Cowtown Crime: A Murder at Rico's Pizza

   Mark Bower needed fast money. He was $1,509 in debt to a Sacramento bail bondsman and the 25-year-old ex-con had no desire to return to jail that week. Mark was a thief and he didn’t desire to be anything but. He had four felony convictions dating back to 1976. Once, when asked where he pictured himself in 10 years time, he answered with “San Quentin.”

He was out on bail for a burglary charge. He had convinced his young girlfriend, Tania, to write a check for $600 to the bondsman with an agreement that they would not cash it, so long as the remaining balance was paid in cash, in two installments,  beginning on February 1st. It was January 30, 1983. 

   Sometime after 10 AM, Mark left the Vacaville apartment he was crashing at with Tania and her roommate Jodie. He took Tania’s orange Datsun 240z and told her that he was, “going into town.” He wore blue jeans, a gray jacket, and brown suede shoes. He wouldn’t return for several hours. 

   At the Supercuts in the Mission Village Shopping Center on the northside of Fairfield, California, hairdresser Cynthia Jackson was just beginning her shift. She was familiar with both Mark and the orange Datsun. She noticed Mark driving by her salon, slowly towards Rico’s Pizza Parlor. 

   Inside of Rico’s, Patrick Dean Mixell, 22-years-old, was preparing to open for what would likely have been a busy day. It was Super Bowl Sunday. The Washington Redskins were playing the Miami Dolphins and pizza orders by hungry sports fans would soon be rolling in when they opened at noon. Patrick was the interim manager of the Fairfield Rico’s and this was his third day on the job. Two of his first daily duties were to turn off the alarm and to relock the front door. He may have only performed one of those actions by the time Bower arrived. Patrick was 5’ 8” and weighed 135 pounds. Mark was 6’ 3” and over 200 lbs. of prison yard muscle. 

   Fifteen minutes later, Cynthia, from at her desk inside of Supercuts, would again witness Mark leaving in the opposite direction. Kenneth, a friend of Mark’s, lived a block away from Rico’s. At around 11:45 Mark would pull up to the curb in front of his house and briefly visit with him, never exiting his car. Kenneth found this odd, as Mark hadn’t stopped by in quite some time. Mark left after a few minutes, leaving in the direction opposite of Rico’s Pizza. 

   At 11:55, cook Michael Lewis arrived for his shift at Rico’s. Coincidentally, he had also been visiting with Kenneth that morning. His normal routine of knocking on the door for entry was not necessary, as the front door was already unlocked. He was at the time clock, near the kitchen, when he heard what he described as a “gurgling sound.” His new boss, Patrick, was lying face down in a pool of blood near the pizza ovens. Michael panicked and left for the clothing store next door to have them call for help. 

   Fairfield PD responded with the ambulance and Michael directed two officers to the scene in the kitchen. One of Mixell’s arms was tucked under his body, the other clutched the keys to the restaurant and alarm system. The two officers quickly assessed that a robbery had taken place. The drawer to the cash register was left open and empty. The safe below the counter was also opened and was emptied of all monies of any kind. A piece of paper was found near the register with the combination to the safe written on it. 

   Word spread swiftly throughout the shopping center that there had been a robbery at Rico’s. Cynthia observed medics removing Patrick Mixell’s body from her window at Supercuts. She immediately phoned the police to tell them of Mark’s coming and going that morning. 

   Mark arrived back at Tania’s apartment sometime around 1 PM. He seemed to be in good spirits. Two days prior, he had told her to call the bondsman and let them know that it was safe for them to cash the check. Tania had been dealing with repeated phone calls from their office demanding to know when sufficient funds would be in her account. Mark had assured her not to worry and that he was working on it. That day she observed him pulling a two-inch-thick roll of cash from his jacket pocket. When she asked him where he had gotten the money, he jokingly replied that he had “robbed a bank.” That night they went on a date together to dinner and a movie. 

   Responding officers, Timm and Hinman, scoured the crime scene at the pizza parlor. They were looking for some kind of object that might have caused the extensive injuries to Mixell’s face and the back of his head. Officer Timm discovered a commercial can opener lying in a sink behind a counter. The can opener was a heavy tool, resembling a pipe-wrench. It was stained red and a scouring pad was on top of the handle. 

    Patrick Mixell would die from his injuries two days later, on February 1. His skull had been fractured in two places: The orbital bone surrounding his left eye and in the back of his head, behind his right ear. The coroner would state that these wounds were not possible to have been caused by a fist and that the industrial can opener could be a likely weapon. Patrick’s family—his mother, father, and three sisters—would lay him to rest that Friday at the Sierra Hills Memorial Park in Sacramento. Rico’s Pizza would offer a $5000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the person responsible. 

   On the morning of January 31, Mark asked Tania to accompany him to the bail bondsman’s office instead of going to work. Together, they drove to Sacramento where Mark paid the bondsman $800, peeling the cash from the thick wad of bills in his pocket. Afterwards, they returned to Fairfield and she reported to work. 

   Tania was informed by co-workers at the auto dealership where she was employed that Fairfield police had stopped by looking for her. They wanted her to come to the station to answer some questions. She lied to officers at the station, telling them that Mark had been with her at her apartment all morning and had not left at all during the day. Knowledge of the robbery and assault, along with Mark’s newfound wealth had most likely put her on edge. Later that evening she asked him to move out of her apartment. Mark agreed, gathering his things and leaving to stay with a friend. 

   The next day, she received a call from Mark, asking her if she would meet him. She agreed and encouraged him to talk to the police. The couple supposedly drove to the police station together, but never entered. They instead drove to Pietro’s Restaurant to eat pizza together. Fairfield PD, already on Mark’s  trail, took him into custody there. The arresting officer noticed that the brown loafers the suspect was wearing appeared to be bloodstained. The shoes were bagged as evidence.

 

   Officers also responded to the friend’s house where Mark had spent the night. After obtaining permission to enter and search, they seized a gray jacket that also appeared to have blood stains on it. Found hidden behind an end table was a locked briefcase. Also found was a .357 Magnum, stolen in a home burglary committed on January 29, the day before the robbery. 

   After a search warrant was obtained, the briefcase was opened. It contained a personal photo album of Mark’s, $48 in cash, various trinkets including a pin that read “I Spell Relief: C-O-C-A-I-N-E”, and several rolls of coins. The coins were both machine-wrapped and hand-rolled and stamped with bank information and handwritten account numbers.  

    Bower was charged with possession of stolen property, relating to a burglary committed in Toledo, Ohio in December of 1982. It was enough to hold him in jail while detectives built their case against him. There was the blood evidence on his shoes and jacket. Blood that would eventually come back as Type O. This was a match to the victim, Mixell, and not the defendant. There were also the rolls of coins found in his briefcase. Coins that could be traced to the branch of the bank that Rico’s did business with. On top this were the eyewitness, all placing him at the scene of the robbery and murder.

   Further investigation revealed that Bower had spent ample time at Rico’s in the months prior to the robbery. Having both friends and family members who had worked there, he had, on numerous occasions, remained inside after closing time and knew where the safe was located. He was formally charged with first first-degree murder and pleaded innocent at his arraignment in August. 

   Bower might not have been sweating the trial. He had previously skated on a robbery and an attempted murder committed in Napa County in 1980. After nearly gutting a man, cutting his throat, and leaving him on the side of the road, Mark was able to plea bargain the case down to a misdemeanor and a six month sentence. 

   The People v. Mark Edwin Bower went to trial in May 1984. The case hinged on the blood evidence and the rolls of coins found in his briefcase. Forensic experts testified that the blood matched the victim, shooting down the defense’s explanation of Bower cutting his hand and bleeding onto his clothes days before the robbery. Testimony from various witnesses linked the coins found in the briefcase to the safe at Rico’s. 

   Tania had finally come clean and testified for the prosecution about Mark’s need for the money and his absence from her apartment on the morning of the robbery. She also testified to receiving phone calls from jail, with Bower asking her to locate and dispose of his hidden briefcase. 

   Bower did not take the stand in his own defense. One witness for the defense was Jodie, Tania’s roommate. She confirmed the times that Bower left and returned on the morning of January 30. She testified that nothing in his mood seemed out of the ordinary. I am not sure that this helped him in the eyes of the jury. 

