Das Criminal

In 2015, Hitchbot — a hitchhiking robot made from pool noodles and a bucket by the eager students of Canada’s Ryerson University-slash-Toronto Metropolitan University — was dismembered by unidentified assailants on the streets of Philadelphia. Its decapitated cake-container of a head has never been recovered. In this episode, we’re going to try to answer the question: Can you murder a robot? Plus, social experiments, baby seal violence, and everyone's favorite sci-fi topic: sex robots. Patreon: http://www.patreon.com/DasCriminal Sources: https://bit.ly/3ygv9Fz

In 1932, the Menzel family purchased Marc Chagall’s painting, Jacob’s Ladder, and hung it in their apartment in Brussels, Belgium. But as the Nazi regime advanced, the Menzels, fearing for their own safety, fled Brussels for the United States, leaving their Chagall painting behind. After the Allied Forces declared victory, the Menzels returned to their Brussels apartment, only to find their Chagall painting missing. The Einsatzstab Rosenberg, a Nazi Party organization responsible for looting cultural property like artwork, had stolen it during the war. But the Menzels were not about to let the fascists take anything else from them. They were determined to find and retrieve the Chagall. Mr. Menzel passed away in 1960, but his widow, Erna, refused to give up on the painting. In 1962, she found it. And the legal case that would follow was controversial and precedent-setting in New York State, the art world, and the field of post-war damages and reparations. Patreon: http://www.patreon.com/DasCriminal Sources: https://bit.ly/3ygv9Fz

On Sunday September 27th, 2015 Marco Muzzo landed at Toronto Pearson International Airport. He was returning on a private jet from a trip to Miami. He got into his SUV and drove off, reaching 85 kilometers per hour (or ~53 mph). At around 4:10 PM, Muzzo’s SUV sped past a stop sign in Vaughan (a city in Ontario, north of Toronto and within the GTA), smashing a family minivan. Gary Neville, 65, was killed instantly. Children Daniel (9), Harry (5), and Milaga (Milly, 2) Neville-Lake also died from their injuries. Neriza Neville and Josephina Frias, also in the minivan, were severely injured. The children's father, Edward, would later die by suicide. In this episode, we dissect this case and the controversy surrounding the sentencing and parole of Marco Muzzo, as well as better solutions to the epidemic of driving while intoxicated or under the influence. Patreon: http://www.patreon.com/DasCriminal Sources: https://bit.ly/3ygv9Fz

Donate to Every Bottom Covered: https://www.everybottomcovered.org/support-us On July 21st, 1999, the girls at the Plankinton juvenile detention boot camp in South Dakota were forced to do a 2.7 mile — or 4.3 kilometer — run. Fourteen-year-old Gina Score was having trouble. Gina had not even finished a week at the boot camp, and she almost immediately fell behind the other girls. Gina was showing signs of heat stroke — the most severe form of heat illness. Gina had several serious indicators: she was barely moving, and gasping for breath. Gina was cooking like an egg in the hot sun. Her organs were shutting down.  She lay like that for more than three hours before staff called an ambulance, but it was too late; at only fourteen years old, Gina Score was declared dead en route to the hospital.  Gina was a victim not only of the cruel staff at Plankinton who literally worked her to death, but of a juvenile criminal “justice” system that doles out ruthless punishments to children under the guise of “alternatives to prison.” The very place that claimed it would help Gina by reforming her into a model citizen murdered her. And while Plankinton itself has been investigated and shut down, most of the ingredients of the deadly recipe that killed Gina Score continue to abuse and traumatize children around the country. Patreon: www.patreon.com/dascriminal Sources: https://bit.ly/3xIznW5

