Did Michael Ronning Kill One Woman… Or Ten?

In this Episode we dive into the case of Michael Ronning, a convicted murderer who spent years bragging about killings no court ever proved. His life stretched from Michigan to Arkansas to Florida, and everywhere he went the same pattern followed: a missing girl, an unexplained death, and a story he couldn’t resist inserting himself into.

Was Ronning a forgotten serial killer, or a drifter who loved the attention that came with pretending to be one? Andrea and Paul sift through the timeline, the victims, the confessions, and the contradictions he left behind. Some of his claims line up a little too well. Others fall apart the second you touch them.

This episode pulls apart the myth of Michael Ronning and the messy truth underneath it.

“Some killers stay silent. Ronning couldn’t shut up long enough to hide anything.”

“Every place he bragged about had a real victim. That is not a coincidence.”

“He confessed to murders he couldn’t possibly have committed. The question is why he wanted the credit.”

“The courts only proved one killing, but the geography tells another story.”

“Was he a serial killer, or just a man who enjoyed the spotlight a little too much?”

“This is the problem with Ronning’s case. The truth and the lies sound exactly the same coming out of his mouth.”

A drifter who loved headlines. A murder tied to a $700 lockbox. A string of claims that crumble under basic scrutiny. We dive into the volatile life and crimes of Michael Ronning, exploring the one confirmed homicide and the many cold cases he tried to claim from Michigan to Arkansas to Florida. Our goal isn’t to glorify him—it’s to separate what really happened from what he wanted people to believe.

We walk through Dana Lynn Hanley’s case step by step: the short construction job, the glimpse of cash, the abduction, the eyewitness who remembered his face, and the conviction that followed. From there, we map the suspected cases Ronning attached himself to, including the Rebecca Sue Hill connection, and ask a hard question: are we seeing a serial predator with a ritual, or a chaotic opportunist who killed when it was easy and bragged when it was useful? Using our AI-assisted profiler “Cade Mercer,” we test the behavioral evidence and the lack of consistent signature—finding rage, proximity, and impulse instead of ritual, planning, and control.

We also zoom o

 “Thank you for listening to Things I Want to Know.
You want these stories, and we want to bring them to you — so hit the support link and keep this circus, and the mics, alive.
Then do us a favor and rate and subscribe; it helps the show find more people like you — the ones who like their mysteries real and their storytellers unfiltered.
And if you want to wear a little of this madness, grab some Andrea-approved gear at paulgnewton.com.
We make t

Chapters

• 0:00 Andrea Hosts her first full show!
• 0:54 Why Michael Ronning Caught Our Attention
• 2:36 Early Life, Image, And Car Culture Tangents
• 3:43 Michigan Links And False Confessions
• 5:03 Pattern Talk: Strangulations And 1980s Forensics
• 6:26 The Rebecca Hill Connection And Florida Lead
• 8:22 Confirmed Case: Dana Lynn Hanley
• 10:35 Eyewitness, Motive, And The $700 Robbery
• 12:15 Charges, Degrees Of Murder, And Sentencing
• 14:46 Could Tech Today Solve The Cold Cases
• 16:21 Profiling With “Cade Mercer” AI
• 18:06 Opportunist vs Serial Predator Analysis
• 20:14 Appeals, Venue, And Jury Issues
• 22:08 Arkansas Roads, Geography, And Case Logistics
• 24:10 Do We Have A True Arkansas Serial Killer
• 26:23 Wrap-Up, Takeaways, And Listener Support

Transcript

Opening Music: 0:03

I need to know everything. Who in the what in the where I need everything? Trust me, I hear what you're saying, but I like it's new what you're telling me. I'm curious, George.

Andrea: 0:12

Well, guess what? I get to run the show today. What do you think about that, Paul?

Paul G : 0:17

Me?

Andrea: 0:18

Yeah.

Paul G : 0:18

I'm running the board.

Andrea: 0:20

That's true, but I'm the one that actually did this case. So I guess I feel like it's my baby that I'm gonna talk about, not really. It's your baby. It's my baby.

Paul G : 0:28

That's kind of weird considering we're talking about a dude that kills women.

Andrea: 0:31

Well, it was kind of interesting that you're like, you're taking the lead on this one.

Paul G : 0:34

I'm like, we did all the research. You wanted to do it. It's things that you want to know.

Andrea: 0:38

Yeah. Yeah.

Paul G : 0:39

And we did what I wanted to do last time, which was the which was the um car bombing, which you didn't care about.

Andrea: 0:46

I just can't get over that. That it's I don't know. I've told a lot of people about it, and they're like, I need to listen to your podcast. I'm like, yeah, you do, you need to listen to us. So basically, guys, we're gonna talk about Michael Ronning. Now I'm probably much trying to be Googled how to say his name, but it looks like roaning. So if I say roaning instead of Ronning, please nobody like it. It's two ends.

Paul G : 1:05

You know, all but if it's two ends, it should be Roan, Ron. I don't know.

Andrea: 1:11

Ron. Anyways, the the man's upset, so unless his family is dead, unless the family gets upset and screams at us, I think we're fine. The reason why I got interested in this guy is because he was connected to one of our previous cases that we did in Arkansas, Rebecca Hill.

Paul G: 1:24

Yeah.

Andrea: 1:24

Which she was found in Florida, and he was he was one of the suspects that was kind of linked to that a little bit. Yeah. And a huge person of interest. So it kind of got me thinking, what's what's up with this guy?

Paul G : 1:34

Yeah. And then the other Arkansas podcast guy, all he wants to do is blame everything on BTK.

Andrea: 1:41

No, I don't think BTK.

Paul G : 1:42

I I I agree. It was this thing. No, stop trying to blame everything on BTK, you dork.

Andrea: 1:47

Well, it's because he's notorious and they just want to pin everything on him, which this guy though, oh, let's call him Michael since I'm gonna butcher his last name. He, I think, is a self-professed serial killer. I think that he just likes to put himself in such a he's a serial killer. Or he like, I don't know, gets his jollies out of trying to insert himself in all these open cases.

Paul G : 2:08

Well, there is, you know, there's another guy. I don't know, was he from Arkansas, that one guy? No, he's from Texas. The i I-95 for something like that killer. He uh went and tried to confess to all of them.

Andrea: 2:19

I don't know, man. I just remember my uncle, who's a truck driver, always would tell me about certain areas in Texas and Arkansas to never have your car break down. So who knows, maybe he did more than what he got convicted for. But anyways, this guy, Michael, from what I can find in his early life, was I can't get any substantial proof as he had a pretty much an abusive life. But not to say that's what created him, but I was curious as like what not excuse what he did, but it's just interesting to realize what may have been a contributing factor. But you know, he loves heavy into drugs and crazy, and he's crazy. His picture of him looks like some dude, a classic 70s, 80s guy that's well, it was the 80s. He's gonna drive a Transam or something, you know what I'm saying?

Paul G : 3:00

Well, or uh the 68, you know, pony. Not a pony, but a oh, who knows? That car that uh they drove in that movie where they were singing to uh Queen Song. Oh but rusted out instead. Or you know, or you can just go full on Dahmer, not Dahmer, but uh Bundy.

Andrea: 3:20

Yeah, Bundy.

Paul G : 3:21

He'd like to just drive your VW.

Andrea: 3:23

Well, that was common for when when he was VW. That was a common car when he was around, right?

Paul G : 3:26

Well, it was cheap. Anybody could buy one.

Andrea: 3:29

I don't know. These when they brought them back though, they looked kind of cool, but they were so small.

Paul G : 3:33

Well, they made those things up until like '98 in Mexico. You could go down and buy a new one.

Andrea: 3:38

Really?

Paul G : 3:39

Made exactly the way it was in the 60s.

Andrea: 3:41

Oh, really? Yeah, that's funny.

Paul G : 3:43

Yeah.

Andrea: 3:43

So, anyways, this guy, Michael, is from Battle Creek, Michigan. Okay.

Paul G : 3:48

And you went to school there, didn't you?

Andrea: 3:49

No, Lansing, Michigan.

Paul G : 3:51

You went to school in Lansing. That was like on. We need to cover that guy, though, where you went all the way up into Canada.

Andrea: 3:56

Yeah.

Paul G : 3:57

She did. People don't know this. Andrea has a long history. You used to work for the coroner.

Andrea: 4:04

Coroner's assistant when I was in nursing school, yes.

Paul G : 4:06

Yeah, and you used to cut people up.

Andrea: 4:08

And help, yes. I got to learn how to take the skull off uh towards the end.

Paul G : 4:13

Nice. I'll I'll remember to keep the sharp utensils hidden. No pliers for you.

