The Collector & the Fugitive /// Part 2 /// 755 | Forensic Files

n [Music] [Music] welcome to True Crime garage wherever you are whatever you're doing thanks for
listening I'm your host Nick and with me as always is a man who just informed me
this morning that if just steel does not win the Kentucky Derby well the garage May shut down for good here is the
slightly optimistic Captain I made some bad Bets with the book and now my knees are on trial it's good
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great episode where me and Nick get into a little heated debate about the devil's not in the west
Memphis 3K so check that out and that's enough of the business all right kiddos everybody gather around grab a chair
grab a beer let's talk some true [Applause] [Music] crime we've already discussed operation
fish we started to talk a little bit about operation Miranda remember in 1984 when Charles ing meets back up with his
fugitive friend Leonard Lake we have this bunker that was built this survival shed it's it's difficult looking at this
today captain and I've seen pictures of this structure over the years I don't think this is up to any type of nuclear
Holocaust but again we have Leonard Lake who's living under the name of Charles Gunner at the time telling neighbors
that this structure is built for end times it's a a just in case it's a survival bunker but we have this bunker
that's built also as a holding cell that is the way or the purpose that was described to Charles ing when he
meets back up with Leonard Lake a bunker built to keep a woman and hold her captive so Lake could fulfill his almost
lifelong fantasy of having a slave a female slave for both work and sex and simply for Leonard's pleasure and if she
didn't fall in line or do as he ordered she would be punished and she would learn the rules she would learn to obey
and she would even someday Leonard believe on a long enough timeline learn to enjoy being his slave and enjoy
pleasing him and if she didn't well he would kill her and try again with a new slave there was also operation Pink
Palace Pink Palace was a rooming house located in San Francisco what we do know about this operation Pink Palace is that
from the time period of August of 19 1984 through the month of October 1984 three persons who were living at
this Pink Palace would leave and never return or simply vanish so there's Maurice Rock of San
Francisco who disappeared from the Carl Street Pink Palace rooming house sometime in August there's also Cheryl
okora who she too of San Francisco unfortunately Cheryl may have been the first operation Miranda victim and then
there is Randy Jacobson aged 36 also staying for a while at the Pink Palace he's last seen on October 15th
1984 there's a little bit of confusion on my end here Captain I I don't think all three of these individuals were
living together we also know that not all three of these individuals went missing at the same time because at the
very least Randy Jacobson is seen many times by many people for at least 45 50 days after Maurice Rock and Cheryl okor
are last scen right I think what happened here and there's evidence to suggest this is that the three of them
or or at least one or two of of them they didn't disappear necessarily from the Pink Palace they went out to the
ranch where Lake and ing were living again under that same ruse of oh here's a job we need somebody to work the land
or work on this pot farm we think that a similar fate befell Maurice Rock and Randy
Jacobson detectives believe that Cheryl was probably most the first victim of this whole dream
fantasy that Leonard Lake created that he called operation Miranda that takes us through October of
1984 on November 2nd 1984 Paul Cosner age 40 he's last seen he's living in the General San Francisco California area
this man he actually has ties to Ohio here Captain he he grew up in Reynoldsburg Ohio at some point he's
offered a job to move out west and he takes that job some of his family move out there with him and this wasn't a
wife and kids I believe it it was his mother and sister Paul Cosner owns a 1980 Honda preload he
disappears and so does the vehicle this is a similar situation to what we've already discussed oer had advertised the
vehicle for sale in a local newspaper so he tells family that he had been in contact with a potential buyer he
describes this buyer as a weird guy now on the night that he's last seen or last
known to be alive and well he's leaving his apartment this is between 7:30 and 8:00 p.m. and he's leaving to meet this
potential buyer the one that he described as a weird guy he never returns he's never heard from again his
family doesn't see him again they don't see the car again well just a few more details on that he was actually going
out on a date and tells his date hey I'm going to be a little late because this guy that I was telling you about that
wants to buy my car I got to go on a test drive with him and to see if he really wants to buy the car so I'm going
to be a little late again last time anybody hears from him nobody ever sees him again that's like
this story on some level starts becoming so monotonous because it's you cross path
with Leonard and Charles nobody sees you again if they have something that you that they want if you have something
that they want or that they need for their survival as they perceive it then like the captain and
said they take control of the situation and you simply disappear there was some information that says that there were
strange messages that were left on Paul Cosner's answering machine I don't have the details of that here Captain but if
in fact if that's true that seems very similar to what we've seen with Charles Gunner you know he runs off with with
some woman Donald Lake decides to not live with mom anymore we have Harvey dubs whose employer receives a phone
call from a mystery man if you will stating that Harvey dubs had to go off on this family
