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Two deranged lawyers talking about our deranged obsessions.
Raven Sinner (00:01)
Thanks for watching!
Raven (00:27)
Hello derangers, welcome back to Deranged De Jure the podcast, the one and only podcast that brings you two deranged lawyers talking about their deranged obsessions. And we have a very special month for you. We're wrapping it all up together for Women's History Month and talking about one of our most favorite deranged subjects, black widows. So.
I am Raven, I'm joined by my co-host.
Pisha (00:55)
Pisha! That was intense, sorry. Dang it, I'm doing it again. Oh boy, oh boy.
Raven (00:58)
You didn't write, did you? That's okay. Well, you know, it's because you're very emphatic. We need you.
Pisha (01:10)
Well, I'm super excited for this episode, to be honest. We have been wanting to kind of round up the month with this and yeah, I'm excited.
Raven (01:19)
Mm-hmm.
Yeah, so we're going to be talking about Black Widows, and we're talking about not the spiders. Not this time, although they are also very interesting, but it is where the name derived from. So, you know, to some degree maybe we can cover Black Widows at some point with spiders. I think I heard that Black Widows, this is just like a little tidbit, they are...
Pisha (01:27)
Not spiders, not this time.
I guess. I don't know.
Raven (01:46)
like eight times more poisonous than rattlesnakes, something like that. So, yeah, like little things, and they eat their spouses, and that's why black widows, the killers, are called what they're called. So, yeah. So, what are black widows? Black widows are women who kill their husbands for a specific purpose, usually for life insurance money.
Pisha (01:51)
Go, go girl.
Aww.
Raven (02:12)
we could just lead into, before we get into the history of Black Widows, we do want to start with our top five favorite femme fatales. And so, yeah.
Pisha (02:23)
Yeah, it's fun starting with top fives, I think.
Raven (02:27)
Yes, yes, that's
Anyway, so, uh, this is a combined effort between Pisha and I. Um, we're going to start with Aileen Wuornos as number one because she should be. She's crazy. Like the craziest. Yeah.
Pisha (02:40)
Oh, absolutely insane. But I appreciate her sentiments, I guess.
Raven (02:46)
Her dedication to the cause, for sure. Yes. So, and then number two on our list is Lizzie Borden. Gotta love a crazy child-ass murderer. Yes, we love them. Number three is Jodie Arias, because, need we say more. Yeah, who doesn't love someone who kills their friends with benefits in the shower with...
Pisha (02:48)
Yeah, exactly.
next wielding ladies.
Raven (03:11)
knives and guns. So yeah. Yeah. And then blames it on like a gang coming. Anyway, she's great. I love her. I actually have some of her artwork. Yeah. Once we get our website going, I think we'll have a little bit more show and tell because it's a little bit difficult with a podcast where we don't know if people are actually watching with what you can do on Spotify. You can't do anywhere else. So
Pisha (03:14)
All of those, wow.
Oh wow, you're gonna have to show that off at some point.
Raven (03:40)
Number four would be Dorothea Puente for obvious reasons.
Pisha (03:45)
Oh yeah, old lady poisoning and collecting on old people's Medicare. That's cool. Very creative.
Raven (03:51)
Yeah, it's pretty fucked, so. Yes, I mean, here's the thing about like, women killers that I love so much. And I guess I should also start this with like, I'm saying I love these things because I'm fascinated with them. Obviously, like, you know, you and I are not in any way promoting people killing or otherwise being violent against anybody. But it's interesting to look at these.
types of activities that these women get into or these schemes that these women get into because they're super complex and we'll get into that later. But then, rounding it out, we had a debate as to whether or not this one should count, but
it's Casey Anthony. This is our number five. And that's because, yes, she was acquitted. However, Pisha and I watched all of the documentaries about her and we've concluded that she's guilty. So. And that's what really counts. It is the court of Pisha and Raven. Yeah. So, yeah. So that rounds out our.
Pisha (04:50)
Totally.
That's right.
Raven (04:59)
Top five femme fatales or women killers, just to get a little flavor, get a little jiggy going with the women killers for this episode. But starting with the history of black widows, and this goes back to, like I said, I think about the 1700s or so. There was a woman named Giulia Tofana. Oh, excuse me.
Giulia Tofana Yare!
Pisha (05:28)
Thank you. We had a long talk about how she was supposed to pronounce this name before we recorded.
Raven (05:35)
Yeah, and I just messed that whole thing up. I apologize.
Pisha (05:37)
No, no, you recovered. We're okay now.
Raven (05:41)
Okay, yes, I use my hands too for anyone who can't see that.
Pisha (05:45)
which makes it truly Italian. And this was actually the... Yeah. And then she actually was documented in Italy in the 17th century. So if my maths ever serves me, I think that means 1600s. I don't...
Raven (05:49)
We really hope we're making our best be proud here.
16 00s. You're right. Yep. So, yeah. Yeah. So, tell us about Giulia
Pisha (06:11)
So Giulia Tofana, she actually didn't kill her victims. She's a very special type of person accused of murder. She was the village poison lady. And all of these women would come from far and wide to get her special poison, which was called Agua Tofana. And well, it wasn't water, it murdered whoever drank it.
Raven (06:25)
Mm-hmm.
Thanks for watching!
Pisha (06:39)
And so it is estimated that she helped 600 women kill their
In most of these relationships, the women were unhappy and in abusive marriages. So there's a little bit of a moral compass here, not much.
But ultimately she was found out after helping about 600 women, like I said, and she was later executed with her assistants who helped her out. And, I think a few of the women who killed their husbands. So that's where that's one of the starters, but I think women have been killing their husbands since forever.
Raven (07:13)
Yeah.
Right, so I think this is the first. Yeah.
Oh yeah, they've just been getting away with it for a lot longer. But she was one of the first recorded ones. So, you know, we'll talk about this. I think that women's schemes, like I said, they tend to be a lot more complicated and a lot more complex. And they are conniving in a lot of ways. So Pisha, why don't you start us out with one of the greatest.
Black Widows.
