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I have been listening to the Martha's Vineyard Beach and Book Club, which actually Elena recommended to me.
She did not listen to it, but she said, girl, this title sounds so you.
And let me tell you, it did. I've been listening to it while I walk, and I am absolutely loving it.
I I love Audible. There's more to imagine when you listen.
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Download Thumbtack today. Hey, weirdos. I'm Ash.
And I'm Elena. And this is Morbid. it sure is for some reason i always pause way too long i i like kind of caught that one but i like you already noticed i looked i side-eyed you like you have to say your name i'm I'm like, fuck.
How many years have we been doing this and I can't ever do it?
We are more than 155 episodes in. Yeah. actually this is the 155th episode yeah but like add in listener tales spooky roads oh yeah i guess yeah i'll just go fuck myself So this is part two of the Ash-centric extravaganza that is the Galveston 11.
It is. We're wrapping up with part two today.
It's going to be intense. But I just wanted to mention really quick that.
A couple of people were like, hey, Elena, you sounded really hoarse in that other episode.
And I know I did. So I apologize. It's just where I'm not sick or anything.
And I think somebody was like, are you possibly having another baby?
Which I was like, ah. i was like if this bitch is pregnant and she didn't tell me or my family like what i'm not uh but i think what is happening is one i don't do well in the heat no And Massachusetts is having the most helter sweltering summer of our lives.
I'm so over it. The humidity is so heavy.
It's like soup. And we are in the pod lab, which is not very ventilated and it's so hot in here.
And we can't have air conditioning or else you would hear air conditioning.
So we're in this like attic-y area that is just a thousand degrees.
And I think it was just drying out my throat.
So. Yeah, I apologize. Hopefully I don't sound like that too much.
Don't you have asthma too? Yeah, it's just a whole, it's a whole host of things.
Because I can picture people being like, why is it affecting Elena and not Ash?
Well, just I don't do well in heat. So I think it's just my body reacts like. uh you don't belong here i just hate the summer guys that's all it is reach me but yeah thanks but i appreciated people like caring that i was hoarse they're like are you okay Alina, what's going on?
So thank you. I appreciate that. And the other thing we just wanted to touch upon before we... Then we're just going to jump right into the episode because...
We're ready. We mentioned in part one, it came up very organically.
Just like random. Randomly in the middle.
And we've been wanting to mention this, we just keep forgetting to, that John Mark Byers, a key player in the West Memphis Three case, Isn't that bananas?
Yeah. And it's crazy. And he died like pretty recently, somewhere around like the 22nd of June.
Yeah, it was mid-June. June. He was only 63.
So like, yes, that's crazy, but he also lived a wild life.
But he died in a car crash. Oh, he died in a car crash?
Yeah. Oh, I didn't realize that. Isn't that nuts?
Oh, that's sad. So John Mark Byers was the stepfather of Christopher Byers.
Right. eight-year-olds that was brutally murdered in that case he was him and his wife or Melissa were very vocal throughout the trial they were super against and Damian, Jason, and Jesse.
And then later, John Mark Byers flipped the script And he was like, whoa, these boys did not do this.
And he was like, Terry Hobbs, though. And he was all on the Terry Hobbs train.
And, you know. But he was definitely on there.
There's pictures of Pam Hobbs in him with Damian Echols in the middle.
That's so insane. A chummy photo. Him and Damien exchanged letters and apologies to each other.
That's awesome. Because then Damien came back angrily and was like, maybe he did it.
You know what I mean? They were just angry at each other.
But they totally buried the hatchet. He became like a total, like, they didn't do it with the rest of us.
It was a crazy story. It was kind of cool to watch because very rarely...
Do people turn around and be like, you know what?
I actually don't think so. Especially like grown ass people.
Usually it's. You're set in your ways a lot of times.
When it's their children, too. Yeah. And for him to turn around and say I was wrong.
So what happened was he was in a single car crash.
What? Yeah. On Chambers Road near Memphis, Tennessee.
And he died of his injuries. Oh, that's awful.
So that's crazy. I don't know where to go.
We live 63 years and then you go in a random ass car crash.
That's awful. And again, when I heard he died, I thought because I know he had mentioned he had like a brain tumor at one point.
Yeah, yeah. And like he had all kinds. He lived, like you said, a wild life.
He lived a life. And so I assumed it was something related to something.
Yeah, I literally just found out like right now that it was a car crash.
Car crash. The other day we were talking about it, and I don't think you had realized that yet.
And you were like, he was only 63. And I was like, well, yeah, but...
But an old 63. Yeah, exactly. So yeah, we just wanted to touch upon that.
That's a crazy thing in the true crime world.
It is. You see such a big figure in that case.
And nothing again, no update yet on Naya Rivera that we've seen.
No, nothing yet. I keep refreshing like Daily Mail and like. anything like that she's still presumed drowned which which is really really sad and i think a lot of people are like well let's just hope for a miracle So still hoping, but I don't know.
We'll update you as soon as we know. And just in case anybody missed it in part one, definitely listen to part one before you listen to this.
Yeah. But remind everybody what case you're going to do next week.
We're doing the Vanessa Guillen case. So I'm going to do that one.
So trust me, we're getting on it. I've already started researching it.
We feel like we have enough information now where we can at least put out an episode... to a point you know like a good we can always put out an update exactly if need be exactly So let's do this.
Let's get into it. Let me like refresh your memory a little bit.
Do it. So in part one, we went over Ed Bell's confession letters, the three sets of best friends who went missing and turned up. dead, brutally murdered.
We went over the fact that Larry Dickens was murdered super gruesomely.
Hate that story. Hate that story so much.
