Circleville Writer /// Part 2 /// 502 | Forensic Files

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[Music] [Music] % [Music] welcome to True Crime garage wherever you are whatever you're doing thanks for
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[Music] crime where we left off yesterday Captain is with The Accidental or what appears to
be an accidental death of Ron Gillespie driving his truck August 19th 1977 am I saying
100% that there was no foul play involved no I don't think anybody can say that for certain however the
evidence shows and stacks up that this does appear to be an accident and if there was anybody else
involved the police the sheriff's department and BCI could not find any evidence of such right and the police
have to rule this in accident based off the evidence and when people talk about a cover up again what would be their
motive what would be the whole police department and the sheriff and everybody else involved coroner everybody else
involved what would be their motive to cover up this accidental death for the superintendent or a bus driver doesn't
make a lot of sense to me that there would be a cover up and in regards to sheriff Dwight Radcliffe I want to point
something out here this name may sound familiar to our longtime listeners because we gave him a shout out in
episode 396 in May of 2020 when Dwight Radcliffe passed away we gave him a shout out because Dwight
Radcliffe was not only the sheriff of pickway County he was the sheriff from 1965 until
2013 he was the longest serving sheriff in the entire country in the United States and I understand that that does
not make him a perfect man nor a perfect Sheriff however what I see here Captain
when we reviewed the information is rather than looking for reasons that this was a cover up what I found were
reasons that the sheriff's Department was looking to prove that there was no foul play to themselves right by sending
the gun to BCI sending the ammunition to BCI had there been Foul Play or had they
suspected Foul Play they would have followed up on that yeah because I want to solve why these individuals are
getting harassed by this letter writer and again let's go back through a couple pieces of evidence his blood alcohol
level was point 16 family is surprised they go hey we're surprised by this cuz he's not a heavy
drinker well if he's not a heavy drinker then1 six he might not be able to operate a vehicle to the best of his
ability also not wearing a safety belt yes Bally thrown from his truck maybe if he's wearing the safety belt he makes it
through the accident and to be clear no one should be operating a vehicle with a
0.16 especially here in the state of Ohio where they've decided 08 half of that is past the legal limit MH now the
next stop in our timeline would be 1983 per the Unsolved Mysteries timeline that we reviewed earlier 1983 in
February is when the attempt is made on Mary Gillespie's life when she finds the
nasty sign that has words and statements so nasty and terrible on it that she has
to tear it down and if the booby trap would have worked it would have triggered the trigger on that gun and
fired a shot in the direction of her and her head as she removed that sign MH however that is six years later that's
it's 77 the time of Ron Gillespie's accident it's 83 with the attempt on Mary Gillespie's
life there is a lot that goes down during that span of time and we're going to go through that and this whole Time
Captain that whole time frame there are letters that are continuing there are suspicions that are going on in town
about who could have tried to kill Ron Gillespie or who was responsible for that truck accident who is responsible
for these letters and how long are they going to continue for Mary gispie that has claimed that there is no Affair
happening but now her husband has passed away and the superintendent he is now going to get a
divorce we could assume if he had a nice relationship before these letters that these letters made his relationship a
lot more complicated yes regardless of the Dynamics of that relationship I would guess so now it's the late 70s
when gour Massie and his wife split up and at some point Gordon Massie and Mary Gillespie say yes we did have a
relationship their statement has always been that the relationship started after
the letters a better date for when that relationship started I don't have for you it's never been provided as far as I
could find other than the simple statement of we didn't start up this relationship until after the letters
started so the other statement would be it would be after Ron Gillespie's passing mhm you can question that as
much as you want I'm fine with it I think that there's plenty of room for speculation there that can be a hard
thing to believe I have seen situations like that witness situations like that in in my own life so I can believe them
I don't 100% believe them however I don't look at this situation and see Mary Gillespie being responsible for
Ron's death and I don't see what others are looking for where they say well Mary
or even Gordon Massie could be sending these letters when the letter started well that doesn't make any sense
why would Gordon Massie threaten his own career his own job by sending these letters they were sent to his boss
before they even sent to Mary glaspie Mary would be threatening her marriage or threatening her job as well if she
were sending the earlier letters yeah and again it's a small town so you screw up it's not just as easy as get in a job
somewhere else you you become a stain on that Community the other person that we
mentioned in yesterday y's episode captain that was possibly tied or at least suspected to by the Gillespies
anyway to be involved in these letters is David longberry David longberry resigned from his position with the West
Fall School District as a bus driver he resigned in October of 1981 October 22nd
