Lords of Bakersfield /// Part 1 /// 328 | Forensic Files

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talk some true crime foreign [Music] Bakersfield California is a city of 380 000 about a hundred miles north of Los
Angeles Bakersfield is the county seat of Kern County and the ninth largest city in California
it's considered to be a pretty wholesome family values type of town but in the late 1970s and early 80s
something strange was going on a series of murders began these murders had just enough similarities and just
enough linking them to make people wonder are they connected now no one shared suspicions that an
undetected serial killer was at work this was something totally different something very strange and something
very rare what we have here is a faint pattern to the killings suggesting an underlying darkness something deep down
at their root what would emerge was an old boy's Network a dirty club with members
scattered amongst the upper echelons a Baker's Field's power elite a ring populated by public officials
entrusted city leaders but this network wasn't just about cronyism or corruption
at its route was pedophilia this True Crime garage and this is the story of the Lords of
Bakersfield [Music] Bakersfield California 1978. the city was described by CNN as
clean safe Conservative Republican and religious yet over a span of seven years from 1978 to 1985 there were five
unusual murders the cases are explored in a sensational 2003 expose that ran in the local paper the Californian written
by Robert Price a columnist for the paper and was assisted by assistant managing editor Lois Henry many of the
facts stated here by us come from this lengthy and scandalous column on January 4th 1978 a gardener working
on a property for a house on Beach Street in Bakersfield could not help but notice blood seeping out from under the
back door of the house this alarming site caused the gardener to call the police officers rushed to the house and
after making their way into the home they found a man lying on the floor covered in blood
the man was naked and it appeared he had been beaten and stabbed but somehow he was still alive he was unresponsive
paramedics arrived on the scene almost as soon as police when they found the man who was barely still clinging to
life they went to work applying life-saving efforts and then they rushed him to the hospital now the gardener
told police that the home belonged to a man named Tommy Tarver the badly beaten man was quickly identified to be in fact
Tommy Tarver yeah Tommy was in his 40s but he's pretty well known in the community he was also doing pretty well
financially Tommy owned a popular hair salon called Mr T Worchester located on F Street in Bakersfield this Salon was
frequented by many of the Rich and Powerful in town it appears Tommy lived alone he had been married twice before
both ending in separation or divorce and Tommy was living an openly gay lifestyle
now we said he was unresponsive in fact he was in a coma and remained so for about five days until he died from his
injuries that he suffered during this heinous attack police were looking for a suspect and
the neighborhood was in shock police canvassed the area talking to anyone in close proximity wanting to know did
anyone see or hear anything strange leading up to their gruesome findings inside the house on Beach Street
a couple that lived nearby told police that the night before a man in his early to mid-20s knocked on their door asking
if they could call him a cab to which they agreed to help according to the papers they did not
notice anything strange about his appearance however while the man remained at the doorway while they were
placing the call for the cab something fell from one of the man's pockets it was a silver spoon
after calling for the cab this was the last that the couple saw of this man spoon was later found by police
now that same day police got a big lead in what would later turn out to be a homicide
investigation this lead came by way of a traffic stop when an officer pulled a vehicle over the officer very quickly
discovered two things way out of the ordinary first the car was stolen and its rightful owner was Tommy Tarver
the man they found attacked in his home who is now in a coma lying in a hospital
bed just a couple days away from Death behind you the second thing that they noticed was that the vehicle was being
operated by a 13 year old boy this is 13 year old Robert Glenn Mistral he was caught behind the wheel of a
soon-to-be Dead Man's stolen vehicle so we have 13 year old Robert that's driving this guy's car that was
viciously attacked but he also has some of his items in the car with him so of course police wanted to know everything
and young Robert did seem to have quite a bit to tell them Robert admitted to knowing the much older Tommy Tarver and
in fact admitted to going to his home Robert told the police he had been living in seedy hotels with his
alcoholic mother Robert said he got by on selling sexual favors to men for money and had been doing so since he was
just 11 years old so Robert and his mother were living or staying however you choose to look at it
at the Rancho Bakersfield Motel now according to Robert this is where he met Tommy Tarver this was some time before
the actual attack Tommy offers to pay Robert to mow his lawn and Robert agrees but according to
Robert as soon as he gets to Tommy's house Tommy starts putting the moves on him now Robert looks like a good suspect
so far right he's caught driving Tommy's car with items belonging to Tommy but here's where the timeline for the night
of the attack this is where it gets a little wonky a taxi driver told police that on that night the night of what
would turn out to be a murder he drove Tommy a man in his 40s and 13 year old Robert to Rancho Bakersfield Motel
coffee shop around 11 30 PM this Motel was apparently a meeting place for men in town many of whom were living secret
double lives the cabbie said he later drove Tommy and a different escort home this was 24 year old William Kenneth
Manley a university student from Santa Rosa William Manley was also staying at the Rancho Bakersfield motel and there
he said he met Tommy at the bar the two decided to go clubbing but Tommy wanted to stop at his house first to
change his clothes while there manly witnessed two other men arrive then argue with Tommy and then one of them
