Episode 493: The Attempted Murder of Olga Rocco

I'm Dan Taberski. In 2011, something strange began to happen at a high school in upstate New York. A mystery illness, bizarre symptoms and spreading fast. What's the answer, and what do you do if they tell you it's all in your head?

Hysterical, a new podcast from Wondery and Pineapple Street Studios, binge all episodes of Hysterical early and ad-free on Wondery. Plus. Hey weirdos, I'm Ash and I'm Elena, and this is morbid.

This is morbid. Oh my god, we're in a silly, goofy mood today we are. It's Monday.

It's Monday, it's Monday. wait, what day is it, though? It's Monday, Monday?

Monday, yeah, and usually Mondays, we're feeling a little like whirr, whirr, because it's the start of the week. You know, that always sucks for everybody. Yeah, but today I'm feeling goofy you are.

I feel you are.

This is a wild case, though, that I'm going to tell you today. Oh, it's what else is new, it's wild.

It's got twisties, it's got turnies, it's got, um, not Sarah Turnies, but we love Sarah Turnies. I'm bummed that it doesn't. You should listen to her podcast.

You should listen to her podcast Voices for Justice and also Disappeared is her new podcast. you should go listen to it. Disappeared is a really good one.

I mean, they're both fantastic. Shout out to Sarah Turnie. we love her, Sarah, Sarah.

Um, but there is some twisties and turnies in this one. It's, uh, like a lifetime movie, it's a whirlwind, it is like this, this is a movie.

Like, this entire thing is amazing, it's from the Forties. Oh baby, so yeah.

So swanky. Exactly where you know me, I do. you've known me my whole life.

I'm like, anything past 1950, I don't know her, I don't know her. This is a good one. See, I'm 1970 and and above.

And above mostly, which is good, but actually, we cover, we cover all, all things.

I have a couple old ones coming up on the roster. You know, it's spooky season. It feels like old timey makes sense, correct?

But yeah, this is from the Forties, it's very Forties, it's got some really inept detectives in it. Yeah, that's very forties, which is always fun, and very forties of us.

And it's in New York. Oh, oh my God, I'm working on a New York one right now, too. Look at that East coast.

What's up, what's up? So again, this is a story about lies, some stalking, oh, and attempted murder.

Oh, and there's tons of twists. Oh, but attempted, so does nobody attempted.

Nobody die, someone dies. Oh, you said that. Interestingly, I did.

You said that with a little twist in your eye. I tried to, all right, I'll let you just go, girl, go, go, go, go go.

I was literally hoping you would do that. I'm going to let you go, go go, go, go, go, go, go, go go. The girls that get it, get it. Yeah, I was going to say, I don't even know if I should, I should explain that one.

It's all you need to know is VPR. Ick, yick, ick, yick. Okay, I just lost my tab.

Okay, okay, so we're going to talk first of all about the person, that's kind of there's two people at the center of this story, okay?

There's a woman named Olga and a woman named Pearl. I love the name Pearl, and they were both put into situations that are unthinkable, to be quite honest. So let's start by talking about Pearl, because we're going to kind of follow her story first, and then we're going to talk about how Olga plays into this. Okay?

So, in the fall of 1946, 19 year old, recent high school graduate Pearl Lusk left her father's home in Quakertown, Pennsylvania, for New York City. The big Apple, where she was just determined she was going to start this whole new life, she was going to be a big city gal.

She was ready for it. Go girl. And, of course, and think about, like, 1940s New York. Oh, fuck yeah, that must have been a wild scene.

Everyone was looking all fabulous. That's the thing, no matter what, even though, like old timey stuff, you're like, yeah, like the shit that was going down in the day, you don't want to be around for it. It was not like a time to be alive, but this fashion, a time to be alive.

Like, why don't we dress like that? Yeah, like men wearing three piece suits, you know, women wearing like these really cool. Just like hats, that was the first thing I thought was hats. I love a layering moment.

I feel like it was a lot of cool layers there was, and the jackets that women used to wear. I immediately thought of the jacket, the jacket of it all.

Yeah, and the hairstyles, yeah, it gives me, I mean, I reference this all the time, but it gives me. I think of Peaky Blinders and how everyone looks fucking amazing in Peaky Blinders, and like, I want to look like that.

I want to go to that, I want to go to there, but yeah, so. 1946 She's off to New York City to start a new life. And, of course, she didn't really have a ton to her name at this point.

She's 19 years old. I was going to say, Yeah, she just graduated high school. So she spent the first month or so living with her mother and stepfather in their apartment in Brooklyn. Cool.

She was just kind of staying there to get, get herself on her feet, find a job. And it wasn't long until she did find a job as a sales girl at the Oppenheim Collins department store in Manhattan. Oh, sounds cool. And luckily, this was what gave her the ability to get her own furnished room in a building on the upper, uh, the city's upper west side. Okay?

So now she has a job, she's got some income, she's got a cool place to live. She's feeling like the move was worth it. Like she's, she's on her way.

She's like, let's go big city, she's like, life is just beginning, let's go. But now, with some cash money flowing in. She's also able to decorate her apartment to her liking, make it like her personality, but she's also able to, like, kind of upgrade her own look, yeah.

She ended up trading in. She had, like, a very girlish aesthetic, like young girlish aesthetic. At first, she was a high school student, after all, makes sense, but now she's, you know, 19, she's moving into her twenties.

She's like, I want to be like, a little more mature in my style. She got a new hairdo. Oh, of course, she's ready to go. A woman that changes her hair is about to change her life.

There you go, I chopped my hair recently. I hope you don't change your life too much. Hopefully it's like an like, a, just an addition to my life new book.

Yeah, there you go, new book, new hair, new hair, new book. Let's go now also.

Pearl's job at the department store gave her a lot of social opportunities. Because she now she's around people her age. She's meeting all these people. And soon, she's taking lunches with friends and coworkers, and she's having dinner dates at the cafeteria with men she met working at the store. She's like, it's like, sex in the city. I was just going to say, she is sex in the city and get like, let's go. I wonder who she is, she's thriving.