Pisha (07:46)
I'm very excited about this. You knew about her beforehand, but I did not. Yep. We'll talk about it. So my first black widow is a woman named Belle Gunness, AKA Hell's Belle or the black hails by heels or the black widow of La Porte. I only added this next fact in because I know how much everyone loves.
Raven (07:50)
Triflers need not apply. Yeah, don't let... We'll get there.
Hells bells!
Pisha (08:15)
my attempts at speaking foreign languages or foreign names or anything? Yes. So anyways, she was born Brynhilde Poulsdater Storsdalf in Norway in 1859. And that's the only reason why I told you that because I wanted to say that. She changed her name to Belle when she immigrated to
Raven (08:19)
That's the entire region. Yeah.
That was perfect.
Love it.
Pisha (08:41)
It seems relevant to the story that she was a thick lady for the time. Yeah, she, she was at least five foot seven and between 210 and 250 pounds, which is huge for ladies at that time.
Raven (08:46)
Hell yeah. Get it, girl.
Pisha (08:56)
She worked in a butcher's shop, cutting up animal carcasses in Chicago until she married Mads Ditlev Anton Sorenson.
Raven (08:56)
Thanks for watching!
Pisha (09:06)
another Norwegian guy in 1884. This is her first husband. You're going to have to keep track. Right? For those keeping score, this is husband number one. So Mads and Belle owned a candy store and had a couple of
Raven (09:14)
For those keeping score at home.
Pisha (09:27)
But then things start to get weird. Things start burning down, for example, the candy store burned to the ground. Couple months later, the home of the couple burned to the ground. And in both instances, it resulted in insurance payouts. Two of their babies died from inflammation of the large intestine, which can happen from poisoning. So...
Raven (09:40)
Oh, no.
Oh, so something happened there. Okay.
Pisha (09:54)
Yeah, just, you know, something happened there. But both children were insured and their deaths resulted in payouts. So there was also some gossip about the babies because Belle never appeared pregnant, but I've chalked this up to it probably being fat shaming. Like I said, she was an enormous person and probably wouldn't look pregnant if she were pregnant. You know what I mean?
Raven (10:02)
you too. Have a good time.
Oh, rude.
I think I understand, yeah.
Pisha (10:24)
Yeah, so this is, it gets more interesting. So dear old Mads had two life insurance policies. On July 30th, 1900, both policies were active at the same time as one would expire that day and the other would enter into force. Can you guess what happened?
Raven (10:46)
Hmm, no, why don't you tell me?
Pisha (10:47)
Well, well, Mads died of a cerebral hemorrhage that day. Bell collected from both insurance policies and used the proceeds to move to LePort, Indiana and buy a pig farm.
Raven (11:02)
I love that for her. Atta girl. Yeah, okay.
Pisha (11:02)
Yeah, I know it's nice. Nice. So in 1902, she married husband number two, Peter Gunness. And a week later, Peter's infant daughter died of unknown causes in Bell's care. And then Peter died eight months after that due to a skull injury. Bell said that he had reached for something on a high shelf and a meat grinder fell and smashed his skull.
Raven (11:30)
Oh yeah, as that happens often.
Pisha (11:32)
Yeah, repeatedly fell over and over smashing his skull. I get that. Yeah. So the coroner, like us, the coroner suspected murder and convened a coroner's jury, but nothing ever came of it. And Bell collected $3,000 in insurance payout for his death. So this is all very convenient for her. She's made some pretty good money. And so she thought, oh, I will start placing
Raven (11:36)
Yeah. You gotta watch out for them.
Pisha (11:58)
marriage ads in Chicago newspapers. She started this in 1905, which again, I guess was a thing. You know, it was back in the day Tinder. It was more like classifieds in the newspaper. Yeah, exactly. So she's really famous for saying in these ads, you better be rich, you better have a job, you better be in shape and healthy, and quote unquote, triflers need not apply.
Raven (12:08)
Yeah, I was going to say the original dating app. Yeah, that's perfect. Yeah.
Pisha (12:26)
Kind of fun phrase. So, yeah, men would answer these ads, Belle would rob them and murder them. All of the bodies seemed to have the same things in common. They had skull trauma and then they were decapitated. The arms were removed at the shoulders and the legs were moved at the knees. All the parts were thrown into bags and buried in the pig pens. So...
Raven (12:28)
I love you.
Wouldn't she feed the pigs the bones? Cause the pigs will eat like all of the bones, right?
Pisha (12:57)
Right. That is the lore. And definitely in my favorite movie, is that Snatch or Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels? It was one of those Guy Ritchie movies, but it was good. But yeah, no, she should have fed them and gotten rid of the evidence, but she did not. And instead what happened was the remains of at least 11 men were found on her property when it was investigated in 1908.
Raven (13:00)
Yeah.
I'll...
one now that I'm thinking about it. I think I'm gonna snap.
Pisha (13:25)
So I just said that her property was investigated in 1908. That's because in April of that year, the Gunniss farmhouse burned down and authorities found the bodies of a headless adult woman initially identified as Belle and her three children. This is when the property was investigated and the remains were found buried in the pig beds. So the body of the headless woman was a bit weird.
Raven (13:25)
Oof.
Pisha (13:53)
First of all, the coroner estimated she would have been several inches, maybe five to six inches shorter than Belle and about 50 pounds less than her. And also there was no explanation for the beheading, like everyone was just super cool that there was no head, I guess. So yeah, so some think Belle believing that a brother of one of her victims was on to her.
Raven (14:09)
Huh. Crazy.
Pisha (14:18)
And then she faked her death and started again somewhere else because the body was never confirmed to be hers. DNA testing in 2008 revealed that the samples were too old for conclusive results. And in November 1908, Bell's hired hand and on and off again lover, Ray Lamphere, was convicted of the arson that burned down the Gunnys house.
and confessed that the body was a murder victim of Bell's that was planted to mislead investigators. So she's not really confirmed dead, but she was ultimately ruled dead.
Yeah. And so what was that? That was three, two husbands, lots of lovers.
Raven (14:57)
See ya.
And a lady of somewhere along the line apparently.
