2024-05-16 00:45:06
<p>A mysterious drug overdose at a posh Pasadena hotel leads our host and LA Times investigative reporter, Paul Pringle, into Los Angeles’ darkest corridors of power and wealth. Pringle discovers that the dean of the University of Southern California's medical school is leading a secret double life. As Pringle and his team at the LA Times untangle a sordid web of lies, drugs, and greed, they encounter obstacles and resistance at every turn—from USC, law enforcement and even within their own organization. <em>Fallen Angels </em>explores how money and privilege can corrupt our most important institutions and destroy people's lives.</p> <p><em>Fallen Angels: A Story of California Corruption is based on Pringle’s book, Bad City: Peril & Power in the City of Angels.</em></p>
Hi, it's Andrea Gunning, the host of Betrayal. I'm excited to announce that the Betrayal podcast is expanding. We are going to be releasing episodes weekly, every Thursday. Each week you'll hear brand new stories, firsthand accounts of shocking deception, broken trust, and the trail of destruction left behind. Listen to Betrayal Weekly on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
I'm John Walczak, host of the new podcast, Missing in Arizona. And I'm Robert Fisher, one of the most wanted men in the world. We cloned his voice using AI. In 2001,. police say I killed my family and rigged my house to explode.
Before escaping into the wilderness.
Police believe he is alive and hiding somewhere.
Join me. I'm going down in the cave. As I track down clues. I'm going to call the police and have you removed.
Hunting. One of the most dangerous fugitives in the world.
Robert Fisher. Do you recognize my voice? Listen to Missing in Arizona every Wednesday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your favorite shows.
Back in 96, Atlanta was booming with excitement around hosting the Centennial Olympic Games. And then, a deranged zealot willing to kill for a cause lit a fuse that would change my life and so many others forever. Rippling out for generations.
Listen to Flashpoint on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
In the early morning hours of September 6, 2016,, St. Louis rapper and activist Darren Seals was found murdered.
You know what they're going to learn? I don't want for death, I don't want for nothing.
Every day, Darren would tell her,
Alright, Ma, be prepared. They are going to try to kill me.
All episodes available now. Listen to After the Uprising, The Murder of Darren Seals on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Content warning. This episode features topics related to sexual assault and abuse, as well as struggles with drug addiction. For those in search of help, there are resources in our show. notes for today's episode.
Fire Department on 26.
. Baby not breathing.
He was just found like this by his parents. I don't know. He called me crying.
On October 5, 2017, Dory orders three-week-old baby, a boy named Boaz, stops breathing. And the man who calls it in, the man on that 911 call, is Carmen Pugliafito.
When I found out that Pugliafito was the one to call 911, I just almost broke down.
That's Dora's sister, Miriam Jones.
Because it's just so painfully obvious that he is responsible for my sister's drug habit. And at this point, I found out that Sarah Warren and others who were involved with him were addicted to drugs. And I just could not believe that nothing was being done about this. No one cared.
Pugliafito tells the paramedics that Dora is his, quote, girlfriend. Like Sarah Warren, he's been subsidizing her lifestyle with money and drugs in exchange for sex. The reporting team at the LA Times, Matt, Sarah, Harriet, Adam, and me, had learned about Dora Yoder during our reporting on Sarah Warren. Dora was one of a number of young people in Pugliafito's circle. But when we learn of the baby's death, we have questions.
How exactly did this three-week-old boy die? Why was Pugliafito the one to make the call? And finally, if he's involved in this tragedy, will Pugliafito finally face justice?
My name is Paul Pringle, and this is Fallen Angels. This is Episode 8, Bad Doctors.
I got a text one day, and I was, like, standing in my, like, front yard doing some kind of, like, yard work or something. And the text was just, like, their baby died.
Reporter Harriet Ryan.
I think the first reaction we had is just all feeling, like, guilt, and just, should we have done something more? But then we, just, you know, started going into reporter mode.