actually of 1981 this whole time again the letters continue now two of the people that have
been very Central to this story all along are Paul fresh hour and his wife who is also Ron Gillespie's sister Karen
fresh hour to this point their only involvement in the story because on our timeline we've not gotten to the
attempted murder yet is that they have been trying to help the Gillespies through their problem through this issue
of receiving these strange and threatening letters we did say yesterday that the letters what we do
know when they were being mailed were coming from Columbus Ohio from postal Hub 430 SE bus shout out to my favorite
postal carrier in Columbus Tim Williams Mr Speedy Delivery himself I'm pretty badass on the keyboards as well Paul
fresh hour and his wife Karen lived in Grove City Ohio they were super tight with the
gesp Paul worked for Budweiser at the anheiser bush in Columbus Ohio he worked there as a
quality control officer or agent whatever you want to call them in 1982 him and his wife Karen and Paul
they file for a divorce it was in early 1983 in February when the attempt is made on Mary Gillespie's life and I
think we should go through that because there's a lot of questions there and you
POS some of those questions yesterday first first off we need to paint the picture she's still
driving her bus route at this point Mar is correct the sign that she discovers is at the end of the day okay this is
not on her morning route this is in the afternoon a description of this sign should be as such it's a nasty sign that
she she sees spots and decides she's going to take it down however it's rigged to this booby trap
right it's a very crude booby trap she doesn't know that though at the time correct that's exactly right but what
what does it say anyways I don't know what the sign says see I don't believe there's a sign until people tell me what
what it says so until they tell me what it says nasty sign don't buy it what do you mean
don't buy that there was a sign or a booby trap no I believe there was a booby trap I don't believe there was
this horrible I mean there supposedly there was a bunch of signs and it was there were they were all on this uh
street but it wasn't a main street right no this was a Main Street this is actually not terribly far from the
accident site of where Ron Gillespie was killed well what street was it on I don't have that in my notes so but the
but but you're also getting that that there was more than one sign there was no the information I have states that
there was one sign see what I heard was that there was signs on both both sides of the street multiple you know a couple
here a couple there like definitely trying to get her attention or anybody's attention that would go down that road
that could be the case then the issue then becomes for me and I think other people will feel this way as well if the
booby trap was intended for Mary Gillespie the more signs that you put up makes it a little dicey that it's going
to hit its intended target mhm the information I have states that it was one sign in a very specific location
that she would have passed through and she would have seen this sign and anybody driving in the area
should have seen this sign as well the way that it's described is that she sees this sign and that the crude booby trap
was set up as such that if she pulled the sign out or I guess anyone for that matter pulled the sign MH to tear it
down it would pull on a string that would pull the trigger on this gun that is aimed at the person that would be
tearing off the sign however she doesn't tear off the sign it's attached to um you know like a
post she pulls the steak or post out of the ground and then sees the string that
is tied to this other steak or post right takes that down as well now on the second post we have what's described as
a box inside the box is where she finds the gun that has the booby trap now there's a couple different versions of
what happens after she takes this down in every version she takes both of these items and brings them back onto her bus
in some of the versions of the story she then discovers that the gun was rigged up to shoot whoever would tear off the
sign mhm in other versions and I think this is where it comes into question where you brought up her own personal
vehicle the majority of the versions of this story is it's not discovered the booby tra anyway until she gets home and
she's done with work and as soon as she discovers this booby trap she gets in her car and now she's driving off and
she's going to report this to the authorities well I also think that maybe that's the reason why people think there
was multiple signs was because like you said she had to take down two post well and there's some dramatizations of this
story that do show multiple signs MH I think the reason why they showed that is to increase the Threat Level some would
say till midnight Michael Scott the office the other situation too is this was not the first day nor first time in
fact in years this has been going on for years where people were posting these nasty signs mhm and we mentioned
yesterday Ron would drive around looking for them which see what I used to teach
guitar lessons we would send a guy out at night once it got dark and he put you know guitar lessons call this number all
around Circleville because normally if people you know if if we put them out during
the day they were going to be taken during the day but if we put them at night at least the morning traffic would
see them well a lot of these signs had to do with her whatever relationship with Gordon Massie which is not that big
of a deal at this point they're both not married uh the yeah but it's it's one of
those relationships oh well you're as you're together you can keep rubbing it in their face that the the the letter