I wonder which one she's thriving, it sounds like she is, and I'm so worried for her because I hate when everything starts off so happy. Yeah, she's not going to keep that way, she was doing the damn thing.

She was on a path that everyone hopes to be on when they move to the big city. To be honest, you got, you had somewhere to stay, to get on your feet, you got on your feet. Things are going well, you're meeting new people.

You're going on dates, everything's great. And on Thanksgiving Day that year, she was approached by a stranger while riding the subway on the way to visit her mother for Thanksgiving Day. Brut Row She was a little busy.

She's got stuff, her social calendar is full, it's fucking Thanksgiving, she's busy, she's got shit to do.

She's on her way to see her mom. So she was not really in the space. To, like, appreciate that. Somebody was like, you know, hitting on her essentially, and like, good for her. She was like, I'm just not. I don't have time, you don't have time to appreciate every man or woman that hits on you.

No, of course you don't, and that's the thing. And she also just was like, You know what? because here's the thing, she was a little interested, she said. The man, who introduced himself as Alan Larue, was polite.

He was charming, and she said he was among the most handsome men she had ever seen. So it wasn't that she wasn't interested, she just was like, you know what, I got a lot going on. I don't have the I don't have the bandwidth to, like, accept this right now.

So she just kind of was like, you know, I got a lot of stuff going on anyways. I'm going on a lot of dates, I'm hanging out with a lot of people, I got a life, I'm working.

And she was like, You know what, I'm not really desperate to? I'm not going to accept a date from a stranger when I don't have to. I mean, that was her feeling about the whole thing good for her. She was like, I already got some lined up, but like, whatever.

So she didn't, even she wouldn't give her address, and she wouldn't give her name. When she was asked. She was just like, whatever, so Pearl was just, she said, Let's play a long game. Yeah, she said, whatever.

But she was like, Oh, you were good to look at, so thank you for that. Yeah, thanks for the uh, but you know, so she leaves. She has a great time at Thanksgiving, you know, I imagine.

And then, uh-oh, because just one month later, Pearl's entire confidence and happiness was shaken a little bit. Because after just three happy months working at the department store, she and a ton of other sales girls were laid off when the holiday season ended. So now she has no job, no income, no social opportunities. They're kind of dwindling down because she's not around these people anymore, so she's very much in a more vulnerable state at this point. And that's when she ran into Alan Larue again.

She ran into him. How strange. In the big city. She meets him on the subway by happenstance, and then she meets him a month later, on the train back from Brooklyn, the day after Christmas.

Huh, so oh, and weird that it was like both holidays. Yeah, exactly. Now she's feeling down. At this point, she's had a run of bad luck.

Like, this isn't a good time. Like I said, she's feeling vulnerable, she's feeling like she's desperate to get some income. And so she, you know, at this point, she's like, my social calendar is not full anymore, I'm not working.

You're still hot, you're still good looking. So she's like, you know what? Sure, she agrees to join him for a drink at a bar in Times Square.

Because he approached her again. Yeah, he approached her again, and she was like, I'll go out with you in Times Square. It's busy, yeah.

Lots of people now during their mini date. He was very sympathetic to what she was saying. He listened to everything and he was like, Oh my god, that sucks like, I know how that feels.

And later, she told the assistant district attorney, He seemed interested in me, like any other man at first. But the more I talked, the more I felt like he had some different kind of interest in me. Huh? So it turned out that Pearl, her intuition was right on. Listen to your gut, baby.

Alan did did think she was beautiful, he did like her, find her charming, but he also had something else in mind for her. Because after they talked some more, he said, You know what, it's kind of like, you know? It's serendipitous that we would run into each other now again. Cause, he said, you're having, you're down on your luck, you're looking for income.

And he's like, as it turns out, I have a job that needs to be done and it's yours if you want it. And she was like, Wow, this is very fortuitous, you don't even know my fucking credentials, buddy, that's right.

But, you know, they've talked on this date, so he's like, You seem, you seem chill, I'm going to take a chance on you.

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So he explained to her. He said, I'm a private detective and I work for an insurance company, and this insurance company specializes in insuring jewelry. Which is all seems pretty valid of something to, you know, this isn't too far fetched at this point. And he said, he his job was the guy. Basically, they relied on him to investigate and find any stolen jewelry, and he's like, So when somebody steals jewelry, I have to do the whole investigation.

I have to find a way to get it back so the insurance company doesn't lose out that checks. So, according to Alan, he said that there's this young woman named Olga, and she worked as a secretary for the Croydon Hat company. And she had stolen some jewelry from a client of their insurance company. And he had reason to believe that Olga still had the jewelry and was holding it, like carrying it on her person, like how it was wearing the jewelry. Now, here's the rub, though Olga had figured out who Alan was and that he was following her.

So she would immediately recognize him if she saw him again, and she would just take off with the loot. So, he said, the other issue here is I can't go right to the police with this because I haven't technically proven her guilt. This is what I'm supposed to do is investigate this stuff, and he's like, So I can't go to the police yet with this.

I have to, like, prove the guilt first. So this is why he needed a random, very unassuming person like Pearl, who could go close enough to Olga to obtain irrefutable evidence of her sticky finger guilt. Now, as a lover of detective stories and Dime store novels at the time, Pearl thought this sounded great. She's like inner Harry, she gets to be, she's like I get to be part of, like an investigation, like a detective thing at private eye.

Exciting, this is exciting, like this is what I moved to New York City for, right, like this kind of fun stuff.

And it's not something that where it's like they're investigating, like this heavy case of craziness, it's a jewelry thief. It literally sounds like a detective story or dime store novel. Yeah, like a cop drama.

Also Detective Larue Lol there you go.

So, not to mention this was also going to help with her loss of income at this point, right? Because he was like, I'll pay you, like, absolutely like.

You'll be on the payroll, okay? So she was like, Hell, yeah, I will absolutely help with this, so he was like, This is great.

