541 - House or Wife

- This is exactly right. (upbeat music) (upbeat music)

- Hello, and welcome my favorite murder.

That is Georgia Hardstar. That's Karen Kilkera. - And we're here to podcast at you. We do it every day of our lives. How are you? - Good, how are you?

- I'm good. It's like a lovely summer day. I just kind of wanted to sit outside all day long. - Yeah. - And folks sit around.

(laughs) - You know when it's hot, you just want to smoke a big long, Virginia slim. You know, the kids are starting to smoke again. Like real cigarettes? - Yeah, not vapes.

- I mean, hopefully. - Yeah. - Vapes are just immediately killing children. - Yeah. - That is allegedly. - Also cigarettes aren't great either, but-- - cigarettes won't get you healthier.

They won't. - They won't. - There's so many things now that it's like,

“remember the story we did where it's like the green wallpaper,”

the green dresses that were poisoning people in the Victorian era, whatever. That's vapes. - Yeah, and you're like, you know that. So you're essentially licking the wallpaper.

You're talking to them like, I didn't know. It's like, you know. You're like, the doctor was here. - Yeah. - Told you to stay away from the wallpaper.

- And look at you go, look at you. - Put that tongue. - Money. (laughs) - I love the wallpaper.

- People hate the tastes like this. - I have a kind of an update. - Okay. - Remember when I covered the body's on Mount Everest in episode 174 called Rough Wins and High Water.

(laughs) Then there. - Yes. Well, I had mentioned the body of a climber that was called Green Boots,

because of his distinctive boots, and he was like what's it called when you're like hiking, and he's like a spot that everyone knows along the trail. Landmark?

- Landmark, thank you.

They could never see his face,

and so he had been identified as possibly being one of two men, both from India, but the Indian government has now identified him. They did DNA testing. - Wow.

- They can't move him right now because it's impossible to survive and move a body. But they are sure now that his name is Dorje Mowroup, and there are plans to recover his body later this summer. - Do you know how long he's been there?

- 30 years. - How? - 30 years. - Well, it's chilling to the photo of him. It's just, oh, I mean, I just can't get over those.

- It's tough, it's like it's such an extreme decision

“when people, I mean, that's why they do it, right?”

And that's why when they come back, they can say they did it, but the danger is, I'll never understand the like, I'll never understand a lot of things. (laughs)

- Agreed. - Flaming out Everest is one of the top ones. - I mean, I'll tell you this multiple times, but there's times where I order like dinner and the doorbell rings and I just can't get off the couch

to answer the doorbell. - To get the food. - You can't even climb your own stairs. - That's my personal Everest, the living room. - That's right.

- Which is black. - I couldn't bother.

- I think what I'm always looking for

is that get up and go, that people who are like rock climates and extreme athletes and all those things, like, they have an engine in there. - Yeah. - It's on.

- I don't know, and is it because they like cut everything else out of their lives that give them dopamine? - Yeah, no, they mean. - Yeah, they have to run for seven miles straight

to get that three beer feelings. - Exactly. - Yeah, exactly. - And when we know better, when we know the way. - We do.

When you never, when you haven't had those deep conversations after three beers at the bar that suddenly everything makes sense. - Of course, you're gonna go fucking climb a mountain. - Right, no one comes and talks to you at mile seven. - No.

- No, they think that guy's intense and I can't really have a conversation right now. He's into his thing. - Right. - They don't ever say that at the bar.

- No, they don't. - Quite the opposite. - Truly. - I was gonna just tell the listener that I told you right before we started

that I driving over here today. I have a brown-long sea shirt on listener. Watcher, welcome to Netflix. - Netflix, it's up. - It's boiling hot outside, but I'm playing against the weather.

- Yeah. - And I was thinking, everyone's mild. Me and Georgia match accidentally or psychically. - Interesting to see what she'll be wearing today. - Yeah.

- And it's literally the extreme opposite of what I am wearing. - I am wearing like a 1970s disco dress that's in rainbow colors. - Yeah. - I'm dressed like Gordon Lightfoot's Roady and you're dressed like Donna Summer herself.

- With podcasts. - Podcasts. - Yes. - Do you have that made or something? - No, it's from unique vintage.

It's on my company, I love.

“- Hey girl, are you going roller skating out to this?”

- Yeah, that's a roller skating outfit. - It really is. - Yeah. - Or birthday party. - And look at this ring I found at a vintage wedding store

in Altadena. - A vintage wedding store? Does that say Carol? - Nope, it says Kant.

- How amazing is that?

- All the like beautiful vintage purses and shoes

and jewelry and like little head pieces. I said the same thing. Does that say Kant and then I'm like, I'm wrong. But I'm gonna be a therapist. - Yeah.

- And did she say it's current? Or that it's a 70's Kant.

“- I don't think it's, I think it's current.”

But you could tell she was like just kind of cheeky and wanted to throw it in and she loves it. And I was like, it's going to a good home. - Should we get started? Do anything?

- No, let's do it. - We have a podcast network. It's called exactly right media. - And these are some highlights from what's going on on that network.

This week on buried bones, Kate and Paul continue their investigation into the Axe Man of New Orleans. One of the most compelling and fascinating old timeie cases. As the bodies continue to pile up, they ask whether the murders are truly connected

or the work of copycat killers. - Did you see they're making a dorthy up went a biopic? With who? I think Gina Davis. How great is that?

- Unbelievable. - Yeah. - Do they have to dig her a trench 'cause she's so much taller than I've been. - Right.

So do I always think of it there?

- But you know what's creepy is that like, she probably is the same age as dorthy up went a day. It's just that we don't look like old ladies anymore when we get older. - And also dorthy up went a,

was drest up as an old lady on purpose. - She was. - She doesn't remember that.

“- She wasn't as old as she dressed and acted like.”

- 'Cause you get away with so much. - She was like in her mid to late 70s, but she was kind of like, "I'm in a little lady." - Yeah.

- And then you pick it up bodies and bring it 'em upstairs and stuff. Like a little old lady. Okay, then also over on disgraced land Jake tells the unbelievable story of the band Happy Mondays.

Legend. - Love them. From thieves and drug dealers to attempted kidnappings and the fall of Manchester's music scene, this one is almost too wild to be true, to be alive than in Manchester.