emergency so like you said it's it's repetitive but the thing here is these victims these people that are
going missing there's no real connection to each other right other than you have
the dubs family and other than you have these persons from the Pink Palace but there's no real connection from from
Donald Lake to well I guess in that situation you would have Donald Lake and Charles Gunner at the the nucleus there
would be Leonard Lake but the Pink Palace people the dubs family there's no connection to those there's no
connection to Paul Cosner yeah so it's not like law enforcement has all these people missing and that and they're all
there's a focus around Leonard lake or or Charles but uh no because this would all have been busted up much sooner
right and unfortunately lives would have been saved what we do have too at this time we do have Charles in he is working
uh he's working for some type of moving company he's kind of not fitting in with
his fellow employees his co-workers and in fact a lot of the dudes there think he's rather weird
because he's always he's always like practicing martial arts in front of them he's
shouting out things and always bragging about his time in the Marines and shouting out things like no gun no fun
no kill no thrill things that are you know off-putting to say the least you don't want to hear some dude at work
shouting those things out and then buddy up with him but somehow he ends up befriending a couple of people at this
moving company one of them is Jeffrey Gerald he vanishes this is in February of 85 this is after telling a few people
that he was going to go help Charles for a side job he's never seen after that later what we know is that Gerald's car
is listed for sale and it's being sold by a person named Charles gunar we also have Michael Caroll this story is one of
the more strange portions of this overall story this whole story is strange it's it's bizarre and and I I
mean I don't take any great relief in saying this but I I do want to point out I don't think that some of the crimes
can happen today I don't think that someone could fly under the radar for so long with this level of risky Behavior
today I just don't think that it could happen one of the things that popped into my head when researching these
insane two individuals was Facebook Marketplace H because these guys would have had a
field day with Facebook Marketplace if you have a item that's for sale that they want and that is a means to an end
for them then they're going to come find you kidnap your family kill them or kill
you and then also you know the The Collector the book The Collector it kind of reminded me of Silence of the Lambs a
little bit the Buffalo Bill there's all these facets to the story and and once it once the full picture is painted
it all makes sense well and one of the things that I will never forget because to me it was such a shocking a sad but
true statement from Thomas Harris who pinned Silence of the Lambs and the the other great books both before and after
when interviewed he said that that nothing that he wrote about was false everything that he wrote
about was true now of course those characters don't exist and those exact scenarios did not exist right but what
he is saying is he simply had to take situations and real life events that he had reviewed and read about over the
years and then apply his own creativity and Imagination to them and so you're exactly right to to kind of pair this up
with a work of literature back to something of Silence of the lamps and The Collector as said
unfortunately it was a piece of inspiration for a an absolute monster like Leonard Lake but it is a rather
brilliant book and the John FS who who wrote the book certainly didn't have any intention of it leading to something of
this nature it's just meant to be literature to be art well yeah but that's what happens when you have
fragile individuals they're looking for their identity they're looking for a path so then Leonard Lake reads this
book and boom he finds his path he finds his identity through this this novel and
he carries that with him and then at some point it looks like like you said fragel I'm glad you use that word
because he strikes me as the type of individual that was looking for reason give me a
reason to go off and just do whatever the hell that I want to to live this life of lawlessness and chaos and
causing other people harm and and taking what I want when I want it and I mean we
have these saying for a reason hurt people hurt people I I think these two individuals were they were so desperate
to want to be somebody to have some kind of power over somebody and it's just so strange
that these two IND individuals found each other and then decided hey you can help me live out my fantasies I can help
you live out your fantasies and I think that what we have here with lake is I think this guy was
probably a real [ __ ] to begin with and then he got shipped off to Vietnam and then that was the breaking point and
when he came back at some point he decided H none of this is for me anymore I don't have to follow your rules I can
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mates cheers you Colonel yeah cheers to you Captain cheers to everybody out there in listener land if you're
drinking in your garage tall cans in the air I mentioned a little bit this Michael Carol
situation he had actually served time with Charles ing when he was serving time for
stealing from the government and they remained in contact with one another eventually Michael Carroll goes out to
visit with Charles ing he's kind of lured out there the same way that some of the other persons were that we've
already discussed he's missing for a few days and that's when Leonard Lake and in
decide well we're going to get in contact with Michael's girlfriend Kathleen Allen she agrees to go with
them because they tell her a story that Michael has been injured that he's been shot and she needs to go visit him you
know this is before the days of cell phones and she needs to go out of town and visit her boyfriend so she goes with