Pisha (15:07)
Yeah, I know. Yeah, she's just murdering all over the place. So yeah, that
Raven (15:11)
Yeah, well, and the poisoning of the children too, right? Like you said that...
Pisha (15:16)
Right, yeah, I'm pretty sure she killed her own children as well. That's the, if she did fake her own death and this was the confession of her lover was accurate, then she did in fact kill her children. So that would be added to the group of what, at least 11 men, but they think as many as 14, maybe more?
Raven (15:40)
Why else in there been a movie about her? That's what I want.
Pisha (15:44)
Has there not been?
Raven (15:46)
Not that I know of. I mean, I miss a lot of movies, so who knows? Oh yeah!
Pisha (15:50)
Yeah, I don't know, but I'd watch it. I, you know, I got to say, as I was researching these ladies, I was like, dang, we Hollywood's been doing it wrong by focusing on all these men. They're so freaking predictable. And like some of these women have super fascinating motives and ways of picking targets. And so that's what I've enjoyed the most about researching all of this. with that, I'll turn it over to you.
I wanna know about your first black widow.
Raven (16:18)
Yeah, oh for sure. Well, yeah, I mean, and to that point, I think that women are just much better at flying under the radar, mostly because they're not suspected of any kind of violent crimes, not that they're not capable, and that's kind of the intrigue about female killers. So my first black widow that I'm going to talk about to you today,
is Judy Buenoano. And so Judy Buenoano was born in Quana, Texas, and I'm less sure how to pronounce Quana that I am Buenoano.
Pisha (16:54)
Hey, it looks right. Quan, nah.
Raven (16:58)
it's in the northern, northeastern part of Texas. That's probably that's why I was saying it. So she was born on April 4th, 1943. Unfortunately for her, her mom died when she was four years old, and her dad remarried to a very awful woman.
and they moved to Roswell, New Mexico, which is clearly why she became a serial killer. So anyway, she was severely abused both sexually, physically, emotionally, all the works, as is what happens. She was treated like a slave by her mom, her stepmom, and her dad, and her brothers as well.
I think there was, you know, sexual abuse happening with the brothers as well, at least from what I
Raven (17:45)
So there was an incident with her brothers where she ended up, I think she like threw some plates, like she ended up assaulting her brothers and landed herself in a juvenile detention center. I think, I wanna say she was like 16, somewhere around there. She never went back home after that. I mean, I think the abuse was so bad that she ended up taking herself out of it.
went to a reformatory school and ultimately got pregnant at 17 with her first son Michael. So like many female serial killers, she moved to Florida and became a nurse.
Pisha (18:22)
Wait, what? You can't just slip that in. Like many women, I was like, sure, they go to Florida and become nurses, although why wouldn't they? That does sound very murdery.
Raven (18:27)
I'm sorry.
Sure.
Well, I don't think together, but I think that there are a lot of serial killers who moved to Florida, and I think there are a lot of serial killers who become nurses. So, or who started, I don't know, who started as nurses and then become serial killers. I should have said it that way.
Pisha (18:46)
Maybe?
So maybe the catalyst here is Florida. Like, Florida makes you murder people.
Raven (18:55)
Obviously. Right, I mean going from Roswell, New Mexico to Florida. She had no chance. She just, she said no chance whatsoever. So yeah. So, you know, her, I hate this. This is something that, you know, there's a lot of things when you read these stories where you're just like, this is written by a man, but like, and there's a lot of things that like, I don't know, that just.
Pisha (19:03)
Right. No.
Raven (19:22)
are completely steeped in the patriarchy. So like, you know, yeah, we're feminists, whatever. But like, but I think it's worth a discussion about some of the words that are used, like illegitimate child. And so they talk about Michael as being an illegitimate child. What really happened is that his dad just didn't step up to the plate, right? Like she's a 17 year old, and then she's being forced to care for this child. The child's not illegitimate.
The child just, you know, his father sucks. Like.
Pisha (19:51)
Right, and the term illegitimate attaches to people's perception of the mother, not to the perception of the father.
Raven (19:59)
Exactly, exactly. Right. So, but ultimately she did find a man and his name was John Goodyear and she met him in 1963 for those keeping score at home. She was 20 years old at that point. So she's still relatively young, but she did meet this. He's in the Air Force. So like she kind of got
lucky with this one. So he went out, he was in the Air Force, she was left at home, she was still taking care of Michael at home, and then in 1971 he died from what was called natural causes at the time. There was no suspicion of anything, no foul play, anything at all. He died of some kind of heart attack. So
And that was an actual cause it made sense. So then after that she met a man named Bobby Joe Morris They moved to Trinidad, Colorado. She just like chose the armpits of every state that she went to
Pisha (20:56)
Next you're gonna tell me she chose like Apple Valley, California to move to.
Raven (21:01)
No, I mean, yes, that would make sense, but she eventually returns to Florida, which makes sense as well. But no, so she gets together with Bobby Joe Morris and moved to Trinidad.
Colorado and they're together from like she moves there with Michael and now she has a daughter and a son James and There's not much like known about this daughter. I don't know if she's like still around I mean potentially she could be because this is in the 1970s. So Anyway, but she's nameless so Anyway, they're in Trinidad, Colorado until 1978
when, surprise surprise, Bobby Joe Morris dies of natural causes. He was, he died what ultimately determined to be a poisoning, but at the time each one of these people who is connected to her dies of some kind of heart attack, some kind of pulmonary disease. So anyway, she, after that happens, she moves back to Florida for inspiration, obviously.
Pisha (22:06)
more and she was running low.
Raven (22:10)
Yeah, she needed to keep that, that the juices flowing. And at that point she changed her last name from Morris to Bueno Ano. For those keeping score at home, that is bastardized Spanish for Goodyear. So, and that's the name of her first husband. So, and yeah, she, she just wanted to pay homage to her first.
Pisha (22:29)
Oh.
Her first victim?
Raven (22:35)
Exactly. So at this point she's still a widow, so she's still a victim in this whole thing. But this is when shit gets whack. So.
