Mugshot Mysteries
Some cases are solved. Most aren’t. All of them are worth talking about.Mugshot Mysteries is a true crime, paranormal, and unsolved mysteries podcast hosted by Kathryn and Gabriel — two people who take the cases seriously but not themselves. Expect deep research, psychological analysis, dark humor, and two hosts who aren’t afraid to disagree, go down rabbit holes, or call each other out when one of them starts believing in ghost pirates.Ghost ships. Serial killers. Haunted houses. Healthcare scandals. Exorcisms. If it’s unsolved, unexplained, or unforgettable, we’re putting it in the lineup.New episodes every week.
The Zodiac Killer: The Murders That Started It All Pt. 1
September 27th, 1969. A man in a homemade black executioner hood walks out of the tree line at Lake Berryessa and approaches two college students picnicking on a small island. He ties them up. Then he stabs them. Then he drives 45 minutes to a payphone and calmly reports the crime to police. He was never identified. He was never caught. This was only attack number three.
In Part 1 of their four-part series, Kathryn and Gabriel build the world the Zodiac operated in: the assassinations and riots that cracked America open in 1968, the Vietnam body count nobody could justify...
Chicago Tylenol Murders 1982: Sealed for Your Protection
September 29, 1982. A twelve-year-old girl takes one Tylenol for a sore throat and never wakes up. Six more strangers die across Chicago suburbs in three days. Same brand. Different stores. No connection except a bottle on a shelf.
Someone replaced acetaminophen with potassium cyanide at three times the lethal dose and returned the capsules to store shelves. No manifesto. No motive ever proven. No arrest. No conviction. One of America's most infamous unsolved cold cases.
Every tamper-evident seal in America exists because of this crime. The Federal Anti-Tampering Act. The Johnson and Johnson recall. The complete...
The Price of Beauty: The Assassination of Gianni Versace & the Making of a Serial Killer Pt. 2
July 15th, 1997. Gianni Versace, the man who dressed Princess Diana, Madonna, and Tupac, who built the supermodel era, who chose the face of Medusa as his logo, is shot twice on the steps of his Miami Beach mansion by a 27-year-old serial killer from San Diego named Andrew Cunanan.
Cunanan was already four murders deep into the most sensational FBI manhunt of the 1990s. And the bureau had completely failed to stop him.
In Part One, Kathryn and Gabriel built the world before the crime: Versace's rise from Reggio di Calabria to global fashion empire, th...
The Price of Beauty: The Assassination of Gianni Versace & the Making of a Serial Killer Pt. 1
July 15th, 1997. Gianni Versace, the man who dressed Princess Diana, Madonna, and Tupac, who built the supermodel era, who chose the face of Medusa as his logo, is shot twice on the steps of his Miami Beach mansion by a 27-year-old serial killer from San Diego named Andrew Cunanan.
Cunanan was already four murders deep into the most sensational FBI manhunt of the 1990s. And the bureau had completely failed to stop him.
In Part One, Kathryn and Gabriel build the world before the crime: Versace's rise from Reggio di Calabria to global fashion empire...
Lindbergh Baby Kidnapping: The Crime of the Century
March 1, 1932. The most famous man in America puts his twenty-month-old son to bed. By 10 PM, the nursery is empty. A ransom note on the windowsill. A homemade ladder against the house. The Lindbergh baby kidnapping had begun.
Charles Lindbergh was not just a celebrity. In a country devastated by the Great Depression, he was proof the American Dream still worked. Then someone took his baby.
What followed was one of history's most contaminated criminal investigations. A crime scene overrun by Lindbergh himself. Ransom negotiations in a Bronx cemetery at midnight. Fifty thousand dollars handed over...
The Circleville Letters: A Small Town Stalked by an Anonymous Killer
1977. Circleville, Ohio. An anonymous letter writer terrorizes a town for nearly two decades. Over 1,000 letters exposing affairs, corruption, and secrets. Then attempted murder.
Mary Gillispie, a school bus driver, was accused of having an affair with school superintendent Gordon Massie. Her husband Ron received threatening letters. In August 1977, Ron told his children he knew who the writer was, grabbed his gun, and left. He never came home. His truck was found wrapped around a tree with a fired gun and blood alcohol twice the legal limit. The sheriff ruled it an accident.
The letters multiplied...
The Black Dahlia: Hollywood's Most Infamous Unsolved Murder
January 9, 1947. Elizabeth Short walks into the Biltmore Hotel in Los Angeles. She paces for four hours. Makes calls. Waits. At 10 PM, someone waves through the glass doors. She walks out. Turns south on Olive Street. Forty-eight hours later, her body is found cut in half on a vacant lot.
This episode reconstructs Elizabeth Short's final 48 hours in real time. One hour of her life equals one minute of runtime. We walk backward from the moment Betty Bersinger found what she thought was a mannequin to the moment Elizabeth left the Biltmore.
Kathryn and Gabriel use...