these two guys later she's going to find herself in a situation locked up at the
lake and in house and in this bunker that's been constructed we do end up learning a lot about Leonard Lake a lot
of that comes from journals that he kept he kept journals that he would make daily entries into Kathleen Allen is
discussed in some of these entries well let's just stay on that for a second because one of the things I think is
fascinated about his journal and then obviously we know that he gets this film equipment and he wants to film
these pornographies but film other things I mean there he has it where he is being interviewed on some of these
videos and it's that goes back to me looking at this crimes it goes back to this idea that Leonard Lake thought he
was something way more important than he was and that it was up to to him to document all this stuff whether it's
through journaling or through photographs or through interviews or through pornography that he is so special he
needs to document all this stuff yeah it's very strange because it's you know it's not the same exact risky Behavior
as BTK reaching out to the media or zodiac reaching out to newspapers but in a way it's Crea more
evidence against you very strange behavior and I I I don't think that we we may not ever fully understand this
need that he seemed to have for cataloging or at least documenting some of this behavior
and some of the actions well I'm glad you brought up BTK because Leonard Lake to me if you if you never seen him he
looks like a a chubby version of Dennis Raider we also have the bond family we got Lonnie Bond we have his
common law wife uh and some sources refer to her as just living girlfriend her name is Brenda OK Conor they the two
of them together have a son these persons have the unfortunate luck of living near Leonard Lake and Charles
in and they they had regular communication or interactions with the one neighbor that they knew as Charles
gunar Lonnie Bond and his son and then wife they they go missing they are no longer seen at
their home it's believed that Lake was already stealing this was one of the neighbors that he had been stealing from
they had some kind of I don't know if I want to call it a friendship but again they're neighbors and they had regular
interaction with one another we're going to circle back to the the bonds here in
a little bit this will be they go missing at some point in April of 1985 so let's fast forward to June 2nd
of 1985 we have Charles Ing and Leonard Lake they are at a lumber yard slh hardware
store Charles ing is spotted by the manager or the owner stealing from the store yeah the owner
said that these two individuals came in from time to time so when they came in together they're like well those are
those two guys that have been in the shop before this time was different though because Charles grabs some items
and then takes off running yeah some of it was it's been reported as building equipment what's regularly reported is
that it was a vice and probably some other items so the shop they phone it into police right
police arrive on the scene well unfortunately the sirens are going to tip these two off Charles ing flees Left
Behind is Leonard Lake Leonard lake is then offering to pay for all of these items no it's just a
misunderstanding he wasn't stealing anything it's not a big deal I can pay for everything and we can all be on our
merry way well like I said these owners knew these two individuals they've come into the store before so I think that
Leonard and Charles went into the store thinking that nobody knew that they were
connected so when Charles takes off with the items and then Leonard realizes they know that I'm connected to them hey
hey guys just a misunderstanding I can make this right lucky for us for whatever reason cuz most store owners
would go okay yeah fine if you're going to pay for the stuff just pay for it and
we'll call it a day lucky for us they said no we're not going to accept that we're going to call law
enforcement yeah and you have to wonder if you like you said Captain if they were familiar with these two was there
a routine of oh we got a couple items missing from our inventory and then after a while you
start to pick up oh you know this group of people that those persons were here yesterday or about that same time and oh
every time we seem to see this one guy we've never seen him steal anything he seems like a nice enough guy but there's
always something that comes up missing and so maybe they were keeping a good eye on these two and you say and I said
the same they knew the workers they knew these two because they regularly came into the store but at this point in our
timeline does anybody really know Leonard lake has he used his real name on any occasion at any time right
leading up to this so this this is what what we get here is we get a very observant police officer and
I'm I'm we're also thankful that this is the way that this went down because what
happens is Leonard lake is there as said he's saying I can pay for this no big deal it's a big
misunderstanding when the police officer looks at Leonard lak's identification oh by the way Leonard
lake is not using that name he's using the name of Robin Stapley so he looks at Robin stapley's
California driver's license and the officer's like wait a second this the guy in front of me and
the guy in the picture on this driver's license they don't look anything alike we're going to phone this in right call
it into the department I got a robin Stapley here he doesn't look anything like his driver's license well and then
he has to call in the the vehicle that this IND individual that he doesn't know who he is yet they got to call in the
vehicle Robin Stapley the officer learns is a man from San Diego who was reported missing by
his family well that's a red flag then now you're looking at the vehicle this air quotes Robin Stapley is driving a
