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The Case of Candy Montgomery & The Unsolved Murder of Sister Cathy Cesnik
37 Plays3 years ago
It's a True Crime week, murderinos! In this week's episode, we're on the case of not one but two infamous True Crime stories that have been famously featured in recent streaming series. Lauren starts us off with the case of Candy Montgomery - a woman who murdered her friend, Betty Gore, with an axe in Wylie, TX on Friday the 13th, 1980. You can see the dramatized version of this story in Hulu's "Candy" starring Jessica Biel as Candy AND yet another upcoming series based on the same story - HBO Max "Love and Death" starring Elizabeth Olsen as Candy.
Later in the episode, Felicia covers the unsolved murder of Sister Cathy Cesnik in Baltimore, Maryland. Her body was discovered on January 3, 1970 under mysterious circumstances. While the case has never been officially solved or suspects charged, the nun may have known too much about the sexual assault on students by two priests at Archbishop Keough High School where she worked. The True Crime tale was explored in Netflix's critically acclaimed "The Keepers" docuseries in 2017.
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Transcript
Introduction to True Crime Adaptations
00:00:13
Speaker
Welcome to the Sinister Sisters podcast. I'm Lauren. I'm Felicia. We're best friends. And we like spooky stuff. And we are back. We are consistent. And we're kind of doing a themed episode this week. So we both are doing true crime cases that have become movies or documentaries or TV shows, I guess is what I'm doing. Yeah, mine's a Netflix series. Oh, and yours is a Hulu series. Yeah.
00:00:44
Speaker
representing all streaming platforms. Absolutely.
Film and Series Reviews
00:00:50
Speaker
So I have my recommendation that I saved from from last week, because I have just been getting back into watching horror movies, so I don't have a lot. But I watched dash cam. And it is by the same guy that made the Zoom horror film host. And it is. Have you heard about dash cam?
00:01:10
Speaker
So James has been trying to get us to watch it and I keep being like, I'm not in the mood. So I will agree to it if you liked it.
00:01:20
Speaker
I don't even know if I liked it. I just was so like, it is one of the craziest phones I've ever seen. Like I will say that. It is like, I think I did that again. Like I was taking notes cause I was going to review it and like throughout it's just like my notes were like horrifying. So scary. Comedy question mark? No, not a comedy. Horrifying. Like it's so crazy. It's this, it's this girl that I don't even want to tell you too much, but
00:01:49
Speaker
she basically has like a live streaming show where she like sinks in her car and or something and she is the most unlikable character I think that's ever been in a movie or television and she ends up going on this journey that she live streams the entire time through one night and it is so bonkers like it showed me things
00:02:14
Speaker
I just didn't want to see. It showed me things I never expected to see. It's just freaking me out of control. It's out of control. It's got tinges of taking a Deborah Logan or like, I was trying to think of another example, something like that. It's like found footage-y and it's
00:02:39
Speaker
I don't know, but it's just, it's just bonkers. It's like, it's a bonkers. And the way in which the main character reacts to everything that happens is so crazy. And the credits are crazy. Just wait till you watch the credits. You're gonna be like, is this happening? Is this happening? And I think it is, I mean, I don't know what it's listed. I'm actually curious to see like how they categorize this film.
00:03:03
Speaker
Oh, no, I just found a bunch of ads for dash cams. No, here I go. This says it just says horror, but I would I would argue it is somewhat of a comedy. I think it's like a horror comedy that is so gruesome. You can't remember that it's funny at times or something.
00:03:27
Speaker
But it's just like her reactions and the way she behaves makes me think it's a comedy. And it's so crude. Oh my God, it's so crude. Oh, really? Yeah. That's so interesting. And she's meant to be unlikable. Yes, for sure. I think it's like comical how much they're trying to make us hate her. Definitely. But it's a wild one. Wow. I can't wait to watch it. OK, I'll watch it.
00:03:53
Speaker
Yeah. All right. What about you? So we talked about this briefly. I was going to recommend the new season of Stranger Things, which obviously we recommend a lot of different genres on here. But for the first time, I really think Stranger Things is pure horror in this season. Did you finish it? I finished it. Oh, OK. Yeah.
00:04:15
Speaker
You should try to avoid all spoilers, but it's so scary and it's so good. And I really think there are a lot of great performances this season. I mean, I always think there are, but it's been so fun to like see the kids grow up and see how much they've changed and, you know, are now awkward or not awkward or all of those things. Yeah. But it's a character that you're going to love this season too. Is it the heavy metal guy?
00:04:44
Speaker
Yeah. Like I said, I always see the first episode, but I absolutely love him. And even just the first episode, like the end of the first episode, there's like a horror gore moment that I was like, what? And not that strange things has ever been for children, but like in my head, I'm always like, this is sort of a kid's adventure show. And I'm like, this is not for kids. No, I had the same thought where I was like, I mean, I don't think
00:05:11
Speaker
James' daughter Willow is eight. She hasn't seen any Stranger Things, of course. But I could see myself as a parent being like, this is OK-ish for a 10 to 12-year-old to watch. I'm pretty sure my nephews have seen, maybe not this new season, but I don't know. I would think my kids could watch Stranger Things. That wouldn't be crazy. Right.