Andrea: 4:19

You know, you have to you have to do it very intricately because if you go too deep, you're gonna cut into the brain because there's not a whole lot of, I guess, space between the biggest.

Paul G : 4:26

Doesn't the bone saw not cut flesh?

Andrea: 4:28

It's like a special type of saw that you have to do in a special way you have to do it in order not to go too deep.

Paul G : 4:33

It's like what they use on your cast, or they used to use on casts, right?

Andrea: 4:36

Kinda, kind of similar to it.

Paul G : 4:38

It kind of vibrates more than anything else.

Andrea: 4:40

Yeah, I would like they would say uh uh cut out the heart, so we'd cut out the heart and I'd weigh it and say how many grams it is, and then I would hand it back.

Paul G : 4:47

So there's just proof right there you've held other men's hearts in your hands. Wahm. All right. But no, she she was corner resistant, and then one time she was forced, basically, to take a like a six-hour car trip to can't she doesn't didn't know where she was going because they didn't want it, they didn't want it to get out yet. But she was out there digging in a pig farm mud pit, which is probably that dude, because it's right at the same time I went and looked it up. Yeah, that dude that was killing prostitutes from Detroit and whatnot, and taking them up there to his pig farm and feeding them to his pigs. She was out there in the mud digging for the bones.

Andrea: 5:26

Yeah, I had a hard time eating pork after that. Squeal. Just because of that, you know, they told us to find whatever we could find bone related. And I couldn't really look at pork the same way after that.

Paul G : 5:40

Yeah, well, I just think of football.

Andrea: 5:43

Think of what? Football. Football? Oh, yeah, pig skin. Okay.

Paul G : 5:46

There you go.

Andrea: 5:48

Well, enough about me. We're gonna talk about Mr. Michael guy. But I like talking about you. God, you could get me laughing. Um the first case that this Michael guy is, he actually got convicted of one, okay, but he liked to kind of insert himself after he got caught, which we'll talk about her at the end, um, about other cases that he supposedly says that he had something to do with. And the first one was Patricia Patricia Ransky. She was 20. She was last seen in her friend's house. And basically when he was in prison, basically kind of, I guess, lack of work term, just mouthing off, he said that, you know, he that he did other prior things. He did uh other murders in Michigan, and this particular thing he's getting convicted of was not his first. But there's a caveat to that. What everything that he said about it that he thought would make himself be there at the scene looked like he can just read it out of a newspaper.

Paul G: 6:41

Really?

Andrea: 6:42

Yeah, like there's no forensic evidence or nothing. But he liked to brag about it. Which I guess if you're gonna go down for one, you might as well go down for a bunch, I guess. But he lived in the same area as her. So he was a person of interest for that point in time, but he can't be linked to her.

Paul G : 6:56

But because he lived in the same area, then he more than likely read the newspapers.

Andrea: 7:00

Right. Yeah, exactly. But at the same time, it's like just because you lived in the same area doesn't necessarily mean that you did it. So at least the cops were due diligent. Say, like, okay, I think he killed her.

Paul G : 7:09

Yeah, I was responsible for the LA City riots in 1992 because I lived in the area.

Andrea: 7:14

Oh, okay.

Paul G : 7:15

Yes, it's all my fault. Robbie King had nothing to do with it.

Andrea: 7:18

You just didn't know. But then the next one that I thought was interesting is a Maggie whom. Um, she's she was 20 as well, but she was strangled in her own apartment.

Paul G : 7:29

No, how did the last one die? Um the girl in her the one that he got convicted for, how did she get killed?

Andrea: 7:35

She got lured out of her house, strangled, and was found.

Paul G : 7:40

She was strangled.

Andrea: 7:41

She was strangled, yeah.

Paul G : 7:42

Okay, so the MO is the same.

Andrea: 7:43

Yeah, MO's been the same on all of these, but you know, he basically had fun from like 1980 back until he got convicted in 86.

Paul G : 7:52

I'm sure it's fun, but okay.

Andrea: 7:54

Well, you know, it's not fun, but you know what I'm trying to say. But anyways, it's Maggie Hune. The only reason why they looked at her is because uh Michael's wife said, Hey, we live close to her, and he kind of bragged that he did it with her, you know, hurt her, murdered her, and you might want to look into it.

Paul G: 8:09

Huh.

Andrea: 8:10

So, yeah. I don't know about that. I guess the wife, I'm thinking if you're you're married to somebody. Like if you were to come home and be like, hey, honey, I'm married to the neighbor. Well, number one, I know you're joking because I know you, but number two, she kind of looks like a witch.

Paul G : 8:24

She's not gonna look like a witch.

Andrea: 8:28

Sorry. People are gonna figure out eventually where we live, and she might listen, and she doesn't want to know that you think of her as a witch.

Paul G : 8:35

No, I just I don't think of her as a witch. I just said she resembled one.

Andrea: 8:39

That's all she's a nice lady, she just likes to talk.

Paul G : 8:43

Yeah. Her dog, though. Her dog goes woof.

Andrea: 8:48

And our dog feels like he's gonna eat it. So yeah.

Paul G : 8:51

Yeah, it's a freaking mastiff. Good luck, Pluto, you Labrador.

Andrea: 8:56

Whatever. Our dogs were raised in the country, and they think that they're the hot country dogs, chisnites of the neighborhood.

Paul G : 9:03

So I didn't raise them. You raised them.

Andrea: 9:05

I know, and they were blaming you. Raised by a bunch of girls.

Paul G : 9:08

Yeah.

Andrea: 9:09

But you know, basically nothing forensic could get tied to this thing. Nothing for this poor lady.

Paul G : 9:14

So this is before DNA. Yeah, this is in the 80s. They were still trying to convict Bundy with teeth marks from biting, which is proven to be stupid wrong.

Andrea: 9:23

I know, but did he in the end confess that he did a mole thinking he'd save his neck, right? Am I remembering that correctly?

Paul G : 9:28

Well, old Bundy at that point would have done anything to get from being killed, because he had a new wife who he couldn't touch.

Andrea: 9:35

No, I think his wife divorced him.

Paul G : 9:37

After.

Andrea: 9:38

Oh, I don't know. Or something.

Paul G : 9:40

I don't know. Who cares? I just feel bad.

Andrea: 9:41

Bundy's an idiot, so yeah. Well. So basically, the one that I thought was interesting is that I think is a huge, huge, huge thing is Rebecca Suehil. For one of you that listened to our previous thing, she was a lady from Arkansas, that she was a little um meant on the slower side mentally. Maybe. Maybe we never met her. They think because she had a lot of fevers as a kid and this, that, and the other. So, anyways, her um, she for whatever reason had left. We don't know how she ended up in Florida. But the interesting thing with this guy is, Michael, is he had a traffic ticket in the same town around the same area that her body at the same time that her body was discovered. Yeah. That to me is like, how are you gonna?

Paul G : 10:21

I mean, it's but it they didn't know it was her, was the problem. That whole problem with that case was that they didn't know it was her, and it took like 30 years for them to figure out that the person they buried in the grave of Rebecca Souille is not her. It wasn't even her, yeah. And they still don't know who that girl is.

Andrea: 10:36

That's sad though. That poor family. But anyways, no, basically April 17th of 84. Yeah, and it's interesting though, is what I don't know if we know who she is, but this is what, an 84? So I guess did we swab anything for DNA then? No.

Paul G : 10:52

I mean DNA didn't exist. I mean, RNA was barely a thing.

Andrea: 10:56

But I'm thinking, like, do we not have fibers or something found on this girl? But then again, they just depends on the decomp. And they misidentified her, and she was probably um what was she like basically down to bones when she was found?

Paul G : 11:07

Is that you still talking about Rebecca Suehill? Yeah, yeah. No, she was in the swamp. Of course, of course, she wasn't gonna have anything forensic evidence on her because, you know, she was melted into the ground because it's a hundred degrees and 90% humidity.

Andrea: 11:21

Yeah. So this Michael guy likes to jump between Michigan, Florida, and Arkansas a lot.

Paul G : 11:27

Isn't it his home base in Arkansas, wouldn't it?

Andrea: 11:29

No, his home base is Michigan, what they say is Michigan, that's where it's from. Okay. But from basically 1980 till the time that he was convicted, he all any cold case between those three states, they tried to pin on him, but nothing would stick.

Paul G : 11:44

Yeah, because all he had was newspaper stuff.

Andrea: 11:46

Newspapers, but he for some reason, I don't know. Like I guess the psychological thing with this guy, just arm chairing, I'm not I'm not a doctor, but I guess he he wanted to be the shisnet of the serial killer world, and he just confessed to anything.

Paul G : 12:03

You gotta break into a dorm for that. I mean Well, I'm just saying.

