronic for sure, then, right absolutely? Yeah. Wow, that's that's intense and it's ongoing. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, it's it's lasted a long long time. Like I said, probably I want to say, maybe even a couple of years at this point. It's been pretty insane. I just wanted to relate it back to you. I think we a lot of us listening myself personally can at least identify with what would be considered acute insomnia, where like, for maybe a couple of days in a row, you don't get much sleep at all, and you feel differently, or you're having trouble concentrating, or you're feeling really drowsy. Probably a lot of us who have been to college or and ory just been in school ever, have felt that during you know, mid day and a class or something. I'm assuming I'm just speaking from my own experience, um, but I I wonder how many people out there listening have dealt with something along the lines of what Scott is describing, and we would very much like to to hear from you if you've ever experienced just blessness of that length, basically because I can only imagine that that has has a way and this is me speaking not from experience, but just I can imagine that it has a way of amplifying whatever it is that you're feeling in the moment or whatever you're going through. Does that make sense, Yes, it does. I have a few insomnia facts that I'm sure you're well aware of, Scott, but this may help some of our fellow listeners. Approximately one in four Americans will develop insomnia this year. About thirty percent of adults have symptoms of insomnia, ten percent have chronic insomnia. And it appears that for a number of factors, or due to a number of factors, insomnia in this country is on the rise. And that may just be the age of spontaneity and instant information. But we're not built to live in this society. Well, we're also just such a mile a minute society wherever things about maximizing your time and you know, not taking time for yourself and everyone's like overstressed and overworked and not doing that self care stuff and a big part of the you know, self care is like an an appropriate amount of sleep. You know, I can tell you what it's like, you know, late in bed at night, just with all these thoughts running through your head. I can almost tell you exactly where to go to like kind of understand what this is all about. And I don't remember the name of this movie, but it was Nicolas Cage and he played a weatherman in this movie. I don't think it was it was it called the Weatherman. It might have been. I think it was. It wasn't really okay, well, he he had there were moments where you were kind of in his head and you could hear the stream of consciousness and it was just just these it seemed like insane thoughts that were just all over the board. They were all over He's thinking about his kid, he's thinking about his job, he's thinking about his relationship with his dad, he's thinking about his daughter, he's thinking about everything, and uh, and that is exactly what it's like. It's just thought after thought after thought. You can't shut it down, you can't stop it. You can't, you know, just turn it all off and go to sleep and get that rest, that you need, and then you know, worry about it the next day. It's like it's it's there now and you've got to deal with I wasn't meaning to imply that, like we're not taking care of ourselves, because like insomnia as a choice, I think it's sort of like a product of maybe not having the ability to just to like kind of have a little time of peace that's just for yourself. All those thoughts are just worrying through your mind at all time because you don't give yourself space or our society doesn't give ourselves space to just kind of slow down for a minute. Everything's like a mile a minute. And if you're a family man, you know, you go from work to being home and taking care of all of that stuff, and there's just so many things that are coming at you at all times. It's really hard to you know, quiet those thoughts. A lot of people will recommend, you know, meditation or you know, breathing exercises or you know, the this this mantra that you can use in your head, you know, at night, just to kind of calm down, and even even techniques. I was given techniques by a psychologist recently that uh, we're techniques that were given to military members, you know, if they're if they're um POWs, and how they get to sleep, because it's critical that they actually get to sleep if they're a because they'll start becoming kind of almost insane if they go without sleep for long, long periods of time. And of course would be easy to not sleep in that situation. You'd be so worried or so upset or her or whatever. And you know, there's certain things that you can chant to yourself over and over again in your head that allow you to get to get to sleep and uh and kind of shut it all down and then and then kind of be fresh and and be alert and kind of understand for them, you know, not to cough up all the secrets that you know, whereas if you know you were deprived of sleep, you might start talking and uh. And that's one of the tactics that I've been taught, and it didn't really work for me. None of the breathing has worked for me. The meditation, I just can't seem to get into the right the right mindset to do it. And speaking of taking moments giving oneself cognitive space, let's pause for a quick word from our sponsor, and we'll be back with more from Scott Benjamin and we have returned. So it sounds like one of the things that