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179: Captivating Hollywood Crimes
55 Plays2 months ago
Hey cryptic cuties, this week we take a trip back in time to the Golden age of Hollywood. In 1949 Jean Spangler was a star on the rise, only in her late 20's she was already a triple threat and seemed to be gaining more recognition for her many talents. All that changed when Jean didn't return home the morning after shooting for a new film all night. As investigations began, more and more questions are raised with very few answers. Tune in as we unravel all the details, from theories and suspects, to the possible connection to another famous Hollywood murder.
Don't forget to come back next week for Alanna's case, until then keep it cryptic!
Darkcast promo this week is Beyond the Rainbow!
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Transcript
Introduction to Castles and Cryptids
00:00:01
Speaker
Darkcast Network. Indie pods with a dark side.
00:00:26
Speaker
ah You are listening to Castles and Cryptids, where the castles are haunted and the cryptids are cryptic as fuck. And I'm Alanna. And I'm Kelsey. And I can hear a little bit of Gordo purring.
00:00:41
Speaker
Yeah, hold on. Let's let's get in there. We cropped out all Hold on. Gordo. I heard it during the intro. He was so... He was so loud.
00:00:55
Speaker
he's so happy finally also i apologize if you guys didn't like i didn't cut out much of if there was a little bit of cat shenanigans last episode because sometimes as i was just telling kelly kelsey it's almost easier not to edit a part out and try to figure out where you are Yeah.
00:01:18
Speaker
And like, he was just doing cute, sometimes little interruptions. Or a few times you had to um run away and be like, hang on. i heard Kordo get into something and then you just hear. Oh, yeah.
00:01:31
Speaker
Like, ah headphones down, you know. Or like. yeah I think I had to lock him out of the room or something.
00:01:42
Speaker
It's been a while. he He pissed you off once or twice, i
Reflecting on Past Episodes
00:01:45
Speaker
think. Yeah. Yeah. But um I hope it didn't derail any anyone too much from the story.
00:01:54
Speaker
Yeah. But yeah, it was it did end up being a long episode, but it was really ah like interesting. And i I enjoyed both our topics, I thought. so I hope everyone liked the one that we honoring Black History Month. Yeah, was good.
00:02:10
Speaker
i I loved it. I was thinking back on it when I was driving home. i was like, oh, we can talk about And hopefully everybody enjoyed it because we had a lot of fun recording it.
00:02:25
Speaker
Oh, that's funny you say driving home, like, because we don't record together. Were you driving home from work? Yeah, in my less than a kilometer drive, I was just like, oh, yeah, that but the last week's topic. And we learned all the uses for peanuts.
00:02:41
Speaker
Oh. No, you know, that's a good topic when it like sticks with you or you think back about something that was like funny. Like, cause yeah yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It was a good one, but definitely.
00:03:00
Speaker
Yeah. We like to go a little, Oh, what's our wheelhouse. We don't know. ah Let's do a bunch of different stuff.
00:03:10
Speaker
Yeah, it's it's hard because a lot of times for podcasts, they really only have like a couple categories. um Don't try to put us in those categories. We are all sorts of things. Yeah. ah got Got different types of episodes and recurring segments or series.
00:03:34
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Podcast Themes and Listener Engagement
00:03:35
Speaker
It's like, yeah, we do a bunch of true crime ones, but then they also like to put us in the history charts and whatever. And politics and... Oh my I... Like, Mr. Ballin will say, don't listen to Mr. Ballin, you all should, but, like, hit he'll be like, oh, if you're a fan of the Strange, Dark, and Mysterious, I'll be like, well, hell yeah, we are you know? oh yeah.
00:04:00
Speaker
And so, like, I feel like that's what we do, like, if it's not mysterious paranormal or true crime it's some sort of dark history or unknown yeah cryptic history because we love things that are cryptic and and yeah last time we got to shine some lights on some people that were lesser known so and yeah all that is very cool ah Yeah, i hadn't heard about any of your individuals before.
00:04:29
Speaker
so ah that's cool. I like hearing new things on podcasts where I'm like, I am getting and education on my own. Right?
00:04:40
Speaker
And then, yeah, I was excited when I was looking at pictures and stuff again for the website. I was like, oh, this is this is cool. That's fun. Sometimes I love seeing which ones you pick for the website or for the episode when you're editing it. And I go...
00:04:55
Speaker
Like I think last time I said to you, i was like, Oh, dark side of social media. That looks fun. And then I was like, Ooh, that's our episode or whatever. Yeah. That'd be a good episode topic.
00:05:07
Speaker
Oh yeah. We already did that. I'll listen that. Oh, right. I've already listened to that. Yeah. I think it came up on good thoughts feed and I was like, hell yeah. All right. Well, yeah, man.
00:05:22
Speaker
Oh, um, I know we're recording this on the early weekday. um and very excited to hear your stuff. Also on the weekend, I smashed my phone a little bit. I just have to put that out there.
00:05:39
Speaker
told my mom. Remember I told you the shoes i wore when I was walking the dog were trying to trip me? i think I mentioned it on the last recording. Anyway, it was a while ago. okay.
00:05:52
Speaker
I totally, yeah, we went for to walk the dog on this last Saturday and, um, the shoelaces got caught on the other shoe and I face planted like and went to brace myself with my hands and whatever it was like okay you know it's fine but because I almost almost tripped already and I was like we're almost home and then it's like oh no but it's like started to melt a bit and now it's concrete and then I was yeah well I was also listening to a podcast and forwarding it like because there was ads and
00:06:25
Speaker
which you guys should be always happy that we don't have ads yet because we're not big enough. But I was fast forwarding and then like I tripped the fuck all over the place and I went down and then like I tried to obviously brace my hands and stuff and then my phone gets like completely like smashed on its like little corners.
00:06:48
Speaker
Anyway. And I skin my knees. was like god damn it. Yeah. Anyway, that's a whole thing we can come back to whenever we have more ads
Podcast Logistics and Personal Stories
00:07:00
Speaker
to really read. I'll be like, you hate ads.
00:07:04
Speaker
I smashed my whole phone trying to skip one. Yeah, I try not to use my phone at all when I'm walking. ah I'm so paranoid because I know I'm like clumsy with phones. But yeah, I know what you mean. Yeah.
00:07:20
Speaker
ah One of the last iPhones I had. ah Back when they made them a little bit sturdier. um oh did they? i ah I was at my work and my work had an escalator and I was walking down the escalator and for some reason I dropped my phone and it went down the escalator. But I was ah I had been at the top of the escalator and it went like end over and all the way down every single step like down the stairs. oh no Yeah, until it went to the very bottom.
00:07:58
Speaker
And it it didn't even break the screen. Like, I didn't have a screen protector on. It didn't break the screen, but it chipped the metal, like, gouged out on the sides in, like, eight places.
00:08:12
Speaker
Yes. But, like, I was having, like, heart palpitations. I thought my phone was obliterated. ah
Introduction to Old Hollywood Crimes
00:08:22
Speaker
Well, yeah.
00:08:23
Speaker
ah Yeah. My screen did... I had a small screen protector on there. Probably if I had to bought one that actually matched that phone when I bought that stupid cheap phone, it might have protected more of the screen. but It seemed like I got, like, yeah, like, bashed on the corners and then went outward from there. oh my god.
00:08:46
Speaker
amazing. They're the worst. Anyway. I digress. I'm sorry.
00:08:55
Speaker
Now Gordo's over there pouting. Gordo? Doesn't Gordo know what we're talking about today? Did we even say? no not yet. Gordo, you know you are the cat's meow and you want to hear all about old Hollywood crimes.
