Episode 545: The Career Girl Murders (Part 2)

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 Alina, I'm Ash, and this is morbid.

And that's the computer, and that is life. Save it for the outtakes. Oh, I said that in my Send it to Daryl voice, and I'm wearing that sweatshirt.

Hey, look at that, hey, uh, so hey, what's going on? We just changed the lighting in this room because we got little fancy light bulbs, yeah.

On Mikey's recommendation, and that was a great recommendation that he had. Yeah, they're these cool light bulbs, and you can change them to different moods, yeah.

Right now, we're in peaceful. Yeah, earlier it was so dreamy, but I was like, it's a little too dreamy in here. I think I'm about to zzz off. It's because it's gloomy outside of Massachusetts today, which is delightful.

Yeah, always welcome, but you can't have too dreamy a mood when it's gloomy outside, or you'll just fall asleep, exactly. And we have a ton of candles lit and stuff.

So the vibe is right, it's hella cozy in here, and it smells like the witchiest shop you've ever walked into. It does. I just did some sage before that.

We did some palo Santo, we really cleansed our asses up in here.

Not like a, not like an enema, but like a I did. A spiritual enema. Yeah, there you go. a spiritual enema occurred in this room and we feel good. Yeah, yeah.

How do you feel today? Listener? How do you feel? let us know, listener?

Hello listeners, everybody listening was just like, What the fuck like, did we break up? like, are you dating someone else? why are you calling me listener?

Weirdo, weirdo, weirdo. How do you feel today? Listener? Who was that? In my body, it was a soul.

It was, it was a soul, it was, it was, it was.

What's happening? I don't know. I'm so tired. I had more end of the world anxiety last night, so I didn't sleep good.

Somebody, a couple people messaged me actually and were like, Ash. I felt crazy that I had end of the world anxiety until you said you had it and like, that made me feel better. So you are seen, you're all in this together, yeah.

I reached out to a therapist last night. It's true. And then me and Mikey were like, we will be very real with you and try to logic it to the other side. It really did help. So, you know, we try.

Thank you, we're all in this together guys, we're all just trying to get through the day. You know, couldn't have said it better myself.

Just trying to get to lunch, really. Yeah, and we did that and we did that.

Had some chicken fingers? We did. We had chicken fingers, all right, so we're okay.

Anyway, quick little side note What's up just before we start? Okay, Takis?

Controversial? What the fuck is up with those? I know? Weird out of the blue, but it's not if you were in my head or in the room.

I keep seeing people eating takis and I was like, Well, I love a strange snack, so like, let's do this. And usually they're, they're like, fiery, they're spicy, and I love a spicy moment.

And I've never had them. So today I said, I said to Mikey and Ash, I said I want Takis, and they said, Order Takis on Doordash. Why leave the house? We live in the 21st century.

You can have whatever you want, go get you some takis. So I did, I ordered one and I said, Oh, this is yummy, it's it's very artificial, but it's very spicy.

And I enjoy that you liked it. In the moment I had one bite and I was like, too spicy, too spicy.

I liked the spice, but I was like, Wow, this is extraordinarily artificial and I like Taco bell, so that's saying something. Yeah, that's the most artificial. But I was like, Okay, like, this is fine.

Within 10 minutes, I felt like I was going to throw up, yeah, for like 20 minutes, yeah, and I was like, Oh, I'm not going to eat Takis again.

And that's the thing. I'm not saying. Takis are like, poisonous or something, you know, like, I'm not trying to down Takis, they just aren't for me.

And I'm a little sad about it and I just wanted to share that with you guys. That's the thing. You were really excited to try them, yeah?

And I think I'm a little sad to know that my body has, like, a food boundary, a limit. Yeah, I've never met. I've never met that boundary before, and I just met it with Takis.

Do you remember when I met it with the Captain Crunch? Slurpee? Yes, we all know when you met it there, that was crazy. That was such a different time in my life where I was willing to put a 7-eleven Captain crunch slurpee that I bought for perhaps 90, maybe 89 cents.

It was blue, it was blue, it was the most artificial blue, and then let me tell you something, I was blue for quite some time.

You were green for a little while. Yep, yep, but yeah, it's a weird moment when you figure out, like, Oh, I can't just eat anything. Growing up is weird.

It's horrible, and again weird, because I love spice and I still like it. Just made me feel yucky for a little while. So I was like, Oh, maybe that was just a little too much, and that's the thing. It wasn't even like you ate them, like too fast or anything like that.

She just had a couple, she didn't even have that many really. But me and Takis were not Elena's taki journey, that was my taki journey.

And I just wanted to, you know, I just wanted to share that with you. Now you can't do the thing that they do on TikTok. Remember we were talking about it the other day with the pickle? I wanted to have you try that.

You wanted to have me try that? I love that. No, honestly, I wanted to try it. Until I had a TAKI and I was like, I don't like this, and then you're like, and I was like, But you, I want to have you try that.

It's a sad day when you meet your food limit, when you meet your maker. yeah, that is a sad day.

I thought it was happening for a second, but alas, I did not. I'm good now, though. Yeah, you look great. She dyed her hair darker. Yeah, I dyed my hair darker.

I had a Cadbury egg and I was right as rain. Everyone's like, maybe that's what? No, I'm just kidding. Everybody's like, where? What boundary is that, though? Explain your boundary.

If you don't like Cadbury eggs, you can get the fuck out of here Cadbury cream eggs. Guys, so good, so good, I even like the caramel ones.

Yeah, those are great too, but the cream ones are my favorite. Superior. Yeah, but you know what, we're not here to talk about that.