- Incredible. I mean, so many drugs. So many drugs all day long. Jake is so good at breaking stuff down. But then after that, you can go watch the movie 24 Hour Party.

People were just truly one of my favorites. - It's incredible. - Then over on Dear Movies,

I love you, Million Casey celebrate the criterion release

of John Waters' desperate living from 1977. And writer and actor Lloyd Kaufman joins them to talk DIY filmmaking, "Mind dinner with Andre and the Movies" he's watching now. - And for the biggest news of the summer,

we've teamed up with Blanchard House once again. We love them.

“For our newest true crime limited series”

called Royal Swindle, listen to the trailer now, before the premiere on July 23rd, follow the show on "I Heart Radio, Apple Podcasts" or wherever you get your podcast, please.

It's a scammer, limited series with crazy people, scamming British horse people insane. - It's going to be epic. - Because we've been talking about from the last rewind, we've been talking about the word perclensity.

I did claim it to be the best title we have ever titled any episode. - Yeah. - I kind of went way out on a limb there. - I don't think you were wrong. - I think the people have responded

and because perclensity is such a popular, I guess title and made up word of George's, we're now gonna make some perclensity merch. - Yeah. - It's so good.

- It's really good. - We just laughed our asses off when we picked it out. We've given some options and we were like, this has to be it. - Yeah.

- It looks like the cover of a drug, the box. It looks like a drug container. Like someone made up a drug, a drug logo. - A drug logo. - Yeah.

- And you went to a convention for drugs and this place gave you a perclensity shirt or a tote. - Yeah. - So please check it out. You can pre-order it now.

Go to myfavoriter.com and click on shop and get in there and look for that pre-order. Very fun. - Yeah. - And let's listen to the rewind as well.

If you don't know what we're talking about, it doesn't really matter. - Okay. My story today starts in Portland, Oregon in late July of 1946.

It's right after the end of World War II. It's summertime. It has been particularly hot, especially for Portland, Oregon. This July, Lone has several days with temperatures

that go over 100 degrees. - This is July and 46 or now. - 46. - Yeah, wow. - Who cares about now?

- Yeah, back in '46, very unusual. - Yeah. - And in this relentless heat, there's a mix of a sort of post-war malaise and it has Portlanders on edge.

As the summer passes, the violent crime rate begins to tick up word. On any given day this summer, you can pick up an Oregon newspaper and see disturbing and grizzly articles

from the crime be. There's the Oak Grove Jane Doe case where an unidentified female victims torso is found in the Willamette River. There's also the case of the 22-year-old veteran

William Kilpak, who was randomly attacked outside of a theater with a hatchet. - Jesus. - He barely survived and he later told a reporter quote, "War is safer than standing in a Portland street."

- Oh my God. But those are not the cases I'm talking about today. Today's cases arguably the most notorious from Portland Summer of '46.

July 27th, as police rushed to a home on southeast Yamhill Street. Inside, they find a chaotic scene,

“an explosion has turned the house upside down.”

And tragically the 44-year-old wife and mother who lives in this home, Furned Boden, is dead. But whether or not this is a murder scene is unclear and in some ways, it remains unclear to this day. - Mm-hmm.

- I'm in your area. - Okay. - This is the story of what the Portland press calls, the Pandora's Box murder, who, quote, case for Karen. - Right?

This is actually a story that we were thinking about doing for the Portland show on the tour. - Yeah. - So the main sources used today are articles from the Oregonian and Oregon Journal Archives

and the writing and research of JD Chandler. And the rest of the sources are in our show notes.

So here's what we know about the Boden family.

On the night of the explosion, Furned Boden is home alone. Her 13-year-old daughter Doris is out roller skating with friends. So in 1946. - Mm-hmm.

- And thank God, right?

“'Cause also her 17-year-old daughter, Shirley,”

is away visiting family. And her husband, Jim, is 130 miles away on the Oregon Coast on a fishing trip. The Boden's have been married for decades. Jim is a steamfitter.

That means he installs and repairs pipes for heating systems in buildings. Sometimes his job takes him out of state for high paying gigs, 'cause not everybody can do that. - Sure.

- And over the last few years, he has worked months long since in places like Alaska and Toledo, Ohio. But Furn herself is also employed, not out of financial necessity, because Jim, of course, makes enough money alone

to support the family as a pipefitter, 'cause there were unions back then. Working was a personal choice for Furn. She reportedly, quote, "thought it her patriotic duty to help out," end quote.

During the war, she joins the Union Pacific Railroad workforce. We don't know what capacity but the odds are that it's clerical.

“She likes the job and enough to keep it after the war ends.”

So back to the night of the explosion. Of course, the police rush to the scene and officers determined that this explosion took place in the basement,

and that it was very powerful.

It actually pushed the kitchen, so the kitchen was directly above, and it pushed the kitchen floor up one inch. - Sure. - So huge.

And of course, Furniture, Dishwear, and Windows throughout the house are destroyed. If any other members of the Boden family had been home, they would have been killed too. And at first investigators wonder

if someone was keeping a military grade explosive in the basement, like a keepsake for war, and then it just accidentally went off. - And where was she? She just immediately died from the explosion.

- She did, okay. - But then when they go into the basement, they find a small box in the corner of the room, and the box has been described to look like a trunk and Apple box, a suitcase, and/or a foot locker.

But foot locker seems to be the most common description across all reporting, so we'll call it a foot locker. It's about three feet long, three feet deep, 10 inches wide, it's kind of small. Investigators can tell that normally this foot locker

is padlocked, they can tell stuff like that. It's already exploded, it's not crazy. - Yeah, that's so weird. - And back then. But of course, now the lock is no longer attached,

and the lid is missing. But somehow the base of this foot locker is largely intact, exploded upwards. Luckily, it's even find a few random items inside, including a journal with handwritten notes.

- That's so weird, that explosion, this is like, doesn't explode every single thing. - Yeah, but it moves the floor above it, by a full inch, so weird. - There's also a bunch of wires running through this box, which immediately leads investigators to believe

this was a deliberate bombing. Officers are dispatched to track down all members of the Bowden family to tell them what's happened.

They find Shirley and Doris first, because they're close by,

but it takes longer to reach Jim over on the organ coast. And when they finally do find him out on his fishing trip, they don't tell him fern is dead. They just say there's been an accident at the house and ask if he knows anything about explosives being stored there.