We'd done a lot of door-knocking of associates of Pugliafito, including Dora Yoder. And she hadn't talked to us, but being out in that area, we had developed some sources.
I remember kind of frantically checking the L.
A. County Coroner's website, looking for a baby with the last name, Yoder. And there it was, that this infant had died. And it was, like, a holy shit moment. It's like, oh my, like, how could this happen?
Matt Hamilton.
I remember, immediately filing a bunch of public records requests for everything about Dora. Yoder. Calls for service. So I did that for Dora at all her addresses and got a bunch of records within a few weeks. One was a call from Dora's father, Menno Yoder, a few years prior.
Altonia Sheriff's Station, can I help you?
I would like to make a report on my daughter.
Okay.
And my daughter's been known to do drugs, and she's involved with a doctor that's also known to do drugs. Last Saturday night, my daughter left, and we haven't seen or talked to her since. But the doctor keeps showing up at the house and telling us she's at a motel someplace. And what she's doing at a motel, if that's true, but we just don't know. This is all coming from this doctor that she's involved with.
And I got his name.
He's an eye doctor.
Dora's father, Menno, had made these calls when the family was trying to get polio-feto out of Dora's life. After it had become clear to them, he was supplying her with drugs and had gotten her hooked on meth.
And then the other was the 911 call from the morning. the baby died. Baby not breathing. Yes, baby not breathing. And, like, as soon as it played, I remember hearing polio-feto's voice.
And it was the same voice I heard in those videos, he and Sarah Warren using drugs. It was just like, oh my gosh, that's polio-feto. I can still hear him saying, baby not breathing. Like, it was very calm, clinical. That phrase has stuck with me, because it's like, if a child was dead, I think you'd put it in more personal terms, but it was like, baby not breathing, in a very direct, calm, almost composed way.
And those recordings are playing at my desk, and I'm like, oh my God. They took my breath away.
Now, in L.
A. County, you don't know why someone died for several months, sometimes, because the toxicology reports take forever. I mean, up to six to eight months. And, frankly, the coroner didn't know how the baby died.
While the police are still waiting for the coroner's toxicology report, Miriam and her family are already convinced that polio-feto is accountable for what happened.
I learned about this from my parents. They called to tell me that Dora's baby died. Just from the day this happened, I knew he was directly or indirectly responsible for this baby's death.
My sister, according to medical records, was not on drugs when she had the baby. She had the baby in a hospital. When she left the hospital, the baby was healthy. She left the hospital and stayed with Ariel's parents' house in Sherman Oaks.
Ariel Franco is Dora's boyfriend, the baby's father.
The baby was at a checkup two days before this baby died, and it was healthy. There were no drugs. And remember, at this point, polio-feto had not met. the baby, had not been in the hospital, had not been near this baby.
Ariel said that polio-feto insisted she come to the house by herself.
He wanted to meet the baby and all of this stuff, and she agreed. So she took the baby, went by herself to her Altadena house, the house polio-feto pays for, and by morning, she's on drugs and the baby's dead.
At that point, we were one of the only people to have put together some of the dots in the situation and connected some of them. So we're like, how do we approach Dora's family, or do we approach Dora's family? We hadn't done any outreach to the Yoders, but in researching her family, we realized that our colleague at the newspaper had written about Dora's older sister years prior. And Dora's older sister was a hairdresser, and she had been profiled in the LA Times about being former Amish, now being a hairdresser in Los Angeles. Miriam had had a great experience in working with the LA Times before.
She answered the phone, and she's like, yes, like, oh my God. She had almost been waiting for the call, it seemed, but she just was ready to talk.
And I felt like this was The Warrens Part II, in a sense, of just another family recognizing polio-feto's influence in their sister or daughter's life and are kind of powerless for how to extricate their loved one.
The 911 call and this conversation with Miriam are the basis for our first story about Boaz Yoder. It runs in January 2018..
The first story we did was really just to kind of point out what we did now, which was, you have the 911 call, you have polio-feto's in the picture, he's paying the rent, and that Dora's sister is kind of pushing authorities to investigate.
