December 6, 2024 • 34 mins
Today on CRU, Nancy Grace and Sheryl McCollum dive deep into the shocking murder of Brian Thompson, CEO of UnitedHealthcare, who was killed while attending a conference in New York City. They discuss the latest details of the case, including the unique choice of weapon—a whale rod with a silencer, the killer's odd behavior, and the engraved shell casings with the words 'deny,' 'defend,' and 'depose.' Nancy and Sheryl also discuss potential motives tied to the insurance industry and the suspect's methodical, yet flawed, execution of the crime.
Show Notes:
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(0:00) Welcome! Nancy and Sheryl introduce this week’s crime roundup
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(0:10) Brief background of the murder of United Healthcare CEO
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(0:30) Unique weapon used
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(4:30) Analyzing the killer's behavior
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(8:00) Comparison to Eric Rudolph’s methods
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(11:30) The killer's trail and mistakes
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(15:00) Public reaction to the murder
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(19:30) The evidence of the crime
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(23:00) Flaws within the healthcare system
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(29:00) Reflections on family and personal life
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Nancy Grace is an outspoken, tireless advocate for victims’ rights and one of television's most respected legal analysts. Nancy Grace had a perfect conviction record during her decade as a prosecutor. She is the founder and publisher of CrimeOnline.com, a crime- fighting digital platform that investigates breaking crime news, spreads awareness of missing people and shines a light on cold cases.
In addition, Crime Stories with Nancy Grace, a daily show hosted by Grace, airs on SIRIUS XM’s Triumph Channel 111 and is downloadable as a podcast on all audio platforms - https://www.crimeonline.com/
Connect with Nancy:
X: @nancygrace
Instagram: @thenancygrace
Facebook: @nancygrace
Sheryl “Mac” McCollum is an Emmy Award winning CSI, a writer for CrimeOnLine, Forensic and Crime Scene Expert for Crime Stories with Nancy Grace, and a CSI for a metro Atlanta Police Department. She is the co-author of the textbook., Cold Case: Pathways to Justice.
Connect with Sheryl:
Email: coldcase2004@gmail.com
Facebook: @sheryl.mccollum
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:06):
Welcome to the Crime Roundup. I'm Cheryl McCollum and I
am joined by the peerless Nancy grayce and y'all, we
are talking about the murder of the CEO of United
Healthcare in New York City.
Speaker 2 (00:23):
The victim, Brian Thompson, was a father.
Speaker 1 (00:27):
Of two, was in New York City for a conference.
Speaker 2 (00:32):
The weapon appears to be a well ride.
Speaker 1 (00:34):
It's a World War II weapon that has a permanent
silencer on it.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
Y'all.
Speaker 1 (00:40):
That's a British Special Forces weapon. Again, this person is
playing the part of a hitman. He's not a real hitman. Morning, honey.
Speaker 3 (00:50):
You know what, can I just tell you I have
walked that same exact spot a million times, fifty four
fifty fifth on the west side. Now over there, Cheryl,
as you know from visiting me in New York so
many times, that's where all the rich people live, you
know that, right the west side, southwest side, and uh,
(01:14):
because you know all those years at Court TV and HLN.
The hardest part is for US East Siders to try
to get over to the west side and get the
crosstown traffic, and it would actually be faster. David and
I have a joke it's like, should we take a
cab or do we have wait? How did it go?
Should should we walk or do we have time to
(01:36):
take a cab because trying to enter cross driving across
town would be so it would take an hour from
me to get from Court TV on the east side
to hill In on the west side. Anyway, so I
would pass walk exactly where this happened, which I'm sure
of sending shock waves to the upper west side. But
(01:59):
the morning what an a whole technical legal term because
all day am I I can't make it out from
his nose up I gotta have more. I was looking
at his hands, determined he was right handed. I know
that they can determine exactly how tall he is from
(02:20):
It sounds difficult, but let's just say he's standing by
a GMC a GMC, okay, a GMC, and you know
exactly how tall the GMC is, and then you extrapolate
you can figure out exactly how tall someone is. That
that's how it's done. It's not brain it's not brain surgery.
(02:42):
So we know a lot about him. We know where
he got the gun, and we know he's a free
because it's a World War two replica blah blah blah
blah blah. But then this a hole flirts with the
hostile worker who says, let me see that's SMA, and
he pulls down his mask and we see his whole face.
Speaker 1 (03:04):
I mean, really, And Nancy, I wanted to ask your
opinion about something. We don't often get a calling card.
It happens, but they're rare, so when they do happen,
I tend to focus on that. And this person, this killer,
carved words into the shellcasings deny, defend, depose.
Speaker 2 (03:32):
What do you make of that?
Speaker 3 (03:34):
Well, they're taken almost verbatim from the title of a
book which we talked about on Crime Stories. It's the
book decrying the insurance industry. And this guy, I don't
think that he came up with the algorithm himself, but
he advanced the use of an algorithm that denied people's claims.
(03:57):
And can I tell you my dad, as you know,
was a heart patient. He started he had his first
coronary thrombosis when I was just a girl. And he
managed to live till eighty seven, and he was in
and of the hospital. He had two open heart surgeries.
(04:20):
He was airlifted to University of Alabama because his state
was so fragile even Emery wouldn't take him. And I
mean he had stints. He had as I call him
Rodeo routers. He kind just everything you could possibly think of.
And we would be on pins and needles waiting to
(04:41):
see what the insurance company was going to cover. He
was lucky. He worn't with Norfolk Southern his whole life.
And I'm a freight agent and so he had great insurance.
