Jean Harris and the Murder of Herman Tarnower (Part 2) | Morbid | Podcast | Forensic Files

hey weirdos I'm Elena I'm Ash and this is morbid [Music] yeah I feel like we should have body
slammed at the end of that like a a dude bro W yeah I like that like metaphorically metaphorically I don't
know I like that so overtook me what's up so lots is up um Lots is up lots is down let's Lots is all around we that's
what I was going to say I was going to finish it and I was going to say lots is you even did the all around with your
head bring it around so once again very cool thing that happened was hanging out with Ander
McMahon wild um 16-year-old me screaming literally can't handle it screaming um but he's very rad and it was very nice
of him and we appreciate him uh and so a really really cool thing as well has already happened for you guys if you're
on wonder plus yeah the no everyone we just can't say who it is because we'll never understand it but when we're here
everyone got it it's a bonus episode it was on top of your regular episodes um it already happened for you but guys it
hasn't happened for me yet so can you tell me how it went everyone just commenting on the
eventual post that comes up it was great El it was a great Elena you had so much
fun I did I know I did and as you had fun too you know what right now I I feel it now and I'm like wow you feel it com
I had so much fun it was an it was fun it was lovely it was exciting it was Grand it was so Grand it was
incredible it's something I it was meteoric it was meteoric I like that yeah I it was great I think like a
religious experience um you know I hope you guys [ __ ] loved it hi I know you did of course cuz I know you guys and I
know this is like right up your wheelhouse I don't think it's up your wheelhouse I think it's in your
wheelhouse I think that's how it goes could be both I got weird with it which is kind of on brand right now for what
what is going on careful so back it up I'm not I'm not yeah I think in I think in like a week or so I can properly like
talk about it you know and and mention what it actually is and actually to make sure that I can because I want to like
be excited with you guys and like you to be able to hear the excitement in real time we're going to record the intro to
that episode that comes out after it right after we record this that exciting bonus episode into the episode so that
we can properly capture the state I'm in it's going to be interesting it is I don't know if
you'll be capable of recording I know anything after that I'm very excited in case you couldn't tell uh but it's going
to be really fun you guys can look forward to it I swear and yeah and I we have some good cases coming up we got
some good stuff coming up yeah it's all good well right now we're in part two of
Jean Harris and the murder of Dr Herman tarau this has been a ride so far just in terms of everything how the ups and
downs and the turns and the yeah this feels this is like an epic drama it is an epic drama it's it's giving like soap
opera a little bit it for sure is you know so in part one we heard all about Jean's upbringing and how it would
obviously later affect her man picker um her man picker her man picker her picker
how her first marriage didn't work out how [ __ ] everybody hated Jim yeah and how she was so close to a second chance
at marriage with Dr Herman High tar hour but how that all ultimately unraveled then of course we got into how she
started relying on daoxin a prescription form of methamphetamine you know the one
that was for her chronic back pain and how that was really starting to change her personality and shift her way of
thinking yeah and then of course we got into Dr tarnower's relationship with his
uh girlfriend Lynn and how that kind of lined up with some pretty scary and strange harassing phone calls that were
leaving Jean quite paranoid yeah understandably yeah now let's get into part two at the same time that her
relationship with Dr tarau seemed to be basically reaching a pretty Bitter End Jean was at the peak of her career which
you you would have hoped would have kind of Taken taken all that energy I know but it's not always that easy no and I
think where she was in a mental state it just wasn't possible for her to really like Relish in that sometimes it's hard
to disengage it exactly so as the head Mistress of one of the nation's most elite private schools like I was saying
in part one she regularly attended Galas and dinner parties with some of the nation's wealthiest families and she was
invited to speak at education conferences around the country in a letter to hi uh in 1977 she wrote my
work day begins at 8:00 a.m. and lasts until I drop damn so it's like she was at the peak of her career but it was
also really taxing on her physical health and her mental health and her relationship was with high is taxing on
her mental health so yeah and it's like sometimes having that busy of like a professional life can like distract you
oh a little bit but it doesn't you know the second you come out of it it all comes crashing down and you're burning
the candle at both Ides it's not healthy precisely so like the Thomas School the
madira school had also been struggling in the mid '70s including an incident this is [ __ ] awful um where a
mentally ill man abducted and sexually assaulted one of the students he left her died to a tree on campus and she
died from exposure holy [ __ ] yeah it's something we're definitely going to look
more into that's horrific yeah well it was this incident that eventually led the previous head mistress to retire you
can imagine why opening the job for somebody new who could re you know Revitalize the school one of the board
members later said of their search for a replacement we wanted someone womanly like a woman is that what like
what are you what are you talking about cool that's we wanted someone womanly what what that's all I guess that's the
requirement Well jean was womanly she met all the board's criteria for an ideal head mistress wow but the job
proved far harder and like I was saying way more emotionally taxing than she had
anticipated and adding to her stress was the additional work that she had taken on in order to help hi with a diet book
that he was actually contracted to produce about his popular Scarsdale diet this is like a high protein low carb
method of weight loss and despite its immense popularity at the time the diet the Scarsdale diet has since been
labeled a pretty good example of a fad diet where you would lose a great deal of weight when you first did this but
you would once you stop dieting you just gain the weight back cuz it's not sustainable yeah I have feelings about
diets for the most part I do too it's a very unhealthy industry I don't care don't come at me nevertheless it's my
opinion it's my opinion nevertheless though in the late 1970s Dr tau's diet was extremely
profitable and Publishing houses across New York were just clamoring to publish his first official book yeah diet book
so in late 1978 his diet really wasn't more than just a one-page eating plan that he was giving out to patients who
wanted to lose weight but his publisher hired Ghost Writer Sam Sinclair author of more than two dozen self-help books
to develop that one single sheet into a several hundred page book damn I feel like you're going to find this part