Michael, her son, also enlists in the army and is transferred from one station to another. And in the course of that, he comes home and spends a couple of days with his mother and then ends up getting really sick on the way to the next station.
and this is, you know, a mysterious illness, but it has some very strange likenesses to arsenic poisoning. So he gets paralysis, ends up needing metal braces for his legs.
and then he's discharged from the army because of this sickness and then has to move home back home with his mother who is now killed I think where are we I think three are we at three yeah I think we're no we're at two yeah there was one in between there but there's not enough evidence as to what happened because the strange thing to me
Pisha (23:33)
too. Yeah.
Raven (23:42)
and the common denominator in a lot of these black widows is they're really able to lure in their victims. Like they just, you know, husband five, husband six, husband seven, you know, we watch.
Pisha (23:54)
And they're not like, hey, what happened to husband one through five?
Raven (23:58)
Yeah, exactly. Yeah, they're more seen as like the poor widow or whatever. It's interesting. I would be really interested in like the psychology of, you know, why that might be. So anyway, on the day that Michael returns home to his mother, James is back home as well and she says, you know, guess what? We're going on a fishing trip down the East River in a canoe. Yeah.
Pisha (24:24)
No.
Raven (24:26)
yeah, on the day, on the day he comes home,
fuck mom, are you fucking kidding me?
Pisha (24:29)
Well yeah, it's obviously our annual canoe trip.
Raven (24:33)
I've never been fishing in my life, what the fuck?
So anyway, so she straps him to a lawn chair inside of a canoe. James is completely on board. James is like, yeah, great idea. Why don't we do this? Let's take him out of his metal braces, put him into this canoe, and we'll just go out into the middle of this river. That sounds like a great idea. So.
Pisha (24:57)
Did they always adhere him to the boat in such a fashion?
Raven (25:01)
Well, this is the thing, I don't think they've ever been fishing before in their lives. I'm not joking. Yeah, I think this is the first time. And so, and like, he had just become paralyzed. So it's not like this has ever happened before, but they thought it was a great idea. So, you know, the boat gets a little wobbly. Yeah, yeah. Well, you know, it's gonna, it's good for the muscles. That's what I've always heard.
Pisha (25:04)
This really was the first time.
Good timing though. That's a good timing to catch some bass.
Raven (25:26)
That's how you get yourself out of paralysis if you go fishing. Yep, so So they're out on the river on the East River having a great time. I'm sure and the boat gets a little wobbly the canoe, you know starts tipping over a little bit and Unfortunately Michael sinks to the bottom of the river while James and Judy survived so yeah
Pisha (25:29)
Go fishin'.
He sinks. He just sinks to the bottom and no one's like, hey, let's try to help him out or
Raven (25:52)
Michael dies. Yeah, he's sick.
No, they never did. I really, I don't know why. I like, I don't know if there was an undercurrent. I don't know what was going on, but like James didn't try and save him. She obviously didn't try and save him. And they just swam back to shore and then told people what happened. And it was too late at that point. So I think he just sank straight to the bottom because the way the lawn chair was on the canoe. So
Pisha (26:21)
Well, yeah.
Raven (26:22)
Yeah, so and I should have mentioned this before, Judy has been collecting insurance money both on John Goodyear and on her second husband as well in Trinidad, Colorado. So she's kind of, she's got a you know some scheming going on in that little brain of hers and she realizes also that she could probably collect on her son as well.
And she does have a life insurance policy on her son. And she is the beneficiary. So she does collect on her own son. So, yeah. Seriously. So with that insurance money though, it goes to a good cause you would imagine. She starts a salon called Fingers and Faces.
Pisha (26:50)
Oh, charming. Mother of the year.
Icky. That's just an icky name. Icky name for a salon.
Raven (27:10)
Well, I mean it's exactly what a salon is, doing your fingers and your faces. Ah, those are gross. Yeah, probably, yeah, trademark.
Pisha (27:13)
Hehehe
What about feet? She didn't put feet in there. Fingers, feet and faces. It was already taken.
Oh, icky.
Raven (27:25)
Yeah, yeah. So while she's at the salon, she meets another, I guess, entrepreneur. His name is John Gentry, and they, you know, fall into a vast romance. This is what happens. So, you know, we've talked a lot about how, like, women need to be really careful about, you know, going on the
the dating apps and how often like, you know, male violence happens against women. But, guys, you gotta be careful too because, I mean, this is nuts. Um, this...
Pisha (27:56)
These women are kinda crazy and unhinged.
Raven (27:59)
Yeah, I mean like the violence, like male violence against women is kind of expected and you kind of know what's coming. With these women, like it is just they could have gotten away with it, especially her until she got a little zealous in her murder. And so yeah, so she...
Pisha (28:17)
A little zealous, a little overzealous and a murderin'.
Raven (28:24)
hooks up with John Gentry and she starts a fast romance, like I said, and eventually, you know, she has him take a life insurance policy out. They're not even married. They're just dating at this point, but you know, of course, as one does, you know, if you really love someone, you take a life insurance policy out on them, so.
Pisha (28:45)
I don't think I've ever had a life insurance policy outside of the game of Monopoly or life ever.
Raven (28:50)
Well, you've never really been in love.
Pisha (28:52)
Hey! That's it then.
was like, don't listen to this episode.
Raven (28:57)
Don't tell I said that. Don't, yeah, sorry.
So, yeah, so she takes the life insurance policy, they take life insurance policies out on each other to make it equal. I mean, we're in the 1970s, let's get real. And then she starts giving him vitamin C pills because he gets sick. And he, you know, I can't remember exactly what his symptoms were, but he was getting really sick.
So she gives him these vitamin C pills and he notices that as he's taking them, his symptoms are getting worse. So he stops taking them for a little while, realizes he's getting better and she convinces him to take the vitamin C pills again and he gets worse again and he's like, mm, I'm just not gonna take these. I think that's a bad idea.