   After a three week trial, the verdict came back guilty. This was after a bizarre, tearful outburst of a juror that almost resulted in a mistrial. While being polled by the judge, a whimpering woman— juror #10— answered, “no” when asked to affirm her guilty verdict. The jury was sent back to deliberation, and returned shortly with a unanimous decision. 

   On the day of sentencing, friends and family members of Patrick Mixell filled the courtroom. Also in attendance was Dennis Sample, the man Bower had stabbed nearly to death in Napa four years prior. The death penalty had been taken off of the table by the prosecution and Bower was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Mark was seen in court weeping tears at the permanent loss of his freedom. The Mixell family cried for the loss of their son and brother. A young man who was loved and taken from them while still in the dawn of his life. All over bail money for a habitual criminal. 

Spotiforgotten: Elvis Hitler

 

  Welcome to Spotiforgotten. Here I will cover great music that is sadly unavailable to stream on Spotify (or Apple, which has a nearly identical library)

   The 1990’s in the suburbs were not kind to the fan of eclectic music. Unless you had a ride out to the city, or at least a closer college town, you were stuck either mail ordering your stuff or buying tapes from chain record stores like The Wherehouse or Musicland. There were some decent staples that could usually be found in these mainstream stores: Misfits, Samhain, Minor Threat, GBH, & The Exploited were all readily available for purchase most of the time. Another band, easily found, was Elvis Hitler. 

   Formed in Detroit in 1986, they would popularize twanging, southern-fried, roots-based punk rock years before the term “psychobilly” would become widely used in the US. Their choice of the shocking band name, not helped by their inclusion on the soundtrack of the lovably awful film, Skinheads: The Second Coming of Hate, would forever relegate them to the digital dustbin and none of their music has ever been available for streaming. 

   It’s too bad, because be their shit rocks. Catchy and toe-tapping, their music stands the test of time. I have also— for years—been convinced that famous goth nerd, Brian “Marilyn Manson” Warner, appropriated their naming convention for his much more lame nom de guerre. Their albums “Disgrageland” (1988), “Hellbilly” (1989) and “ Supersadomasochisticexpialidocious” (1992) are must-haves for any aficionado of shit-kicking rock n’ roll. 

Cowtown Crime: The Deaths of Jesse & Sonny

    

Neither Brad McGowan or Jesse Brown were bad kids. They might have rubbed elbows with some guys who had reputations as troublemakers. They might even have been related to some. But, the lures of alcohol and weed did not necessarily get one pigeonholed as a hoodlum, at least not in 1995. Plenty of good kids were messing around with that stuff. 

That's what had brought Brad and Jesse to North Orchard Park on the night of April 15. They wanted to get fucked up and public parks were often the place to do so after the sun went down. The stories differ on what actually went down when 24-year-old Aaron Davis and his girlfriend Julie crossed paths with the intoxicated duo. Aaron and Julie insist that the two had accosted them unprovoked, with the intent of sexually assaulting Julie. After a short tussle, which Aaron claimed to have been able to defuse, the two went on their way, intending to exit the park. Davis then claimed that they were attacked from behind by Brown and McGowan. Davis pulled out his pocket knife and stabbed both assailants, gravely wounding McGowan in the abdomen and killing 17-year-old Jesse Brown. 

   The Vacaville Police Department was quick to arrive on the scene, as they often were. An assessment of the circumstances had them conclude that Davis had acted in self-defense, with his life, and Julie’s being in immediate danger. The Solano County District Attorney agreed and the stabbings and killing were ruled justifiable. No charges were filed against Davis. This didn't sit well with the friends and family of Jesse Brown. 

Brad McGowan & Jesse Brown

  Word quickly spread back to Aaron Davis that he could be in grave danger. Rumors around town were that his version of the events was skewed and that Jesse did not deserve to die. Jesse also had connections. His cousin, Chris, was not someone to be trifled with. A local tough guy, said to be gang affiliated, he carried a reputation of someone who handled business and would never let the killing of his cousin slide. Davis claimed that he and his family began receiving death threats. So much so, that Davis would go into hiding, even leaving his job after being threatened in person while working. Vacaville was a small city, where everyone knew everyone else. He would live for the next two months constantly looking over both shoulders. 

   Michael “Sonny” Schairer was one of those who had vowed revenge. Sonny was a good looking guy, as in movie star handsome. His reputation was that of a hooligan with a heart of gold. Not known to be particularly dangerous, he would still never back down from a fight and was extremely popular with girls. He was tight with Jesse Brown’s family, particularly his older cousins. 

   It is not known if Sonny’s encounter with Aaron Davis on July 19, 1995 was by chance or the result of calculated stalking. Aaron and Julie, while driving down East Monte Vista, noticed a car make a quick U-turn and began following them. The car was being driven by Sonny and was occupied by at least one other man. With high beams on, Sonny tailgated the couple at high speeds, forcing them to blow through several stop signs in an attempt to make an escape. 

   They were followed all of the way back to within a block of their home, with at one point, Sonny stopping to pick up a large rock and throwing it at their car. Aaron drew a .40 caliber Glock 22 that he had been keeping on hand, just in case of a situation such as this unfolding. He claims to have yelled at Julie to run home, while Sonny approached him, allegedly reaching for his waistband. The two where chased right up to their front door, with Davis repeatedly telling Sonny to back off.

   “Are you Aaron Davis?” Sonny asked, still reaching for his hip. Sonny’s last words were, “I’m gonna…” He was shot and killed by Davis with a single bullet to the chest. No gun was found in his waistband. 

   Aaron was arrested and put on trial for 2nd degree murder. He was facing 25 years to life for what some would call basic self-defense and what the Schairer family called a cold-blooded murder. The trial divided the opinions of the people of Cowtown and would end with Davis’ acquittal. There were wails and threats in the courtroom by Sonny’s supporters, and Davis was, again, given police protection to ensure his safety. Sonny’s father, Michael Sr., was appalled, stating that Davis had been given a license to kill and would most likely be adding more bodies to the Vacaville-Elmira Cemetery.  

   There is no confirmation, but it is highly doubtful that Aaron Davis remained in Vacaville. With two bodies and a world of shit and threats on his head, it would have been the wise move to vacate Cowtown forever. 

Michael “Sonny” Schairer

Spotiforgotten: Holly & The Italians "The Right to be Italian"

  Welcome to Spotiforgotten. Here I will cover great music that is sadly unavailable to stream on Spotify (or Apple, which has a nearly identical library)

   I know very little about modern music. I couldn't tell you what the kids are listening to today or what is currently topping the charts. It holds no appeal to me, partially due to lacking one essential quality: Fun. It's not fun to listen to or to discuss. This record is a whole lot of fun. Teen angst shouldn't only be Cobain-esque despair and self-debasement. Sometimes you need to get out of your dark room and go cruising. Drive up and down the same drag and see who else is out. Grab some soda pops and french fries and chase around some cute boys or girls. Call your friends up on the phone and gossip a little before heading to the all-night diner for coffee and cigarettes until the manager kicks you out. Head to the point for some making out and heavy petting in your mom's backseat. You will thank yourself later for living a little and having some good old fashioned fun. 

Spotiforgotten: Rokker

 Welcome to Spotiforgotten. Here I will cover great music that is sadly unavailable to stream on Spotify (or Apple, which has a nearly identical library)

   There was once a time- long, long, long ago- when punk rock was played by fucking weirdos. There are several testaments to this fact, left behind in either record store cut-out bins or overpriced and behind the glass. Odd and crude slabs of wax by bands such as Puke, Spit, & Guts or Tutu & The Pirates stand as relics of an era when punk rock had no official uniform. There were no commandments set in stone, regulating how a band would look, sound, or think. It was true misfit music, made by outcasts for outcasts. 

   There is no finer example of this than Rokker, from Austin, TX. They cut a single, self-titled album in 1979, then disappeared into the abyss. This record sounds exactly like what it is. A bunch of oddballs from Texas in the late 70’s, who had no idea what punk was supposed to sound like. Original pressings fetch insane prices from collectors, but lucky for us, the album was repressed a few years back. This is fun and wacky stuff, that it is no longer even possible to recreate. 

Spotiforgotten: Mack Stevens & The Slapback Rhythmaires “Home Made Tattoo”

Welcome to Spotiforgotten. Here I will cover great music that is sadly unavailable to stream on Spotify (or Apple, which has a nearly identical library). 