00:09:14
Speaker
The glitz, the
The Mystery of Jean Spangler's Disappearance
00:09:15
Speaker
glamour. The cat's pajamas. Yeah. Yeah. It's a fun, like...
00:09:25
Speaker
There's a lot to dive into there. obviously Obviously, we like some of our historical older stuff. If good plots has anything to be believed. Mine...
00:09:40
Speaker
Yeah, I had a bit of a hard time settling on, like, which one I wanted to do, because there are some really well-known ones ah yeah that I feel like kind of come up all the time. i know, I think I said to you before we started that Fatty Arbuckle is one that always gets, like, mentioned also. Yeah, I saw that one.
00:10:01
Speaker
Yeah. and but it's bean his name's not even fatty so like i'm glad we're gonna highlight some other cases that's all all that yeah uh the one i'm gonna talk about is also ah probably fairly popular but i i myself hadn't uh heard of it so maybe some other people haven't either Oh yeah, I'd imagine.
00:10:33
Speaker
I wonder if I have. Uh, so it's the disappearance of Jean Spangler. um Oh.
00:10:44
Speaker
Gordo. Okay. Your tail. Your tail cannot
00:10:50
Speaker
In the laptop. A tail as old as time? tail as bold as Gordo? Gordo.
00:10:58
Speaker
ah tail is borning with the escorrdo Yeah, now he's just hitting me with the tail. um I did see it flicking over there. Jean was born Jean Elizabeth Spangler September 2nd, 1923 in Seattle, Washington. And her parents have the best names ever.
00:11:27
Speaker
ah More people need to have these names. ah Florence. and Cecil. I love it. Okay. I love the name Florence.
00:11:38
Speaker
and I feel like names cycle back like fashion, right? Yeah. I'm not sure about Florence, but I know I've mentioned to you, possibly on the podcast, that um sometimes I'll be updating like new baby names, and they're like really old-sounding names, like Edith and, like I don't know, Marjorie.
00:11:59
Speaker
Oh, yeah. Yeah. mer Marjorie, right? Okay. No, Florence and Cecil. God damn it. there was You said Marjorie.
00:12:11
Speaker
Because someone was talking about a Marjorie earlier in my thing. Anyway, I'm so sorry. and okay Something I listened to earlier. No. Florence and Cecil are her parents.
00:12:23
Speaker
Damn. And Jean was a dancer, a model, and an actress. I think this was all in Yeah, I think that might have all been while she was in high school. ah Because kind of after that, it mentions that she graduated from high school in Los Angeles and ah started modeling professionally. okay.
00:12:50
Speaker
After she graduated. Yeah, they start young, it seems. Yeah. She also started to dance at the Florentine Gardens and at the Earl Carroll Theater, which the... I think it's... Excuse you, Gordo.
00:13:13
Speaker
I think it's the Florentine Gardens. um Sorry. Okay, Gordo, you just have to go. Jesus Christ.
00:13:24
Speaker
um It sounded like something got dropped on the mic almost. No, I don't know what he was doing.
00:13:33
Speaker
Yeah, one of the two places, i can't remember which, it was notorious for their clientele and also to a link for another famous, very, very famous murder case, ah the Black Dahlia.
00:13:51
Speaker
everbra har everybody has it came up and I thought oh my god we never covered that yeah ah ah Yeah, it'll get mentioned few times in one.
00:14:02
Speaker
um Yeah, so Jean also ended up dancing. It was either Florentine Gardens or the Earl Carroll Theater. um But um the Black Dahlia murder um of 22-year-old Elizabeth Short, um she rented a room behind the nightclub.
00:14:21
Speaker
um And that was also where Jean Spangler was dancing. bad And it was within the same time period, like only a few years apart.
00:14:35
Speaker
So, yeah.
00:14:38
Speaker
Crazy. um Yeah. So jumping ahead a little to 1941, Jean is 18 years old and she start starts kind of attracting more attention for her acting skills and starts earning some small parts in movies.
00:14:56
Speaker
uh she ends up mainly going uncredited i guess for a lot of her work but she did end up earning about eight actual like credit like screen credits okay but she did more um she just went uncredited a lot of times i think something i ran across said that she was an extra um in quite a bit of stuff so Right. Or like if you get, yeah, some sort of extra roles are non-speakings.
00:15:27
Speaker
They don't really get credited. Yeah. You're not even man number two or something. Yeah. Maybe not even that. Yeah. Yeah.
00:15:44
Speaker
um Yeah, so she's acting in her um at about 18, and then at 19 years old, ah she marries 21-year-old Dexter Benner, who's a plastic.
00:15:56
Speaker
Dexter? Yeah. He's a plastics manufacturer. ah like, I'm going to say plastic surgeon. I know, that's what I thought it was going to be, and I was like, oh, manufacturer just makes plastic. Yeah.
00:16:12
Speaker
yeah um Yeah, it was not a good marriage. It was very short, lasting only about six months before Jean filed for divorce and cited Dexter's mental cruelty.
00:16:28
Speaker
So not good at all. Yeah. Irreconcilable differences. like I'll take it. You know, give one of those, like, boxes to check or whatever. Yeah, like, I'm not really sure. There isn't a lot of details about that because um they end up continuing an on-again, off-again relationship for, like, years.
00:16:53
Speaker
um Yeah. Okay. Okay. Yeah, yeah. That happens. so i i have some of that in mind, too. Yeah.
00:17:05
Speaker
Jean ends up getting pregnant and gives birth to their daughter, Christine, in April of 1944. So about two years after they originally got married. Okay.
00:17:16
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Torrid love affair. Oops. Pregnant. Pregnant. Can't relate. No, I'm just kidding. um So I think they continue on again, off again, but before they finally eventually divorce in 1946, and they begin, like, viciously fighting over custody of their daughter. Oh, no.
00:17:41
Speaker
Yeah. That's always unfortunate, because the kid does not need to go through that, like...
00:17:49
Speaker
I'm not saying it's about two. so okay Yeah, they don't remember a lot, but like, i don't know, I wass gonna say it's not necessarily better to be together fighting it out while you try to figure it out. But like, just in general, try not to disrespect your your poor partner, especially when it's the parent of your child.
00:18:15
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. yeah That's how wish there had been more information or anything talking about this, like, mental cruelty that she filed divorce over. Like, yeah i don't know. why Yeah, I'd like, I wish there was more information about that. um Definitely sounds like she was not very happy.
00:18:38
Speaker
no the anyway. Okay. at the end anyway Yeah, so Brenner stated that Jean, quote, preferred parties to priorities. Oh no.
00:18:50
Speaker
Yeah. um And, I mean, his case or argument must have been pretty compelling because he ended up winning custody, which then he decided to completely deny Jean her visitation rights.
00:19:06
Speaker
which resulted in the judge revoking his custody like custodial agreement and placed Christine back with Jean. So, like, he had full custody and then lost it because he refused to let um Jean even see Christine, their daughter.
00:19:25
Speaker
but oh that is odd. like Like, the judge is like, you're not going to play fair, so back to square one or whatever. Yeah, right? Yeah. That's crazy.
00:19:37
Speaker
Yeah, so Christine's back living with Jean, and it's a little confusing, but I guess they moved into a two-bedroom apartment in Park La Brea, and And this two-bedroom ah apartment, I guess, was shared with her mother, Florence, and then Jean's brother, and then the brother's wife.
00:20:01
Speaker
So there's, like, four adults plus Christine now that's living there in a two-bedroom apartment. Damn.
00:20:13
Speaker
Yeah, I was like, what state again? I'm sorry. area I think like this is all happening in LA now. Okay. Cause yeah, I was gonna say yes.