Two months later, the coroner's toxicology report confirms what Miriam and her family have suspected. There was meth in the baby's body.
Hi, it's Andrea Gunning, host of Betrayal. I'm excited to announce that the Betrayal podcast is expanding. We are going to be releasing episodes weekly, every Thursday. Each week, you'll hear brand new stories, firsthand accounts of shocking deception, broken trust, and the trail of destruction left behind. Stories about regaining a sense of safety, a handle on reality, after your entire world is flipped upside down.
From unbelievable romantic betrayals.
. The love that was so real for me was always just a game for him. ...to betrayals in your own family...
When I think about my dad, oh, well, he is a sociopath.
financial betrayal.
This is not even the part where he steals millions of dollars.
and life-or-death deceptions.
She's practicing how she's going to cry when the police calls her after they kill me.
Listen to Betrayal Weekly on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
I'm John Walczak, host of the new podcast, Missing in Arizona. And I'm Robert Fisher, one of the most wanted men in the world. We cloned his voice using AI. In 2001,. police say I killed my family.
First mom, then the kids. And rigged my house to explode. In a quiet suburb. This is the Beverly Hills of the Valley. Before escaping into the wilderness.
There was sleet and hail and snow coming down. They found my wife's SUV. Right on the reservation boundary. And my dog flew.
All I could think of is he's going to sniper me out of some tree.
But not me.
Police believe he is alive and hiding somewhere.
For two years. They won't tell you anything. I've traveled the nation. I'm going down in the cave. Tracking down clues.
They were thinking that I picked him up and took him somewhere. If you keep asking me this, I'm going to call the police and have you removed.
Searching for Robert Fisher.
One of the most dangerous fugitives in the world.
Do you recognize my voice? Join...
An exploding house.
The hunt. Family annihilation. Today.
And a disappearing act.
Listen to Missing in Arizona every Wednesday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your favorite shows.
It started with a backpack at the 1996 Centennial Olympic Games. A backpack that contained a bomb. While the authorities focused on the wrong suspect, a serial bomber planned his next attacks. Two abortion clinics. And a lesbian bar.
But this isn't his story. It's a human story. One that I've become entangled with.
I saw, as soon as I turned the corner, basically someone bleeding out.
The victims of these brutal attacks were left to pick up the pieces. Forced to explore the gray areas between right and wrong. Life and death. Their once ordinary lives, and mine, changed forever.
It kind of gave me a feeling of pending doom.
And all the while, our country found itself facing down a long and ugly reckoning with a growing threat. Far-right, homegrown, religious terrorism. Listen to Flashpoint on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
New from Double Asterisk and iHeart Podcasts, a 10-part true crime podcast series.
Emergency 911.
There's a fire in my parking lot. This car is on fire.
In the early morning hours of September 6, 2016,, St. Louis rapper and iconic Ferguson activist, Darren Seals, was found shot dead.
Every day, Darren would tell her, they are going to try to kill me.
A young man in 2016 was killed on this block.
I'm a podcast journalist.
And I'm a former state senator, Maria Chappell-Nadal. I was in the movement with Darren, and I've spent two years with co-host, Ray Novoshelsky, investigating his death.
Even if I did want to tell you something, that's a dangerous game to play. The FBI did this to myself. They've been following him for months. That's enough proof right there.
All episodes available now. Listen to After the Uprising, Season 2, The Murder of Darren Seals, on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
So now the L.
A. County Sheriff's Department opens an investigation with the D.A.'s office into Pullio Fito.
There was a criminal investigation, a homicide investigation, opened up into this incident with Boaz. Because I went to the homicide department, and I gave a statement for almost three hours about everything I knew about Pullio Fito and my sister. And R.A.L. How he gives her drugs, how he monitors her, about how he gives R.A.L. drugs, and they agreed to investigate further.