He says no, but the police believe there's something off about the way he's answering their question. - According to police, Jim seems very agitated as he's responding. - So now the investigation moves back to Portland

and as detectives dive deeper into the personal lives of this family, a picture of a failing marriage comes into focus. They find out that notebook that they found in the foot locker appears to log ferns whereabouts across several dates.

As if someone was quietly documenting her movements, they have a good idea of who was doing this. The husband, yeah, I thought you'd say it. - The husband, the husband. Then they find out that on June 20th, about a month before

her death fern filed for divorce, citing Jim's cruel behavior. And after that on June 27th, Jim submitted a response

and accused fern of being unfaithful.

“So investigators determined that the notebook”

in the foot locker was Jim tracking his wife's whereabouts, probably to record evidence and prove his theory that she was cheating on him. So news spreads quickly about fern's death and within a day or so, a local contractor named William Buell

reaches out to the police and identifies himself as an old buddy of Jim's. And William says that Jim recently came to him with an odd request. He wanted to get his hands on explosives strong enough

to quote blow the fish out of the ocean. - Cool. - Great, just go ask your buddy. - Yeah. - William has access to dynamite through his job.

So he gives us front six sticks of TNT. - Ask a couple questions. William says he saw Jim put the explosives into a foot locker, ostensibly, the same one found by investigators

and he never seemed to ask any questions.

- Brows before, hoes. - Okay. - Okay. - Dynamite Brows. When police speak to the Bowdoin daughters,

they say their dad had recently taken on a very secretive project. They would watch him disappear down into the basement over and over.

“And he was usually wearing thick gloves when he did it.”

And he seemed intentionally invasive about what he was doing down there. - Evasive? - Evasive, sorry. - Evasive.

- Yeah. - It's like that in their faces. - The king had shot her faces. - He's looking through their diaries. - What am I doing?

- What do you think I'm doing? - Guess what I'm doing. - Well, but here's what's weird. That is what he does.

So he basically will go down into the basement

and mess around with his big gloves on and he'll come up and be like, "No, but he go into the basement "and certainly don't look into that foot locker." - Okay. - And then he's like, "It's padlocked and my notes are inside.

"Do not go look at it." - Great. - So he's just warning people, "Don't go near it. "My journals in there, it's padlocked anyway. "Stay away, your diary."

- Yeah. - Now, Furn and her daughters really want to know what's going on, what their dad is up to and what is in that foot locker. They do contemplate going downstairs to snoop around

because of these weird warnings. Investigators go question Jim again when they find this out from the family and at first he sticks to his original story, he even denies that his friend William gave him

that dynamite and that he asked for it. But eventually Jim will crack and admit that he did in fact create a bomb and keep it in his basement. He sketches a diagram of it even for the police,

showing exactly how he had rigged this circuit, connecting the dynamite sticks to some batteries. So if someone lifted the lid of the locker, it would trigger an explosion. - What's your two-daughter, I mean your wife, of course,

but your two daughters in the house

and you're like basically egging them on

to open the fucking locker? - It's like he's a cowardly family annihilator. - Yeah. - He can't do it directly, but he's true. - Yeah.

- So Furn obviously fell for this terrible ruse, but Jim maintains to investigators. - Oh, do they think she opened it? - She opened it. - Oh, that's how she died.

- I thought I just blew up on its own. - So they think she went down there finally when the girls were out because the girls basically told the investigators like we actually were talking about maybe going

and looking because he was getting so weird about it. - Ah, I know. - So right now I'm about to show you a picture of Jim Bowden, but you better get ready. - Come, so scared.

- Oh, Jesus Christ! (laughing) - God Almighty. - Can you imagine if this man was waiting

“around the corner for you on a dark and stormy night?”

- It looks like the bomb just blew up in his face. - I mean, he doesn't love flossing. That's something I can guarantee you. - Oh, he looks shell-shocked. - Okay.

- He looks absolutely like if he had a knife in his hand and he was dragging it behind him, you would run. - Yeah, definitely hatch it outside the theater. - Did we know he didn't do that one, do? - That's so true, right?

- He switched it up when not didn't work out. - Yeah. - It was like a bummer. - Jesus. - We have fern as well.

- Okay. - For fern. And then I think we have a picture of the foot locker. - Oh. - And that headline says explosion damages home.

- Has been questioned. - I don't know why when I think of an explosion, I think of it destroying everything, but there's so much left over. - Yes, interesting.

- I'm wonder also, if it's like, he kills his wife and then he can just still go live and he's the victim. - I'm sure I'm sure there's insurance. Somewhere in the story.

- Somewhere in the house or wife. - But the thinking is so beyond bad. - So Jim maintains to investigators, the bomb was not meant for fern. He claims that it was built with a different person in mind,

a local man named George Hockenews. Love when a brand new character comes into the investigation. - I love this story because it sounds like we all know it's happening, but you've already told me something weird has happened.

- Okay, so according to Jim,

“your favorite TV show of all time, I wrote that down.”

About a year earlier, he'd become suspicious that his wife was having an affair with this man, George. - Okay. - He was working in Toledo at the time and he claims he began receiving anonymous letters

to imply that fern was cheating on him. - Okay. - The letters said cryptic things like, quote, Saturday afternoon tea parties and lunchons can obviously become Saturday night dinners and breakfast.

- And quote, love the word luncheon. - Luncheon, sex luncheon. - Welcome to my sex luncheon. - Look, do you want any crab cakes? - So gross, so gross.

- Sex croc cakes, so they don't mix. - Are you trying to do a title right now? - I don't know, we're not calling this sex and crab cakes. - Sex and crab cakes. (laughing)

- Okay, so of course, Jim reads these letters. He's overcome a jealousy, but he wants definitive proof of his wife's infidelity.

So every time he talks to her on the phone

and fern tells him of what she's doing and what her plans are, he takes careful notes. - And then secretly fact checks what she's saying by calling up the people in places that she mentions to him.

- Vince does that to you, right? - I mean, that's not what he does.

“- He's like, take notes on your partner's whereabouts, right?”

And like, write him in a journal and lock them up. - Cara, clank, who? - All right, take a picture right here, right now, and show it right now, and show it right now. - So Jim does this for months.