began engaging in sex with Tommy manly decided to leave but not before pocketing about a thousand dollars worth
of silverware and jewelry from the home on his way out because of the witness this is the couple that identified manly
as the man who stopped and asked to call a cab he was arrested and charged with the
murder of Tommy Tarver mistrell the 13 year old was charged only with burglarizing Tommy's home and
Tommy's hair salon as well apparently the salon was an easy target for Robert because he had a key to get into the
place now it's unclear if Tommy ever gave him the key or my guess is that Robert got the key when he burglarized
and then had the keys to Tommy's Car at the trial Manley's defense tried to claim that Robert Mistral had been with
Tommy earlier that night and was possibly a suspect but the deputy D.A convinced the judge
not to let Robert be questioned in the end manly was acquitted of the murder of Tommy Tarver and Robert got
six months in the San Felipe boys home a Kern County Youth facility for the burglary charges
the murder of Tommy Tarver remains unsolved at the time of course this was a shocking murder but no one realized
that this would be the first in a series of killings involving what later would appear to be an underground community in
Bakersfield Glenn Fitz was well at least according to one article this article described him as quote a
pillar of the law enforcement Community end quote he was the former director of the Kern County Police Academy a member
of the Bakersfield Police commission and recently retired police science instructor from Bakersfield College
unfortunately Glenn's wife passed away so by April 1979 he was 56 years old retired and Living Single
around this time he started hanging out in a nearby park where he was interacting with the teenagers there
he would routinely invite local teens back to his place well that's not creepy at all no come on over come hey I'm
going to just hang out at the park and stare at kids all day back then they didn't even have cable he started
hosting parties with teenagers and this is what was expected well the short of it is he was trading things like beer
alcoholic drinks and pot for sex or sex acts with both teenage boys and possibly
teenage girls as well on April 10 1979 Glenn threw a birthday party for one of his teen friends
attending this party was about 20 teens some of them as young as 14 years old yeah come over let's have a party for my
teenager friend where's the party at El crepo's house well at the party was a 14 year old
named Dana Charlene Butler Dana went missing and it seems like the last time anyone remembers interacting
with the young girl well Dana was alive and well and wantingly attended this very party
it wasn't until three days later that she was found dead dumped in a park reports were that she was found with 30
to 40 shallow knife wounds and two deep fatal wounds it appeared she was tortured before being killed and the
body contained more evidence investigators found one of Fitz's pubic hairs as well as dog hairs from both of
his dogs on the body this was the 70s and hair evidence was standard in lieu of yet to be developed
DNA the police searched Fitz's home and just as suspected they found blood matching
Dana's Witnesses told police investigators that Fitz replaced the plumbing fixtures and some carpeting
inside the home just the day after Dana went missing with mounting evidence a grand jury was
convened and they interviewed everyone this including Fitz and the plumber but just as this was really picking up speed
it came to a screeching halt this is when the DA's office inexplicably declined to ask for an indictment for
murder against Glenn Fitz the head of the Bakersfield Police Department detectives unit
told the Californian the newspaper that he was baffled as to why charges weren't
brought as in his opinion there was ample evidence and all of the files that he had seen
now meanwhile the Californian reported that there was a suspect but never named Glenn Fitz as the suspect and they say
this because he had not been named by police but nevertheless it appears that the whole town seemed to know who the
suspect was parents knew that Fitz was the suspect and they started picketing around his
house the county administration's building and right outside of the courthouse building as well again if you
know this guy is a creep then why are you letting him why are you letting kids go to his house for a party it's
ridiculous likely the if you're talking about the parents it's likely they were unaware that their children were going
over to his house to get drunk and do drugs anyway these people these 200 people
it's about 200 people that participated in these picketing events outside of the
the two buildings and his home obviously they wanted an arrest made in this case
they were calling themselves the mothers of Bakersfield examples of the mobs picketing signs well some of them read
quote who is blocking the investigation question mark and DA office what are you
afraid of question mark now the other thing here is the local sheriff's department they were very confident that
Fitz was good for this crime and the DA's office and then the grand jury failed to bring an indictment so
local law enforcement and I'm guessing that this was not public knowledge at the time likely this was probably more
of a behind closed doors type of thing but it sounds to me like basically the local law enforcement was threatening
the D.A okay so if you don't charge this man for the murder of this girl then we are going to push to charge the
same man with any kind of lesser charge so at the very least we can make an arrest right right we're going to get
this jackass no matter what that's basically what they're saying well I don't know if it was the mob of people
or the behind the scenes activity that we just explained or if it was a combination of both but whatever it was
it seems like the D.A hand was was forced because eventually the da press charges against fits but
not for the murder of a 14 year old but instead for suspicion of Furnishing drugs to a minor so of course this is an
extremely lenient charge based off of the general facts and evidence of the case but wouldn't they be able to like
charge them with multiple accounts of this for like the parties and stuff that he was throwing I believe there were