interesting yeah Sinclair was given 6 months to produce the entire book W but when Jean read the first draft of what
he' produced she was shocked by really how unethical and actually poorly written the book was oh no her opinions
LED obviously she's a woman with opinion so that's not great in this time no not
in that time a lot of tension started to you know unravel between herself Dr tarau and the Ghost Writer Sinclair to
the point where she offered to rewrite the entire manuscript herself wow she was like this is so bad that
like I'm going to do it all and make it better and I'm not she wasn't like she wasn't a writer damn you know like
obviously she's a very she's a trained professional when it comes to like being a teacher and that kind of thing so she
can write I'm sure she proves herself holy [ __ ] yeah under any circumstances rewriting Dr tau's book would have been
um a huge time commitment but considering that Jean also had a very demanding full-time job it seemed pretty
unrealistic and unnecessary and unnecessary yet somehow she managed to pull off the impossible and produced a
respectable final draft for the publisher on time wow yeah wrot the whole thing over I'm just like why' you
do that like that that's very impressive but like I think she just was like this
is [ __ ] and it can't go into the world with High's name on it and I love him so
much so I'm going to help here and I think she probably thought like I'm going to do this for him and prove 100%
that's all it is it's like but girl she's in a constant Loop of trying to prove is I feel it's so the complete
Scarsdale Medical diet by Dr Herman tarau and Sam Sinclair we miss the name there think
y'all mean Jean Harris but okay came out in late December of 1978 and it was an immediate success of course all the
credit really went to Dr tarau alone instead of the group of doctors who had really created the book at the Scarsdale
Medical Group or Jean Harris who literally wrote the entire [ __ ] book that's gross yeah yet for Jean writing
the book was never about money it was an opportunity to prove to hi that she was
still of use to him and worth keeping in his life so when he offered to pay her $2,000 for her work she was deeply hurt
and immediately left New York and returned to Virginia me I would have taken that cash yeah get the [ __ ] away
two weeks later she received a check from Dr tarau along with a note that read for reasons that I cannot explain
it is imperative that I make all book dispersements at this time I am enclosing a check for $4,000 that I hope
you will accept so he wanted to pay her for this this was a professional Exchange in his mind and for her it's
like it was proving her love for him yeah exactly her her work on the book was a labor of love yeah something to
show him how much she valued him and he basically dismissed that and treated it like it was a service that could be
bought which it is technically but that's not that that was not her intent and why she did it I also and just to
just to flip this on its head did she tell him this is a labor of love for me uh I I don't know because if you don't
express that to someone then they are going to look at it as a professional thing yeah treat it as such if you don't
express things to people they can't read your damn mind that's the thing so there
is that whole thing where like yes I'm sure it was a labor of love for her but if you do not express that no one's
going to know it yeah that's so you got to say it just to look at it from both sides he was paying her for the book
because she did a service yeah and I don't know if she did I don't think they were great communicators that's the
thing I don't think there's a lot of communication so it's a lot of assuming somebody's going to understand my
intention here yeah and that never works out no it doesn't you got to be pretty upfront with people well and this was
this was a pretty big Turning Point in their relationship imagine she wrote to him you have said to me so many times I
never ask anything of you I never ask anything of anyone but my dear that isn't true for starters you ask every
woman to be as incapable of love as you are wow that was a good line reads upon reads upon in here and giving her a
check for the work H reminded Jean yet again that their relationship had become purely transactional but still she
couldn't let go of their relationship it was almost like she became addicted to oh 100% almost as addicted as the pills
that he'd been prescribing her and now she was stuck in this terrible position of being totally emotionally reliant on
a man who really didn't want anything to do with her pretty clearly yeah and at that point it's like if he is being
clear that like nothing is coming of this yeah you got to walk away yep then it then it does become on you that that
you're not letting it go and I do think it got to that point and that's the thing it's like there there's there's
times when and again I don't know what the interactions were anything like that he was because it's shitty when
someone's pretending that they're still eluding that there might be something there of course that's going to leave
you with a little string of Hope of course and when you're in that position of desperation and you love someone and
you're you know all that you're going to take anything as a little string of hope
so you don't know what kind of things were dangling in front of her but it does sound like he was at least
attempting to communicate that this is a transactional relationship now and at that that point you need to do the work
to get away yeah to like walk away yeah cuz it's been made clear you know yeah it really has it's it's it's just one of
those things if he's not making it clear I I get why you're hanging on to Hope because when you're in that position
nothing's logical yeah but none of it kind of sounds like it's being made clear it yeah none of this is logical
well that's I was going to say and even that's not logical so yeah well throughout the later years of the 1970s
Jean's relationship with Dr tarau began to crumble at a pretty rapid rate he was
just seemingly replacing her with his younger lab assistant Lynn by the end of the decade her emotional distress and
her drug dependency at this point had really started to distort her thinking she was profoundly depressed very lonely
she was struggling with anxiety on a daily basis and it was all showing and not only in her personal life but her
professional life too that makes that's so sad she unraveled cuz outside of this
man she has so much worth it she does you knowes yeah absolutely one colleague said sometimes she was a very beautiful
woman at other times she looked like a Haggard skinny old woman all hunched over and she also started having quote
unquote spells of anger and other bizarre behaviors where she would lash out at people for like a lot of the
times no reason her coworker said anything could set her off it needn't be a major crisis she really didn't like
the girls meaning the girls at the school where she was head mistress that's not cool in fact at one point she
became so irrationally frustrated with their lack of uh respect for cleanliness that she banned oranges from the campus
because the girls always left their peels their orange peels laying around instead of tossing them so she was like
okay no more oranges on campus that's some head mistress [ __ ] which I'm also like who like isn't there