According to the journal, the police find in the foot locker and he claims to have, at least on one occasion, caught his wife lying. Fern told him that she was going to a tea party, as was mentioned in the letter,

but when Jim calls around to confirm it, he can't, he concludes that she made it up. When he returns to Portland, he notices that his wife is spending a lot of time with her coworker, George.

We don't know too much about George. He was a private person. Records suggest he was a solid member of the community. He held his post at Union Pacific for more than four decades. And he's heavily involved in Portland's civic organizations.

We also know that in the 20s, he was married to a woman named Thelma, but she's not listed in-- - George and Thelma are my grandparents named. - Ooh.

- Like, that's why I'm named Georgia, is because of Georgia. - Is that right? - That's Thelma. - The carbo?

- The carbo? - Yeah. - No, not the carbo. - But our clothes don't match. If we're going to do it, let's do it.

- Wait, what? I don't understand that. - Oh, just like weird psychic connections. - Oh, like this, your grandparents are here. - That was just like a connection.

You knew what's going to happen. - Okay. - Okay, ready, get ready. - That's for your grandparents. - You're talking weird though, George and Thelma.

- Like, super weird, George Mary's Thelma. - Okay. - This is where we are. - Okay. - But because she's not listed in his future

obituary, nor do they seem to have children together, it seems likely this marriage was over by the time George and Thelma were together at Union Pacific. - But he's a little older.

- She seems like he's a little older. So they meet at Union Pacific in the 40s. Basically, after that, she starts driving him to work. Now, at the time, I was kind of surprised to learn this,

but carpooling with coworkers got very common during the war because there was all these gas reactions. - Sure. - Makes sense. - Yeah. - It was strongly encouraged and it seems for and also drove other work colleagues.

- Yeah. - I feel like that was kind of a normal thing as carpools of multiple people. - Yeah. - Like up until probably the 80s.

- Right. - And then we're all like everybody's on their own. - Peace, we gotta take up as much room as possible. - We hate the ozone. - Get me a mix, separate it,

or whatever the things we're called. - It's so fabulous. - Remember this? - McDialty. - Yeah.

- It's so great. - That is the day of what they ever saw. (laughing) - Hot sides hot, like cool sides cool. - David Letterman talked about the McDialty so much

when that thing came out. - The kids don't know what I'm talking about. - They don't, but please, look it up. Look it up, you'll have a good time. So over time, George and Furn do become close.

While Jim is out of town, George helps her around the house with handy work. Sometimes he stays for dinner with the family. And those dinners continue when Jim comes back to Portland. So it doesn't seem like Furn's acting like she has anything

to hide. - Right. - Still, Jim is consumed by jealousy. - Do we think George was gay? - Maybe.

- I mean, she could have friends with him. - There's so many possibilities or you're the kind of woman that in the 40s is like, no, I want to work. And I want the outside of the house. So I bet she was great and the kind of person

that had a bunch of friends. - Sure. - Boy, some girls can be friends, can't they? So even though he has no proof, he's consumed with jealousy. So he starts accusing Furn of having this affair.

So basically, he works out of town

and he's having affairs probably. - Right.

“- And then coming back to her being like, how dare you?”

So both Furn and George consistently and adamantly deny

So even after Furn's death, George will continue to stress

that their relationship was purely platonic. Although he does say that they had a strong bond and he did admit he kept Furn's checkbook for safe keeping when her marriage started to fall apart. - Oh.

- This now, it sounds weird, but back then, women weren't even supposed to have checkbooks. - Right. - Like, so I wonder if it was like, can you make sure that the budget's balanced

'cause I don't have to do it. - Oh, he's like keeping it as and balancing it. - That's what it sounds like. - Yeah, interesting. - Yeah.

- Yeah, not like, it's in a drawer when you need it. - Yeah, it's on him.

“- No, I think it's like she turned it over to him.”

- Okay. - Which makes me go, I wonder what he did at Union Pacific. - Right. - He could have been an accountant or something. - Jim can't shake his feeling that George is a threat

to his family, that's called paranoia.

And the boat and start fighting constantly. Furn eventually reaches a breaking point and that's when she files for divorce. And that's also when Jim comes up with this plan to get rid of his competition or so he claims.

But before he could plant it somewhere where George would be the one that would open the foot locker, Jim claims that he got cold feet, that he wasn't sure how to get rid of this bomb that he had built, so he locked it up

and left it in his basement until he could think of a better plan with his daughters, just sleeping above. - Just right upstairs. So Jim Bowden is arrested and charged

with his wife Furn's murder. The trial begins in December of 1946. And it seems like Jim's legal strategy is to double down on the claim that George was his intended victim, not Furn.

Per reporting, Jim's lawyers seem interested in exploring the castle doctrine,

“which is the idea that you can defend your home”

with deadly force if need be. - Okay. - So if Jim saw George as a threat to his home visavi, his marriage, then a jury might be convinced to convict him of a lesser charge like manslaughter.

- All right, fine. - But prosecutors jump on this logic immediately. If that was the case, why did Jim go through the elaborate process of learning how to create a deadly bomb, only to leave it in his basement in a place

that was accessible to his family? - Right. - You said that already, like 20 minutes ago. Not only that, but the prosecution reveals that the lock Jim used to secure the foot locker

was one they had used before, so Furn knew the combination. - Okay. - Standing in the kitchen going, "Do not go near that lock foot locker." - You rest your case, that's it, guilty.

- No, you're on her, no. - Prosecutors push back also on the idea that Jim didn't know how to dismantle or dispose of the bomb when obviously he fucking built the bomb. - Right, right.

- It doesn't say that. - I'm the laborer, that you're fucking phishing in.

- Don't build it in the first place.

- Yes, that too. - Okay. - He knew exactly what wires to cut. - Right. - He could disarm that bomb anytime.

- Sure. - The throw it in the lake. He was fishing where we can, right? - Yes, that's right.

“- It could have never threatened anybody”

because you go snips nip like every grade. - Cannery is movie we've ever seen. - And it's over. - In the end, the district attorney, John, our collier's case rests on the idea

that Furn just as likely could have been the intended target which suggests premeditated murder. - Yeah. - Even the judge tells the jury, quote, "We have only the defendant's own statement

that he intended the bomb for George Hawkin-Yose, rather than his wife. "It's a question of fact for the jury to decide." - Yeah. - And quote.