Andrea: 12:07

Well, that's what Bunny did. But um, you know, like he No, no, Bundy.

Paul G : 12:12

I think Bundy is not the shiznet, the the shisnet of all killers. It's a tie between Dahmer and uh the clown man.

Andrea: 12:20

Gacy?

Paul G : 12:21

Yeah. Because Gacy was killing them, putting them in he had killed so many of them, he had to start throwing them on the river.

Andrea: 12:27

Yeah.

Paul G : 12:29

And Dahmer's like, I don't have to throw mine away, I just eat them. Oh god.

Andrea: 12:32

What? I think I saw a meme on him that uh was so distasteful, but funny at the same time. If you like serial killer, like but kind of dark humor, but something about if the price of beat goes meat meat goes up, I I still have my friend over here.

Paul G : 12:49

Dahmer's cousin, I know him really well, yeah.

Andrea: 12:52

Geez, you're awful. So think about this though. You're like between like 1984 and 1985, I was like in elementary school.

Paul G : 13:02

85? Yeah, I was still in elementary school too.

Andrea: 13:05

So like think about this. Like, this is when all this is going on, he's driving back and forth, there's no internet, there's no forensics. I wonder, though, how many cases out there they could pin on him that he's not supposedly opened his mouth about.

Paul G : 13:19

But did he do him? That's the question. When you get it to a guy like this, though, if if all he's given you is report, you know, is the stuff he gets off the off the news, off the new out of the newspapers and the TV, uh, 10 o'clock news, then the problem you run into is you know, is he just lying and he just happened to think he was going to be the you know hot to trot serial killer because he hated his life and he'd rather be in jail.

Andrea: 13:44

That's true. Wasn't there I can't remember his name, but the one that liked to like they openly accepted his confessions for like all these murders.

Paul G : 13:52

That was the like the I-95 guy down in Texas. They they took him as face value until all of a sudden they figured out we're up to like 70. And then they went and looked at it again. It was like, no.

Andrea: 14:04

But I thought there was like somebody else. He had a Netflix series and he like Yeah, was it him?

Paul G : 14:08

Yeah, I don't know where I have to go look him up, but yeah. Yeah. I I've I have had you know many naps since I watched that.

Andrea: 14:17

What got this guy convicted was Dana Lynn Hanley. And they her he is how he got convicted was just he was just being an idiot. I'll just be honest, he was being an idiot. Usually that's the way it works, isn't it? Well, okay. Um he What did he I mean, what did he do?

Paul G : 14:32

Just like take pictures and keep them around his car or something?

Andrea: 14:36

No, he was living in the Jonesboro area. But this isn't that's like in the eastern part of the state of Arkansas for something. My aunt lives there, but doesn't know. And basically, he needed a job. So he was pulled up to this guy's house or found out who where he was. It's not actually been documented how they met, but he went up with this to this guy's family, him and his girl, basically Dana, Diana, and then his her boyfriend. And Michael's like, hey, I need a job, and points to his wife and caddo in the car. So the boyfriend felt kind of bad. He's like, Well, okay, come back, come back next week, do construction, I'll get you set up. So he does. Him and his friend, Michael and his friend, decide that the car pulled together that they're gonna go do this construction. They did it for a week, and he wanted to get paid on Friday. Yeah. So he goes back to the boyfriend. Buy some beer, man. Beer and probably drugs. And so, you know, you know, it was the 80s. And so he goes over to the house and knocks the door.

Paul G : 15:27

And they need my money because I gotta buy that new Death Leopard album.

Andrea: 15:31

That was common then. So the mistake of the boyfriend was he brings over the lockbox, unlocks it, and then of course Michael's like, ooh, lots of cash in there.

Paul G : 15:43

Oh, he sees the money, huh?

Andrea: 15:44

Sees the money, gets paid his money. So Monday stump comes up again next day at work. He misses a day of work, but his friend goes, not him. What does he do? Goes back to the house, sees that his boss, the boyfriend, has left, knocks on the door, and Diana lets him in, and that's the end of it.

Paul G : 16:04

He kills her for the money. It sounds like he's not really a serial killer, if you ask me, though, because we know how those guys operate.

Andrea: 16:10

Yeah, exactly.

Paul G : 16:11

He's just an opportunist.

Andrea: 16:12

Yeah, a robber. The sad thing about it is though, he forces her into the car and he takes her out going towards Pocahontas and O'Keen, Missouri, is where she's Missouri. I mean, Arkansas is where she's found.

Paul G: 16:25

Yeah.

Andrea: 16:25

The interesting thing that is about that though, a lady was driving past the car when he sees this woman kind of struggling in the car and sees Michael driving, and she distinctly remembers that for whatever reason in her head, she remembers. She didn't do anything. She what do you do? I mean, she's not, it's not like they're driving recklessly or she's flinging in the car. She just remembers looking up because I read the newspaper.com on it. She said she remembers it vividly that that was her in the car, and she saw Michael driving it, and they were going in the opposite direction of her. And for whatever reason, when all this blew up and they were trying to find her, that she remembers that face because it had something to do with the pit a picture in the paper. So she was in his trial saying, You were the one driving the car, you know, I saw her in the car, but she was found by trappers several weeks later.

Paul G : 17:12

Man, it's amazing. Many people still trap. It's like this is cruel.

Andrea: 17:18

Do they still do it here now? I mean, I know like deer hunting.

Paul G : 17:22

I mean, it's okay if you do it, I guess, but it didn't mean I have to like it.

Andrea: 17:25

Squirrel hunting, all that stuff's big here, but I didn't know trapping was even still a thing.

Paul G : 17:29

Yeah.

Andrea: 17:29

I thought you got a gun. What do you got to trap?

Paul G : 17:31

Well, I don't know. Throw a lot of you why do you throw dynamite in the in the pond to fish?

Andrea: 17:37

Mm-hmm. Yeah, points out. Oh, that's crazy. So basically, the boyfriend, when he gets home, realizes she's not there, and he calls the police and they start asking him questions, and he was mentioning all the different people he works with who's been by the house, and basically they go after Michael. And so, um, of course, he says he's innocent, you know, and he's a suspect of person of interest for quite a while. And then finally they break up. He's stuck around the whole time. Like he was a person of interest about all these newspaper articles, but with like no actual like, uh, we're gonna charge you.

Paul G : 18:12

But he's still staying in Jonesboro. Yeah, he's still staying in Jonesboro. I don't know. See, if he was a serial killer, he'd been gone.

Andrea: 18:18

But my thing is if you're a person of interest, are you like watched? Are you followed? Do you get like, hey, if you leave this the c you know, believe Arkansas, we're gonna put a warrant on him. How does that work? I mean, yeah, if you're innocent, you're gonna stick around and fight it out, but this man's guilty.

Paul G : 18:37

Is he? Yeah, yeah, I guess he is. This is the one they knew who he was, yeah. This is the one that he gets convicted. King of Prince there and everything.

Andrea: 18:42

Yeah, yeah, everything's there. Um, he gets convicted. I can't remember exactly what what exactly was the smoking gun, but he ended up robbing their house and killing her for $700. But I guess back in the 80s that was a lot of money.

Paul G : 18:59

Yeah. $700. I mean, there's whole songs. Blues songs are like, I got $700, you know. It's like $700, really.

Andrea: 19:07

Yeah.

Paul G : 19:07

$700? You can't even buy an iPhone for that now.

Andrea: 19:11

Oh, yeah, you can't. You can't even like live on a house payment for that or rent.

Paul G : 19:16

You're rent you're running a shack even in Dronesboro. Eek. Exactly.

Andrea: 19:22

So basically that's what convicts him. And while he's waiting and, you know, basically convicted, that's when he decides to rattle off everything else that he thinks that he's done.

Paul G: 19:30

Yeah.

Andrea: 19:31

Which I don't know. I kind of get the impression, like, if you're gonna go down for one, you might as well go down for everything else.

Paul G : 19:37

Yeah, but that's just dumb.

Andrea: 19:39

I mean, what I don't understand. If you get life in prison, why didn't he get the death penalty? I don't know. I mean, I don't really I guess that's something else I need to look up because I want to know like what constitutes the death penalty in Arkansas. I kind of get the impression it's premeditated, premeditated, heinous, or gruesome, that kind of stuff. That's kind of how I take it. If there's any lawyers out there, please inform us because we're slightly curious here, and we know every state's different.

Paul G : 20:10

Yeah.

Andrea: 20:11

But um the family was extremely devastated. They lost a daughter, you know, all this other good stuff.

Paul G : 20:17

So it's look it so he did they charge him with kidnapping? I don't think they did, if I'm looking here. Uh no sexual assault, no torture. He didn't premeditate the killer just to rob him.

Andrea: 20:29

So yeah.