Hate it. And when we left you off, Ed Bell was like, welp, I'm going to Panama. no big deal brb except not real mad at that so let's dive back in I'm diving in.
So we're diving in with Lise Olsen. Now again, I said this in part one.
Yep. I think her name is Lise. Other people call her Lisa.
I'm gonna call her Lise because I saw both.
We're just going to call Elise. And if you know how to say her name, hit me up.
Let me know. Do it. Let us know. So Elise Olson.
I love to learn. I love to learn. Lee Solson is the woman we talked about at the beginning of part one.
She uncovered these confession letters and she went out to speak to Ed Bell on multiple occasions.
And if you she's a bad bitch. And if you want to see like some of their interviews and stuff, I highly, highly, highly recommend.
It's an A&E docuseries, and it's called the Galveston 11.
I love it. I can never say that town. name galveston is a it has a weird because i want to say gavel gavelston oh yeah but it's galville it's like it feels weird Yeah.
Anyways, watch that documentary. It's really good.
Do it. It's like seven parts. She teamed up with a Galveston police detective who was retired, Fred Page, to get more information on the case.
Together, they interviewed tons of the victim's family members.
They interviewed like people who knew Ed Bell back in the day.
And like I said, Ed himself. So I told you guys this in part one.
Ed claims that he never killed anybody and it was all the government setting him up to make it look like he was a killer.
The program. The program. The program made me do it.
He blames the fact that he's a convicted rapist on the fact that he has an overactive hormone system.
What, like when you're pregnant? I guess so.
I mean, I guess he's pregnant. I mean, I wanted to murder many people when I was pregnant, but I did not do it.
Never carried it out. Didn't do it. straight up is like i guess i just have like an overactive hormone system yeah i don't think that's it it's like maybe go to a doctor and get that checked out instead of like taking it out on other people but okay diagnosis He also says that he never harmed those girls.
At least in the documentary, he's like, isn't rape in and of itself pretty harmful?
And he's like... Well, yeah, but you know what I mean.
No, I don't. She literally is like, no, I don't.
Like, but okay. Yeah. So like I said in part one, the fact that Ed says he never killed anyone is interesting because.
If he didn't kill those girls, there's a lot of strong coincidences that tie him to this fucking case.
And one of the biggest I would say. is that all of those killings in Texas and specifically in Galveston stopped when he went to Panama.
Huh. crazy. Wonder how that happened. It's so weird.
So we're going to go back to the killings and talk about the rest of these.
Now, these are all single um people like in the beginning we talked about how pairs of best friends were being killed this is now single people That's strange.
Single girls. It is. I wonder if it became difficult or if he had some mishaps with the pairs that he was like, you know what?
I should just do one person at a time. Let's not try to subdue two people at once.
I wonder if like some shit went awry. Probably.
I wonder. I would think so. Because it's a weird transition.
Well, because they always say you're safer in numbers.
Yeah. And you'd think you'd go from one to two instead of two to one.
Yeah, I think that he's just an idiot and it sucks.
I think some shit went wrong. I think you might be right.
So, Brenda Jones, we're going to talk about her first.
She was 14 years old. It was July of 1971, and she went missing.
Oh. Brenda loved music. It's funny. A lot of these girls love music.
Yeah. I feel like the 70s was such a time for good music, though.
So it's like, how could you not? Oh, it definitely was. also loved teaching Sunday school and she loved dancing to Soul Train with her sister Phyllis.
That is the most wholesome thing I have ever heard.
The most wholesome thing. And Phyllis fucking loved her.
Like, her and Brenda were BFFs. Oh, Phyllis and Brenda.
So Brenda just seems like the purest soul ever because what she was doing the day she went missing is she wanted to go visit her aunt who was sick.
And she was at the Jenny Seeley Hospital in Galveston.
Okay. So she asked her mom, she's like... can I go visit auntie like in the hospital?
And her mom's like a little hesitant because she had to take a bus to get there.
But she's like, okay, like just be home before dark.
So she's like, yeah, yeah, yeah. So Brenda does make it to Jenny Seeley to visit her aunt.
She has her visit. And then she's coming home and she gets on the bus.
She like gets on the bus home and the bus driver remembers saying to her like, get home, it's getting dark, like head right back home.
And she turned around and she said, oh yeah, I'm going to, I'm just going to stop and grab my sister a Coke.
No. And, like, Phyllis. The purest reason to stop.
The purest reason to stop and I feel like with all these cases, like we said, there's always a last person.
There's always some kind of survivor's guilt.
Phyllis still wonders what would have happened if Brenda just came straight home.
Oh, I mean, I would. Of course. And it's not by any means anyone's fault except the person who did it.
But it's just a completely normal thing. instinctually I would think the same thing but that's just obviously who Brenda was like she loved to do things for people I mean she's Stop and get my sister.
She loves her sister. She's a teacher, like a Sunday school teacher.
Like she just wanted to be around other people and help them.
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So Brenda's body was the only body to be recovered the same day that she was reported missing.
Oh, wow. Which is crazy. They found her body super fast.
It was floating in the water near the Pelican Island Bridge.
So again, we have another girl around the same age as these other girls that went missing in Galveston and it's in the bodies in a body of water Which is the worst way to find a body.
Worst way to find a body. And it also sucks because a lot of your evidence is gone.
Oh, yeah. I mean, that's why people put bodies in the water because it's an easy way to eliminate all the evidence.
Exactly. Exactly. So she had been strangled.
She was naked from the waist down. And this is kind of like a trigger alert, I guess.
Her underwear had been stuffed into her mouth. oh yeah which she seems to be the only one that that happened to so that was very aggressive That's a John Wayne Gacy move.
Yeah, it is. She was also tied and bound with laces from her own sandals.