five charges that were pushed forth and three of them were felony charges now this did result in fits being arrested
on May 21st apparently no indictment was ever handed down a Pulitzer prize-winning expose
many years later on the corruption in Bakersfield stated that quote senior prosecutors withheld key evidence from
the panel meaning the grand jury right I just wonder what his connection is to this prosecutor well he was
retired law enforcement he held all three of those different positions throughout his career being the former
director of Kern County Police Academy member of the Bakersfield Police commission and retired police science
instructor from Bakersfield College no right rag I get that part but you just wonder how close these individuals are
or if they're you know a part of some group outside of their jobs it really really makes you wonder right because
what you're talking about is why the hell who cares if they had some kind of connection on a professional basis we're
talking about murder here the murder of a child and we're also talking about evidence to point to him as being the
very likely suspect right in this case now I understand that her body is found out in the park somewhere and but we
have evidence of of him or or yeah man on the body right we got pubes well here's the other thing too
this is one thing that I found very interesting okay so his his previous job of the police science instructor and
then we have the neighbors claiming that he they were aware that he was replacing
plumbing and carpeting inside his home yeah the day after it's believed that she went missing that seems like
somebody with one okay look yeah if you got large blood stains everywhere no duh
you you get rid of the carpet and try to replace that but on top of that factor in the the
the job that he had a police science instructor he is aware of certain things that the general public would not be
aware of and it makes you really wonder what what Plumbing fixtures was he replacing you know we've talked about
some cases where the where law enforcement will go in with their texts and remove drains and drain pipes right
because they know that they're going to find evidence down there and that's something that a lot of people don't
consider when they're trying to cover up a homicide right so on you got that on the one hand you go okay well
like you said replacing the carpet is not a big deal pipes you got to have some kind of knowledge about that but
then you're going to leave pubes and dog hair on the victim seems to not make sense right
um I mean a lot of this case is not going to make sense nobody I mean like that you you would do all these
necessary steps you know to to your house but you want to do that to the to the actual crime
scene I feel like what we have here is a man that panicked and thought that the first thing and most important thing to
do at the fastest point was to get the body out of his house yeah and then went back in and tried to
do damage control to his house now mind you he went to all this effort and and what did police find inside of his home
blood that matched the same blood type as danus so do you know where they found that at I don't know it seemed like a
lot of the the work that he was doing appeared to be taking place in the in the bathroom or the bathroom area of the
home I couldn't find where they said specifically where the blood was in fact found but
look I I believe 100 that she was probably killed in that bathroom or moved to the bathroom shortly after some
kind of attack took place we're talking about possibly a prolonged torture that went
on in this case as well from from what little we can see and observe in this case again sometimes when they're
are those points of evidence they don't actually report on them now one thing that does go in the way of
a defense for why maybe the D.A did not press charges or did not get that indictment that the public was so very
eagerly seeking apparently there was some kind of quote screw-up that's that's how it's been reported as a
screw-up at the coroner's office now apparently for some reason and I'm uncertain of
their exact protocol back there and then but they failed to do a time of death test on Dana Butler
uh so they they never established a time of death now this this only really becomes difficult once you do get to
trial because with her missing for several days before her body's found your your you know Alibi or need for an
alibi all that gets pretty dicey when you've not really honed in or even created a window of time for the
possible time of death so there was also some doubts out there as to whether 56 year old Glenn Fitz who
many say was in poor health with a heart condition if he could have in fact killed the girl and then disposed of her
on his own well you know we we know that he was working out daily at the park within days of all of this mess here
Glenn Fitz died of a gunshot to the Head leaving behind a strange note which read
Dana Butler was last seen in front of a church between 11 39 and 12 30. I on the
morning of April 9 was home waiting for and there the note ends the death of Glenn Fitz was officially ruled a
suicide which we should point out some weird things with this as well because first Fitz's body was found Outdoors
between his home and his neighbors and second a neighbor reported hearing two gunshots on that day
now the murder of Dana Butler remains unsolved Glenn Fitz may have killed her or she may have been killed by someone
else it does seem however whoever killed her did so inside Fitz's home this was the second case where an older
man associated with teenage boys ended up dead and here again this man could have been preying on teens for sex
[Music] welcome back cheers mates for all of our old episodes check out the Stitcher app
and check out our weekly bonus show called off the record you can do so at truecrimegarage.com awesome welcome back
to you Captain welcome now the next case we have here takes place in 1981. so we have 55 year old
Edwin buck Edwin was the Personnel director for Kern County he was associated with a name we have
heard before this is Young Robert mistrell at this time robber is about 17 years
old and he told police that he met Buck at beach park in 1979 when he was 15. police were aware of activity at this