Paul G : 20:30

So he's second degree murder.

Andrea: 20:32

Yeah, that would be. I do remember in the paper it said all I did was rob. I don't know what happened to her after I left. Uh you were found in the car, so that was kind of your I mean people saw this, witnessed this.

Paul G : 20:43

Yeah, he didn't they he didn't do anything. Yeah, it's second degree murder. That's what it is.

Andrea: 20:48

Oh.

Paul G : 20:49

And that's that's you can you can get life on second degree murder, but yeah.

Andrea: 20:53

I always thought first degree you got life.

Paul G : 20:55

You can well, you get life, you can. I mean, first degree murder you can get as little as 15 years.

Andrea: 21:01

Are you serious? Fifteen years Especially back in the 80s. Well, yeah, you're right. It's in the eighties. Now I would think like 15 years is not enough for taking a human life on purpose.

Paul G : 21:13

Right?

Andrea: 21:15

But there was no sexual assault or nothing.

Paul G : 21:17

He just He didn't plan it. You know.

Andrea: 21:19

So I mean, okay, you're going to this house to get money that you think you're you're gonna like woo bank on 700 bucks. Do you really think you're gonna walk away?

Paul G : 21:30

In the eighties though, a car was about ten grand.

Andrea: 21:34

Really?

Paul G : 21:34

Yeah. So I mean it's still not that much when you when you figure I mean most car payments were like two fifty.

Andrea: 21:40

Oh god, wouldn't you love a $250 car payment now?

Paul G : 21:43

I had one for a while. But yeah, uh that's because I put like a half down when I walked in. I crashed my Eldorado and it was just toast. So I went in and took that insurance money about $11,000 and bought that Mustang.

Andrea: 21:59

Oh wow.

Paul G : 22:00

I'm a Mustang. I drove a black Mustang for 20 years.

Andrea: 22:03

It's a beautiful car.

Paul G : 22:04

Yeah, but it was using about a quarter oil a month. So it was time to move on or rebuild the engine, and I didn't want to do it.

Andrea: 22:12

So But it makes me wonder though, if that witness didn't see them in the car, would it be a hung jury or mistrial?

Paul G : 22:23

Probably not. Probably still got it convicted. Jury trials are notorious about convicting people with very little evidence. It's like that one where I was watching that documentary about the the English girl, the au pair.

Andrea: 22:36

Oh, yeah, we were talking about this earlier.

Paul G : 22:38

Yeah. And you know, the the con jury convicted her of a second-degree murder, but the judge gave her time served and let her out because he agreed with the defense's science. And in the judge's defense. The science now backs her defense, but it doesn't back the prosecution of the time.

Andrea: 22:57

Really?

Paul G : 22:58

Yeah. That's interesting. Well, I mean, I mean, I know Shake and Baby syndrome. He had a fra skull fracture on the back of his head, it was two inches long. You don't get a two-inch skull fracture without neck injury from Shake and Baby uh syndrome.

Andrea: 23:14

Yeah.

Paul G : 23:14

You have to get the the neck injury would be there.

Andrea: 23:17

Wow.

Paul G : 23:18

And the baby had no neck injury, just a cracked cranium.

Andrea: 23:23

I would I don't know. I would think if you have a a cracked cranium as a baby, you'd be screaming your head off, and as a parent you'd be like, Oh, I'm not gonna take my kid in.

Paul G : 23:31

Yeah, I g you know, that's beyond what I've read and watched on the doc. So I don't know. They they said he was normal up until he wouldn't. It took about two weeks, they said. And uh his brain swelled.

Andrea: 23:47

Yeah. Poor soul.

Paul G : 23:48

Yeah. But that's you know, that's why you gotta watch out when you hit get hit as a kid, too, because your skulls can you that can happen, and the kid was normal for two weeks. Anyway.

Andrea: 23:59

But this guy, he decided he wants to sit in prison and of course, you know, make all these false statements and all that good stuff. But he did end up basically um more or less died in prison.

Paul G : 24:10

Yeah, yeah. That's why he that's why you get the death penalties. And it's okay that he died in prison. Early died in prison and then die old age living out in the country.

Andrea: 24:18

He died recently though.

Paul G : 24:19

Playing the banjo.

Andrea: 24:20

2022. Well, that's not you know I mean, that's not that long.

Paul G : 24:24

I mean, that's I mean, he probably wasn't that old whenever he got put in.

Andrea: 24:29

No, but makes me wonder though, which I couldn't find anything on like why, yeah, they excluded it, but did they include him in anything? Because I couldn't find any of that either.

Paul G : 24:40

Well, it sounds like I mean, well, from what you're saying, if if that's you were saying that none of the other murders were traceable.

Andrea: 24:51

Yeah, like some of the people they found they couldn't find any forensic evidence.

Paul G : 24:54

But he lived in every place that he did.

Andrea: 24:56

He did. He did. There's there's a couple in the Michigan area that when they were found, there was like there was nothing for them to get any remotely physical evidence off of.

Paul G : 25:04

She lost her life over $700.

Andrea: 25:07

Yeah, $700.

Paul G : 25:08

Yeehaw. Man, people could be killed for less.

Andrea: 25:10

So I mean Yeah, I don't understand that. But uh, but you know, like other people, other coal cases between like Florida and Arkansas and Michigan, like all the way up, all the way up, you know, however basically interstates like the Jonesboro area, they tried to piece everything, but could not find anything else. And I'm guessing, like, I wonder how if this I'm not saying this should ever repeat, but if this case was like now, would how much our technology has changed, would they able to pin some of these coal cases and give families more answers because of forensics evolving? You know? But um that's kind of I mean, there's he's kind of a jerk for basically like, oh, I did this and oh I did that. Oh, you might want to look at this.

Paul G : 25:55

I know a lot of guys that uh say that about the girls are with. And I'm like, dude, you're such a liar. I can sit here and tell you right now can't play a player, man.

Andrea: 26:07

Can't play a player.

Paul G : 26:08

That's right. I was not a nice guy when I was younger.

Andrea: 26:13

So um so what else can you find on that? You were looking up something.

Paul G : 26:18

No, I'm just I'm just I'm I'm sitting here just screwing around with chat while we're talking.

Andrea: 26:23

Oh, he loves chat, and chat kind of helped me with some of this.

Paul G : 26:26

Yeah, well, it's a beautiful research machine.

Andrea: 26:29

Yes.

Paul G : 26:30

You want to find out something, but you have to train your AI. You can't just walk in and start using AI. It it it will it'll fight you. Right?

Andrea: 26:40

Yeah, yeah.

Paul G : 26:41

So I've I've been training mine since it first came out. What golly, that's 2023? Yeah, yeah, I've been training mine forever. I even put a brainstem over top of it.

Andrea: 26:51

You you don't train your dragon?

Paul G : 26:53

If it turns into a dragon, I'm leaving. Why? So what are the well so he got to prison though, and he was trying to negotiate himself out?

Andrea: 27:02

Yeah, he's trying to negotiate to have like a latter sentence or trying to negotiate a little bit with um the basically um the one where his um wife said that you might want to check this out.

Paul G : 27:13

Uh his wife was lying about him.

Andrea: 27:15

Yeah, I just made a whole entire live knocked over on the mood. Maggie Hume. He was also he was also trying to get some catalades on um the Rebecca Hill one too.

Paul G : 27:28

No, wait a minute. Cat legs?

Andrea: 27:30

Not cat cat legs, not cat legs. But basically he's kind of like, hey, you might want to look into this, or I did this here, or I did two of them here, didn't give names. So he's a drifter, he goes in and out, he's probably high on drugs, probably wants money. How does he get these people basically to we know about the the henley one because he basically he just went up to the house and be like, give me your money, but he didn't have to kill her.

Paul G : 27:53

Yeah. Yeah, I don't know. Why, why, why did he bother to kill her? That's the question. What what what how could that help anybody or anything? Just take the money and leave.

Andrea: 28:05

Exactly. Like, why did he have to do that to her? But he was in these areas for all these people. So basically, like from 1982 to 83, there's two to three unnamed Michigan murders. We know about the Maggie Hume, but the confession was unreliable. And the Rosanski thing, nothing fit. He basically wasn't reading off the newspaper. Yeah. But um, from 84 to 85, there's several rural Arkansas and Florida cases that the pattern matches only the pattern of either strangulation or they were in found in rural places. But that's every serial killer. I know, that's every. But if I mean, I don't know. I would like to think like they did for Bundy, that if you've got a bunch of coal cases and you got someone that I don't know, might want some notoriety, yeah, watch go talk to them.

Paul G : 28:50

Well, at least to go talk to them and see how full of shit they are.