writer can keep rubbing that that in their face see I told you I was right from the beginning yeah but that's not
the issue the issue is what people what has being posted is that there's some kind of relationship between Gordon
Massie and Gillespie's daughter who at this time would only be 13 years old so Mary Gillespie is tearing these
down not to save her own name nor Gordon massie's name she's doing it in defense
of her own child to me it seems like this individual if if the letter writer is connected to whoever's putting out
these signs then their their target all long has been the superintendent it's difficult to say I don't I don't know
how to answer that or or respond to that statement with words I I don't think you're wrong the problem becomes that
there are so many people that this thing let's just call it a thing cuz we don't
know what it is we don't know if it's multiple people we don't know if it's one individual fight and if it's
multiple people we don't know if they know who the others are that are doing this terrible stuff right it seems to be
targeting a lot of people from what I can see and yes it does seem to be that this started with Gordon Massie but I
have some strong opinions on who I think the writer is and I think we can address
that once we get through the events of 1983 because the way that The Story Goes per Unsolved Mysteries and the local
Legend and the story that's repeated over and over and over again for the most part to this day is that they trace
this gun back to Paul fresh hour Paul says yeah that's my gun but it was stolen from my residence the issue then
becomes well why didn't you report it stolen well I didn't know it was stolen until now
right okay well if that's a good defense I know that this is not a homicide that
it was an attempted murder but if a homicide was committed with my gun and a a a good defensible excuse is well it
was stolen but I never reported it stolen and everybody just went along with it then we all would use that
excuse all the time it's not believable and then Dwight Radcliffe the sheriff at the time sits Paul down Paul
says hey I agreed to do this and he shows me some of the letters in the envelope es that are coming from the
circle will Rider and says you know what try to mimic this try to write like this
copy it and then Sheriff radliff uses this as further evidence that he was not just the person that owned the gun that
belonged in the booby trap but the writer the letters and the envelopes coming from the Circleville writer
matched what was written on the sign of the set booby trap mhm and Paul could not be eliminated as that writer in fact
Radcliffe takes it a step further and says that this is proof that he was the writer so not only is he the attempted
murderer but he's also the circle Ville riter mhm they take him to trial and in October the trial last about one week
Paul does not testify on his own behalf and he is sentenced to 7 to 25 years in prison which is the maximum sentence at
that time then he gets jammed up even further because he can't get paroled because the letter writer continues to
write these letters and send them to businesses churches individuals Mary Gillespie she
gets more the school board keeps getting more letters in fact Paul fresh hour himself gets a letter and we know
Unsolved Mysteries gets a letter yeah it's like Oprah you get a letter you get a letter you get a letter look
underneath your chair and so Radcliffe tells the warden hey you can't let this guy out he click clearly has not learned
his lesson he's still writing these letters well they you know they did the investigation to see if there was a way
basically for him to get a letter out there's that's easy to do it's easy to do do you know do you know what prison
he went to well he was in Lima Ohio so this would be a Maximum Security Prison at the time and but but the letters were
still coming from Columbus yes which makes it difficult one but the other thing too doesn't make it impossible I
mean we have no but the the tricky thing Captain becomes they monitor in these prisons they monitor the ingoing and
outgoing mail no I understand that but what I'm saying is if the mail was still coming from Columbus you would all you'd
have to do is bribe one of the officers to take the mail for you and then that officer might think well I get to I get
to read the letter beforehand all he all he's doing doing is talking some [ __ ]
and I know he's harmless because we have him locked up I'm just saying it wouldn't be that farfetch to for to have
him bribe somebody to hey if I write a couple letters will you drop them off for me no and I'm glad you bring that up
for a couple of reasons because I'm on your side I want to say this though I believe the warden exactly as the warden
said in his statement in his letter that I did an investigation and it is my opinion as the warden of this prison
that Paul fresh hour is not mailing these letters through my Prison Walls I believe that statement 100% because they
are checking the incoming mail and the outgoing mail mhm and even when the letters continued the warden said cool
I'll play along Paul you want to keep playing your game I'll put you and lock you up in solitary confinement MH and he
kept him in solitary time and time again three different times and the letters continued during all those times but I
again I'm with you I've seen Shaw Shank Redemption I've read the book uh read in
there said you know what whatever you need I can get for you guys mhm and what did he do he got him and I know that's
fictional but let's throw this little Wrinkle in there Paul fresh hour at one point in his life worked as a
corrections officer in a prison in the state of Ohio not at the Lima prison he worked at the Ohio penitentiary which is
in Franklin County mhm he worked that job I don't know for how many years I believe it was less than this was after