00:20:26
Speaker
the it didn't really say like sounds familiar. so But yeah. Okay. Yeah, like, I didn't run across anything that necessarily said when they moved. Like, she was born in Washington, but then it says she graduated high school in L.A. So it must have been some time they moved to L.A., like, when she was in school.
00:20:45
Speaker
right Can you imagine coming from a small town and then going to, like, Hollywood High? Yeah, i have some of that craziness in mind, too. I'm like, ah, so Star Trek. It's like the Cinderella story.
00:21:01
Speaker
um which is funny because we just watched Into the Woods the other night and i was like, oh, I've never seen this. And i was like, oh, yeah. You finally watched it? Yes. but da It's good, but it was long.
00:21:17
Speaker
Um, did you enjoy, what is it? It's, it has Chris, Chris Pine in it, right? Right. Yes. Yes. The guy, can him, him and that other guy are, uh, singing on that water.
00:21:33
Speaker
Yeah. They're singing on the waterfall and they're just like one upping each other. So the one guy like rips his shirt and then the other guy's like kicking the water. Um, oh my God. No, cause I,
00:21:46
Speaker
I can sort of picture it, but also I gapped out because it was like a very long, i was like, let's put this on. always wanted to watch It's only two hours. And then we were like eating supper and stuff. And i was like, and then by the end of it, we were like, oh my God.
00:22:01
Speaker
Like the songs about like, you don't have to be alone. And some of the songs just went on like so long. I was like, I'm ready for Hamilton. like that movie. No, it was good.
00:22:14
Speaker
just, I judged some of the songs a little bit. That's all.
00:22:21
Speaker
look You gotta rewatch the the scene of them. It's on YouTube. It's on YouTube. It's hilarious. They're just... I had wanted to... I had heard all about Anna Kendrick talking about in her book.
00:22:34
Speaker
Because, like, she was like, oh, I had to go down the steps. And then they were like, we're just gonna make your feet magnetic. And she was like, can't I just pretend that I can't get down the steps and my shoes are glued? And they're like, no!
00:22:47
Speaker
She was like, okay! damn that's wild so I kind of wanted to see that scene and whatever um anyway yeah sorry to derail but yeah it was good uh yeah so I think it was um oh shoot hold on I gotta find out which of my sources I basically had two sources one was true crime edition uh and the
00:23:20
Speaker
other one was entertainment weekly which was like really crazy but honestly they were like yeah i was really surprised they they ended up being ah one of the best sources i was like totally like you get magazines where people have to actually research like freaking yeah ah yeah and so and it was written out really well and like easy to follow but had really good information um but the true crime edition they had a really nice timeline of events uh so um
00:24:01
Speaker
Including like actual times that stuff happened that I didn't run across to anywhere that was like this specific. So yeah, everything else was kind of the backstory. So this goes into um what what our case actually kind of is about so october 7th 1949 at 5 p.m uh jean spangler says goodbye to her five-year-old daughter christine and ends up asking her sister-in-law sophie uh to watch over christine um while she's out of the house and i guess at this time like florence uh jean's mother was out of town doing something
00:24:43
Speaker
I guess she might normally have been the one to watch Christine, but she wasn't available because she was out of town. And Jean had to go, like, film something? Yeah, that's what she says.
00:24:54
Speaker
There's a couple different things she says. um So Sophie is her sister-in-law. So she asks her to watch her daughter. um So Sophie says, quote, she came down the stairs and asked how she looked.
00:25:06
Speaker
um she's Sophie's later you saying this to reporters, saying she smiled at me and then at her little girl, Christine, and asked where she was, or sorry, and Christine asked where she was going And Jean replied, going to work.
00:25:21
Speaker
ah But I guess she turned to Sophie and like winked when she said that she was going to work. But didn't really like follow up. Sophie was like, oh, she winked at me when she was saying she was going to work. So was she actually going to work?
00:25:36
Speaker
Oh, okay. Yeah. That is odd. Because most of the other things I saw also says that Jean had told Sophie that she was going to be meeting...
Exploring Theories on Jean's Disappearance
00:25:48
Speaker
um her ex-husband Dexter Brenner um to discuss child support payments that she had not been receiving from him. So yeah.
00:26:02
Speaker
um And that she would be going, oh sorry. And after that, that she would be going to a night shoot for a film that she was working on. ah So kind of like, don't expect me to be home until the morning because she would be,
00:26:16
Speaker
Yeah, seeing Dexter and then she would be going to um the film set. It's a busy day. Yeah, that's about 5pm that that happens. And then about 6pm, there's some witness ah that ends up seeing Jean at the farmer's market that's happening.
00:26:39
Speaker
And this farmer's market... is a short walk from Jean's apartment and of the salesmen. i I would love that. i don't Always catch me at the farmer's market. It sounds lovely.
00:26:54
Speaker
this This city is not walkable. um No. It's not set up very friendly. Oh, yes. Fredericton had a very walkable downtown farmer's market because we were such a small city.
00:27:09
Speaker
Yeah, and this is not even like, ah the city is also not very public transit friendly, like it just isn't set up in a convenient way.
00:27:20
Speaker
I know the type, yeah. This is reminding me very much of my hometown. Yeah. ah So a salesman there also remembers her ah taking her time in the store um and described it as if she had been passing time, like kind of browsing while she was waiting for somebody. Like maybe she wasn't actually there to like shop. Maybe she was just passing time waiting for something else.
00:27:48
Speaker
Mm hmm.
00:27:52
Speaker
And then about 7pm, Jean ends up calling the apartment and she speaks to Sophie. She tells her that the night shoot will likely run all night and that she will not be home that evening.
00:28:05
Speaker
Jean may have made this call from near the farmer's market or from the farmer's market, ah not from the film set. like So she might not have actually been calling from the film set like maybe had been implied.
00:28:20
Speaker
implied Right. yeah sucks. Or it's harder with no cell phones back then because we had... Right.
00:28:32
Speaker
I guess, yeah, you would think you would have a clearer idea of where someone was based on like, well, they made a call from the house at this time. But it's yeah, it's still, yeah, it still can be difficult to track down a little ah mysterious. You're like, okay, but wait, where were they when they made that call? Yeah.
00:28:52
Speaker
Okay. Uh, so this phone call, I guess, ends up being the last time that Sophie speaks to Jean.
00:29:00
Speaker
Oh. Damn. Um, yeah. So, that was all on October 7th. So, getting into October 8th, at, uh, 1.30 in the morning, there's, uh, this popular radio DJ who was known for conducting, like, table-side interviews, I guess, in restaurants.
00:29:20
Speaker
Uh, he ends up seeing Gene at the Cheesebox restaurant on... It's called the Cheesebox, okay? I've never heard of it. I've, like, never heard it. don't know.
00:29:33
Speaker
That's wild. Does it still exist? Cheesecake Factory. Are they known for great cheese selection? The Cheesebox restaurant on Sunset and Laurel Canyon Boulevard.
00:29:49
Speaker
um is this i'm already disappointed because i haven't heard of it ah can't be that great no i would like to know shots fired you guys should send us some of your food if you think i should feel otherwise
00:30:07
Speaker
ah Yeah, so there's this popular radio DJ that was there interviewing somebody um and noticed Jean because, again, she's like a minor like actress and stuff. She's in stuff, so they noticed her. It's a day and age when like you're beautiful and people would be like, oh my god, have you been in the movies?
00:30:26
Speaker
Yeah. She definitely is beautiful. Wow. Don't look up pictures yet. It's spoilers. You're not allowed to look up pictures until I tell you to. No, I'm just like saying how when I was a kid, like you could like fantasize that you were to get like discovered someday.