Andrea: 28:53

Yeah, exactly. But at least, like say, you know, like towards the end, they were trying to pin everything on Bundy. Why I couldn't find anything of why they didn't do the same thing to this guy.

Paul G : 29:01

Well, they've now they're trying to pin everything on BTK, probably just because he's alive.

Paul G: 29:06

Yeah.

Paul G : 29:07

And they can go, they can go ask him, oh, what did you do this? And he's gonna say, um, he's gonna think to himself, if my commissary count fool. And they they're gonna say it is no. Oh yeah, I did that. Because he he's a ruthl, he's a worthless piece of crap.

Andrea: 29:26

But if you watch his when he confesses and gets up there and just says everything, he's so nonchalant like he's ordering groceries off Walmart.

Paul G : 29:33

I mean, he's so And when he's lying, you can tell a little bit too, because he starts to his body moves around a little bit. I guess. When he's telling you something and he's reliving it, if you watch him, he'd leaning in and he's sitting still.

Andrea: 29:48

Really?

Paul G : 29:49

His hands aren't moving, and he's like, Yes, it was very interesting. You know, and he ate it he's very clinical about it.

Andrea: 29:56

Yeah, like he's just ordering groceries.

Paul G : 29:57

Yeah, but when he starts to lie. Because they caught him in one, and I believe I could be wrong. Uh when they caught him in one, you could see he's shifting in his seat a little. Just a touch, just ever so slightly.

Paul G: 30:10

Hmm.

Paul G : 30:10

And it's like, hmm, probably a lie. And you know, Gacy, he didn't I don't even think he caught to him at the end, did he?

Andrea: 30:20

Um, I don't think so. Dahmer did.

Paul G : 30:23

Dahmer's like, yeah, those guys are delicious.

Andrea: 30:25

Oh my god.

Paul G : 30:26

I had Mason Keontae. Oh God, that's nasty.

Andrea: 30:29

What? I do know that Dahmer found God and wanted to confess and be open and honest, from what I remember, and then he ended up getting killed in prison. But Gacy, I think if anyone's watched a documentary on there about Gacy or it's on Peacock, I think the thing that when I was listening to it that bothered me the most, we're kind of getting off on tangents here, which was what we love to do. Yeah. Um, the families weren't allowed to see him be executed. Like they had a separate room where they sat in, and I think I uh watched it. They in the show they basically are down there and don't watch anything.

Paul G : 31:06

And then well, and the caveat to this is these big cases we're never gonna do. Like we're never gonna do John Benet Ramsay. That would it's not one more it's not one we're gonna cover because it's been covered to death.

Andrea: 31:18

Morgan Nick.

Paul G : 31:19

Yeah, Morgan Nick. We're not gonna do Morgan Nick, even though she's just down the street. And the reason for that is is because if you want to find out everything you want to know about Morgan Nick, there's a website for one that is run by her mother.

Andrea: 31:30

Yeah.

Paul G : 31:31

And that's all there.

Andrea: 31:33

Yeah, everything's there.

Paul G : 31:34

And you know, we don't still don't know if that's we think they think like 98% it was that dude that died in prison.

Andrea: 31:41

Yeah.

Paul G : 31:42

But we're not gonna cover it. It's not gonna be something we do because we already know. Yeah, these are things we want to know. Yeah, like the carbon. Like that was messed up.

Andrea: 31:52

This Michael guy, because how did you think you're a song a strong person of interest in Rebecca Hill? But why are you not pursuing anything to try to get a conviction on that? Yeah, even though he's okay, he's dead. Yes, we understand that. But for the family of her, he wasn't dead for the longest time. He wasn't dead for the longest time, but they recently figured out who her name was, so he's been dead a while.

Paul G : 32:12

Yeah, and they're trying to pin that on him because he got a parking or a speeding ticket in the area. Yeah, but it could have just been happenstance, but happenstance is a little bit if it happens too much, then yes, you gotta think about it for a second.

Andrea: 32:26

And hers, I think so, because same area where she was. Strangulation. Strangulation, you know, he kept going back and forth between Florida and Arkansas.

Paul G : 32:34

And he could have picked her up in Arkansas on his way to Florida. Yep, because you have to go down Little Rock or you have to go through Memphis.

Andrea: 32:41

Yep.

Paul G : 32:42

And he may have wanted to hit Shreeport first. If you want to hit Shreeport, you're gonna have to go up Little Rock from Jonesboro to Little Rock, then to Hot Springs to Shreeport.

Paul G: 32:50

Mm-hmm.

Paul G : 32:51

Because there's no roads linking the I-40 or what is it, I-49, I-40. Yeah, we still there's no roads linking I-40 to Pensacola, Florida, or uh Alabama. You have to go down these two-lane roads the whole way. We know because we go on a trip every year.

Andrea: 33:11

But if anybody wants to go out there, pull out a map of Arkansas and you will see that there's like all these highways through Little Rock and then to Jonesboro and then to northwest Arkansas. But the you don't that's it.

Paul G : 33:22

I mean the Yeah, you can you go down across it, but you're on a two-laner. Yep. So you hit the cross it, and then uh back in 08, Obama built um Big Four Lane for no reason at all. But they built Big Four Lane down there.

Paul G: 33:36

Really?

Paul G : 33:36

Yeah, it was five lane actually, because it's got a center median that's a turn lane. But I was like, they built that. I was like, this is due to the Obama Infrastructure Act thing. And I was like, well, that's great, and I appreciate the road. It's much nicer than the piece of crap I was driving on. But I was gonna see my my uh cousin Freddie. Fred Rowe, actually.

Andrea: 33:59

But if you think about it though, this time Michael was doing this, it was two-lane highways pretty much all the way from the B.

Paul G : 34:05

It was Clinton era too. Yeah, all so it was bad roads.

Andrea: 34:08

Oh, yeah. So it's like from Florida and you go through Alabama, Mississippi, which is pretty rural that we drove. Yeah, and then I can only imagine it was like in the 80s, and then you get up what up to Jonesboro. That road up was probably a two-lane or the whole way up.

Paul G : 34:22

Yeah, up to Jonesboro, it sure was. It's just none but cows.

Andrea: 34:25

Yeah, so who knows between Jonesboro to uh or Little Rock or between Jonesboro to Florida, how many two lane highways or other victims have just been dumped along that highway that we he he could have been linked to, or smaller communities tend to notice those things.

Paul G : 34:41

That's the good news. Because, you know, it's like, whoa, what are what's what's up with the 87 buzzards?

Andrea: 34:47

Yeah, true. But what I couldn't find on or didn't you find out what I'd like to find out is like people like him was was he swabbed for DNA and put in a database?

Paul G : 34:57

Hmm.

Andrea: 34:58

I never I couldn't find anything.

Paul G : 34:59

They should have done that, but then they wouldn't have known it. Well, they could have they could have swabbed. He was in the prison system forever. Yeah, like I could've Arkansas prison system, so I couldn't find anything for Arkansas. Huckabee's uh prison system wasn't that great. The first Huckabee, not the Sarah Sanders.

Andrea: 35:15

But it's I don't couldn't find anything really definitive to say if we have a law that states every federal person or any crime committed that's a felony, you have to be swapped in Arkansas. I know some states have that because I kept thinking how rural that is and how many things he got linked to. But then again, you have DNA on file, and then is DNA on file it's gonna match a potential person that's just bones scattered in a field on the side of the road, you know what I mean? So I could I was just curious, like that's something else I'd like to kind of like get into is like I know that nurses in her fingerprint system.

Paul G : 35:52

Yeah, yeah. So why is it media curators are just you know not ever paid attention to. Stop that. What?

Andrea: 36:00

You're so funny.

Paul G : 36:02

Under Liza Fletcher Act, Arkansas, when someone is arrested for any felony offense, law enforcement at the detention facility must take a DNA sample.

Andrea: 36:12

Okay, we do have it. Okay.

Paul G : 36:14

We've got his DNA somewhere. Oh no. Just put it in the CODIS. See what happened.

Andrea: 36:18

Then why are we not linking him to more? He sure loved to brag about it, the way he's been doing those things. I'm sure there's more people out there.

Paul G : 36:24

You would think. You know what I mean?

Andrea: 36:27

Yeah. Oh well.

Paul G : 36:29

So there's a special segment.

Andrea: 36:32

Oh.

Paul G : 36:33

Yes. Special segment here is when the facts get messy and the story starts pulling in too many directions. Right? We bring in one person. Cade Mercer.

Andrea: 36:47

Cade.