In the face of a homicide investigation, Pullio Fito starts to feel real heat. He hires a law firm and claims he never gave drugs to Dora Yoder. And he threatens the L.A. Times with a libel lawsuit. He also tries another attack to intimidate the witnesses.
Only a month or two after the investigation began, I received some strange visitors at my house. And they didn't identify themselves fully, except by name. They didn't say who they worked for or that they were private investigators. They just simply said they had some questions for me, and they started asking me questions about baby's death. I told them the same thing.
I told the sheriff's department.
And I figured it out when they were asking me questions that they were clearly working for Pullio Fito. And I told them to leave and never come back. And at that end of the conversation, they left and instead approached my family. And they literally provided my parents with a completed written statement for them to sign. The statement was obviously in favor of Pullio Fito.
The entire story of everything that happened.
Dora's parents won't sign the statement. And based on the suspicion that Pullio Fito was the source of the meth in Boas' bloodstream, L.A. County sheriff homicide, detectives begin building a case for involuntary manslaughter.
But the detectives have one big problem. Dora won't say anything to implicate Pullio Fito. She won't testify whether he provided the meth. She won't say whether he was using drugs with her the night before the baby's death. And Pullio Fito himself isn't any more forthcoming.
He did acknowledge that he had gone to Dora's apartment the night before to see the baby. But he claimed that he saw no drug use. And that in the morning, he said he was at home with his wife in Pasadena when Dora had called him. And that his first instinct was to call 911..
And that after the call, he said he drove over to her apartment. But it was swarming with EMTs. So he kept driving.
But when the coroner rules on the cause of death, it's not a drug poisoning, despite the fact that there was meth in the baby's system. It's deemed a, quote, accidental asphyxiation caused by the blankets in the crib. Methamphetamine exposure from breast milk is listed as a, quote, contributing condition, but not related to the immediate cause of death.
But Matt and Harriet discovered that the deputy medical examiner who conducted the autopsy had changed her ruling after learning that the Times was asking questions. Initially, she had determined the cause of death was inconclusive. But now, it's an accident.
I mean, a baby doesn't just have meth in its system.
It was 50 nanograms per milliliter of meth in the baby's body, which is not super high.
There's not a lot of studies that are done. It was a very tiny amount, and it wasn't enough for them to determine that it played a role in the death. So they have never charged anybody.
There was also a burn on Boaz's hand. I know, like, kids get, like, injuries generally. But, I mean, there was a burn on the baby's hand. And Yoder had told investigators that her 18-day-old infant had reached out and touched a hot pan. And that's how he got the burn.
This retired pathologist had told us that, in his view, the burn that was described to him was from more than just touching something hot.
Dennis Kilcoyne was a homicide detective with the LAPD for 36 years. He investigated high-profile cases like the serial killer Grim Sleeper and the Black Widow murders. He's worked extensively with medical examiners. We were required to, as part of our investigation, required to attend the autopsies. And because that was deemed to be a continuation of your crime scene investigation,
because you would gather information from the body and the wounds, and this and that,
and recovery of bullets from the body and that type of stuff. I've never heard of a baby dying of asphyxiation because of too many blankets put on them. Not blankets put over their face. Blankets wading down their chest cavity is what they're claiming. That seems pretty off the wall to me.
There shouldn't be methamphetamine traces in any kid's body. It's something that shouldn't be there. You know, any more than rat poison should be there. You've got a baby that's got meth in its system.
You've got a baby that has about a week-old burn injury to his left hand. And the mother's story with that is that she has the baby in some type of a wrap that holds the baby close to the mother's chest.
And she said, well, when she had the baby in this wrap up against her that the baby reached for a hot pan.
Well, I've got a handful of kids myself, and I've never seen any baby at 20 days old reach for anything.
The former detective is also skeptical about the fact that the deputy medical examiner had changed her conclusion about the cause of death. I never had a case where that happened.
The detectives, after they told me what the medical examiner ruled and told me the D.