00:05:32
Speaker
Yeah. And so then I'm like, if you started at 10 watching Stranger Things season one, like, I don't even think you're old enough to watch the last season yet. I know. My God, it's crazy. So beware, I guess, if you have if you have kids, because it all of a sudden is like no takes no prisoners. Like it is just like true horror at the end of episode one. But I really liked it. And then I did also see the new Jurassic World.
00:06:01
Speaker
That was kind of fun because it's the old characters, you know, coming back. Yes. So my own one critique is that they focus on these like big bugs for most of it, which is like, why are we talking about locusts in a Jurassic Park movie? Like I would just like to see dinosaurs. Just give me dinosaurs. Give me what I want.
00:06:28
Speaker
It's like a big focus on it. And the villain is kind of weak. He's like an Elon Musk wannabe character. And I'm like, man, I don't really believe that. I mean, I do believe him as a character, but I was like, this is kind of a boring villain. He has like a tantrum at one point that I was like, what? Oh, I also have been watching the new season of The Boys, which is extremely gruesome.
00:06:55
Speaker
kind of unimaginably. I mean, I can't believe how gruesome that show is. It's so dark, so scary. And then also funny. I don't know. That shows crazy. I have to watch it. I know I've never watched it. I mean, just for the gore alone, I think it's worth it. Like it's just, and you like superhero stuff. You will probably love it, honestly. Yeah. I should watch it for sure.
00:07:20
Speaker
Especially, I think though we're about to do a, we just, James hosted some panels at Fan Expo this weekend. That was a big convention. I already told Felicia, but we got to see Brendan Fraser and now I'm like, I kind of want to do a Brendan Fraser movie marathon and watch all of his movies. I thought you were going to say a Brendan Fraser episode and I was like, love it. I don't know what we'll talk about, but I'm interested. But I'm watching, that would be a fun movie night for sure.
00:07:48
Speaker
He had some, he had some shit happen to him. Do you know his like, his story? Not really. He was sexually assaulted by somebody high up in Hollywood and was like, I'm not doing this. No, like like his peak, like George of the jungle time period. Yeah. Oh my God. That's so scary.
00:08:14
Speaker
Yeah, I'm talking about that because you wouldn't think about that happening to like adults, but like it does. That's horrible. That's horrifying. Yeah. And it's just sad because it I mean, it really like made him kind of want to take a step back from. Yeah. And leave forever. So that is kind of like partially, you know, why he he went away for a while. Wow, I had no idea. Yeah, terrible.
00:08:41
Speaker
Yeah. Oh, it's so, oh my gosh. It is, I didn't know, but everyone, I mean, I don't know. I didn't know all the details. I'm looking at it now and it's really, it's really, really gross. It's the man who was the president of the, where did that just go? Hollywood Foreign Press Association.
00:09:02
Speaker
was the one that assaulted him just gross but anyway I'm so glad he's back he's about to be in a Scorsese movie so he's really having his he's coming back to Hollywood he said and he's obviously he's been
00:09:17
Speaker
back around for a little bit. I've never watched Doom Patrol, but that's a TV show that he's been on for a long time, and he talked about a lot in the panel. But he just seems like such a sweet man, and how gross, and exactly as Felicia said, I'm glad that he spoke up. Yeah, and is getting his career and life he deserves back. Yeah, for sure. But I'll keep you guys posted if I end up too, because I've never seen The Mummy, which is a big reveal.
00:09:47
Speaker
I know. Oh, my gosh. So good. I haven't seen it in like a million years, but I don't remember. And I obviously I've seen George of the jungle and I also really liked Bedazzled growing up. Did you see that? Oh, is that the movie? Oh, my God. Wait, is that something about a devil? Yes, Elizabeth Hurley is a devil and like super sexy and we actually have it. It's a weird, weird story, but we never actually watched it. We have a copy of it.
00:10:16
Speaker
You have to watch it. You have the VHS? No, it's a DVD, I think.
00:10:21
Speaker
Nevermind. I was like, that would be amazing. Yeah.
The Case of Candy Montgomery
00:10:25
Speaker
All right. Well, I guess I should get into things, but this week I'm very excited. I'm talking about Candy Montgomery. So I do have to give credit. It's actually kind of, I'm a little bit disappointed in myself because I got the recommendation to do this story from James's uncle who they call him super Dave because he's just the coolest guy. He's,
00:10:49
Speaker
I think I've talked about his cousin Bailey on the podcast before she listens to our podcast. And so she was telling her dad when we were all at brunch and he was like, well, I've got a story for you. And he told me about Candy Montgomery because
00:11:05
Speaker
this happened in Wiley, Texas, which is super close to Dallas. It's like 20 miles northeast of us. So he like knew all these details and was telling me all about it. And I was like, Oh, this is amazing. And I wrote it down in my notes app. And of course, didn't look again until there's now a Jessica Beale TV show. That's okay. It's okay. Because this is better because then they can hear the story and then go watch the show and get a full experience.