can lead to insomnia would be the persistent, unwelcome thoughts circling around like fish in a in a fish bowl. Right. This reminds me a little bit of the idea of the earworm, having a statue of song stuck in your head, and for many people, one of the ways to cure that thought, or to break that curse of the earworm, is to go through the entire song, you know, to to confront that which is sort of a thorn in the side of our brain. Uh. Mantras have been have been used with various results person to person. It's interesting that you said this one didn't quite do the job for you. And I think we we talked off during the break about is I think we're dying to know if you're comfortable. What is the mantra? It is so simple, this is this is the most simple thing you can imagine. It's it's simply the words don't think, and you repeat the words don't think over and over and over in your head. And if you're just saying if you're concentrating on thinking, don't think. You're not thinking about other things, and you you're just thinking thinking about don't think. And you say that over and over over again into your head until you finally fall asleep. And I guess it works, but I just haven't been able to get past, you know, several times of saying don't think, and then you know, I'm back to thinking about what I was thinking about before. And it's like semantic satiation. Right when you say the words over and over in your head, they begin to lose meaning. Yeah, exactly right. And you know, the breathing exercises, they just haven't worked for me either. It's like, you know, the counting the uh, you know, the seconds that you've inhaled and the seconds that you exhale and all that. You know, it's supposedly the four count is the magic number for a lot of people, and uh, you know, inhale for four and hold it, and exhale for four and hold it, and it just doesn't work for me. I just haven't been able to have much success with that. Wow. Well, I want to get into something Ben mentioned there and that idea and process of curing yourself of an earworm, because I think that relates a lot to the motivations behind making this show Monster Presents in Zomniac in the first place, Like, why on earth if you are having nightmares and sleeplessness due to these monsters, these killers, would you continue making the podcast about these guys? Well, it kind of came about at the same time, you know, I mean, I guess, I guess they just sort of developed around these the same time when I when I began doing the research for this podcast, and I didn't really have much trouble with it before, but then when I started to really really dig deep into some of these characters that we're going to talk about, Um, you know, that's when the nightmares really kind of escalated, I suppose, and and really got worse. And I wouldn't you know, I would torture myself this way. And I know that, you know, the management here doesn't want me to, uh, you know, be sleepless all the time. And you know, also you know it feels like I'm again they don't want to seem like they're they're making me do this and making my home life miserable or anything like that. But um, that's just kind of what's happened along the way, and I'm trying to pull myself out of that right now, and I think I'm I'm getting there, but I'm not there yet. I'm not there yet. So I guess my question is, Scott Benjamin, are you being forced to make this show against your will? No? I'm not. No, I'm not. I still enjoy, you know, the true crime stuff. It has kind of taken a twist to where it's not, you know, the the fun, leisure time activity that it was. But I I do enjoy still reading and I still you know, at my desk, you'll still see me looking up some you know, some kind of bad stuff and some interesting characters. Let's put it that way, that, you know, not the ones we're gonna talk about now, but maybe even a whole new set. Maybe we'll we'll see what happens there. Okay, So left the records show Matt Frederick did not singlehandedly forced Gott benjam to make this very difficult Yeah. Well, we also have the cameras with the new eye tracking technology that we've been using, and they can discern that he was, in fact telling the church. You definitely didn't single handedly force Scott to do anything because as people know, your street name is Maddie two hands Frederick. Yeah, it was double handedly for sure if it was right. So maybe let's dive in. Let's chase some of these shadows. Let's walk a little further away from the light here and see some of the cases that that have I don't want to say inspired you're insomnia, but have have been in lockstep with this condition. One that Matt you and you know had mentioned before was the case of a fellow named Stephen Mark McDaniel. Sure, that's aka the Creepy neighbor. It's very creepy neighbor. And uh, you know, he's kind of a standout on this list. He's a he's a guy that I don't think he well, actually he's not a serial killer. He's he's a person who killed one individual, but he was somebody that uh, well myself included. But the authorities believe that this guy would have been a serial killer had he been able to continue. He was just really bad at what he did and he got caught early early on. But uh, there's some incredibly disturbing things about this character that uh we'll come up in the podcast, and lots of detail that um it's hard to overlook some of these, some of these signs that he was well on his way to becoming, you know, a lifetime criminal. Now, he was a law student at some point, right he was, as