Oh my God. She and Phyllis in the documentary talks about how she loved those sandals.
They were like gladiator style sandals. Oh, yeah.
And I think she saved up her money to get them or it was a gift from her mom and her mom didn't like them because they were like kind of saucy for the time.
They're kind of spicy. But she was like, these are like the best.
Oh, that's even worse. And she ends up getting tied and bound with them, her feet and her wrists.
Um, so, that's how she's found. Absolutely terrible.
Now, Fred Page was working... with a Galveston policewoman named Michelle Sullenberger, and they were able to recover a ton of evidence from this crime scene. including those laces from Brenda's shoes.
Wow. So in the documentary, you see her laces and it's like super haunting.
You also see the slip that was in her mouth, like the underwear.
It's like undergarment. I wouldn't necessarily say underwear.
Oh, okay. So the knots were still tied in the laces of her shoes.
They were still tied like they had been cut off her body.
So you can see where they were tied. they were able to get male DNA off the laces.
So not all of it had washed away. Wow. What fucking sucks, though. is that there wasn't enough DNA found to make a profile, which If they were able to make a profile, they could have fucking compared it, and I'm sure it would have compared perfectly to Ed Bell's.
Ed is already in jail for Larry Dickens' murder, so they have his shit already.
Oh, yeah. And had they been able to get like enough off of these sandals, they totally wouldn't have been able to.
And it's probably just because back then.
The techniques were not as it's like. Right.
And I'm sure it's like the techniques, it's the water.
It had like everything working against it.
Yeah. It's no good. So even though we don't have DNA to connect Ed Bell in Brenda's murder, the Jenny Seeley Hospital in and of itself is a super strong connection.
Okay. Okay. So in part one, I mentioned that like anytime Ed was arrested for indecent exposure, rape, all the horrifying shit that he was arrested for. he never like served time instead he went and got psychiatric treatment oh yeah This treatment was always done at the Jenny Seeley Hospital, which is fucking bananas.
So that's not only crazy in and of itself. ed bell was known even by the hospital to go back to the hospital and pick up girls around that area what So he very well could have seen Brenda leaving.
Absolutely. Maybe like, I mean, he must have like followed her bus, but still.
It's not crazy to think that that's where he saw her.
No, absolutely not. It's that for me. I was like, OK, hello.
That's a huge coincidence if it's just a coincidence.
A lot of these coincidences are huge. Yeah.
So, Fred and Paige are trying to figure, or excuse me, Fred and Paige, Fred, Paige and Lise are trying to find out like anybody that maybe was picked up by him in that area.
And they stumble across this woman named Susan.
Now, Susan at the time was Susan Witten, but now she's Susan Witten Armstrong.
I think she got married. Okay. And she also changed her name a bunch because I think she had like some awful shit happen in her life, which we're going to talk about.
Oh, good. So Susan was spending time as a patient at Jenny Seeley for depression treatment.
She was pretty young at the time and she had just gone through a divorce and she was just having like a really shitty time.
Yeah. So while she was at the hospital, she made friends.
And remember, this is the 70s, so I guess you could leave and come back to the hospital, I guess.
OK. They decided they were going to have a party.
So she was like, cool, I'm going to go grab some beer.
I'll be back, which I was like, interesting.
Go for a beer run real quick. You'll feel good.
So she goes to go on the beer run and she runs into who?
Ed Bell. I was going to say, good old Ed.
Good old Eddie. And she's like, oh, hey, like, can you point me in the direction of like yada yada?
And he was like, of course I can. And not only will I point you in the direction, I'll like bring you right there.
I know where yada yada is. I know exactly where yada yada is.
Yada yada is. I think it was that she was asking where like the Holiday Inn was because it was right near there.
And so he begins to show her where to go.
He's like walking along with her. And then all of a fucking sudden he pulls out a gun, holds it to like her chest and is like, you're not going anywhere.
Like, shut the fuck up or I'll shoot you right now.
Holy shit. So he walks her at gunpoint to his truck.
We all remember his stupid fucking truck.
He ties her hands and feet. He gags her.
So I feel like this is the first time we're seeing the gagging. which then I feel like a little bit correlates to Brenda's slip being shoved in her mouth.
Yeah. He gags her, he shoves her in the truck, and he brings her out to this, like, completely deserted, desolate construction site.
I'm horrified. And as he's raping her, because he does rape her, he tells her that this is what he does.
He does this one to two times a week. He picks up girls. young girls and one to two times a week and rapes them what the fuck it's like and I'm like, what?
I don't even have anything to say. Like, what?
I feel like somebody else did that. Who?
I feel like it was, like, Paul Bernardo or something, like, used to tell people, like, this is what I do.
I think you might be right. Just, like, shut up and let it happen.
Yeah. Yeah, I feel like somebody else has done that.
Well, and it's like a scare tactic because it's like...
This is what I do. Like, I'm a fucking professional.
So don't fight back. Exactly. Because it's like and it's like.
And once I'm done with you, there's going to be more after you.
Right. So it's putting that in your head.
Like, by the way, once I'm done with you, this isn't over.
That's just terrifying. So fucked up. So crazily enough he returns her back to the fucking hospital when all is said and done.
And obviously she's like freaking the fuck out and she tells her friend what happened and then it gets back to the staff and then gets to the police. yeah so ed bell was arrested for the rape but never faced charges because he said that susan was his girlfriend And, like, back then... You can't rape your girlfriend, right?
Back then, you couldn't. It was not... Even now, a lot of times, it's like, well...
Well, you're his girlfriend or you're his wife.
And it's like, what? So that was that. So like.
It's a connection to the Jenny Seeley Hospital connection to like the gagging and then like the stuffed undergarment in Brenda's mouth.