park and actually warned Edwin buck and other men there numerous times about sexual activity and sexual activity with
minor boys Robert hung out with buck on a few occasions a buck caught Robert stealing
money and tools from him on one of these occasions and threatened to have Robert
arrested for the theft a buck told Robert that he would not involve the police if Robert agreed to
participate in making a porno movie with another young boy so always a good idea to throw blackmail
in child pornography into the blender of totally effed up situations right yeah but you can't imagine I mean you're 17
years old you stole some stuff the guy goes I'm going to the cops right or you can have sex with this kid
like go to the cops [ __ ] you know what I mean yeah yeah and I think I don't want to get into that too
much because I think there's there's a lot of there's more weight stuff to sift through before we before we get into
some of that stuff but what we have here is Robert doesn't tell you know old nasty Uncle Buck to go to
the police yeah instead he recruits a friend and this is 18 year old Roy carmanish
but Roy wasn't recruited for the purpose of starring in a homemade movie he had an entirely different role to play
so one night Robert invited Edwin Buck for a Moonlight Drive once they got out into a nice spot Buck pulled the vehicle
over and parked the car Roy who was unbeknownst to Buck following them this is all a part of
Robert's plan Roy pulled up in front of them Robert apparently knew what was going to go down because later he said
he retreated to Roy's car this is where he sat so he would not have to see anything
Roy was high on LSD at the time and attacked buck Roy stabbed Buck several times he hit
him in the head with a hammer and he slit his throat the two boys then stuffed Buck's body
into the trunk of Buck's car they drove the car back to Buck's home and parked it in the garage
once there they robbed the house and set it on fire later investigators found Buck's body in
the trunk of his burned out car this was three days later Robert and Roy were soon arrested
and one of the bits of evidence that they found in this whole scenario was they found a microwave oven from Buck's
home they found this at Robert's mother's place now this case was a media sensation for
just about as many reasons as all of us could imagine Robert would be tried as an adult
it seemed that he was suspected in the unsolved murder of Tommy Tarver as well this is because a hammer was also
thought to have been used in that murder now at trial Robert and Roy they turned on each other
Robert blamed Roy stating that Roy was the one that killed Edwin buck Roy's defense
presented Robert's involvement not only in the Tommy Tarver murder that was still unsolved as but presented that as
evidence that he was guilty of Edwin Buck's murder as well what came out of Robert's trial
rather than just the facts surrounding the murder of Edwin Buck is why this case is famous right Robert had all
sorts of first-hand stories to tell about secret homosexuality including sex with minors and all of the corruption
among the elite in Bakersfield what he called the Lords of Bakersfield all right
we need to provide some background information here so until these cases broke in the late
70s and early 80s Bakersfield's Dirty Little Secret was just that it was a secret
Whispers and rumors existed as far back as the 1950s of a loose network of powerful prominent white men who used
their power and influence to protect each other and they harbored a dark secret they were into homosexual
pedophilia in some cases and just sex with very young men and others stories about a so-called white Orchid
Society were told in town for years but no one could really substantiate these Tales which were of a group of older
male Predators victimizing young men and boys so then in 1985 there's a lawsuit by a
former police officer which alleged a network of corruption favoritism and cronyism in Kern County
a 2000 page exhibit to this lawsuit addressed a pedophile ring among the power elite
using the term the Lords of Bakersfield the lawsuit was dismissed but the moniker stuck and the Lord's Legend it
has its name the 2003 Californian expose about the Lords of Bakersfield describes
it as formally the province of conspiracy theorists except that now it seemed there was some truth to the
legend yeah it seemed like there was some validity to these stories but this this was a really hard case to research
there's not a lot out there well and I want to go ahead and throw this out there for everybody listening and
primarily for those that are already familiar with this case this is this is one of those weird situations where the
tentacles of this story kind of spread far and wide and through a lot of different people a lot of different
buildings organizations and such and it's also a story that may span not only a couple of decades but several decades
I mean we have rumors go going back to the 1950s so anybody listening to our presentation of this story please keep
in mind that there may be things that that could be connected to this things that might not be connected
to this when you really look at this story and and you you realize that you have to present it in some form and in
some light it gets difficult along the way to decide which portions to include and not to include the connections here
are not always clear so if in our review of this case if you believe that we miss something we
may have just it may just not have been presented us to have a clear connection or
we had to pick and choose some of these to include and to not include right so the ones that we're going to go over
here are the ones that that I could find were were for the most part believed or
reported to be believed as part of this whole legend of the Lords of Bakersfield
so let's go back to that murder trial right we have Robert mistrell the the the the the one that was involved in the
first case that we talked about and now involved in being on trial for the murder of Edwin buck
he testified to some bombshell information that's clear now although he was under 18 he claims that he slept
with as many as 150 men in both Bakersfield and in Los Angeles he says many of these men were people of
prominence in the community men who held positions of power and influence these men were politicians media judges