   Rockabilly is an odd style of music. It’s simplistic beats and formulaic structures require a compliance by artists to almost paint-by-numbers, lest they be exiled from the genre completely. This is not a criticism, but a praise for those who are able to stand out amongst so much that is unremarkable. Mack Stevens has always stood out. The Texas wild man possesses the charisma, voice, and songwriting ability to elevate his music above what is mostly forgettable to all but the hardest core of fans. 

   “Home Made Tattoo” was released in 1999 and doesn’t even have an entry on Discogs. The songs are raw, dark, humorous, and, sometimes, downright morbid. It’s the sound of a desolate West Texas desert that you’ve just buried a body in and now you have to find a church to pray at and repent for your wrongdoings. It’s a well-oiled .38 Special in one hand and a can of Pearl in the other. It’s music made for lonely dark highways and dimly lit barrooms. Mack Stevens is the real deal and the 24(!) tracks on this album are a testament to his greatness. ALL of his records are worth listening to, there isn’t a bad one in the lot. Do yourself a favor and venture beyond the limited streaming world to check this stuff out. 

Spotiforgotten: Antiseen “Hell”

Welcome to Spotiforgotten. Here I will cover great music that is sadly unavailable to stream on Spotify (or Apple, which has a nearly identical library). 

Cover songs can be a tricky art to master. One needs not only originality in their own sound, but also in their tastes and selections of the numbers that they choose to showcase. I’m hard-pressed to find a finer example of both than in Carolina Destructo Rock Gods, Antiseen, and their collection of cover songs (and a few originals): “Hell.” Released in 1995 and reissued in 2001, this album runs the gamut of influences. Clayton and co. cover such genres as country (Ernest Tubb “Thanks A Lot”, Hank Williams “I Saw The Light”), rockabilly (Jumping Gene Simmons “Haunted House”,  Elvis Presley “Mean Woman Blues”), punk (two tracks by the Ramones and Skrewdriver “I Don’t Like You”), classic rock (BTO “Taking Care of Business”, Bob Dylan “Positively 4th St”), soul (Curtis Mayfield “Don’t Worry If There’s A Hell Below, We’re All Gonna Go”) and even some Afrofuturist avant-garde jazz (Sun Ra “Space is the Place”). Their version of Talking Heads’ “Psycho Killer” is, in my not-so-humble opinion, the best version of the song. Mix in some of their originals taken from various singles and a few live tracks and you’ve got a dynamite record from start-to-finish. 

   An album full of this many covers probably makes for a royal pain in the ass for licensing, so I can sort of understand its absence. This also means that any Antiseen playlist made from Spotify’s library will be grossly incomplete. Do what I did: Upload your CD to Apple, then add the songs to your playlist from your own library. You will be the only one who can hear the complete tracks, but who gives a shit?

My Friend, Ben

   During the first few weeks of the 4th grade, Ben became my best friend. I was a new kid, at a new school, in a new town. Somewhere along the line, I had convinced myself that I was a karate badass who was not to be trifled with. Ben and I had gotten into a verbal confrontation on the playground and I gave him a shove. He (to borrow the terminology of professional wrestling) “oversold” my push and flung himself in a ridiculously exaggerated fashion onto the ground. He then shuffled off to find a teacher to tell. When he returned, with the yard duty by his side, he was in hysterics, crying and babbling that I had hit him, barely comprehensible. The side of his face was bright red. This was not only due to flushing, but because he had slapped himself. This rat played dirty.

   No big deal was made over a minor playground scuffle. They didn’t even call our parents. What they did instead was to put the two of us in an empty classroom to talk it out. The teacher was to return after we had finished to make sure we had smoothed everything over, utilizing our nine-year-old’s understanding of diplomacy. Ben immediately admitted to me that he had been faking. He could make himself cry on command, he said, and he wanted to be an actor. We agreed to concoct a story together that would get neither of us into trouble. I do not remember what preposterous tale we came up with, only that by the end we were both laughing and more than pleased that we had crossed each other’s paths. We began playing together daily, both at school and home. 

   Ben was a funny kid. His sense of humor was…sophisticated for a boy of nine. He possessed sarcasm and a cutting cynicism that normally wouldn’t have developed until someone was in their early-20’s and had been given enough time and experience and disappointment. He was what some may have called an old soul. A boy from another time. To me, he was just Ben. There was no other word better suited to describe him. 

   The types of play that I enjoyed with my other friends – army, war, football, karate, WWF wrestling – didn’t hold any interest for Ben, so we never partook in any of them while together. He seemed to fill his time more artistically. Homemade VHS videos of puppets he had created singing Cyndi Lauper songs, clip art collages featuring things like Tammy Faye Baker reading Playboy, drawings and giant dioramas, usually centered around Gumby and Godzilla. He was the best artist in class, by far. Once, when the entire class had submitted captioned artwork to be displayed in a scrapbook that our teacher had assembled, the work of another student bore a little too close of a resemblance for Ben’s liking. He covertly added a speech bubble to the other boy’s project reading, “I copy Ben!”

   His favorite activity, though, may have been petty vandalism. Ben loved mischief. So much so that he formed a club around it. I was inducted as the 3rd member of The Mischief Club shortly after our first meeting. Official club business included doorbell ditching (or “nigger knocking”, if you prefer the vernacular of the time), egging of cars and houses, prank phone calls, and running through supermarkets with our arms extended outward, knocking as many items off of the shelf as possible. The toilet paper aisle was a favorite for this, and I can’t recall either of us being ballsy or stupid enough to try it in the aisles full of beer or jars of spaghetti sauce. Ben was always as cool, collected, and as inconspicuous as possible. I, on the other hand, would always be laughing maniacally, eyes darting around on the lookout for trouble. 

   The night before picture day it had rained heavily. In class Ben got the idea to, at recess time, scope out any girls who were standing close enough to puddles in their nice clothes and then run by and splash them. We got so excited at the idea that we made up a song in anticipation of “Puddle Time,” as we named it. It was doo-wopy type of number: Puddle time, Puddle time, Put-put-puddle time…Puddle Tiii-eee-iiime. This went over as well as one would expect and we both spent the rest of the day’s recesses standing against the wall. This was standard punishment for recess infractions, and one I grew quite accustomed to. We would repeat Puddle Time after every rain that school year. 

   Another one of Ben’s favorite activities was raiding his older brother Joe’s room. Joe was in high school and I don’t remember him being home much. He was a hardcore punk. In those days punk rockers in the suburbs often fell into two categories: There were the brainy freaks who were barely socialized and then the thuggish goons who were merely biding their time until adulthood and the state penitentiary called. His brother was, undoubtedly, of the latter type. Often when calling Ben, if Joe were the one to answer the phone, the conversation would go something like this:

   “Hi, is Ben there?”

   “Yeah, hold on. BENNY, IT’S ONE OF YOUR LITTLE QUEER FRIENDS!”

   I had no interest in punk music at the time, still preferring the less-hardcore sounds of Huey Lewis and the News. But his room was a trove of other kinds of treasures: The pornographic kind. We pilfered stacks of Hustlers, thumbing through each issue repeatedly.  In addition to all the naked ass and spread beavers, which I was excited by but still too young to fully appreciate, there were pages and pages of jokes, dirty comic strips, ads for aphrodisiacs and sexual enhancement gimmicks, and – what we found the most humor in – the endless ads for phone sex. The ridiculousness of these were never lost on us and even our pre-pubescent minds had enough sense to realize that there was no way the pictured blonde named Shirley was the person actually answering on the other end. We even called one time and I “ruined” the call by not being able to stop laughing. 

   In addition to magazines, there were videos, too. I became a lifelong John Waters fan after a mind-blowing viewing of Female Trouble. This remains one of my favorite movies to this day and it's endlessly quotable dialog was first repeated by me on a 4th grade playground. As enamored as we were by Waters, it was the other VHS tapes that piqued even more of our curiosity. I can still remember most of the titles: Stephanie’s Lust Story, I Like to Watch, Brooke Does College, and- the jewel of them all- Taboo 2. 1980’s porn is entertaining at any age, but to grade-schoolers it was downright sublime. We would interject dialog from the movies into casual conversations whenever possible. Saying, “Ahhhh! Watch the teeth!” in class or having discussions about Junior and his sister Sherry, as if they were kids at school, in front of our mothers.