You know, doesn't tell her whatever, but she is seething. She's so mad that he caught on to her because she's gotten away with it every single time. So there is either a wedding or a friend's party or something like that they are invited to and she insists that they take separate cars. So they take these separate cars. She insists that he parks in this very specific spot.
in this um like it's kind of like it's an open space so there's like a lot of parking stuff um there i think they're in like kind of a rural era area it's rural era too everything's all of those things i hate that word as it is anyway
Pisha (30:22)
Brrrrroo murderer
Raven (30:28)
So she has him park in this very specific spot in this rural area and she's like, go park over there. I'm going to go park over here and everything's going to be fine. So they go to the party, they're drinking whatever and then you know she's getting kind of lovey on him.
And she's like, hey, would you bring a champagne bottle home for us? So she's asking him to go to the liquor store to go pick up a champagne bottle. And he's like, yeah, of course. Um, you know, feeling well, love you back. So he takes the car and gets down the road and not like, I don't know, maybe half a block away or something like that. Uh, his car explodes. So yeah.
Pisha (31:13)
What?
Raven (31:17)
Yes, she had planted a car bomb in her lover's car.
because he didn't die from the poison that she had given him.
Pisha (31:26)
Well, really it's his fault. He should have just died the first time, yeah.
Raven (31:28)
I know. He should have died the first time. Yeah. But the thing is, he didn't die from this one either.
No, he didn't. Yeah, so she, he was at the hospital, she went to the hospital. And you know, I was pretending to be like mourning by him when like she knew full well that she had failed at killing him and she wasn't expecting it. So, um, but Gentry was somewhat smart and the law enforcement eventually caught up with them.
and she was ultimately charged and convicted with the attempted murder of John Gentry, the death of her son Michael, as well as Bobby Joe Morris.
But anyway, Bobby Joe Morris and John Goodyear as well. So one of the most troubling things about our lady, Judy Bueno-Anno. So she fought this case in the criminal justice system, but ultimately was convicted.
and placed on death row. She was the second woman in Florida history, actually in 150 years. I didn't look up who the first woman in Florida history was to be executed, but anyway, she, can you guess what her last meal was?
Pisha (32:49)
Last meal of Judy Buena Ano. I'm gonna guess it was lobster.
Raven (32:54)
Yes.
Yeah, that would be a smart guess, but you would be wrong. She asked for steamed vegetables, including asparagus and broccoli. Blah. Fresh strawberries and hot tea, because she was still watching her figure, after all.
Pisha (33:05)
Haha
You want to go into death looking good so your ghost has a nice figure.
Raven (33:24)
I mean, you know, it is very insightful of her for sure. So that is the story of Judy Buenoano. Mm-hmm. Yep, she was.
Pisha (33:32)
Oof. Wow, sassy lady.
Well, I'll tell you about my next Black Widow. I love her. Her name is Nanny Doss, AKA the Giggling Granny, the Lonely Hearts Killer, the Jolly Black Widow, and Lady Bluebeard. I don't know where that one came from. We'll talk about the others later. Yeah, I know, quite impressive, right? We'll talk about those other ones later though.
Raven (33:41)
Please.
Wow! Okay. Yeah.
Pisha (34:05)
they will make sense as we talk more about Nanny. So she was born in Alabama in 1905. She was emotionally and physically abused by her father. He forbade his four daughters from, okay, sorry, I was doing math again. He forbade his daughters, his four daughters from wearing makeup or attractive clothing or going to school dances or social events because he believed it would prevent them from being molested.
At 16 years old, Nanny married her first husband with her father's approval. It resulted in four children, two died of quote unquote, food poisoning and a tumultuous relationship ensued. This guy's name was like Charlie Bragg or something like that.
Anyways, in 1927, the husband disappeared with one of the children that was remaining, leaving Nanny and the other child alone. He returned again and then divorced Nanny in 1928. He got out alive, but he stated that he was always kind of frightened of her. Yeah, so Nanny starts her murdering, her second marriage, for those keeping count at home.
is to Robert Franklin Harrelson. It lasted 16 years despite the guy being a complete drunk asshole. And during this time, Nanny's daughter Melvina believed she witnessed her mother visit her baby, so Nanny's grandbaby, and stab it in the head with her hat pin.
Raven (35:48)
Oh my God.
Pisha (35:49)
Right? Like what the hell? That may have been her first murder, besides those two children who died of food poisoning. Yeah, so later Melvina's other child, Robert, died from asphyxia of unknown causes while under nanny's care. Nanny collected a $500 payout from life insurance she took out on this child, this child being her grandchild.
Then in 1945, Harrelson, her husband, raped her. The next day, she put rat poison in his corn whiskey and he died that night. That's fine. Yeah, that's okay. We're okay with that one. So moving on to our third marriage. This was to a guy named Arlie Lanning in 1946. This is literally
Raven (36:27)
Oh, that one... he deserved that. Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Pisha (36:40)
months after her second husband has died. And so she met him on a lonely hearts column. I'm thinking this is kind of like one of those marriage classifieds we were talking before. And so Arlie died really quickly. He died of quote unquote heart failure in 1952. The couple's house burned down shortly after and Nanny collected an insurance payout.
Raven (36:54)
Yes.
Pisha (37:08)
But that's after Arlie's mother died mysteriously in her sleep. Don't worry. I'm going to add all this up for you later because I'm losing track of all the people who are murdered at this point. Right? So now we're on our fourth marriage. This is to, yeah, to Richard Morton in 1952. Again, months after the death of her third husband.
Raven (37:16)
Oh my god.
Yeah, I think I've lost track. Okay. Yeah.
Woo!
Pisha (37:34)
She met him again on another lonely hearts column. She poisoned him to death in 1953 and she poisoned her own mother to death who came to live with them three months earlier. So she's just on a spree at this point. I'm assuming she's collecting money on all of them. Yeah, yeah, so don't worry, we're getting through this. We are now on her fifth marriage to Samuel Doss a month after.
Raven (37:50)
This is great.
Wow.
Pisha (38:05)
Richard Morton, her fourth husband, has died. This is in 1953. Nanny killed him, Mr. Samuel Doss, in 1954 in a rush to collect on the two life insurance policies she had taken out on him. And so this sudden death, for some reason, alerted his doctor who ordered an autopsy and copious amounts of arsenic was found in his system. Nanny was promptly arrested.
and she confessed to killing four out of her five husbands, two children, one of her sisters, her mother, two grandchildren and a mother-in-law. Right? So I think that's 11. It feels so much more impressive just talking about them all and going through the chronology and just how close together
Raven (38:44)
Oh, Jesus.