00:30:40
Speaker
Even if you lived in stupid rural New Brunswick. Maybe I'll go to Maine to audition for something Stephen King will shoot you. You know, like that was my closest, you know.
00:30:57
Speaker
famous person Jesus I don't know ah so when Jean's at the restaurant she was seen with a tall dark ah man and they were arguing and guess so it didn't seem like it was going good and they noted that she was still in the restaurant by like 2.30am so had been there at least an hour so yeah the restaurant's still open at 2.30am damn Yeah, it must be some sort of like lounge or maybe the bar area or something, but still. Right. Yeah, even bars close at two.
00:31:35
Speaker
Yeah. ah So the early morning, I'm not exactly sure what time.
00:31:43
Speaker
There's a gas station attendant named Art Rogers, and he spoke to a couple in a convertible on their way ah that said they're on said they were on their way to Fresno.
00:31:57
Speaker
And the woman matched Jean's description. As the couple ended up pulling away, the woman... Like something said she slunk down.
00:32:10
Speaker
that doesn't really make sense because it also said that she yelled, like turned around and yelled back to the attendant, have the police follow this car. So like if somebody slinks down, I wouldn't think they'd be turning around to yell something at somebody as they're pulling away. i think you getting up bigger out of the convertible, like kind of sitting up straighter.
00:32:32
Speaker
that Yeah. Crouching down and then yelling. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, it's not in line with what you're trying to do if you're not trying to draw attention to yourself. Yeah, I'm not too sure.
00:32:49
Speaker
Yeah. um The attendant later called the police and reported the incident. And when Jean failed to return to the apartment in the morning, Sophie reported her as missing um to the Los Angeles the Police Department.
00:33:06
Speaker
Yeah, so Sophie reports her missing, but because of Jean's profession and age, they didn't take it seriously. And I don't know what a teletype is.
00:33:17
Speaker
and might be like what they use to like put out police dispatches. But a um it said that they failed to put her status as missing on the teletype. So I guess people weren't really properly notified. So like maybe they didn't catch it if she had been seen anywhere.
00:33:36
Speaker
Okay, because, like, me I've heard the term teleprompt meaning the, like, banner. the the ticker, of the banner thing that goes across the bottom when you're doing, like, a newscast or whatever. Okay, so maybe they're, like, it's just not out there enough.
00:33:51
Speaker
I don't know. Yeah. um Yeah, so they didn't really do their job that way. um the next that thing we have is that An employee at Griffith Park ends up finding Jean's purse about two days later ah near the Ferndale entrance that was located about nine kilometers away from um Jean's apartment, like where she was living.
00:34:24
Speaker
So near at the entrance to the park. Yeah, one of the entrances, I guess. It's like a big... So Griffith Park is like really big. ah it's said it's 4,000 acres of land and one of the largest urban parks in North America.
00:34:40
Speaker
I feel like I've heard of it. Like to me, I'm like, it's like California's like Central Park or something. i don't know. Probably. think so. Yeah. Yeah. It said it includes an observatory, ah zoo, museums, and an amphitheater.
00:34:56
Speaker
And it's located in the Las Feliz neighborhood. okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It also has ah really dark side, I guess, because of its size and proximity to the santa monica my ah Santa Monica Mountains. It is a common dumping ground for bodies.
00:35:15
Speaker
Okay. So. I was Yeah, they find her. don't know. And they find her purse at the entrance to it. Oh, lovely.
00:35:26
Speaker
Santa Monica? um Yeah. Santa Monica mountains. So like, it's kind of like rugged terrain and everything, I guess. Right.
00:35:37
Speaker
I mean, like, I've heard of the La Brea Tar Pits, you know, you hear of all this stuff. um I'm like, Santa Monica. I've heard nothing. Nothing terrible about you.
00:35:49
Speaker
Savage Garden made you seem like a beautiful town.
00:35:55
Speaker
Yeah, the mountains, I guess, are different. ah Okay. I feel like it's West Coast, right? I don't know. Santa Monica. Yeah, that's California. Okay, never mind.
00:36:09
Speaker
ah Inside Jean's purse was a handwritten note. ah This is really interesting. so Okay. um I guess they figured out it's for sure her handwrit handwriting, but it says Kirk, like the name Kirk, K-I-R-K.
00:36:25
Speaker
Yeah. can't Can't wait any longer. Going to see Dr. Scott. It will work best this way while mother is away. That's all it says.
00:36:36
Speaker
And remember, her mother is out of town right now. Yeah, yeah, yeah. it was found in her pocket? In her purse. No, in her purse. Right.
00:36:47
Speaker
Yeah. And it said it will work out best this way? Yeah, they're saying, Kirk, can't wait any longer, going to see Dr. Scott.
00:36:57
Speaker
It will work best this way while Mother is away. Right. That would imply heavily that she was a pregonante.
00:37:10
Speaker
Mm-hmm, very possibly. Put a stop to it. Okay. Uh, it's noted that the purse handles were ripped at one end of the bag, like both handles, I guess, but none of the valuables inside had been taken. And Sophie confirmed that Jean, uh, didn't have any money with her, um and didn't normally have a lot of money.
00:37:33
Speaker
So it was unlikely that the purse had been damaged or taken during a robbery. Sorry, this is after they found the purse, but not her? They haven't?
00:37:44
Speaker
Nope. Okay. Yeah, just the purse. That's very sad. ah Once Jean's purse was located, police obviously start taking her disappearance more seriously. Because again, they didn't even really list her as missing. They thought, oh she's like an actress and um all that kind of stuff. She probably just went out with a group of friends or went out with like somebody and went to do something. It's Hollywood.
00:38:15
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, yeah. It doesn't take much for like them maybe not to take it seriously. Not that that's always the cop's fault because you can't always know when it is serious. But like, yeah, someone doesn't want to go out with their group or whatever. Yeah, you're like, okay.
00:38:36
Speaker
I think some stuff said there was about 60 officers and volunteers that gathered in the park and started conducting searches. And investigators also began reconstructing her movements, trying to figure out happened.
00:38:51
Speaker
And um they are interviewing Sophie because she's kind of the last one that talked to Jean. And Jean had obviously, as I said, told Sophie that she would be at a night shoot.
00:39:04
Speaker
But when the investigators followed up with, I guess, the Screen Extras Guild, so that must be where she was registered as like an extra, Not the SAG, but the SAG.
00:39:15
Speaker
Screen Extras. Yeah, the Yeah, the Screen Extras Guild. i Well, they just had the SAG recently, so I couldn't help myself.
00:39:26
Speaker
Yeah. The Zieg. The Zieg. Yeah, so, like, investigators are like, okay, so they contact Screen Actors Oh my god, Screen Extras Guild.
00:39:42
Speaker
And... okay They find out that they had no, ah they said there was no record of Jean working that night or on actually there being any film that was being shot that night in the city, like at all.
00:39:57
Speaker
Yeah, so not only was Jean not registered to be working that night, there was no film that was in production that night. And was that the night, wait.
00:40:09
Speaker
Sorry. Okay. Okay. Sorry. That's the night she went missing. And she had said that she was going to be at a night shoot. um And they've now confirmed their there was no night shoot at all. Okay.
00:40:23
Speaker
Okay. So she's missing. Nobody else is. Nobody else is like, oh, I haven't seen her at the same time. I'm just trying handle it.
00:40:36
Speaker
I didn't see anything about like that kind of stuff. It's just Sophie, that like her sister-in-law, that reported her missing. Right. Right, or right. Okay. Okay.
00:40:48
Speaker
I was just like, damn. Yeah. I'm glad that someone really realized she was missing. Or whatever. Yeah, she realized like pretty quickly, but they didn't take it seriously until they found her purse two days or so later.