00:11:32
Speaker
Exactly. So it felt very niche when he was telling me about it. I was like, Ooh, this is amazing. I'm really, you know, edgy story. And now it's a big TV show, but I'm excited because as Felicia said, I watched the TV show. You can go watch the TV show. It was not very helpful for this podcast because the way that they've decided to do the TV show is like totally out of order. It's very weird.
00:11:59
Speaker
obviously it's like not like in order of events. So it's kind of like the sinner actually where she starts off covered in blood and you kind of have to like, you know, go back and piece things together, but it bounces around a lot. So it's kind of hard to track for me. So I did watch it, but most of the research I did on my own, but Candy Montgomery played by Jessica Beale on the TV show also,
00:12:26
Speaker
going to get another, I think it's a movie, starring Elizabeth Olsen for HBO Max, weirdly. Yes, I saw that. And I was like, oh, a couple of people had the same idea at the same time. Okay. Yeah.
00:12:40
Speaker
I do always like, I always feel bad when things like that happen. Cause I'm like, it's just about who, I don't know. Maybe it's not about who gets it. Yeah. Cause maybe it'll be about who's better, but she was a Christian suburban housewife who killed her friend, Betty Gore by striking her with an ax 41 times in 1980. Yeah. That is personal.
00:13:08
Speaker
I mean, dang. Very personal. So Wiley's, you know, a small town kind of classic what you think about small town life, you know, sending your kids to a little red schoolhouse, very quiet. And it was a church service at the Methodist Church of Lucas that brought these two women together.
00:13:30
Speaker
And Betty, who was the murdered victim, had been one of those girls who was pretty conventional, just pretty innocent, beautiful smile, frequently the center of attention, and very popular in her hometown, which was Norwich, Kansas. So then in college, this is kind of scandalous,
00:13:53
Speaker
she fell in love with her math teacher or math professor, but actually ended up marrying a different man. So this was Alan Gore, who her family and friends were very surprised she ended up with him and seemingly, I mean, again, it was a different time. It was, you know, I guess the seventies or really like late sixties, but they were very disappointed her family and friends that she ended up with him and not the math teacher.
00:14:22
Speaker
Oh, weird. So I know, right? I'm like, probably now nowadays you would encourage her not to marry her math professor. You would think, but I don't know. Yes. But he was, you know, just small, plain kind of shy, which really is odd casting in the TV show, too, because he's played by the actor who played porn stash and Orange is the New Black. Do you remember that guy? So he's like a big guy. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah.
00:14:52
Speaker
So in real life, not that way.
00:14:55
Speaker
But they were married in January 1970, moved to the Dallas suburb of Wiley. And in 1976, after their first child was born, Betty took a job as a teacher. And very sadly, she hated it. So sorry, Felicia. Not a good review. But she didn't enjoy it. She hated being left alone when Alan was traveling for work.
00:15:25
Speaker
She constantly had mild illnesses that she was complaining about, just very unhappily married. She pressured Allen into getting her pregnant with their second child. Their sex life was already very bad at this time, and it just kind of led to resentment in their marriage. And it seems like she was kind of unhappy to be with him, but also unhappy to be left alone and wanted his attention.
00:15:55
Speaker
which is kind of a classic sad small town married life. So this led to Candy Montgomery, who I mentioned, they all knew each other. They were all involved at the church. So Candy started to have an affair with Betty's husband, Alan Gore. So their affair is kind of funny because it feels
00:16:24
Speaker
Just very like in on the tv show like you see this too but you know it was like late summer day in nineteen seventy eight they were playing church volleyball. And they accidentally bumped into each other when they were trying to go out.
00:16:41
Speaker
That's all it took. She said in the, I guess, I don't know if it was like in the court case or when, you know, all these details came up, but she said he smelled sexy. She had, I know, which I'm like this small, plain, like shy guy, but you know, you do what you got to do, I guess. So she mentioned to her friends that she was looking to start having an affair.
00:17:07
Speaker
She wanted to shake up her boring life and she wanted passion. Right? Isn't that usually a secret? Just tell all your friends. I just can't imagine like mentioning to my friends, Hey guys, I'm really sad. I'm gonna start having an affair. Yeah. Don't tell anyone. I found the guy. Like, yes. Like just like I'll have an affair with someone. Yeah. Like I don't feel like that's normally the order it goes, but I don't think so. I would hope not.
00:17:38
Speaker
Right? I thought it was like you accidentally fell in love with someone else. I don't know. I don't know. Not in Candy's case. So, I mean, he was not cute, but she had known him for nine months. You know, he was super involved in the community. He helped organize sports. He sang in the choir. He was very outgoing where, you know, his wife Betty didn't really want to be involved. So they were, you know, started with some subtle flirting.