was his victim. They were at Mercer Law School in Making, Georgia, and they were, um, I don't know if they were necessarily in class together or not. They were in the same graduating class. They had attended university together and knew of each other. Um, him obviously a little bit more in her. He was infatuated with her. She knew very little of him. And they lived near each other in the same apartment complex. You know, they were next door neighbors. And ah, he had an unhealthy obsession with her. I guess that's probably the best way to put it. And uh, and she really didn't understand that, didn't know it until it was far too late. And one of one of the craziest things about this is how the public learned about it, specifically the local population in Making, Georgia. It was a it was a local TV station that they were conducting interviews outside of the apartment complex. Where where was it where Stephen and Lauren live? Correct and Stephen happened to be walking near them or something and agreed to do an interview. Yes, yeah, absolutely, she the the the reporter grabbed Stephen and uh, and you know that that's the thing. I I've got a theory about that that I'll come to in just a moment. But she grabbed him and had him do a quick and of view and he looks all disheveled and and a little bit wild eyed, and his hair is kind of crazy, and he's just an unusual looking guy to begin with. Um, you'll understand what I mean if you see him. Um. And he gives this, uh, this interview, which, when you're looking back, is like the worst acting job you've ever seen in your life. When you when you really, you know, investigate what happened and understand what was going on right at that moment. This is just one key element of the story, and I guess maybe a bit of a plot twist in it is that during the interview, the reporter mentions to him that they have located a body on the property or nearby this ye, and he immediately just goes quiet, goes goes completely catatonic, and and stares at the lens of the camera and can't believe what's going on, and it says, you know, kind of stammers body, you know, like he's he can't believe it. And then he kind of staggers away from the camera, sits down for a while, says he needs to sit down and rest, and you know they're trying to comfort him, trying to console him, because he up until this point had been involved in the supposed search for Lauren's body. Um, even though he knew exactly where she was, knew exactly what had happened to her. It was it's just it's it's really a remarkable piece of footage. And they do bring him back on the camera later and have him talk, and you know he's supposedly really upset, and you know he's crying these crocodile tears. Um. You know how how concerned he is over what's going on, and you know how he was so close to Lauren and how you know, everybody loved her. I can't imagine what happened. Somebody must have you know, snatched her in the park when she's out for a jog or something like that. You know, he's just beside himself with with fear and worry, and you know anger about this, but uh, all along, you know, it's pretty evident what's really happening. But I mean, geez, like, for someone who reacted so poorly, like why do you think he would have put himself out there like that? You think he was just kind of cocky and I didn't think he was gonna get caught or that he had done the perfect crime or something. So this is my theory. And I mentioned this just a moment ago, but I I truly feel like Steven kind of put himself in a position to be interviewed, to get himself on camera, and to be able to kind of say like, I, Hey, I don't know what's going on. I'm just a neighbor, and you know, I'm clear of this whole thing. He thought he was in the clear. And a lot of these guys, a lot of you know, just about every case that you'll read about with serial killers or killers like this, like like Steven McDaniel, you'll find that they have this, uh, this narcissistic tendency where they feel like they're a lot smarter than everybody else in there. And it's like, this is his moment to kind of stand right there where the crime happened right in front of where the crime happened, and say to everybody else, you know, you know, you idiots aren't looking in the right spot. I know exactly where she is, and I'm just gonna lie to you, right to your face and tell you exactly what's going you know what, I'm what I want you to think, and you're gonna take it and kind of believe it. I feel like this is like just kind of like the the ultimate you know, like I'll show you move from a killer. And we've seen this before with other killers, and in fact, another one in this series does something similar, like another another really had on camera interview with the with the local news station, and again, I feel like it's just that narcissistic tendency for these guys to say, you know, I'm a lot smarter than you and you're just not looking in the right spot. I can tell you where they are. I'm not going to Can we can we just mention who that is? It's yeah, definitely, it's the it's the first couple of stories that we're gonna talk about in Insomniac, and it's it's her Baumeister. Her Baumeister was interviewed by a local Indianapolis television station, right on the very property where all of his bodies were buried. And he's doing it, you know, right at the at the base of his driveway, with his property in the background, and he's talking about some uh you know, an animal that was striped over on the road. Uh you know, road crew ran over a