Weird. Pretty clear to me. Pretty clear.
It is interesting to some people. They're like, does Brenda Jones fit?
Because she was his only black victim if she was a victim of his.
But it's like she was a very young girl at the time.
Like, I don't think he cared. I mean, and it's like it's one of those things where it's like, yeah, all the literature says that serial killers tend to stay within their race.
Mm-hmm. And they also don't usually deviate.
Like, they don't go... Yeah, it's not usual.
But... That's not like set in stone. It's not like there's not like a rule book that they all have to open up like the rules manual and be like, whoops, I wanted to, but I can't.
Can't do that. Gotta stay in this. No, that's stupid.
So it's quite possible. I think... Is it strange, pathology-wise?
Sure. But... I also think that Ed didn't really have a type because if you look at these girls, they're they range pretty far in age from each other.
I mean, they're all under fucking 16 or excuse me, under 18.
But there's a pretty far age span. And like brunette, blondes.
Yeah, they don't all look exactly like each other.
Yeah. So I think he just liked young girls.
Right. I think if you were a young girl, you were Ed's type.
You fit the victim profile. Right. Which is awful.
Yeah. So. We're going to go to another girl that went missing in 1971, and this is Colette Wilson.
Okay. So, Colette was 13 years old. Ugh.
Her family described her as a social butterfly... a butterfly a butterfly butterfly people loved her uh they said that she could talk to anybody like she could literally just walk in a room and be like oh oh, hey, what's up?
And be friends with the person at the end of the conversation.
Man, what a skill. She made friends super easy.
So that summer, Colette really wanted to go to this band camp because she was super good at playing clarinet.
And she loved playing clarinet. I always wanted to play clarinet when I was younger.
Did you really? I did. But I did not. Oh, well.
That's sad. I'm sorry. Sad tale in the middle of this really sad tale.
So like way to make people really bummed out.
Yeah. Well, the issue with this particular camp was that it was like super far.
And her mom would have had to drive her there and then drive all the way back and then go back to get her and then drive all the way back.
Yeah. And Colette was one of 12 children.
So her mom was busy. She had some stuff to do.
She had a few things to do throughout the day.
Few things on her plate. But luckily, everything did seem to work out because the band director offered to pick up Colette not super far from her house.
So her mom would drive her to this little highway junction on the corner.
And it was already on the band director's route.
So he was like, he or she was like, I'll just grab you along the way.
Oh, okay. That was nice. So they would meet there in the morning and then he would drive her back.
He or she would drive her back. And Colette's mom would be there to pick her up.
Yeah. So one particular day, Colette's mom drives out to the meeting point and she's not there neither is the band director and there's just a black car parked there Huh.
And this is at the end of the day? This is at the end of the day when she's supposed to pick her up because she already dropped her off that morning.
Nobody's there. Like literally nobody's there except that black car.
And she's like, Okay, like what the fuck is going on?
So Colette's body is claimed to have been the first that was located in the Texas killing fields. oh so the killing fields name gives me chills every time i hear it because it's just like The killing feels.
It feels like this designated terrifying area.
Her body was found just nine days after Maria and Debbie had been discovered.
Wow. So that was in November. So she went missing on June 17th and wasn't found until November.
When she was a long time when she was discovered, she was nude and it had it appeared that she had been killed by a gunshot wound to the head.
So most of these girls either were killed with gunshots or were strangled.
Yeah. Or it was, like, hard to determine because they were so... decomposed by the time they got to them also Colette's clarinet was never found And I don't know why that just like bums me out so fucking hard.
I'm just so sad. That's just such like a yucky...
It's really shitty. And so Colette's remains were found in, like I said, in November. near the attic's reservoir.
So again, a body of water, which is weird.
Another strange thing in Colette's case is that her remains were found among another girl's bones.
And this girl was Gloria Gonzalez. Now, not a lot is known about Gloria Gonzalez's case because her family just like really doesn't like to talk about it anymore.
Yeah. And she was 19 years old when she went missing.
She worked as a bookkeeper. And she was reported missing in October of 1971 by her roommate. oh okay and then this is when she was found huh um the did i say the last time she was found was seen was outside of her apartment uh no oh so that was the last time she was seen oh okay So Gloria's cause of death appeared to be blunt force trauma to the head.
Oh, that's different. Different. Very different.
But also weird that she was found among Colette's remains because it's like, did this person go back and say like, did Ed Bell go back and just put somebody else there?
Is that just like an easy dumping ground?
Or is it just an easy dumping ground so multiple killers have found it?
That's the thing. So Gloria is considered one of the 11, but it is strange.
Yeah. So like a lot of these victims, Colette had to be identified by dental records.
Colette's dentist was her father. So he had to go down. and hold his daughter's jaw in his hand and confirm what the fuck that was her mouth Holy shit.
Like that? Holding your child's mandible in your hand to compare it to your own dental records that you have captured of her.
Horrible. Like you you might as well just be gut punched over and over and over.
Oh, yeah. So just run me over with a semi truck.
The sad thing is that when she first went missing, he specifically held on to so much hope.
There's one interview in particular where it's um her mom and dad sitting there talking and he's like you know like all we can do is hope like maybe she'll come back one day like this could all be over if she just comes back it'll be okay like and he specifically like out of all the family members held on a lot of hope and he died at the age of 43 and a lot of people say he died of a broken heart probably I can't imagine how you ever go on after that.
Oh, yeah. I literally cannot fathom that.
I thought that was one of the most horrifying things of this whole case.
Wow. That's truly, truly horrifying. Like gut-wrenching.
So now we have been in 1971 for a while.
We're going to fast forward to 1973. So 1973 is the year that Kim Pitchford disappeared.