Honda preload this Honda Prelude vehicle is registered to a one Paul Cosner so now
if you're the officer you're sitting here going is this Paul Cosner using Robin stapley's California driver's license
for some reason right oh you know what let's check the license plate on this Honda
Prelude the plate comes back registered to yet another person Lonnie Bond so you
have a driver's license that doesn't look like the man standing in front of you you have a vehicle that doesn't
belong to the driver's license name and you have a license plate that doesn't belong to the registered name on the
vehicle or the driver's license and what law enforcement's going to learn is all
three of these individuals have been reported missing have been reported missing
and we're looking in this vehicle and we find a gun with a silencer on it got him
well he's not allowed to have a silencer we've talked about suppressors and other
episodes and uh you will know that you have to have a license for those which this individual is not able to provide
the other thing too is you start looking at this Honda Prelude and you see a bullet hole in the car's roof along with
blood spatter a stun gun and several unspent bullets under the passenger seat they find a utility bill that was in the
name of Leonard lak's exwife Clarin blah which this is very helpful because this
provides an an address because think about this situation if you're law enforcement at this point you've picked
up this guy you have no clue who he is you've got a whole bunch of leads because he has items on his person that
connect him to three different missing males but in a sense you have no idea who this guy is yeah or where are these
three missing people and so when you get this when you see this bill and it gives
you this address to this this remote cabin you go okay well we need to go look into this remote cabin but first
we're going to take this guy back to headquarters to figure out who the hell he is well while there Leonard Lake the
man that we know to be Leonard Lake says that he's willing to talk willing to cooperate with police he asked for a
pencil and some paper he then pens a letter to someone which we will later find out is to this Clarin
baz while there's no one in the room with him he takes a cide capsule he's found unresponsive in the room and
rushed off to the nearby Kaiser Hospital it takes a couple of days but Leonard Lake passes away he dies at the hospital
he's pronounced dead on June six while he's out and while he's in the hospital unresponsive of course like the captain
said police are going to go out to this address that they find on this utility bill there they find what has been
referred to for many different sources as a quote sea of evidence of murder kidnapping and torture that took place
at this location in fact the newspapers a lot of the newspapers were calling this a death camp they have all these
missing people they've already tied this individual to this property and they have three missing persons tied to this
individual they're looking and sorting for evidence to figure out are these people still alive if they are where are
they and if they're not where are they well also like you said that that letter that he wrote before he committed
suicide basically was a suicide note but obviously that in that know it doesn't leave us a bunch of information or
evidence to to tell law enforcement what happened to these individuals but they're going to find so
much stuff on this property like you said before they're going to end up finding this journal and that journal is
going to basically read like a Playbook of the crimes that Leonard and Charles committed and as we said a sea of
evidence that sums it up nicely but back to the cyanide so of course they're going to
reach out this Clarin balaz and she tells law enforcement that she's not surprised that Leonard Lake took his own
life that he had told her on multiple occasions if he was ever in a situation with law enforcement that that he
couldn't get out of that he was going to be sent off the prison he would kill himself he had told her the same if
there were apocalyptic type event where he could not defend himself or didn't think he
had a chance of survival that he would take his own life he was going to go out on his terms well he told her I carry
around cide so if something happens I'm going to pop this pill and down I go and
the way that he did this at the police headquarters was he had this pill or pills sewn into the collar of his shirt
so you can Pat this guy down yeah it would be easy to miss a pill you could pull out his pockets empty his pockets
and still not find his plan B if you will let's go through some of the items of note more notable items that were
found at this property mind you Charles ing is still gone at this point yeah he's on the Run he's on the Run what
they find at the again the papers were calling it a death camp they found a bunch of evidence that that told them
that Leonard Lake stole his brother's identity he opened up a PO Box in his brother's name and Donald Lake's name
and he was cashing Donald lak's disability checks so there's one missing person and one
crime that we can go okay it looks like Leonard is responsible for this plus law
enforcement the the easy evidence is when they pull up to the property all these vehicles that belong to these
missing individuals they also found evidence that told them that Leonard Lake also stole Charles Gunner his best
friend his supposed best friend's identity and was cashing his government checks as well then we have the bunker
or the shed right behind the dwelling there this was referred to by both police and the news papers as the
dungeon and inside this structure detectives found posted on a wall a list of typewritten rules for female captives
to follow they also found pictures of 21 women some of them nude I do want to point out here that of the 21 women they
don't think that all of the 21 women were murder victims but they definitely believe that some if not many of them