he got out of the military after he went to college I always think it's funny when they they get flipped to the other
side like for so many years I was the the officer and now I am I am the prisoner so if anybody could figure out
how to do it it would be somebody in Paul's situation somebody who had worked as you said both sides both sides of the
bars mhm the other issue though also becomes it it doesn't have to be Paul fresh hour writing these actual letters
that continue during this time to be connected to Paul it could be somebody for him on the outside that doesn't need
nor require any information from Paul at all and just keeps sending them on his own or her own to try to make it look
like Paul is innocent because what did they tell us at trial what did they tell us in the
papers he was the writer Not only was he the attempted murderer but he was the writer that they're one and the same
so if the letters continue then maybe they got it wrong with the attempted murder right let's dig through this
attempted murder charge a bit more because there is some evidence that magically has lost its
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[Music] [Applause] [Music] 2023 well we're back I didn't go anywhere well you should have tall cans
in the air cheers to everybody front and side to side oh by the way if you would
like to receive some mail from us make sure you sign up on our mailing list that's right that's right we will try
not to send any booby traps so here's some issues with Paul's guilt and with his innocent or innocence that we should
point out M first off we had several people at his trial that testified as to I Witnesses of what they saw that day
where the sign and the booby trap was set up yeah but we have issues we always seem to have issues the issue became a
couple of things one Paul did not go to work that day we know he worked in Columbus so that would have been a
really good day for Paul freshh hour if in fact he was innocent to go to work yeah and that you know it would have
been a 20 30 minute drive for him the anheiser bush plant is North Columbus it would have been an hour for him to get
to this location and he worked long days as a quality control officer he worked 50 hours a week up in North Columbus
yeah but if he didn't go to work he's coming from his home in Grove City that's correct I'm sorry I was I thought
you meant if he was at work but yeah so it would have been a great Alibi had he been at work now he did have an alibi
for portions of that day the question then became when in fact was the sign in the booby trap set up because there are
other people that say hey I saw a tall sandy-haired man in in a yellow El Camino parked right in that general area
and this was before the sign was visible to anyone else there were other eyewitnesses
however that put Paul in the general area of Circleville and Danville around the time that it is believed that the
sign and booby trap were set up so more for him being in the area rather than against and of course the damning
evidence is that he did not go to work that day there's also a lot of stuff going on in Paul's life leading up to
February of 1983 in 1982 he and his wife Karen divorce and it's not a good one it's not a clean break it's not nice and
neat for everybody well then why not shoot her one problem has always been for the case against Paul fresh hour as
setting the the booby trap attempting to kill his one-time sister-in-law is that he's this nice
quiet man he would never do anything like this however at the divorce proceedings it's presented at that trial
at that court case Paul beat up his wife when he suspected that she was running around on him and he beat her up pretty
bad and we know this because we have the police report she has a black eye she received SE several
stitches and this is not a he said she said situation because in the court proceedings his own attorney tells the
court it's okay Paul never meant to do that he lost control but he's gone to counseling since and he's gone because
he is sorry for what he did that's admitting that he was violent against his own wife yeah piece of [ __ ] they
divorce in 1982 and at some point Paul moves on he has a girlfriend which becomes his wife
before February of 1983 Paul somehow even with the violence is awarded the children and the house
during the divorce and Karen goes to live in a trailer at the back of Mary Gillespie's
property there are signs that are being po posted in darbyville and Circleville leading up to the booby trap sign that
are now making nasty statements about Karen fresh hour saying that she's a lesbian and naming the woman that she is
supposedly involved with even though she has a boyfriend mhm and she goes on you
can have a boyfriend and a girlfriend at the same time that's true I mean I mean
all of the stories we cover you can have a husband or a wife and a boyfriend or girlfriend of the same same time I'm
pointing part of this out though because there are a lot of people that believe that Karen fres hour could have been the
letter writer well I mean just because there's some nasty signs about her it's like you got to take a couple for the
team my look when I look at these letters I mean just going off I want to know your opinion to me the the the
writing seems a little feminine um possibly that's you're pointing out something that's good that we have not
pointed out that the letters are not identical no there's several different styles of writing in the handwritten
letters there's also some that are typed some are on postcards some are on these
little weird looking tag things some are on signs as we've pointed out but yeah it's like even though they're they're
using they're almost like creating their own different fonts but even the one uh
font where they're using like really boxy letters it still looks like more more likely that a female would have