attorneys County Executives and more and Robert took this a step further he named names
now one of the names that he named was Edwin buck and Tommy Tarver of course here's where things get a little
a little dicey here for me Captain go Harry I have a longer list of individuals that
he named and I don't know that I don't know that they're all that they all should be named by by me I don't
know that I feel comfortable naming all of them I will say that one of the other
names that he mentioned was Glenn Fitz the ex-policeman or a police officer who was suspected in Dana's Dana Butler's
murder the another interesting person that he names is Ted Fritz okay let's the different people Ted Fritz was the
editor and co-owner of the Californian the the local newspaper that we've referenced more than once
Fritz was Notorious in town for his legendary parties with the wealthy Elite and here again there are a lot of names
that are thrown out as having attended these parties and I will I refuse to name them here
because because of just this I don't want anybody to be under the assumption that any of these individuals are guilty
of anything at all just because they attended some party all right we're kind of seeing this in the media right now
with with the arrests and that the suicide of Epstein and having these black books and and all these people
connected you know you can't um I think it's irresponsible to just make the leap that some creepo has your
contact information and therefore that you're associated with every wrongdoing he he did I I think it's uh
irresponsible leap and we we need to look for more evidence correct and what what I will say here is look I'm not
foolish enough to believe that nobody that attended one of Ted Fritz's parties is not guilty has never done a bad thing
in their life right you you know I I wouldn't believe that for one bit but as you pointed out I believe it's
irresponsible to throw out the suggestion that just because somebody attended a party that they had a there's
a deeper relationship there that they that whoever you know it's it's just downright wrong
to to imply that anybody associated with an individual is guilty of all the same
things that that individual is likely guilty of right okay so his whole part in this story is he more so than these
these parties is that he's the editor and the co-owner of the California of that newspaper and I mean just browsing
this list these are names of people that are still alive and people that you would know by name I want to I want to
say this though as well the the list I'm looking at nobody on this list has ever been
convicted of anything you know heinous anything weird uh and to my knowledge has never even been suspected of
anything like that but of course because Ted Fritz is a powerful individual in this area many of these attendees would
be politicians law enforcement local government officials and so on now Robert mistrell's role at these parties
I guess he worked at these parties he says along with other boys his age and sometimes younger
his job was part of like the wait staff almost you know wait on the guest dress up in a tank top and shorts and be
he said he was told to be accommodating of the male guest so Robert says in turn right check their
coats and give them hand jobs uh we sure let me check your code stop saying jokes because I don't wanna I
don't wanna laugh this is a this is a very I mean it's so disturbing though it's
disturbing it's and it's a difficult it's a difficult thing to discuss a little bit here
um Robert says for whatever his job was at these parties right and we also gotta
we also gotta mention these are his claims right we have to then determine this guy's a thief a known Thief right
yeah he has some problems we we don't want to assume that all of all of his allegations are false though either I
mean or truthful I think I think there's a weird that we're we're waiting in weird Waters here right
hit well so Robert says in turn for his role at these parties he was provided with money temporary residence
at Fritz's mansion and he was also allowed to drive luxury cars now while Fritz remained the editor of
the Californian the paper stayed away from coverage of the Lords of Bakersfield so Fritz's bigger connection
seems to be that of a close connection to Robert mistrell according to Robert mistro
and the fact that he is pretty much running the California in the newspaper and many people suspect all these years
later that that's why that newspaper stayed away from you know thorough coverage of anything
that could possibly involve any of these Lords of Bakersfield or naming names or
throwing people under the bus and like I said I mean just a fine different sources about this case was
really difficult well one thing that is super interesting to me and I I'm gonna go out on the ledge here
and say that it's probably I think you're supposed to say out on a limb right not out on the
ledge no I think you can do I think you can go on out you can go on on anything you want go ahead and jump we don't care
my people say go out on a plank go out on a bridge um so this is where I think I'm I'm
starting to see some really strong evidence or at least people that are willing to take their
suspicions to the to the to the furthest out right so this man who's in charge of the
Californian of the newspaper he ends up dying of AIDS in 1997. his sister his flesh and blood his sister took over
as managing editor in 2003 she is the one that gave Robert Price the go-ahead to write the expose
on the Lord's even though it would point the finger at the paper that she was now
in charge of and her own brother yeah but if you know it's I I would think being related to him if
she knew that something wrong happened that at some point you have to allow that information to come out well
and I want to give her plenty of credit as well as the newspaper itself for writing or wrong you know and correcting
their missteps through through over the years but one of the most disturbing things that Robert attested to during
this trial was the wink and not Arrangement that allowed certain men to check out Court supervised juveniles
like library books from the boys home and returned them a few hours later but yeah well this was I took this from
Robert Price's article now mistrell alleged in the trial testimony and later in his own failed lawsuit against the