  As I said, I was still too young to fully grasp (no pun intended) the purpose or possibilities of an erection. Ben, I suspect, figured that out long before me. But, jacking off was still a source of shame in the 4th grade and the ones who had made this great discovery would have never copped to it. Ben seemed to deal with his guilty conscience on the issue by projecting. Billy, the boy who lived across the street from him, was a compulsive masturbator. Ben assured me of this. Billy liked to jack off with cubes of butter and would often do so in full view of his bedroom window. Why no one but Ben ever witnessed this, I was never made aware of. Regardless, with my big mouth, the rumors spread and took hold. So much so that, to this day, the words “butter,” “Billy,” and “jacking off” are permanently intertwined in my mind. 

   Our fascination and exploration of all things pornographic was taken to the next level one day when Ben showed up to play with a Reader’s Digest-sized magazine. It was like nothing I had ever seen before and wouldn’t see again until the rise of the internet over 10 years later. The magazine was more like a catalog and was devoted almost entirely to sexual “freaks.”  Long Dong Silver, Moby Dick, The Incredible Bulk, and John Von Dong were all represented. We sat, concealed from passerby in some bushes, flipping through the pages debating whether or not the ungodly massive and/or duel cocks on display were legit or not. What if he got all the way hard!? It would poke him in the chin! Contemplation of such things may or may not have led to recurring vivid dreams that I had all throughout my adolescence in which I was able to autofellate. 

   This particular magazine was the only one in which I asked Ben to borrow. I had an older brother the same age as his and I couldn’t wait to see the look on his face when I showed him this. I tucked the magazine into my waistband and headed toward home. I cannot for the life of me remember the specifics of what happened on my walk home. Something – it could have been seeing my mother’s car drive by – spooked me and I withdrew the magazine and quickly threw it in a creek. I had every intention of going back to retrieve it and to salvage what hadn’t been ruined and waterlogged. But, I was never able to find it. I told Ben the next day what had happened in a nonchalant but still apologetic manner. He was devastated and acted genuinely betrayed.  

   “I trusted you. And you let me down,” he would say. He was awash in a seriousness that I found uncharacteristic at the time, but would see more and more the longer we were friends. The melancholy didn’t last, though, and we were back to our fixation on the X-rated world. 

   The culmination of this, to me, was a time in the school nurse’s office. To get out of class all one had to say was that you felt sick and needed to see the nurse. They would give you a hall pass and you would go and sit amongst the other afflicted children and wait for either the ice pack or thermometer. That time it was only Ben and I in the waiting room. Well, Ben, I, and a giant stuffed panda that was larger than either of us. As we waited, Ben picked up the panda and began to strike poses straight out of Hustler. He did doggy, 69, reverse cowgirl, face sitting, all the while miming facials reminiscent of the male model’s orgasmic expressions. At that moment I seriously thought that I might die from laughing so hard. It was not only the hilarity of what I was seeing, but also the nervous fear that the nurse would walk in while he was on all fours displaying his O-face. She did not interrupt, but such was life with Ben. Full of laughter and the anxiety of being caught.        

   Ben had a mean streak, too. I’m not entirely sure of where it all came from, but there were a plethora of factors to choose from. Shit, he knew himself, even at that young age, that he was fucked up. He was the youngest of three brothers. A year before I had met him, Steve, the middle brother, had died of pediatric cancer. It wasn’t something that Ben seemed out of touch with or repressed in any way. He would discuss the topic freely when it came up and articulated feelings of mortality in a manner that would be astute for anyone, more so for a 10-year-old. Any vitriol was reserved for Kelly and Sam. Kelly was a child suffering from leukemia who went to our school. He was a few grades below us, making him very young.  Ben used to shoot dirty looks at him whenever he passed. He would whisper that he hated him, in a manner so only those two could hear. Kelly would just look sad, scared, and confused, all doe-eyed in the face of this venom that he couldn’t make any sense of. Ben would always state how slighted he felt for his family and that the school never held any stupid fundraisers for Steve the way they did for that other kid. I don’t remember Ben’s reaction when Kelly died in 1989. Maybe we were out of touch at the time, maybe not. 

   Sam was a kid in our class. I am not sure what disability he had been born with, but it showed in his skinny and palsied frame. He was severely knock-kneed and walked with a distinctive shuffle that other kids, little assholes that we were, learned to imitate. To be fair, Sam got fucked with by others, but Ben seemed to make a special mission of it. Hitting him, knocking him over, and berating him whenever he had the chance. I don’t want to get on a high horse here because I had my own forms of Sam torment, much of which did not involve Ben at all.  But Ben’s methods seemed to be born less of selfish amusement and more of a cathartic release of bottled up aggression and anger. I have no idea what became of Sam or where he is today. If he shows up at my door someday with an AR-15 and riddles me full of holes, please know that I totally had it coming. 

   Ben had been referred to our school’s psychologist before I had even moved there. He would sit in for single and group therapies. One of the other boys in his group was in our class and was suffering from abuse at the hands of his dad. I guess they didn’t have mandatory reporting laws back then. I know all this because Ben spilled the beans to me on everyone else in the sessions. He was unsympathetic and would scoff at their issues and state with certainty that their pain paled next to his. Underneath Ben’s wacky hijinks was always a cloud of misery and despair. Something that, I am sure of now, he had no clue of how to process, much less deal with. He described this feeling to me one day as we were riding bikes to his house. 

   “Do you know that feeling in your guts that you get when you’re about to go on a really scary rollercoaster?” he asked me. “It’s like that and it won’t go away.”

   These days Ben would have received a laundry list of diagnoses and, most likely, an even longer list of medications to curtail these dreadful feelings. He would have easily been tagged bi-polar and possibly sociopathic. The Ben that I knew and loved may not have been allowed to exist today. In retrospect, I know how I feel about it. I’m just not sure that it’s the way I am supposed to feel about it. 

   Ben and I fell out of touch in junior high. Even though his family were Lutherans, he was sent to Catholic school for 6th grade in a last ditch attempt by his mother to curb his bad behavior. He was expelled before the year was out and we lost touch shortly after. The next year I would last less than two months at the same school. Chalk it up to the bitch nuns not knowing how to handle whirlwinds like us. 

   The last time I saw Ben it was me noticing him  walking down a trendy street in Berkeley. I was standing around in all of my punkness and he barely recognized me. Funny enough, I had run into his brother Joe a few months earlier under the same circumstance. Joe was oddly more receptive.

   “You’re looking pretty punk,” Joe said. “What made you wanna go this way?” he asked. 

   “It’s fun,” was my only answer. He seemed pleased with this.

   “Damn right. I had a blast!” he said before going on his way. 

    Ben was less welcoming and not at all as excited as I about our chance encounter. He had no enthusiasm for rekindling an old, childhood friendship. We went to lunch together and barely spoke. He seemed detached and very uncomfortable with my loud brashness, a common trait that we once both shared. Whatever connection we had had been severed by time and development. The only small nugget of conversation that I can still recall was him asking me what my drugs of choice were and seeming confused when I answered back with only beer. 

   Years later, during my brief stint on social media, I searched endlessly for Ben, all to no avail. Even if there was little chance of picking up where we had left off, there was still the curiosity. Probably no different than a million other social media lurkers: What did he look like now? Did he get married? Have a family? Come out as gay? Was he ever able to put his artistic skills to their full potential? 

   Other than what he ended up looking like, I would never find these answers. After years of searching, I was finally able to locate a page for Ben. It was on FindAGrave. He had died in 2017 at the age of 40. He is buried next to his brother, Joe, who had died 8 years prior. That one I had heard about. Ben’s cause of death wasn’t listed in any obituaries as it was for his brothers, both of whom died of cancer. Did Ben have the same terrible genetic predisposition, or was it something even more unlucky and sad? Did the stresses of living a whole life with a grown-up mind finally crack him up and push him beyond the breaking point? I wish I could think not. His epitaph does not narrow things down, simply reading, “You will always be loved. You will always be remembered. You will always be missed.” All three statements are true. 