00:18:08
Speaker
Candy was also only 29 at the time, which I think is helpful to keep in mind. She was very sexually frustrated in her marriage as well. So she saw her chance and she made a move after church choir practice one night. She jumped into the passenger seat of his car and just said, I'm attracted to you and jumped out of the car.
00:18:37
Speaker
Wow. I drive by flirting. I drive by flirting. She got in his car, she said, I'm attracted to you, jumped out. Alan was obviously very surprised, but really thought of, you know, Candy as kind of this bold woman who spoke her mind.
00:18:56
Speaker
They didn't address it for a week. And then this time after a church volleyball game, she got into his car again and said, would you be interested in having an affair? And he said it would not be good for his family. She said it would not be good for her family, but he kissed her. Classic.
00:19:18
Speaker
but also not classic. It's just strange. Do people talk about these things in this way? It's so strange. I guess I meant it ironically. It doesn't seem like they were swept up. No, no. It was like a business transaction.
00:19:34
Speaker
Yes, which it gets even worse in the business transaction area. So two or three weeks past, Alan called her on her 29th birthday and asked if she wanted to come with him the next day to get his tires checked in McKinney, and they could talk more about what she mentioned. Yeah, get your tires checked. Right? Get some, I don't know, get your oil changed. It's silly.
00:20:00
Speaker
So she met him at the auto repair shop. He had bought her a birthday card. They had lunch. They talked about their marriages, their children, and a little bit about the affair, just saying, you know, they didn't want their spouses to find out. They needed to be very, very careful, but that they should maybe think about it more.
00:20:24
Speaker
So they spent the next month planning on how it would happen, what they would do if someone saw, they agreed to make it, you know, only physical, no emotional involvement. They had like some time passed again, they had lunch again, they discussed more pros and cons.
00:20:44
Speaker
And they finally made a list of rules. So it was all about like, you know, all the arrangements, who would, it's crazy. They have it in like the evidence for the court trial. And it's like literally like Candy will buy the motel room. Like she will bring lunch ahead of time. Like it's like so- What? This is so weird.
00:21:09
Speaker
So weird, but they did, they set a date for the affair to begin. So they decided on December 12th, 1978, they were gonna start having this affair. And the motel that they consistently went to, this is the other part of the story that we talked about with Bailey's dad, is the motel where they went is really close to the Alamo Drafthouse that we go to all the time in Richardson.
00:21:34
Speaker
So, they actually drove out of Wiley to come to Dallas to have their affair, which also feels really funny. So, they continued with the affair. It felt very exciting at first. There's so many details you can read. I might even, in the podcast notes, share this long-ass article that I read. Yeah, sure.
00:21:58
Speaker
include all the details because it's written like it's like a, I don't know, scandalous story. But they started to develop feelings. That feels more classic. And they, you know, there were even times that they didn't have sex. They just spent the time talking. So in February, two months after they had started the affair, Candy confronted him, said, I don't want to fall in love with you.
00:22:26
Speaker
And they continued to, you know, try to keep it as physical as possible. But obviously they were like, that's the weirdest is that she always made him a meal, at least seemingly before they had sex. So it was like, they sat down and had a meal in this motel room and then had sex. Yeah. She like would like wash the dishes and stuff. That's very weird. But in April,
00:22:51
Speaker
Candy went on a month trip with her husband to visit her family in Georgia. Candy and Alan both missed each other. They said it was great again when they finally were back together. But Betty was seven months pregnant at the time. And so they decided to take a break on the affair so that Alan could be back with his pregnant wife. And very well- Wow, how considerate. Right?
00:23:20
Speaker
For the last two months of your pregnancy, I'll allow you to go spend some time with your wife. So Candy even threw a baby shower for Betty. So they were friends this whole time. That's horrible. It's pretty horrible. So after Betty had the baby,
00:23:40
Speaker
Candy and Alan picked back up the affair, but it wasn't as good. They, you know, Candy was more reserved. Alan was guilty. It's kind of uncomfortable. Betty had started to feel suspect about their relationship. Candy or, or not there. She never suspected Candy, but she was nervous about like her own marriage and that he was maybe having an affair.
00:24:07
Speaker
Candy was also not happy because the sex was just getting more average. She was having more feelings for Alan and also feeling a little bit guilty about her friend. They decided to end the affair. So nothing happened for six or seven months after the affair ended. They were surface level friends. Even the women were dropping their kids off at each other's houses. They were surface level friends.
00:24:36
Speaker
But Betty reportedly found the old cards and letters that Candy had given to Alan sometime in there. So Candy and her husband were babysitting the Gore's oldest daughter while Alan was out of town in June of 1980.
00:24:58
Speaker
And then on Friday the 13th of June 1980, which was also weirdly a month after the movie Friday the 13th came out, the original Friday the 13th. So Candy stopped by the Gore house to pick up a swimsuit for the oldest daughter that was staying with them. And Betty Gore finally confronted Candy about the affair. Candy admitted to the affair.