You're going to be great. She's not going to suspect a thing, you know? She's like, you're. He's like, you're a woman. She's not going to be scared of a woman. Or like, feel like you're following her for some nefarious reason.

Sure, so. The next morning, Pearl met Alan outside a building on West 39th Street, and it was there that he explained. Okay, this is the first phase of the plan, he said. You're going to go into the offices of the Croydon Hat company, where Olga works as the A.S. Like one of the secretaries. And what she was going to do was she was going to go up to the secretary and hope it, hopefully, it was Pearl.

Or Olga, or excuse me, Olga, thank you, yep. And asked to speak with another secretary, who goes by the name of Sadie White.

Okay, and he said, there actually isn't anyone working there, named Sadie White. But you're going to go up there and you're going to get a good look at Olga. Because you're going to talk to her, you're going to be right there in front of her face. And he said, While you're talking to the receptionist, you'll get that chance.

So he said, I need you to know her. When you see her, you need to be very clear of what she looks like. So he gave Pearl a photo of Olga and he said, Make sure you find her. That secretary. And he's like, go study her. Make sure you're able to recognize her. And he was adamant that she recognize her, even in a crowd, like in a subway crowd.

Like, I want you to be able to point her out because I don't want you to be obvious about you. Trying to see if she has the jewelry, so Pearl did it. She went in, she talked to Olga and she returned back to Alan. And she said, Oh, I've memorized her, like I memorized her face, I know her clothing, I could pick her out.

And Alan told Pearl to take the rest of the morning off and then to meet him at his apartment on East 17th Street later that afternoon. And they would go into phase two of the plan. Okay, and he's like, take this time, keep looking at that photo, get to know her. This is so bizarre.

I have no idea where we're headed, that's the thing, like, you cannot have any idea where this is headed, you really can't.

Now, Pearl just kind of spent the time. Like she looked at the photo, she knew who it was, like she was like I was standing right in front of her. So she went to see a movie and she talked on the phone with some friends before meeting Alan at his apartment at around 3.30 p.m. When she went in the apartment, he was holding what he said was an x-ray camera.

And this was the key to catching Olga and retrieving those jewels. According to Pearl, the camera looked like just an ordinary shoe box wrapped in brown paper, like you would carry out of a department store. But he said, she said. On one end, there was a hole in what looked like a camera aperture, and on the other end, there was a short piece of wire loop that hung out of the bottom of the box. Okay?

So you would like pull that? It would take the photo. Remember, we're in the forties, of course, so it's not like, Um, and so this is what didn't seem like totally out of the ordinary here. And he explained to her All you do is point this at her and pull the wire.

And he said the x-ray photo would capture if she was wearing the jewelry hidden somewhere. Okay, and he was very serious when saying, he said, This is what. This is what we need. In order to go to the police and say, Look, she has the jewelry. Sure, and he was very serious, saying, but don't snap the picture where she can see you do it.

Take it when she gets off the train in Brooklyn, that's where she lives. You want to be right behind her when you follow her out of the train so you can take it at close range. You want to be only two or three feet away from her when you snap the photo. Okay, and he, she was, like, all right.

Now Pearl left Alan's apartment, she went back to the Croydon Hat Company building and she waited for Olga to come out. She finally saw Olga come out of the building after work and begin her commute home. So Olga came out a little after five and she made her way towards the Times Square station and caught a train to Brooklyn. Pearl followed her onto the train, not too close, but she did sit across from Olga on the train.

Okay, and again, she looks like she's just holding a package, right? It's like wrapped in brown paper. Pearl then aimed the camera at Olga and pulled the wire, and she was like, I think I got a good photo.

Like, that's it. So she got off the train. She went to the bar in Times Square where she met Alan again. And she was like, everything went awesome. Like, Alan was like, shit, like, how close were you to her?

Like, you know, had she noticed you were following her, like, did anything go wrong? Did she seem suspicious? And Pearl explained that Olga had only been a few feet away from her and she took the picture. She didn't seem to notice her.

Everything seemed like it went great, so Alan was like, that's amazing. I'm going to get the picture developed tonight and I'll meet you tomorrow morning and I'll let you know how it turned out. Yeah, now. When they met the following day, he was like, bad news.

The picture wasn't good, why did I suspect that? So, he told Pearl that he believed it was the camera to blame. He was like, It's not you, you did great.

Like, good job. But he was like, you know what, I'm going to get us a better one like that was kind of like, not, not great.

Anyways, like, I'm going to make sure we get a better one, like, give me a few days and I'll be able to get a better one. So she's like, All right. So a few days later, on December 31st, 1946, New Year's Eve, New Year's Eve.

They love holidays, they really do, you're right. Pearl called Alan at his apartment and he said he was able to get a new x-ray camera. And he said, Meet me at the laundromat near Union Square, which she did a little after 8am.

Now, Pearl said, when he handed this camera to her, it was much. It was different. It was bigger, it was heavier, and it wasn't wrapped in brown paper now.

It was wrapped in Christmas paper to make it look like a Christmas present. Yeah, inconspicuous, yeah. And Alan explained Pearl was to take the camera, go to the train station in Brooklyn, follow Olga from there.

Once they were on the train, get close to Olga, not too close. Take that picture just like you did before, same old things. He's like, keep the same chill way you did it and he. But, he added, remember to aim it low at her waist.

Okay, and he, she was like, why? and he was like, I think that's where she's probably carrying the jewels pinned inside her dress, at her waist. That's what we we've gotten information, that that's what she does. Why would anyone keep jewels pinned to their waist?

Not real sure, but Pearl did exactly what Alan told her to do. She caught the seat opposite Olga on the train and they began deboarding the train. She decided to wait until they were getting off the train. Because he had told her to do that initially, and she didn't do it the first time. Oh, okay.

So they began getting off the train, and Pearl was standing a few feet behind Olga. She aimed the camera at Olga's lower body, pulled the wire to take the picture, and she said the camera jerked in her hands and made a loud explosion happen. Oh, this caused immediate confusion and panic and chaos everywhere, yeah.