   

   

   

   Geraldo Rivera - Murder: Live From Death Row

 If I had a special talent at 11-years-old, if there was one thing that I truly excelled at, it was doing an impression of Charles Manson. The crazy eyes, the waving of the arms and groovy dancing, the gravelly southern/hippy voice; I had it down pat. I would break into character as Charlie often and randomly, to the delight of my older brothers and chagrin of my mother. All of these mannerisms I first learned from repeated viewings of the primetime Geraldo Rivera special, “Murder: Live from Death Row.”

  This television event aired sometime in April or May of 1988 and instantly became the most entertaining and fascinating thing that I had ever seen up to that point. I say repeated viewings because my mother had taped the show and I spent the next 10 years wearing out the heads on that VHS tape. It was simultaneously funny and terrifying and endlessly quotable. There were many nights in bed when waves of panic would sweep over my young mind and body after an especially creepy snippet of the show would suddenly flash inside my brain. It was a two hour long montage of murder and mayhem, with several segments bookmarked by Rivera’s exclusive interview with Charles Manson in San Quentin Prison. It was sensationalistic, hyperbolic, and exploitative, as all great television should be. 

   What follows is a retrospective review, complete with a “Where Are They Now” for each segment. 

Segment 1: Carnage & Soundbites

We begin with news footage. The gruesome kind. The type that was then easily available if you rented or owned videos such as “Faces of Death” or “The Inhumanities” and now one would need a subscription to Documenting Reality to view. Back in the good old 1980’s, it was fit for prime time. Dead bodies in the street, corpses being hauled out of rivers, hysterical grieving families, all unfolding to Geraldo’s haunting narration that we are severely fucked. Hey, you ignorant, suburban bitches! Don’t you know how much danger you are in!? Get your goddamn head out of the sand! Your dumb, unsuspecting ass will probably be murdered as you watch this! The opening is nothing short of excellent. 

   We get clips of the upcoming Manson interview, which both Manson and Rivera conduct using nothing but soundbites. Charlie’s brow is decorated with a tattooed swastika, while Geraldo’s is permanently furrowed, in case you had any doubt of his disgust with this appalling, yet entertaining little man. 

   We see surveillance footage- the shit, grainy 1980’s kind- of a liquor store robbery gone wrong. Seventeen-year-old Matt McKay is coldly shot and killed before our eyes by Andre Lewis. News and trial footage play about the senseless thrill killing of Shaun Ouillette by teenaged classmate Rod Matthews. The ginger-headed, bespectacled Matthews just wanted to know what it felt like to kill someone. Cut to news clips of another liquor store murder in Tampa, where clerk, Rita Waldron, is murdered by a creep named Miguel Segarra. We see her son, sitting in a squad car, being told that his mother had just been murdered. Geraldo and us viewers are sickened by this. 

 On to more carnage, this time on the mean streets of Los Angeles and New York City. Both of which are presented as warzones. We see clips of gangbangers, both living and dead, and learn about the evils of drugs. Geraldo interviews a young incarcerated Crips gang member whose identity is never revealed. He killed his mother’s boyfriend, among other people, and smiles about it. 

   The 1988 murder of New York City police officer Edward Byrne is discussed. Clips of his funeral are shown and his father is very briefly interviewed. Come to think of it, every interview on this show, with the exception of Manson, is rushed through, with Geraldo firing off rapid fire questions then not giving the subjects ample time to answer. 

   Still in the studio, we cut to NYC Mayor, Ed Koch. He is angry as fuck about all this damn crime. It’s more than a tad bit funny watching a New York Liberal Democrat argue in favor of both the death penalty and sanctions against Mexico. Koch also makes reference to the murder of Enrique “Kiki” Camarena, immortalized years later in the series “Narcos: Mexico.”

   The first segment wraps with a trip to Alabama’s death row and we are briefly introduced to three condemned inmates from various states, Tommy Arthur, Judith Ann Neelley, and Richard Drake. More on them later. 

Where Are They Now?

-Andre Lewis was convicted of the 1985 murder of Matt McKay and sentenced to death in Texas in 1987. After coming within eight hours of his scheduled execution in 1993, his death sentence was vacated and he was re-sentenced to life. He is no longer listed as within the custody of The Texas Dept. of Criminal Justice and his fate is unknown. 

-Rod Matthews was sentenced to life in prison at the age of 14 for the murder of Shaun Ouillette, also 14. He was paroled in 2024, after serving 36 years. 

-Miguel Segarra remains in prison in Florida, serving life without parole for the murder of Rita Waldron. He was sentenced in 1996 to an additional five years for an escape attempt when he was caught attempting to saw through the bars of his cell. 

-While never named on the show, Howard “Pappy” Mason was convicted for ordering the assassination of Officer Ed Byrne while already behind bars for a weapons charge. He was sentenced to life in federal prison and served his first several years at the notoriously harsh ADX Florence. 

Segment 2: Charlie 

   A downright spectacular montage of the Manson Family crime spree is shown. News footage, crime scene photos, documentary clips, and Geraldo’s voiceover are all set to the most ominous music this side of a John Carpenter soundtrack. We are introduced to the main characters of Manson, Charles “Tex” Watson, Susan Atkins, Patricia Krenwinkel, and Lynette “Squeaky” Fromme. Oddly left out was Leslie Van Houten. If you are reading this, I can only assume that you are already familiar with the details of the Tate-LaBianca murders. 

 

   Charles Manson is led into the prison visiting room, shackled and barking orders at his keepers, and the interview begins. I have seen an unedited version of this interview and it proves my theory that it was nothing more than Geraldo goading Manson into making villainous statements and Charlie happily complying. They both are hip to what was going on and what makes for entertaining television. No written synopsis of this interview can do it justice and I highly recommend watching it, if you haven’t already. 

  Manson can be either frightening or frighteningly charismatic, depending on the viewer. He is both rambling and coherent. Every phrase he utters could easily be sloganeered onto a T-shirt, bumper sticker, or meme. In his unique way, he breaks down the issue of crime by blaming society, shitty child rearing, and the prison industrial complex, all of which seems to fly right over Mr. Rivera’s head. 

   Back at the studio, there is a quick exchange with former Los Angeles County District Attorney and Manson prosecutor Vincent Bugliosi. He confirms his belief that Manson is totally sane and simply hamming it up for the cameras. 

Where Are They Now?

All of the Manson Family killers were sentenced to death in 1971, with all sentences being commuted to life-with-parole one year later. 

-Charles “Tex” Watson found God in prison and Jesus has totally forgiven him for all of his past transgressions. The two are now cellmates and play handball together on the yard. He authored an autobiography and fathered four children from behind bars. He has been denied parole 18 times and remains incarcerated at R. J. Donovan Correctional Facility in Southern California. 

-Susan Atkins also found God in prison, but he couldn’t save her from dying of brain cancer in a prison hospital in 2009. 

-Patricia Krenwinkel remains incarcerated, having her 2022 parole reversed by California Governor/living mannequin Gavin Newsom. She is the longest serving female prisoner in California. She also remains the least sexy of all the Manson Girls. 

-Leslie Van Houten was the most successful in severing herself from the stink of The Family. She successfully appealed and was granted a new trial in 1977. Once again, she was convicted and sentenced to life. She was paroled in 2023 and remains free. Her friends and supporters included filmmaking genius John Waters. 

-Lynette “Squeaky” Fromme, while never implicated in any of the murders, was shipped up the river after attempting to assassinate President Gerald Ford in 1975 in Sacramento. She was paroled in 2009 and reportedly still devoted to Manson. She is said by neighbors to be very friendly and personable. 

Segment 3: Crimes of Passion

   Geraldo reminds us that the bedroom can be the most dangerous place, in a line straight from the Lifetime Movie Network. We kick off with the story of the murder of Jennifer Levin by Robert Chambers in New York City’s Central Park. Dubbed by the press as “The Preppy Murderer,” Chambers looks as douchey as one would suspect. In interrogation footage he blames her and rough sex. Mainly her tying him up and “squeezing his balls.” He wasn’t going to take that. 

   The ever insightful Geraldo reminds us viewers that murder isn’t just for the poor, as we cut to the Sunnyvale massacre perpetrated by Richard Wayne Farley. This slow, train wreck of a horror story is glossed over with Rivera’s simple explanation that a woman had “rejected his advances.”