Paul G : 36:48

He isn't at he is not a detective, and he is not a storyteller. He is the line between what we think happened and what the evidence can actually support. Cade, though, works a way a profiler should. Okay? He breaks the case down to behavior, opportunity, and probability, with no drama, no bias, no bending the story to fit the villain we want. So what we're gonna start doing now is I'm gonna see what Cade Mercer has to say. And Cade Mercer basically is AI, just so you know. He just gave him a fancy name. I didn't give it the name. I said, What do you want to be called? And that's what it picked. It picked Cade Mercer, and then I said, Okay, give me something for Cade Mercer to say. And it gave me this, hey, how's it going?

Andrea: 37:34

Oh, yeah.

Paul G : 37:34

Yeah, and I'm like, no, no, no, no, no. You gotta talk like a real person, you moron. So anyway, so what does Cade see what what we did um for Cade, how I programmed the AI is I told it to take all of the known uh profiling of the guys who came up with it. Yeah, right. And because it it can go out and grab all that information, compile this plus new investigative procedures and take all those things and put them in Cade's brain and make him use all those facts to come up with a profile whether or not this person really did it and or why they did it, or if there's another suspect out there. And the reason I did this is so that way we could um kind of because it knows so much more than we do. Right? It's only spitting out probably 30% of the information it has when we're doing research, because there's so much. The volume of research isn't it's just the volume of uh stuff is just so massive. And we're not trained investigators.

Andrea: 38:52

No, we just have fun doing this because we think true crime's interesting.

Paul G : 38:55

So that's what you know. I just wanted to see if there was any other leads or something we might have missed that the AI could pick up.

Andrea: 39:04

Okay.

Paul G : 39:05

And so I said, Hey, you know what? I'm just gonna make it part of the show. Screw it.

Andrea: 39:09

And Paul loves his part because that's when he gets to be Robert Ressler.

Paul G : 39:13

I don't I'm not. This is the Compooder. A computer gets to be Robert Ressler, right? Exactly. So I asked Kate, I said, Kate, what does what do you think about this guy? And he said, Your question is how Michael R Ronning actually reads as an offender. Here's my position without the noise. He is not a refined serial predator. Which we kind of came up to that. He is an impulsive, unstable drifter whose life produced opportunities for violence and not a coherent plant pattern.

Andrea: 39:48

That makes sense for the last victim.

Paul G : 39:50

Yeah. The one confirmed homicide shows rage, proximity, and poor impulse control, and the suspect uh the suspected cases fit only when you look at geography and victim type, not when you drill to the method or behavior. Okay, that makes sense because you know it says three points that support that view. First is crimes lack a consistent signature. Stabbing, strangulation, outdoor disposal, indoor tech. Uh that level of variation usually means either a liar or a chaotic uh offender with no internal rituals.

Andrea: 40:26

Okay.

Paul G : 40:27

Right? And how many of them have rituals? All these guys do.

Andrea: 40:30

Right? Yeah, bind, torture, and kill. That was EBTK's thing.

Paul G : 40:33

Bundy, Dahmer, all those guys had a ritual. And second, though, is his confessions are self-serving. He talked to manipulate outcomes, not to unburden himself because he's trying to get out of he's trying to get out of the uh out of jail.

Andrea: 40:47

He was trying to make things easier in his sentence. Yeah.

Paul G : 40:50

Offenders who can confess for attention tend to blend facts, rumor, and fantasy into something investigators can't actually use. And third, he inserts himself into investigations only when the evidence is weak in that investigation.

Andrea: 41:06

Okay.

Paul G : 41:14

And we know that's true. The offenders take pride in their killings. I killed them for a reason.

Andrea: 41:18

Yeah, I would think like if he did it, then he would be able to be like, oh yeah, here's how it happened, here's how it went down, and you know, basically be able to like point by point by point by point by.

Paul G : 41:27

Prime example, BTK.

Andrea: 41:29

Oh, yeah, he took a lot of pride in his stuff. He's like almost bragging.

Paul G : 41:32

A real serial killer pro protects the crimes that matter to him. Ronning performed for whoever was listening.

Andrea: 41:41

Yeah, that's probably about right.

Paul G : 41:42

The truth about it is simple. He's he is dangerous to dangerous enough to have killed more than once, but too chaotic and too inconsistent to anchor half the murders he claimed. His mouth wrote the checks, but his behavior never earned the money.

Andrea: 41:57

So probably more than likely, the one that he got convicted for is the one only one that he probably He might have killed a girl in Florida, is what it's saying.

Paul G : 42:04

Yeah, might have killed twice.

Andrea: 42:06

Florida, and then you know, this other lady.

Paul G : 42:08

So I mean Maybe somebody in Michigan he actually killed.

Andrea: 42:12

Yeah, but who how you gonna know? I mean, it was the 80s and he bragged a lot.

Paul G : 42:15

I mean Yeah, and so even the even the AI is like and I didn't front load it, I was just asking. Yeah, like hey, you can front load your AI to make it sound it will tell you what you want. But since I've been training mine, I told it if it agrees with me, great, but if it doesn't, um if it doesn't and then it agrees with me anyway, which is basically a lie, I'm gonna punch it in the face. Oh but then it said it didn't have a face, so it didn't care.

Andrea: 42:38

I was like, well, you don't want to make your Robert Wrestler wanna be. I'm upset.

Paul G : 42:42

I'm upset him, man. I upset his ass all day. Reminded of me.

Andrea: 42:47

So more than likely he got convicted of one. Then why didn't he just confess to Rebecca Hill and be like, hey man, I did it?

Paul G : 42:53

Well, they didn't know.

Andrea: 42:54

Oh, that's true. Well, at the time, why didn't he found her in Little Rock? But uh the my thing is why didn't he?

Paul G : 43:01

He did probably a serial killer generally doesn't know their name.

Andrea: 43:04

Well, yeah, that's probably true. And if you're saying like a chick from Arkansas that I dumped in Florida, that could have been anybody.

Paul G : 43:09

But at the time, remember she was dumped in Little Rock.

Andrea: 43:13

But yeah.

Paul G : 43:14

But they didn't own they didn't know she was in Florida. They didn't know. Yeah, you're right, you're right. He yeah, exactly.

Andrea: 43:21

So yeah, that makes sense. Poor families. I just, you know, and if you look up, Google his picture, guys, he just looks like he just looks like an idiot. Smarky, snarky little a-hole, basically.

Paul G : 43:34

Yeah, and you know, how many times have we seen, you know, like you got all the ones that we've been mentioning, they don't look like serial killers. Maybe Dahmer, but not the rest of them.

Andrea: 43:43

BTK looked like it's some he looked like who what did he what did he do? He used to be uh yeah, deacon in Lutheran Church. Yeah, and he also was like an ins how's inspector guy and security guy, but he was also like the uh enforcement of like the rules or regulations around the town.

Paul G : 43:59

He's a dog catcher too, I think.

Andrea: 44:00

Yeah, I mean he's the one that tells you if your lawn's too tall, grass or something like that. He kind of looks like that kind of dude.

Paul G : 44:06

Yeah, and you know, let's that's what it is, what it is, right?

Andrea: 44:11

Yeah.

Paul G : 44:12

So, um man. So what do you think? Do you think he did those crimes? Or do you think he just kind of lied about them?

Andrea: 44:23

You know, I don't know how big Battle Creek was in the eighties to think that big town. Was it a big town?

Paul G : 44:31

It was still coming off of the cars. So it wasn't like it is now where there's nothing left, like Detroit and whatnot. They're just shells of their former selves. They were still partially building cars there.

Andrea: 44:42

So I guess we'll say like Battle Creek was an average-sized town. He grew up there. I guess he could probably, for lack of a better better term, bullshit his way through saying that he did stuff because it was in the paper and maybe he just kind of wanted to be hot. I I think for this Rebecca Hill and the the Diana Hanley, I think those are the ones that he probably did because things just seem too more obviously.

Paul G : 45:06

You get the speeding ticket right there in town. It's so it's not like in and not too far away. What we should have done is Googled how far away that speeding ticket was issued from her dump site. And if it was more than 20 miles, it probably wouldn't him. Yeah, but I mean I would say it's just a happenstance at that point.

Andrea: 45:24

But the other ones, I think there's no I don't know. There's no forensic evidence to link. If he did it, I think that he put more sustenance and he would be able to explain a little bit more that could be provable.

Paul G : 45:37

Yeah, if you just read newspaper clips and you can infer a lot from newspaper clip too.

Andrea: 45:41

Yeah, but I think like the one he got convicted of, obviously, he was just he come on, he they had evidence too, as well as an eyewitness. And Rebecca Suehil, I think there's a lot that's a strong person of interest on that one that I read. But I don't think that will ever be pinned on him or solved completely.

Paul G : 46:00

No, because she was just bones and a t-shirt. Yeah, that's all she had. That's all that was left. And any DNA was already corrupted and gone. Maybe in the future we can reconstruct DNA in a way that's 99% accurate. Yeah. But as of right now, you know, I don't think that's possible. We do get touched DNA.