somebody above you that you have to get like approval from can you ban oranges from a school don't oranges fall under
like free something yeah you know free Something Free orange free Citrus you know but but that just shows like howal
bizar and irrational her thinking was yeah by the end of 1980 the entire Affair had started to take a toll on
actually everybody involved and of course Jean and particular at the end of January her contract with the school was
renewed and she received a substantial raise which was good wow but in private she told her secretary she quote felt
like packing a bag and getting the hell out of there yeah it sounds bad yeah the
comment was understood to indicate that she was burning out but in truth things were far worse than really anybody even
knew in late February she spent uh Jean spent 10 days traveling on the west coast in a fundraising and recruitment
effort for the school and during that trip she ran out of dooin oh when she got back to Washington in the first week
of March she immediately called hi who promised that he would send more but any relief she felt was quickly undermined
when he also told her that he had decided decided not to bring her as his companion to an upcoming Heart
Association banquet he said she was still invited to attend but Lynn was also invited to
attend see and here it's like he's being clear yeah this is clear it's cruel to say it's it's very clear what he's
saying but it's also like but so you were bringing her yeah he had asked her so it's like and then said that's un
clear like you know like it feels like it's flip-flopping I think revoking the invitation probably came from her
State at that time I think he was like you are clearly not doing well and like I don't like you can still come if you
want like I think he was trying to let her down easy it was probably one of those things where it was like you can
come if you want cuz I invited you but like you don't up to you yeah when and like I said when ha had initially asked
her to accompany him to the banquet like he did Jean took that invitation to mean
that things between them were returning to normal of course so his decision to attend the banquet alone now not only
felt like a rejection of her as a companion but also an indication that she was now on equal ground with Lynn
because Lynn he wasn't going with Lynn but she was invited to come if she wanted to oh yeah and she always
believed that Lynn was nothing more than ha's mistress which meant that she probably like Jean herself probably was
at this point too damn you know so his rejection was an absolute shock to Jean which is interesting but rather than
react in the moment she simply said she'd call him back and she abruptly hung up the phone
in the days that followed she seemed to operate on autopilot meeting with difficult parents and students a lot of
whom were confrontational it's a very you know elite school and by then dis oxin had completely left her body and
the symptoms of withdrawal were starting to set in oh no among other things she was feeling even more depressed and
despondent and her ability to cope with her declining mental health pretty much evaporated oh this is really sad it's
very sad on the evening of March 9th after spending days unable to reach chai and he hasn't sent a prescription he's
basically just like ghosting her oh [ __ ] she sat down to write her lover a letter
she said I am distraught as I write this your phone call to tell me you preferred
the company of a vicious adulterous psychotic was topped by a call from the dean of students 10 minutes later and
has kept me awake for almost 36 hours what I say will ramble but it will be the truth and I have to do something
besides shriek with pain this is a quote I haven't played the slave for you I would have never committed adultery for
you but I have added a dimension to your life and given you pleasure and dignity
as you have me I've watched you grow rich in the Years where we have been together and I have watched me go
through moments where I was almost destitute and now that thieving [ __ ] has the Run of your home and you accuse me
of stealing money in books the many things your [ __ ] does openly and obviously you now have the cruelty to
accuse me of wow yeah which if you think about the letters that we read between them in part one obviously they're like
love letters and this is not a love letter but even just like her way of thinking you can tell is completely
distorted oh 100% like she is angry this is Rage coded this is like that thieving [ __ ] calling her a whole
it's like what I'm not a doctor but she seems a little manic here yeah she seems
like there's I mean clearly because she's going through withdrawal symptoms this
is in her right mind like she is not in a normal state of being like her homeo stasis here exactly and that's scary in
the end she's talking about Lynn basically like she thought that I it's a little unclear cuz it almost seems like
she saw like cuz he was saying Lynn is invited to the banquet and so are you and I think she thought they were on the
same playing field and then I don't know if there was like another call that happened where he was saying like no I'm
still with Lynn yeah or like I am taking Lynn kind of thing it's a little unclear
but she she's focusing a lot of anger at Lynn yeah and it's like don't focus it on the girl focus it on the guy but not
how you do apparently no no well that's like a small excerpt because this letter
went on for pages and Pages as Jee poured out every ounce of anger and resentment that she felt toward hi and
Lynn over the previous 5 years she had a lot to say but she still indicated that
all she wanted was to spend as much time with high as she could which is very sad
no now she planned to send the letter by registered mail to ensure that he would
receive it but then she got got a better idea she would drive the 5 hours from Washington to New York to deliver it to
high in person yeah this has gone far beyond yeah what it should have way far beyond by the morning of March 10th Jean
had been withdrawing from methamphetamine and painkillers for days and she was severely sleep deprived as
well so to say that she was not in her right mind would actually be a serious understatement oh yeah she's dangerous
right now she is to herself I was going to say to herself and everyone around her yeah she had spent 14 years devoting
everything she had to her job and to her Manar hour and now she was just starting
to feel like she was being pushed out of both it felt to her she later said that
quote the last of her support systems had now been knocked out from under her so that morning she called her secretary
and told her to cancel all her appointments for that afternoon and then she called hi and actually managed to
get through to him and she said hi it's been a bad few weeks I'd like to come up
and talk to you for a few minutes and he said he was having dinner that night and
that it would be better if they could chot the following day but she insisted and he relented and said fine come see
me tonight oh boy neither Herman tarau nor anybody else knew it but Jean Harris had come up with a plan and I just want
to give a trigger warning for suicide here she purchased a 32 caliber handgun a few days earlier after seeing hi one