Come on.
Pisha (38:59)
were, they were very close together. So Nanny was sentenced to life in prison. She died in prison of leukemia in 1965. So now is your chance to ask why she's called the giggling granny.
Raven (39:15)
I would like to know why is she called the giggling granny?
Pisha (39:19)
She is called the giggling granny because when she took the stand, I guess she testified instead of taking the fifth. And while she was testifying to murdering her husband, she couldn't stop laughing the whole time.
Raven (39:37)
That's an edge. Oh.
Pisha (39:38)
She was just, she was just giggling. And that's why the jolly black widow, she was just as like all the pictures of her. She's got the biggest freaking smile on her face. And, and she said on the stand, she testified that she did it not only for insurance money, but also because she was in this quest to find true love. And none of these men were treating her well. And so she thought it was just easier to kill them when she decided they weren't the right one.
Raven (40:05)
Yeah, just get rid of them. Throw them away, old man. And also your family!
Pisha (40:07)
Yeah. And so that's, yeah. And all of her family, that, I mean, like I said, I can only assume she had policies on all of them too, because I don't understand why you would kill all those other people just for fun. I mean, I guess just for fun.
Raven (40:22)
I think, yeah, either that or like they knew something that she thought they might go to the cops. And I don't know, but I'm guessing you're probably right about the insurance that tends to be.
Pisha (40:32)
But I like yours. I like that these people were onto her because there's no freaking way. She had five marriages in the course of, well, no, that first one lasted, what was it, 16 years, but all of the ones after that were like.
bang, dead, you're dead, you're dead, you're dead, you're dead. So they obviously caught on. It was too much, too fast, too many murders, too fast, girl.
Raven (40:56)
Thank you.
Yeah, it's like your credit card debt getting, you know, catching up with you. Eventually your killing sprees will catch up with you just like your shopping sprees as well. I was trying to go with that.
Pisha (41:11)
Yep, well, I like it. It made sense to me as a shopper. Not a murderer as a shopper.
Raven (41:16)
There we go. Cool.
Well good, I'm glad to hear. So wow, well that shoof nanny dos, I'll tell you what, that is a story I didn't know about.
Pisha (41:27)
I had never heard of her before this, and so I was quite pleased the more I read about her.
Raven (41:35)
Yeah, that is, that's unhinged, that's crazy. All right, well cool. Well, I'm about to tell you about another Black widow. She is the Black widow of Kyoto. So we're going overseas to Japan, and we're going to talk about... I can't stand her, but I love it.
Pisha (41:38)
Right?
Mr. Worldwide Worldwide. Sorry, I had to throw it in.
Raven (42:04)
Anyway, so we're yeah, so Chisako Kakehi, which I'm probably butchering, but I'm gonna say it anyway.
she was born on November 28th of 1946 in Kitakyushu City. And so, you know, kind of common theme with a lot of our
other murderers or other black widows. Her upbringing was also very traditional and strict. There's not any, like, there's nothing other than, you know, people talking about her dad being very against her doing anything other than, you know, settling down and getting married. Like, there's not like abuse or anything like that. But the sad thing is, you know, because
women have been oppressed throughout history, she was actually super smart and wanted to go and pursue a higher education but was forced not to by her family and her family would not let her. It's hard enough today to try and get an education but to be in the 19, I guess it was probably in the 1960s at this point, trying to get an education in Japan as a woman.
She wouldn't have had a job. She wouldn't have had, you know, the finances to be able to do that. So she, you know, took some menial work and eventually did settle down and was able to, you know, find a husband in accordance with her father's wishes. So really this is her dad's fault. Everything that happens after this. So...
Pisha (43:37)
Always a man's fault though.
Raven (43:38)
It truly is. You can always tie this back to a man. So...
Pisha (43:41)
Yeah, really. I don't want to victim shame or anything, but all of these men have some accountability here.
Raven (43:49)
They had it coming. What were they wearing?
Were they drinking that night? Anyway, so, so her first husband owned a fabric printing company. He's a no-namer as well. But, but, you know, they were married actually for 25 years, and they had two children together. And that's, you know, so everything seemed to be going great. Yeah, yeah, I would say so.
Pisha (44:11)
Yeah, that's pretty good for a black widow.
Raven (44:16)
There was no sign that this was coming. However, he was the first one to introduce her to cyanide as an agent for multiple arts and crafts, so It's his fault, too Anyway, um, he died suddenly in 1994 at 53 years old He had Arts and crafts exactly
Pisha (44:29)
Multiple arts and crafts
Okay.
of arts and crafts.
Raven (44:46)
Yes. Those will get you every time, I tell you. So he was actually discharged from the hospital and was in good health at that point, after falling into a heart attack. And then a couple of days later, he suddenly died. So I should stick this here. I think it's later in my outline, but in Japan, autopsies are relatively rare. So, you know, I think in the United States these days,
Pisha (44:50)
Oh my god. Every time.
Raven (45:11)
it's kind of the norm, it depends on where you are, but they're very rare in Japan because I think there's a lot less murder or are murderers just getting away with it because there's less autopsies, who knows. So this really sucked for her though because she ended up inheriting his company and she tanked into the ground. She went into debt.
She lost the company and so in any case she ended up Needing to find a new husband in order to take care of her So she took out a new husband Yeah, yeah So she I mean she was very methodical about you know who she was choosing she was choosing older wealthier men who had no children
Pisha (45:45)
took out a new husband. I like that.
Raven (46:00)
And she was using dating, not sites, but like kind of the same thing, like using like the newspapers and stuff like that in order to actually, no, I'm sorry. I think these were websites. So she was using these sites in order to get these men because her second husband,
that she acclaimed along with the life insurance policy. He died of a stroke in 2006 at the age of 69. So
Pisha (46:26)
So when did these murders start happening? Because she was married to that first guy forever, right?