00:41:05
Speaker
Yeah. That's unfortunate. So unfortunately, that's basically the case. um The rest is kind of theories as to what's happened. So sorry to be a bummer. She is still missing. i have never found her, her remains, or any other information.
00:41:24
Speaker
Oh, shit. Yeah, it's like insane. She just fucking disappeared. Yeah, but the theories are kind of... ah Some are more grounded, I'd say. Some are a little wild.
00:41:37
Speaker
but We don't bring up aliens, but there's some interesting ones.
00:41:56
Speaker
Oh, there's Sparkle Farts, my trusty unicorn. I've got to tell these good people about our show. there, I'm CJ, host of Beyond the Rainbow, true crimes of the LGBTQ+.
00:42:10
Speaker
While I do have episodes on some of the more well-known cases from the LGBTQ community, such as Matthew Shepard, Brandon, Tina, and the Orlando Pulse nightclub massacre, I'm going I cover world cases like the London nail bombing murders, Australia's snowtown murders, in South Africa's corrective rape and murder of lesbians.
00:42:32
Speaker
I cover lesser known cases like the murder of 21 year old trans man Alex Van Dolsen in Indiana. Police called his death a suicide.
00:42:43
Speaker
Spoiler alert, it wasn't. I tell you about wrongful conviction cases, serial killers, and school shooters. My unicorn and I cover all sorts of crimes against the LGBTQ and crimes by members of the LGBTQ.
00:43:00
Speaker
You don't have to be part of the community to listen. All walks of life are welcome to become Rainbow Warriors because you matter. And remember, it's not a crime to be gay.
00:43:14
Speaker
Unless you're a murderer.
00:43:24
Speaker
The first one is probably a pretty obvious one. That would be that ah her ex-husband, Dexter Brenner, is involved. um So when police interviewed him, he said he had not seen Jean for a few weeks, at least.
00:43:40
Speaker
um He had kind of, like, moved on um but there was some strange behavior. So he had a new wife that was named Lynn, but they had only been married for, like, a month.
00:43:54
Speaker
ah before. happened fairly recent. Where was he on the night of the murder? I'm not sure, but it said that the wife gave him an alibi.
00:44:06
Speaker
but it didn't detail what exactly that was, so. But, like, your wife could give you an alibi if you convinced her to. ah Yeah.
00:44:18
Speaker
Oh, gosh. According to Sophie, as, like, she had said, like, ah as Sophie had been told by Jean, Dexter was behind on the child support payments and that Jean had said that she was going to go meet him like the day before the day she disappeared. like She had told Jean she was on her way to meet him and then she was going to be going to the night shoot.
00:44:42
Speaker
But now they figured out the night shoot is a lie. So is Dexter really the last person that saw her, supposedly, if she was actually going to go meet him? So... Oh, weird. Yeah, okay.
00:44:54
Speaker
Yeah. um After Jean's disappearance, ah Brenner and Jean's mother, Florence, began another brutal custody battle for Christine.
00:45:07
Speaker
oh no. I hate this. No, that's unfortunate and uncomfortable for everyone. I know. Whether we're involved or not, you're just like, oh no. Oh.
00:45:20
Speaker
I don't like this because of the outcome. it says that Brenner eventually won custody, and two years later, Brenner and his new wife, Lynn, ended up trying to adopt Christine so that Lynn would become Christine's, like, legal mother, ah citing that Jean had just abandoned her and because she had disappeared.
00:45:41
Speaker
What?
Speculation and Conclusion on Jean's Case
00:45:45
Speaker
Okay. okay Who was Lynn, though? Wait... Lynn is the ex-husband's new wife.
00:45:57
Speaker
So he's just trying to get her, like, listed as Christine's mom, I guess, like, by having her adopt her. Yeah. Oh. Yeah, but there was a ah judge that ruled that there was no proof that, like, Jean had died and blocked the request for the adoption.
00:46:18
Speaker
But that didn't stop Brenner from eventually moving to Florida with Lynn and Christine and never returning to California again. So I don't know how much, like, Jean's family, like, her brother, um the sister-in-law, where her mom, Florence, like, ever really saw Christine again. I don't know if they really ever had a chance to.
00:46:44
Speaker
hopefully. Because he kind of took her away. is Yeah. it's It's tough to stay in touch with that um easiest of
Podcast Promotion and Future Plans
00:46:53
Speaker
times. Yeah, again, this is, like, nineteen forty s nine yeah this is so yeah it is different times it's not like here facetime with your mom or facetime with your grandma it's uh totally different you know as a kid like i feel like you hate it and then you grow up and you're like well like you don't want to lose all those people and so you get why they like try to stay in touch and whatnot anyway i don't know yeah you're like hell yeah oh
00:47:24
Speaker
um yeah so that's the whole ex-husband theory the next one is that she had a new a new lover as you mentioned she may have been pregnant miss um yeah so uh this one's kind of feeds into the next one so some of jean's colleagues like her co-workers on the film sets ended up coming forward to police with some information about her life that they had kind of picked up.
00:47:56
Speaker
Wow. There was this gentleman named Robert Cummings who... I don't know what he's in. He was in like a few movies. um But I guess he had worked with her. And ah Robert told and the police and investigators that about two weeks before her disappearance that she had told him that ah she was in a new relationship and having the time of her life.
00:48:22
Speaker
um But she had also said it wasn't really a serious one. um Sure, Robert.
00:48:32
Speaker
And
00:48:35
Speaker
ah Florence, Jean's mom, also told police that Jean had told her about this quote unquote Kirk, but the one she talked about in the letter, ah said that she knew him from work.
00:48:49
Speaker
And Florence said that someone named Kirk had picked Jean up from that apartment a few times, but had never ah come to the door and like introduced himself. He had always waited in the car.
00:49:02
Speaker
Okay. Yeah, so there is ah apparently a Kirk that was mentioned before um the name appeared in the letter.
00:49:13
Speaker
And there's a 13 year old girl um who like knew Jean from the neighborhood. um And she said that she had seen Jean drive by in a car ah in North Hollywood with an older man and that Jean looked nervous at the time.
00:49:35
Speaker
Oh. um It must have been around the time of the disappearance, and that's probably why this was relevant. um But because um because the girl knew Jean personally, the police took this a little bit more seriously than just, like, a 13-year-old girl being like, I saw Jean.
00:49:52
Speaker
um It's like, no, I know her. Like, I talk to her all the time. So it's kind of like, yeah, I saw her. She's driving. So police took it a little bit seriously, but it didn't really lead to anything like it.
00:50:05
Speaker
didn't bring up any more information unfortunately yeah i was gonna say i hope it would mean more in today's day and age they would take a 13 year old's opinion more seriously but yeah like this is just back in the day so um yeah uh i do the next person a lot of yeah um next person I'll talk about is quite famous there's kind of conflicting information about how this all oh goes about but supposedly hearing the news about the case actor Kirk Douglas ah father to Michael Douglas
00:50:55
Speaker
i yeah also a famous actor ah Phones investigators from Palm Springs where he had been vacationing and like calls them and is like, hey, i people are telling me about a case and that there's somebody named Kirk and my name's Kirk.
00:51:17
Speaker
And
00:51:20
Speaker
ah he volunteered that Jean may have worked as an extra on one of his last films, but claimed that he barely remembered her. um There was wow also sources that said that police had to contact him and that's when he said he didn't really know her and that like a co-worker had to be like, no, like you guys work together. And he's like, what?
00:51:45
Speaker
ah So yeah, kind of two different versions that. yeah Because, like, he can't remember who he worked with. I'm kind of like, he's old.