last time she planned to walk a short distance to a little Park that she liked near High's house and there was a pond
in the park that she actually always like to sit by and she decided that would be the place she wanted to go to
end her life oh man that's sad very very sad before leaving she actually finalized her will and she wrote a
letter of resignation addressed to the board of directors at the madira school and then she got in the car and left
Washington Bound for New York so it was late almost 11:00 at night when Jean finally got to Dr
tarnower's apartment a student had actually given her flowers earlier that day so she thought hi might like to have
them so she grabbed that b of flowers and the gun before exiting the car and going up to the apartment inside it was
dark and it seemed that high and his housekeeper uh Suzanne had already gone to bed so Jean climbed the stairs called
softly out to hi but got no response and quietly she entered the bedroom where she found him sleeping and she whispered
to him as she fumbled with the wall switch to turn the light on this this is already very scary that she just like
walked into his bedroom yeah while he's sleeping and it's just going to flick the light on that's literally my worst
nightmare immediately jarring yeah so when the light came on hi was just waking up so he was rubbing his eyes and
he's like what the [ __ ] and despite his giving into seeing her that night he told her at that point that he was tired
and he didn't want to talk in the middle of the night like yeah probably smart yeah but jean just sat down on the edge
of the bed hoping that her continued presence would Rouse him but hi was like yeah cool I'm going to go back to sleep
yeah so she just started C chatting casually and according to her he said Jesus Jee just shut up and go to bed
which like I can kind of understand I'm going to be honest that I probably wouldn't be as nice like that it I'd be
pissed I'm a horrible person when I just wake up like Drew is like you're so mean
when you first wake up or like you're not quite awake I I think I would say worse possibly I definitely and if
you're saying I'm going to like I was asleep and you woke me up by walking in my room and flicking the light on and
then just talking at me and I tell you to leave I'm going to sleep and you just keep talking yeah I'm gonna say shut up
and go to bed and like talking about nothing like just casually sitting there on the edge of my bed talking come on
stop it that's also how you know that she is very much not clearly here cuz this is
not logical behavior and it's not logical and it's not characteristic for her no like from based on everything you
know just seems over the top yeah so not wanting to sleep Jean went into the primary bathroom to gather a few of her
things that she intended to give her daughter-in-law it had always been the responsibility of hi's housekeeper
Suzanne to remove Jean's things when she left and replace them with Lynn's clothing and vice versa when Jean was
coming that's [ __ ] up which like think of that job being like oh let me let me
take this woman's clothes one mistress's stuff out like and that's [ __ ] up yeah
that's super [ __ ] up that's really [ __ ] up it's [ __ ] up of him to do that and it's [ __ ] up of him to have a
woman that works for him do that to two other women yeah like that's that's a lot of manipulation again it reminds me
of Richard and his housekeeper that was in love with him yep so not saying that his housekeeper was in love with him she
wasn't but jean was surprised when she switched on the light and found the room filled with somebody else's clothing the
realization that that clothing and that jewelry all around belonged to Lynn seemed to cause something to snap inside
of Jean yeah so now she was irrationally angry like I rap and grabbed a handful of clothing and other items and stormed
back into the bedroom room she threw the items at at high on the bed but overshot
and ended up sending several of the heavier items crashing through one of the bedroom
windows yeah this this is escalated to a point also I'm like what did you throw between clothing and jewelry that it
crashed through a bedroom window was it like shoes or something maybe shoes you got to hum those shoes out a window to
get them to go through yeah like thing I don't I don't know if this was simple overshooting of the bed I think it was
humming as hard as you can I think so too yeah and uh this whole version of events is Jean's version of events
obviously so we're going to have to kind of step in every now and again and say like she said that happened but we
probably think this so by that point hi was um out of bed and very angry and apparently slapped Jean hard across the
face which sent her retreating into the bathroom [ __ ] up she said yeah super [ __ ] up she said he was angrier than
she had ever seen him and when he entered the dressing room adjacent to the bathroom he hit her again just as
hard as he had the first time during the 4-Hour drive to New Y or the 5H hour drive to New York Jean had envisioned
one last romantic moment with high where she would say goodbye and then go to the
park according to her and in her mind the whole thing had been so romantic and peaceful but now things had fallen apart
so quickly and none of it was going according to her plan yeah so she said later that she yelled at him and this is
this is so [ __ ] Bleak and sad and awful hit me again High make it hard enough to kill me oh this is awful yeah
but rather than hit her again he just looked down at her with disgust and told her to get out so she hesitated for a
moment and then she stood up and started walking toward the bedroom door she said
intending to start her walk to the park but when she reached the edge of the bed
she said it occurred to her that her entire plan had already unraveled so it made no difference whether she went to
the park to end her life or if she just simply did it right there and then in his bedroom so she said to him according
to her never mind hi I'll do it myself and she grabbed the gun from her handbag and placed the barrel to her
Temple again given the outcome of this incident we only have her description of the events to go by but until her death
in 2012 she did maintain that what happened next was entirely accidental I'm just and obviously
there's a little bit of a reason I guess I don't I don't know why you would have
the gun on your person yeah why you would even take it in there if you were planning just to go
to the park yeah I don't know if maybe she was planning to leave her car and and walk there and walk over but even
still you could walk out to your car and grab your grab the gun yeah I just think
unless she had to valet possibly I think I just think walking into his home with a loaded gun
the way things have gone and the the 10 moments you have had together and and you know this being oh the middle of the
night where you're going to flick on his light and wake him up I don't know if having a gun with you is sending the
right message you know I would say probably not so I feel like it's strange that she was able to just grab that gun
out of her purse but who knows it gets stranger okay so apparently according to Jean when hi saw the gun in her hand he
jumped toward her from behind which knocked the gun away from her head and caused it to discharge when she turned