state that he and other boys were taken from the boys home under the excuse that
they were going to be given jobs but he says instead they were drugged sexually abused and forced to participate in porn
before being returned to the Boys Home home as if nothing happened yeah so that's awful so further Robert claims
that he was used as a scout to recruit other boys for parties thrown by these older men where young men were desired
to be amendable to their advances but Robert's trial testimony seems to have been shoved under the rug in other words
none of this Scandal really leaked out until much much later so at first we have no leakage and then
but then we have a lot of leakage well no investigation into his claims of abuse and statutory rape ever ensued
after the trial in the end 18 year old Roy pled guilty to first-degree murder and was sentenced
to life without parole and Robert was convicted of first-degree murder by a jury receiving a sentence of 31 years to
life while this is difficult too because you do want to believe somebody that is
accusing somebody of of these heinous crimes you don't want to think that somebody would go through this endure
this suffering and and just be making this stuff up right but then it becomes this this double-edged sword for me
where it's like you go well he's basically creating this giant conspiracy and then it's like well where's your
evidence of it well because it's such a giant conspiracy you'd go well that's why there's no evidence they don't want
this stuff to get out out there doesn't make does that make any sense makes total sense number one but then
let's add in to the fact that there doesn't seem to be any investigation into his claims so where you go all
right well are these allegations is this just a man that's on trial for first degree murder who's coming up with
with excuses excuses and maybe playing to the the crowd a bit and saying you know this this was a jury trial
um he's technically under the age of 18 even though he's going to be tried as an adult
you look look what you have here in the end you have an 18 year old Roy who pled
guilty and gets first degree murder uh well pled guilty to first-degree murder and was sentenced to life without parole
and then you have 17 year old Robert who is convicted of first-degree murder by a
jury receiving a sentence of 31 years to life think about those two scenarios real quick all right we have an adult
who pled guilty and received no you know leniency for him pleading guilty to where we have
to go through the trial and convict Robert of first-degree murder and he's actually shown some leniency for a
couple of reasons one probably because the jury even though he's being tried as an adult he's viewed as a child being 17
years old and on top of that the jury's probably viewing him as some some type of victim right so he gets 31 years to
life now keep in mind I do understand that the story being being put forth is that Robert
simply was involved in the plan that created this plan of murder and then sat by while it happened and then helped
dispose of the body right whereas Roy showed up and and really carried out this brutal brutal murder so I I get
that there is a difference there right but you're the reason that the vicious murderer is there though right correct I
mean Edwin Buck may have never been murdered at all let alone murdered by Roy yeah
you have had this Robert not set it up if I took Jeffrey Dahmer and Ted bunny to a party and it didn't end well that's
that's on me right that's all I'm saying so yeah this this is where it gets very
difficult and the other thing I want to point out too while we're on this whole thought is
you heard that number that that we pushed forward there was that he claimed Robert claimed like 150 men in both
Bakersfield and Los Angeles that he slept with before he was the age of 18. I'm not saying that Robert's lying I'm
just saying that's a very high number that's a very high number and there were a lot of people along the way that he
named that we didn't name and a lot of these people are involved in law enforcement and Prosecuting
criminals and things of that nature and at some point you start to go like you said
you want to believe him you want to say hey let's investigate these allegations and that's where I think this whole
thing went wrong that his allegations don't seem to have been investigated but then at some point you go 150 men
how can that be well and then on top of that you go every one of these people that he's
naming is involved in some they have they're in some you know line of power they right they they have their men of
influence and you start to wonder you can at some point it can't be everybody it's not everybody that's involved in
this well right and it's and I was I struggled with this a little bit this week because again you know I don't want
a victim blame at all you know if that's the case if these horrible acts happen to this kid or this kid was put into
these awful situations I want a victim blame but I think it's it's also a little different you're not just coming
forward and saying look this is what happened to me and here's the evidence we have somebody that is you know a part
of like a boy's home a part of a community where he's in and out of trouble so he's around he's Law
Enforcement Officers he's around people of power so when you end up getting caught with something you get and you
end up getting busted with something it's not that out of line to think maybe this kid is so messed up and has so much
um disdain for um Authority that he just goes look uh This One Cop he arrested me a long time
ago his name was uh Jack whatever right well he was in on it too he was having sex with boys all this this this teacher
that was mean to me oh yeah they were having sex with boys too you know it's not that far-fetched to to
think that that story could be created by a troubled youth and that's why these allegations really should have been
looked into further well they weren't investigated at all it seems like so they should have been
investigated look this is a story with with so many injustices but that is one of the big ones
[Music] I want to thank you guys for listening thanks for telling a friend and sharing
on social media much love and cheers and until tomorrow be good be kind and don't
let it thank you [Music] [Applause] [Music]