raccoon with a striping machine and he's just outraged over the treatment of this poor little animal. But you know, right behind him are the dead bodies of of all these young men that he had been killing on his property. So it's a bizarre interview, but he gives no outward appearance of being anything other than just a typical, you know, small businessman, and he's very concerned about what's happening there in his community. And it's it's just a bizarre, bizarre interview. Chilling r It really is. I mean, when you when you consider what was happening at the time in that individual's life and particular in particular right on that property right where the camera crew crew was. He's got the ultimate secret right there behind him, and he's he's just not letting anybody through that he's he's got that that that hard veneer that he's not letting anybody look beyond and Bambaster had uh quite a quite a body count right there was still he's he's passed away. Now you want to spoil the means of his death, but he is no longer on on the planet in corporeal form, and he is still being linked to more murders, I believe through the eighties and the nineties. Yeah, I believe so. Um. Well, they they tied him to some stranglings that happened on I seventy prior to him owning the home where he was interviewed, where we're talking about you know this, uh this interview happening, and uh what happens is the you know, the the victims are all the same age, the same weight, you know, the same demographic basically as um the ones that he killed on his property. But as soon as he bought this home, the highway killing stopped and his killings began. And so it's very very likely that you know, his victim count was officially I think eleven, you know, what he's convicted of. They believe that it went as high as twenty or possibly more. You know, if they can tie him to all of the others that they didn't have any kind of physical evidence, you know, for isn't it terrible? How when we speak of these things, we're talking about body count, you know, as the number of victims. When you're thinking about some of these most notorious serial killers, and it's their body count a lot of times is one of those things that becomes it's the number of the stat that people look forward to, like how prolific they were or whatever. Um. But yeah, just the fact that eleven people lost their lives because of this guy, at least at least and that's eleven families, and you know that the number of people affected by that, it grows exponentially, you know. I mean it's there's somebody that cared about that person. There's somebody, you know, lots of people probably they cared about that person. Friends, family, associates, you know, whatever it happens to be. Um, you know, somebody, somebody raised that person, you know, to the point where they were killed. And all of the effort and the time and the love and you know, the care that went into raising that person and being close to that person, all that's just taken away for a senseless reason so quickly. And and so just again senselessly. It's there's there's no reason for this other than you know, one person's selfishness, one person's you know, desire to um, well, just to I guess be lawless. I don't know, I don't know how better to put this than um. You know, it's just they're they're succumbing to their urges and and it's just it's horrific. So what circumstances led to Ballmeister's apprehension did they find? Uh? They found it was. It's kind of a twisted story and it it's probably one of the first few things you're gonna hear an episode one where he is he's kind of tracked down to an area in Canada and they discover his body. Really because he knew he had been found out, you know, he knew that he was being tracked at that time. He had gotten early word when he was in a different part of Indiana. Um. He was visiting his mother at the time in northern Indiana and had fled from their understanding what was going on in Indianapolis at his home. He knew that, you know, the time was up for him, and he he began to run and he realized at some point, you know, I'm not gonna be able to outrun this. I'm not going to be able to to ever go back to the life that I had. I can't live like this. So, you know, he decided to take care of himself. I guess, if you want to put it that way, and uh, he never ever there's a lot of you know, a lot of these guys do uh. He never accepted blame for any of these murders. He never mentioned any of the murders really in his suicide note. Um. But it's it's kind of shocking you. You would think that it would be your time to come clean and you know, just clearly conscious that one last time. But he never ever admitted to any of it. And perhaps in a very real way, he compartmentalized his his killing persona and his day to day her bombinster persona. Oh. I believe that completely. I think it's two separate individuals. I mean, he you know, it's a Dr Jekyll Mr. Hyde thing, you know, where Um, you know, I I believe that there were there were times when he felt it was safe for him to do this, or it was it was the right thing for him to do. And other times when you know, he had to play the part of the businessman and the family man and and kind of keep it all together on the surface for the community and for you know, his own reputation. Um, although there were a lot of cracks in that reputation. You know, he found that you know, he um did a lot of troubles along the way, I guess for her, but you know, hit and run accidents and you know, uh, speeding