Nope, but you know, we have. We had to get our you guys are like who we talk to, so we had to, like, get all that out real quick. No one else cares about my talky journey, yeah.

Our two minute like, Hey, what's up? corner listener, listener, dear listener. So we are in a part two situation right now.

Yes, and I left you guys on a little bit of, like, a excuse me, what? Yeah, I was pissed at you, yeah. And it was mostly because, like, this whole next part of this is just so infuriating at times. And you can just see how ridiculous and how negligent a lot of this was.

Yeah, so when we left you, we were talking about Detective Eddie Bulger there, the detective who was incredibly racist. I was going to say, the racist. I was like, I don't know a nice way to say that, and I don't care.

So he's an incredibly racist detective, and he was kicked off of the case and then he decided to insert himself back into it. He. Apparently, photos were found in George Whitmore's coat pockets, They were of a woman. He said he found those in the trash and that he was just using them. To like, kind of like, hype himself up to his friends and be like, this is my girlfriend.

Yeah, you know, he's a young kid. Yeah, like, he's a young. Like, you know, like, he's like, he's, he's a teen.

And like I, I have a feeling he has nothing to do with this. That's adorable. It is. It was in a weird way.

He's just decided to declare that that person in those photos was Janice Wiley, incorrect. I feel so now. He is being charged like he's being looked at and suspected at the very least of killing Janice and Emily. Yeah.

And that's where I left you, which was like, Oh no, what's going to happen? That really is where you quite now detectives interrogated. You're like, you quite literally ruined my life. Pretty much so.

Detectives interrogated George Whitmore for 26 straight hours Jesus 26 straight hours. And after which, he not only confessed to the assaults of Elba Barrero, but also to the murders of Janice Wiley and Emily Hoffert. Yeah.

After 26 hours of straight prodding, I might confess to a lot of shit that I didn't do. I think a lot of people would, yup. He also confessed to the murder of Minnie Edmonds, who we talked about that was killed a week before Elba Barrero was attacked.

Right, at no time was he informed of his rights, so that's not good, or asked whether he wanted a lawyer. That's illegal.

The interrogation Interrogation resulted in him signing a 61 page confession that included very intimate details of the Wiley-Hoffert murders. Only the killer would have information about, or someone that was at the scene, or the detectives. Including descriptions of the broken bottle during the attack and the knives used to kill both women. The fact that the knives broke, like all those little details that they hadn't released to the public yet.

Right? According to the Whitmore statement, he had entered the apartment building unseen, so he said, he somehow got into that apartment building and no one saw him. Okay, and had been on his way to the roof when, inexplicably, he just left the stairway and entered the corridor for no reason.

He couldn't come up with a reason why he did that, probably because it didn't happen, and he said. He entered the corridor on the third floor and just began trying doors until he came to Janice and Emily's, which he found unlocked. But it wasn't. Does everyone remember part one?

Uh-huh. That door was locked, it was locked when Pat got home, right? That door was not unlocked, and they found no evidence that it was unlocked.

In fact, that was what was fucking them up about, like, obviously, aside from the obvious brutality, that's what was fucking them up about this crime scene, right? They were like, how did someone get in? There's no way somebody got in, There's this open window, but we're on the third floor and there's no fire escape.

But now he's saying in his confession that the door was unlocked. It reminds me a lot of the Jesse Mischelli thing I was thinking about that, where there's blatantly wrong details, but they are just pretending that's fine, like, just what?

Don't worry about that. Like, No, look at this other detail. yeah, this detail's right though, and it's like, Well, that's wrong, and that's a big one.

That should negate the other ones. So, for eight months, frustrated investigators in Manhattan had been under intense pressure to solve the Wiley-Hoffer murders at this point. But they had not made even a single step of progress at this point. Despite the, you know, a lot of efforts. They were canvassing the whole place and they had unrestrained resources, like the entire Manhattan Police Department was on this. And because of this. Reports of Whitmore's arrest came as a huge relief not only to the residents of New York, but also to the investigators and politicians who were feeling that intense pressure.

So this is not a good mix of things because everybody's like, great, we got someone, don't care if it's the right person. Within days of his arrest, however, several people began to doubt the credibility of the confession. At his arraignment for the murder of Minnie Edmonds, he actually recanted his confession, with his lawyer telling the judge that George had been coerced into signing the document by Brooklyn detectives and was beaten into it. Oh, no.

During that interrogation, like, he was very much not doing that under his own volition. And you know, if Detective Bulger, if he was there, you know, that guy was definitely beaten. Yep, that's so sad.

That, like, hurts my heart, yeah, and George, even, like, requested to take a lie detector to prove that he was telling the truth. I mean, come on, like, yeah.

He's not gonna. Obviously there are cases where someone's and they're like, Yeah, I'll take a lie detector test because they're just so confident. But this guy is younger, right? His IQ is very low.

Oh, and he is like, not understanding what's going on, no one's even, and the other thing is like, he's not understanding. Because like, he's dealing with that whole thing, but also no one's explaining things to him.

Right, like, no one's even trying to make him understand what's going on, so it's like, he's not gonna yell. I'm gonna take a lie detector test, just to be like, I can take a lie detector test and I can fool it. You know, like, he's doing that because he's like, I'm innocent and that'll prove it, right.

And he's a teenager, he's 19, 19 years old. 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, 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 date line, 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.

Scammers are best known for living the high life until they're forced to trade it all in for handcuffs and an orange jumpsuit once they're finally caught. I'm Saachi Cole and I'm Sarah Hagee. And we're the host of Scamfluencers, a weekly podcast from Wondery that takes you along the twists and turns of some of the most infamous scams of all time. The impact on victims and what's left once the facade falls away? We've covered stories like a Shark tank certified entrepreneur who left the show with an investment but soon faced mounting bills. An active lawsuit filed by Larry King. And no real product to push.