00:51:56
Speaker
Well, because she's an extra. She's just a, he's not old at this time. He's not old at this time. suppose. um But she's also just an extra who We literally just watched the um Avengers one where they, like, give him the brown hair and stuff to make him look younger because they have to go back into the 70s and, like,
00:52:20
Speaker
whatever they have to do you know iron man has to go back he's like oh michael douglas yes they make him look like young michael douglas because they like give him the the brown hair and they're like by the way your package is downstairs and the guys probably opened it you should probably get down here right away and that's how they get him down there and Whatever.
00:52:44
Speaker
They're always watching the Evander's movies in this house.
00:52:49
Speaker
I normally watch them once and then I move on. What? Yeah. I normally watch them once and then I'm like, meh, there's only a few of them. I know. There's so many. If I hadn't seen them a couple times, I probably wouldn't have this lore imprinted in my head. Yeah.
00:53:07
Speaker
um and yeah but kirk kirk douglas he died in 2020 but back in october 13th of 1949 so that would be like 70 years earlier sorry ah yeah i'm just trying to figure out because she she disappeared on like october seventh so it's it was like fairly soon ah like a week um he talked to the san bernardino son where he said quote uh then i recalled that she was a tall girl in a green dress and that i talked and kidded with her a bit on the set as i have done with many other people but i never saw her before or after and have never been out with her because people were trying to say like he was dating her or something
00:53:58
Speaker
okay so just like standard pr response uh i have done and kidded with her as i've done with many others right um many people who haven't gone missing uh exactly that's how i want to be remembered you're like oh even if she had had some close scenes still
00:54:23
Speaker
So, ah one of, yeah, that like that's kind of that theory, the whole and new lover kind of thing. um ah if That feeds into this one that ah she disappeared due to an abortion of some kind.
00:54:40
Speaker
ah So one of Jean's friends eventually came forward and told police that Jean was about three months pregnant ah when she disappeared and that it had been the result of some sort of affair that she had had.
00:54:53
Speaker
With somebody. Some illegitimate pregnancy she had to conceal? Something. Investigators searched for... um When they couldn't figure out who this the Kirk was like in the letter, they started looking for the other name that appeared in the letter, which was Dr. Scott.
00:55:12
Speaker
And they questioned all of the doctors in the l LA area to try and figure out who this Dr. Scott is. oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Who was Dr. Scott?
00:55:25
Speaker
Yeah. Great Scott! I always think of Rocky Horror Picture Show. Great Scott! um Dr. Scott? I don't remember, but did we ever find out?
00:55:38
Speaker
Or he's just good guy. This is also a mystery. There was ex-medical student ah known as just Doc, who came from a wealthy family and that performed illegal abortions for a fee.
00:55:56
Speaker
um He was often found, or like, he was known to often offer his services to sex workers um that were in L.A., um So they thought maybe he was Dr. Scott, but they were unable to locate this, like, ex-medical student, um probably because he came from a wealthy family, but...
00:56:20
Speaker
Damn it, this is not not endearing him to me. I'm like, okay. um Investigators did uncover an affair that Jean had while her, I think this is while Brenner and her were still married while he was in the army.
00:56:38
Speaker
and was with an Air Corps lieutenant. And it this also hadn't been a good relationship. I guess this gentleman had beaten Jean while they were involved and then had threatened to kill her if she ever left him.
00:56:52
Speaker
also Oh, no. Very bad. Jean. Yeah, that sucks. um his name was scotty like his nickname was scotty uh so they thought maybe it had been him but they weren't really sure and i guess for some reason every source says that gene's former lawyer said that gene and scotty had not seen each other since 1945 so that like that couldn't be how she was pregnant i don't know why her former lawyer knows this they couldn't have made that more clear yeah i guess i'll choose whatever they want me to play leave okay now are you ready to get to just like oh no two wild wild theories are you ready
00:57:43
Speaker
The first one, it's everybody's favorite person when you're talking about LA in the 1940s. In the book, Black Dahlia Avenger, a genius for murder, private investigator Steve Hodel
00:57:59
Speaker
like comes up in everything. It's just like, my dad is every serial killer ever. Okay. It's my fucking every time. don't remember him yet. Okay. Okay. um Sorry.
00:58:15
Speaker
So private investigator Steve Podal spoke about the Gene Spangler disappearance. He said, quote, I believe that Kirk is not a first name, as the LAPD chief of detectives Thad Browns tried to suggest when he personally interviewed actor Kirk Douglas.
00:58:33
Speaker
ah But it's a surname. Kirk, I admit, or sorry, Kirk, I submit was Dr. Eric Kirk, ah Sergeant Stoker's chiropractor, abortionist, and informant.
00:58:46
Speaker
um So can't remember. Oh, Sergeant Stoker, I think is like
00:58:56
Speaker
one of the sergeants in the LAPD, I think. So that's why maybe like they pretended that they couldn't find him. This is his theory. um He says shortly before Jean's disappearance, Dr. Eric Kirk had been arrested.
00:59:09
Speaker
However, LAPD Captain Ed... Jokish? had since penned an open letter to the author, Steve Hodel.
00:59:21
Speaker
This is a crazy quote. ah Your book is filled with so much baseless innuendo, misinformation, and faulty logic that it would be impossible to dress it all address it all in a letter.
00:59:35
Speaker
but Damn! ed joke-ish former policeman. ah That feels haughty for someone who's presumably never written a book or whatever. Very true. Very true.
00:59:48
Speaker
He's a policeman? Yeah, a former policeman at that time. but
00:59:56
Speaker
Okay. Keep in mind that ah Steve Hodel has ah basically came forward and said that his dad...
01:00:09
Speaker
killed the black dahlia also may have been zodiac killer um i think there was some bizarre theory that he was also somehow jack the ripper but that made absolutely no sense because he would have been like 120 um and then so he wanted to be everybody guy wanted to be at all he wants his he wants his dad to be everybody he always comes up yeah Weird.
01:00:37
Speaker
That is so bizarre. so I don't know. This is the only credence I lead to the, um, lend to this theory is just the, as I said, the years, um, are very similar, um of when this happens. And, like, Jean was dancing at one of the, like, clubs where Elizabeth Short was renting an apartment behind,
01:01:04
Speaker
um A few years before. and so it is not outlandish. We're not talking about even different cities or anything like that. um And then one of the reasons I said not to Google any pictures, because if you go on to the drive, i did um put a side by side of Elizabeth Short, the Black Dahlia and ah Jean Spangler, um who is who disappeared two years after Elizabeth Short was killed.
01:01:33
Speaker
They look almost identical. They could be the same person. Like they're oh really wildly similar features. Their hair is basically the same type of hair.
01:01:47
Speaker
um oh shit. Yeah, so there's pictures on the drive. I like had to put them side by side and then like take a screenshot. had to make my own side by side picture because there wasn't any good ones.
01:02:01
Speaker
let me try and get on that as I drop a bunch of shit because as I explained to you this week I am have bad luck and I'm clumsy yeah um yeah that's why i said don't look anything up I did a yeah there's pictures of Jean and then there's a side by side of her and Elizabeth short the black dahlia oh right Yeah, they look like crazy similar. um a Yeah, they have like similar facial features um and hair. Like I'd say hair is the most striking.
01:02:41
Speaker
um Not to get too much in it, but the hotel residence was only a quarter. oh this just said a quarter. I'm pretty sure this was a quarter mile um from where Jean's purse was found.
01:02:57
Speaker
So it was nearby. really? Yeah. And Steve Hodel, the son, remembers that his older brother, Duncan, had noted that their father, the one that was the doctor and supposedly every serial killer ever, was dating, quote, a gorgeous actress type named Jean around this time.