- So, it took that jury five hours to deliberate and come back with a murder conviction for Jim Bowden. He ascents to life in prison for the murder of his wife and it seems like he actually did spend the rest of his life in prison.

- Imagine that. - Right. The rare story where that's, he didn't get out on good behavior. Jim passes away sometime in the '50s.

We don't know why. So whether the target of Jim's homemade bomb was Furn or George is something that we kind of can't ever know. - Yeah. - Are you as frustrated right now as I usually am?

- No point. - Because I think it's her. I think she was the target. - Yeah. - It's kind of logical.

- It's kind of clear. - Yeah. - And we only have his claims to go on. - Right. - The indisputable fact is that he was the only genuine threat

in the Bowden home. And as D.A. John Collier said during Jim's trial quote, "Did you ever once hear this defendant say, "I'm sorry I wish I had my wife back. "His silence for sounds louder than his words."

- Oh, he did was defend himself, not a moment of. - Yep. It's not me and I wanted to kill him. - It's like, still a killer. His wife's death was premeditated, intentional,

and deliberate. This man is a good poker player. And quote, "Wow." And that's the story of Portland's so-called Pandora's box murder. - Wow.

- I didn't understand in the beginning and it's so much more chilling that he won.

I thought it just accidentally blew off at some point. - It was like the thing of him standing around being like, do not, he thought he was using reverse psychology. - Right.

“- But that's what's creepy about it to me is,”

his daughters easily could have, they all talked about maybe going down the looping. So was he like a half family annihilator? - Yeah, I wonder what the daughter is thought. This poor girl's so sad.

- Yeah. - Wow, well great job.

- I've never heard of that one.

- Yeah. - It was hard to not pick that one for Portland, yeah. But the one you didn't Portland isn't credible. - I think we're putting up the live episodes soon. It's the one of the high school scam.

The high school bank robbers. - Yes. - That'll be out in a couple episodes. So make sure you check out that live episode from Portland. - That's right.

- Okay. My story's a little wild too and that a what actually happened. Kind of a thing, perfect. I think we're gonna solve it as I always say, although I know what, we know what happened and it sucks.

- Can I just say this really quick? - Yeah. - In terms of cold cases, I'm getting ready to come here today

“and I was like, "Bit caught the Gilgob each killer."”

- That's a reality anymore. - Yeah. - As hard as things are these days, we must focus on things that are true progress. - Right.

- That thing was like, he's behind the line. - Yeah. - He can't kill another person. - Yeah. - My God.

You see sometimes as headlines like click baby headlines, I saw this one on an Instagram account called History Fields,

with the headline that makes you laugh at first.

It's along the lines of Man and Illinois sentenced to prison for causing the 1993 Great Flood to keep partying. That's like the idea behind it as a skyline. - Whatever you're about to tell me I'm so here for that. - Yes you are.

- And the local story goes that this catastrophic flood was almost entirely preventable. We're not for the town near Doowell, who basically wanted to strand his wife on one side of the flood plane,

so he could keep drinking and partying and fishing on the other side. - Okay.

“- So he purposely caused the levee to break.”

That's the story, that's the headline. - Okay. - But of course, as truth so often tend to be, the real story is a little darker and much more complex than the folklore

and click bait headlines with lead you to believe. This is the story of James Scott, the man who authorities claim caused a massive natural disaster so he could strand his wife on one side of the river while he partied on the other.

- Everybody can relate to that, right? I just want to party a little bit more and someone's gonna stop me from doing that. So I'll flood the zone. - Right, so you see that headline and you're like,

I know that guy. - Yeah, I used to party with him in high school. - I am that guy. - I get it. (laughing)

The main sources for the story are the Vice-Duck Humanity and a 2017 episode of criminal podcast, criminal called Katastrophe, also the dollop cover this one as well. It's just such a perfect dollop story

that I'm gonna now cover and the rest of the sources can be found in the show notes. So let's talk about the flood. It's July 16th, 1993, exactly 33 years before this story airs on the day.

- Oh, to the day. - God, that's upsetting. - I was like, where was I? - And then it's just like, you mean, so a whole person ago?

- Yeah, 33 years ago when I realized what high school reunion I would be coming up on recently. I kind of, the dissociated from my life. - Did you go like this backwards? - Whoa.

So 33 years and we're on the banks of the Mississippi River. How did I make it this far? - We did it, we've done it and we've done it, high five. So we're on the banks of the Mississippi River. We're in two towns on opposite sides

of the Mississippi River, one side is Quincy, which is an Illinois and the other side is West Quincy, which is actually in Missouri. - They love to do that back there. - Kansas City, Kansas City, Texas.

- Yeah, I mean, touch either side, right. - We're only about 20 miles upstream from Hannibal, Missouri, which as you know is where Mark Twain was born and is the basis for the setting of Tom Sawyer and the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.

- Just to give you and your brain and idea where we are.

- I've always got to go literary like that.

- Yeah, I thought you were going to say, birthplace of Hannibal Burst, hilarious comedian, Hannibal Burst. - So this summer, the Mississippi is looking particularly mighty. The previous winter had been very snowy.

Of course, there's, you know, climate change, even in 93 guys imagine that. And it's also been a very rainy spring and early summer. So the river is worryingly high in the days leading up to July 16th.

It's been raining buckets, that summer rain. All up and down the Mississippi, the river has been breaking through its levees, washing out houses, neighborhoods, towns and wiping out harvests on thousands of acres of farmland.

And I read that during this great flood of 1993, more than 1,000 levees were basically breached along the Mississippi and the area. So 1,000 levees. - Housing, yeah. - So that's all fucking a town.

- Oh, it looks like a river, but that's the town. - Yeah. - There's a bunch of people's livelihoods

- Not supposed to be there.

- Maybe we do it before and after. - I love it before and after. - I love it before. - I love it before. - Yeah, I just click, click, click, click, click, over, over. - Okay, especially when it's a haircut.

(laughs) - But the river is good too. - It's not too about natural disasters. - Oh, same, same. - Same, right? - Sometimes. - Sometimes.