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Despite his continued claims of innocence, Deputy Police Commissioner Walter Arm told reporters Quote This man came up with details that could have only been known by. Could have been known by no one but the police and the man who committed the crime. He had information that was never released publicly, and like, again, we said, the person who committed the crime and the detectives. Brooklyn District Attorney Edward Silver made similar remarks to the press. He said I would not proceed as speedily if I did not have more than a confession.

What else do you have? So, yeah, that's the thing. Let us know what else you have. Proceed speedily to tell us what else you have now. For some of the investigators leading the team in Manhattan, it was really that extent of the details in the confession that were actually suspicious to them as well.

In fact, it was as though the confession was a little too good, a little too detailed. It didn't just contain information never released to the public, it contained details about the crime scene so minute that only someone processing the scene with a keen eye would have noticed them. That's exactly because, in the craziness of all of whatever took place, no killer is going to notice the tiny little details. This blood stained over here and I saw it.

He's going to be like, it was chaos. I know what I did, I know what I saw in that moment, but that's it. But, like you said, he's not going to notice these little details that a crime scene technician would exactly.

Then there was the photographs that were found in George Whitmore's possession at the time of his arrest, which Detective Bulger claimed were of Janice Wiley. When he was shown the photographs, he repeated what he said. He said, That's I don't know who that is. I found them in the trash, I don't. I honestly don't know who that girl is.

If it's Janice Wiley, I didn't know that, I just found them, which of course, they were like, Yeah, yeah, like, likely story. But then they asked Max Wiley, Janice's father, and they had him look at them. And he told investigators they were definitely not photos of his daughter, and he had never seen the woman in those photos before. And he was definitive about that.

Wow, and these weren't like strange photographs that you were like, I don't know. Maybe it's a woman. Like he knows his daughter, he's looking at the woman's face, He's like, That's not my kid.

Like, I think he would know, yeah, and again, for this man, he's probably hoping they're catching the guy, of course, who did this to his daughter?

So he's going to hope that this is the guy, so he's not going to, if anything, he's going to kind of not hope. It's like, hard to word it. But he's not going to want this to not be the end of the closure that they want. You know what I mean, he doesn't want false closure.

Yeah, so for him to say that's not her, that's not her. Like, he's going to want this closed. And if it's not the guy, he wants the right guy, like he wants the right guy off the streets that did this.

Definitely. Finally, there was also George Whitmore's alibi, and this one's this one blows my mind. He claimed he was at work when this was happening, washing dishes in a Wildwood, New Jersey restaurant at the time of Janice and Emily's murders. So he's all the way in New Jersey.

That's what he's saying, is his alibi. Nearly all of George's coworkers confirmed that he was at the restaurant at that time. And they distinctly remembered this, and they said they remember this because we were all watching together. A televised speech given by Dr. Martin Luther King at the March on Washington, when Whitmore was supposedly in Manhattan, killing Janice and Emily.

And that whole that held no ground whatsoever. Like, they were just like what all his coworkers were like. He was there with us, he was watching it, and they're just like, Nah, he was in Manhattan, killing two women.

It's like, he's a whole state away. I know, obviously New Jersey and New York are close, but like, what? But it's like he has an alibi that people are confirming, like, how is that not worth anything?

Oh, that makes you feel like so shitty that there wasn't like cameras and shit, I know, cause you're like, Oh, I just want them to be like, See, here he is, he's washing dishes, he's right there.

Now in October, Whitmore's attorney successfully petitioned the court for his client to at least be evaluated by a psychiatrist. At the very least after what he described as quote the longest study of one patient in Bellevue's history. The hospital's director of psychiatry, Dr. Arthur Zitrin, declared George Whitmore sane and able to stand trial for the murder of many Edmonds. But he, although he was declared sane, that didn't necessarily mean that he was competent to stand trial.

Okay, he had actually, like we had said, dropped out of school in the eighth grade. I believe it was and had an IQ that was well below average. So he didn't even know what was like he, he couldn't understand the complete.

Heaviness and gravity of everything that was happening. And he couldn't understand how he was being fucked with. Yeah, he's like, I was at work, yeah.

Like, he's just sitting there telling you I found them in the garbage. Yeah, like, he's telling you the truth. I found these in the garbage.

That's not even of her, I don't even know her. I was at work when this happened. I have people to to like, confirm that for you. How scary is that that you can have all of those?

A whole restaurant of coworkers say that you were there, all of that defense behind you, and they can still railroad you. Yeah, that is so scary. And despite that, and all the questions surrounding the confession and the supposed evidence against him. The district attorney in Brooklyn moved forward in the case against George for the assault of Elba Barrero.

That's shocking. Yeah, well, shocking it is, and it's not, unfortunately.

Now, in November 1964, George Whitmore went on trial in Brooklyn Supreme Court for the attempted sexual assault of Elba Barrero. In court, Barrero told the jury her assailant caught up with her on the sidewalk and grabbed her from behind. In November 1964, George Whitmore went on trial in Brooklyn Supreme Court for the attempted sexual assault of Elba Barrero. In court, Barrero told the jury that whoever attacked her had caught up with her on the sidewalk and had actually grabbed her from behind.

And she said, snatched her pocketbook, placed his right hand over her mouth and his left hand around her neck, and said, If you scream, I'll kill you. That's so scary now. Barrero then claimed that she and her attacker, Quote, walked face to face for two blocks to 192 Bristol Street. Where the assailant took her down a flight of stairs to the basement, pressed her against a wall and briefly removed his hand from her mouth. This is when she started screaming. Following her testimony, Elba Barrero again identified George Whitmore as the person who attacked her that day.

