We are back.

Jeff tells the story of the 2003 Antwerp Diamond Heist, one of the largest and most sophisticated diamond robberies in history. Often called the “Heist of the Century,” the crime targeted the Antwerp Diamond Center in Belgium and exposed shocking security vulnerabilities in what was believed to be one of the most secure vaults in the world.

Sam shares the story of the Mapleton Murder on the Brighton Line, a chilling railway murder investigated by British authorities. The case would become one of the most disturbing crimes in railway history.

Mind the gap.

Visit us on Linktree for the collection of links, Instagram, or email us at [email protected].

Jeff’s Sources:

• Heist of the Century – Netflix Documentary
• Selby, S. A., & Campbell, G. (2010). Flawless: Inside the Largest Diamond Heist in History. Union Square Press.
• https://www.beldiamond.com/blogs/news/why-is-antwerp-the-diamond-capital-of-the-world
• https://time.com/7308331/stolen-heist-of-the-century-netflix/
• https://www.wired.com/2009/03/ff-diamonds-2/
• https://luxurylondon.co.uk/culture/entertainment/netflix-stolen-heist-of-the-century-antwerp-2003-leonardo-notarbartolo/

Sam’s Sources:

• https://www.btp.police.uk/police-forces/british-transport-police/areas/about-us/about-us/our-history/crime-history/murder-of-issac-gold/
• Gordon, R. Michael. Murder Files from Scotland Yard and the Black Museum.
• https://www.cuckfieldconnections.org.uk/post/1881-the-physiognomy-of-a-murderer-there-s-no-art-to-find-the-mind-s-construction-in-the-face
• https://review.gale.com/2016/03/03/the-compartment-was-much-bespattered-with-blood-the-brighton-railway-murder/

This week’s episode is a replay featuring two unforgettable stories from the archives.

Jeff revisits the chilling case of Otto in the Attic from Episode 57 — a disturbing and tragic story that explores isolation, secrecy, and the darker corners of human behavior hidden in plain sight.

Sam replays her story from Episode 73 about Hedy Lamarr, the glamorous Hollywood star whose brilliance extended far beyond the silver screen. Behind the fame was a groundbreaking inventor whose work helped lay the foundation for modern wireless communication.

Two wildly different stories, one episode — fear and genius, darkness and brilliance.

Visit us on Linktree for the collection of links, Instagram, or email us at  [email protected].

Sam shares the harrowing true story of Samantha Stites, a Michigan woman who endured more than a decade of obsessive stalking before being violently kidnapped and held in a soundproof bunker by her stalker in October 2022. The case, now featured in the docuseries Stalking Samantha: 13 Years of Terror, reveals how stalking escalated despite legal protections, how Samantha survived by staying mentally sharp under terrifying conditions, and how her bravery and quick thinking helped bring her captor to justice after years of relentless terror.

Trigger Warning: Discussion of long-term stalking, abduction, torture, and non-consensual confinement.

Visit us on Linktree for the collection of links, Instagram, or email us at [email protected].

• Stalking Samantha: 13 Years of Terror — docuseries (Hulu/Disney+) about Samantha Stites’ ordeal and survival.
• TV show “You” inspired true crime case highlighted in ABC News Studios’ docu-series ‘Stalking Samantha: 13 Years of Terror’ — ABC News report on how her case unfolded.
• Michigan Woman Shares Story of Survival After Being Kidnapped — local Michigan news coverage of her escape and stalker’s conviction.
• Hulu’s Stalking Samantha: Where Is Christopher Thomas Now? — overview of the case, prosecution, sentence, and aftermath, including advocacy and systemic concerns.

This week Jeff shares the incredible true story of the Unsinkable Molly Brown.

Margaret “Molly” Brown is often remembered for surviving the sinking of the Titanic, but her legend goes far beyond that fateful night. As the ship went down, Brown helped others into lifeboats, took control when chaos erupted, and famously threatened to throw a man overboard when he tried to turn the lifeboat away from survivors.

