Killer Nurse: Genene Jones | A Calling | 1

This episode contains descriptions and details that some listeners might find disturbing. Listener discretion is advised. It's late in the evening on December 11th, 1981.

Most of San Antonio, Texas is winding down for the night. But the pediatric intensive care unit at Bear County Hospital never sleeps, and staff are just arriving for the overnight shift.

39-year-old Patricia Alberti walks out of the break room, stealing herself for another busy night. Patricia worked as an army medic before starting here as a licensed vocational nurse. Yet somehow, the PICU is harder than the battlefield.

The patients here are just so young, so tiny, and Patricia is still adjusting to how helpless she often feels. She's arrived a little early tonight because she wants to check on one particular patient.

Three nights ago, 11-month-old Joshua Sawyer was pulled out of a terrible fire at his family's house. He only narrowly escaped being burned alive. Patricia peers through the window in the door of Joshua's hospital room.

He was comatose when he came in, covered in soot from head to toe, and suffering from severe smoke inhalation. He'd already had two seizures, and a lot of the staff didn't expect him to make it through that first night. But Joshua did pull through.

Doctors stabilized him with sedatives, and he's been making slow but steady improvements since then. As Patricia looks at him now, she can already tell that his color's better.

She knows she shouldn't get her hopes up, but she has a good feeling about this baby. Suddenly, Patricia hears footsteps approaching, along with the sound of a familiar voice.

Dread curling in her stomach, she quickly ducks into a vacant room across the hall, pulling the door ajar behind her. The last person she wants to see right now is Genene Jones. Patricia has never liked Genene much.

She's arrogant and overconfident in her abilities, and Patricia often notices Genene making sloppy, avoidable mistakes. But more recently, Patricia has begun to suspect that that's only the tip of the iceberg.

Over the past few months, an unusually high number of infants under Genene's care have become seriously ill. A few have even died, for reasons that just don't seem to add up.

So, for a little while now, Patricia's been quietly keeping a close eye on all of Genene's patients. As Patricia listens at the door, she realizes that Genene's talking to Joshua's mother.

The young woman is clearly in shock and has barely spoken a word since her young son was brought in. So it's no surprise that Genene is doing most of the talking. But she's not delivering any of the good news about Joshua's improvement.

Instead, Genene solemnly tells her that Joshua is likely to be so brain damaged that even if he wakes up, he'll never live an ordinary life. And then, as Joshua's mother sobs, Genene says, At this point, your son would be better off dead.

Patricia's mouth falls open. Even if this were true, no nurse should ever say that to a parent. But there's absolutely nothing in Joshua's chart to suggest he's brain damaged.

Unless Genene Jones knows something nobody else does, she's lying to this devastated mother. Why though? Patricia just can't see it yet.

She's too close. But soon enough, she'll understand, and she'll be haunted by this moment for the rest of her life. She'll come to look back on it as a fatal missed opportunity, her last chance to intervene and stop Genene Jones.

From Airship, I'm Jeremy Schwartz, and this is American Criminal.

4:51

The Death Shift

In February of 1983, the hospital system in San Antonio, Texas made headlines for all the wrong reasons. Over the past year or so, an unusual number of infants had died under suspicious circumstances.

But this wasn't a matter of human error or bad luck. As details emerged, this case was revealed to be every parent's worst nightmare. Because the children who died, they were all under the care of one nurse, Genene Jones.

And she was killing her tiny patients one by one. To most of Genene's colleagues, this news wasn't that shocking.

For months on end, people had been quietly referring to Genene's usual shifts as the death shift, the time of night when otherwise healthier stable patients would die without warning.

And those same colleagues had been desperately trying to sound the alarm.

But they were ignored and silenced by hospital administrators who refused to admit that anything was wrong, who didn't want to open themselves up to investigations and lawsuits.

And so, Genene Jones, who from the outside seemed like an unusually dedicated and eager nurse, had gotten away with murder over and over again. But once she was unmasked as a killer, the questions were only just beginning.

The biggest one of them all was simple to ask and seemingly impossible to answer.

Why?

This is episode one in our four-part series on Genene Jones, A Calling.

6:39

Brother's Funeral

It's a cold, sunny afternoon in November of 1966 in San Antonio, Texas. 16-year-old Genene Jones walks through the parking lot of John Marshall High School.

She's arriving towards the end of the lunch period, with 10 minutes until afternoon classes start. Just enough time for her to make an entrance. At first, nobody notices Genene when she walks into the cafeteria.