around hi was standing there with a shocked look on his face and he shouted at her look what you've done while
holding up his bloody hand in the webbing where his thumb connected with his right hand there was a bullet hole
where blood was just pouring out so they stared at each other for a few seconds and then hi walked to the bathroom and
Jean could hear the water running which makes my hand radio I literally my whole
body body I was like like starting to rinse that off I'm just like oh that makes my legs hurt for some weird reason
that's interesting I don't know maybe it's like a thing in your brain I think it is but also this guy's a doctor and
he just got shot in the hand yeah like he's going to be insanely angry yeah or you would assume yeah so with high out
of the room Jean said she began frantically looking for the gun on the floor hoping that she'd find it and end
her own life before he came out of the bathroom so she dropped to her hands and knees and she could see the gun under
the bed and she said she just reached it and was Raising it to her head again when hi's arm came at her from the side
and wrenched it out of her hand for the second time they sat across from each other just staring at each other for a
short time and then hi reached over for the phone to call his housekeeper Suzanne okay so for the most part Jean's
recollection of the nights events appear to be pretty clear and somewhat supported by the evidence like some of
them but when it comes to what happened after high reached for the phone her of events became cloudy and left
investigators with a lot of questions okay according to Jean she must have tried to reach for the gun again because
she recalled physically fighting with high and during that attack she was struck in the face again and during the
struggle she fell back on the bed with high on top of her and she felt something poking her stomach she assumed
it was the barrel of the gun so she squeezed the trigger and heard a loud bang as the gun went off but to her
surprise she didn't feel any pain hi then slid off of her and without thinking she jumped off the bed and ran
toward the bathroom knowing that she needed to shoot herself again or he was definitely going to get the gun from her
for a third time so hi was on his knees by the side of the bed and when Jean stopped and looked at him she didn't
understand why he stopped chasing her but without giving it much thought she raised the gun to her head took a deep
breath and pulled the trigger she said she said the gun made a clicking sound but nothing happened and then she looked
down and saw that all of the chambers were empty she ran to the bathroom and she started
rumaging around in her pocket for more bullets which so she had more bullets which is strange to me also how many how
many chambers are in this G she Two Shots have gone off correct according to Jean we'll get there cuz like yeah you
just threw two in there no no so she R and again why do you have more bullets if if you were planning on just shooting
yourself you would have taken that loaded gun in my opinion you would have just taken that loaded gun with you I
would have left it in the car probably like I'm not I don't want to put myself in these shoes but I don't think I would
have brought the loaded gun in to say goodbye to hi and I definitely wouldn't have extra bullets that I brought with
me as well no that the extra bullets makes no sense but when she found the extra bullets it occurred to her she
didn't know how to load or unload the gun she said which that so how like do I don't do you buy a loaded gun does that
make any sense I I'm not positive about this but I don't think you do I don't think so
either I'm fairly certain you don't I'll look it up just to be sure but I'm I'm like what I would think you wouldn't
I'll keep going while you look it up feel free to interrupt me so she banged the gun on the side of the bathtub
hoping to dislodge the empty shells but all she succeeded in doing was breaking the cylinder from the gun which meant at
that point it was useless you cannot buy a loaded gun I didn't think in the United States I that makes sense that I
didn't think so either but I was like I don't want to claim that I know this for
sure I don't you never know if maybe like she said to the person I don't know how to load this can you load it up for
me and like they did something illegally but I don't know it's I'm going to go with no on that I would go with no on
that too but at this point she remembered exiting the bathroom and telling hi that the gun was broken and
she said it's probably dead and he she said he replied you're probably right and he slowly climbed into bed and
covered himself with a blanket then according to Jean it was then that she realized hi was injured his in was off
and he looked absolutely exhausted so she decided she needed to go get help so she ran down the stairs into the dark
and she could hear Suzanne talking to someone in the dining room but she paid no attention to what she was saying
outside she said that she remembered there was a pay phone down the street about a quarter mile away so she jumped
in her car and raced in the direction of the phone which is strange to get in your car and leave the scene uhhuh as
she neared the phone a police car sped up behind her with its lights flashing so she made a u-turn and started heading
back toward the house with the police car obviously following very closely behind her and when she reached the
driveway she jumped out and shouted to the officer hurry up he's been shot when they entered the house Suzanne was
standing by the stairs and she when she saw Jean she shouted she's the one she did
it Jean Suzanne and the officer went upstairs to the bedroom where they found Herman tarau on his knees beside the bed
slumped against the side table one bloody hand still reaching for the phone so when she said he got into bed and he
put a blanket over himself I don't think he's kneeling on the yeah I don't think
that happened with Suzanne's help the officer laid High down on his back and then went down to his car to get an
oxygen tank Jean lay across the bed just caressing hi's face as he lay on the floor struggling to breathe and asked
him oh hi why didn't you kill me a short time later Dr Herman tarau died from a severed artery caused when a bullet
entered his chest so he just bled out I I have some question several questions uhuh so Jean never denied that she had
shot high but from that point forward her story about the nights events would change a number of times that does not
Shock me because it needs a little work from that first one MH mhm At first she told detectives at the scene quote there
was a fight and the gun went off and his testimony in court officer Daniel O Sullivan recounted his questioning of
Gene for the jury according to a Sullivan Jean quote asked the doctor to kill her meaning Dr tarau and the
struggle then resumed and several shots were fired several means more than two yeah in fact Jean had told the officer
he wanted to live I wanted to die I've been through so much hell with him I loved him very much he slept with every
woman he could and I've had it the next morning the news of the murder broke on the front page of the New York Times and
in the article Police Chief William Harris has quoted us saying we found a revolver in the glove compartment of her