Paul G: 46:18

Yeah.

Paul G : 46:19

So a little beady tiny bit of DNA you can can track you down and kill you.

Andrea: 46:23

That's crazy if you think about it. How many things, how many objects and things we touched at?

Paul G : 46:29

They had touch DNA back in Bill Clinton there too.

Andrea: 46:32

Oh, did they?

Paul G : 46:32

You could get well, not touch DNA, they could get fingerprints off of uh paper.

Andrea: 46:37

Yeah.

Paul G : 46:38

And before that it was impossible. There was a new breakthrough at the time.

Andrea: 46:42

Hmm.

Paul G : 46:43

Interesting.

Andrea: 46:43

I thought we always could get it off paper, but maybe could we couldn't because it was It's not all paper, I guess.

Paul G : 46:48

I don't know. It's just one of the little factoids that's stuck in my brain.

Andrea: 46:52

But I don't know. As far as the other ones, I don't know. I think if like our lovely Robert Ressler computer.

Paul G : 46:58

Robert Russler.

Andrea: 46:59

Um basically, um, I think it's on the money.

Paul G : 47:02

I mean, yeah, maybe he committed two of them, but not anywhere nearly.

Andrea: 47:05

But if you but he it's funny though, because he says, I'm a serial killer of Arkansas, I'm serial killer of Arkansas. No, you're not.

Paul G : 47:11

No, that's the dude that slaughtered his entire family down in Russellville. Oh, yeah, Clarksville.

Andrea: 47:17

Yeah.

Paul G : 47:18

And that's that's coming up. We're gonna do that one. Oh my god. That's something everybody's forgotten. It's it's on TV shows and stuff, but it's that guy just a family annihilator.

Andrea: 47:28

That's that's a whole different level of evil.

Paul G : 47:30

And you got the one lady who we're gonna do as well. That's on the list of whenever where she's she uh just went crazy and killed her family. She went all the way from Rogers all the way down to West Fork, which is about 40 miles away, and killed everybody in her family. Even somebody who didn't even, he was like just a family friend, is like, you know what, you're here, I'm gonna kill you too.

Opening Music: 47:56

Oh yeah.

Paul G : 47:56

And she spent she spent off and on her entire rest of her life going between prison and the mental facility.

Andrea: 48:04

Oh yeah. And there's a couple other people that I found too. I'm gonna pull them up here.

Paul G : 48:07

She's nuts.

Andrea: 48:08

Well, yeah, obviously.

Paul G : 48:09

I think she's still alive. I'm not no, she died a couple years ago.

Andrea: 48:12

Yeah, oh, let's see here. We found one that I don't know if I can find much on, but it kind of like raised eyebrows. The sleeping bag man of Beaver Lake.

Paul G : 48:21

Oh, yeah, I remember reading about that guy. There's nothing on that, yeah. But I'm thinking I was working on the Halloween episode, and I'm glad I didn't do it now because the the only other podcaster in the state that talks about this stuff is that guy with the on Northwest Arkansas Times, and he did that on Halloween. And I was like, you jerk. He tried to blame her, BTK.

Andrea: 48:41

Oh yeah.

Paul G : 48:42

This guy ever, dude.

Andrea: 48:43

This guy was found. This lady sleeping bag man was found in October of 1996. I'm like, I was a senior in high school.

Paul G : 48:50

Yeah, I was uh zooming the girls at the nightclubs.

Andrea: 48:53

Uh another one, Socora Moran Mendoza. February. Oh February 1st, 1997, here in Pea Ridge. Really? Yeah, I thought that was interesting.

Paul G : 49:03

I remember something about that. Hmm.

Andrea: 49:07

Yeah, so that one I thought that was kind of interesting. Um other than that, I mean, I'm just like to pull out the ones that I'm like, I guess hit more to home for the state. The ones around here, I'm like, I was in high school. I was a junior, I was in elementary school. I mean, you're in high school, you don't pay attention. I was fixing him like graduate high school. I didn't know about a beaver-like man found in his sleeping bag.

Paul G : 49:26

Yeah, he's floating.

Andrea: 49:27

That's a stalfel.

Paul G : 49:28

Well, don't sleep on the lake. You know? Well, maybe it's like don't like cats, you know. You see them on the road, you're like, stay on the road. What?

Andrea: 49:38

You're so bad. So bad. But this guy was also, this Mendoza guy was also found by a trapper. And his body was inside a suitcase.

Paul G : 49:50

So I wonder if he was, you know, if he was drawn to that area to trap because of the banjos or there's lack of banjos. There's no banjos here.

Andrea: 50:01

It's not like deliverance.

Paul G : 50:03

It's either what I never understood about the Beverly Hillbillies is that they say they struck oil. Where in Arkansas did we strike oil that much? We did not. Maybe Tex Arcana. Yeah. That's about it. The only thing we strike around here is rock. It's northwest Arkansas or the northern part of Arkansas's cash crop is rock.

Andrea: 50:28

Yeah, rock. Rock. Oh, I did find something on this Michael guy. I just forgot about this point. 1998, he tried to appeal his conviction.

Paul G : 50:36

Oh yeah?

Andrea: 50:36

Yeah.

Paul G : 50:37

Did it win? No.

Andrea: 50:38

No.

Paul G : 50:39

What did he try to convict? How did he appeal it?

Andrea: 50:42

Oh, I it didn't really say specifically. All it said was uh 12 points is what got him rejected. So I'm like, is this a point system? I'm like, this guy like murdered somebody. I mean I can't points? Yes, what's it?

Paul G : 50:56

Was it like your driver's license?

Andrea: 50:57

I know, that's what I thought of.

Paul G : 50:58

Traffic points?

Andrea: 50:59

Yeah, traffic points. That doesn't make any sense. No.

Paul G : 51:02

But he I guess he applied. I'm just looking here. It says 12 his on appeal, he raised 12 points of error.

Andrea: 51:10

Oh, 12 points of error. The guy wrote it wrong.

Paul G : 51:13

Uh the venue, he argued, the charges were filed in the wrong county.

Andrea: 51:17

Well, technically, I I mean, come on now.

Paul G : 51:20

What's it matter? Uh, evidence of other crimes. He contended that the trial court allowed references to other alleged offenses that improperly influenced the jury.

Andrea: 51:33

I mean, that one's kind of a big one.

Paul G : 51:35

It it holds more weight now than it did back then. Juror confidence. One juror said he had skips in his hearing test in his ability to hear the testimony. And Ronning argued that uh should have triggered a mistrial.

Paul G: 51:52

Okay.

Paul G : 51:53

Uh well, I mean he's only was it what was he doing? Listen back on an LP? Oh god. Put a nickel on the on the thing, and that way it'll just stay, it won't skip no more.

Andrea: 52:04

Yeah, put a nickel on your hearing aid.

Paul G : 52:07

Then sufficiency of the evidence, he claimed the proof was only circumstantial and didn't meet the standard for conviction. But they said, no, you're gone. Stay where you are. I'm sure.

Andrea: 52:20

I get that. I mean, that's why we have these amendments and laws to protect people the being wrongly convicted. And it protects I mean, we have a I mean, when it works, a great judicial system.

Paul G : 52:30

But you know, like it's the 80s, everybody got convicted of anything that they just you know, as long as the community didn't like you.

Andrea: 52:37

And that's kind of sad because I mean, innocent people I doubt he was innocent. Yeah, innocent people do basically, you know, go to jail for this and things like that. And so, I mean that's why we have these rules. I mean, venue, that makes sense.

Paul G : 52:55

I mean, you But you know, if he murdered kidnap if I don't know why they didn't charge him with kidnapping. That could have aggravated it and he could have gone to to the death death penalty. Because he did kidnap her.

Andrea: 53:09

Yeah, yeah, I would think so. I mean, but uh venue is important because if you're put if you're put your jury pool in an area where they've already read the paper, they already know what's going on.

Paul G : 53:22

Well, that's true for all juries unless they're sequestered, and even then they've already got a wind of it. And then like unless they're just not paying attention. And do you really want that person on a on a jury? Because they're probably not gonna pay attention while the trial's going on.

Andrea: 53:34

But uh the defense could have argued for the juror with the hearing aid that why you know that that the juror with the hearing aid got breast his or her soul. Basically needed to like not be there because they're can't hear I mean I can see them arguing they can't hear properly or whatever, but um they can read back the transcript. That's true.

Paul G : 53:54

If you missed something, just read it back, and that's perfectly fine.

Andrea: 53:58

That's true, that's a good point. But like I think it was such like when I was researching this, like there was newspapers from like Jonesboro, Little Rock, all over like Oklahoma, Missouri.