A. can't file charges, the detectives were, in my opinion, genuinely upset. They felt, just like I did, that all the evidence pointed to poliofeto. They made it clear that they referred this to the D.A. as a homicide and that poliofeto should be charged, at minimum, with manslaughter.
The D.
A. would not budge because of the medical examiner's ruling. And so they were very upset.
I would guarantee you that the prominence of this doctor and USC and all that stuff had 100 percent had something to do with it. If this was Joe Blow's kid, Joe Blow probably would have been in jail right now.
He just danced through the raindrops, as they say, and it's just, it's maddening.
In poliofeto's medical board hearing, he denies ever giving drugs to anyone. And he lies about his relationship with Dora.
He was asked under oath about his relationship with Dora Yoder. And the prosecutor asks him, you know, she's a known drug user, right? And his response is, I don't know what her current status is. And the prosecutor says, but you have use with her, correct? And he says, no, I have not.
And he initially said that he had no firsthand knowledge of Yoder's drug use, but acknowledges eventually that he knew of her addiction. He's paying for her apartment, but denies he's a sugar daddy and describes himself as her health care consultant. So he situated himself in this under oath as kind of a practicing Catholic who is trying to help a young mother save her unborn baby's life.
But after hearing the testimony of the Warrens, Don Stokes, and Devon Kahn, the medical board has had enough. It strips poliofeto of his medical license. For now, at least, he won't be able to practice medicine in the state of California. For Miriam, it's not enough. Poliofeto is still in her sister's life, paying for drugs and her silence.
And he's dangerous.
Poliofeto is paying for her things to keep her from talking to the police. That's the only explanation. And when it becomes too inconvenient for him, she might conveniently overdose on drugs. It's only a matter of time. And because of their inaction, because the DA's office refuses to take any action, I wrote them this email and I explained to them that you're letting him murder my sister.
Because if she dies, who's to say that he didn't murder her? Because look what he's done.
Hi, it's Andrea Gunning, host of Betrayal. I'm excited to announce that the Betrayal podcast is expanding. We are going to be releasing episodes weekly, every Thursday. Each week, you'll hear brand new stories, firsthand, accounts of shocking deception, broken trust, and the trail of destruction left behind. Stories about regaining a sense of safety, a handle on reality after your entire world is flipped upside down.
From unbelievable romantic betrayals. The love that was so real for me was always just a game for him. To betrayals in your own family.
When I think about my dad, oh, well, he is a sociopath.
Financial betrayal.
This is not even the part where he steals millions of dollars.
And life or death deceptions.
She's practicing how she's going to cry when the police calls her after they kill me.
Listen to Betrayal Weekly on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
They found my wife's SUV.
Right on the reservation boundary.
And my dog flew.
All I could think of is he's going to sniper me out of some tree.
But not me. Police believe he is alive and hiding somewhere. For two years. They won't tell you anything. I've traveled the nation.
I'm going down in the cave. Tracking down clues.
They were thinking that I picked him up and took him somewhere.
If you keep asking me this, I'm going to call the police and have you removed. Searching for Robert Fisher.
One of the most dangerous fugitives in the world.
Do you recognize my voice?
Join An Exploding House.
The Hunt. Family Annihilation. Today. And A Disappearing Act. Listen to Missing in Arizona every Wednesday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your favorite shows.
It started with a backpack at the 1996 Centennial Olympic Games. A backpack that contained a bomb. While the authorities focused on the wrong suspect, a serial bomber planned his next attacks. Two abortion clinics. And a lesbian bar.
But this isn't his story. It's a human story. One that I've become entangled with.
I saw, as soon as I turned the corner, basically someone bleeding out.
The victims of these brutal attacks were left to pick up the pieces. Forced to explore the gray areas between right and wrong. Life and death. Their once ordinary lives, and mine, changed forever.
It kind of gave me a feeling of pending doom.
And all the while, our country found itself facing down a long and ugly reckoning with a growing threat. Far-right, homegrown, religious terrorism. Listen to Flashpoint on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
New from Double Asterisk. An iHeart Podcast. A 10-part true crime podcast series.