wrote that than a man I don't think you in my opinion I can't apply gender to any of the writing that's cuz you're not
an expert okay so once you become an expert in junk science I'm just I'm in a room full of experts I just don't I
happen to be not be one of them so the the thing here though Captain would you agree that
no would you agree that saying that Paul fresh hour was not the letter writer does not then make him innocent of the
attempted murder charge yeah but it's also I mean the the reason why Karen makes sense is because she would have
opportunity to get his gun all they did was uh basically shave off like part of the number but that would have to mean
there'd be some reason why Mary Gillespie's sister wanted her dead if in fact it was actually rigged up in a way
that it would work right you know that's where it this story gets really complicated the case does get very
complicated because there's about 8,000 different rabbit holes that you could go
down and the problem with this case is the people again I keep going back to who is Central to this story and it's
the fresh hours it's the Gillespies it's Gordon Massie and it's the school board
where it all kind of starts and the victims if there are real victims are Ron Gillespie Mary GES
and at this point Karen Gillespie you can say whatever you want to say about Karen Gillespie and people can think
whatever they want to think I'm telling you her husband beat her up we know that
to be a fact because we have a police report it's presented in court proceedings and through his own attorney
admits to it yeah so what you're saying is Karen is telling us this uh Paul right correct Paul with the shitty
mustache and the half mullet he beat her up so again if may look maybe she was the
letter writer and it was just she was getting kicks telling people hey you're not supposed to be doing this you're
doing this maybe she loved her sister but said hey you're doing wrong because I love my brother-in-law he's a good guy
and you're cheating on him bad for you right but then your husband beats you up maybe and let's look if it happened once
beats are up in 1982 right the letter start in in 76 early 77 I understand that just I know I'm just
pointing it out for all involved okay again I'm not an expert I just that's what I'm saying I'm trying to keep up
you try you when you get your certification on the wall then we'll let you speak okay follow me on this though
you pointed something out really interesting was this booby trap even going to work it seemed like it would
hypothetically right but it didn't what a great way to frame the son of a [ __ ] that has beat
you probably multiple times you see what I'm saying you're now you're you're out
of the relationship for all you for all we know he can't let it go he he might still be harassing her here and there
and she goes hey I'm I'm going to set this trap up with his gun and he's going to go to jail for this I
agree if Paul fresh hour was set up it had to be somebody extremely close to him somebody that had access to that gun
that as he just said I don't know when it disappeared someone stole it from me that's how that's how inside the person
would have to be well if you're the letter writer and I'm right write us a note the thing is know that we're right
you're talking to a you're talking to a room full of people and I don't mean here in the garage I mean I don't
believe for a second that there was anything of at least half a dozen people writing these letters really because why
would Karen fresh hour why would she be the original letter writer I don't believe the person that started the
letter campaign and Back in 77 was the same person that was still writing the letters in the late 90s yeah if there's
hundreds maybe a thousand of these letters yeah you're going to have multiple writers cuz also it'd be so
easy like you hate your job your boss is a little bit of a [ __ ] muffin so you're
like hey I'm going to write him a note get all my grievances out get my point across and they'll just assume it's a
part of these other letters so I'm cover I'm going to be covering myself up well
the issue for me becomes with Karen being the letter writer for the entire campaign if if she's upset about an
affair why wouldn't she just tell her brother there's no point in mailing a letter to
Gordon Massie and take it a step further yeah but if you start with that hey I know
hey you stay away it's easier to send them a threatening letter but not say stay away
from so would you not want your brother to to know you just want the affair to end and it's it's prob maybe it's better
he doesn't know yeah yeah because where my mind goes is you just tell the if you
really care about them you just tell them hey I think this is going on or I know it's
going on because of a and C the other tricky thing too is somebody definitely had some kind of insid or knowledge of
the the school buses the high school the superintendent and the employees there I
don't know unless she's being fed that information from Mary Gillespie I don't know that Karen would
know that information mhm and it's equally difficult to believe that Paul fresh hour would know that information
where I don't think that Paul I think that Paul was the letter writer for a portion of this story but I don't think
that he was the letter writer when it first started but that's why I'm saying with so many letters it's it's it really
puts law enforcement or any armchair detective at a loss I mean you're going to be chasing your tail we have
businesses that we're ridden to we're talking about three or four lines sent to him on a on basically a posted note
right I think a lot of those are just random people that knew hey as long as I go up to Columbus and send it from
Columbus people are going to assume this shit's coming from the Circleville letter writer well and in some cases