tickets and he was drinking a lot of work and stuff like that. It was just there were a lot of there's a lot of probably a lot of flags exactly right, and more than that, even but he seemed to get around it, and he seemed to, like you said, compartmentalize it. I think in a in a way that worked for him. Let's pause for a moment here, we'll have a word from our sponsor, and then we will return with more Insomniac. And we have returned, we should say that we're giving these cases a high level look to give give you a taste of what we're exploring in Insomniac, But the episodes themselves are very deep dives. Would you say that's accurate? Oh? Absolutely, yeah. I mean, we're we're not giving anything away here. I know, we were kind of revealing a few little, you know, secrets here and there, But there's so much more to each one of these stories that that like, no matter how much we reveal here, there's gonna be so much more revealed in those episodes. Well, let's take a look at at least one more person of interest. Could you tell us a little bit about Arthur shaw Cross. This person was unfamiliar to me, which is surprising sometimes. Yeah. Well, yeah, you know a lot of a lot of you know, a lot of criminals. Ben, I don't mean to sound that way. I mean, you know, yeah, I'm kind of surprised, but um, this is the Rochester Strangler. This is a guy that, um he had an interesting criminal career, I guess because it was broken up by a couple of decades, really right, Yeah, Well, you know, he wasn't necessarily dormant as he as much as he was um um incarcerated. So you know, he he served his time for some horrific crimes. Um of course, in in Rochester. He then was was put in jail for I believe it was like fifteen years or something like that. He should have been in prison for probably for the rest of his life or what he had done. I'm not going to tell you what he did, but uh, he should should have been in jail for the rest of his life. He was let out early, um, and I went almost in media, right back to killing again. But he had a completely different set of victims, a different type of victims that he was after at that point. So his his crime spanned from you know, the early nineteen seventies all the way to about nineteen eighty nine. Um. You know, the second set actually goes from gosh, I don't know when, probably I want to say, like the maybe early eighties until about nineteen nine. And uh, the victim count, as we you know, we've already talked about this horrific victim count thing. Um, it could have been stopped at two I'll put it there. And and after he was released, he killed an additional twelve people. So you know, that just shows you what a mistake it was to let this guy out. And some of the things that he did were just horrific. I mean, some of the details are the stuff of nightmares and and we're the stuff of nightmares for me for a while. Um. But yes, some some really really bad things going on. I mean, he he claimed he was also kind of a liar and a bragger, and he embellished a lot of his his crimes. But what he truly did, what they discuss her that he did, was nearly as bad as as his own fantasy world that he lived in. We talked about the previous two guys that found a way to insert themselves onto television to almost as a wink and a nod of like, here I am, you'll never catch me. There's something with this character shaw Cross that he did where I think correct me if I'm wrong, but I think he frequented a bar that was kind of known as a police hang out, actually was dunkin Donuts. Dunkin Donuts, I think you're thinking of Edmund. Edmund Kemper went to a bar that was he So this is not uncommon. I mean, this happens with other criminals as well. They want to get kind of the inside track on what the police are up to. So Duncan Donuts is where you get that. Yeah, let's you know, it's a funny stereotype, I know, but it's true. He he found the dunkin Donuts that was near his home where the police were hanging out, and these guys would go into the dunkin Donuts and they would kind of discuss what they were dealing with, what they were you know, kind of openly. Once they were familiar with, you know, the regulars that would come in at which shaw Cross was won. He would just kind of sit at the counter and listen to what they were doing, and he would you know, talk with him occasionally, but he didn't really insert himself into the conversation quite as much. He would just listen to what's happening, and and by playing this kind of cat and mouse game with them, you know, there's a lot of these guys do um. He was able to function in the way that he wanted to longer than he normally would have because he had the inside scoop on what they were up to and what they were gonna where they were going to do, the stings that they were going to set up to try to capture him, you know, where they were going to be that day to kind of look, you know, if they're gonna be down by the river, if they're gonna be um, you know, at the playground, whatever they were gonna be doing, you know, to look for this guy. He knew he had the inside scoop and and Edmund Kemper did a similar thing at a bar and I think it was called the jury room, was across from the courthouse, and he befriended police as well, and you know, the same type of thing. And when you know, it came right down to it, Edmund Kemper when he actually you know, he's trying to confess at some point, and he called the police and they didn't even believe him. He had to call several times and give them, you know, very accurate information