And when Pearl looked up, cause she was just stunned at, like, what the fuck just happened? like? she's like, Did this camera just blow up? What the hell happened? Pearl looked up. Olga was laying on her back on the platform, holding her leg, and her leg looked as though it was nearly blown off. Oh my God.

Just shattered, completely, ruined. Seconds later, a security guard rushed over to Pearl because Pearl was splattered in Olga's blood. And holding that box, and the security guard was like, What the fuck? and I guess, Pearl answered. I just took a woman's picture and somebody shot her, and Pearl told the security guard before she was grabbed by police, she was like, I just took her picture.

She was like, I don't, who shot her? like she had no idea, like, what happened, what the fuck? So police officers took her, They ripped open the parcel that she was holding.

That's not a camera, baby. And inside was a sawed off shotgun 12 gauge shotgun mounted between two cream cheese boxes. What, yes, what?

If you look it up, it is the most wild picture when you see what it actually looked like. Let me see, like, Oh my God, I'll just look up Pearl Lusk guys like, and we'll. We'll post some of these photos so you can see. But the actual photo of the sawed off 12 gauge shotgun, what the fuck?

I'm at a loss, no, like, truly at a loss. I'm at a true loss. For like that, that must've been a heavy package. So this motherfucker, like, just made, like, made this. And the cream cheese boxes are wooden, by the way, they're not like Philadelphia cream cheese boxes.

Immediately, what I pictured? You are not alone, I'm here with you. Because I also thought of the Philadelphia Cream Cheese cardboard box, and I was like, Wow, that. Why would they be between that? But that must've been really heavy, and she said that it was heavier than the last one.

She said It was much heavier and much bigger. So I wonder what he had done in that first box. Yeah, I know, like I, cause it was smaller, she said. It was like a shoe box.

I'm like, did you just put a handgun in there and it just didn't work? Or was he just trying to like, was there nothing in there, like, really? And he was just trying to see if, like, she followed protocol. That's what I wondered initially was, is he testing her to see if there was actually? But then I'm like, I don't know.

But it makes sense, though. Like that, he was testing her because when she came back to meet him, he was like, How'd it go? Did she suspect you? Did you get close to her? What did you do? He had a lot of questions.

He wanted to see, like, Did you do it right? can I trust you to actually do it this time? Like that kind of thing I could see?

That being the case, we will never know, thank God. Pearl looked down at Olga and then looked at the gun in her hands at this point, and she was like, Holy shit, I'm the one who shot her.

Like, she had no idea. And as she was being pulled away by the police officer, she looked down at Olga and was starting to cry her eyes out. And she said, I'm awfully sorry I shot you. There was a new job, you see, and I thought I was taking your picture with an x-ray camera.

Like, she started to just try to explain it to this woman whose leg is blown off. I know, like, bad timing, Pearl, but I get it, but like, I get, you're trying to be like, I did not mean to shoot you. Oh my God, I guess. Olga looked at Pearl and then looked away and said, This time, you got me.

He can have me now if he wants me. I'm a cripple. What happened to the police? I called them, but he was too smart for them. Oh, no.

So she knew, like, exactly what had happened here, what the fuck is happening right now, I'm about to tell you so. Pearl was immediately taken into custody, where she explained her side of the story and said she was an avid reader of detective and confession stories. Quote unquote. And that was one of the reasons that she was helping this man, Alan Larue.

So, when detectives showed Pearl a photo of Olga and her husband Alphonse Al Rocco, taken several months earlier in a New York City nightclub, she said That man's Alan Larue. Oh my god, so this was Olga's ex-husband, Yes, what?

And she said, That's the man who hired me to shoot Olga, what? And she said, He even has the same clothes on. Oh my God, like that is him.

That's creepy, so. Detectives questioned Pearl, and a separate set of investigators were at the hospital taking a statement from Olga. And she explained that the male Pearl thought man Pearl thought to be Alan. Larue was in all likelihood her ex-husband, Al Rocco, and she said they had been married in May 1945 and divorced a year later. Oh, wow.

So that was a bad marriage, so let's talk about them. So, Olga Trapani met Al Rocco in the spring of 1944, and after one year of dating, they married in May 1945. Okay?

Now, despite their daughter having dated him for a year before getting married, Olga's parents told reporters that they really didn't know Al. Like, even though they, like, were around him, they met him, they spent time with him, they were like he was a mystery, like we still don't really know him. Oh, that must've creeped them out.

Yeah, and by the winter of 1947, the most they knew about him was that he was of Italian ancestry and of average height and weight. That's what they could say about him, they didn't even know, like what he did for work or anything, They didn't know anything about him.

A reporter for The New York Times wrote that they knew nothing of his work. Sometimes he disappeared for months, occasionally he returned with lots of money, and just as often with none. What, yeah?

Okay, he's a sketchy fucking character, yeah. And others who knew Rocco seemed to know just as little about him, like his landlord, he was like he was a quiet guy.

Like, that's all I know, like, I don't know, I guess he was Italian is all I can say, like.

Other than that, I don't know. And although they didn't know a lot of details about him, Olga's family did not like him. Well, yeah, I'm sure that probably like not knowing anything about the guy that your daughter is going to marry, you're not going to like that. Yeah, they all got a vibe that he was a bad person.

Like hiding something. All of them were like, something's off here. And after their divorce, a few months before Olga was shot, they saw him get even worse. They saw a very bad side of him. So, according to Olga's mother, once, the marriage was annulled in early November 1946, so the only months before, Al became very verbally abusive.

And she said Quote had constantly annoyed her daughter, threatening to kill her ever since their separation. Oh my God.

I'm Dan Taberski. In 2011, something strange began to happen at the high school in Leroy, New York. I was like, at my locker and she came up to me and she was like, stuttering, super bad. I'm like, stop around, She's like, I can't.

A mystery illness, bizarre symptoms and spreading fast, like doubling and tripling. And it's all these girls with a diagnosis. The state tried to keep on the down low. Everybody thought I was holding something back. well, you were holding something back intentionally.