Lords of Bakersfield /// Part 1 /// 328

Part 1 of 2

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In a span of just over seven years there were five strange murders in Bakersfield, California. Could there be something even more sinister at the root of these crimes? This exploration is filled with drugs, illegal sex, corruption, abuse and murder. Step in the garage for the story of the Lords of Bakersfield. Blackback Honey Rye Whiskey - Garage Grade - 4 out of 5 bottle caps

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Brief Summary

The episode discusses the Bakersfield murders and the corrupt elite involved in a pedophile ring.

Key points

The Dark Side of Bakersfield. Bakersfield, a seemingly wholesome town, hides a dark secret of murder and corruption.
The Murder of Tommy Tarver. Tommy Tarver, a well-known figure, is found brutally attacked in his home.
The Disappearance of Dana Butler. 14-year-old Dana Butler goes missing after attending a party hosted by a local man.
Evidence Against Glenn Fitz. Former police director Glenn Fitz becomes a suspect in the murder of Dana Butler.
Public Outcry for Justice. Citizens demand justice as evidence mounts against a local police figure.
The Unsolved Murder of Dana Butler. Dana Butler's murder remains unsolved, with Glenn Fitz as a potential suspect.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

What would emerge was an old boy's network.

Description of the Bakersfield case

4:39WatchNov 21, 2022

Tension

75/ 100High tension

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