they're just simply placed in mailboxes they weren't mailed at all right the early letters were all coming from
Columbus the letters the majority of the letters that were being sent and received while Paul was in prison are
coming from Columbus but not all 10,000 are actually mailed and through the through the system itself well the but
the reason why you wouldn't tell your brother-in-law is that you're well it's your brother it's not your
brother-in-law if you're Karen yes if you're Karen then it's your brother is you're you're now
taking um guilt away and and people that are they're obviously if they're having this
affair they have guilt because they're obviously not telling people they don't know exactly what they want to do with
their lives they kind of using their spouses as they continue to have this affair and you're just you're now just
creating pain where if you can get to your sister-in-law if you can get to the other guy that's having the affair and
you can get one of them to see the light that maybe the affair will just stop he doesn't have to know about it he
doesn't have to be in pain about it um and they could just move forward but you end up telling him
anyway well because nobody nobody did anything you see what I'm saying so you you kind of gave them the chance and
they didn't and so you also can't know that Mary would open the letter addressed to
her you see what I mean it gets very complicated very quickly when you try to assign a certain person to being the
letter writer no no yeah no and it it it works that way for every single person that you try to apply it too not just
Karen it works that way for Paul for Mary for Gordon for uh a lot of other people involved and I think the reason
why it works out that way is a the letter writer constantly contradicts themselves the threat to Gordon Massie
hey if you don't do this I'm going to go to the school board but then you don't give him time to do anything about it
you just go to the school board hey if you don't Mary if you don't come out with this affair I'm going to go to the
school board well you've already gone to the school board uh and then you tell the husband
but what's the husband supposed to do he's not he's supposed to end the affair it seems to be the original letter
writer was more concerned about ending the affair rather than actual consequences for any of these people
well and I actually think that like I said there's there's probably lot of letters that we've never seen that the
public has never seen because nobody came forward and said hey I got this letter talking about this affair I had
um with so and so because they never came forward with that letter and I think if we had all those early letters
would' have a better idea of who was who was writing these but again the problem
with this case is once you get all these letters out there and like I said if I think my boss is the biggest you know
you know douche in the world right I can write him a letter in this style and and
get away with it and how many other people in that town decided I can do the same thing now take that same logic and
go in 82 I'm beat up by this little [ __ ] of a man that thinks he can put his hands on women whenever he wants and
uh I'm tired of his [ __ ] and maybe he's threatening her even afterwards and decides to set him up it's not
impossible I find I find it difficult there again to believe that Karen would be the letter writer based off of the
nasty things that were said about her on the signs no did you not hear what I said has nothing to do with her being
the letter writer it's now opportunity oh some people are questioning whether Paul is the letter writer let me set up
this scenario using his gun that I stole from him right and make it seem like these signs were set up and it didn't
seem like there was a lot of eyewitnesses that saw those signs there's some reports of oh yeah I think
I might have saw this I might saw this but but then she collects that evidence and what did she find a booby trap that
does not work for whatever reason and she takes it back and just so happens to be Paul's gun and what a great way for
you know Karen or possibly Mary and Karen to set up uh so this son of a [ __ ] Goes to
Jail see what I'm saying oh I agree because of a [ __ ] beat up my sister and she came to me and
said hey we're going to I got this little ruse because they're not going to put him behind bars they're not going to
protect me I'm going to protect myself I could totally see going okay yeah that makes a lot of sense and then it's his
gun and if they think he's the rider this guy goes to jail I get what you're saying and many people have thought that
and it's certainly an interesting angle to look at many people have said you know what maybe Paul is innocent here
and maybe Paul's the actual hero and Karen is the villain all along that we should have been looking for when we
thought Paul was the villain well I mean Paul's Paul's a villain in my eyes I mean you you don't put your hands on
women there's a couple things that get again conveniently left out from the story along the way one the incident of
Paul actually being a violent man on record when people say he's not capable of such horrible things so the gun
itself is lab tested so they can come up with the serial number to trace where it
came from they cha they trace it to a sale at a pawn shop in Columbus and it's proven that that pawn shop sold the gun
to Paul fresh hour that's not really in question because Paul admits to the sheriff yes in fact that is my gun but
it was stolen and I don't know when it was stolen why didn't you ever report it stolen H I don't know why because I
didn't know it was stolen yes that's fair right however he does say that his home was burglarized so I again I that's
where he loses me a little bit is there a report of this burglary it was there an insurance claim of this Burg burglary