about what he had done in order to convince them that, yeah, he was he was the one guilty for this. He is responsible. Also, he's anomalous in that he does have a higher i Q. A lot of these killers tend to be lower in the in the intelligence spectrum, right, So he has Kemper as that chilling interview upon which the series mind Hunter has based more than a few episodes, wherein he describes in first person and here's Shaw Shaw crosses is I would call him one of the I guess lower i Q lower than Kemper at least, and uh, he just he was smart enough though, to understand where he needed to be and what, you know, the information that he needed to gather in order to continue to again function the way that he was functioning at that time, and um, it just it just allowed him to continue to do what he wanted to do. M So we touched on something briefly that I think bears further examination here, and that is the idea of the survivors, the relatives, the loved ones, of the victims of for those people, as anyone who has been involved in a tragedy like this is well aware, for those people, the murder never really stops happening, right, And we can be stuck in that moment the same way you can be stuck hearing the same segment of a song or telling yourself, don't think, don't think, don't think. What what do you what? What have you learned about the way at least us society treats uh the loved ones, the survivors of these tragedies. Do you think that there is any sand to the idea that this country may glorify UH serial killers? Yeah, I think, unfortunately, I think that that's the case. It's been the case in the past. I think that they're they're getting a lot better at this now. I think some of these mass shooters that we hear about recently, you know, some of the ones that that kill everybody all at once, you know, in one day, not a serial killer necessarily, but you know, some of these some of the news outlets are trying to avoid using the name of the person, trying to give them a little less fame for what they've done, because I think a lot of people are well we've probably heard this, They've tried, they're trying to kind of outdo each other, and it's horrific game that they're playing. Um. I think there may be doing a little bit less of that when you when it comes to you know, capturing like the Golden State killer, um or capturing you know, uh, serial killers that you know are maybe local that you know, we don't hear about, you know, national, nationwide, brother you'll probably hear their names in the papers still, and I think they're doing a better job of it. I think that they're trying to minimize that so that they're not glorified with the way they were. Um. As far as like the you know, the treatment that the families received, I think there's still a lot of compassion that's given uh to the families of the victims by the police, by you know, supporting, um, members of the of the force. You know that the psychologists or you know, whoever happens to come in and you have to like kind of talk the kids through this thing. And Um, I don't know, maybe I'm maybe I'm talking myself into a corner here, but no, no, I feel like I feel like there's still a lot of compassion for the people that have to go through this, are the victims families. But um, maybe they're they're definitely not not glorifying the killer quite as much as they have been in the last couple of decades, right, because especially in the eighties and nineties, Who was this huge phase of that, and in some ways it could be seen as a successor to the earlier cultural practice of glorifying other criminals, right, you know, like uh, Bonnie and Clyde, for instance. It reminds me of a most wanted list or something that's plastered all over town or something to that effect, where everybody in town knows the face of those bad people that we're chasing, right Right, that's a very I mean, it's a very good point. It's one that we have to address. I don't know whether there is an answer, because it's also important to be aware of this. This is more horrible than horror fiction, and it's important to be armed with this information. One thing, stop me if this is too far into spoil or territory. But one thing I'm very curious about Scott is, um, did you find or have you found, in the course of your research something that completely surprised you or if you had to pick one or two moments that sort of stayed with you more so than you know, the I hate to say typical, but the regular stuff that stayed with you. Was there anything that just caught you flat footed? Well, there are a couple of things. Yeah, I can point to a couple of things, and one I'm not going to give you too much detail on because it's the end of the series and I don't want to really reveal where we're going with this whole thing. But um gosh, there there are a few things. One one was that, um, one of the characters that were going to talk about in this series is is uh. His name is Donald Henry pee Wee Gaskins, Jr. And he goes by pee Wee. It's funny name, I know, but this guy is bad. He's bad, I mean really bad guy. And uh, he's he was known as the meanest man in America at one point, and there's very very good reason for that. He wrote a book that was called The Final Truth. He wrote it himself. He actually had a ghostwriter, you know, somebody who came in and sat down with him on death row and he just kind of let it all out. I mean, he knew he was going to be executed. He knew that. You know, this was it. It was him coming clean for all of his crimes, everything