It's loud and busy, packed with students chatting and laughing over the last of their sloppy Joes and chocolate milk. But as Genene makes her slow, deliberate way across the room, a silence begins to fall.

Students turn to each other in surprise, exchanging whispers, what is she doing here on the day of her brother's funeral? The news of Travis Jones' death in a freak accident has shaken everybody in town.

14 was so young, and Travis always seemed younger than his age. Part of that was down to his learning disability, but it was also his naturally sweet, open-hearted personality. He was the kind of kid you couldn't help but like.

And nobody's taken his death harder than Genene. She was inconsolable on the day it happened, sobbing openly in front of her horrified classmates after hearing the news.

She hasn't been back to school since, and all of that made perfect sense for a girl who just lost her brother. But now, Genene seems eerily calm.

She's still in her funeral clothes, a long-sleeve black dress and matching pumps, and she's carrying a single red flower against her chest. Her eyes are red and swollen from crying.

She must have come straight from the cemetery, but it's not clear why. Nobody expected her at school today. In fact, she's not supposed to be back until next week.

Genene's homeroom teacher, Mrs. Baker, is just as surprised as anyone. She walks quickly over to Genene, puts a protective hand on her shoulder, and asks her if it's a good idea for her to be here.

Wouldn't she rather be at home with her family? Genene turns to her with a strange, beatific smile and says that she's sure. In fact, there's no place on earth she'd rather be than surrounded by her friends.

Mrs. Baker is surprised to hear her say this because Genene's never struck her as someone with a lot of close friends at school. She's chubby and plain, and high schoolers can be merciless about looks.

And it's not just Genene's appearance that makes her a bit of an outcast. Nicer kids might describe her as intense, but really she's just rude and bossy, and she has a tendency to make every conversation about herself.

Right this second though, Genene seems to be the most popular girl in school. Mrs. Baker watches in amazement as her classmates flock to her side.

They ask her how she's doing and offer her their uneaten cookies and jello cups. And then they start asking her questions about the funeral. They just can't help themselves.

The death of somebody their own age is morbidly fascinating to them. Mrs. Baker tries to intervene, telling the kids to back off and mind their own business.

But Genene is already answering their questions happily, talking a mile a minute. She tells them that when her brother's casket was lowered into the ground, she felt such a strong pain in her chest that she was sure she was having a heart attack.

She tells them how eerie it was to see Travis' embalmed body, his skin waxy and smooth like a doll's. She talks about the devastation she feels, the pain so deep she could barely get out of bed this morning.

A couple of the students peel off, creeped out by the whole scene, but most of them are hanging on Genene's every word. Every high schooler loves drama. And right now, Genene Jones is delivering.

After years of invisibility, she's finally the center of attention. That desire for the spotlight has been with Genene ever since she was a little girl.

She was put up for adoption just days after she was born in the summer of 1950, and was quickly adopted by Dick and Gladys Jones, a couple who were determined to build a family, but were unable to conceive.

They loved their adopted children and did everything they could to give them a comfortable middle class life.

But despite this, Genene always felt overshadowed by her siblings, in particular her older sister Lisa, who was as calm and demure as Genene was moody and volatile. Genene grew up with the sense that she was the black sheep of the family.

She felt disregarded by everybody, except her younger brother Travis, who idolized her. Though she was never satisfied with her family dynamic, Genene had a materially comfortable childhood.

She grew up in a four bedroom mansion on a huge plot of land in a San Antonio suburb. Her dad made good money as a nightclub owner and professional gambler, and was known around town as a high roller.

He even drove a Cadillac and gave generously to local causes. But by the end of the 1950s, he was racking up unpaid tax bills and struggling to cover his business debts. Fortunately, Dick knew how to pivot.

He sold his nightclub and used the money to fund a more stable venture, an advertising company which rented out billboards and bus bench ads.

When Dick told his kids that he needed a volunteer to help him paint and put up billboards around town, 13-year-old Genene jumped at the chance. She had always longed for her dad's undivided attention, which she never got at home.

Now she got to spend whole afternoons with him after school, which gave her a much needed escape. Middle school was tough on Genene. She was smart, but awkward.

She had trouble reading social cues, knowing when to stop talking, and tended to boss her classmates around like she was in charge of them. She was oblivious to how she came off though, and couldn't understand why she struggled to make friends.