- Can be a natural disaster. - A natural disaster. - A natural disaster. - If you do it yourself, it's a natural disaster. - So for the week preceding July 16th, there's been an all-hands-on-deck effort

to come down to the levees and help sandbag. It's kind of this like, feel good, get the community together to help. Pretty much everyone in town is there. They use bulldozers to try to scrape the dirt upward

to make the levee taller.

And then put sandbags on the top of that

just to make it taller.

“And that's how the water, you know, you get it.”

And so by the afternoon of the 16th, the river is at 31.9 feet high. And the levee is supposed to keep out water up to 32 feet. - Oh. - So we're not, how close enough? - Okay. At this point, it's not really safe

for most volunteers to be out working on the levees, but there are a few of another river keeping watch for brakes along with a national guard. At 2pm, from a quarter mile away, guardsman and volunteers on a bridge

here, trees cracking and realized the levee has broken. In an area that wasn't being directly watched because it had thought to be one of the strongest points. Instantly rushing water creates a hundred foot gap in the levee

and water comes pouring through, washing out roads and bridges, flooding farmland, and essentially cutting off access to West Quincy. And we have a photo of that levee breach, just to give you an idea.

So that is the point of where they've reached. And just opened up and all this water, they've been held back, just flowed in and took everything out. - Yep, it's pretty fucked up. - A barge gets sucked through the hole,

like a fucking ship. - Oh my god. - Like a long ship. - Them long flat ones, so they like to have on those rivers.

“And crashes into a gas station causing an explosion”

and a fire that burns into the night. It's just mayhem, but miraculously no one is killed and not accident or hurt or in this instance of flooding at all. So no one's hurt just a lot of damage.

That evening on the local news and interview airs from just after the levee had broke, they show up and they're just trying to interview whoever is there. And they find this 23 year old man who is a volunteer who's trying to help put those damn bags up and stuff.

His name is James Scott. He said he had seen the weak spot where the levee wound up breaking and he had tried to patch it up. Everyone else had left.

In the interview, he says, quote, "Everybody else left." (laughing) I start. I decided to stick around till the next crew came and quote. He says that he had seen a spot

where the water was seeping in and he had moved some sandbags to that spot and then had gone to get help and while he was doing that, the levee had broken. So James, who most people call Jim or Jimmy,

we're gonna call him Jimmy, is from Quincy on the higher-up Illinois side. So his town is fine, but his wife Susie works at a restaurant on the Missouri side where it just flooded.

And so he, like many other Quincy residents, had been out helping to prevent a flood for his neighbors across the river. When that interview with him, airs, it catches the attention of a lot of people

in Quincy who know who he is, but particularly a police detective. And this is because of detective noise, Jimmy, very well. The thing is, Jimmy and his brothers, but especially Jimmy are a bit notorious

around Quincy for various crimes, but particularly for arson. So I'm gonna show you a screen grab from that news report that's from the Vice-Documenery 'cause I wanna show you, he's got that.

He listens to Slayer, probably. - Yeah, for sure, right? - And a lotly crew, maybe, I don't know.

“- That's what all the boys who are seniors”

when I was a freshman, that's what they look like in 80. - Totally. - I mean, now this is the 90s, but there was an adultness to young men back then. - With their little moustaches and stuff, absolutely.

Yeah, I totally dated a guy that looked like that. - Absolutely. - But like, it's just, he looks like a bad guy, but I would think that he would have a pack of cigarettes rolled in one of those sleeves.

- Definitely, definitely smokes. - And drinks a lot of beer. - Yeah. - And wants to go to the lake. - Right, but tried to help, tried to help his neighbors.

- So we thought, also that was my hair from the 90s. - And the 90s. - It just kind of needs some hair oil and weird wavy. We're on TV, yet we don't seem to care just kidding. - It was tough back then, there was no products.

- No, just like harsh ones.

- Basically in 1982, when Jimmy is 12,

he and his two brothers, who are 11 and 13, they sneak into their old elementary school at night. And the elementary school, I think at this point, isn't in use anymore, but they sneak in. And they're already known as local troublemakers,

but that night in school is when they send them their reputation. They wind up in the auditorium, smoking cigarettes, at basically the youngest brother ends up with a lighter

- They're just fucking, I can't judge. If I were judged based on shit that I lit on fire, when I was that inch, I would be in prison. - But I'm just guessing, did you light things on fire indoors?

- Yeah. - Oh, and we were bad fucking kids.

“- But did you light things like curtains on fucking fire?”

- Yeah, where it's like, this is the second step

to every Christmas tree fire you've ever seen. - We didn't know that. There was definitely vandalism. I refused to implicate myself or my family. - But there was some, but there was some vandalism.

- Are you Banksy? - Oh, you're amazing. I wish. - I told you how, as I think I was in fourth grade, with my fingernail, I carved the word fucking

to the back of a chair. - Yes. But I'd seen it, it was spray painted out our school wall and everyone was like, "Right, look, I did that. I spray painted it.

That was me when I was six." And then I processed it in a borrow car. But just to say, like, they targeted him because he had done bad stuff in the past. And it's like, "So have I."

So let's not, we can't do that. - Many kids do, but then if you're getting older, and you look like you're 39, right? How about you don't light the fucking curtains on fire? - Yes, but he was 12 when that happened.

“- He's still not a good, he still did some crimes.”

- Yes. - He's still, also, the fact that the crime is arson as opposed to vandalism, those are wildly fire apart in terms of the, what's going on with the 12-year-old. - Totally.

- That's totally. - It's your bug. - Okay, so he lights the curtain on fire and immediately ignites as curtains do when you light them on fire.

- Especially old ones at grammar school. - Totally, this is an old fucking school too. The boys try for a few seconds to put it out, but they realize the fire's spreading to the whole curtain, so they've tried to get out of the school

through the window that they climbed through. On their way out, Jimmy realizes his brother is holding a stolen grade book. So he's worried about fingerprints, so Jimmy takes the grade books, lights it on fire,

and throws it back into the classroom, and they get out of there.

- Oh, so they, like basically they're getting F's,

and they went and took the book that said that. - I don't know, from what I read the school's already closed, so maybe they were just like closed out. - Oh, just, I don't know. - Stuff to burn. - Yeah, okay.