bad that he did. It was all like, this is all real stuff. It was all, you know, proven at some point. Um. Now he of course, I think there's a little bit of embellishment, because that's the way these guys operate, you know, there's a little bit. But but the killings themselves, the ones that he is guilty of, he he fesces up to in great detail and tells you exactly what happened. Uh, in pretty good detail, I mean real serious detail. Um, probably more than you would want to know. Um. I've read the whole book, and it was it was pretty shocking. You know, the only one that I can think of that comes even close to this as a as another one that was written by another killer is. His last name was Schaefer Gerard Shaffer, I think is his name, And in that book he UM describes it was called killer Fiction and he played it off his fiction. But I don't think much of that book was fiction. I think a lot of it was was based on his his crimes, or at least his fantasies of the crimes that he did commit. So uh, there's a lot of parallels to you know, what he really had had done in his real life. And those two books are probably about the only two that have really kind of disturbed me to the point, you know, like far beyond any other true crime book that I've ever read. And the other thing that has kind of stuck with me is is the very last person that we're going to talk about in this whole series. And there's a reason this guy was put off to the end. He's the he's the one that um I found the most disturbing. His name is, his name is Dean Coral. He's called the candy Man, and Dean was unique in a way that UM he had two teenage accomplices that helped him with his murders, and the way that they went about this, the coldness, to callousness, the depravity that they showed throughout this whole thing. Um, it's just it's far beyond anything any other criminal that I've ever read about. He's probably one of the worst people that I've I've ever read about my whole life. And I've read many many true crime books and and know of a lot of you know, the typical or the more common killers that you know most of us have probably heard of. Um, but this one, Uh, this story goes above and beyond it. It's horrific just to jump in there. I remember the first time I listened to the last two episodes in early cuts, and I turned I kept turning it off because I could not listen to it. Yeah, it's it's uh, it's shocking the way that you know, he had had command of these two teenage accomplices and what they did for him and and with him, and you're you're gonna find it, You're gonna find it pretty uh, pretty disturbing, let's just put it that way. Honestly, Scott, When I think about that case in those episodes. It gives me a better understanding of why and how something like this could affect you if you have just an ounce of empathy, you know, like seeing through the eyes of some of those victims just enough, I can imagine how it would bring about nightmares and anxieties and fears and all of that. I see it, we see. That's the thing is that, you know, prior to all of this, I didn't really come at it with that sense of empathy. And I've kind of developed that over you know, the last several years and um more so, you know, probably because of what I've been going through my own personal life, and it does affect you differently. So you know, I don't mean to sound whiny about any of this or anything like that. It's it's just that's just the way that things have kind of progressed for me, and I'm trying to get away from that. I'm trying to, you know, I guess shut that off a little bit more and trying to, uh, it's awful to say it become a little bit more hardened again against this type of thing because I do I do enjoy reading this stuff. It's it's interesting to me still, but but coming from that point with with that empathy, that does make it a lot more difficult. And until you have that sensation, that feeling or that understanding, I don't know if you can really put yourself in that in that same or that similar situation, like maybe what you know the person next to you who's reading the same thing is going through you know, it's it's all different for everybody. Well, and I think you maybe it's pretty clear, but this condition that you're struggling with did develop like in tandem with you kind of developing the show, and it sort of became part of the show organically where it just made sense. It wasn't like a clever pitch. It was literally this is Scott's life. And I remember seeing you in the office a couple of times, and I actually had a month of pretty bad insomnia myself. We talked about it a couple of times, and that was actually when I is realized that you were having those troubles because I told you about my troubles and we were kind of sharing, you know, ideas like what to do about it or whatever. And I think it was sometime around that same time when I kind of took an informal poll around the office with you know, who's having sleeping trouble? And I think a lot of people did. A lot of them said, you know, I don't sleep more than three or four hours a night most nights, and you know, I have a lot of worry about work and you know, about personal things or whatever. And you know, not to get anybody's you know, personal business or anything, but you know a lot of people are having sleep issues around here that. I mean, most of the people in the office are. And I would bet if this is just kind of a microcosm of what's going on everywhere else, most people are doing, you know, or having some issues