Now, knowing that her dad would be coming to pick her up at 3 p.m sharp made it easier to get through the school day.

But despite bringing Genene closer to her father, the billboard business ended up being the worst thing that ever happened to the Jones family.

You see, Travis took an interest in his dad's new venture as well, but he didn't want to ride along in the truck.

Instead, his focus was on Dick's workshop, a shed on the grounds of the family's house, where he made all of the billboards from scratch.

14-year-old Travis began spending more and more time alone in the workshop, tinkering with various tools, teaching himself how to build things. Dick was glad to see his younger son showing some aptitude for manual labor.

He and Gladys had worried that Travis' learning disability would leave him without a lot of career options. But on a November afternoon in 1966, Dick was taking a nap inside the house when the sound and force of an explosion jolted him awake.

He looked around confused and panicked, half wondering if he'd dreamed the noise. Then he smelled the smoke. He sprinted down the stairs and out into the sprawling backyard, stopping in his tracks at the site of his workshop on fire.

Then he saw something far worse. Travis was crumpled in the grass just outside the workshop, screaming in agony. As Dick ran towards him, he saw that metal shards were protruding from his son's face, which was an unrecognizable bloody mess.

Terrified, Dick called the local police, who rushed Travis to Methodist Hospital in Central San Antonio. It was by far the best hospital in the area, with the state of the RDR and trauma center, but not even the doctors there could save Travis.

He died from his injuries not long after arriving. When Genene received the news at school, she let out a scream so loud that her classmates all heard it from down the hallway. Her shock and anguish were genuine.

Travis had always been the person she felt closest to, and she couldn't comprehend the idea that he was dead. The way he died just made it worse. It didn't make any sense.

It seemed Travis had been working on some kind of homemade explosive device, possibly a pipe bomb, which had exploded in his face.

But Travis had never shown any signs of aggression or anger, so this revelation left everyone asking why he'd been making a bomb. And now they'd never know.

Her brother's death changed Genene permanently, giving her a lingering sense that disaster could strike at any moment. But even through the haze of her grief, she noticed something else, too.

For the first time in her life, people were paying attention to her. In fact, they couldn't take their eyes off her. As the closest to Travis in age, she was the focus of everyone's concern, teachers, neighbors, even her own parents.

They were incredibly patient with her in the run-up to the funeral, indulging all of her questions and her requests. When Genene saw the flowers that the family had bought for Travis, she declared that they weren't special enough for him.

She insisted on spending her own allowance on a different bouquet of red and yellow, Travis' favorite colors. Then, at the funeral, she screamed out loud at the sight of Travis' coffin being lowered into the grave and collapsed to the ground.

Less than two hours later, though, she walks into her school cafeteria, still in her funeral dress and basks in the attention of her fellow students. It's an unexpected silver lining to the devastating loss of her brother.

She's finally at the center of the story, and that's a feeling she never wants to lose.

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18:38

Linda's Skepticism

On a Friday night in May 1967, about six months after Genene Jones' brother died in an explosion.

Inside the gymnasium at John Marshall High School in San Antonio, preparations for the junior prom are in full swing. The ordinarily drab room is being transformed by streamers, balloons, and glittering disco balls.

17-year-old Genene is supposed to be helping, but she's so busy talking that she's barely hung a single streamer. Linda Rosenbush is Genene's best friend. The two girls usually balance each other out well.

Linda's more quiet and curious and happy to let Genene monologue most of the time. But today, Linda's running short on patience. She's basically decorating the gym alone, while Genene tells a long-winded story about a fight she had with her mom.

And that long-winded story is so boring. Eventually, Linda snaps. She interrupts Genene mid-rant, telling her she needs to hurry up and hang the streamers.

But she regrets it almost immediately when she sees Genene's eyes filled with tears. Guilt-stricken, Linda gets down from the stool she's on and puts a hand on Genene's shoulder, hoping to avoid major drama.

And then, Genene starts talking about what's actually bothering her. The truth is, she says, her parents have never really loved her, and this fight was just the latest reminder of that.

She tells Linda that unlike her other three siblings, her parents never formally adopted her. Once she was old enough to realize this, she says, she begged them to go through the legal process.

She was devastated by the idea that she wasn't a real part of the family, but they refused and told her to stop being so dramatic. She should be grateful just to have a home at all. Linda is horrified by this story, but she's also skeptical.

She's known Genene long enough to know that she has a loose relationship with the truth. A few months ago, she convinced Linda that she was related to a famous musician, Mickey Dolenz from The Monkees.