   The story of Ronald Gene Simmons’ slaughter of his entire family is told in less time than would fill a Youtube short, proving that our attention spans went to shit a good 40 years ago. More disturbing news footage is shown and a witness to this spree is interviewed for an intense five seconds. 

   We cut to Abderdeen, NJ for a profoundly upsetting story about a teenage murder/suicide. I remember this particular case really jabbing me in my 11-year-old guts. 

   Caged heat time, as we head into a women’s prison in North Carolina. Here we meet three shockingly well dressed and coiffed ladies, all doing time for murder. Apparently the NC penal system doesn’t want to infringe on a convict’s right to style. Engress Harris is a young woman serving time for killing her ex-husband over a custody dispute. She was upset at the way things turned out, you see? The title graphic under her name reads, “Passion Killer.”

   Anne Henson looks like your square aunt whom you make sure never to cuss in front of and was there for hiring a hitman to kill her abusive husband, which she gives a detailed account of. Her graphic reads, “Had Husband Killed.” Apparently, she lacked passion. 

    Last is Rochelle Daniels, who killed her newborn baby by throwing her in a bag and leaving her in the woods. She is the only woman who expresses remorse and becomes tearful, just before Geraldo informs us that she has confessed to killing and burying a second baby. 

   Then it’s back to the studio and Alabama’s death row. Again we meet Tommy Arthur. He is waiting for his date with Alabama’s electric chair, “Yellow Mama,” and has an accent as thick as whiskey soaked cotton. He was on death row for a contract murder committed while he was out on a prison work release for killing his sister-in-law. The latter he fully cops to, blaming alcoholism. The contract hit he claims to have no knowledge of. His ex-wife and a woman he shot and wounded are interviewed and neither has anything nice to say about him. Geraldo tells Tommy that his estranged son is watching this program and has just been informed that he is his father. This was years before Maury was doing this bit. 

Where Are They Now?

-Robert Chambers was convicted of manslaughter and served 15 years for the killing of Levin. After his release in 2003, he fully embraced life as a loser and was busted for drugs in 2005 and 2007. He was given more time for these offenses than for the murder and was released on parole in 2023.

-Richard Wayne Farley was sentenced to death in 1992 for the mass shooting of his former workplace. He was played by John-Boy from The Waltons in a made-for-television movie opposite Brooke Shields. Due to California’s current memorandum on the death penalty, it is highly unlikely that he will ever be executed. 

-Ronald Gene Simmons was sentenced to death for the mass killing of 16 people, 14 of which were members of his allegedly inbred immediate family. He was executed by the State of Arkansas in 1990 after less than three years on death row. Governor Bill Clinton signed his death warrant. 

-Engress Harris was sentenced to life for the murder of her husband and had a criminal record dating back to at least 1981. She was paroled in 2007, then violated and returned to prison in 2012, where she remains today. 

-Anne Henson’s whereabouts are unknown. I was unable to find anything about her or her crime. This leads me to believe her name on the show may have been either misspelled or a pseudonym.

-Rochelle Daniels was given a 30-year sentence for murdering her child and was released from prison sometime in the 2000’s. No word on if she ever had any more kids. 

-Tommy Arthur was executed by lethal injection on May 26, 2017 after seven previous stays of execution. There was a somewhat active online movement promoting his innocence prior to his death, much as there is for other obviously innocent individuals like Scott Peterson. 

Segment 4: Experts and Sex Murderers

   In-studio we get an interview with noted attorney F. Lee Bailey. This guy is fucking dull and has nothing interesting to say. Next up is Jack Levin, a supposed “murder specialist.” I’m not too sure about his murder credentials, but he sure looks the part of a specialist. He quickly delves into advocacy of gun control and is just as swiftly blown off by Geraldo. 

   The ominous music plays again and the story of the abduction of Katie Richards told by her friend Rachel Zeitz. While walking together on a cold Vermont street, the two were accosted by serial killer Gary Schaefer. Rachel managed to run to safety, while a crying Katie was forced into the car. She was later found murdered and in such a horrible state that family members had trouble identifying her. A snippet of an interview with Katie’s mother is guaranteed to heart wrench even the most jaded of viewers. 

  Ken Wooden, author of the “Child Lures” abduction prevention program, is introduced. Ken demonstrates how easy it is to lure unsuspecting children and teens from a shopping center and into his car, complete with Geraldo and hidden cameras in tow. He sweet talks several kids into complying, each in a matter of minutes. Stranger danger paranoia be damned, this segment is unnerving. 

   This segways into showing how these abduction techniques were used for real by serial killer/confessor Gerald Stano. More carnage photos and a testimonial from a grieving mother. If you asked an AI to create a stereotypical creepy sex killer, it would come out looking exactly like Stano. 

   A rogue's gallery of supposed mugshots is shown with Geraldo’s voiceover explaining that these sex killers are literally anywhere and everywhere. We get Gacy, Lucas, Kemper, DeSalvo, Wayne Williams (another “innocent” guy), Christopher Wilder, Bianchi, Toole, Bundy, annnnnd…

   …The award for Creepiest Motherfucker on the Show goes to Joseph Kallinger. Bearded and batshit looking, we meet Joe on the grounds of the mental institution that he is committed to. He lazily puffs on a cigarette and looks Thorazined right out of his mind. He sits for an interview with Geraldo and explains how he’s a patient person who likes to help people and wanted to kill everyone on Earth then himself so he could become God. Joe only killed three, including his own son. He tranquilly explains how hallucinated voices from God command him to do things like cutting another patient’s throat in the hospital last March 11th. In a very subdued manner, he tells Geraldo that he would murder him before slowly licking his lips in the most deranged possible manner. This was pure nightmare fuel for the 11-year-old me. 

    A plug plays on how to order the Child Lures book and it’s back to the studio and Alabama death row. We are once again introduced to Judith Neelley, via satellite. Geraldo takes us back down Bummer Road with a recap of Judith and her husband Alvin’s killing spree. The swinging couple- who look like every crazed, redneck stereotype this side of a shitty Rob Zombie remake- liked to cruise around, looking for women to abduct, some as young as 13. After being inticed into their car they would be raped by Alvin then murdered and dumped by both of them. 

    Judith’s defense is that she was just another victim of the evil Alvin and was forced to take part in the murders under threat of her life. There is little doubt that she probably suffered some awful abuse, but nothing quite to the extent of her victims, one of which she injected with liquid drain cleaner. A psychologist who worked for her defense team backed up her claims of unaccountability. The next interviewee, a man who had been shot by Judith after his wife was murdered, called bullshit on the whole act. Geraldo does an enthralling 15 second interview with a young woman whom the Neelleys attempted to abduct. The camera cuts back to Judy, who is looking around for a hole to crawl into, and Rivera verbally pimp-slaps her by reminding her that an execution took place that very day and that nobody believes her. 

Where Are They Now?

-F. Lee Bailey died in 2021 after a long life of service defending wrongly accused suspects such as Albert DeSalvo and O.J. Simpson. 

-Jack Levin is a Professor of Criminology & Sociology at Northwestern University and looks significantly less awesome than he did in the 80’s. 

-Gary Schaefer was sentenced to 30-years-to-life for murder and died in 2023 at the Kentucky State Penitentiary. One can only wonder/hope that he was celled up with Fleece Johnson. 

-Ken Wooden passed away in Vermont in 2023 at the age of 87. He authored three books. As a hopeless nostalgic of 1980’s stranger danger, he holds a place in my heart and I hope he’s resting in peace. 

-Gerald Eugne Stano was executed in Florida’s electric chair in 1998. While convicted of nine murders, there is speculation that his confessions to many of those and the remaining 32 were false and made both out of both pressure from law enforcement and a masochistic desire for attention. 

-Joe Kallinger died in 1996 in a Pennsylvania prison from heart failure. He was transferred to state prison from the nut farm in 1990 and spent at least the last five years of his life on 24-hour suicide watch. He was said to have hallucinated a woman’s floating severed head and The Holy Spirit in his toilet bowl, both of which spoke to him. 

-Alvin Neelley died while serving a life sentence in Georgia in 2005. His body went unclaimed and was buried in the prison cemetery.

-Judith Ann Neelley’s death sentence was commuted to life in 1999, only days from her scheduled execution. She remains in Tutwiler Women’s Prison in Alabama and is eligible for parole every five years. She has never wavered from her version of events. She and Alvin left behind a daughter who was raised in foster care. 