Bell named Kim in one of his confession letters, and he even made note of the black fur jacket that she'd been wearing on the night that she disappeared.
I mean... What more do you want? Yeah. What fucking more do you want?
How is he getting all these details? I don't know.
And how is he, like... He can't just be remembering these details from reading them.
No, because he could have easily been like, oh, yeah, and then I killed Maria and Debbie and one of their black jackets was there.
Yeah. Like you wouldn't remember who it belonged to, I feel like.
You only remember who it belonged to because you were there.
Right. And you saw it on her. Exactly. Yeah.
I think he also described her as, like, the red-haired girl, and she had red hair.
Oh, shit. 16 years old and she was super, super excited to get her driver's license, obviously, because what 16 year old isn't?
Of course. And she was taking driver's ed classes at Frank Dobby High School, which was in Houston.
OK, so. Usually she would go use a pay phone to let her mom know that she was out of class and her mom would come pick her up.
Unfortunately, that night her mom thinks that she was on the phone when Kim called.
And back then there was no call waiting and there was no like beep in or anything like that.
So she just didn't get the call. oh no and so another one example of these people that have to live with that and it's Like you didn't do anything wrong.
It's just awful that you have to live with that.
I know we've said it like 45 times at this point.
But it truly is one of the worst. It's like, how do you how do you if anything were to happen to you and I was the last person to see you or like you had called me and I missed it, even if I didn't know, like.
Whose could ever know? So, according to witnesses, Kim got a ride with somebody in a red Volkswagen.
And two days later, Kim's body was found, again, partially nude in a ditch alongside a rice canal in Alvin, Texas.
Wow. So again. And quick. water and really quick yeah yeah it was literally two days i think her driver's ed was on wednesday and she was found on friday wow so crazy She had been strangled.
So again, we have another strangulation.
Yep. According to Lise, one of, this is fucking crazy. one of Kim's friends confided in Lease that in the days and weeks leading up to Kim's murder, They were being followed by a flasher that had been following them from their neighborhood along I-45.
That was Ed. That was Ed. Ed does that shit.
I-45 is the killing fields. Yep. Let's talk about some more connections between Ed and Kimberly's murder.
Let's do it. So number one. ed grew up right around the area where kimberly was found and this is like a this is not just like oh he grew up around the corner from there like that's crazy this is like middle of fucking nowhere You wouldn't know that area.
It would be hard to get in and out of there if you didn't know where you were.
Yeah. Number two. Ed worked at a Volkswagen dealership and was known to constantly change cars.
Oh. Because remember, he had a white van that ended up burned.
Then he's working at a Volkswagen. Why wouldn't he get a fucking Volkswagen?
Of course not. Number three. Ed constantly used the I-45, aka part of, like I just said, the Texas killing fields, because he was a traveling salesman at the time.
I mean, case closed, guys. Do you remember in part one, Jimmy Summerfield said Ed was always coming and going?
Yep. Because he was a traveling salesman.
There you go. Hi. Hello. So, last victim to have gone missing... and probably a victim of Ed Bell's, was 12-year-old Suzanne Susie Bowers.
12 years old. 12 years old. So this was in May of 1977 that she went missing.
She was walking home from her grandparents' house to grab her bathing suit and head back over. awful come on so Susie's mom died when she was like when Susie was super young and Susie was being raised by her dad and her grandparents were basically were also helping raise her and they lived like a couple blocks away from where she was so this was not like a super long walk that she had to make it was like not it was like oh yeah like go ahead and i'll be back in like 10 minutes yeah which is it just makes me so sad So when she didn't return back to her grandparents' house, her family obviously was becoming super worried because they were like,
Susie would have never ran away. Like all these parents were like, a lot of them I'm sure were asked, you know, would she have maybe run away?
Yeah. And all of these families were like, no, these girls are not runaways.
Yeah, they're not unhappy at home. They're not unhappy.
She's going to get her fucking bathing suit.
Of course she didn't run away. She's excited to go like swimming or whatever.
Of course. And then when she didn't turn up at night, they knew that something awful had happened.
Susie's remains took two years to find. Wow.
Two years. Oh, those poor parents. Yeah, her dad and her grandparents.
It's like, she was found in Altaloma behind a cattle pen in a deserted area. right near a body of water of course um and there appeared to have been gunshot wounds to her head but again 12 year old it was two years later so it was a little hard to tell connection to Ed Bell?
Ed Bell lived two miles from where Susie's remains were found.
Come on. Uh, in his, oh, okay. Now we're gonna get into Ed Bell's stupid fucking trailer, which was designed to look like a red caboose.
Are you fucking kidding me? A red fucking like a caboose train.
Dude's the lamest. Like why? That's just dumb.
I'm sorry. I'm sorry if you live in a caboose.
I'm sure none of you do. But like. I think it's because it said Belle that I'm so mad about it.
Oh, man. Put that on a shirt. I'm sorry if you live in a caboose.
That's the perfect, like, that's the slogan for all podcasters right now.
It's like, I'm sorry if you live in a caboose.
I have to apologize. Honestly. Make sure you can cover your ass.
Like even like the most like niche. if you live in a caboose I'm sorry I offended you that's not what I meant toward you it's just because I'm talking about a murderer So it was widely known that Ed Bell lived in this fucking caboose with his third wife, who was much younger.
Weird. And they lived in the fucking caboose.
Did they live in a caboose? Yes. Are you sure?
I'm so I'm just fucking hyped about this damn caboose.
It was located, like, obviously you could move the trailer because it was a trailer.
It was a caboose. It was a caboose. I don't know if I mentioned that.
You didn't. It was found in a lot of precarious spots, this fucking caboose.