She said They walked face to face. Yeah, I don't even know how to picture that. Yeah, I don't know if, like, like, one of them was walking backwards and the other was walking in front of it.

That's what it sounds to me, that's how it's described. I'm not sure exactly what the logistics of that are. But then she, also, when it had originally happened, said she couldn't, couldn't quite remember the person's face, Yeah.

So it's just weird how that changed up a little bit. Like, I'm not saying that she's lying. I'm just like, did somebody tell you to say that a certain way? So it sounded better, yeah.

There's definitely some strange things surrounding this. Because, I mean, right from the way that they made her identify him was completely tainted, completely wrong. Yeah, so it's like, there a lot of this is like, Oh, from the start, yeah.

Now under cross-examination, Elba Barrero admitted to Whitmore's defense attorney, Jerome Leftow, that she had already met with lawyers from Newsweek to discuss the $10,000 reward money.

And when asked whether she had met with them before or after her appearance before the grand jury, she replied I don't know, Oh. However, on Redirect, she told the assistant district attorney that she had been entirely unaware of their reward when she went before the grand jury. Okay, so that's a little flip floppy, so it's just a little whatever her, whatever the like, you know, intention here is, it's just not coming off clear what's happening here.

You're not coming off clear in what is going on here, not at all. And after a week of testimony, the all white, all male jury deliberated for nine hours. So I'm not a jury of his peers whatsoever. Nope.

They deliberated for nine hours before finding Whitmore guilty of the assault and attempted rape of Elba Barrero. Wow. The conviction carried with it a maximum sentence of 10 years for the attempted rape and five years for the assault. And they said, quote Unless psychiatrists find him to be a perpetual sexual menace to the community, in that case, he can be imprisoned for life. Oh my God.

Yeah, and that's just this one crime, there's others that he's going to trial for. Yeah, there's more that are coming.

However, Judge David Malbin elected to withhold sentencing in the case, pending the outcome of the cases against Whitmore for the Wiley-Hoffert murders and the murder of Minnie Edmonds. Okay now? While they waited for the judge's decision, Jerome Leftow had petitioned the court for a new trial after receiving a sworn affidavit from one of the jurors. Claiming that quote, another member of the panel had made invidious remarks to the jury room about Black people. The affidavit also noted that during the trial for the attack on Barrero, jurors were made aware of the additional charges against George Whitmore for the three murders. That is completely not okay.

That's the thing I'm like, how many conflicts of interest are we at now? Like, 47? And Leftow obviously argued that this could have further biased the jury against their client. This is all illegal.

They've biased everyone against him from the start, putting him in an interrogation room and telling him that's the suspect, and then having Alba Barrero identify him. You've already biased her again. That she thinks he's a criminal and now he's in there, you can't tell them that he's up for three murders. What are you doing?

That's insane. And then this jury member signed a sworn affidavit saying, Members of this jury are racist and made racist remarks against Black people while deliberating. That's so heinous, it really like, that breaks your heart, what the fuck?

And both the prosecution and the judge were wholly resistant to the claims. Didn't want to hear it, with Judge Malbins telling reporters quote I'm not going to make searching inquiry. We want to protect the sanctity of the jury as to what happens in the jury room during deliberations. We want to protect this racist ass.

Jury is basically what that man just said. Yeah, I want to let them be racist. If they want to be racist, I don't like, No, I'm not doing this.

Wow, cool, cool, wow. Meanwhile, one of the jurors later said that he actually heard another juror say in that room quote. This is nothing compared to what he's going to get in New York.

Oh my God. So they were well aware and all assumed he was guilty and were like, kind of giddy about it, like, can't wait to watch that, that's gross. While the prosecution and the majority of law enforcement were honestly committed to believing Whitmore's confession and guilt were genuine, which is really upsetting.

There were many who had been skeptical of the case from the start. Like there were a lot in of investigators that were like, I don't buy this. Like, I think this is fucked up and dirty, which is at least good, good.

Good, I guess. Now, just two months after his conviction for the attack on Elba Barrero. A source within the Manhattan District Attorney's office told reporters that the case against Whitmore for the murder of Janice and Emily was, quote shot full of holes. So he told the reporter, like, This is bullshit, wow.

Not happening now officially. The DA's office refused to comment on the state of the case against Whitmore. But many in the press felt that there was a strong possibility that the case was going to be dropped against him. That's how bad it was. I hope so now.

The district attorney wasn't the only one skeptical about the potential for a trial against Whitmore. George's own lawyers were feeling pretty confident that the charges were going to be dropped, and they were more than happy to fill in the reasons why. Like, they were like, Fuck this, his lawyers said. Quote. The facts show that a picture the police said was of Miss Wiley and was supposedly stolen from by Whitmore from her apartment is not a picture of Miss Wiley. It is instead a picture of a girl named Arlene Franco, who lives in Wildwood, New Jersey.

Oh, they found her, and that's where he works, that's where he works, where Whitmore's father runs a junkyard dude, and he said he found it in the trash.

Yeah. Whitmore's lawyers went on to emphasize the number of other discrepancies in the case against George, including that several people placed him in New Jersey at the time of the murders. And that he had an intelligence quotient of 60 and could not possibly have comprehended the language in the confession that he supposedly made, Wow, there was no way that he could understand all of that language. So it's just point after point, after point after point of why he's not guilty.