On August 10th, 2021, the Dandong City court found Michael Spavor guilty of espionage and sentenced him to 11 years in prison and the payment of a fine and deportation following the sentence. Spavor was arrested alongside another Canadian, Michael Kovrig, on charges of espionage in December of 2018. The “Two Michaels,” as the cases are commonly known, have caused a stir in Canadian politics and strained Canada’s relationship with China. Many believe that the arrest of the two Michaels was a direct response by China to Canada’s arrest of Meng Wanzhou. Meng, a Chinese citizen, and executive of the massive multinational technology company Huawei, was arrested by Canadian authorities on December 1, 2018. She was stopped by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police while transiting in Vancouver International Airport.  The RCMP announced that they had detained Meng on behalf of an extradition request by the United States. The US District Court for the Eastern District of New York had issued a warrant for Meng’s arrest on August 22, 2018, and Canada has an extradition agreement with the United States. The US charged Meng with bank fraud, wire fraud, conspiracy to commit bank fraud, and conspiracy to commit wire fraud. At heart is the claim that Meng had knowingly cleared money for Huawei when it was meant for Skycomm, a Huawei subsidiary that has been dealing with Iran contrary to US sanctions.  What crimes have been committed here? Is this justice being conducted or a complicated game of international relations? Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/DasCriminal Sources: https://bit.ly/3bhoMVw

On June 4th, 2008, Jodi Arias murdered Travis Alexander — her ex, her on-again/off-again boyfriend, her friend-with-benefits, her stalking victim, or her fuck buddy, depending on how you view their relationship. Media pundits like Nancy Grace saw this as a case of a beautiful, narcissistic psychopath slaughtering her ex-boyfriend in cold blood. Arias’s defense team painted her as a woman abused. But we want to take another approach — one that recognizes the toxic nature of Jodi and Travis’s relationship while affirming that nothing in Travis’s behavior justifies his brutal death. In the words of author and activist Sarah Schulman: conflict is not abuse. Hurt feelings — even when caused by someone else’s deceit or selfishness — don’t give someone a free pass for violence. Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/DasCriminal Sources: https://bit.ly/3bhoMVw

In the early hours of December 28, 2015, Lynn Witteveen was woken up in her Haggis Drive, Peterborough home by a commotion in the kitchen. She made her way to the source of the noise just in time to see her partner, Dr. Andrew Chan, plead with his son Thomas as Thomas stabbed him to death. Thomas then turned his attention to Lynn. He stabs her multiple times, but she manages to flee to the bedroom and call 911. The operator hears Lynn plead with her partner’s son, “I love you, I love you.” Inaudible screaming follows, and then “Ah. I’m dead.” Lynn tells the dispatcher she has a knife in her head. In the background, Thomas is heard yelling.  Lynn Witteveen survived this horrific attack. Unfortunately, her partner and Thomas’s father, Andrew, did not. So, what happened? Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/DasCriminal Sources: https://bit.ly/3bhoMVw

On April 3rd, 2018, around 12:45 pm Pacific Time, someone with a grudge against YouTube went to the platform’s physical headquarters at 901 Cherry Avenue in San Bruno, California, armed with a semi-automatic pistol. That person shot and wounded three people before turning the weapon around and killing themselves with a shot to the heart. When details emerged about the YouTube attacker, social media lit up. This person didn’t conform to so many of the stereotypes we hold about mass shooters. Nasim Najafi Aghdam was vegan, a member of the Baháʼí Faith, and — exceedingly rare for lone mass shooters — a woman. Why did Nasim decide to commit such an act of violence at the YouTube headquarters before ending her own life? Join us for a look into the 2018 YouTube headquarters shooting and the life of the woman behind the attack. Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/DasCriminal Sources: https://bit.ly/3bhoMVw

At his inaugural address in 1963, Alabama Governor George Wallace infamously declared, “Segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever.” An avowed racist, he opposed the Civil Rights Movement and its mission to end legalized racial discrimination in the United States. To label him a “controversial” figure would be an injustice to the people he hated and devoted his political career to oppressing. On Monday, May 15th, 1972, at approximately four in the afternoon, Arthur Herman Bremer fired at George Wallace at point-blank range. Though seriously injured, Wallace survived the attack. But why did Bremer fire on the governor? Was this a political statement? Or, was it something else entirely? Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/DasCriminal Sources: https://bit.ly/3bhoMVw