This is so weird. At one point, it was located just a few miles from where Sharon and Renee's bodies were found.
You don't say. It was located where Brooks and Georgia were abducted.
Huh. Like not super far from there. And also where Ed exposed himself to a girl named Vicki Rangel and her friend Susan.
He's disgusting. So let's talk about that.
Another thing of Ed being disgusting. Just another thing.
He apparently knocked on Vicky's door when she and her friend were home alone.
Now, this story, I'm like, what the fuck?
So he told them that somebody had just caught a huge fish.
You gotta come see it. that's the best you've got to like get your shit done.
Like you're, I know you're, you're a fucking professional at this, but like.
Wow. Big fish gotta see it. That's a bold move.
Like what? Of course. And remember, these are young girls.
So like maybe in the 70s, if somebody knocked on my door and I was 14, I'd be like, I got to see this fucking fish.
That's... That's interesting. So they're like, well, I got to see this fucking fish and I don't blame them.
Oh, these poor girls. I'd be excited to see a huge fish.
That's the other. Well. So they, you know, he points them in the direction of where this fucking huge fish was supposed to be.
Now that I'm thinking about it, I'm like, yeah, I do want to see a fucking huge fish.
Well, I'm sure he made it seem like this fish was fucking huge.
Like, it's a big old fish. I'm just thinking about it.
I'm like, I want to see that. Yeah. I've seen huge fish and it's exhilarating.
So I understand that. Now I'm thinking about it.
I mean, you've ever seen like a sunfish.
That shit will change your life. Yeah, I get it.
Oh, when you ever watch like Discovery Channel and you see them out on the boats.
It took me a minute, but I get it. You get it.
I'm in the state of mind. I'm glad. You know what?
I get it right now, too. Yeah. So he points them in the direction of the fish, you know, the big one.
And they turn around. They're like, where's the... And he's in the bushes behind them. nude from the waist down exposing himself and masturbating disgusting piece of shit disgusting piece of shit Luckily, they were able to run away.
Vicky's mom was working basically right next door to their house, so they ran right in there and were like, mom like oh these poor girls and they're young girls it's like what the fuck so that makes me so angry It makes me angry, too.
Ed Bell was identified and arrested. but never fucking face charges because he's like a cat or some shit with nine lives.
Damn. And guess what? This happened. This... I don't want to call it, like, an incident, but this assault happened... just a few weeks before Georgia and Brooks went missing and just a few miles away.
To me, it's a perfect escalation. He was working in the area.
Yep. Like, and I don't mean like working like his job.
Like, I mean, he was fucking prowling in this area.
He was doing his. disgusting shit in that area.
Exactly. Yeah. So now we know what we know about Ed when he was living in Texas and And we know that as soon as he left Texas, I said in the beginning, after he murdered, murdered, after he murdered, after he murdered Larry Dickens, he went to fucking Panama and all these killings stopped. but what happened when he was in panama what happened well how did also how did he get back here Who knows?
I do. So Larry Boucher was a retired investigator who helped officials get to Ed in Panama.
Wow. Insane. So because Ed was on the list of most wanted and he was...
Ed was considered to be extremely dangerous, obviously, if you listen to what he did to Larry.
So they did an episode about him on Unsolved Mysteries.
Ooh. Now, somebody mentioned this in the comment, but I really hope that not everybody saw it because fun, fun fact.
You're like, I'm really excited to tell you.
I was like, Elena, somebody said in the comments that I wanted to say it.
Ash was like, damn it. I'm not mad at you.
But fun, fun fact, Matthew McConaughey's first TV role was in this episode of Unsolved Mysteries.
That's wild. He played Larry Dickens. That's. so wild.
I had no idea. I think the person who commented it on our Instagram was like and that's when I realized that I loved Matthew McConaughey.
He was my first boy crush. I get it. I get it, girl.
So back to the sadness. So part of the episode is the last known sighting of Ed before he escaped to Panama.
Now, that wasn't murdering Larry. He must not have gone to Panama right away, I guess, because this attack happened in September of 1984.
Okay. In Texas. Wow. So this woman was in her home and all her kids were there and she's just like getting ready for the day.
She was in the bathroom doing her makeup.
And nasty ass Ed Bell breaks into her fucking house and threatens her with a knife.
With her kids all there? With her kids all there.
Now, she did suffer stab wounds. He was able to somewhat attack her.
But she was able to like overcome this, like overtake him.
And she chased him out of her fucking house with a gun.
Fuck yeah. Bad bitch alert. Like, I think she, like, actually shot at him, like, while he was driving away.
Wow. But he was able to get away, and that's apparently when he was like, I gotta go to Panama.
So he was in Panama for 14 years. And while he was there, he used the name Cecil Boyd.
Boyd. Boyd. Boyd. Boyd. People who knew him or like got to know him during that time also called him Wally. which I don't really see the connection.
Cecil Wally. Okay. Cecil Wally. Yeah. All right.
I don't really know where that happened, but we're going to go with it.
So when Ed was in Panama, interestingly enough, there were two disappearances similar to the ones that happened while he was in Texas. huh, so weird.
Now, like, there's not a lot known about them because, like, obviously different place.
But one girl was a nursing student and the other was a nurse.
They were both like much younger girls. And Ed lived right around the area where one of them went missing. and he belonged to a yacht club where the other one was last seen.
Huh. Again, he seems to be in a lot of these places.
Yeah, he seems to be in a lot of the wrong places at the wrong times.
He has real bad luck, that guy. Ugh. So while he was living in Panama, he took up looking for gold.
Like, I'm not even shitting you. Like, he just became like a gold miner.
Is that what that's called? A gold miner?
Yeah. And I think when you use that little thing, it's like a sluicer.