01:03:22
Speaker
Oh, no. Yeah, so she they do remember the name Gene. The two brothers do. Okay. Hodel also fit the description of the man that was seen with Gene at the gas station.
01:03:42
Speaker
And his vehicle, the convertible, I guess, also matched the description of the one seen by the gas station attendant. And he was also known to give ah abortions may or may not be from the house.
01:04:00
Speaker
So, I mean, it is not totally crazy that it could have been. and But, I mean. Okay. Um...
01:04:13
Speaker
And Elizabeth Short was killed just two years before Jean went missing. um Steve Hodel, the son, over like all this time has um tried to get the, like, I think he's trying to get possession of the property or trying to get it thoroughly searched, but nobody has ever really been cooperating with him because different people have lived in the house.
01:04:36
Speaker
since his family lived there. That makes it hard. Yeah, he said that at one point he was able to test, like, the soil samples outside. Like, he wasn't allowed inside the house, but somebody let him on the property outside the house.
01:04:53
Speaker
And they collected soil samples that tested positive for human remains. um But nobody has ever given him permission to do a thorough search of the exterior or interior of the house so dang so because of that like the whole black dahlia case and then also this one is kind of tied to it as well and has kind of been in limbo because like there's been different celebrities um even that have owned the house and nobody's like cooperated with him really really who's owned the house
01:05:32
Speaker
um hold on i have to look her up he she was in orange is the new block
01:05:39
Speaker
i almost had to look it up because i was like mom and the hojos she was in that 70s show as well what's it guys laura something laura prepon Yeah, she owned the house for a while. She was, like, the one that owned it at the time that he was trying to get permission to search it, and she was like, no.
01:06:02
Speaker
What? Yeah. Oh, my God, that's fucking Donna. Yeah, it said that she has now, like, since sold the property or something, but, yeah, nobody has ever, like, hey um worked with him, so.
01:06:18
Speaker
I, he...
01:06:21
Speaker
don't want to tarnish her name but I I yeah I think I read at least one of them after that 70s show was into Scientology and I thought it was the guy who played Hyde and I wasn't sure if that was the one that she hooked up with but I know that she has been branching out with her like culinary stuff and I'm just like good for you and I hope that like yeah that stuff hasn't brought you down instead of bringing you up cause you know it's an ensemble cast but then yeah I think obviously it's not a good thing if one of your cast is like oh they probably had some sexual harassment you're like oh great you know like it's like yeah just like um
01:07:15
Speaker
what small bill and the one chick in it that was in that crazy sex cult whatever it was like oh i am less familiar with this when you say crazy sex cult like nexium like one of those hot celebrity ones oh i've heard of that one yeah i can't remember her name um but yeah she was in smallville I think I probably know who you mean, actually. Yeah.
01:07:46
Speaker
I don't know. Um... It's rough out there, Anyway, that so the ah last theory that is also kind of wild, but not too wild. I mean, it does have some evidence, maybe?
01:08:03
Speaker
ah Is that this could have been a mob hit, which I feel like they just throw into every case. But... ah yeah i'm like so yeah okay um police in their investigation ended up going to palm springs an area that jean frequented and had been seen recently before she disappeared uh she often went to the dunes the dollhouse and the saddle and sirloin those are three different clubs
01:08:37
Speaker
Sounds like it's all in in Alberta somewhere. The Saddle and Sirloin. The Dunes, the Dollhouse, the Saddle and Sirloin. we just like... Oh, come Yeah, we what is the Calgary Arena called? The Saddle Dome? ah yeah Okay. Country and Western.
01:08:56
Speaker
Alright. ah Police found out that she had been seen in the company of Davy Ogle and Frank Nikolai, ah who were members of the, or sorry, employees of the mob boss Mickey Cohen ah just before her death.
01:09:14
Speaker
Nikolai and Ogle were both under indictment and had gone missing just days before Jean. And yeah, police had it on good authority that Nikolai's body was at the bottom of the Cucamonga Vineyard Lime Pit.
01:09:33
Speaker
That just sounds great. Cucamonga. Cucamonga. I know I've heard that. don't know if it was made But a vineyard lime pit. So like that body's gone.
01:09:46
Speaker
ah Said neither body was ever found.
01:09:53
Speaker
It is also interesting that ah supposedly four months... after gene's disappearance and the supposed death of nikolai and ogle that a u.s customs agent in el paso reported that they saw gene with nikolai and ogle and another witness said that they had seen the three of them at a nearby hotel like also near el paso and that these two witnesses were able to confirm their identities in a photo
01:10:27
Speaker
And that was four months, supposedly, after she disappeared and the other two supposedly died.
01:10:34
Speaker
know so that's a pretty positive identification. Yeah, it is a little compelling, I'd say. I mean...
01:10:46
Speaker
Yeah. Damn. I mean, like, I can feel almost like any single one of these, like, they're they're good theories. None of them feel like outrageous to me there is like a little bit that's enough to make like each one of them worth mentioning for sure oh yeah um you're like that could happen yeah so there were i guess various other witnesses that ended up coming forward at different times um but many ended up being ah investigated and were determined to be false claims or reported sightings that kind of stuff oh okay yeah
01:11:27
Speaker
Yeah. Sorry. Police continued to circulate Jean's picture, hoping that it would help lead to new information. There was a celebrity columnist named Luella Parsons.
01:11:41
Speaker
She must have been popular at the time, but she went on TV and offered a thousand dollar reward, which would be over ten thousand dollars. think American in 2020.
01:11:51
Speaker
So like a decent reward. um Yeah. information but Like that. Yeah. I was like, oh, thank you for the conversion. i I always forget to do that. And then I'm like, hold on. What is that?
01:12:04
Speaker
People will be like, time money converter. And i'm like, I have never in my life found that website if that exists. Oh, you just... I just Google.
01:12:16
Speaker
They must. They're like, time money converter. I'm like, what? Okay. Yeah. Let me convert from Canada to US. Ooh. No.
01:12:27
Speaker
Yeah. yeah Times a million. Whoa, it's even bigger. Times a million, yeah. um Just like, so I was trying to file my taxes. I was doing it on like TurboTax online myself.
01:12:44
Speaker
And I didn't know there was a glitch in which when you type in the number, it adds like.00 on to your the end of your thing automatically. So I was attempting to claim an income of $3 million. dollars um
01:13:00
Speaker
You look so many right here. I kept looking it and I was like, what the fuck? Because first it wasn't adding any any commas. So I was like, oh yeah, I'm just typing in what my T-force is.
01:13:12
Speaker
Just all good. And then I get to the bottom and I'm just like, and i it comes to the top and I scroll back up and it it had like a really bad leg and then it added like all the commas and like decimal points and I was like, $3 million!
01:13:29
Speaker
And then I Googled it because I was like, what, what should I do? Like, I don't know how else to put this in. It keeps automatically. How should I spend my $1 million? $3 million. Yeah.
01:13:42
Speaker
And it said, Oh yeah, this is a glitch that the company's known about for like four years. And I was like, Oh great. So at this point, is it a glitch anymore? we just not fixing it? I was like, wow. Um, and yeah i was like wow um So then they're like, yeah, they just recommend rounding up or rounding down. I was like, okay, well, like last year I didn't have to do this or the year before the year before that or the year before that.
01:14:08
Speaker
So I don't know why you're trying make me accidentally claim $3 million dollars and get me audited by the revenue agency. Oh, yeah, our podcast it did not make that much. like ah I'm sorry. we made like less than $500 revenue. You can't put that bitch on us.
01:14:26
Speaker
I was like, oh my god, if if I hadn't noticed, like, would it, I was wondering, like, would it have flagged it? That, like, I was trying to all of sudden claim $3 million dollars income?