Segment 5: Justifiable Homicide

   The pre-commercial bumper shows the glorious, unedited news footage of Gary Plauche’s shooting of Jeffey Doucet. A clip of the Manson interview is played, with Geraldo arguing with Charlie about whether or not he’s the devil. 

   In the studio, Rivera reminds the viewers that not everyone who kills is a perverted psychopath. We cut to a Miami jewelry store where the proprietor, Boris, describes a fatal shooting of an attempted armed robber, whom Geraldo identifies as a “punk.” The store owner expresses remorse at the situation, but points out that the robber “chose his own day to die.” The police agree and the killing is ruled as justified. 

   In rural South Carolina, an 11-year-old boy, home alone, shoots and kills two potential home invaders. In an interview with the boy’s mother, she quotes the boy saying, “Mama, they looked like rough men.” This may be the line of the night. 

   On to Louisiana, where we again see the news footage- a staple of every gorehound Banned from TV/Faces of Death-style mondo video- of the Gary Plauche shooting. Jeffrey Doucet, Plauche’s son Jody’s karate instructor, had kidnapped the boy. Jody was taken out of state and continually sexually abused by Doucet. After his arrest and return to Louisiana, Doucet was being perp-walked through the airport. Plauche, wearing a disguise of a cap and sunglasses and casually talking on a pay phone, turns, points a gun, and fucking domes Doucet right in front of the police and news cameras. Gary is restrained by police who ask, “Why, Gary, why??” immediately realizing what had just happened. 

   I cannot overstate the vicarious catharsis that I experience while watching this video. Myself, and virtually every other father that I know, like to loudly proclaim that we would act in an identical manner to Plauche if the same situation were to happen to our own son or daughter. It’s an easy statement to make and requires no real action on our part. But to actually take matters into our own hands, and in such a bold, ballsy, and reckless manner as Plauche, is a whole different game. One much easier said than done. 

   Gary Plauche was arrested and charged with 2nd degree murder. After much public support and weighing of the circumstances, he was ordered to receive psychiatric help and the charges were dropped. A-fucking-men. 

   Next we meet a family in Southern California. Elderly and ailing couple, Jay and Gladys McFadden, had formed a failed suicide pact. An audio tape plays of Gladys’ wishes and assurances that her death was totally consensual. Jay, surrounded by his children, hysterically wails and cries, radiating so much pain and grief that it is hard to watch. He cusses and unintelligibly snaps at Geraldo after being asked a stupid question. The McFadden daughter explains that Jay had dropped the gun after shooting her mother and was unable to fulfill his end of the pact. He panicked, called 911, and was arrested for murder. The muder charges were eventually dropped and Jay was given probation for aiding and abetting a suicide. He continually reminds his children that he wants to die. 

   In the studio we talk to 11-year-old Todd Knight and family about the aforementioned shooting of the two burglars in North Carolina. Soft spoken and humble, he does not consider himself a hero for his administration of swift Southern Justice. His family seems traumatized by the events. 

   Outro to the commercial break, we get another clip of Charles Manson delivering great lines about being above all law and some wacky, psychedelic dance moves. 

Where Are They Now?

-Boris Falkov, jewelry store owner, is alive and well in Miami. Tip: Don’t ever attempt to strongarm a guy named “Boris.” It won’t work out well for you. 

-Gary Plauche, despite what the show told us, pleaded guilty to manslaughter and was given a suspended sentence. He later expressed no regrets for killing Doucet and claimed he would do it again. He died of a stroke in 2014 at the age of 68. 

-Jody Plauche still lives in Louisiana and is an advocate for victims of child sexual abuse. He authored a book about the events titled, “Why, Gary, Why?” And has referred to his father as, “the greatest dad of all time.” This writer agrees with that assessment. 

-Jay McFadden, although debilitated by both grief and a series of strokes, went on in life, with his children stating that he remained industrious and kept himself busy. He finally joined his wife in death in 2010 at the age of 87.

-Todd Knight’s whereabouts are not known. Honestly, I did not put much effort into locating him. Leave the little gunslinger be. 

Segment 6: Mass Killers & More Manson

    For any younger readers, it might be hard to imagine a time when mass shootings weren’t something that regularly popped up on your news feed while checking your phone and then were quickly swept under the rug a week later. I’m not even sure what the exact numbers are or how much more common mass shootings are today. I only know that the cases Geraldo covers in the opening of this segment were truly shocking and were often front page news for weeks after the fact. 

 Queue the creepy ass music. Chicago, 1966. A man named Richard Speck, his ugly face so pockmarked it would make Edward James Olmos feel bad for him, annihilates eight student nurses in one night. The nurses headshots are juxtaposed over the bloody crime scene. Speck is shown casually smoking in court. 

  Austin, also in 1966. Charles Whitman climbs the tower of The University of Texas after killing his wife and mother. He snipes 42 people, 12 fatally before being killed by police. A shot of his corpse is shown. 

   Southern California, 1984. The infamous McDonald's massacre is perpetrated by James Huberty. 21 men, women, and children were killed and we are not spared the bloody news footage of the aftermath. Huberty left the house that day telling his wife he was going “hunting for humans.”

   Again, it’s impossible to understate the amount of carnage that aired on network television back then. I remember regularly seeing similar gory death photos on shows like 20/20, as well. Today, that stuff is censored everywhere. YouTube channels specifically covering shootings blur out the effects of the very catastrophes that they are choosing to show. Other outlets have downright banned the use of words like “murder”, “suicide”, and “rape” and instead summarize crimes like they are talking to toddlers. Even pay services like Netflix, who don’t have to answer to sponsors or the FCC, pussy out when it comes to true life gore. Don’t get the wrong idea, I have my limits, too. When I get a serious case of the heebie-jeebies I do the sensible thing and turn the blood and guts off. If you choose to watch a program titled “Murder: Live from Death Row,” we all know why you’re here. You’re not fooling anybody. Sorry, I digress. 

   OG postal shooter, “Crazy” Pat Sherrill’s rampage is covered and a tearful co-worker describes watching his friends die. 

   We see the then-current record holder for a mass murder in David Burke. He caused the crash of PSA Flight 1771, killing everyone on board. Crime scene crews are shown hauling plastic bags, presumably full of body parts, out of the impact zone.

 

  Back to San Quentin and more Charles Manson, delivering his most outrageous lines yet. Geraldo feigns disgust while daydreaming about Nielsen ratings. Charlie rambles on about how he doesn’t care about your society because you’re all a bunch of assholes. He feels he’s been scapegoated and made into what the public needs him to be. I could seriously listen to Manson yammer on for hours. Think whatever you want about that. Geraldo’s voiceover calls him a “paranoid psychotic,” blatantly disregarding everything that Vincent Bugliosi has previously said. There isn’t any doubt, though, that Manson is getting more and more wacky the longer the interview goes on. He sings, he dances, he talks gibberish. He claims no matter how much you try and box him in that his mind is still free. It’s in the desert, it’s in the mountains, man!

   We return to the studio with Doris Tate, mother of Sharon on the panel. Like Bugliosi, she believes all of his antics are an act, performed for attention. 

   During the commercial break an ad for Vivarin plays. I didn’t think it was possible for me to become any more stupidly nostalgic about the 80’s while watching this, but that commercial put me right over the edge. As the kids say, if you know, you know. 

   Doris Tate tells Geraldo she feels that the members of the Manson family are as equally responsible for the murders as Manson himself, agreeing with a statement Charlie had made earlier. Her reasoning for this conclusion is made abundantly clear shortly after. Bugliosi agrees and adds that the family members were already dangerous and had “murder in their blood.” Manson and the anti-establishment sentiment of the 1960’s brought it to the surface. 

   Geraldo sticks his own neck on the chopping block, telling Bugliosi that sources have informed him that Manson was the first of the “satanic cult leaders” and that there are still murders being carried out in his name. The look on Bugliosi’s face is priceless as he wonders if Geraldo is mentally retarded and dumbfoundedly replies, “Who told you that?” Bugliosi does then concede that there are likely other crimes and murders committed by the Manson Family, but nothing recent as Geraldo had implied. 

   Doris is sure that Manson and his cronies will never be released from prison. She attends parole hearings but only of Watkins and Atkins, the actual killers of Sharon Tate. Those other victims can get their own fucking families to advocate for them. Bugliosi adds that he feels that the death sentences originally handed down were an appropriate punishment. 