Paul G : 54:10

I'm sure it's Michigan Michigan papers.

Andrea: 54:12

Michigan papers were in there, um, all this stuff, and um it was just kind of like very eye-opening. It's like wow, like it kind of took off. And I guess for 86, when everybody thinks that, you know, we don't have indoor plumbing and we're like all hillbillies, that this probably was a big high profile thing.

Paul G : 54:30

We all have teeth.

Andrea: 54:31

We do twofers.

Paul G : 54:34

I always tell people back in 1992, Arkansas passed a law where everyone has to wear shoes.

Andrea: 54:40

That's true. No, it's not.

Paul G : 54:44

But he died in prison, right?

Andrea: 54:45

He died in prison.

Paul G : 54:47

Do you think it was I you know, I I'm unsure. Looking at this, I'm always on the side of somebody getting I don't like seeing people get convicted unfairly.

Andrea: 54:58

I don't either.

Paul G : 54:59

Because I've been convicted in not for crimes, but for social things unfairly, just because somebody didn't like me. Yeah. It's happened to me several times in my life when the entire community of you know, the the people I'm dealing with come down on me and say, You did this. I'm like, no, I didn't. And I draw a lot of ire because I speak my mind and I don't care. And you know, in a corporate land, which is what we live in, they don't like that here.

Andrea: 55:30

No, they don't like that, especially in Arkansas. They don't like that at all.

Paul G : 55:35

And um party line or don't talk. That's not me. I don't know if you've noticed.

Andrea: 55:41

You they want everyone to follow one certain way, and that's not Paul's over here skirting a line and dancing and having a party, and that's because I was not drinking at work. No, you never did anything like that.

Paul G : 55:53

No, I didn't.

Andrea: 55:54

But you know, you were your own self, but to be your own self these days and you're true to yourself is something that really is not fair that we're not we can do it, but you're gonna be ousted in the court of I guess you could say of social opinion. Public opinion. Social public opinion, yeah.

Paul G : 56:11

And you just being honest is kind of one of those things that people get killed for these days. They get canceled for being honest.

Andrea: 56:19

Yeah.

Paul G : 56:20

You know, and you know, I mean But at the same time, you got people like when Charlie Kirk got shot got shot, you know. They can't people come out and say, Oh, I'm so glad he did. And they got fired. But so you can't I mean you have to be careful what you're honest about, I think.

Andrea: 56:37

The thing is, at the end of the day, he was a man. Yeah, he had a family. So it didn't matter. He was a human being.

Paul G : 56:43

It did it doesn't matter. He could have been a leftist, it doesn't make any difference. No, and that's that's the stance I take. And I think you've probably agree with that.

Andrea: 56:51

Oh, yeah, definitely. I mean, you're he was a human being. Everyone's a human being and deserves the right to feel what they want or be who they want, but you don't you shouldn't jump up and down because someone got shot.

Paul G : 57:02

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And we all know that no matter how much that person is a scumbag, it's probably not a good idea to kill them.

Andrea: 57:10

They're still somebody's son or somebody's daughter or father, husband. I mean, they're still they're still a human.

Paul G : 57:18

Yeah, and it shows more about you when you do stuff like that than oh, I agree completely.

Andrea: 57:24

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Paul G : 57:25

But that's what's you know, it's it's kind of the society we live in. It's just weird anymore. I don't understand.

Andrea: 57:30

Like in the 80s, they would like, you know, like this guy, the lump.

Paul G : 57:35

Sorry.

Andrea: 57:35

You know, they would convict anybody, and it he could have had like the worst, Michael could have had the worst defense attorney and legitimate like issues, and he was a bad trial, and they'd be like, hang him. I mean, um, you know what I mean? And i now if something like that happened, we gotta mind the P's and Q's, we gotta make sure everything's okay. Yeah, it's just weird how we evolved.

Paul G : 57:56

I I but at the same time, you know, I mean I would be considered a liberal in 1958.

Andrea: 58:06

Oh, I never really thought about that.

Paul G : 58:08

I would be because I believe every person on their own merits.

Andrea: 58:12

Yeah, we would have been probably in 58. That's when, you know, segregation and all that stuff. I remember my father and my mother talking about it a little bit. You know.

Paul G : 58:21

It's it's weird how things have changed, so who knows? And it doesn't really matter anyway. None of it really actually counts for anything because it's just my opinion.

Andrea: 58:32

Yeah, this is our opinion goes. But it makes me want to know and curious.

Paul G : 58:36

Makes you want to know.

Andrea: 58:37

Does Arkansas have a true homegrown, legitimate serial killer?

Paul G : 58:41

Because this guy's over and over and over with with with cooldown periods, is what you're talking about. Yeah, this is a classic cure serial killer, not a spree killer.

Andrea: 58:48

Yeah. So do we have one? And if so, what is this person's name?

Paul G : 58:53

Yeah. And how far back in history do we have to go?

Andrea: 58:56

Oh gosh.

Paul G : 58:57

That sucks. I hate doing like 1870 cases.

Andrea: 59:00

I did think of one. We did have one. I read a book on him, and maybe I'll read the book.

Paul G : 59:04

Oh, is that one you picked up, wasn't it? Yeah. That book, I remember that.

Andrea: 59:07

Uh Railway Killer. I think he might qualify for that, and I'll do some research and write that up and read the book again and see what you all think if he meets the definition.

Paul G : 59:17

So if you like this episode and you like listening to us just sit around and talk about nothing mostly, and you know, a guy that pretended to be a serial killer, or do you hear new episodes coming up? What do they need to do, Andrea?

Andrea: 59:31

They need to like our podcast and give us five stars and they just share it with friends and family and everybody.

Paul G : 59:36

Everybody, she's over here flaunting herself.

Andrea: 59:39

I'm not flaunting. I talk with my hands, which is a kind of a bad trait, but or go to www.paulgnewton.com.

Paul G : 59:50

That's right, Paulgnewton.com. You're supporting Andrea and I, and you help us pay for all this equipment that we have because I've probably got I have to have a special insurance. Policy to cover all this stuff.

Andrea: 1:00:01

Yeah.

Paul G : 1:00:01

Because no one pays us to do this.

Andrea: 1:00:03

We just have fun doing it.

Paul G : 1:00:04

Yeah, and I like to do things the right way. So it sounds good.

Andrea: 1:00:09

Yes, he does a very he's very talented at all this stuff.

Paul G : 1:00:12

Yeah, I guess I am. But you know, like us. So I was telling that I get paid for it.

Andrea: 1:00:18

Sh share us, tell your friends about us.

Paul G : 1:00:21

Visit the you know go to the website. We have some new shirts up. We have an we have a really cool one for the Walmart parking lot CSI.

Andrea: 1:00:29

Yes, which if any everybody in Arkansas would laugh because we're Walmart country.

Paul G : 1:00:33

But um and you go look at it on the on the website, go to smile, go to to uh get your squag on PaulGNewton.com. And if you like it, buy it. It's about 25 bucks or so, which isn't bad.

Andrea: 1:00:47

That and I like the Squid Wars t-shirt. I would just buy that just because it's got got cats fight squids.

Paul G : 1:00:51

I think it's anything. If anything, do me a favor and go to the website, go to swag, go to the the the the t-shirt where the squid wars 2172.

Andrea: 1:01:02

Yeah.

Paul G : 1:01:03

And read the description.

Andrea: 1:01:04

Oh, yeah, Paul worked hard on that. It's pretty funny. If you read the description, you can't help but laugh. And there's like what a spaceship hamburger or something. Yes, space hamburger. Space hamburger.

Paul G : 1:01:13

I don't know why I came up with that. It was like, mm, face hamburger. Stupid.

Andrea: 1:01:17

We should buy like a rocket. You know what we should do? We should buy that Walmart t-shirt and we should give it to the new CEO of Walmart.

Paul G : 1:01:24

Send it to him.

Andrea: 1:01:25

Send it to him.

Paul G : 1:01:26

Well, we gotta get they gotta get one first. He's he the other guy still hadn't retired yet. He's retiring.

Andrea: 1:01:32

Oh yeah. That would be I don't think the guy would open it. They probably think it was a bomb and return it back to us, but it'd be pretty funny. Pretty funny if we did it.

Paul G : 1:01:39

Alright. Thank you guys for listening, and we do appreciate it. And remember, this stuff ain't free, even though it is. So bye.

Opening Music: 1:01:51

Now you'll be surprised if the info you get is by letting them talk, so I'm letting them talk. Gotta keep quiet, maneuver in signs to let them talk up their body. Another one body, this is how I go. I got some secrets, I'm shaking the game, so they stay on their toes. Stay in your lane.