Oh, and that button that was taken that Alba Barrero had ripped from her attacker's coat, yeah. The F.BI gave a report that stated the button did not match Whitmore's coat. So what are we even fucking doing here? So they introduced that button in that trial, and they used it kind of as like here, it is like a smoking button.

Didn't even match, but they said it did. Yeah, they were like, this is from his coat, what the fuck?

How are you even able to get away with that? Well, just two months later, Judge David Malbin, who didn't want to hear about the racist jury, wanted to let them be racist if they wanted to. Did. He also not want to hear all the evidence as to why this Black man didn't commit this crime? Yeah, he was like, No, I don't want to hear it. He vacated Whitmore's conviction in the Barrero trial after it was determined that the jury had been racially biased and may have been influenced by learning of the other charges against him.

Maybe, perhaps weird. Two months later, he was like, after all this heat came, he was like, you know what, I think you're right.

On second thought, I just can't sleep at night, given the questionable no, on second thought, I just can't sleep at night. It's like, Wow, yeah. Given the questionable nature of the confession and the evidence against him in the other case, we would all assume at this point that the charges are going to be dropped.

Like, looking at everything I've just told you. So, yeah, logical brains would be like, absolutely, but based on who's going forward with that.

Based on these fuckers, I'm like, Nah, yeah. In April, the district attorney in the Edmonds murder case proceeded as though nothing had changed. I really hope that he ended up suing the district attorney at some point in that case. The jury deadlocked, but the prosecutor vowed to try Whitmore again.

What in the meantime? Wait, I'm actually shocked that they deadlocked, yeah, right, in the meantime, because I think they had nothing.

I think that was literally they probably deadlocked, based purely on like some of them were probably racist. Yeah, you know what I mean, like, it's like they didn't have anything in that case, like.

That was just like, a What evidence do you have? They have that confession, that's about it, right? And it's a shitty confession.

In the meantime, the district attorney in Manhattan decided not to pursue the case against Whitmore for the murders of Janice and Emily. But that didn't mark the end of legal troubles for George Whitmore. Don't think that was the end of everything. The following year, the district attorney in Brooklyn retried George for the attack on Barrero, and he was found again guilty. So that was vacated.

That's why they were able to retry him, and they retried him again for the Elba Barrero attack. And he was found guilty and sentenced. This is a manhunt, and he was sentenced to five to 10 years in prison. Oh my God.

The conviction would be overturned a year later, but had he already spent a year in prison at that point, probably longer. On the ground that the judge had refused to allow the defense to cross-examine police concerning the false confession in the Wiley-Hoffert case, why?

For what reason? Why not? Just like, Nah, yeah, I decided I can't sleep at night these days.

Different judge? No, well, that was the same judge that they were talking about. That's why it was overturned, yeah.

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 cover-up?

If you believe the defense theory, however, this was all a cover-up 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. join Wondery Plus in the Wondery App, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify.

Now, the same year, it was alleged that Whitmore was actually under the influence of Truth Serum, which he when he was evaluated at Bellevue hospital. That, like before, this all started, okay, finally, that came out. That's kind of shaky, right? That's kind of shaky.

But it's. But he was under the under the influence of that, and during that time he kept insisting he was innocent. So not shaky. Right now. Truth serum to be like, tell us that you did it, yeah.

And he was like, No, I'm innocent, and his confession? he kept saying, My, the confession was coerced. I was beaten into saying this. And because of this, there was an investigation requested into this. Because now they're like, wait a second.

Did you beat him into this? No. Days after this was revealed, New York Governor Nelson Rockefeller refused the request for an investigation. He said he quote had no jurisdiction over the courts, and therefore it would be inappropriate to seek to intervene in matters pending before them. He's like, I don't want to, like, seek out justice.

You know, like, we don't want to do that, it's like, I don't want to make sure that people aren't being beaten into into confessions. We don't want to check up on any of our systems in place, we just want to let them roll. You know that that answer is essentially why bother?

Why bother? Yeah, I don't really want to is really the answer. I don't feel like doing it, I don't feel like it.

The DA's office tried Whitmore for a third time, and he was again convicted and sentenced to five to 10 years in prison. How many years and years of this man's life were disrupted because of this, dealing with this shit? By 1972, George Whitmore had begun to lose complete hope of clearing his name. Like he was like, This is it.

Then a journalist from the New York World. Telegram received an affidavit from Elba Barrero's sister, stating that, prior to identifying George Whitmore as her attacker, Elba had already identified two other men as the assailant. Kind of iconic that her sister was like, Hey, I love my sister. But it was in an affidavit she was being truthful on the affidavit, saying, like, I'm not saying he didn't do it. I'm not saying she's not, but I'm just telling you. She identified two other guys before that.

So that doesn't hold a lot of weight. Wow, the way he was identified and the fact that two other people had already been identified. I mean, come on, and how many years later did this come out like Jesus Christ, this poor fucking man?

Yeah. And in fact, Elba had only identified Whitmore after Detective Bulger and his partner had made her aware of the $10,000 reward being offered by Newsweek. So they literally just waved a bag of cash in her fucking face, and that is precisely when she agreed to change her statement. That's disgusting.

That is disgusting. Like, I know that's a lot of money, but that's not worth sending somebody to jail for, to prison for the rest of their life. Yeah, like, that's fucked up, that's on another level.

At the request of the newly appointed Brooklyn District Attorney, Eugene Gold, the case was reopened and the statements from Elba's sister were confirmed. And that's when Whitmore's convictions were overturned and he was officially exonerated. So luckily, the new Brooklyn District attorney was like, whoa, whoa, open that shit back up, put these these in here, like, put all this new information in here.