She'd woven a whole story insisting that Mickey often called her up to chat while he was on the road with the band. At the time, Linda had no reason to doubt her. The story was just specific enough to be plausible.

But then, Linda mentioned it to Genene's older sister. Lisa had scoffed and said it was just another of Genene's lies. But this story is different.

It's so dark and so upsetting. Linda doesn't want to believe that Genene would lie about something so serious. On the other hand, she just can't imagine that Jones is behaving like this.

Whenever she's spent time with them, they've seemed like loving, attentive parents. Linda says a few comforting words to Genene and then excuses herself, pretending that she needs to go and get more streamers.

Really, she just wants to get out of the conversation and be on her own for a while. Genene hasn't been the same since Travis' death, and at this point, Linda's having a hard time putting it all down to grief. It feels bigger than that.

It's like Genene's constantly trying to rewrite her own life and find ways to make herself the main character in some dramatic saga. Worse than that, it feels like Genene's willing bad things to happen.

Like she enjoys being the bearer of terrible news.

22:23

Family Losses

The story that Genene told Linda about her parents isn't true, but it feels true to her. Ever since her brother died, she's felt completely abandoned. Her older sister Lisa has married and moved out, and her older brother Wiley is barely ever home.

That leaves just Genene and her parents most of the time. Genene and her mom fight constantly, and her dad's a shadow of his former self.

He's never recovered from the trauma of waking up to the sound of that explosion, and the memory of finding his son dying on the grass. He's been more withdrawn and quiet ever since, and he's lost his enthusiasm for work.

In fact, he's lost his enthusiasm for everything. Spending time with her dad was once Genene's refuge from school. Now it's the reverse.

School's the one place she can get away from her parents. Unable to get any attention at home, she doubles down on getting her peers to notice her.

And although she's still not exactly popular, she does have a circle of casual friends who find her entertaining enough to hang out with.

There's not a whole lot to do in town on the weekend, so they usually end up buying a bunch of six packs, parking their cars in a circle in some empty field, and shooting the breeze. Genene gets along better with the boys than the girls.

She's a natural adrenaline junkie and often dares the guys to drag race. And she catches the eye of one boy in particular, Jimmy Delaney.

A recent high school dropout, Jimmy's not much of a catch in terms of looks or prospects, but he and Genene share an appetite for quick thrills, whether it's drinking, partying, or hot rodding.

More importantly, Jimmy treats Genene like she's the most special person in the room, which is all she's ever wanted. Jimmy's support becomes more important than ever as Genene's senior year of high school begins.

In October of 1967, her father is diagnosed with terminal cancer. His deterioration is rapid and terrifying. Within a month, he's so weak that he can't make it up or down the stairs anymore.

Genene's in denial about his decline, convinced that he'll turn things around and make a recovery. This can't be happening. Not so soon after Travis.

But shortly after Christmas, less than three months on from his diagnosis, Dick Jones dies. Genene's reaction is strangely muted. She doesn't sob or collapse at her father's funeral like she did at Travis's.

But she does find a way to draw the spotlight in her direction. Within a few days of the burial, she makes an announcement. She tells her family that she and Jimmy are engaged, and they've set a wedding date for that Valentine's Day.

Everybody is horrified. February 14th is less than a month away, and the entire family is still in mourning. But Genene doesn't seem to give a second thought about how inappropriate it is.

She can't bear to focus on the loss of her father, and marrying Jimmy is an ideal distraction. As a bride, she'll be relentlessly busy, with no time to dwell on her grief, and she'll also be the center of attention.

Unfortunately for Genene, she's not 18 yet, and Gladys flat out refuses to give her permission to marry Jimmy while she's still in high school. After several screaming arguments, her mother and daughter finally come to a compromise.

Genene and Jimmy can get married in the summer, so long as Genene finishes school first and gets her diploma. That works out for Genene, because she can still throw herself into wedding planning to distract from her grief.

And she gets to enjoy the perks of being a bride-to-be for a period of months, not weeks. As spring begins, relatives and family friends throw a series of parties and bridal showers for Genene, who is in her element.

That June, Genene graduates from John Marshall High School, and two weeks later, she marries Jimmy. It's a lavish ceremony, held on the family's sprawling property with more than a hundred guests in attendance.

Between the eight-piece band and the free-flowing champagne, no expense is spared. To onlookers, Genene seems blissfully happy.