were some of those women some of the pictures and the women in these pictures have
been identified as murder victims and if you look at photos you know there's actually quite a
bit of photos of this facility I don't even know what you want to call it I mean death bunker I think dungeon I
think the papers and the police nailed it when they were calling it The Dungeon yeah cuz there was you know there was a
room that was there was basically a hidden door to get to the room and it was basic basically a holding cell and
it and even had this uh little tiny mirror but is a oneway mirror so basically they could monitor whoever
they had in that room they could monitor them in multiple ways in that same room
there's a small mattress and a bucket that police believe was used as a toilet they you know obviously they're
seeing all the obvious signs that this was used to hold women in a cell type environment to keep to keep them like
prisoners well like you said there was a list of rules found in this room as well basically so hey got nothing else
to do you can you can either lay down or take a crap in the the bucket or you could read this list of rules they would
also find a handdrawn treasure map and this is what led police to finding two buried five gallon buckets one of
these buckets contained envelopes with names and victim's identifications and the other bucket is
where they found Leonard lak's handwritten journals for the years of 1983 and 1984 along with two videotapes
documenting the torture of two of the female victims and in those on those videotapes
you can hear and see both Charles Ing and Leonard Lake in those videos they also found
some burn sites on the property the treasure map of course is going to spearhead the
digging the Excavating of some of the land there but these Burns sites become part
of this as well because they're now collecting ashes that have bones and like teeth that didn't burn up and even
some fingernails and such that somebody had try to permanently destroy these bodies these
remains so that they would never be found but they're collecting all this evidence from the scene and they're
walking out of there and they're telling they're telling the media that we think
that there could be as many as the number most commonly reported is 25 murder victims unfortunately that
number's never been confirmed that's the number that's reported the most often but I saw several sources that were
saying 27 at the time that they were suspected of 27 murders and because a lot of this
stuff was destroyed and a lot of the remains destroyed that they they had a hard time figuring out exactly how many
people were killed and kidnapped by these two individuals one of the things that I
thought was fascinating is you have some of these law enforcement agents that are
going through this property looking for evidence but they but they were individuals that worked some of these
cases mhm so you're walking through and you see a bunch of camera equipment and you're going hey remember that family
that went missing and we think that it had something to do with this camera equipment well there's some camera
equipment here and they found paperwork with the Harvey Dub's name on it receipts and
stuff for that said camera equipment and then like I said these vehicles so once
you find out that well there's one vehicle stolen from this guy and he's never been seen again and here's another
V here's another vehicle from somebody and this were reported missing you start putting two and two together and going
well that that's another murder victim now we just got to try to find their remains somewhere on the property one of
the things that uh a question for you when I was looking at this is I wonder how many of these were planned victims I
think when they're stealing a car or taking a friend out to the middle of nowhere and
and stealing their identity I think those are all planned victims but I wonder how many people because they did
have land and they did have these rooms did they have a situation where it's like hey come out work for
us and did that person find things they're not supposed to find or did Leonard and Charles sit them down
and explain to them hey this is what we're doing do you want to be a part of it well we do know that detectives were
very concerned about a possible third suspect being involved they worked that angle for a long time in this case we do
know that in the end they are telling us that they do not believe that a third suspect was involved that it was just
these two guys working together and then we also know based off of the timeline that Charles
in while he was certainly a part of some of these kidnappings and homicides he was not involved in the Donald lake or
Charles gunar homicides no cuz he would have been in prison at the time yeah he was in at lenworth so Charles Gunner
strange you know they're they're they're looking and unfortunately sifting through the ashes if you will on this
property looking for victims Charles gunar is somebody that is immediately connected to monster Leonard Lake
however they can't find any trace of him other than that his identity was stolen and that Lake was
cashing Gunner checks they're searching this property in 1985 and the the the searches were
extensive they went on and on because of just the nature of the landscape you can
imagine how long they would have spent there and you're also not in a great Rush at the time because one of your
perpetrators is dead there's no trial for Leonard Lake right now in regards to Charles Gunner they're
searching the property in 1985 his body's not discovered his body's Unearthed his remains are
Unearthed in 1992 when somebody else had owned the property and was digging for other
purposes so I think that what we cannot hit home enough in this case is the undetermined number of
victims in this case they don't still to this day they do not know exactly how many people were murdered by Leonard
lake or by Leonard Lake in unison with with Charles in what we do know is Charles ing did he he is eventually