On November 8th, 2010, three intruders entered the Pan family household in Markham, Ontario near Toronto. After stealing the cash in the home, they tied up the family's 24-year-old daughter, Jennifer, and shot her parents. Her mother, Bich, died instantly, but her father, Han, miraculously survived. When York Regional arrived at the scene, they quickly realized that not everything was as it seemed. They turned their attention toward one of the central characters in the event: Jennifer Pan herself. Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/DasCriminal Sources: https://bit.ly/3bhoMVw

On May 28th, 2014, a group of five adults and one child attempted to proselytize people in a McDonald's in Zhaoyuan, China. When a woman name Wu Shuoyan refused to give them her contact information, they beat her to death inside the restaurant. Join us for a deep dive into cults and new religious movements in China, Mao's stance on religion, the so-called Eastern Lightning sect and its female Jesus, and a family whose collective delusion eventually drove it to murder. Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/DasCriminal Sources: https://bit.ly/3bhoMVw

Between February 13 and February 15, 1945, RAF and USAAF bombers flew over the German city of Dresden, dropping hundreds of tons of incendiary and high explosive bombs over the densely populated city. Incendiary bombs caused a widespread fire that ravaged the city. All in all, the attack resulted in around 25,000 Germans killed and many more injured.  In the weeks and years that followed, the attack on Dresden would occupy a central role in the debates over Allied war crimes and whether such an operation was militarily necessary at that point in World War II. Dresden had served as a haven for refugees coming in from elsewhere in Germany, and so its destruction seemed doubly horrible. Worse, Dresden has become a rallying cry among elements of the far-right, who use it as a symbol of Allied brutality and thus the need for vengeance. Even now, 75 years later, the debate rages on over Dresden. Patreon: www.patreon.com/dascriminal Sources: https://bit.ly/3bhoMVw

This episode is upcycled from our Patreon page; it was originally published in April for our Connolly Collective. We will be back next week with a brand new episode! It is April 15th, 1989. Your club, Liverpool FC, have reached the semi-finals of the oldest club competition in the world - the FA Cup. They are due to face Nottingham Forest in the neutral venue of Hillsborough Stadium in Sheffield. Somehow, you manage to snag a couple of tickets. You go in. You are in the Leppings Lane terrace behind one of the goals. You begin to feel dizzy as bodies crush around you. Some people are yelling. Others are being pulled up from the lower tier into the upper tier by fellow fans. A few try to climb the fences that separate the stands from the football pitch but are stopped by police. Eventually, you manage to escape the crush. Ninety-four people have lost their lives that day. Another dies a few days later, and a 96th dies in 1993 after having been kept in a vegetative state since that day. You are alive, fortunately. The day after, you turn over the newspaper to find the press accusing you and your fellow fans of causing the crush. You are called hooligans and thugs. You are accused of pissing on paramedics and fighting with police. It is your fault, you are told. This is what happened on April 15th, 1989. What began as a bright Saturday with football to enjoy ended in tragedy. And it was no mere accident. At every moment of the disaster, local authorities failed to act. Moreover, they then conspired to cover-up their many failures. This cover-up ran from the Yorkshire police up to the very highest pinnacle of power: the British government. Patreon: www.patreon.com/dascriminal Sources: https://bit.ly/3bhoMVw

If you search for biographies of Marie Antoinette, most of them focus on her fashion sense, her romantic relationships, and even how some of the French tabloids published misleading stories about her, such as the infamous “Let them eat cake” line and the Diamond Necklace Affair. It’s almost as though — nearly 230 years after her execution — we’re meant to believe that Marie Antoinette was a victim of the French Revolution rather than a symbol of its grievances in the first place. So, why has Marie Antoinette’s image been sanitized in recent years? Was she simply a misunderstood aristocrat — born in the wrong place at the wrong time? Or have we, perhaps, been buying into some counter-revolutionary revisionism? Patreon: http://www.patreon.com/DasCriminal Sources: https://bit.ly/3bhoMVw