Despite the two tragic losses her family has suffered in the last 18 months, she's ready to start a brand-new chapter with her high school sweetheart. But below the surface, cracks are already forming.

Genene's been so preoccupied with being the bride that she's been able to ignore a lot of Jimmy's flaws. But that changes almost as soon as they're married.

Genene's desperate to move out of her family's house, which has become such a miserable place for her lately. And she's counting on Jimmy to make that happen. After all, a good man should be a provider.

That's one of the many things she learned from her dad. But Jimmy Delaney is no Dick Jones. While Dick was always running multiple business ventures at once, Jimmy's totally happy to be underemployed.

He's always told Genene that his ambition is to be a mechanic. And she's just gone ahead and assumed that he had the skills to match. But when Gladys pulls some strings to get Jimmy a job at an auto shop, it doesn't go well.

He's clumsy and undisciplined, and seems to lack basic spatial reasoning skills. Worse than that, he doesn't seem motivated to actually learn the trade. He doesn't last a month.

And with Jimmy unable to hold down a job, there's no way he and Genene can afford to get their own place. So Gladys steps in to save the day again. She offers the newlyweds a cottage on the grounds of the Jones estate, rent free.

It's not exactly the fresh start that Genene had in mind, but they can't afford to turn down such a generous offer.

Even as she sets up her new home, though, Genene's still not happy, and she makes no secret of how resentful she is about how her life's turning out.

She picks fights with Jimmy in public, making snide comments about how he can't even pay the check at a restaurant.

The remarks sting, because deep down, Jimmy feels like everybody in town sees him as a loser who married Genene for her family's money. Before long, he can't take his wife's needling anymore.

In July of 1969, seven months after the wedding, Jimmy enlists in the Navy, finally motivated to turn his life around. With Jimmy away at boot camp, Genene's left alone with her thoughts for the first time since her father's death.

Her mind is a much darker place than it used to be, and now she has nothing and no body to distract her.

Alone in the cottage just a few hundred feet away from the spots where her brother and father died, her thoughts constantly spiral back to death and disease.

Strangely, the only thing that makes her feel better is reading the old family medical encyclopedia. It's a thick, hardback book that her mom would always consult when one of the kids got sick.

Now, as she flips through the pages, Genene's drawn to the entries about the worst possible illnesses a person can get. The lightning bolts that can change someone's life overnight or end it.

Somehow, reading about the worst case scenario makes her feel in control. Although she doesn't know it yet, this information is taking root in her brain. And from those roots, something monstrous will soon begin to grow.

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31:43

Nursing Path

It's a chilly Monday morning in early 1975 in San Antonio, Texas.

Ordinarily, 24-year-old Genene Jones would be leaving for work right about now. It's just after 7.30, but she hasn't even finished getting dressed. She's staring at her skin, horror struck.

It's gotten so much worse overnight. The rash started as a small scaly patch on her left hand. She thought nothing of it, assuming she'd burned herself on the stove.

But in the days since then, it's spread gradually up her left arm and across her chest. And now, when she looks at herself in the mirror, she can see tendrils of red stretching up onto her neck, as if an invisible force is quietly choking her.

She keeps peering at it in the mirror, turning her head one way and then the other, her chest tight with fear. She finally forces herself to leave the bathroom, but only makes it as far as the kitchen before collapsing onto a chair, her legs weak.

She calls the beauty parlor at Methodist Hospital, where she works, and tells them she's too sick to come in today. And it's not a lie, because although Genene hasn't been to a doctor yet, she knows exactly what this rash is.

She has skin cancer, and she's absolutely certain that just like her father, she'll be dead within months. After her dad's shockingly quick death from cancer, Genene became consumed by health anxiety, constantly watching herself for symptoms.

Things got much worse after Jimmy left for boot camp. Despite all the problems in their marriage, Jimmy was a solid dependable presence, and a reliable source of the attention Genene craved. Without him, she spiraled.

She began having affairs with various men in town, and talked freely about her conquest to friends, like she was hoping that word would get back to Jimmy. She wanted him to come home, but she couldn't admit it.

Instead, she hoped that by making him jealous, she could force his hand. But Jimmy didn't rush home when he found out about Genene's antics.

He finished boot camp, and once he was stationed at a naval base in Georgia, he invited Genene to come out and join him there. They could start over in a brand new town, in a house that was just theirs.