00:25:24
Speaker
saying that it ended six or seven months ago is no longer going on. But Betty went and retrieved an axe from the garage and started to come after Candy and actually struck Candy's toe. So there was a struggle with an axe. This is not how I thought it went. Interesting. Okay. Well, if you'll remember, Betty is dead and cannot share her side of the story.
00:25:53
Speaker
So we'll get into that. Great point. Thank you. Okay, go ahead. Go ahead. So we'll get into that. So I should have said that when I started this. This is all Candy's depiction of events. Version of events. Yeah. Yes. So there was a struggle with the axe after she had hit Candy's toe. Candy Montgomery prevailed and then hit Betty 41 times and killed her.
00:26:18
Speaker
So investigators later found, I just think this is another weird piece of trivia, I guess, investigators also found a newspaper in the house that was open to an ad for the new film, The Shining, which if you'll remember, Jack Nicholson chases Shelly Duvall around with an ax, which just feels weird. But Candy did not report anything.
00:26:42
Speaker
So took a shower, went along with her day and really sad. I mean, I guess I'll get, I'll get to it later. So Alan became concerned that night when he tried to call Betty and she didn't answer. He couldn't get ahold of her. And, you know, as I said, she was traditionally home and sad. So
00:27:05
Speaker
She was home, she was supposed to be home with their baby daughter at the time. So he called the neighbors to go check on her. When they came to check on her, they discovered Betty to be murdered with the baby just laying awake and crying in her crib. God, it's horrible.
00:27:25
Speaker
It's really horrible. So investigators, you know, initially it seems like from the TV show, at least like obviously they suspected Allen at first, but his, him being out of town was pretty quickly, you know, proven to not be true. And so they did, investigators eventually found Candy's thumbprint on the freezer door, as well as a bloody footprint made by her foot flop in the laundry room.
00:27:53
Speaker
They also found blood and hair in the shower because Candy had taken a shower at their house to try to get the blood off. Wow. At the Gore's house. At the Gore's house, she took the shower. Wow. Yeah. So Candy was eventually arrested and charged with the murder of Betty Gore. She pleaded that she killed Gore out of self-defense, that Betty had struck her twice with the axe,
00:28:21
Speaker
and she got control of the weapon, but Betty refused to let her go. She claims that she tried to run multiple times. Cause that's kind of my feeling is like, if someone's coming at you with an ax, get out of the house. Like that seems like what you would do naturally. If you kill somebody self-defense, I just feel like you don't hit them 41 times. So there's some interesting information about that.
00:28:48
Speaker
Okay. So the prosecution said, you know, why didn't you run? Why did you hit her 41 times? That doesn't line up. But Candy's lawyer brought a psychiatrist from Houston who had evaluated Candy and had put her under hypnosis to discover that Candy had experienced a disassociative event. So that's basically, you know, where you like blackout
00:29:14
Speaker
and can't control yourself. So the altercation with Betty supposedly triggered a psychological reaction in her where she became unaware of what she was doing. As a child, I always think this stuff is like, I don't know, I need to do more research on hypnosis and things like this nowadays because I feel like that used to be such a thing where it was like,
00:29:40
Speaker
what happened in your past that like, I don't know. So apparently
00:29:46
Speaker
Right, or like that, I don't know. So basically, as a child, Candy had been struck with a sharp instrument, which left her bleeding badly. And when she cried because she was bleeding, her mother shook her and raised her fingers to her lips and said, shh, which Candy claimed was the exact same gesture and sound that Betty made during the fight. And the psychiatrist said that that made her snap.
00:30:16
Speaker
Okay. I'm not sure if I believe that, but okay. It's interesting. So mostly I'm like, has no one else shook her and shushed her ever in her life? I mean, maybe, maybe not. Yeah. I think you killed someone. They have to figure out some way to get you off. Like it's so clear that she did it. So it's like the only reason, the only way they can help her is to like,
00:30:43
Speaker
basically say she didn't mean to because she was in some state. Right. And I will say that, you know, Candy was much more loved by the community.
00:30:56
Speaker
and it was a trial by jury. So they talked for, or you know, what's that called? Deliberated? Deliberated, thank you. They deliberated for about four and a half hours and she was fully acquitted of the murder charge. What? No. Yep. No. No way. That is not how I thought the story was going at all.
00:31:25
Speaker
Isn't that scandalous? You can hit somebody 41 times with an axe, claim self-defense and a, you know, psychotic break, basically, and dissociative event.
00:31:38
Speaker
So she just has gone on with her life? Yeah, so I have a little bit of an update, which is really weird. So Candy and Pat, her husband moved to Georgia. Obviously, they had to get out of that town. But they later divorced, and she's still alive. She now goes by the last name of Wheeler.
00:32:03
Speaker
But what has she been doing in her time? She has been working with her daughter, Jenny, as a mental health therapist, counseling teens and adults who suffer from depression. Oh, that feels like a bad fit, career-wise. Can you imagine if your therapist was murderer Candy Montgomery? Oh my god.