But Molly Brown’s life didn’t begin or end with the Titanic. She was a fierce advocate for workers’ rights, women’s suffrage, education, and civil rights decades before those causes were widely accepted. A philanthropist, activist, and unapologetically bold woman, she used her wealth and influence to help others whenever she could.

This is the story of a survivor, a fighter, and a woman who refused to be forgotten.

Visit us on Linktree for the collection of links, Instagram, or email us at [email protected]

Sources:

• History Hit – Who Was the Unsinkable Molly Brown?
  https://www.historyhit.com/who-was-the-unsinkable-molly-brown/
• Wikipedia – Margaret Brown
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret_Brown
• Forbes – Decades Before Women Had the Right to Vote, Margaret “Molly” Brown Was a Fierce Bandit for Human Rights
  https://www.forbes.com/sites/jerylbrunner/2020/02/28/decades-before-women-had-the-right-to-vote-margaret-molly-brown-was-a-fierce-bandit-for-human-rights/
• Encyclopaedia Britannica – Titanic
  https://www.britannica.com/topic/Titanic

On this week’s show, Jeff shares the story of Nellie Bly, born Elizabeth Jane Cochran in 1864, a pioneering American journalist whose fearless investigative reporting helped define modern journalism.

Bly gained national attention in 1887 after faking mental illness to be committed to the Women’s Lunatic Asylum on Blackwell’s Island in New York City. Her undercover reporting exposed brutal conditions and widespread abuse inside the asylum, leading to public outrage and significant reforms in mental health care.

In 1889, Nellie Bly became the first woman to travel around the world, completing the journey in just 72 days. Her courage, innovation, and determination shattered expectations and opened the door for generations of investigative journalists to follow.

Trigger Warning:
Discussion of mental illness, institutional abuse, and historical mistreatment of patients.

Visit us on Linktree for the collection of links, Instagram, or email us at [email protected]

Sources:

• National Women’s History Museum – Nellie Bly Biography
  https://www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/nellie-bly-0
• Library of Congress – Nellie Bly and Blackwell’s Island
  https://blogs.loc.gov/headlinesandheroes/2022/11/nellie-bly-blackwells-island/
• Soflete – Nellie Bly
  https://soflete.com/blogs/die-living/nellie-bly
• Encyclopaedia Britannica – Nellie Bly
  https://www.britannica.com/biography/Nellie-Bly
• Ten Days in a Mad-House – University of Pennsylvania Digital Library
  https://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/bly/madhouse/madhouse.html
• Google Search – How did Nellie Bly get committed?
  https://www.google.com/search?q=how+did+nellie+bly+get+committed

On this week’s show, Jeff shares the story of the Tulsa Race Massacre. The Tulsa race massacre was a two-day-long white supremacist terrorist attack that took place in the Greenwood District of Tulsa, Oklahoma, between May 31 and June 1, 1921.

Mobs of white residents - some of whom were deputized and armed by city officials - attacked Black residents and systematically destroyed homes, businesses, and institutions in what was known as “Black Wall Street.” The violence left Greenwood in ruins and resulted in the deaths of hundreds of Black men, women, and children.

The Tulsa Race Massacre is widely considered one of the worst incidents of racial violence in American history and remains a critical example of how systemic racism, government complicity, and historical erasure shaped the United States.

⚠️Trigger Warning:
Racial violence, mass death, destruction of communities, white supremacist terrorism. 

Sources:

• Tulsa Race Massacre: A History from Beginning to End by Hourly History
• National Endowment for the Humanities — article by Kweku Larry Crowe and Thabiti Lewis
• https://www.neh.gov/article/1921-tulsa-massacre
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulsa_race_massacre
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Summer
• https://www.history.com/articles/black-wall-street-tulsa-visionaries
• https://www.tulsalibrary.org/black-wall-street
• https://www.democracynow.org/2016/9/22/tulsa_still_faces_historical_trauma_from
• https://cinematreasures.org/theaters/12823

To kick off the new year, Sam tells the fascinating and rebellious story of the Forty Elephants Gang—a notorious, all-female London crime syndicate that operated from the 1870s through the 1950s.