those are things that I could not find if he chose not to report the burglary why the other thing that gets lost along
the way is when we go back to the writer and and when we look at Paul's guilt again we've
both agreed that whether or whether or not he was the writer at any time during this story has little to do with him
actually being guilty he doesn't have to be the writer and be guilty of this attempted murder the thing that gets
really tricky with this when you think about how many possible writers there were along the way is we have a
situation where four people readily admit we were receiving letters Ron and Mary
gaspie and the four of us took action we took actions into our own hands and decided we are going to send some
Anonymous letters to the person we think is writing them to us right there we see
a chain of events that sets into place multiple writers mhm how many other people received letters and thought they
knew who was sending them the letter and anonymously wrote them and then that person anonymously writes somebody else
and then somebody else and it continues on and on and on a great this reminds me
of another great book Needful Things where somebody does something wrong to one person they assume somebody else did
it to them they wrong that person and then that person wrongs somebody else and somebody else and then somebody else
and the circle and cycle continues and itow grows and it gets more vicious as it goes oh again that's the funny thing
about where it happened Circleville the difficult thing against Paul fresh hour is one he admitted that with that group
of four that they sent several letters Anonymous letters m later according to Dwight Radcliffe Sheriff Dwight
Radcliffe Paul freshh hour this is before he was convicted before his trial during interrogation admits to Dwight
Radcliffe as to sending 40 to 50 of the 1,000 Circleville writer letters this is
magically left from the story as well Paul fresh hour his original statement to the courts against
the charges of attempted murder of Mary Gillespie he pled Innocent by reason of insanity on August 8th
1983 he later changed that to Simply innocent and he decided to fight the charges and lost in court at the
trial Karen his wife who may not be innocent we don't know I I can see your point there captain and other people
have brought up that scenario as well but Karen testifies in court that on more than one occasion she caught Paul
with strange letters one that he had ripped up and tried to flush down a toilet one that she found between the
mattresses she thought that Paul was the letter writer but she also didn't think
that he was doing it since 77 I wonder if there's a situation here Captain where Paul fresh went off the
rails do we have a situation where his life is spiraling out of control and he uses this already existence of the
letter writer and the letters themselves as something easy for him to step into to take advantage of his
situation he loved Ron Gillespie there's no doubt about that that's his own words
that I'm using there he says that Ron Gillespie was his best friend he's convinced that somebody killed or Ron
Gillespie was involved in some type of Foul Play that led to his death is there a chance that he
ultimately believed Mary Gillespie was somehow responsible for the death of his best friend
and then after his nasty divorce and after he is brought into the light and shown to be who he really is uses this
writer as an opportunity yeah to attack his to further attack his ex-wife by posting
nasty signs about her and attack Mary Gillespie posting signs about her and sending nasty letters along the way
David longberry who we've mentioned several times in these episodes he's not without fault here he's not just another
innocent person along the way he in the 9s was accused of raping or sexually assaulting an 11-year-old girl and he
went on the run I couldn't find exactly what happened to him or confirmation of such
but the story has always been that he hung himself somewhere in Texas I happen to wonder Captain I'm not going to sit
here and pretend to know who the writer was I'm not sit here and pretend to say that Paul was 100% guilty or that Ron
Gillespie died 100% in a in a one car accident that involved nobody else but it looks to me to be a situation where
Paul was guilty of what he was charged with and Ron's unfortunate ending was probably just an accident I also think
that there's a good strong chance David longberry who resigned in 1981 and who worked for the school
system in 76 and 7778 and leading up to 1981 knew the inner workings of such he may have been the writer or one of the
writers in the beginning and I think Paul was probably one of the writers at some point along the way maybe in ' 82
83 maybe he figured out a way to continue to write them or had someone on the outside that's the other thing here
too that I think gets missed people assume because the letters continued that it couldn't have been Paul they
also assume that he had to have been getting letters out of prison he doesn't somebody could have helped him on the
outside with getting no information from Paul at all no help from Paul at all M nothing well when people say well he got
a letter I mean if he was the letter writer he could just go well look guys I got a
letter I just it's he does this hey guys I got a letter I just finished writing it no but but that's
what makes this case so complicated like what like what you were saying is there one writer or multiple
writers and are the writers even aware of each other or are they all using each other as a pond to not get be caught as
the main writer and a lot of times we should point out the light the writer is not committing any actual crime right to
send somebody a letter saying hey I know your secrets that's not a crime sounds like a good time you have this whole