01:14:38
Speaker
No, but it does weird you out, right? That could have been bad I was scared. We tax things to our Patreon. I'll be like, okay, let me get on that. And then it's like, nothing. And you're like, okay.
01:14:50
Speaker
you're like, am I actually going to start making you money on this someday? Right? Yeah. I was scared. I was like, oh, if I had not caught that. going and Fucking FBI. so like and Somebody kicked down my door. like Well, you never know. You're trying to create tax fraud. ah Throw you in jail.
01:15:10
Speaker
ah Yeah. Okay, I don't have much more. Yeah, so they offer this reward, um but that leads nowhere. And the LA Times continue to run stories of Jean, kind of like keep it in the media, but nothing ever came of it.
01:15:26
Speaker
um This was really disappointing, I thought. ah In the past 70 years, I guess the case file... um like the original investigation, Jean's purse, as well as the note, um have all kind of vanished, like, been purposefully discarded, as per an L.A. retired LAPD homicide detective, Rick Jackson.
01:15:48
Speaker
He reports that when he was an LAPD detective, um he would every once in a while, like, get assigned to the case to, like, re-review it. um because it was still it's still technically an open case it's considered more of a cold case and he reports that he never saw the note um that gene had written outside of the photographs we have of it um he had never come across the purse and like that the original case file and like interviews or anything like that were all all gone like
01:16:23
Speaker
Damn. um But he did have a couple things to say. um Quote, nothing I ever read would indicate that she skipped town. You went on saying people generally don't do that kind of thing unless there's a motive or a unique set of sort ah unique set of reasons.
01:16:42
Speaker
Obviously, she cared for her daughter enough to get custody back. Like, remember that she kept fighting for custody. Um, and stuff against her She didn't drop off the face of the earth. Yeah.
01:16:53
Speaker
Sorry. Yeah. Um, and he went on saying, it just makes sense that she meant foul play, and there's no doubt that she was dead, and that's why she never resurfaced.
01:17:07
Speaker
Damn. Jackson believes that Brenner, her ex-husband, is the strongest suspect. Um... And I guess, I don't know if this is still true, but the search for Jean Spangler, who when she went missing was only 27 years old. She was really young.
01:17:27
Speaker
um It was one of the biggest manhunts, I guess, that happened in Los Angeles history. I don't know if that's still true, but yeah, there was like a lot of people um involved and like searching for her.
01:17:44
Speaker
That's too bad because we just never remember her name now. like i know. oh um I had never heard of her. and then i think it kind of gets lumped in with the Black Dahlia case because there's like a lot of like...
01:18:01
Speaker
similar cases that kind of get lumped in with that and I can see why like as i looked more into it um I can see why it kind of gets mentioned but um doesn't mean that it is related i think a lot of the cold cases that have been solved in like the last 15 years years have really shown that like ah it's not always as many serial killers that we think have traveled ah back and forth and back and forth doing all these murders. Sometimes it is just one of all things. Yeah, right? so many serial killers to still uncover. Yeah, like that would really suck. But it's crazy when they like take someone down like Golden State Killer who's almost freaking 90, I swear, when they finally caught him. It's just crazy.
01:18:47
Speaker
Like it really is. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know if they'll ever... Like, I don't know what happened. um i don't know if Brenner is still alive or not.
01:19:00
Speaker
Oh. and I don't think... No, he wouldn't be alive. He would have He'd be over 100. I mean, he could be, but probably not.
01:19:13
Speaker
Because he was a couple years older than her, and she was born in 1923.
01:19:19
Speaker
three so oh yeah yeah yeah mine are yeah also quite old in that way don't say she's dead from 1950 because you know my mom still listens our parents are in that range no yeah but you're right like 1920s oh shit yeah they're yeah like they're all probably dead but Yeah, so I think those ones are really hard when, like, there's not enough people, like, alive that were around during that time, so.
01:19:55
Speaker
Yeah. And then with, yeah, with, like, the purse and case file gone and basically them just relying on, like, notes and pictures of evidence instead of actual evidence that they could perform any sort of tests on, I think.
01:20:14
Speaker
ah make it harder yeah yeah i do agree yeah it's rough but that was a really good one i really appreciate you i yeah shout out to entertainment weekly and then that uh for good uh really really good um information and then true crime edition that had really good ah detailed timeline again I didn't see like the actual times of stuff in order it would kind of like lots of stuff outlined kind of what happened but it didn't give like specifics of like this hour this happened and like this happened here so that you could kind of keep it timeline of dates I love a good timeline like that you can't get that all the oh yeah yeah shout out to them because they
01:21:07
Speaker
I read a, probably read like 10, 15 sources, but ended up just mainly relying on them because they pretty well had everything. like That's how you know a good source.
01:21:21
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Crazy. Good job. Thank birth. ah we haven't mentioned it already. We are probably going to be splitting up this episode and releasing the part Atlanta segment probably next week.
01:21:43
Speaker
ah episode hollywood that'll be more Episode one, one be releasing our Patreon page. so that's good because we will be releasing our patreon hopefully in between then um because we have our patreon or our february february one to go um so yeah after that then we should hopefully be a little back on track because i went a little overboard with i had a really good resource for this one where i was like vanity fair yeah you just keep going and going and i was like this is going to be a definitely a part two if not
01:22:19
Speaker
Like, I don't know. So yeah, I think that will out. I've used Vanity Fair before and they've had some great articles. Like... It's funny. I maybe like identify we were watching Friends over again and like laughing. How, you know, with our daughter, like you know she's never seen it before. So sometimes it's like, oh my god. It's like watching for the first time, right?
01:22:47
Speaker
And then it's like, That one where, like, Phoebe joins a book club and Rachel's like, yeah, I want to join too. And she's like, but did you read the book? she's like, well, no, but I read Vanity Fair. And to me, I'm like, okay, but to be fair, like, if you did read a Vanity Fair article, it's almost like a short story.
01:23:04
Speaker
Because the one that I read was like... a novella almost yeah it's like a new york times month yeah ah that i had like copied it was like this is 28 pages long i was like shit that's what i normally have in all my sources and you were just one of them like i think that was my problem this time i was trying to shorten it and then i was like well this is really just really good it's a really good story yeah it just like it couldn't shorten it it becomes pre pre-edited you might as well just read it verbatim Amazing research. I will definitely show him my source in our next episode. I can't wait.
01:23:42
Speaker
oh So good.
01:23:46
Speaker
um But yeah, really good time. i enjoyed yours a hell of a lot. Thanks. I can't wait. I'm excited now that we'll get this one out. Then we're going to work on our Patreon. And then we're to work on our next regular bonus episode. So just keep tuned because, yeah, there'll be a lot coming out here.
01:24:10
Speaker
Yeah, in the meantime, you can rate, review, subscribe, a follow, like, start. don't know. Don't forget to keep it cryptic.
01:24:23
Speaker
Yeah. The most important of all. Right.
01:24:31
Speaker
Smash that like button, y'all. No, but it really... i did enjoy that. and i do have a... a story I can't wait to tell you. So I'm excited.
01:24:51
Speaker
Thank you for listening to Castles Encrypted. We love all our listeners and appreciate every subscriber, every new review, every listen, rate and download. Our music is by Kobe Offair and our cover art is by Antonio Garcia.
01:25:05
Speaker
We are also a proud member of DIRCast Network where you can find the best and spookiest of all indie podcasts. Follow us on social media where we are at Castles and Cryptids on mostly all of the things now, including TikTok.
01:25:19
Speaker
Check out our bonus content on Patreon, Cryptid Clashes, video mini-sodes of your hosts making asses of themselves, Ask Me Anything, quizzes, other special episodes and more.
01:25:31
Speaker
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