And he got it overturned. Wow. After being released from prison in 1973, George sued for violations of his civil rights. But he lost his case in what fucking world? and received no compensation.

How did he lose that case? No compensation, what this whole legal circus and truly nightmare he found himself in for years and years.

Yeah, actually ended up being the cat. One of the catalysts for abolishing the death penalty in New York as well. And it also aided in the Supreme Court's Miranda ruling in 1966 that guarantees criminal suspects the right to consult with an attorney. Oh wow, okay, so something good came out of it somewhere.

That's the thing, though. It's like, yeah, because I know we talk about the death penalty a lot. And you say, like, you're a little less gray, I'm always pretty gray. But then a case like this comes along and it's like, that'll throw you for a loop. Yes, like, genuinely, because he would have been facing the death penalty.

You can fuck it up so badly. And then what if all of that came to light after they had already put this man to death? Yeah, like he was, he would have been sent to death for these murders. Wow.

That's that, like that actually just turned my stomach, yeah. And what makes the cases against George Whitmore so egregious is that the charges against him in the two Brooklyn cases were mostly just a pretense. That would have validated the charges against him for the murders of Janice and Emily. Making Eddie Bulger there and the Brooklyn detectives look like fucking heroes, that was the whole. The whole thing behind this was Eddie Bulger and his little cronies wanted to look like fucking superheroes at the end of the day.

Please tell me that that man got karma, please tell me. The problem here was that. Even before Whitmore went on trial for the attack of Elba Barrero, investigators in Manhattan were fairly certain he had nothing to do with the Wiley Hoffer murders. Investigators were like, No, we don't think he did this. So, even though Detective Bulger was like, I want to get my hero status and get this on.

Most of the investigators were like, Fuck off, this doesn't work. In October 1964, police arrested Out of This was like something totally different. Arrested 35 year old Nathan Delaney for the murder of a rival drug dealer. Oh wow. As this was his third arrest for a violent crime, Delaney knew he could receive the death penalty.

That's a three strikes rule for the murder. And so he offered to tell the DA the name of the real killer in the Wiley Hoffer case. Damn. At the time, there was still intense pressure to close this case, and the DA's office knew the case against Whitmore was in sham. Like he didn't do it.

So they agreed to Delaney's conditions, because, remember, there's still a case against George Whitmore. For this part, yeah, they only were able to exonerate him for the Alba Barrero situation and Minnie's murder, right?

And Minnie Edmonds? But like this, they're still. This was still hanging over his head, they were still trying to fit pieces into this one now. According to Nathan Delaney, he had been at home on the afternoon of August 28th, 1963, which is when Janice and Emily were killed.

And he said there was a knock on his door, so he opens the door. And Delaney was surprised because he saw his acquaintance, whose name is Richard Rickey Robles, Okay, he was covered in blood and visibly shaken. Now. Rickey, who had just been released from prison, told Delaney that he had gone out looking for drug money and had killed two women.

What? And the way he said it was that, he said. QuoTe He just iced two dames, what the fuck? That's how he described it. And Delaney claimed he gave Robles a new set of clothes, and his wife, Delaney's wife gave him a garbage bag for the bloody clothes. Which I was like, Wow.

You guys are disgusting, yeah, now. Nathan Delaney agreed to wear a wire holy shit, and together with his wife present, they engaged Rickey Robles in the conversation. Just a regular conversation.

And during that whole time talking, he again admitted to killing Janice and Emily on the wire. They were able to, like steer the conversation to like, remember that time. And he was like, Oh, absolutely so. He was just looking for drug money.

He was, so we'll go, he'll explain. So all of this was recorded, him admitting to the whole thing. And it was submitted to the prosecutor, and the taped confession was enough to get a warrant for his arrest.

And Rickey Robles was taken into custody on January 27th, 1965.

At the station, Rickey Robles maintained his innocence and asked for a lawyer. So nice that they gave him that, in case you were wondering, he is white. Yeah, I had a feeling.

So he got a lawyer and he was registered, and I'm sure they read him his full rights. Yeah. He was promptly provided a lawyer and the two were left alone in the administrative office.

And after about 25 minutes, Robles lawyer needed to leave the room and ask the officers waiting outside to watch his client until he came back in the interrogation room, the detectives offered Rickey some food and he declined. And at which point, one of them said, Rick, did you ever think it would wind up like this? And without thinking, he replied. He thought it would, from what he read in the newspapers, that he thought someday he would be arrested for killing those two girls.

So his lawyer left the room after 25 minutes to go. Like, get something to eat or drink, or like, piss or something like that, just for a second. And those detectives were like, Hey, Rickey, you do this? And he was like, Sure, did, sure, did, like as soon as his lawyer left.

But so does that matter, though, that his lawyer had left the room. Is that, like, is that a conflict? I think it ended up working out, it worked out okay.

So I think it's fine, it's okay, because I think it was just in casual. Like they weren't interrogating him. They were just like, Did you ever think it? They didn't even say, Did you ever think you would get caught?

They just said, Do you ever think it would wind up this way? Yeah, that's innocuous. And he was like, Yeah, it's crazy. I murdered people, and they were like, Wow, I didn't know you were going to say that.

Like, I don't understand. So when they asked what happened, Robles replied Don't know. I went to pull a lousy burglary and I wound up killing two girls. Just to be that callous about it. Now, according to Robles, this is what happened.

He had gone out that morning with the intention of finding an apartment to rob, which is what led him to the building on East 88th Street, which he said he chose. Because there was no doorman at the time. I thought there was, though, there was a doorman, but I don't know if the doorman was on break or like, wasn't at the door at the time. When he entered the lobby, no one was present, so he just walked right in.