Yeah, well, yeah, no, it's hysteria, it's all in your head, it's not physical.

Oh my gosh, you're exaggerating. Is this the largest mass hysteria since the Witches of Salem, or is it something else entirely? Something's wrong here.

Something's not right. Leroy was the new dateline, and everyone was trying to solve the murder. A new limited series from Wondery and Pineapple Street Studios. Hysterical Follow Hysterical on the Wondery app, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge all episodes of Hysterical early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus.

She struck him with her motor vehicle, she had been under the influence, and then she left him there. In January 2022, local woman Karen Reed was implicated in the mysterious death of her boyfriend, Boston Police Officer John O'Keefe. It was alleged that after an innocent night out for drinks with friends, Karen and John got into a lover's quarrel en route to the next location. What happens next depends on who you ask.

Was it a crime of passion? If you believe the prosecution, it's because the evidence was so compelling. This was clearly an intentional act. And his cause of death was blunt force trauma with hypothermia. Or a corrupt police coverup, if you believe the defense theory, however, this was all a coverup to prevent one of their own from going down.

Everyone had an opinion, and after the 10-week trial, the jury could not come to a unanimous decision to end in a mistrial. It's just a confirmation of just how complicated this case is. Law and Crime presents the most in-depth analysis to date of the sensational case. In Karen. You can listen to Karen exclusively with Wondery Plus.

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So it didn't take long for detectives to learn not only had the couple had an abusive relationship and a very, very aggressive and hostile separation. But this was not the first time that Al had tried to kill Olga. What on one occasion? This is where the detectives and police, in this case, failed fucking miserably. Like shame, shame.

On this one, shame. Well, that makes sense, because she said, like, he finally got me, he finally got me, and he was like, too smart for the police. And it's true.

Yeah, he got away with so much when you hear all the shit he did that everyone just ignored. Oh, the 40s. On one occasion in mid-October, after the couple had separated already, like they were separated, not divorced. Al confronted Olga at the train station in Times Square.

He took out a switchblade knife, forced her into his car and drove her to a motel in Poughkeepsie. What? Once they were there, he forced Olga to undress, hid her clothes, threatened to kill her, and said, If you don't come back to me, I'm going to murder you. Um, what? So? She spent two days in that motel room being terrorized by him, while he was trying to force her at knife point to come back to him.

Somehow, she managed to convince Al to bring her back to New York, and once there, she fled. She ran away from him back to her parents home in Brooklyn. And a few weeks later, on November 1st, just before the couple's marriage was annulled, Al then shot at Olga through an open window in her mother's kitchen. Jesus Christ.

Two of the bullets struck her in the right thigh and left her with a.

45-caliber slug in her thigh and a permanent limp. Oh my God. Now you would think, after those two incidences of, um, kidnapping, assault and attempted murder, yeah, just those few things that maybe he should be arrested or talked to, perhaps.

Scolded, they were both reported to the police. Both those incidents and Olga made thorough statements, but from the looks of things, nothing was done to follow up or arrest. Rocco. What?

Yes, he just terrorized her with no consequences, and like the way that he terrorized her, he literally kidnapped her and held her hostage and then shot her in the leg. And they're like, Yeah.

And actually, a few weeks later, Olga went back to work and she got a threatening call from Al immediately. Oh no, poor Olga, she told detectives. He said he was watching me, he knew everything he knew when I went to work. And that he did not aim the he did not aim right the first time, but that when he would aim again, he would kill me. So he literally was like, I didn't aim for your leg, I just aimed wrong.

I meant to kill you, oh my God. So Olga reported it to the police, who told her, Don't worry, don't worry, don't worry about it.

I have a permanent limp and a slug in my leg. Yeah, fuck right off with that now. In this case, it's unclear whether they followed up on anything. But I couldn't find anything to say that they did or didn't. Sounds like they did not. In the days that followed that threatening phone call, Olga received daily threatening calls from Al Rocco and regularly saw him in the crowd at the train station and on city streets following her. Oh my God.

And each time, every day, she reported the incident to detectives at the 66th Precinct, and they didn't do shit. All about it, nothing. One day, just after Christmas, she was going, This is even this is the saddest one, I think. She was entering the Times Square station and she saw Al following her very closely behind her.

So she panicked and she paid for her train fare. And then she went up to the subway guard on the stairway leading to the platform. And she said, I'm being followed by my ex-husband. He's very dangerous, He's threatening me, I'm very scared. Can I just stand with you until he's gone?

And the guard said, No, you can't, what? He said. She could not stay there because of the people that were going down the steps at that time.

So he was like, tough, what a fucking asshole. tough ass lady, like like she's, and can you imagine the panic in her voice when she's saying this?

This piece of shit subway guard was like, No, can you stand with me? No, you can't stand with me, Oh my God.

Like, good luck out there, I guess, poor Olga now. The last time that Olga had heard from AL was three days before the shooting on the train. So three days before he shot her. When he came to her family's home to confront her, and the family members were like, What the fuck?

And they heard him shout I'll kill you and kill myself. And Olga reported the incident to the police, like she had all the fucking others of them. And on the evening of December 30th, detectives did come to her house to finally take a statement. And Olga told the detectives that after everything she'd been through with Al over the past few months, she was afraid. She was like, he's going to kill me, like, it's very clear, he's trying to kill me.

She said They told me that I should not be frightened and that they were going to protect me and that they would guard me when I went to work. So it's like, okay, he's already shot her and she shouldn't be frightened. Well, and it's like, Okay, like, cool, they're saying they're going to protect you and like, escort you to work.

Yeah, clearly they didn't. And she gave the statement from their hospital bed after being shot. Um, when she left for work the next morning on the 31st, she said there was no detectives anywhere and the only escort she had to the train station was her sister.

So bravo detectives, bravo, these people are fucked, and you know, they're not making any like written reports of this. Because at this point, this guy would have had a stack like three inches thick, yeah.