A sluicer? You go sluicing for gold. It's like that little thing that it like.
I thought you were kidding. No. It like filters out all the stuff and the gold sits on top.
I think it's called a sluicer. All right.
Well, he was... Fun facts. Random facts that roll around in my brain.
I thought it was like... I don't even know what I thought it was.
Yeah. Well, while he was sluicing, he also met his much younger girlfriend, Bernadina Ramirez.
Number four. Number four. So she was 16 when she met Belle.
Oh. And they met because her dad was in the gold business and Ed was kind of like learning the ropes from him.
Learning the sluice. And learning to be sluicen.
Steady sluicen. I'm going to make sure that's the right word, but you keep going.
Okay, I will. um bernadina already had a child and she said that she was like responsible for all her shit and she like self-proclaimed she was a lot more mature than just 16.
But still, she was 16 and Ed's yucky and I don't condone it because I hate him.
He's certainly yucky. She also she had no idea about Ed's past.
So you can imagine this poor girl surprise.
When on February 14th, which is supposed to be a really romantic day, probably for her in 1993, officers broke into the boat that they were living on. and arrested Ed Bell.
Damn. She was probably like, what the fuck?
Like they had been dating a long time. She never fucking knew what happened to him.
Like he was just gone. She never found out what happened. until Fred and Fred Page and Lise went back to Panama to find her to see what she knew.
What? They went out there and they were like, you know, like we're getting together all this information, like told her everything.
And she... I believe that she had no idea because she has like she starts to cry and she's like, I didn't know that he did that.
Like, I mean, we've seen it. Yeah, it's like BTK went home to his fucking family every night.
Yeah, and his poor wife was just like, please no one talk to me ever again.
Exactly. Holy shit. But Bernardino was like, I hope that, like, he regrets what he did before God, and I hope that, like...
Like, she was like, I don't condone any of that.
Yeah, she was like, fuck this guy. So when Ed was extradited back to the U.S., he was sentenced to 70 years for first-degree murder. because of the murder of Larry Dickens.
Yeah. And then he wrote these confession letters from his jail cell that we were talking about.
But like I said, he went back and forth about like 45 million different times about the reasons why he wrote them and He said nothing was true and he just made it up based on what he read in newspapers.
And then Lise at one point was like, Well, like, what about that poem that you wrote, like the 11 that went to heaven?
And he goes, that was just a poem. And it's like, it was just a what?
That was just a poem. A poem, he says. A poem.
That was just my poem. And it's like, okay, very specific poem.
He probably thought somebody would just be like, okay.
I think I honestly think that. All right.
And all the interviews that you got. You guys got to go watch the 11 that went to the Galveston 11.
Yeah. The A&E documentary. So fucking good. you're going to want to punch your fucking TV screen because he's just so like he like smirks.
And, you know, when like somebody is lying and they like And they know that they're pissing you off and they smoke at you.
Oh, yeah. That's what he does to Lise like this whole time.
And I'm like, I fucking hate you. It's so frustrating.
Got to watch it. I know. Do it. So personally, we're at the end here.
Personally, I think that there's way too many fucking connections to just be pure happenstance.
I think Ed Bell did this shit. Oh, I definitely think he did.
And right at the end of his life, he was named a suspect and they reopened Maria and Debbie's case.
He was named a suspect in their case in 2017.
But then he died in prison not too long after the case got reopened.
And he was 82 when he died. What a dick.
I'm like, God damn it. Come on. So. I'm just like, I'm so frustrated that he's dead now because I think a lot of people would have so many questions answered.
Oh, yeah. And I think that if he were convicted in the Maria and Debbie case, it would lead to more convictions in a lot of these cases that we talked about.
I think so. It always sucks. When these fuckers die.
It does. Like the Ariel Castro. Oh, that was like so frustrating.
Ivan Milat. I hate that he's dead because you know that fucker was just smirking all the way to the end.
It's so annoying. I'm like, fuck. And just to finish this off and with one of his dumb ass quotes, he said, I never killed anybody.
The police killed Larry. Blamed me. About the 11, I won't say anything until I'm a free man.
So that is... in and of itself says to me, you fucking did it, but you're not going to say anything until you're free. because you think that you're like not going to be able to put back in jail or something, be put back in jail.
Well, that's it's like so somehow you think that they're just going to be like, oh, you'll tell us when we let you out.
Here you go, sir. Exactly. And just open the door and be like, go on your way.
It reminds me of... Sarah Turney and her dad.
And how he's like, I'll let you know on my deathbed when nothing can fucking happen to me.
That's literally what I was just... thinking and we all know that he's guilty and as soon as you hear that you you're like okay well you might you might as well just say like yeah i did it it's like the oj simpson if i did it right It's a roundabout way of saying you did it.
It's so frustrating to me. Very frustrating.
So that is the case of the Galveston 11.
Maria and Debbie's case is still open. Wow.
So. I mean, I don't really know how because it's like, I think you guys have the answer.
I think we should get on the case. I think we should call Fred and I think we should call Lise.
Let's become citizen detectives and do this.
Let's do it. I think we should do it. I'm ready.
Because this case really frustrated me. Yeah, it's really frustrating.
And you got to watch the documentary. I'm definitely going to.
Everybody watch it. Let's all watch it together.
Let's all watch it together. And then there's so, and actually a lot of the articles that you can find on this are written by Lise herself.
Hey. She works for the Chronicle. Good for her.
Yeah. And she's a, she's a very, you know what, Elena?
What? Her writing kind of reminds me of the way that you write.
Ooh. So I loved reading. it oh that just that just made me feel like like genuinely i love that it was really good oh love it that that was very horrifying yeah Very traumatizing.