And he was able to get into the maintenance corridor and found his way to the third floor. That's terrifying when he found all the doors locked, including Janice and Emily's. Because, remember, it was locked? Even though George Whitmore's confession said it was unlocked, Ricky Robles is saying it was locked.

That's a big part of this. Robles poked his head out of the windows and saw that a window in apartment 3C was open. So he's in the maintenance like hall, and there's windows. He peeked out the window in the corridor, saw that there was an apartment with a window open, so he climbed out on the ledge and slid over to the window.

So he did scale the building, which is how he got into the apartment. So one of my comments in part one was like, he couldn't, like, nobody could like, scale a building. He literally essentially did. Technically, he didn't scale up.

No, right, but he scaled over sideways. What the fuck? Which? They were not even thinking that was a possibility.

Because you really wouldn't like a third floor in New York, like, obviously, that's not super high for New York. But like, you're going to land on concrete, it's like, that's like, that's dangerous.

At the very least, wow, you think you're safe at that point? You're on the third floor, yeah.

Like, why not leave your window open? He went over a ledge to get into that apartment. That's terrifying. So Janice Wiley, Oh my God.

Was just in her room and this man just crawls through the apartment window. And she's probably like, getting ready for work at this point, like, ready to head out for her day. So, once inside the apartment, Ricky Robles found Janice Wiley in her bedroom.

He said quote with a sheet wrapped around her, and he said he immediately decided to sexually assault her. Oh my god, so she was still sleeping, yeah.

Now, according to Delaney's wife, while he was assaulting Janice Robles. Quote heard the front door and he got up against the wall. And then the girl with the glasses came in. That's Emily. Just as she got to him, he tried to take her glasses off her face as soon as she walked in, and she said, Don't touch me.

Leave my glasses alone. So, as Robles tied the two women together, he heard Janice tell Emily to do as he said. And they won't get hurt. So Janice was being like, let's just go along with whatever he says, and we're not going to. She really thought they weren't going to get hurt. Oh my God.

But Emily was angry. Yeah, I would be fucking angry too. And she sees this guy sexually assaulting her friend and roommate like, she's pissed and you're panicked too.

And so she repeatedly had said she wanted to quote. Get a good look at him to identify him later. Oh my god. And she was trying like she was pissed, yeah. But this caused Ricky Robles to panic.

And he went into the kitchen where, according to Delaney's wife quote, he thought it over and in about five minutes decided he was going to kill them. With his decision made, Robles grabbed the glass bottle, a kitchen knife and then returned to the bedroom and stabbed both women to death, with both of them finally dead. He stole about $20, or $30, from Emily's purse and then fled the building. And they were each stabbed over 60 times, with three different a broken bottle, a knife that ended up breaking, and then a bigger knife.

So he went back and forth between that kitchen at least twice. Did he ever did they ever say if he was, like, under the influence? Because that just seems so he was? He was a heroin addict and he was breaking into this apartment to get money to get more heroin. So that is part of this. Is that he was, that was the intention. Here is to get money.

Right, and he specifically, he is quoted as saying, to get more heroin, that was the whole point.

Now I don't like that. He decides to try to use Emily as like, Well, she said this. So I panicked. So that's why this happened, and that's when I did it. And it's like, No, you piece of shit.

That wasn't it? No, like, you're a piece of shit, and you were going to, like, like, just run out of the apartment. Don't try to put it on her.

Because that's the thing. It's like, she's saying, I want to get a good look at you, so get out of there, yeah, get out of there.

Get the fuck out of there, then, shouldn't be here in the fucking first place. Yeah, cover your face and run out, wow.

But I just don't like, regardless of whether she said that or not, because we don't know if she said that. The only people who know whether she said that is Janice and Emily and him, and he's the only one that can talk. And to be quite honest, he's not fucking credible as far as I'm concerned, so he's a piece of shit.

So Ricky Robles went on trial for the murders in October 1965, and a jury deliberated for five hours before finding him guilty. You scared me, guilty of two charges of felony murder in the first degree. Good.

After the verdict was read, reporters asked Assistant DA John Keenan why police had pursued George Whitmore when they knew he was not the real killer, and Keenan replied. Quote There were good and bad policemen, and he insisted that the defense had used Whitmore as a quote smoke screen to cloud the case. At least he was honest, like, there's good, there's some bad fucking policemen out there.

And that's the truth. They were on it. There are bad ones. A month later, Ricky Robles was sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole after 26 years. Why?

Yeah, he is also, you know, he's not getting parole, it's not happening, no, now. Once investigators settled on George Whitmore as their suspect, nearly everyone seemed convinced of his guilt and never bothered to consider any alternatives.

And look what happened, regardless of any of the evidence. After being kicked off the case in Manhattan. Detective Eddie Bulger believed his arrest of Whitmore would make his career and vindicate him in the eyes of anyone who disapproved of his methods. That was his whole thing. How did that turn out for you? I was like, did that help?

Yeah, did that work out? Like you also hope that? I mean, this is like, very obvious that he just like steamrolled this entire thing. Yeah. Was any action taken against him?

Neither he nor anyone else involved in the false imprisonment and false arrest of George Whitmore were ever held accountable at all for any of the reprehensible actions that they committed. Nope, wow.

They got nothing. Wow. The fact that this man, like we were just saying like, steamrolled this entire fucking thing totally derailed it.

Just was like, bye, see you later. Like, this is what I think. So this is what happened. And let's just throw this poor man in jail forever. And he just got to, he just got to keep on doing that, probably.