They're just the the amount that they did. Is zilch zero, goose egg zero now? When Olga and her sister got to the platform at the station in Brooklyn, she said she noticed the woman carrying what appeared to be a medium sized Christmas present. Because she probably, I wonder if she saw her before, she might've. And she said she was carrying a box, a rather large box and it was wrapped, and it had something that protruded, protruded at one end of the box.

And I'm assuming that is the handle of the sawed off shotgun, which I'm still a little confused by. Yeah, but did Pearl, like, pull a string or did she pull the wire of some kind? That that trigger that pulled the trigger? Okay, but I'm wondering how.

The the part of like, cause it was a sawed off shotgun, so it was shorter. But I'm like, that handle, like, not the barrel, but the handle of the shotgun, that's like, on the other side was that wrapped, too? Cause you can't, it's hard to tell in the picture.

It looks like it might've been, but it's hard, cause it's all unwrapped and, like, dissembled. You know, yeah, now, despite the bizarre details of what Pearl was saying happened that day, like, you know, that does sound insane, like that sounds wild. Detectives said they were inclined to accept as truth a story too fantastic to be fiction, which, like, I guess, like, someone making that up is pretty wild.

And Olga's statement, like, on the scene, I'm sure it really helps, yeah, now. After taking statements from Olga Pearl and Olga's family members, investigators said that it was very clear that once his wife was not going to come back to him. Al Rocco had concocted an elaborate scheme to kill her. Because if he couldn't have her, no one else was going to have her either. Now, while Olga is laying in Roosevelt Hospital in critical condition, with a literal quote mangled left thigh, detectives started finally searching for Al Rocco.

Now, on January 1st, the day after the shooting, investigators learned that quote. An unidentified man had called twice at Pearl's rooming house, asking to speak with her. So they were hoping they could intercept him because they were assuming he would call for another time. When he couldn't get a hold of her. So they brought Pearl back to the rooming house and had her sit there with them a little after 5 p..m. They waited for several hours, but he didn't call back. Damn it.

So detectives continued their interview with Pearl Lusk, and other investigators began looking for Al Rocco through his background.

What they learned? They learned a lot about him, but they learned that the 28-year-old, by the way, he's 28 years old. He had served a year in the Bronx County jail a few years earlier for auto theft. And he had a bunch of arrests for disorderly conduct, car theft, all kinds of stuff like that. Things they should have known when he was doing this to Olga, exactly. But the thing is, when they were looking at his criminal record, they were like none of it. Detectives were calling him a diabolical genius.

And they were like, when you look at his record, you're like, nothing really lends itself to that. He's just a car thief. Yeah, I know, you know, like, that's it. And like, disorderly conduct, you know, but. And in fact, an evaluation conducted at Bellevue Hospital in 1938 of Rocco labeled him as a man of average intelligence. You know, he's not normal. Not below, not above.

But they had opened up to tips from the public at this point, and the first tip came in around 11 a...m. on the morning of January 1st. That's when a Brooklyn resident saw a man on Brighton Beach who disrobed completely and just entered the water. Okay?

According to the witness, he said they said the man quote shed a gray tweed overcoat, a brown suit, a blue tie and a white shirt. Then, wearing gloves, underwear, shoes and socks, he plunged into the icy surf, headed out to sea and disappeared. I was wearing gloves, oh, like, Oh, is he the Loch Ness monster? Like, What's going on here?

He just headed out to sea, like, just what do you mean?

Police searched the water for hours and they couldn't find anybody in there. And they showed the clothing that they did find. They showed it to Olga for identification and she said, No, like, that's not his, so it was just a random, unrelated incident and this just goes away.

And I'm like, where's that man that just went out to sea in his underwear? Like, are we all just forgetting that that happened? Or like, did that even happen? Or did the guy just leave some clothes there? That's such a strange story to tell, very strange.

But and I mean, it did happen because there was clothing found. yeah, they found the guy's clothing, like the same clothing that this man had described. Weird. Now, on January 3rd, Olga's condition took a turn for the worst.

Oh, no, she had actually had to have her leg amputated and it left her in what doctors said was a fight for her life. Oh, no.

That same morning, Pearl Lusk appeared in General Sessions Court, which was a court mostly for misdemeanors. At the time, she was sobbing like beside herself, cause she's like, How the fuck did I find myself in this situation? Yeah.

And she was explaining to them I was just a pawn in Al Rocco's plan. And she's like, I genuinely believed. His story about being a private investigator in pursuit of a jewel thief. Yeah, I literally did. And the assistant district Attorney, Jacob Grumet, noted that investigators did believe Pearl was telling the truth, that none of them believed she was lying.

But they said they wanted her held as a material witness because when they captured Rocco, Hopefully, who he referred to as an arch fiend, an arch fiend, they wanted her to be there as a material witness. So the judge agreed.

Okay, it's like, yeah. And set Pearl's bail at $10,000 and then remanded her into the custody of the Florence Crittenden Crittenden Home, which was a home for unwed mothers. Interesting, but I think that's just where they were like, because they were like, we got to keep track of you.

Because I could see why they would want to keep her, because she would want to get as far away from this shit as possible. And you want to hear exactly what this guy told you, right? Tell me more, tell me more.

Yeah, did you get very far, like, what happened here? And so detectives finally figured out what their job title was at this point, and they started working to find Al Rocco.

So imagine that good job, fantastic, because now that, you know, he actually almost killed Olga. Now's the time to do their job. I think, yeah.

Once somebody is almost dead, yeah. They questioned several people and they all said, like acquaintances, people they thought might've seen him. And they all said they had not seen or heard from Al Rocco. In weeks, I bet.

Now, the big break came on January 6th. When a neighbor. And this is this story is a little hard to follow. Okay, so I'll do my best. Al is a little hard to follow, I guess, truly.

So a neighbor of Al Rocco's first cousin, so his cousin's neighbor, yes, reported his car had been stolen by a man who introduced himself as Alan Lamonte.

Okay. According to the neighbor, Dominic Rizzo, the man introduced himself as a friend of Mrs Rizzo's brother, James. Capozoli I think it is Capozoli, Capozoli.