car and she made certain admissions okay so she put the she threw it in the glove compartment yeah okay in
her frenzy of going to get some help again that doesn't make sense to me yeah uh he stopped short obviously of
providing any details as to what jean had admitted to later that day she was booked on a charge of second deegree
murder a charge which her lawyer strongly objected to the lawyer Joel AR now told reporters nothing I've heard
would would apply to intent homicide okay which it's gray yeah I don't know yeah the story of High's
murder though obviously was one of the most scandalous things to hit the front page in a long time he was one of the
most well-known and well-respected doctors in the country at the time and it seemed like he'd been killed by a
jealous lover who also came from high society now like I said earlier Jean stuck to her story and she sort of she
stuck to her story in the way that she maintained that it was an accident but the other aspects of the story didn't
make sense like you and I have kind of touched on according to Jean she did shoot high in the hand and one time in
the stomach thinking that she was shooting herself but when Dr uh I think it's Lewis row performed the autopsy the
next day he noted that Dr tarau had been struck by four bullets yeah four yeah one in the upper AR uh interior chest
wall one in the hand one in the right arm and one in the shoulder yeah so that doesn't even really make
sense for if he's on top of her and she feels the gun poking her stomach that was my M shot in the stomach if they if
they're belly to belly like you would imagine they would be yep or even really like they could have been groined to
belly if he's a bit taller than her yeah you know like but for his chest to be at
her stomach that doesn't make a lot of sense that doesn't make any sense if he has climbed on top of her like she said
yeah no none of that makes sense and the amount of bullets that were shot yeah I
don't I I don't believe her story I don't I don't either yeah so it it was the bullet that entered near his
shoulder that likely killed him according to the autopsy the bullet had entered the right chest cavity
fracturing three ribs the fractures had caused the laceration of the plural lining the bullet had traveled in a
downward trajectory on the surface of the lung causing a great deal of hemorrhaging in lung tissue it continued
downward Perforating the diaphragm and the front part of the right kidney where it was recovered damn so he it really
banged around in there yeah the autopsy directly contradicted Jean story like yeah to me it's I mean it's black
and white there it is not only had ha been shot two more times than she had even told police but he'd also been shot
in multiple locations including one wound that indicated the shooter had actually been standing over him downward
trajectory exactly Dr row concluded Dr tarnower's wounds are not consistent with a struggle over
a gun between a left-handed woman and a right-handed man ah yeah I mean I believe that forensic pathologist mhm
when Jean finally went to trial in late November of 1980 the prosecution and the
defense immediately ran into problem selecting a jury not only had a lot of people heard about the scandal in the
paper or on the news they were also familiar with the Scarsdale diet and many prospective jurors had even tried
it oh man so that really puts a rch things at all then there were the details of the case itself in 1980 a
love triangle between three Society people wasn't really something a lot of Americans understood or condoned for
that matter and just as important was the fact that Dr tarau was Jewish and Jean was not as her lawyer put it this
relationship crossed religious lines and there was a good chance that some jurors
might seek to punish Jean for that wow which it's like even know why that would come to play I didn't even think of that
as a possibility I was more like oh it was in the papers and then people have tried the diet that's all I thought is
like he's a really popular doctor a lot of people know him the diet high society
but the fact that he's Jewish and she's not plays a role in this is like get a grip we got to do better fck G touch
some grass everybody I'm like how about she's a person and he is two and one of them got murdered yeah how about like we
look at the facts here so when the trial began in Earnest a few weeks later the prosecutor George uh
George Bolan presented the case to the jury as one of simple jealousy and rage and you know I kind of agree with this
case unfortunately he theorized that quote Mrs Harris desperately unhappy over the loss of Dr tarnower's
affections and resentful of his relationship with a younger woman entered his home unannounced and
unexpected and intentionally shot him causing his death I mean that's pretty much what
happened yeah support of that theory one witness after another was called to testify as to Jean's psychological state
in the days leading up to the shooting tar hour's housekeeper Suzanne vanderen which that's a really fun vanderen
vanderen that's a great last name she kept meticulous Diaries documenting all the drama that went on in the house we
love a girly who keeps a diary for us that's a receipts Queen yeah to me that screams Gemini I love that that does
feel like a Gemini move we love a goddamn drama and we love a godamn receipt we love it she told the jury she
quote maintained the Diaries to keep track of what she served at the doctor's dinner parties but they also contained
information about who was staying at the house on particular evenings because it
was her job to keep track of that what she had to know when to switch things over I love that and I think she just
liked the tea I think she just liked the tea yeah but the defense argued the opposite telling the jury that Jean
shooting of Dr tarau was accidental I don't know how you accidentally shoot somebody four different times at least
one of them being in a downward trajectory I yeah you're going to have I don't think I can be convinced that you
can accidentally shoot someone four times and to lie about the amount of times yeah that's shady it's
Shady so they argued though that she had gone to his house to say goodbye and had
fully intended to take her own life after that but the situation escalated and the two ended up in a physical
struggle the Press hung on absolutely every word of every witness but none were more captivating than Jean herself
oh boy yeah she proved to be a crucial if somewhat problematic witness for the defense on one hand she was able to
adequately explain the stress that she had been under the multiple stresses at the time and her state of mind leading
up to the shooting and when she managed to get her version of events out in a way that supported everything she'd
claimed and which I I you do have to take into account that there there's clearly some psychological break yeah
chemical imbalance happening here which obviously does not make it okay but it does need to be taken into consideration
with like what her State of Mind was here I I don't know necessarily think she had a fully laid out plan for
anything that was going to happen that night I think she probably thought that she would take her life at some point
because she wrote her resignation letter to work and finalized her will yeah that
that's telling to me but then on the flip side of that she came with a loaded gun and extra bullets you only