Who knows how many other cases Race factored into that? He was on exactly, and he probably just did that, like, did he do the same thing?

Like our other, were other people falsely imprisoned because of him? Like, this isn't the first time he's done this, or the last time like. This is not something you just do. And that who's? I forget who the person was that made the comment of, like, there are gonna bad police.

It's like, you sit there and you admit that and nothing is done about it, nothing's done. They got nothing. Wow, what a frustrating case.

Yeah, I'm glad that they end up like, obviously, like, it's horrible. But I'm glad that at the end of the day, the right person got put into prison. But it's like, but it's, but it's. He didn't. So after he was released from prison, George Whitmore went back to New Jersey, where he briefly owned and operated a fishing boat. Well, good for him.

And eventually worked odd jobs and just, you know, floated around. And George, he struggled a lot, like he went through a lot. And he ended up dying of a heart attack. On October 8th, 2012. Wow, at the age of 68..

That's that's so young. Although his case and exoneration have become one of the most taught examples of coercion and false arrest. Yeah, in the United States. The state of New York. Never made any attempt to right the wrongs committed against him or take responsibility for anything that happened during this. Just the fact that he sued and didn't get anything in return, like.

Nothing what he was put through his, but it's so similar. Yeah, to like the Jesse Miss Kelly in the West Memphis. Three of it all.

They don't get anything, get out of here, they don't get anything and deal with the rest of your life, deal with what's happening.

Wow, now Ricky Robles when this was all going on, because, remember, he was just out in the world while George Whitmore was being railroaded here, he watched the whole thing play out. He watched Whitmore almost die for what he had done. And he was quoted as saying quote I didn't know what to do.

I didn't know how to get him off and then he said, I didn't want the guy to go to the electric chair. But how could I help him without implicating myself? Well, that's the whole thing. You couldn't, but you knew what to do. Why can't you implicate yourself?

This man should pay for what you did, you did it, he didn't like you, that's what that's.

Somebody that, just, like, doesn't have a conscience or a soul, or like, that's that's completely soulless. No, and there is. There's a lot of sadness at the end of this case, too. So following the death of his daughter, Max Wiley did become like a crusader against, you know, these kinds of crimes. And he ended up authoring a book in 1964 titled Career Girl. Watch Your Step. Like many in the media and law enforcement at the time, Max wrote. No matter how accustomed to your own community you may become, never grow to feel safe in it.

Feel threatened, you are threatened, you are never safe. That is such a social commentary on being a woman, yeah.

Now, on September 24th, 1968, Janice's mother, Isabel, actually died from cancer. Oh God, and the following year, Janice's sister, Pam, died of pneumonia. Oh my God, so he was like.

Just alone, his wife and both his children. And after so much tragic loss in like, the smallest span of time. And just like quick trigger warning. Because this is a very sad end to this case. Max Wiley checked into a motel in Fredericksburg, Virginia, on September 21st, 1975. And after calling the front desk to report that he was having a heart attack, he shot himself in the head with a 38 caliber revolver.

Oh my god. During the trial, it was also learned that during the initial canvas, the police had spoken to Ricky Robles.

No, but his mother, No, no, lied to detectives and told them on the day of the murders her son was at her apartment, asleep on the couch. You know, there's no excuse for that.

There's no fucking excuse for that, but I'm flipping this woman off right now. No, fuck you, no.

Two people's daughters.

Were viciously, brutally, savagely murdered by your son. You can go ahead and say, I don't think he did it, but you know full well, he was not asleep on your couch. Yeah, you don't lie, man. I understand, like the inherent like, need, or or urge to protect your child, but not when they're in the wrong like that.

And you don't lie, you don't say he was there when he wasn't. Because it's like, dude, that's going to come back, you don't know that, that's going to come back.

And how do you? I'm sorry, how do you live with yourself after? Yeah, I couldn't derailing it, and that's the thing, derailing the investigation. And then look at George Whitmore.

Exactly like, Come on, man, what a frustrating case all the way to the very end. And Ricky Robles maintained his innocence until 1986, when hoping that he was going to win parole. He admitted to the parole board that he murdered Janice Wiley and Emily Hoffert. And Robles has consistently been denied parole and is currently serving his sentence at the Attica Correctional Facility in upstate New York.

Wow, because after he admitted to it, he, of course, was like, No, I'm innocent. This is all bullshit. And that is the Career girl Martyrs case. Oh, what a tragic, frustrating.

Janice Wiley and Emily Hoffert. So sad and just how senseless that was, and the brutality that's attached to such a senseless murder. Like, yeah.

Wow, wow, like flabbergasting it really is. The crime itself is so fucked up and so brutal and so horrific.

And then the investigation afterwards is even. It's also brutal and horrible and fucked up. What I was so expecting, I was so expecting you to say that. It was somebody that knew Janice and had previously dated her, or felt as though she wronged them in some way. Yeah, just because of that's what they were going off of, too. How just personal it is to stab somebody over 60 times.

And she seemed to get more. Yeah, she did get more than I mean. Emily was also brutalized, but like Janice, too, yeah, it's just so crazy.

Because he had also he'd come in there and immediately decided he was sexually assaulting her. And it was, and I didn't go into the details because I just don't want to. It was a brutal sexual assault, she went through a brutal sexual assault by this fucking pig, he is a pig.

Before he did so, it's like he's a monster. Wow, we need a palate cleanser, brother, we sure do.

Yeah, we do.

So yeah, well, with that, we hope you keep listening, and we hope you keep it. Weird, but not so weird that you watch somebody take the fall for a heinous crime that you committed, yeah.

Don't keep it that weird listener, don't do that, don't do that.

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