At last, he was stepping up to be the kind of husband she always wanted. She said yes without hesitation. Unfortunately, Jimmy's new lease on life didn't last very long.

Once the novelty of a naval career wore off, his old personality re-emerged. He began slacking off, showing up late, and eventually got into disciplinary trouble. In early 1972, he was discharged from the Navy.

Right around the same time Genene gave birth to the couple's first son. For Genene, this was the final straw. Now, it wasn't just herself she had to take care of.

Jimmy had always been more of a liability than an asset. And it was time to cut him loose. In the spring of that year, while Jimmy was out, Genene packed a suitcase, picked up 4-month-old Richard, and left for the airport.

By the time Jimmy got home, Genene and the baby were on a plane back to San Antonio. At 21, Genene was now a single mother, and she was thrilled about it.

She trained as a beautician in Georgia, and once she settled in Texas, she found a job at the salon inside Methodist Hospital. It was supposed to just be a way to pay the bills, but Genene found that she was energized by the environment.

She enjoyed getting to know the patients who came into the beauty parlor. Unlike some of her colleagues who would shrink away from asking too many medical questions, Genene loved finding out all the gory details about their conditions.

And while some patients found this unnerving, most of them appreciated her directness and her genuine interest in what they were going through. She was only a few years out of high school, but Genene felt like her life had direction, purpose.

Just as she was beginning to feel settled back in Texas, though, another lightning bolt struck the family. Her older brother Wiley was diagnosed with cancer.

In a haunting echo of what had happened to their father, he was beyond treatment by the time he was diagnosed, and he died just a few months later. But Wiley was only 28 years old, which made his rapid decline all the more terrifying.

This was when Genene's fixation on illness really began to spiral out of control. It felt like cancer was stalking her family, lying in wait to take her next.

Now, every time she wakes up with a headache or an upset stomach, she's convinced it's the first symptom. It's not just her own health either.

She's constantly fear-mongering among her friends and family, armchair diagnosing people with tumors if they have a sore throat or an aching hip.

And when she sees that angry rash spreading across her body, she knows, just knows, that it's skin cancer. Except that it's not. When Genene shows up at her doctor's office, she's so anxious that she's visibly shaking.

She tells him that she's consulted medical textbooks, and she's certain that she either has basal or squamous cell carcinoma. Confused, the doctor examines the rash and tells her that it looks like an allergic reaction.

After hearing that she works at a beauty salon where harsh chemicals are often used, his suspicion is confirmed. It's an easy fix, he tells her. Just wear gloves at work.

But that's not what Genene does. What she does is quit her job that very day. And when people ask her why, she puts a characteristically dramatic spin on things.

She claims that her doctor told her, if you keep working there, you're gonna lose your hands. Maybe this is just a story Genene tells to garner attention and sympathy, or maybe it's what she really believes.

Maybe her fear is just that in control of her. Yet despite her terror of getting sick, she can't stay away from the hospital. She keeps coming up with reasons to visit her old colleagues.

She's drawn to the place. For some reason, being in an environment where she's surrounded by seriously ill people makes her anxiety feel manageable.

One morning, when she's hanging out at Methodist, Genene's former boss asked if she's heard about the Licensed Vocational Nurse Pathway. It's a one-year program, and the hospital is always looking for more LVNs.

In that moment, it's like the pieces finally fall into place. Genene has never really wanted to be a beautician. There's no stakes to that kind of work.

She wants to be on the ward, right in the thick of it, surrounded by desperately ill patients who need her to save them.

And as she stands there in the foyer of the hospital, picturing this future for herself, she feels truly at peace for the first time in years. Genene Jones has found her purpose.

From Airship, this is episode one in our series on the crimes of Genene Jones. On the next episode, once Genene starts work as a nurse, her obsession with catastrophic illness takes a deadly turn.

We use many different sources while preparing this episode. A few we can recommend are The Death Shift by Peter Elkin. Elkin's August 1983 article of the same name published in Texas Monthly, and an episode of the TV series Murder by Medic.

This episode may contain reenactments or dramatized details, and while in some cases we can't know exactly what happened, all our dramatizations are based on historical research.

American Criminal is a co-production of Air, Ship and Evergreen podcasts. It's hosted, edited and produced by me, Jeremy Schwartz. Audio editing and sound design by Sean Ruhl-Hoffman.

Music by Throg. This episode is written and researched by Emma Dipton. Managing producer Emily Burke.

Executive producers are Joel Callan, William Simpson and Lindsey Graham.