Where Are They Now?

-Richard Speck was sentenced to death in 1967. His sentence was later commuted to 100-300 years and he died of heart failure in a Joliet prison in 1991. Five years later a video tape would surface showing that Speck had been turned out behind bars and seemed to enjoy his role as a prison bitch. On the tape, he is seen wearing women’s panties, sporting hormonal treatment induced breasts, using hard drugs, blowing other prisoners, and bragging about his crimes. 

-Charles Whitman, James Huberty, Patrick Sherrill and David Burke were all killed by police or committed suicide at the scenes of their crimes. 

-Doris Tate died from a brain tumor in 1992. The Doris Tate Crime Victims Bureau was named in her honor and continues as the non-profit Crime Victims Alliance. 

-Vincent Bugliosi died from cancer in 2015 at the age of 80. He was the author of 16 books with subjects ranging from true crime to politics and history to a massive tome about the assaination of John F. Kennedy. 

 

Segment 7: Death Row & Victim’s Families

   Handheld mirrors jut out from between bars as Geraldo walks the cellblock of Alabama’s death row. The place looks cold and claustrophobic. The cells are about the size of a broom closet and made all the more sterile looking by the inmates’ state-issued white uniforms. For some reason a shot of California’s double-seater gas chamber is shown before Geraldo sidles up to the bars for a chat with some of the condemned. 

   Henry Hayes is polite, soft-spoken, and timid looking in his cell. He is also a former Ku Klux Klansman who randomly selected a black man, named Michael Donald, off the streets of Mobile and abducted, lynched, and murdered him. The photos from this crime scene are, by far, the most graphic of the night. Arguments by opposing sides will go on for eternity regarding the culpability or lack thereof in cases like Rodney King, Michael Brown, or George Floyd. The murder of Michael Donald leaves no room for such debate. This is as abhorrent as it can possibly get. Hayes says that he wants to live and that life is important. 

   A few cells down is Richard Fraser. He says he’s an innocent man and hell yes, he’s scared to die. Being on death row makes him hate the damn world. 

   We travel to death row in Texas to meet John Joseph Cannon, behind a wall of visiting room glass. He feels particularly slighted by the method of execution in Texas, lethal injection, seeing it as an insult. At 17-years-old he killed a woman who had taken him in before raping her corpse. 

   On to Fort Worth, where we are shown family members of various murder victims attending a support group. Their voices are full of agony and bereavement. These are the clips that noise musicians sample and make sound collages out of. One woman recounts having to tell her four-year-old that Daddy isn’t coming home. Another recalls the sexual elements of her parents’ murders not being admissible in court. She breaks down and gets a supporting hug from Geraldo. 

   Blowhard F. Lee Bailey returns to the studio for more dullness. When his legal techniques are challenged by Geraldo, he vehemently denies ever attacking victims in court. Rivera then brings on two members of a victim’s advocacy group for an impromptu face off with Bailey. They express their concern about victims having no support from anyone but the state while F. Lee Bailey looks like he’s about to fall asleep. 

   Florida Governor Bob Martinez is interviewed, via satellite. He expresses his satisfaction with signing so many death warrants, but derides the post-sentencing legal delays leading up to an execution. He also doesn’t care much for those pesky activists who show up and cause so much trouble. 

   The outro gives us a glimpse of a large candlelight vigil being held in Texas by the families of murder victims. 

Where Are They Now?

-Henry Francis Hayes took his last ride on Alabama’s Yellow Mama on June 6, 1997. He is the only klansman to be executed in the 20th century for a race-related homicide. 

-Richard Wayne Frazier (misspelled on the show as “Fraser”) was able to have his 1985 conviction for the 1977 murders of Mobile couple Jesse and Irene Doughtry overturned on appeal. He was granted a new trial where he was again convicted and resentenced to death in 1990. His sentence was commuted to life without parole in 2001. He is no longer in custody and presumed to have died in prison. 

-John Joseph Cannon was insulted executed by lethal injection in 1998. At the dying age of 38, he had spent more than half of his life on death row. 

- Bob Martinez served as Governor of the State of Florida until 1991, signing over three dozen death warrants and presiding over nine executions. After leaving office he served as Drug Czar in the cabinet of George Bush, Sr. and as a consultant for law firms. He resides in the Tampa area. 

Segment 8: Death Penalty Debate & Wrap Up 

   Gov. Martinez returns to remind the viewers that the criminals condemned to die made a choice to commit murder. He feels the system is fair and has an ample process of checks and balances. 

   Henry Schwartzschild of the American Civil Liberties Union stands up to refute the governor. He opposes the death penalty on moral grounds, while clarifying that he doesn’t excuse the crimes of the condemned. In his opinion, capital punishment prevents no crimes and solves no social ills. 

   The satellite feed to Colorado’s death row fails and Richard Drake sits, unresponsive, in awkward silence. 

   We return to Gov. Martinez, who is given an ally in Matt Byrne, father of murdered police officer Edward. They double-team ACLU spokesman Schwartzschild with another reminder of the personal responsibility of individuals choosing to commit murder. Byrne feels that they forfeit their own lives in doing so. This is met with huge applause from the studio audience. 

   The technical issues are solved and we get Richard Drake in Colorado. He’s a weaselly guy who sounds like he’s speaking through his nostrils. He has already had his death sentence for killing his wife commuted, but fears an imminent return to death row. Geraldo is especially hostile toward Drake and interrupts nearly every statement that he makes. Drake talks some legal mumbo-jumbo before his ex-father-in-law stands up in the studio and proclaims his hope that Drake will be put to death. Drake is given no chance to respond.

   During the commercial break a bumper plays of Charles Manson playing it up to Geraldo so patronizingly, it becomes impossible to view the interview as anything other than a farce. 

   Geraldo wraps up the show with maximum fear mongering, stating that the Founding Fathers could have never imagined this current generation of serial and mass murderers. One can only assume that he is inferring that constitutional rights should no longer then apply. He bids us viewers goodnight. 

   We close with the conclusion of the Manson interview. Charlie is being shackled up with cuffs and a belly chain and is notably more subdued. He and Geraldo seem to hurl veiled threats at each other before amicably parting. Manson reminds us that he never actually killed anyone. He leaves us with a statement of grandeur: “The world wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for me. If it wasn't for me, you’d all be gone.”

 

Where Are They Now?

-Henry Schwartzschild died from cancer in 1996 in White Plains, New York at the age of 70. He retired from the ACLU in 1990 and focused his activism on the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. No word yet on whether or not he was able to solve that problem.

-Richard Drake remained off of death row for the 1982 murder-for-hire of his wife, Regina, in front of their three children. Both he and his brother James, the actual killer, have been paroled. (The 2nd photo is actually Richard’s brother, James. They look enough alike, though)

-Charles Miles Manson, aged 83, was transferred in November 2017 from Corcoran State Prison to a hospital in Bakersfield where he died on the 19th from a combination of a heart attack, respiratory failure, and colon cancer. He had been denied parole 12 times and spent over 60 years of his life incarcerated in some form. He left behind an estate estimated to be worth from $400,000 to $1million. To this day, books, documentaries, feature films, and podcasts continue to be produced regaling his life and crimes. Manson memorabilia regularly sells for hundreds or thousands of dollars, making him an entertainment juggernaut, on par with Elvis. 

  

   After this last, extended viewing of this special, I can say that I am glad that it is still easily available, given the content. I had uploaded a VHS rip of Geraldo Rivera’s follow up special, “Devil Worship: Exposing Satan’s Underground” to YouTube only to have it quickly deleted and a strike put on my account. The violation? “Promoting Self-Harm.” What the fuck ever. These specials are a fun and morbid slice of a bygone and recent history. Hysterias and public panics come and go, with some remaining or returning more frequently than others. The desire of creators to aggrandize and exaggerate has given way to a sterilized need to be “respectful” and as non-abrasive as humanly possible. And this, in my opinion, is much less entertaining. Make no mistake about it, True Crime, in all of its platforms, is entertainment and nothing more. It is junk food for the mind. Who the hell wants to eat junk food when all of the sugar, salt, additives, cholesterol, and anything else that may be potentially harmful has been removed?