Based out of the Elephant & Castle area, the Forty Elephants were famous for their daring shoplifting operations targeting luxury goods. Led by powerful “Queens” like Alice Diamond (aka Diamond Annie) and later Lilian Rose Kendall (the Bobbed-Haired Bandit), the gang included key members such as Maggie Hill and the Partridge sisters.

They were known not just for crime, but for style, organization, and resilience—using custom pocket-lined clothing, strict hierarchy, and bold confidence to outsmart shopkeepers and police alike. This is a story of women who carved out power in a world designed to deny it to them.

Visit us on Linktree for the collection of links, Instagram, or email us at [email protected].

• Ridiculous History Podcast – Classic Episode: The Forty Elephants: London’s All-Female Jewel Thieves
• The Poisoners’ Cabinet Podcast – Episode 188: The Many Crimes of The Forty Elephants
• “A Thousand Blows: How a Women-Only Gang Menaced Victorian London” – BBC Culture
  https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20250219-a-thousand-blows-how-a-women-only-gang-menaced-victorian-london
• Forty Elephants – Wikipedia
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forty_Elephants
• Forty Elephants: South London’s Supreme Shoplifters – London Museum
  https://www.londonmuseum.org.uk/collections/london-stories/forty-elephants-south-londons-supreme-shoplifters/

Join Jeff and Sam for a conversation to close out the year.

Visit us on Linktree for the collection of links, Instagram, or email us at [email protected].

On this week’s show, Jeff shares the heartbreaking and relentless story of Andre and Kalinka Bamberski. Kalinka was just 14 years old when she died under suspicious circumstances. What followed was not closure, but a 40-year fight for justice, as her father Andre refused to let her story be forgotten.

This episode is a powerful reminder of persistence, parental love, and the long road toward accountability.

⚠️Trigger Warning: This episode includes discussion of sexual assault.

Happy Holidays,
Jeff and Sam 🎄

Visit us on Linktree for the collection of links, Instagram, or email us at [email protected].

• My Daughter’s Killer (Netflix Documentary)
• My Daughter’s Killer — Rogan Productions
  https://roganproductions.co.uk/project/my-daughters-killer/
• Thirty-year search for justice — The Guardian
  https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/oct/24/thirty-year-search-justice
• The Kalinka Affair — Atavist Magazine
  https://magazine.atavist.com/2012/the-kalinka-affair
• Kalinka Bamberski Case — Wikipedia
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kalinka_Bamberski_case
• Into the Shadows: For You, Kalinka — Simon Whistler (YouTube)
  https://youtu.be/vS6jobnVEHI?si=-mMjuxy2kOytUULx

Sam shares the powerful survival story of Randy Burke, a man who endured an unimaginable medical battle and kept his promise to make it home.
Jeff tells the incredible World War II story of the Night Witches, the daring all-female Soviet pilots who terrorized Nazi forces with stealth, skill, and relentless bravery under cover of darkness.

Visit us on Linktree for the full collection of links, Instagram, or email us at [email protected].

• Davenport Man Keeps His Promise While Fighting COVID-19
  https://qctimes.com/news/davenport-man-keeps-his-promise-while-fighting-covid-19/article_948fbacb-fc42-5a1c-9f6e-1610a830c71b.html?mode=nowapp
• Home for Christmas: Iowa Man Who Battled COVID-19 for 163 Days Enjoys Emotional Homecoming
  https://www.fox13memphis.com/news/trending/home-for-christmas-iowa-man-who-battled-covid-19-for-163-days-enjoys-emotional-homecoming/article_07138ca1-ca2f-5bde-aadc-95268c9cbc91.html

• Night Witches — Wikipedia
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Night_Witches
• Meet the Night Witches: The Daring Female Pilots Who Bombed Nazis by Night — History.com
  https://www.history.com/articles/meet-the-night-witches-the-daring-female-pilots-who-bombed-nazis-by-night
• The Soviet Night Witches — Wright Museum of World War II
  https://wrightmuseum.org
• Marina Raskova and the Night Witches — Grey Dynamics
  https://greydynamics.com