00:32:28
Speaker
It's crazy, but has not had any other run-ins with law enforcement. Just that one time with the axe. I just murdered someone.
00:32:41
Speaker
And her husband has stood by her through the little thing. Yes. Supposedly. Yes. Wow. In the TV show, it kind of dramatically, what is that called? Like it kind of like shows him wavering and like he's like, yeah, they had the affair and it was sad. But then like at some point he's like, oh, you know, he's like, she's not a violent woman. But then sometimes it's like a little less on her side. I'm also like, if she, if this was a dissociative state, when she was done killing this person, she would have called the police.
00:33:11
Speaker
She was in the shower and tried to go along her day. Like, it's just so weird. No, I don't like it. It's also they like do. Yeah, they do an interesting job in the TV show, too, of like, I don't know. I don't know if I love I kind of think that if we're comparing retelling of true crime stories, the staircase, I think is more interesting with Tony Collette.
00:33:34
Speaker
this one it's like oh i started that too i forgot to tell you that i started that one too yes i need to finish it still but in this jessica b.o version like
00:33:43
Speaker
Betty shows up at the trial and it's like ghost Betty. And it's like, well, that's your version. That's your version, Candy. But that's kind of all they get into. I mean, it's such a perfect story. A suburban housewife named Candy kills another woman with an ax. I mean, it just doesn't seem real. It's like two American perfect true crime story. It's horrible.
00:34:09
Speaker
It's really an interesting story, and just to tie up the last bit of it, the other kind of weird part is Alan Gore, who is Betty's husband, left the state of Texas as well. He got remarried, but then he actually lost custody of his children to Betty's parents and has since gotten a divorce and moved to Florida with a girlfriend.
00:34:34
Speaker
but now has reportedly reconnected with his children maybe. I wonder how he lost custody. Well, I wonder if that was like early on or like, because I guess if I was Betty's parents, I wouldn't want the kids to be, not that the dad killed her, but like brought this one. I don't know. It's complicated, but I think I would want the kids to be away from all of that. Yeah.
00:35:00
Speaker
Yeah, I totally see it. And it's, you know, especially if they remember like they didn't really like him from the beginning, they wanted her to be with that math professor. Yeah, I forgot about that. Yeah, totally. So I think they probably fought pretty
The Unsolved Murder of Kathy Sesnick
00:35:14
Speaker
hard. And I'm also like, if your wife was murdered by a woman that you had an affair with, you probably are also not in the best place to be a dad. Probably not. Probably not.
00:35:24
Speaker
Wow, that is a crazy story. It's a really sad, crazy story. But I, you know, again, mixed reviews on the Jessica Beale show, she is unrecognizable. They have made her like, very not cute, very suburban Texas housewife. And then the best is that, of course, I mean, maybe not, of course, but Justin Timberlake has a really funny cameo. Oh, really? That's it. I actually watched the first episode.
00:35:53
Speaker
but I didn't really hook me, but I'm gonna maybe come back to it. I agree. I think if I hadn't chosen this as my podcast episode, I wouldn't have finished it, but like she does a good job. I love, shoot, what's her name from Yellow Jackets, Monica. No, it's not Monica. Melanie.
00:36:14
Speaker
Melanie. I was about to say Monica Lewinsky. I know you were. Yeah, it's very similar. Melanie Lewinsky. Yes, Melanie Lewinsky. It's just too close. That is pretty close to Monica Lewinsky. That's pretty close.
00:36:32
Speaker
Anyway, that's my story. That was long. I'm sorry. I didn't know how detailed it was. No, it's fine. It was great. It's great. And now I guess I'll finish the series. And I'm more excited for the Elizabeth Olsen one, personally. Me too.
00:37:00
Speaker
All right. So let's stay on this true crime train, shall we? My story is also been made into a it's been made to a Netflix series called The Keepers. And this story is the show. So good. So good. And that and that is a docu docu series, to be clear. So it's not a dramatized series. And this is about the murder of Catherine or Kathy Sesnick.
00:37:29
Speaker
And I guess I'll talk about
00:37:34
Speaker
the overview first, and then I'll go into the details of her life. But basically, Kathy Sesnick was murdered on November 7, 1969. Her body wasn't discovered until January of 1970, near a garbage dump in Baltimore. And it is a unsolved murder. Okay, so
00:38:04
Speaker
Now we will go into all the reasons why it should probably be solved, but it is not. It's just so sad. It's so sad. Okay, so Katherine Sesnick was born in 1942 in Pennsylvania in a neighborhood called Lawrenceville.
00:38:29
Speaker
She is the oldest child of her family. She has a few siblings. And she at age 18 decided that she wanted to become a nun. So she did go to, I think, a Catholic school growing up.
00:38:48
Speaker
She was extremely smart, literally valedictorian. And, oh, was the May queen, which I think is sort of like a prom queen, I guess. I don't know. Yes. Yes. And then she, when she was 18, she joined the school's Sisters of Notre Dame in Baltimore to become
00:39:12
Speaker
a nun. So as she started this journey, she eventually started teaching at the Archbishop Kyog High School in Baltimore, Maryland.