The Flatwoods Monster: West Virginia's 1952 UFO Encounter That Terrified a Nation
September 12, 1952. Seven people climb a hill in Flatwoods, West Virginia after watching a red light streak across the sky. At the top, they encounter something ten feet tall with a spade-shaped head, glowing eyes, and a metallic body. They run in terror. Several begin vomiting.
To understand what happened, you need to understand 1952 America. The Soviets had the bomb. Boys were dying in Korea. UFOs appeared on radar over Washington DC.
Kathryn and Gabriel examine witness testimonies and Project Blue Book's barn owl conclusion. They investigate the unexplained chemical smell and what extreme fear does...
The Mothman of Point Pleasant: Prophecy, Paranoia & the Silver Bridge Collapse
November 15, 1966. Two young couples encounter a seven-foot creature with glowing red eyes and ten-foot wings at an abandoned TNT plant in Point Pleasant, West Virginia. Over the next thirteen months, more than one hundred witnesses report seeing the same impossible entity. Then, on December 15, 1967, the Silver Bridge collapses during rush hour, killing forty-six people. The sightings stop.
Was the Mothman a harbinger of disaster? A misidentified sandhill crane? Mass psychogenic illness consuming a stressed Cold War community? Or something that doesn't fit any category we have words for?
Kathryn and Gabriel investigate the original witness...
The Flannan Isles Lighthouse: Three Men Vanished Into Thin Air (1900)
Flannan Isles lighthouse keepers mystery Scotland December 1900. Three experienced keepers James Ducat, Thomas Marshall, and Donald MacArthur vanished without trace from Eilean Mor island in the Outer Hebrides. No bodies found. No distress signals. Just a stopped clock, an unlit lamp, and one missing oilskin coat. Official explanation: rogue wave swept them into the Atlantic. Locals say the island took them back. One of history's most disturbing unsolved maritime mysteries.
THE CASE
December 26, 1900. Relief keeper Joseph Moore arrives at Flannan Isles lighthouse twenty miles west of Isle of Lewis Scotland. The lighthouse is dark. He...
Hell's Belle: The Belle Gunness Story — America's Deadliest Female Serial Killer
Belle Gunness La Porte Indiana 1908. America's first prolific female serial killer. A lonely hearts scammer who lured at least 40 men to her farm with promises of marriage, poisoned them, bashed their skulls with a meat cleaver, and buried them in her hog pen. Then her farmhouse burned down with a headless woman inside five inches too short and fifty pounds too light to be Belle. Did she die in that fire or escape with a suitcase full of cash?
THE CASE
Belle Gunness born Brynhild Paulsdatter Storset in Selbu Norway moved to Chicago in 1881 and...
The Hinterkaifeck Murders: A Killer Lived in Their Attic — And No One Was Ever Caught
Germany, 1922. Footprints in the snow leading to a farmhouse. None leading back. Someone walked out of the forest toward the Gruber family home and never left. Days later, all six people inside were murdered with their own farm tool. The killer stayed for days afterward, sleeping in their beds, eating their food, feeding their animals. This is the Hinterkaifeck murders, Germany's most disturbing unsolved case.
THE CASE
On March 31, 1922, six people were brutally killed at Hinterkaifeck, an isolated farm in Bavaria, Germany. Andreas Gruber (63), his wife Cäzilia (72), their daughter Viktoria (35), her children Cäzilia (7) an...
The Enfield Poltergeist: Britain's Most Haunted House — Real Phenomenon or the Greatest Hoax Ever Told?
Britain's most documented haunted house. The true story of the Enfield Poltergeist.
August 1977, 284 Green Street, Enfield, London: 11-year-old Janet Hodgson's bed shakes. Knocking from inside walls. A police officer witnesses paranormal activity—chair slides 4 feet by itself, official report. 18 months of supernatural events: ghostly possession, levitating children, flying furniture, horrifying voice claiming to be a dead man. 30 witnesses. This is the Enfield haunting.
THE CASE: Aug 30, 1977: Bed shaking, rhythmic knocking | Furniture moves alone | Neighbors witness knocking that responds | WPC Carolyn Heeps documents paranormal activity (official police report) | Society for Psychical Research in...
The Cost of Health: The Luigi Mangione Case - From Ivy League to Death Row - (Pt. 3 of 3)
December 4, 2024, 6:44 AM. Masked shooter kills UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson. Shell casings etched: "Delay. Deny. Depose." Five days later: 26-year-old arrested at McDonald's. Ghost gun, manifesto, $10K cash in backpack. 57,000 laughing reactions. $1M defense fund. The case that divided America.
THE CRIME: Nov 24: Arrives NYC via Greyhound | Nov 30: Checks in as "Mark Rosario" | Dec 4, 6:44 AM: Shoots Thompson, gun jams, clears it, continues | Flees on e-bike through Central Park | Dec 9: Arrested Altoona McDonald's
LUIGI MANGIONE: Age 26, MD real estate family | UPenn engineering master's | Chronic back pain, spinal fusion 2023 | Withdrew from life | Missing persons...