“- By two in the morning, the whole town smells like smoke,”

the fire keeps burning into the morning, as fire fire does work to put out the blaze, but the hundred K square foot school is ultimately burned to the ground. - Oh my God. - Like this old brick,

beautiful building. - And it was a couple of fifth graders that did it. - Right. - A fifth, six, seven. Investigators immediately suspect that kids had been involved and asked local teachers to keep an eye out

for any kids who are behaving strangely, which is smart. Doesn't take long for teachers to hone in on the Scott Boys who are behaving very weirdly, and who have made a few cryptic allusions

to their friends about having started the fire. - Okay, because they want that credit. They want the credit and their children. And juvenile court, a judge determines that Jimmy was the ringleader and sends him to a juvenile detention center

for the rest of the school year, which is about four months. The youngest brother is sent to live with a foster family, and the oldest brother gets probation. By the summer, the whole family is reunited, but the Scott Boys, especially Jimmy,

get a reputation around town that they can't seem to shake or don't want to. And they don't do much to shake it, because Jimmy does set a few other fires, mainly abandoned cars and dumpsters this time.

Jimmy's got something to say in his late teens, and he also gets arrested a few times for petty theft. I mean, he's not, you know, our perfect innocent victim. He does set a fire at one occasion,

according to police to an occupied department of a girl who turned him down for a date. So it's not good that he's, he's, it's not good. It's not good, Jordan.

Yeah, it's a, he's a, he's a trouble maker. Yeah, for sure. But fires next level. Yeah, fires, not good. It's not good.

It's not good. When Jimmy's 18, he is charged for several arsons at once, and he is sentenced to seven years in prison. He serves three, and he's released when he's 21, and he gets a job at Burger King.

And of course, because this always seems to happen,

he marries a woman to once to marry him. Yes, you know. I mean, coming in hot off of like a jail stint. Yeah. And boy, there's a McConaughey vibe to her is.

Yeah, he's always got cigarettes rolled up and his ear up on the cash register at Burger King. This guy comes rolling in. Oh, he's got schlits. Cool, schlits.

I was called in the breath. So he marries a woman named Susie, and he's known to party a lot at his friend's house. But it does seem like he's calmed down with the arsons, and mostly with the thefts too, two years past,

and that brings us to those rainy days in July, leading up to the levy breaking on the 16th. So we met him as like a concerned citizen. Yes. But when the cops find out and see him,

they're like, our boys are boys at the scene of,

That's the thing. It was a natural event, right? Or was it a crime? That's why they did a crime.

“So when October 1st, James is arrested on unrelated”

burglary charges, but once of the station, it turns out that police have warrants for five different crimes. Most prominent of which is intentionally breaking the levy that caused the July 16th flood.

So they immediately are like, you did this. He wasn't in the act. He did it. Jimmy vehemently denies this. He denies all the charges.

He says he did pass a bad check. That's the only thing he did. He stole a backpack out of a truck. He admits to those two things. What if he did bother this thing's while

he was piling up those sandbin? But if he just got it done. Yeah. But he says he had nothing to do with this flood. He is ultimately convicted under an obscure Missouri law

that makes it a felony to quote, knowingly cause a catastrophe. A catastrophe is defined as an explosion, fire, flood, collapse of a building or the release of poison, radioactive material,

bacteria, viruses, or other difficult to combine forces. This might stories that a catastrophe story as well. Yeah. So this event must result in the death or physical injury to 10 or more people. Oh, no.

Or substantial damage to five or more buildings. No.

“But that's what he gets fucking lost a lot.”

It's like an old obscure law that they're like, great. Let's use this. Which sounds like there's like a sheriff that knows that boy. And I'm going to get him this time. Like it does, doesn't it?

It does. But again, no one was killed in the flood. But of course, many buildings were substantially damaged.

But here's the thing, we have discussed all the evidence

the police have that show that Jimmy broke the levee. That's it. It's like a hunch. And he was there. Oh, that's it.

Their case is basically that he was there. And that he is a history of setting fires and thefts. And there is his water. Yeah. He controls water.

He can now can't. I didn't tell you that. He came up fire for water. That's water, not fire. That is a really good point.

It's like even caught fires. Sure. Maybe, but he's taken it in a totally different direction now. There's only one other piece of evidence in it's this. In the days leading up to the levee break, when everyone had been helping to stand back,

Jimmy included, he had said, or a teenager, he knew that he was playing basketball with, said that he said, quote, "If that levee breaks, I hope it's transsoosy over and tailor, so I can party here without her." And quote. It doesn't sound like a teenager talking.

It doesn't look like a teenager talking. And it also doesn't sound like a threat, right? As much as it is, a fun husband's concept about getting away from his, you know, a divorce is coming. And this is pretty much the only basis for the motive of wanting to cause a flood in order

to party that the prosecution uses. Like they didn't have a motive, this guy who knows if he got anything out of saying that as they tend to do. Yeah. So that's it.

Well, evidence the prosecution has is a federal expert saying that the levee had failed at one of its strongest points and had been inspected two hours earlier, like it should not have failed where it did. But at the same time, two soil experts who testified for the defense said that the levee was very likely to break and that the spot where it did was where they would have predicted

it would have broken. But those are soil experts. Yeah.

Because here's the thing.

Because it's a very narrow point in the river, which creates a bottleneck. So the river is flowing. It goes to here. And then suddenly there's a ton of pressure on the levee. Yeah.

And the effort to build the levee's taller by pushing the dirt up with bulldozers actually may have undermined the levees by thinning them out. And it was like really soft sand. So they pushed it and made the wall thinner. Oh.

But it was 3, 31.9 inches and the water was 32. Yeah. That's like an inch too much. Did I say inch? Do I mean something else?

I think you mean feet. And I mean feet. And I mean. And what I say inches. feet.

You should know. So basically the experts testified out. They also said that it's highly unlikely that anyone would be able to an intentionally break a levee holding back a raging river without being swept away themselves. What if they're a bad kid?

Could they do that? They can then hold on tight. And remember, most people had left the levees by that point because they were basically at their maximum level at the time they failed. They were dangerous.

Yeah. Why didn't he? He was hanging out to the next people. Got there.

“I think he later says something about feeling like, you know, this is my way to prove myself.”

And I'm going to be, you know, you're going to see me and I know that I'm like, you

know, I'm going to get the accolades I've always wanted kind of a thing.