Emergency 911.
There's a fire in my parking lot. This car is on fire.
In the early morning hours of September 6, 2016,, St. Louis rapper and iconic Ferguson activist, Darren Seals, was found shot dead.
Every day, Darren would tell her, they are going to try to kill me.
A young man in 2016 was killed on this block.
I'm a podcast journalist.
And I'm a former state senator, Maria Chappell-Nadal. I was in the movement with Darren, and I've spent two years with co-host, Ray Novoshelsky, investigating his death.
Even if I did want to tell you something, that's a dangerous game to play. The FBI did this to my son. They've been following him for months. That's enough proof right there.
All episodes available now. Listen to After the Uprising, Season 2, The Murder of Darren Seals, on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
One thing is different at the L.
A. Times. As the reporters keep working on the Yoder story, the top editors are fully on board for the investigation.
Obviously, the story was scrutinized, edited, vetted for legal risk, but ultimately, we were able to publish with a reasonable amount of time.
And it turns out, we're going to need their support. It's February, 2018.. Harriet Ryan is in the newsroom at the L.A. Times.
It's actually related to the baby case a little bit, because I was sitting at my desk. I have a phone on my desk. When I looked down, it was from a block number, and the police always call on block numbers. And because I was working this baby death story, I was like, it might be one of those guys. So I picked it up, and it ended up being this tip about George Tyndall.
This is how reporting works. A hotel manager happens to meet a photographer who works for the Times and tells him he has a tip. The photographer comes to me. We report and report, find documents, get witnesses on the record, and ultimately publish an expose about a powerful doctor using drugs to control the lives of young women. And that leads us to this guy, Dr.
George Tyndall. If USC had problems with polio-feto, Tyndall is a liability on a whole other level.
The person asked if we could speak confidentially and did not give their name, did not, like, explain who they were, and just said, like, I know you guys have been writing a lot about USC. I really encourage you to look into Dr. George Tyndall.
I was, like, asking a bunch of questions. Who is he? I think? they told me he was at the Student Health Center, and then the person was just like, I'll call you back. They, just, like, wouldn't give me their number.
So, yeah, so I started Googling George Tyndall. I saw that he had been a gynecologist at the Student Health Clinic, and that alarmed me, because, I mean, that's if it's, like, somebody who's the manager of the bookstore, like, who cares, you know? But, like, yeah, that's a very sensitive job.
When the tipster calls back and describes Tyndall as a, quote, creepy gynecologist, Harriet digs in more. She learns that the doctor, who's still licensed, actually doesn't work for USC anymore, but apparently he's trying to get his old job back.
He was trying to return to USC at the time. The person that had called me was very concerned that he might be working someplace else.
Harriet came over to Paul and me shortly afterward, and Harriet's not someone who's rattled, but there was something about the call that rattled her. I remember her telling us that the fear in the person's voice was just very palpable and memorable, and she was taken aback by that level of caution and hesitancy, because all this person was saying was, look at Dr. Tyndall and why he left the university.
We started working, looking at court records. He didn't really have any lawsuits against him, nothing as far as USC.
We looked at databases across the United States, at court systems across the U.
S. We really found nothing. Usually there's some sort of indicator in the public record that there's some smoke and potentially some fire, and we found none of that.
Dr. Tyndall had a clean medical board record. I couldn't find any evidence of him having kids. There was a woman who appeared to be his wife. Her name's Daisy Patricio, and she showed up on a lot of public records.
So I did call the DMV and wanted a list of all vehicles Dr. Tyndall owned, and I remember two or three coming back. And the license plate on one of the vehicles was COEDDOC. And when the DMV tells you this, they don't pronounce it like that. They say each letter.
So they're like C-Charlie-O-E-D-D-O-C. And I'm like, wait, that says COEDDOC? So that was one of the early indicators. that was just, like, how many gynecologists on a college campus would call themselves COEDDOC? It was a little alarming.