caught it's in July of 85 this guy and this was a regular Behavior of in before the two got busted in San
Francisco he he was a habitual shoplifter he had received warnings from stores he had been received a slap on
the wrist at least once before they got busted but he's he's attempting to steal
items while on the run up in Canada so he's arrested up in Canada that law enforcement they're in communication now
with the authorities in California who they're like look good thing you caught this shoplifter because he's also a
suspected serial murderer and we have a lot of evidence suggesting that he's killed multiple people there becomes
this battle and I don't want to go through I don't want to get into the weeds too much on this here Captain
because it's it's a long drawn out and even detailed it's a laborious process to go through this portion of the story
and frankly that's a nice word laborious it it wouldn't be it would not hold the
attention of the listeners because it certainly did not hold my attention we get this squabble over extradition here
where the United States and the authorities in California like you need to send this dude to us so we can try
him for murders and oh by the way that's capital punishment we are going to uh the death penalty is on the table
for this guy and rightfully so again this is not a or a pro or negative death penalty show
but if you have it in your state this guy and they did have it this guy is certainly deserving of it if he is in
fact guilty of all of these atrocities so Canada at the time is saying well we're not going to send him back to you
just so you can kill him we don't believe in that so there's this squabble for a period of time over whether they
would even send him back thanks Canada this is the way that I heard it like 20 years ago so I'm going to pull a uh
that's my story and I'm sticking to it so whether this is the truth or not this is how I'm going to report it because
this is the truth as I know it to be in the book Die For Me by Don Lasser basically what they say is the United
States at some point gets tired of fighting with Canada to get this guy back and they say you know what if you
really want him that bad and if you really want to spare this Monster's life cool you can have him and the charges
that you picked him up on there he will get out eventually and and since you want him so bad you'll have to let him
live there now you don't really want that do you with with here's the evidence that we have against this guy
as being a multiple murderer right do you really want him running around on your streets up there and So eventually
Canada says yeah I think you're right you can have him back you guys figure out what to do with him he ends up in
trial he doesn't go to trial until the 990s and in fact I believe it was something ridiculous like 12 or 14 years
later at one time Charles ing the prosecution of Charles ing was the most expensive prosecution in the history of
the state of California it was millions of dollars like something of upwards of $20
million to convict this guy one thing that everybody remains very angry about to this day and rightfully so Clarin
baz was given immunity for her cooperation in helping to prosecute Charles in her name and identity are all
over the place at that property in fact two of the guns that were used or believed used to murder
some of these victims were registered to clarland boss to this day captain and I
think the authorities felt like their hands their hand was forced a little bit here to Grant her immunity and to need
her to work with them I'm not convinced using hindsight I'm not convinced that they absolutely needed her or to Grant
her that sweetheart deal I'm also not convinced that she was fully aware of what was going on but there are some
there are some markers here right the the guns were registered in her name she already knew by her own admission to law
enforcement she was aware that Leonard Lake was committing crimes she claimed she was unaware that
he was committing murder and kidnapping but they also found her name endorsing some of those checks that were
coming in from identities that he stole Donald Lake's identity Charles Gunner's identity unfortunately we have a death
penalty case here Charles ing is finally convicted it takes over a decade It's 1999 before he's on trial these
guys their crime spree ended in 1985 14 years to put this man behind prison and then an immunity deal given
to clarland balaz here we sit today Charles in still incarcerated at San Quinton State Prison and we have
clarland balaz who nobody knows her level of involvement in a case where we could be talking about as many as 27
people murdered but some of the evidence we have as far as the journals go or as
far as the videos go we don't have any evidence that I'm aware of that directly connects her to any of these murders and
so to those tap I mean could you imagine being law enforcement and having to watch those
tapes to try to collect more evidence yeah the the tapes are are rather disturbing and I hesitate and and I
don't really want to go into describing What was seen on these videotapes right we do know that they
were used as evidence of course they would be used as evidence against Charles A as he's spotted in he's
seen in these videotapes and they are I'm trying to find a way to put this in its simplest form when the
public hears about these tapes I think that's what really Drew attention to this case I think the fascinating thing
about this case is the way in which they were living the way in which these two Criminal Minds were intertwined
and it seemed like they were enabling each other um and then I think it's also fascinating
that one of them had an addiction of you know just simple shoplifting and that was the
downfall and what got them to be ultimately caught for crimes way more heinous than shoplifting well and there
is some indicator that Charles in and Leonard Lake were not into the same things even though