presumably need one bullet if you're going to kill yourself I wonder if this was um always going to be a murder
suicide yeah and then she just didn't get to the other part yeah I think that's highly possible either backed out
of it or didn't have the time to do it yeah because the whole jealousy angle of like if I can't have you nobody will and
I can't live without you to me this looks like a pretty C suicide that was watched yeah yeah I
think I think you're very much onto something there but on the other hand many observers found Jean to be quote
sad humorous and cutting she had spent so many years yeah humorous is an interesting adjective there I'm like sad
and cutting totally yeah but humorous okay that's interesting but she had spent a lot of years among the
wealthiest of society and had adopted a lot of their behavior she was very cold very distant on the stand and her
Behavior as she described it was often difficult for many people to empathize with equally challenging was the
so-called Scarsdale letter which Jean had written to high before driving to New York among other things the letter
made jean look pretty uh Petty and vindictive yeah which ultimately then supported the prosecutions theory that
she killed out of jealousy unfortunately yeah it does it very much does cuz remember I read an excerpt of that that
was pages and pages long yeah so when the case finally came to an end in mid-February of 1981 the jury was
instructed that they were to decide whether Jean was guilty or innocent and if they decide the former they could
choose between a charge of manslaughter or second deegree murder according to one of the jurors Marie Jackson she said
we never considered the Lesser charges we stuck on the murder charge and that's all we talked about whoa which you can
kind of understand yeah I mean it does seem like she came there with a gun that's the thing a loaded gun at that
yeah the defense had BAS their argument largely on the fact that Jee was suffering from mental illness at the
time but the jury actually found that difficult to believe and remember this wasn't a time where they would have been
like oh my God she's on meth they would have been like oh she's on a prescription that you know like we don't
know a lot about you know Jackson told a reporter we thought some people might have thought that she was crazy when she
did it but there was no psychiatric testimony about that so we couldn't do it yeah they should have brought
something in I know I don't know why they wouldn't yeah in the end though it was a reenactment of the shoot that
ultimately brought the jury to a unanimous decision after 48 Hours of deliberation the jury emerged and found
Jee Harris guilty of second degree murder ultimately it was her own testimony and of course like I just said
the Reconstruction of those events that night that swayed them juror Mary and Steven said if her intent was suicide
the actions that took place that night should have worked out yeah which I agree with it doesn't make sense to the
jury exactly it didn't make any sense that Jean would have had multiple opport unities to end her own life but somehow
ended up killing Dr turn tarau four after shooting him four times exactly that's the thing it doesn't add up
another juror said if she never would have got on the stand I guess I would have had to reconstruct in my mind what
happened but here I had Jee Harris telling me what did happen oop so it's like she kind of sealed her own fath
there yeah on March 19th she appeared in court for sentencing where she was given
15 years to life for the murder of Dr Herman tarau and when asked if she had anything to say on her own behalf she
told the judge I did not murder Dr tarau I loved him very much no one in this world feels his loss more than I do I am
not guilty you and Mr Bolan the prosecutor have arranged my life in such a way that I'll be in a cage for the
rest of it and with irons on my hands every time I get out that's not Justice it's a travesty of Justice whoa I that's
a pretty heavy statement like if you kill someone you should go to jail for it yeah made for a little while big old
mistake girl uh despite the anger and bitterness that she felt around her sentencing she did
ultimately she was said to have made the most of her time at the Bedford Hills Correctional Facility uh she was there
for 12 years she worked in the Parenting Center while she was incarcerated uh teaching parenting class classes to the
inmate mothers and helping them build skills that they would need to get their kids back after they were done with
their sentences W and she also worked in and started programs that would help uh
other inmates learn skills to help them find work when they were released including getting a high school diploma
or college degree damn and in the meantime she appealed her sentence and applied for clemency until she was
eventually paroled in 1993 waa she died of natural causes on December 23rd 2012 at the age of 89 damn and that is the
story of the murder of Dr Herman tarau and Jean Harris who said murder what a twisty
turny damn It's just sad it's just really really sad it's really sad because I think I think she snapped a little bit
but actually I didn't even think about I don't know why that didn't occur to me that it was probably a murder suicide I
that that I completely agree like that's what it reads to me when I first went through this I I was like I think she
snapped when she got into the bathroom and Lynn's clothes were there yeah and that's when she killed him mhm but I
think you're right she that could have been her plan all along that's why she had all those bullets yeah cuz she was
like who knows how long how many bullets it's going to take to kill him yeah and
then I need one left over yeah so it just makes sense you're not going there to take your own life with a purse full
of bullets no I I just don't and a loaded gun yeah yeah I think that makes a lot of sense I think I think you're
pretty right there yeah it's just really sad it's really sad case and it's like none of this really ever had to happen
you just moved on from him yeah you know like it was just and he was I think he was somewhat of a womanizer but I don't
think he deserved that ending no I don't think he deserved to die I think it's like he he was doing what he had always
done and that's people had let him do it for a long time so she let him and then
she kind of let him do it as well until she didn't yeah and yeah it's really it's sad none of that had happened no
liter none of it at all and it started like so sounded like such a like a great meat
a beautiful love affair at first I was like wow I'm rooting for you two kids yeah but then it pops off really quick
yeah crazy so that's the story we got some more stuff coming your way some very exciting stuff especially this girl
over here her eyes just lit the [ __ ] up hell yeah I think it's already happened
but you know we told you about it in the beginning yeah but will record right after so you can get the full feeling
yeah and with all of that being said you guys we hope you keep listening and we hope you keep it weird but not so weird
that any of this takes place no you just got to you got to get out when it's time
to go babe yeah get out of there yeah hit the road girl hit the road Jean that's right don't you come back no
[Music] [Music] [Music]