00:39:26
Speaker
It was a school just for girls, kind of a newer school. It had only opened in 1965. And she was kind of the young, fun teacher there, even though she was a nun. Not that she was lax on her none-iness, but she was the cool, young one, and the girls at the school felt like they could talk to her. Maria Von Trapp. Yeah, that's exactly it.
00:39:56
Speaker
I think they even mentioned that the key first as well by listening to a podcast too. And they they have one girl that that compared her to sound of music. Just like a very person. Yeah. And while she was teaching at this school, she started to notice that some of her students were acting strangely and she started to believe that they were being sexually abused.
00:40:25
Speaker
And so this is going to get very, very sad for a while, actually. So there was a Catholic priest named Joseph Maskell, who worked at the Archbishop Kiyog High School between 1969 and 1975. So he came on there the same year that Kathy started.
00:40:48
Speaker
He was a pretty, I believe, fairly young priest. Yeah, I think he was in like 20s, 30s, I guess. And he not only worked at this school as like kind of a, like, what's his job title? Oh, he was the, I guess, the chaplain?
00:41:11
Speaker
and counselor to the children. Okay. And he also worked as the chaplain for the Baltimore Police Department, which is a fact that I had totally forgotten about until I started researching this. So he had a total in with the police. He was, you know, a Catholic priest, like everyone assumed he was a good guy. He
00:41:38
Speaker
also got a master's degree in school psychology from Towson State University. And so he seemed to have this balance of being religious and also interested in the psychology of how to help kids in two different ways. So it seemed like the ideal candidate for this job. So basically, a few girls had come to Kathy
00:42:05
Speaker
And Kathy sort of asked them, you know, like, Is somebody hurting you here? And they said yes. And she had suspected Maskell. So she asked if it was Maskell. And they said yes. And this kind of happened towards the end of a school year. And she basically said, I'm going to do everything I can to stop this. And
00:42:28
Speaker
just go home and have a good summer and it'll be dealt with by the fall is basically what she had tried to tell the students. She just seems like such a wonderful
00:42:40
Speaker
Like not like a soft spoken. No, she was very outspoken. But she also like understood his position of power and was scared about, you know, going up against this guy. So it wasn't until I think like 1992, which is way after all this happened, that some former students
00:43:09
Speaker
ended up trying to sue Maskell and see the students were Theresa Lancaster and Jean Wehner. And they both filed a lawsuit against Maskell, the school, the school sisters of Notre Dame,
00:43:27
Speaker
a bunch of different people for what they had experienced and their time there. And what they had described is that Maskell not only was having sex with the students, but they said that he would drug them, they would come out like in a daze, like they barely knew what happened. He had threatened them with guns. And then most horrifyingly,
00:43:52
Speaker
He sort of brought in his friends to sexually abuse the students while he watched. So this included friends from the clergy and also from the Baltimore Police Department. There was apparently the girls referred to his father Bob as this guy that was the worst of the worst. And like even Maskell, they said like even Maskell had to tell him to like calm down sometimes.
00:44:21
Speaker
And Father Bob has basically never been identified because the girls didn't know who he was. But in this lawsuit that was filed in the 90s, and this is, I mean, it just gets worse and worse. They basically said that the statute of limitation on this abuse had passed. So nothing happened, basically.
00:44:47
Speaker
So that was horrible. And then to go back to Kathy now, so she knew this information and wanted to do something about it, presumably. And it's unclear how far like she got in terms of trying to help these girls. So all we know
00:45:13
Speaker
is that she, at the end of that school year, even though she had said she was trying to help the girls and had told the girls that, she ended up leaving that school and trying to go to another school, I guess.
00:45:33
Speaker
And we don't know if she had tried to talk to anyone about what she knew. We don't know exactly how she left that school, but she felt like she needed to leave, I guess. Probably felt unsafe in some way.
00:45:51
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. So November 7th, 1969, she was now, let me go back. So not only has she left this school, but she was also taking a break from being a nun. So I can't remember what it's called, but there's some sort of thing you can go through where you basically like take a break from being a nun and like go live out in the real world. And I think it's kind of to make sure that you really want to be a nun. And I think it's exactly what she does in Sound of Music, right?
00:46:20
Speaker
it's like they're like, Oh, maybe this thing. I think that's right. But yeah, so she basically her another woman decided to take a break. She started working at different school, she started living outside of the the nun nunnery. I don't know what these carriage house apartments. And she
00:46:40
Speaker
was trying to lead a more normal life. And I wonder whether she had just lost faith in religion due to the sexual assault she had heard about. I don't know if she had actually come up against trying to stop it and was shut down. Who knows exactly? But that night on November 7th, she had gone to a shopping center
00:47:08
Speaker
in town to get a gift for her sister's engagement. She cast a paycheck at First National Bank. She went to a bakery and that night she didn't come home. So her roommates and some other of her friends were looking for her and eventually at 4.40 a.m. that morning
00:47:32
Speaker
they find her car and it's illegally parked across from her apartment complex and it's covered and mud and leaves, which is very strange, especially since, yeah, I don't know what this part of Baltimore looks like, but that was very strange. And the stuff, there was stuff in the passenger seat, but she wasn't there. So
00:47:58
Speaker
The body of Kathy was not found for a few months, as I said. And it wasn't found until January 3rd of 1970. And it was found by Hunter and his son at an informal landfill, basically. And they found that she, I mean, sorry, this gets so dark. They assumed by her state that she had been somehow sexually assaulted and died from blunt force trauma.