Raven (46:31)
Right, I mean, yeah, he died in 1994. And then there's really not a whole lot between 1994. I mean, according to one site that I was looking at, she had acquired 14 lovers on this site.
Pisha (46:36)
Okay.
Raven (46:49)
yeah, so, but like I said, so her second husband died in 2006. So there's quite a gap between the first and the second one. But, you know, that's when things started kind of picking up for her. She started getting a lot more business and, she was just a lot more successful in her entrepreneurship. So she married her third husband.
Pisha (46:48)
Got it.
Raven (47:06)
Yamamoto, who also died of a heart attack at 75, and they were only months into their marriage at that point.
yeah. So the third one died of a heart attack at 75, but they were months into their marriage, and that's when she got sloppy. So then
around 2013, so between Toshiyaki Yamamoto, I think was like September.
20th of 2013 and then she got married to Isaiya Kakehi, which is where her name comes from, in December of 2013. So, married husband number three in September, husband number three dies in November, marries husband number four in December, and kills him in December. So she...
Pisha (47:56)
See, like with Nanny, she started acting too fast, too hard, too fast, overzealous.
Raven (48:03)
Yeah, you got a little greedy, a little greedy. Yeah. So a lot of greedy. Yeah, maybe slow it down there, Kakehi. So, so yeah, so husband number three happened at a restaurant where he, I think he keeled over in the middle of the street. And this is not funny. I'm sorry. It's really not funny.
Pisha (48:06)
a little greedy, a lot of greedy.
Haha, you laughed. We're burning in hell anyways.
Raven (48:27)
I think I should not have. I did seriously at this point. But, um, so he had actually
cancer. Lung cancer.
and was doing quite well afterwards. But when he keeled over, Chisako went over and was like crying in the streets and was like, oh my god, he's dying of lung cancer. He's not okay. He's gonna die. And they were like, well, you know, I think he's okay. Let's go get him some help. And she's like, no, it's terminal. He'll never survive.
Pisha (48:58)
Hehehe
Raven (49:02)
And I think actually he actually did survive. He survived but was not okay and did ultimately, I think die a couple of years later. So then.
Pisha (49:13)
Did he get to like testify against her or anything?
Raven (49:15)
No, because he died beforehand and she was never suspected until later, until Isao Kakehi.
yeah, so Isao,
was his fiance. You know, they fell hard and fast or whatever, but what ended up happening, so he...
had a lovely dinner with his wife as one does and then
she ended up killing him with her poison of choice was cyanide so just extra bad yeah
So and she ended up confessing, at least that was what you know authorities said. Some law enforcement clued in on her when they looked at her past and saw that she had like seven you know prior people who had died mysteriously. And so anyway she ended up telling authorities that she had killed him because he had given his money to other women and she you know killed him
She was also at that time unfaithful to him and was already moving on to the next one. So she was just trying to wrap it all up. She ended up getting in all $12 million, in yen I don't know how much it was, but $12 million in insurance and inheritance for her dead husbands. So she was the ultimate capitalist. She won.
Pisha (50:29)
Oooo
How? How do I come into that kind of money? I mean, besides killing my husband, cause I can't do that.
Raven (50:36)
Oh, you gotta start killing your husband. Well, not if we're going to publish this. No, I don't. I don't. I'm sorry. No, don't do that, please. But yeah, so she kind of was the ultimate winner here. She yeah, like I said, she had gained quite a lot of money, but
Pisha (50:46)
Oh sorry, I started choking to death.
Raven (51:00)
By the time that she was caught, this is like 2014, she's in prison for a long time. I think that the wheels of justice turned a little bit slowly. And so when she confessed, her lawyer said that she had confessed under the spells of dementia, that this was not a true confession and that they tried to strike it, but ultimately the judge...
ruled against them and she was convicted of
three murders and one attempted murder of the husband who she tried to kill but then the one of us saying like didn't die but then died later of cancer. So yeah. So anyway. Yeah.
Pisha (51:37)
Wow. So she was the most successful in terms of pecuniary gain.
Raven (51:44)
Yes, she was, but you know, but not for long. The judge did ultimately sentence her to a death sentence and her response, can you guess what it was?
Pisha (51:54)
No.
Raven (51:54)
Yeah, so picture this, you're in a courtroom and there's like 500 to 600 people who are in line to get into this courtroom because this is like a sensational story in Japan, right? So all of the media is there, everything like that. So the judge hands down the sentence, silence, and she looks up and she goes, am I supposed to say something? Yeah, so.
Pisha (52:20)
She's like, are we done here?
Raven (52:22)
All right, well, moving on.
Pisha (52:23)
How? But she might have had dementia.
Raven (52:26)
She might've had, I mean, that's probably saying, you know, her dementia had probably gotten a hold of her at that point, so. But she was ultimately, I think, executed in 2021.
Pisha (52:38)
They still, they still executed her. I mean, because she had to have been pretty old, right?
Raven (52:42)
They still do.
Yeah, yeah she was but...
Pisha (52:49)
Why would you waste the resources on that?
Raven (52:52)
I don't know, that's a good question. And now I'm second guessing myself, I hope that's right. Well, someone can tell me if I'm wrong. But I'm.
Pisha (52:59)
You know what? If no one corrects us, we're correct.
Raven (53:03)
She was sentenced to death. I think that she did ultimately get electrocuted, I think in 2021. I know she died in 2021. And then, you know, I'm like, did I mix her up with the other one? I hate when this happens, but anyway. Yeah. So, yeah. So anyway, so that's Chisako, our black widow of Kyoto.
So that, I think that wraps up our black widows,
there's...
A lot to be said for women who murder for insurance money.
Pisha (53:31)
Well, yeah, I mean, it isn't always for insurance money.
at least in the case of the giggling granny, she was trying to find love. I can think of a couple of other ways that would be better.
Raven (53:40)
Oh, yeah.
Pisha (53:44)
But yeah, like I
speak to why women murder and how it's different from men.
Raven (53:53)
Right, sure. So, I mean, so there is this narrative, I think, that goes with, you know, women who are scorned or women who are just greedy and out for insurance money and that kind of thing.