Yes. But never go see a big fucking fish again.
No, no. But like. I get it now. I get it, but don't ever say, if somebody knocks on your door and is like, you want to see it?
Be like, well, I don't live near a body of water, so nah.
No. And even if you do live near a body of water, just say no.
Just be like, you know what? I'm going to go on Disney Plus.
I'll look at National Geographic and I'll see a big ass fish.
There it is. We don't need that. Also, we're not sponsored by them, but.
No, we're not. But like I just got Disney Plus and.
It's pretty rad. The only reason I got it was to see Hamilton.
I mean, hello. Hello. And also, if you haven't watched Hamilton, guys, go get Disney+.
Okay, I will. That shit is... So good. I love that last episode.
I was like, I'm not really a musical girl.
And now this episode, you're like, go watch Hamilton.
Hamilton is not a musical. It's an experience.
It's a moment. I'm open. No, I'm totally open to seeing Hamilton.
Lin-Manuel Miranda is, to me right now, the only good thing we have in the world.
The only, like, holy... We don't have a lot left.
Just completely... pure and good and wonderful thing we have and i just want him to be protected at all costs and i also never want to find out anything bad about him because i just feel like he's just a good person.
I think you might be right. You know who else is good people?
He wrote Hamilton after reading the book on vacation.
Did he really? He literally was on vacation, read a biography about Hamilton and was like, hmm.
I'm going to do this groundbreaking completely.
Like when you watch it, you're like, how the fuck did you come up with this?
So do you like the musical? Guys, watch Hamilton.
I was trying to segue there and be like, you know who else is good people?
Our patriots. And you were like. But Lin!
I need to keep talking about Lin-Manuel Miranda.
Well, we will after this, but first, let's take some Patreons!
Let's do it! Number one, we're going to thank, I think your name is Janelle.
Janelle. But it's spelled G-I-N-E-L-L-E.
I like it. And so did that motorcycle outside.
Wowzers. Fuck you, guy. Hey, I don't know if I've mentioned this on several other episodes, but my neighbor got a motorcycle.
And there it is. You're like, nine years ago.
It's happened many times. Next up is Danielle Carter.
Danielle Carter, thank you so much. We then have Darlene Keller Sheets.
Darlene Keller Sheets, thank you. That sounds like killer sheets.
Killer sheets. I would hate if my sheets were killer.
I'm gonna make that movie. Casey Lee, thank you.
Casey Lee, you're the best. Thank you so much.
Jamie Richardson, thank you. Jamie Richardson, thank you so much.
Destiny Rothenberg, thank you. Destiny Rothenberg, you're awesome.
Thank you so much. This is a really cute name and like, wow, I love your hair color.
Marie Minnie. Marie Minnie? That's cute.
You're going to love her hair color. I like that.
Let me just zoom in really quick. I like alliteration.
Oh, I love your hair color. Okay. Okay.
Tell me your secrets. Wow. Thank you. Casey Schwind.
Casey. Casey. Casey. Casey Schwind. Alayna, you don't have a list.
I don't have a list. See, you lie. You liar.
What is it, Casey? Casey Schwind. Casey Schwind.
Thank you so much. I like schwa names. Schwa.
And I like you. I like you. Michelle Garcia.
Michelle Garcia. Glad to see you. Thank you.
You're the best. Reese Townsend. patrice townsend thank you so much townsend is a fun last name it was very smooth it is oh an alliteration gabby gunning Gabby Gunning.
I love that. I love alliteration. Mean it.
Danielle Stoddard. Danielle Stoddard. Thank you so much.
Oh, and her. thing is of harley quinn cool oh that is cool yeah we like you we do we love all of you danny gomez I love that Danny Gomez you have such a friendly smile you know what let me see hold on like oh oh oh oh I just like closed it out.
Like what a friendly smile that is. Oh, you do.
Very welcoming. I just want to be your friend.
Me too. From that. Are we friends now? And then we have Ashley Warwick.
Ashley Warwick. Hello. We love you. Thank you so much. april rukowski april rukowski that's a cool last name or rutkowski i love a ski at the end of the name Yeah.
Are you Polish? Thank you so much. I love you.
Julie Wooderson. Julie Wooderson? What are you doing?
Chucking wood. Thanks so much. Kiara Gable.
Kiara Gable? Like the House of Seven Gables in Salem, Massachusetts?
Or Anne of Green Gables, like the cartoon and book.
Yeah, two very different spectrums of the imagination, but yes.
We then have a Madonna. Destiny. Destiny.
So hot right now. Let's finish it off with a Madonna named Destiny.
Yes, Destiny, you closed it out. Thank you. so much to our patreons so much you guys are rad as fuck you deserve the world and we're gonna try to give it to you How did you guys feel about the Patreon goodies?
Oh, I hope you're excited about it. It seemed like everybody was excited about it.
Well, anyways, you can follow us on Instagram at Morbid Podcast.
Hit us up on Twitter. A Morbid Podcast. There's that motorcycle again.
Send us a Gmail. morbidpodcast.gmail.com and let me know ways that I can make a motorcycle not work.
Well, that's all, right? That's all the things?
Yeah, that's all the things. Okay, well, we hope you keep listening.
And we hope you keep it weird. But not so weird that you like do a bunch of really bad shit and then you disappear to Panama and then you have to like make friends with somebody while you're in Panama and like bad things happen while you're in Panama too and then like you get caught while you're in Panama because you're not that fucking smart.
And you go back to Canada and then you read all these... Canada?
You don't go to Canada. You don't. Where are we from?
America. And you get caught. And then don't die in prison if you're up under all these fucking... You have to face it.
Face the money. Face the music. that's what it is i'm leaving bye Thank you.
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