00:48:28
Speaker
to the head, basically. And so what's interesting about this is what is it? Like, did she know too much and was she killed by Maskell or someone
00:48:46
Speaker
that he hired to kill her because she knew too much. That's kind of the first thought, right? Because she had all this huge information. But then they actually, the most updated part of this is that they ended up exhuming Maskell's body because he had died in 2001. And they did a DNA test.
00:49:12
Speaker
to see if he was the one that killed her and it wasn't him. So they did rule him out as a suspect. And even though so he was never actually charged for any of the abuse that he did, the church just basically took him out of that school and put him somewhere else, which is like a thing that always seems to happen in the Catholic Church when someone does something really bad, which is instead of he was eventually removed for the ministry, too.
00:49:38
Speaker
But a lot of times with these sexual assault cases, people are just moved around, which is not helpful. And so it adds to them feeling like they can get away with anything and hurting more kids. So he was never charged, but the Archdiocese of Baltimore did end up settling with 16 of Maskell's victims.
00:50:00
Speaker
for a total of $472,000, which really doesn't feel like enough to me. That doesn't even feel like that scratches the surface of what happened. So, oh, there was another thing. So after all that Maskell had, I think he had the first thing that he had done is resign from the school. And there was a groundskeeper there and he had all these boxes papers that he asked to be buried.
00:50:29
Speaker
Which like what that he asked me and He said it's stuff from the school that it's just boring paperwork that he just doesn't want to Destroy but he doesn't want to store it and so he's gonna bury it And so of course that groundskeeper was eventually fired or left and he told people about it They opened up those boxes and of course it contained nude photos of underage girls closet
00:50:56
Speaker
So that was also pretty much like, yep, this is the guy. Yes, he did it. Yes, he's gross.
00:51:02
Speaker
yes, he's gross, but did he have anything to do with Kathy's murder? And that's, it's just my instinct is like, yes, but there hasn't really been any clear evidence. Oh, one thing that I was listening to in this podcast that really made me so mad is that so Kathy's sister after the day after her death,
00:51:28
Speaker
received a letter from Kathy in the mail, so it had been postmarked like it had already been sent to her. And instead of reading the letter to see what it said, she just turned it into the police department, which I just want to remind you that at this time, Maskell was the chaplain of the Baltimore Police Department. So it's like if there was anything incriminating in that letter,
00:51:54
Speaker
She said she was nervous about anything. Yeah, the only people that would know about it would be the Baltimore Police Department, which no offense has a history of being corrupt. And it's just like, what? Are you freaking? I mean, the police department and the Catholic Church are just two of the most like, we're going to protect our own at all costs and regardless of right and wrong. Yeah.
00:52:21
Speaker
There's also one of the past students that said that she had some recovered memories of Maskell, and this is like unclear if this is true or not, but she had a recovered memory of Maskell driving her out to see the body of Kathy and saying that he basically was like, this is what happens if you tell on people you shouldn't or whatever.
00:52:49
Speaker
and is like, you'll end up dead. So I don't know if that's real, but it just feels like in some way her knowledge of what was going on at this school had something to do with why she was murdered, but we still don't know. And I just, it's a bummer. Yeah. It is such a bummer. And I mean, I love those women in the Netflix show that are just like doing the research on their own and like trying to get to the bottom of it.
00:53:20
Speaker
Absolutely. Absolutely. And I haven't seen the keepers in a while. I watched it like last year or something, but absolutely like them, like keeping the fight alive to figure out what happened is amazing. And also like bringing together all the victims of that school so they can have like some form of healing is amazing too, because it, Maskell died basically never having to pay for anything he did. And it's just very unfair. I really always hate that. And I feel like that happens in so many cases too.
00:53:49
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. Well, thank you so much for doing that story. It's, yeah, I, yeah, I love the keepers. I know. And I hope, you know, I hope in the future, we'll, we'll get more information. I mean, things are being solved more and more with DNA. So I feel like there's always hope for these older cases still, especially cases that have as much, you know, media attention and, um, you know, stuff like that. But yeah, that was our true crime week, people.
00:54:19
Speaker
True Crime Week, it was a long one, packed and loaded with info. I know I was almost like, should we break it into two? But I don't know. Nah, that's okay. You know what? We owe them this. Yeah, we owe them a long one. That's true. Thank you all so much for listening. We hope you have some sweet, sweet nightmares. Bye.