I'm not saying that I'm not somewhat entertained, also just fascinated by those types of stories. But, you know, the thing is that women tend to kill. So men tend to kill.
indiscriminately. They kill and you know this always keeps popping up in my mind when I think about this about how society has talked about how women are the emotional ones and I'm like are you talking about like
Anger is not an emotion because if you're going that direction, then the whole thing with the heat of passion doesn't come from women, it comes from men. So in common law and in law today, the heat of passion is a common defense for criminal cases, for murders, that kind of thing. And it lowers your culpability.
right?
the classic one in this is you come home as a husband, as a woman, and find your wife in bed with another man, you shoot that man, and that's a heat of passion type of crime, right? And you get a lower sentence, you get, if you have lower culpability because of your emotions. So, so, so no, I mean the law has carved this out for men, right? But when it
to defenses that are more specific or tend to be more specific. I can't say that this doesn't happen in the reverse, but where it came up in the 1980s and 1990s is what we know now as battered women's syndrome and it's still not widely accepted to this day. So what we've accepted in the law is that if you are just angry and a fit of rage
Because you're a man and you have emotions, we accept that as being lower culpability. But if you're tortured, abused, and just mentally traumatized for years on end, and you happen to defend yourself, or, you
act disproportionately to the act that is being done to you because you are in fear that you're going to be killed. That's not a sufficient justification for the murder in a lot of these cases. So it's wild. Completely, right?
Pisha (56:16)
So unfair. Like, I mean, after years and years of abuse, you hear about all these women who snap, you know, and they finally kill their abuser and they get the book thrown at them. Because ultimately the law says that these men didn't intend to kill their wives when they're abusing them. They don't intend to kill them. They intend to torture and keep them alive and keep them in pain.
Raven (56:30)
Mm-hmm.
Pisha (56:45)
So she shouldn't be in fear of her life because he's not threatening her life. And so she's not acting in self-defense, she snaps. And it's so frustrating, but in no way helps her evade some of the punishment that comes with taking a life. Does that make sense?
Raven (57:08)
Right. Yeah, it does. I mean, I think the point is that the abuse doesn't rise to the level of a life-threatening.
action taken against a woman necessarily. And so that's why, which is not really a great rationale, why battered woman syndrome has not been so widely accepted.
law is trying to catch up with the psychology. It's just, it's slow. And this is just, the law moves slowly.
Pisha (57:38)
and the patriarchy, like rules, things like this reinforce the patriarchy as it was created by men for men. And so, you know, something that challenges that, like, hey, women are absolutely in legitimate fear for their lives when they're being beaten and tortured, because who's to say that one time you might bleed out, you might go unconscious and stop breathing. So.
Raven (57:47)
Right.
Pisha (58:05)
It's just it's not fair and it's not only catching up because the law moves slowly, but because there's no interest in moving quickly for women in a patriarchal society.
Raven (58:15)
Yeah, that's exactly right. Yeah, and I mean, and to that, this is like, you know, kind of a side point to what we're talking about, because, you know, we're talking about women being greedy with like life insurance money and stuff like that. But we do have to remember in the like historical context of things that women weren't able to have their own bank accounts. They were not able to make their own money. And so, you know, the couple's a little creative. Like, are we going to blame them for that?
Pisha (58:40)
You had to get money somehow. These women, it's not like they lost an abusive husband who, you know, to food poisoning and then could just turn around and get a job. Technically, especially for the first couple that we talked about, that was not an option for them. But later on, at least...
Raven (58:52)
Right.
sure. Exactly.
Pisha (59:03)
in the case of our Kyoto Black Widow, she was constrained by societal expectations of women. And so I mean, all these women, sure, you can call it greedy, but is it greedy or survival?
Raven (59:18)
Right, right. Yeah. And you know, I mean, I don't mean to say that,
women are always justified in their killings or their violence or anything like that. But it is an interesting, I think, perspective and something that we have to keep in mind when we're talking about especially these historical murders, like the context of what's going on there. And, you know, not to say that
I think the patriarchy works against men committing violence in very different ways in that they're taught to be violent. And so we do need to address that at some point as well. And I have a lot of sympathy for men because of that, because they're taught to stifle their emotions and all this stuff. I mean, we can go for hours talking about this stuff. But I guess the point is that...
in women's history,
murders have happened. So, there you go. Yeah, so, so I think this wraps up our Women's History Month. You know, we covered a lot of things. We covered dating apps. We
Pisha (1:00:08)
In women's history murders have happened. I like that catchy
Raven (1:00:22)
nacho killers. Yeah.
Pisha (1:00:26)
It will never not be funny to me. Yeah.
Raven (1:00:29)
No, not me either, and not Sue Floyd as well. Yeah, and we forecast into our future with an investigation into this experience of your friend Eric Brazil. So.
Pisha (1:00:41)
Yeah, that one's slightly less related to women's history, but thank you for making room for it this month as it was the second year anniversary of his
and we will be doing that. I think we're talking about doing that over the summer. So everyone, you know, look forward to that.
Raven (1:00:57)
Yeah.
Pisha (1:01:00)
As far as next month,
we're really going to look at the progression from Ruby Ridge to the January 6th insurrection. So we're gonna start with Ruby Ridge, move into Waco, then the Oklahoma City bombing, and then wrap it all up with January 6th. So next month's gonna be super
we're going to some...
extreme far right stuff. So everyone pull up your bootstraps.
Raven (1:01:30)
Pull yourselves up.
Pisha (1:01:31)
Yeah, pull yourself up by your bootstraps as they love to say. So, that's all we've got for this week and for the next month. And in the meantime, we are looking for someone to make a website for us. So please hit us up on Gmail if you know anything about making websites, that would be cool. And
Raven (1:01:50)
Yeah.
Please.
Pisha (1:01:59)
Also, of course, like, listen, follow, subscribe, all the socials. And until next time, stay out of law school and the infirmaries.
Raven Deranger (1:02:12)
Remember to like and subscribe to Deranged DeJure on your favorite podcast platform and follow at deranged.dejure on all the major social media. Contact us by email at deranged.dejure at gmail.com. This has been a Raven Kink production.