When Jean Harris met Herman Tarnower in the winter of 1966, she quickly fell in love the charming doctor. Having just come out of a disappointing twenty-year marriage, Harris was desperate to find the love and stimulating partnership she’d long dreamed of, and believed she’d finally found it in the intellectual Tarnower and the two would live happily ever after. But fourteen years later, Tarnower was dead and Harris was on trial for his murder, her fantasy of happily ever after having crumbled around her.

Thank you to the Incredible Dave White of Bring Me the Axe Podcast for research and Writing support!

References Alexander, Shana. 1983. Very Much a Lady: The Untold Story of Jean Harris and Dr. Herman Tarnower. New York, NY: Simon and Schuster.

Clendinen, Dudley. 1981. "Jean Harrids as a witness: sad, humorous, cutting." New York Times, January 28: B2.

Faron, James. 1980. "'Scarsdale Diet' doctor slain; headmistress charged." New York Times, March 12: A1.

Feron, James. 1981. "Defiant Jean Harris sentenced to mandatory fifteen years." New York Times, March 21: 1.

—. 1980. "Hard questioning is screening out Tarnower jurors." New York Times, November 13: B2.

—. 1980. "Jean Harris jury told of clothing found 'slashed'." New York Times, December 3: B1.

—. 1981. "Jurors in Harris trial re-enacted night of murder in deliberations." New York Times, February 26: A1.

—. 1980. "Policeman tells how Mrs. Harris described fight." New York Times, December 12: B1.

Haden-Guest, Anthony. 1980. "The headmistress and the diet doctor." New York Magazine, March 31.

The People of the State of New York v. Jean S. Harris. 1981. 84 A.D.2d 63 (Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of New York, Second Department, December 30).

United Press International. 1981. "Juror says Mrs. Harris's tesimony was the key to murder." New York Times, February 25: B2. Connect with Wondery http://wondery.com/shows http://facebook.com/WonderyMedia http://twitter.com/WonderyMedia http://instagram.com/WonderyMedia

Brief Summary

Jean Harris's tragic relationship with Dr. Tarnower leads to a shocking murder fueled by jealousy and mental health struggles.

Key points

Jean's Emotional Collapse. Jean's relationship with Dr. Tarau deteriorates, leading to her emotional distress and drug dependency.
The Letter of Despair. In a heartfelt letter, Jean confronts Dr. Tarau about their toxic relationship.
A Dangerous State of Mind. Jean is in a severely altered mental state due to withdrawal, making her unpredictable and dangerous.
The Fatal Confrontation. In a tragic turn of events, Jean confronts High with a gun, leading to a deadly struggle.
The Aftermath of Violence. After the shooting, Jean's frantic attempts to seek help reveal the chaos of the situation.
The Autopsy Revelation. The autopsy revealed Dr. Tarau was shot four times, contradicting Jean's story.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

I feel like packing a bag and getting the hell out of there.

Jean expresses her burnout at work.

15:54WatchMar 10, 2025

Tension

85/ 100High tension

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