So he's saying he knows this guy. Dominic's wife's brother got it, and her sister's, cousin's, best friend's brother twice removed. Exactly now. Alan Lamonte explained he had recently come into possession of a large number of tools, with instructions to give them to James Capozoli.

Okay, but the tools were in Cairo, which is a small town in the Catskills. I know I thought Egypt, I was like, he's going all the way to Egypt now.

I also thought that, right your face, I was like, you thought the same thing? I sure did. I was like, this motherfucker is borrowing your car to go to Egypt.

This is just a small town in the Catskills. So. And he said his car had broken down so he had no way of getting there. So I need your help. So Mrs Rizzo, Dominic's wife, called her brother James, who said quote he'd be delighted to have the tools, although he did not remember Lamonte.

He was like, Sounds awesome, I don't know this guy, but like, I'll take the tools, oh my God. And despite her brother having no memory of the man claiming to be Alan Lamonte, the Rizzos. Dominic and his wife invited him to dinner and then the next morning, they drove him out to Cairo.

So they all got there a little after 1230 p.m. and they stopped for lunch at a local diner. And Alan Lamonte finished first. So he told the couple the tools were just a few blocks away and he's like, why don't you finish your coffee? And I'll just take the car to go get the tools. Come on.

And they were like, Absolutely wow. Alan Lamonte, go right ahead, imagine being that.

Yeah, just take my vehicle, imagine being that pure, take my whole ass vehicle. Yeah, just go right ahead.

When two hours passed and there was still no sign of Alan Lamonte or their car, Dominic Rizzo called the state police and reported the car stolen. I can't believe it took them two hours and this is when they figured out that the driver was not Alan Lamonte, it was in fact Al Rocco. Whoa.

And it was because Mrs Rizzo identified him from a smug shot.

Now, a short time later, State Police picked up Rocco's trail as he passed through Prattsville, and they began to chase him, leading in the direction of a town called Oneonta. Yes, correct, I did it right now. More than 50 state troopers and two New York City detectives were pursuing Rocco that evening, and eventually they ran him into the woods near Gilboa. It was there that he abandoned Rizzo's car along the side of the road.

And they also found out that earlier that evening, he had actually forced his way into a home, a home of Mr. and Mrs. Leroy Lewis. And he held the couple at gunpoint and demanded they feed him, and they told him, and apparently he told them he planned to quote. Remain there indefinitely.

Oh, sure, come on in. Which is not something you want to hear from someone holding you at gunpoint. You want to be like, No, I'd like you to leave as quickly as possible, yeah.

Like, leave yesterday, thank you. And he told the couple, I've got to stay. I was framed, I'd be like, you've got to go.

Now, despite saying he was going to stay there indefinitely and that he had to stay. After just a few hours, he just changed his mind and fled into the woods. They were like, Godspeed, they were like, I'm going to contact someone, I'm going to call someone. So, state troopers reached their farmhouse this couple about a half hour after he had left.

And the couple said, He went that away, he went to that away. Following his trail into the woods, they did eventually find Al Rocco. He was sleeping, he was hiding in a sleeping bag near a large tree, pretty near the farmhouse.

And they ordered him to surrender, when he immediately refused, immediately fought back, so he refuses to surrender. And a trooper fires a warning shot. And then demanded him come out, and they shouted, Come on out, you skunk.

That's what they yelled at him, incredibly. And instead of being the skunk that he was and coming out, he drew his gun and he fired four times in the direction of the troopers. This ballsy motherfucker, you know, that's not going to go over well.

So the troopers returned fire in what the New York Times described as a heavy barrage. So I don't think Al's coming out of this one. Spoiler alert I was going to say, bye, bye, Al. So. The shooting lasted nearly two minutes.

And when it finally came to an end, Al Rocco was dead. One bullet had passed through his head, another through his chest. You're playing with fire. AL. Yeah, I play stupid games. So Rocco hadn't even made it completely out of his sleeping bag.

And when detectives searched his body, they found $62.

93 on him, in cash and in change. That's a good amount of money for back then. And they found two photographs, one of his ex-wife, OlgA Yeah.

And the other of a girl, that's state Police Inspector Charles Laforge. Laforge refused to identify because, quote he did not wish to hurt this girl. What? I have so many questions, here are my questions.

One who didn't wish to hurt this girl, the state trooper didn't want to hurt her. By releasing her identity or two, you are somehow implying or inferring that Al didn't want to hurt this girl. How the fuck do you know that? He tried to kill his ex-wife on 65 different occasions?

The way I take that is that the state trooper didn't want to hurt her, like, didn't want to upset her. Yeah, but who the fuck is that? Like, I need what two photographs on him, and you're not going to tell me who that other photogra also, she should probably know.

Do you think it was Pearl? I hope she knows. I don't think so. He probably wouldn't have a photo of her. I mean, he's a stalker, he might.

But like, cameras were like, you know, not easy, what? So? like, Who's this other girl? Yeah. And what was the plan there?

That's freaky, deaky, man, I gotta know, but we'll never know. But later that day, detectives informed Olga of Al Rocca's death and the Catskills. And then she said, R..i...d.

She began to laugh heartily, Laugh good for Olga, Honestly. After everything she'd fucking been through. Oh yeah, she deserved to laugh.

She did, and then she began to sob, and she said, At last, I'll be able to get a good night's rest, yeah, which I don't blame her.

And when Olga's family heard the news, they were also pretty pleased with the outcome, Olga's brother Salvatore said. I heard the wonderful news just as I was leaving the hospital. I never felt better than I do now because my family and I, as well as Olga, have been worried, sick about her safety. As long as he was walking around, yeah, and it's true.

He terrorized that family, no one was doing anything. Yeah, he terrorized that family, and the police did fucking nothing to help them.

Because that's the thing. He also shot into their home, he could have hurt anyone, he could have killed anybody in that. You don't know if there's kids in that home or what.

Like, you could have killed anybody, truly, he was so far beyond. And then to involve this poor young girl, to kill someone, to try to kill someone, he's sick.