We also wanted to talk to people that worked around Dr. Tyndall.
On LinkedIn, we would use the Wayback Machine, archive.
org, for the roster of the student health clinic to figure out not just who was working there now, but who had worked there and quit. You know, dating back, like, a decade. We would focus on, you know, specific people that maybe were more likely to know. And then we would just, like, go into Nexus or Votoregs, figure out what that person's address was, put their address under their name. And then we would just start out in the morning, and either my Pontiac Five or Matt had this, like, orange car.
It was, like, bright orange, and people would always be like, oh, yeah, I saw the orange car. And we would just go. Like, we'd just go all day.
It's painstaking work, and it's frustrating. No one they approach will talk about Dr. George Tyndall. Until someone finally does.
Once this house, and it had, like, a, one of those L.
A.
, like, metal screens that people got after Charles Manson. So it's, like, they open their door, but there's still this, like, rough metal screen. You can't see the person. They can see you, but you can't see them. And it was, like, near the airport, so it was really loud.
It was the first time we'd, like, aggressively made our pitch to somebody to talk. And it was, like, me and Matt were standing there. You're asking this person to take a huge risk to talk to you, to even just, like, open their door to you. It costs them their job, their livelihood. And I was just trying to make the case that it was worth it.
And it seemed like I was talking for, like, 10 minutes straight, but it was probably only a few minutes. And then there was, like, a long pause, and then the person just opened the door. And we sat down at the kitchen table, and they were, like, a firsthand witness to Dr. Tyndall. And they just laid it out.
And they were, like, I think he's been sexually assaulting women for years.
In October of 2012,, USC master's student Lucy Chee called the student health clinic to make a gynecology appointment, a routine visit. This is six years before Harriet and Matt first hear about Dr. George Tyndall.
When I made the appointment, I made it a point to ask for a female doctor. And I was told that I would have to wait weeks, maybe even up to a month, or I could see the male doctor the next day.
But when Lucy agreed to see the male doctor that day, she got an odd reaction from the receptionist handling the appointment.
At first, she was very matter-of-fact about what the scheduling would be like. And I said, okay, then I'll just see the male doctor. And she said, no, are you sure? And I said, yeah, that's fine. And then she said, are you sure?
You can wait. And I said, no, no, I'd rather not wait. So she was, it felt like to me. she was trying to encourage me to wait and see a female doctor.
Looking back, there were a lot of signs. I remember getting to the clinic and checking in. And the receptionist was smiling at me and we were talking about, you know, what a beautiful day it was. And then she saw who I was seeing and then she immediately started to frown. And she tried to schedule me for a different day to see a different doctor.
And I remember I was just like, you know, I just want to get this over with. I'll see him, it's fine.
I was waiting in a waiting area just outside of his office slash exam room. And I remember he opened the door and he gave me a really big smile. You know, I'm used to doctors being friendly, but detached, not with such a big smile. And I remember that being a little strange. He also locked the door for me.
He didn't close the privacy screen. And he made me change in front of him. And then, when I was changing in front of him, he turned to the side. But I could see that he was looking at me out of the corner of my eye. I could see his eyes looking.
And I remember thinking, I don't know what's going on. Let's just get this over with.
Tyndall then pointed to a map of China on the wall of the examination room.
He asked me about that after I was in the stirrups. He said, are you Chinese? Can you tell me what part of China you're from? You know, it's very strange. I mean, people know that usually there's like anatomy pictures or like brochures about diseases.
You know, not like a map of China on the wall.
He asked me if I'd ever modeled before, which to me is very strange. Because, being in L.A., I know what models look like. I don't look like a model. You know, I'm short. I have bad skin.
I'm like, I'm overweight.
Like, you know, I know what a model looks like. And I don't know why he's asking me that question. It's so strange.
It all felt off to Lucy. And once she was on the table, helpless, the doctor sexually assaulted her.