situation with this car accident was that caused or was it an accident was it so that there that becomes a Twist and
then you have this whole possible booby trap that was set up and then how many other little stories that
have just been left behind in the past of the Circleville letter writer of other possible wrongdoings happening one
of the stories that has been left behind and I would like to highlight it before
we wrap up here today Captain is that in March of 1992 Chief mcken he's the police chief in Grove City where Paul
fresh hour one time lived he actually went back there and lived after he got out of prison and he passed away while
still living in Grove City all those years later but in March of 1992 the police chief of Grove City receives a
letter that says that Mary Gillespie is responsible for the letters but includes
this tidbit of information whoever killed Ron Gillespie is also the person who killed a woman named Vicky cotch I
agree with all the people out there that say that this mystery is super intriguing it's super
fascinating what I don't love and I know that they're pushing a different product
we have True Crime here in the garage but what is often said is that the Circleville letter writer is the
greatest mystery in the history of the state of Ohio or one of the greatest mysteries in the state of Ohio I would
like to point out regardless of whatever this letter said I don't have the exact
wording in front of me that was received by The Grove City police department but
it did say whoever killed Ron Gillespie also killed Vicky cotch Vicky cotch her murder is still unsolved to this day and
she was killed in Pickaway County and this is from Dave Yos the Ohio Attorney General's List of unsolved homicides
their database the details of the case are this on August 14th 1980 Vicky kotch was reported missing from her residence
in Circleville Ohio Vicki was last seen by friends on or about August 10th 1980 after attending an event in Ross County
Ohio on Friday August 15th 19 80 her vehicle was found parked approximately five blocks from her residence
unoccupied neither residence nor her vehicle revealed any evidence of a struggle or altercation on September
17th 1980 a nearly skeletonized body was discovered in an area of Madison County
Ohio The Remains were identified as Vicky cotch through dental records the cause of death is listed as death due to
violence again her case is still unsolved to this very day and she was a teacher working in that area back in
1980 before she went missing when we highlight mysteries of Ohio or anywhere for that matter I think we need to sift
through some of the sensationalized and some of the ones that are filled with bright lights and
shiny objects and confusing rabbit holes and look to the real cases like that of Vicky
cotch thank you our friends for joining us again for another fascinating case if
you need more True Crime Garage in your earballs check out our bonus show cut off the Record that's on Stitcher
premium Colonel do we have any recommended reading for this week this week we are recommending a great Ohio
True Crime book it's titled murder and Mayhem in Dayton in the Miami Valley this features several different true
crime stories from the Miami Valley area of Ohio which has a rich but gruesome and bloody history so check out murder
in Mayhem in Dayton and the Miami Valley by upand coming true crime author Sarah
kushel find that great title and others on our recommend page at true Crim garage.com much love to you guys I see
you here in the garage next week and until then be good be kind and don't [Music]
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Circleville Writer /// Part 2 /// 502

Part 2 of 2

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Circleville, Ohio appears to be a town where everyone knows everyone’s secrets, or at least one person did. For over a decade anonymous letters were arriving in the mailboxes of residents, businesses, local city officials, schools and churches. These letters were demanding, accusatory and often threatening. Then one of the recipients dies a mysterious death. Afterwards, the local unsolved murder is mentioned time and time again in the letters. The author was claiming to know who was responsible for this unsolved murder of a local lady. Vulgar signs started to appear on the sides of busy roads and a murder attempt is made. A man is locked up for the attempted murder and yet the letters continued. Unsolved Mysteries featured this case and they too received strange and ominous letters. Many have called the Circleville Writer case - Ohio's greatest unsolved mystery. Join Nic and the Captain at your favorite spot on the Garage couch and hear the rest of the story.

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Brief Summary

The episode covers the Circleville Letter Writer case, focusing on Ron Gillespie's death and the attempted murder of Mary Gillespie, involving local figures and ongoing threats.

Key points

Gift of Better Sleep. Your mattress purchase helps give the gift of better sleep to children in need.
True Crime Garage Introduction. Welcome to True Crime Garage, where hosts dive into intriguing stories.
The Accidental Death of Ron Gillespie. Exploring the circumstances surrounding Ron Gillespie's fatal truck accident.
Attempt on Mary Gillespie's Life. A nasty sign leads to a booby trap intended for Mary Gillespie.
Paul Freshour's Trial. Paul Freshour is sentenced for attempted murder linked to threatening letters.
Paul's Dual Life. Paul was once a corrections officer, now a prisoner. Could he be innocent?

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

What would be their motive to cover up?

Questioning the police's actions.

4:19WatchNov 16, 2023

Tension

60/ 100Some tension

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