The Cost of Health: Delay, Deny, Defend - The Insurance Denials Behind Luigi Mangione (Pt. 2 of 3)
$14.6 billion in fraud. The 2025 DOJ Takedown, the largest ever. One billion catheters billed. A couple makes $615 million from fake wound care. While the government chases criminals, insurers legally deny billions in legitimate claims. Using AI. With 90% error rates. When a UnitedHealthcare CEO was killed, 57,000 reacted with laughing emojis. This episode explains why.
WHAT WE COVER:
Criminal Fraud: Operation Gold Rush: Russian organization steals $941M using 1M stolen identities | Arizona couple: $1.2B billed, $615M received, $68M seized | 324 defendants, 96 were medical professionals | Why both government and private insurers get defrauded
"...
The Cost of Health: The Broken System That Made Luigi Mangione Inevitable (Pt. 1 of 3)
December 4, 2024. UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson is killed outside a Manhattan hotel. Bullet casings read: "Delay. Deny. Depose." UnitedHealth's Facebook post gets 62,000 reactions...57,000 are laughing emojis. Supporters raise over $1 million for the suspect's defense. How did American healthcare get so broken that tens of thousands cheered a CEO's death?
This is the 96-year history that explains the reaction.
WHAT WE COVER:
The Birth (1929-1945): Great Depression creates health insurance | Baylor Hospital's 50-cent plan for Dallas teachers | Blue Cross/Blue Shield as nonprofits | WWII wage controls tie insurance to jobs | 1942 tax...
The Mary Celeste Ghost Ship Mystery: 10 People Vanished. Only the Ship Survived.
December 4, 1872. A ship appears on the horizon. No one at the wheel. No response to signals. The boarding party finds her: the Mary Celeste, drifting 400 miles east of the Azores. Ten people vanished: a captain, his wife, their two-year-old daughter, seven experienced sailors. The cargo of 1,701 barrels sits untouched. Six months of food and water remains. Personal belongings lie undisturbed. But the lifeboat is gone. And everyone aboard has disappeared without a trace. One hundred and fifty-two years later, we still don't know why.
SOURCES: Gibraltar Vice Admiralty Court salvage inquiry records (1872-73) | Frederick Solly-Flood in...
D.B. Cooper: He Hijacked a Plane, Jumped Into a Storm, and No One Ever Found Him
The night before Thanksgiving, 1971. A man in a business suit. A bomb in a briefcase. $200,000 in twenties. And a jump into the freezing darkness over Washington state.
This week on Mugshot Mysteries, we're diving into the only unsolved air piracy case in American history, the legend of D.B. Cooper (or Dan Cooper, because the media got his name wrong from day one).
Join us as we break down how a polite, bourbon-sipping hijacker outsmarted the FBI, traumatized a flight crew with excessive courtesy, and vanished into thin air...literally. We cover copycat hijackings, mysterious...
Colonial Parkway Murders: DNA Solved 2 of 8. Who Killed the Rest?
Between 1986-1989, eight young people were murdered or vanished along Virginia's Colonial Parkway. For 37 years, families sought answers. In January 2024, DNA identified a suspect: Alan Wade Wilmer Sr., a commercial fisherman who died in 2017.
THE VICTIMS:
Cathy Thomas (27) & Rebecca Dowski (21) - Oct 1986David Knobling (20) & Robin Edwards (14) - Sept 1987Keith Call (20) & Cassandra Hailey (18) - April 1988 (still missing)Daniel Lauer (21) & Annamaria Phelps (18) - Sept 1989THE BREAKTHROUGH: January 2024: DNA links Wilmer to Knobling/Edwards murders | Also connected to Teresa Howell killing (1989) | Wilmer was "suspect number one" in 1987 but passed polygraph | FBI sought him in...
The Exorcism of Anneliese Michel: The Vatican-Approved Exorcism That Ended in Death
July 1, 1976. Bavaria, Germany. Twenty-three-year-old Anneliese Michel dies weighing 68 pounds after 67 exorcism sessions over ten months. Her parents and two Catholic priests believed they were saving her soul from demonic possession. Medical professionals believed she was a mentally ill young woman who needed psychiatric care.
This Halloween, we present both sides with equal weight—the evidence for possession and the psychological explanations—without dismissing either. We explore disturbing audio recordings, witness testimonies about simultaneous voices and unexplained knowledge, reactions to blessed objects, and predictions that came true. We also examine epilepsy, dissociative disorders, and how culture shapes mental illn...
Dyatlov Pass Incident: Nine Hikers Found Dead in the Snow. What Really Happened?
In February 1959, nine experienced Soviet hikers cut through their tent from the inside and fled into the freezing Ural Mountains wearing only underwear. When searchers found their bodies weeks later, the scene was inexplicable: one missing her tongue and eyes, two with crushed rib cages but no external wounds, clothing testing positive for radiation. The Soviet government blamed a "compelling natural force" and closed the case.
Sixty-five years later, the Dyatlov Pass Incident remains one of history's most haunting mysteries.
THE HIKERS: Igor Dyatlov (23, group leader) | Zinaida Kolmogorova (22) | Lyudmila Dubinina (20) | Alexander Kolevatov (24) | Rustem...