Tyndall told me that when he was examining me that he needed to relax my vaginal muscles. And I believed him. You know, I internalized it. I think I never wanted to allow myself to believe what he was doing was wrong. I think I was still very idealistic about doctors and the medical field in general.
And so I didn't allow myself to believe, you know, the things he was doing to me were wrong. He, you know, he made vague excuses for when he was assaulting me about how there was a medical necessity.
Then Lucy heard the voice of one of the nurses just outside the examination room.
She came when I was halfway through my exam and she was knocking on the door. She's yelling through the door saying, are you in there with a patient? Let me in. And immediately after I left the exam room, I remember just wanting to get away, as far away as possible. And there were so many female staff members.
I was just running down, you know, like a short hallway. And staff members were calling me from left and right, asking me if I was okay. Someone followed me out of the clinic to ask me if I was okay, to ask, if there was anything they could help me with.
There were actually several instances that, looking back, that I realized, oh, everyone knew.
It's not just the staff at the health clinic, the people who work with Tyndall, who knew what he did and had been doing for years. The more we investigate, the more it becomes clear. At the highest levels of leadership at USC, they knew.
Next time on Fallen Angels.
USC just has this, like, had this culture of, like, no bad news. Like, nobody wants to hear any bad news. Just solve the problem.
But USC could no longer avoid bad news.
It seemed like they were filibustering, to a certain extent. We needed him to see it was over.
And ugly truths are finally revealed.
USC was not the only university to have a doctor who preyed on women students.
But USC, again, is the worst. We're always going to have predators, but it's the good people who stand by and do nothing that allow them to flourish.
That's next time on Fallen Angels.
Fallen Angels, the story of California corruption, is a production of iHeart Podcast in partnership with Best Case Studios. I'm Paul Pringle. This show is based on my book, Bad City, Peril and Power in the City of Angels. Fallen Angels was written by Isabel Evans, Adam Pincus, and Brent Katz. Isabel Evans is our producer.
Brent Katz is co-producer. Associate producers are Hannah Leibowitz, Lockard and Anpaho Locke. Executive producers are me, Paul Pringle, Joe Piccarello, and Adam Pincus for Best Case Studios. Original music is by James Newberry. This episode was edited by Max Michael Miller with assistance from Nisha Venkat.
Additional editing, sound design, and additional music by Dean White. Harriet Ryan, Matt Hamilton, Sarah Parvini, and Adam Elmarek are consulting producers. Our iHeart team is Allie Perry and Carl Kadle. Follow and rate Fallen Angels wherever you get your podcasts.
Hi, it's Andrea Gunning, the host of Betrayal. I'm excited to announce that the Betrayal podcast is expanding. We are going to be releasing episodes weekly. every Thursday. Each week, you'll hear brand new stories, firsthand accounts of shocking deception, broken trust, and the trail of destruction left behind.
Listen to Betrayal Weekly on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
I'm John Walczak, host of the new podcast Missing in Arizona. And I'm Robert Fisher, one of the most wanted men in the world. We cloned his voice using AI. In 2001,. police say I killed my family and rigged my house to explode.
Before escaping into the wilderness.
Police believe he is alive and hiding somewhere.
Join me. I'm going down in the cave. As I track down clues. I'm going to call the police and have you removed.
Hunting. One of the most dangerous fugitives in the world.
Robert Fisher. Do you recognize my voice? Listen to Missing in Arizona every Wednesday on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your favorite shows.
Back in 96, Atlanta was booming with excitement around hosting the Centennial Olympic Games. And then a deranged zealot willing to kill for a cause lit a fuse that would change my life and so many others forever. Rippling out for generations.
Listen to Flashpoint on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
In the early morning hours of September 6, 2016,, St. Louis rapper and activist Darren Seals was found murdered.
That's what they're going to learn. I went for death. I went for nothing. Every day, Darren would tell her, all right, Ma, be prepared. They are going to try to kill me.
All episodes available now. Listen to After the Uprising, The Murder of Darren Seals on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
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