with sleep, you know, whether it's something kind of minor, or you know, it's something a little a little tougher, a little you know, something that really causes some problems, you know, at home and at work. And I bet a lot of people are going through that. How would you say the insomniac components of the show, Like there's sort of these discreet moments in the show where you talk about this, how would you say those kind of informed the bigger story or like what do you want people to take away from that? Well? I think actually, you know what it's funny, it's it's a little bit it's kind of separate in a way. And I try to tell the story just so that it's it's just a story, so that it's you know, this this horrific true crime story and it's something that you haven't heard before. But then my own personal part of this whole thing, it's just kind of like something that we've we've added here and there to kind of let people know, you know, what's happening at the time, you know, like what I was feeling at the time, what's good, what I'm going through, And uh, it's I'm trying to keep them separate. And I'm kind of like, I'm trying to keep all this, you know, the work stuff separate from my personal life. And it's a good Um, I don't know, it's a good analogy for that, I guess is that, you know, trying to just kind of keep one thing here, one thing there, and and keep them apart as much as I can, but they do come together to form this whole story and this, you know, that's that's part of who I am right now at this moment. And uh, and I guess you're you're getting to see a glimpse of that you're getting to see. You know what that's all about, you know, the melding of these two things. You certainly look like Scott, Benjamin that I remember from from car stuff and the guy who portrayed the Zodiac. Wait a second, did you like become the Zodiac Killer? Tell what this is about? Absolutely not man, just the voice of I'll give you a little flavor that. Well. The show is called Monster Presents Insomniac. It is available now wherever you find your favorite chilling podcast. Scott, thank you so much for coming by and and hanging out with us today and giving us, giving us a firsthand exploration of this unique approach to true crime. Uh. And I've got to say I appreciate it, but I am very worried for you. Well, no need to worry, Ben, I'm I'm kind of on the men now. I'm getting I'm getting better slow but sure. I'm I'm kind of figuring this, uh, the sleep thing out a little bit, you know, day by day, and I'm i am getting better. Um So no worries there. Um I should be back to normal pretty soon here, I would I would think, I hope anyway, but I do want to thank you know, all three of you been mad Noll, all of you for letting me come in here and share the space with you today. I really appreciate it. And I hope I haven't talked too much. It feels like I've been kind of taking over the show. I didn't mean to do that, but this is uh, that's that's what being it, guess is all about highlight your story and your show and we we love it and where we we love you Scott always. Thank you very much. I appreciate it, and uh, and I have felt like, you know, people have been, you know, kind of compassionate about this, you know, understanding of what I've been going through. And and uh, I hope other people out there that you know, are suffering with the same type of thing. Have somebody that can, you know, kind of help them along with it. Two And you can talk about it, you can you know, figure it out, because you do have to figure out it. It will it will destroy you quickly. And what are your personal experiences with insomnia? Are you one of those twenty five percent of Americans who will acquire insomnia this year or already has. If so, how do you address it? How do you deal with it. Do you do you think this is just something that we deal with now the way our society is, right? Is it the new normal? Yeah? Or is it something specific? Is there something going on specifically that we're we're all grappling with who knows? Tell us about it. You can find us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. We highly recommend our community page. Here's where it gets crazy. You can give us a phone call where we are one eight three three st d w y t K. Leave us a message you might get on the air if you choose to get on there. Let us know if you do not want that, or if you don't want to be named any specifics, just leave it in that message. If you want to find us on social, you can find us on Instagram where we're Conspiracy Stuff Show and Ben you are on there as well. That's true. You can see me get kicked in and out of various countries, organizations and restricted areas at Ben Bolan and Secret Society's no comment, okay, And you can find me just you know, paling around with my kid or doing a little travel or cooking some delicious foods over at how now Noel Brown and hey, that's that's enough about our show. How can people learn about Monster Presents Insomniac Scott. Well, they can go to Insomniac podcast dot com and that's probably the best place, really, But you can also get an Apple podcast or the I heart Radio app. And if none of those methods of communication are really really hitting the spot for you, we have good news. There is one way that you can always contact us. You can send us a good old fashioned email. We are conspiracy at iHeart radio dot com. Stuff they don't want you to know is a production of iHeart Radios. How stuff Works. 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