But in truth, he's just down there with the lighter, trying to light the levee on fire. I'm trying to light the river on fire. So, over and over, okay, there's also evidence about, I'm not going to get into levees not actually doing anything in the first place, but exacerbating flooding. I don't want to argue with you today about that.

We will go back and do our Katrina argument.

So, here's the thing.

“Jimmy is found guilty and he's given a life sentence.”

What? Anyone die? A life sentence. There's a sheriff behind all of this or someone that's mad.

And when the judge convicts him, he says to Jimmy, like, basically, you did this because

you had a sense of, quote, excitement or power or sexual arousal or all of the above and quote from his alleged crimes. So basically saying, like, he's a pyro destroyer, he gets, like, gets off on all of this, which isn't even, wasn't even part of the prosecution's argument. He just kind of, and also, it makes sense for fire because that's like a psychologically

study. Right. How would the opposite thing give him, and yeah, no, totally. And also, that would, he would have had to do it before to know that that turns him on. Right.

It's such a weird gigantic. It's not, it doesn't make sense. It makes sense. Missouri law enforcement officials themselves speak on the record and say that the sentence feels out of step with the severity of the crime.

So everyone's like, wait, let's get in here, hurry up, assuming there was a crime.

So predators routinely get much shorter sentences from murder and fucking pedophiles and rapists get shorter sentences than this. So this raises the question, why are the authorities so keen to charge anyone for breaking

“the levy if it's not anything clear that it was broken?”

Oh, scapegoating? Like I said, the levy's have been breaking over a thousand times up and down the river all throughout the early summer of '93. It had been happening. This was one the only one.

Right. Oh, no, this is the one. It must be someone who did it. And no one had been criminally charged for those breaking of levies. They couldn't get him.

There's a contingent of people, yes, I said, a contingent of people. Led by a journalist named Adam Pitluck, who's the guy who did the vice-documentary, who believe that Jimmy was a convenience scapegoat. Okay, here's this. This is just going to blow you with.

Okay. The local farmers do not have federal flood insurance that covers flooding. They don't have insurance for that. They do have homeowner's policies that cover damage due to criminal vandalism. Oh, no.

So in every other instance of flooding on the Mississippi River in the summer of 1993, there are no insurance payouts because of that. But in West Quincy, Missouri, most farmers and business owners are made whole again after Jimmy is convicted for causing the flood. So out of the people who get that insurance payout because it was vandalism includes

the civilian chair of the levy district commission. He's the largest landowner in the area and he is one of the people who had testified in Jimmy's trial that the levy had broken at its strongest point. Oh, she testified against Jimmy and got the biggest payout of anyone. He lied.

And even he, he's in this documentary for a minute, being all like sheepish.

“And he's like, well, I think he served this time.”

You could tell he's like, oh, shit, I did not think he would get back in prison. Well, life sent counts so that he does not disclose his financial stake in the outcome of the trial when he testifies. So that immediately is, this smells like making a murder or it does, but nobody died. So Jimmy's granted a new trial when it comes to light that the prosecution had not shared

all of their witnesses with the defense in advance. But Jimmy's conviction and sentence are both upheld at the new trial. I think the town and the people in this surrounding area were so angry and so upset that they wanted to blame someone. Yes.

They found him. Yeah, he skipped out. And I mean, even if no one died, the amount of damage if it's so devastating. Yeah. Personally, I don't think he did anything.

To cause a huge levy to collapse has to be more than one person could do. I mean, it's tried to picture it where I'm like, so if he has like a box cutter and he's slicing open the sand back, I would he single handedly do it. Totally. So while he's in prison, his two biggest advocates are his mother and the journalist

Adam Pitluck that I mentioned, he writes a book laying out the case for Jimmy's innocence and appears in the vice documentary and also the other one is his mother Sharon. On the criminal episode, she says, quote, there's only two that know what happened that night and nobody's going to change my mind that is God Almighty and Jim, everything happens for a reason that me and the river don't get along as far away from the river I can

stay, I'm happy and quote and she just talks to him every day and it's just like on his side trying to get him back trying to get him out. Trying to get him out. He's still in jail. He's 56 years old now when I was 23 and he's been in prison since 1993.

He's taken every class available to him and trained service dogs. Come on.

After a few delays, he's finally scheduled to have his first parole hearing at the end of

this month. Oh, wow. July 26. God. As of the vice documentary, which was made in 2019, he did not plan to apologize for causing

to parole him, especially because nobody was heard, that he refuses to do it because he's adamant that he didn't do anything wrong and he will not take blame for something that he didn't do. Right. I have a pass that I am not proud of, but when it comes to the West Quincy Lovey, I'm

sorry for what people lost, I'm sorry for what we went through as a community, but for me

to go in there and say, I'm sorry for something I've never done, I can't do it and quote.

Jimmy's biggest advocate, his mother Sharon, passes away in 2019 without getting to see her son free. And that is the story of Jimmy Scott and the great 1993 Mississippi River flood. So clickbait, well, I'll hide the clickbait behind the clickbait and the real story. Yeah.

“That's because what the fuck is the partying thing?”

He did it to party and so he goes to jail for life. The whole argument, too, is like, okay, if he did it, which a lot of people, including me, don't think he did, that's too long of a sentence.

That doesn't make any sense, right?

But I really don't think he had any, you know, there's no proof that he did. They couldn't prove he did anyways, right? So he shouldn't even have been sentenced. I mean, it's that if it is what you're saying, it's like corruption at the highest and most kind of evil level.

Totally. Just let that guy go and be in jail forever. Right. Whoo. Good one.

It's not a good one.

I was excited to do that one.

Yeah, that's very you. Great. Thank you.

“This is, I would say in our top 7,000 episodes.”

Wouldn't be. I hope I have an opportunity for you at the end of the month that he like, oh, my God. That's out or something. Oh, yeah, I can't wait to hear her. That's very exciting.

Thank you for listening to that. Yes, listener and watch her. Thank you for listening. We genuinely have got it too. You're like a levy and unbreakable levy to us, to us.

In our hearts and souls. That's right. Say sexy and don't get murdered. Goodbye. Elvis, do you want to clicky?

This has been an exactly right production. Our senior producer is Molly Smith and our associate producer is Tessa Hughes. Our editor is Aristotle Acevedo. This episode was mixed by Leonis Quilacci. Our researchers are Mary Maglashin and Ali Alkin.

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Goodbye.