that they committed a lot of the same crimes right like when we described the two of them at the beginning it's
Charles in was he was not above committing murder but his type of murder would have been more In the Heat of the
Moment Blaze of Glory type stuff where he's going in with a group of men in violently robbing a bank or maybe forced
to shoot his way out of a situation when he's attempting to steal weapons or a large amount of
weapons in fact we do know that they that these two were different when they first met and even when they joined back
up in 84 based off of Leonard Lakes journal entries he does State on more than one occasion in these
journals that Charles ing does not he again he's calling him Charlie in the right in the
notebooks but he does say that Charlie doesn't seem to be into my plan the these journal entries most of
them are not very descriptive in fact they're rather cryptic and vague and I think they were cryptic and vague for a
reason that's about the most that we get from Lake as far as whether Charles in was ready to do this out of the gate
or not was that Charlie seems to not like my plan or not want to go along with my plan yeah you wonder also
if ultimately would Leonard would Leonard Lake take out Charlie and and there's no doubt in my mind that he
would I don't wonder I actually don't wonder I think he he absolutely would have taken out but but also I think it's
very fascinating because Leonard Lake was living in a fantasy world of the novel The
Collector and Charles was almost living out any you know action movie Bad Guy role you know Die Hard that's what he
was living out in their mind they're both living in these fantasy worlds and I think again both because of these
tapes these horrible tapes that were found that's what drew the Public's attention because I think the
fascination for wanting to see these or to or when you when there's crimes that we have audio of that people want to
hear those or see those things it's because it's all a story all these crime cases are just a
story and there's there's nor normally no visual repres representation of the crime does that make any sense so I
think the fact that there is and that if if a Dark Twisted mind wanted to see these that they probably could find
them and and that makes these crimes even more real and not just a story well and I look I I don't want to
I don't want anybody to think that we're hiding the ball here that we're that we're sweeping any of this under the rug
yes those videotapes are a part of the story it's just a part of the story I'm not
comfortable reviewing um I I I mean reviewing audibly here for everybody to hear I have reviewed the information
that is readily available about those videotapes and what is readily available if one were to go looking hard enough
and they can find it are the transcripts they have transcribed all of the audio from those videotapes right
I've reviewed that multiple times I don't feel great talking about it here it doesn't do anything for our story for
the purpose of locking anybody up or finding the bad guy what it does if anybody is curious is confirms 100%
because Charles in's trial was more drawn out than I believe that it needed to be so when you have that type of
situation that is suggestive to me that there are persons out there that thought
maybe Charles ing was some kind of victim himself that he was just another Pawn in Leonard lak's
big chess game of murder and and sex slaves and kidnapping right but what those tapes
confirm is no he was willing he did go along he is speaking to the victim he too is threatening the victim is he
being subservient to Leonard Lake yeah yeah he is Leonard Lake was clearly the leader as far as those transcripts go in
the conversations that are had on those vide tapes but just like the presiding judge in Charles in's case
in at his trial mind you he is sentenced was sentenced to death the presiding judge at Charles in's trial said quote
Mr ing was not under any duress nor does the evidence support that he was under the domination of Leonard Lake meaning
that the judge after reviewing everything was 100% convinced that in the 11 homicides that Charles ing was
convicted of right that he did this [Music] willingly if you need more True Crime
garage for your earballs make sure you subscribe on Apple podcast or sign up on patreon Colonel do we have any
recommended reading for the beautiful listeners you know we rarely do this Captain but I am happy to do it today we
are recommending a fictional book titled a letter from Sherry by Cheryl Grant a letter from Sherry is a story inspired
by California serial killer murders executed by Charles in and Leonard Lake Cheryl Grant was adopted at a very young
age and she grew up believing that her biological mother was murdered by her biological father when she was a
teenager she began searching for answers as an adult her biological Aunt found her and
confirmed that her mother Sher Otoro had been a victim of the caleris County California Killers Charles Ing and
Leonard Lake back in 1985 she reached out to the retired detective on the case and he sent her an 11 page letter
written by her mother while she was being held against her will by Lake and in that 11-page letter addressed to no one
simply left there hoping that someone would find it found its way somehow to Cheryl that letter answered almost every
question that Cheryl had about who her mother was why Cheryl was put up for adoption and why her mother was no
longer around I just finished this book earlier this week and it's a great read it's powerful with a lot of emotion and
it was hard to put down so go and check out a letter from Sherry by Cheryl Grant
you can find that great recommendation and many more including podcast and documentaries on our recommended page on
our website true Crim garage.com yeah and while you're at truecrime garage.com sign up on the mailing list until next
week be good be kind and don't litter [Music]