In this episode, we continue our discussion on the death of Frank Olson ― the U.S. Army biochemist who mysteriously fell out a New York City hotel window in 1953. Content warning: This episode includes discussions of drug use and possible suicide. If you feel suicidal and need to talk, Wikipedia has a list of crisis lines around the world. Please check out decolonizepalestine.com to learn more about things like greenwashing! Patreon: http://www.patreon.com/DasCriminal Sources: https://bit.ly/3bhoMVw

In the early hours of November 28th, 1953, U.S. Army biochemist Frank Olson plummeted out the window of room 1018A at the Statler Hotel in New York City. Though his colleagues first reported this as a jump or fall, details about Frank Olson's opposition to the use of bioweapons in the Korean War, his connections to the CIA's Project MKUltra, and a recent unwitting LSD trip would eventually come to light. What happened to Frank Olson? Did he fall out the window in the middle of the night? Did he have some sort of nervous breakdown and leap to his death? Or, is it possible that Frank Olson was pushed? Content warning: This episode includes discussions of drug use and possible suicide. If you feel suicidal and need to talk, Wikipedia has a list of crisis lines around the world. Patreon: http://www.patreon.com/DasCriminal Sources: https://bit.ly/3bhoMVw

On Thursday, former reality TV star and right-wing lobbyist Josh Duggar was arrested by U.S. Marshals; Friday, news broke that Duggar is charged with receiving and possessing child sexual abuse images. These aren’t the first allegations of sex crimes against children for Josh Duggar; in 2015, In Touch Weekly reported that between 2002 and 2003 — when he was 14 and 15 years old — Duggar molested five girls — four of whom are his sisters. Cable channel TLC canceled the Duggar family’s reality show, 19 Kids and Counting, after these allegations surfaced. But the series continued in the form of a spin-off, Counting On. What appears on its face to be an upbeat reality show about a large family is also a window into the all-embracing conservatism of some Christian fundamentalists in the United States. Content warning: This episode contains mentions of child sexual abuse. If you are a survivor of sexual violence and need to talk, RAINN has a 24/7 hotline at +1 800 656 4673 and a live chat at RAINN.org. Patreon: http://www.patreon.com/DasCriminal Sources: https://bit.ly/3bhoMVw

On February 17th, 2015, three teenage girls from Bethnal Green, London, boarded a flight at Gatwick Airport for Istanbul, Turkey. The schoolgirls — Amira Abase, Shamima Begum, and Kadiza Sultana — weren’t headed for a Mediterranean holiday; they were en route to Syria to join the Islamic State — otherwise known as ISIS or Daesh. The news shocked the British public. Though thousands of men — and at least dozens of women — had already traveled from Europe to Syria and Iraq to join jihadist organizations, the idea that three straight-A students would run away from home to join a terrorist syndicate seemed incomprehensible. So, why did Amira, Shamima, and Kadiza leave their relatively guarded lives in East London to join the Islamic State? What has happened to them in the meantime? And — most important to our discussion of the Syrian Civil War — what is to be done with the ISIS members who remain? Patreon: http://www.patreon.com/DasCriminal Sources: https://bit.ly/3bhoMVw

This week, we’re going to break down who is involved in Syria’s Civil War, which groups are allied with which, and clear up some common misconceptions or repetitive misinformation about the conflict. We’re mostly going to focus on the major players — namely the government forces, opposition forces, autonomous administration (sometimes erroneously called ‘the Kurds’), and the Islamic State. Patreon: http://www.patreon.com/DasCriminal Sources: https://bit.ly/3bhoMVw

On June 6th, Syrian-American blogger Amina Abdallah Arraf al Omari — known for her web page about being a lesbian in Syria titled, A Gay Girl in Damascus — was reported to have been abducted by men who appeared to be Syrian government forces. International media outlets like The Guardian picked up the story, and well-meaning LGBT activists worldwide began to organize to support her release. But as with so many threads that make up the complex web of the Syrian Civil War, Amina’s arrest and the spotlight it put on her blog began to demand more explanation. Who is Amina? What happened? And why is this story so important to our understanding of the Syrian Civil War? Patreon: http://www.patreon.com/DasCriminal Sources: https://bit.ly/3bhoMVw