Like, he's a sick fuck, yeah, bye. Al rest in distress now. Days after the shooting. Al's body was claimed from the Bundy funeral home in upstate New York by his uncle, Philip Rocco, who returned the body to Brooklyn.

And after his death? Judge James Wallace ordered that Pearl be released from custody after a grand jury declined to charge her in relation to the shooting. As she left the criminal courts building, Pearl told reporters I want to forget it all, I bet, and I don't blame her now. According to Pearl's mother, Stella, they were going to retrieve some of Pearl's belongings from her room at the boarding house. And then she was going to leave the city.

She was like, I'm taking her home now. After several weeks of recovery, following having her leg amputated on her way home from work, Olga was discharged from Roosevelt Hospital. And in February, she filed a claim against the Neat City of New York, demanding $200,000. It alleged that New York police failed to protect her. Quote at a time when the police knew she was in imminent danger of death at the hands of her criminal husband. In a statement to the press, her lawyer, Samuel Douglas, said.

To provide her with protection while she was on its subway system now. The city refused to pay the claim, and Olga filed a suit against them, eventually taking the case to the State Supreme Court. Finally, in April 1953, the State Supreme Court ruled in favor of the city. I did not see that one coming.

I didn't think you would, they said.

That's a bunch of bullshit. The court said they were sympathetic to what had happened. No, you're not. The justices defended their decision, though, saying.

Other than the fact that he previously tried to shoot her in that city, he kidnapped her and tortured her in that city. There's also the fact that she literally walked up to one of your subway guards and asked for protection, and they said, No, thank you, ma'am, good luck.

Correct? So there's that, like, blatant City should have protected her, didn't that? subway guard literally said, Get lost. There's a whole laundry list of ways that they didn't protect her.

Now, luckily, in the years that followed, Pearl and Olga became friends. I wanted to hear that so bad. They would get together whenever they could. Aww. And after leaving the city, Pearl married and eventually had children.

Olga stayed in the city, she made a nice living for herself, designing and selling costume, jewelry. And Al Rocco is still dead. That's good, didn't rise.

I'm glad that Pearl, he did not rise, but Pearl and Olga came together, and Olga was like, Girl, it's okay, like we both met this asshole. We both believed what he said.

Holy shit, you know, like, and Olga? I'm like, what a bad bitch. Just kept on going. And that she was like, you know what girl? I know that like, he's a dick, he's a manipulative dick.

And I know he manipulated you into thinking that you weren't doing what you were doing. I also kind of love the irony that she became a jewelry maker, that is kind of fun, that's fun, that is fun.

Also, imagine if your mom was Pearl Lusk and she just whips that one out at the dinner table, like, she's like, Oh, and one time I shot a lady by accident carrying a Christmas package. One time I got tricked into becoming an assassin. You want to hear that one, kids?

You want to hear that story? I'd be like, Yeah, I do. She's like, you ever heard of two truths and a lie like, Hell, yeah, I do.

Damn, it's, it's a wild, wild tale, that's a doozy. I'm so glad. Some twists and turns.

I'm so glad Olga didn't die. Like, it's horrible that she had to have her leg amputated. Like, to have that taken away from you is awful, but could you imagine one she died would be tragic in and of itself? Yeah.

And then Pearl has to live with that for the rest of her life. Like, I'm so glad that didn't happen. Yeah, exactly. And Dave had noted when he was looking up stuff about this that he found this photo of when Pearl was initially taken into custody. Like, right after the incident, yeah.

There's this like kind of famous photo of her and the detective, and they're like smiling at the camera and it looks almost like a wedding photo. It's like, the strangest thing. Do you have it?

I don't have it up right now, but I will post it because it's just like a strange, my god, very strange photo, very strange situation.

What a time to be alive. Truly, it's this story I just cannot. I cannot fathom it. No, I never expected any of the things that came from this story. And it's so sad because Olga's like this beautiful gal.

Yeah, she had her whole life ahead of her, and she still did. But it's like now she's got to deal with the aftermath of this. Because of some asshole seriously that she met for and dated for a year.

And because New York City did literally nothing to help her, wow, absolutely nothing, holy shit. There's also a really great photo of, um, Olga being brought out of the hospital.

Is she cheesin? and she's cheesin for the camera? Her hair is done, her makeup is done, she looks like a 40s goddess.

Like it is, it's a great one and she's got like flowers on her lap. It's just a cool picture. There's also one of her later where she's like, all dolled up, um, and she's got like, fancy like shoes and stuff on.

She looks great. Oh yeah, she's, she's a bad bitch. Holy Cannoli Olga forever.

I'm looking at this Pearl Lusk, Oh my god, why is she cheesin, right? It's just a very strange.

I think she just had no fucking clue. Wow, yeah, it's literally like there's a photo, we'll post one of these, because it's just I, I don't even know how to like. They're both literally in the back of the car, the detective and Pearl, and they're both just looking at the camera. Like, they just got married, like I, if you told me this is a right after they got married photo, I'd be like, Yes, what an adorable couple.

Wow, they look so happy together. Wow, this is. I've never heard a story quite like this. It's a really wild one.

That's wild. Yeah, for sure. truly wild. Oh my gosh.

Olga is a fucking queen, she really is. look at that hair, she truly is wow.

She's gorgeous, she's a queen. Even the guy that's wheeling her out is just like, Meh, everyone's happy, you know? everyone's just happy to be here.

Unreal, but that is the truly wild story of the attempted murder of Olga Rocco. It sure was, yeah, so we hope that you keep listening.

And we hope you keep it weird, but not so weird that you carry anything for anyone, especially if it's a Christmas package. Just say no, never carry anything for anyone, don't. That has always been my stance.

It remains my stance, just don't do it, especially like when don't. If some guy named Alan Larue asks you to do it, don't do it, nope.

Hey weirdos, I'm Alayna. Oh my God, I was like, Per quoi? I literally?....

You just sat there, went.

I was like, Is there a queue? I didn't know, we were doing a bit. I just wanna be you.

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