The Collector & the Fugitive /// Part 2 /// 755

Part 2 of 2

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Leonard Lake and Charles Ng silently terrorized and collected victims in the greater San Fransisco area for about two years. Leonard Lake was a criminal in every way, committing every type of criminal offense that one could think of. He was obsessed with the book “The Collector" by John Fowles. When Lake met Charles Ng, Charles was a fugitive on the run from the U.S. Government. To this day we still do not know how many people fell prey to this California Killer duo.

Beer of the Week - Summerfest by Sierra Nevada

Garage Grade - 4 out of 5 bottle caps

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Brief Summary

Leonard Lake and Charles Ing's crimes, including kidnappings and murders, are detailed alongside their eventual capture and trial.

Key points

Welcome to True Crime Garage. Hosts Nick and Captain introduce the show with humor and a beer review.
The Devil's Not in the West. A heated debate about the Memphis 3K case is introduced.
The Disappearance of Paul Cosner. Paul Cosner goes missing after meeting a potential buyer for his car.
Michael Carroll's Fate. Michael Carroll goes missing after visiting Charles Ing, leading to a dark turn.
The Misunderstanding. Leonard Lake insists it's just a misunderstanding when confronted by police.
A Sea of Evidence. Police uncover a horrifying amount of evidence linking Leonard Lake to multiple murders.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

It's good to be seen, it's good to see you!

Nick welcomes listeners to the show.

0:40WatchMay 1, 2024

Tension

85/ 100High tension

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