But we would be on pins and needles. I mean
there he is working for the railroad and my mom
a payroll clerk with us in school. You know, we
wouldn't have been devastated. We would have lost our house
(05:05):
that my grandfather built. We would have, you know, because
of insurance. And do you know that this morning, across
the country, it's really freaky. I'll get back to him
flirting in a moment. I mean, really, a man flirting
and shows his face and he's about to go commit
a murder. Really, you gotta get you just have to
(05:27):
have Starbucks and a bottle of water and candy before
you murder somebody. But now all across the country, these
sick tributes are appearing even outside the hotel where he
was gunned down. These tributes there people are happy. Well,
there was a balloon outside the hotel this morning and
(05:50):
taped to the balloon and said CEO down over the
image of a smiling star, and party poppers were found outside.
That's outside the Hilton Hotel in Midtown.
Speaker 1 (06:02):
Well, I knew some folks were going to make him
out to be some Robin Hood. But you know, like
I told my children when they were little, Robin.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
Hood's a criminal. He stole from people.
Speaker 3 (06:11):
Bottom line, I'm not going to get into Robinhood with
you because I have my own thoughts on that and
they are quite divergent from yours. But in this, I mean,
this is the cold blooded murder of a father and
a lot it's been made about this stranged wife, and
I mean you do have to look at her. Of
course you have to look at her. I mean, there's strange.
(06:31):
I live in two mega mansions less than a mile apart,
but they seem to be to have been getting along
fairly well. And of course you have to point out,
you have to it's part of any investigation that she
may very well have known his itinerary. But it ain't
hard to find your Oh my goodness, your Rubbi GoF
on Mes said, ain't. But because even I just it
(06:56):
took me less than thirty seconds to go online and
where the entire day was laid out online for that
executive forum. And you know how rich people are. They
love free food, anything free. I mean, you know, so
you know he was over there at that breakfast, that's
(07:17):
where he was going. Predictable.
Speaker 2 (07:20):
There are some things that you think was this a hit?
Speaker 1 (07:24):
And then there are other things that make you think, no,
this was a single person that has targeted this victim.
Speaker 3 (07:30):
It's not a hit. Oh he's not a pro. He's
not a pro. What a pro wants to get in
and get out? Why would you go to the trouble?
What did you take it to Cave Jewelers and have
the bulletsing grave? For Pete's sake? Why would you leave
a calling card? Pros don't want to get caught. They
don't even that's just gone. You never see them. This
guy's a deer in the headlights right for the surreillance
(07:52):
exactly because there's twenty six thousand cameras, literally twenty five
five hundred surrellance cameras in Manhattan alone. I think he
caught most of them.
Speaker 1 (08:03):
Agreed, a pro would have done a kill shot. It
would have been for the neck up. He wouldn't have
had to fire twice and he hit him in the
leg and hit him in the leg. And a pro
wouldn't have sent letters of warning beforehand, and there wouldn't
have been any messages on the shellcasing. So for me,
this kind of rings to like DC Sniper or Eric
Robert Rudolph.
Speaker 2 (08:24):
This seems revengeful.
Speaker 1 (08:26):
This seems like somebody next level that is sitting at
home in their basement, you know, engraving these shellcasings because
they are so angry.
Speaker 3 (08:35):
And you do know he took a greathound bus from
our home the atl Correct.
Speaker 1 (08:41):
I was going to ask you that too, because again
he did some planning, just like Eric Robert Rudolph. He thought, Okay,
I'm not going to take a plane because I want
to take a gun, the gun that I've selected. So
he thought, I'll take a bus. I'll stay at a
hostel with a fake ID. They'll never know who I am,
they'll never track me down.
Speaker 3 (09:00):
Yeah, other than that fingerprint I left on my candy
wrapper waits and the water bottle at the Zillbron and
now we're willing to cell phone may not be a burner,
it may actually be his phone.
Speaker 2 (09:14):
And y'all, I'm going.
Speaker 1 (09:15):
To go back to Eric Robert Rudolf for a second,
because he did a lot of planet He did a
lot of research and building of those bombs. Before the
Olympic Park bombing, he had his plan to escape when
he hit that Nanda Hala forest.
Speaker 2 (09:29):
Natany would like to have never found him. It took
seven years. You know.
Speaker 3 (09:32):
I've got it in for Rudolph, right because number one,
I were at the Olympic bombing that night, was until
four am with our friend Al Dixon taking witness statements.
And then when he set off the simultaneous bombs at
the abortion clinic, some of that shrapnel actually hit my investigator.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
I mean, we'll all never get over that, you know.
But here's the deal.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
When you watch him when that gun jams and he's
able to stay with it, clear and then re engage,
he does have some knowledge of that weapon.
Speaker 2 (10:04):
There's no question. Still not a pro.
Speaker 3 (10:07):
Goodness now, and that taking the pro stans. I mean,
I've always been watching too many movies. What does this
guy do for a living? How can he be gone
this long from work and or family? I mean, which
tells me he probably doesn't have one. And again, in
(10:29):
playing to his vanity, he flirts with the clerk at
the hostile the youth hostel, and that's how we end
up seeing his whole face I mean, and his big smile.
Just his behavior before is I don't know, I find
(10:52):
it irreconcilable with what he did. This guy hanging out
at Starbucks drinking a bottle of water got to have
his candy fix, leaving behind a cell phone, and there's
now a video of him coming up off the underground
subway and walking almost jauntily to the murder. And then
(11:12):
he is a flirty moment with a hostile clerk just oh,
which ends up with us getting its full on face.
Speaker 1 (11:20):
If you know that guy, that is obvious who it is,
if you know it.
Speaker 2 (11:26):
So I'm really kind of surprised we don't already have
a name.
Speaker 3 (11:30):
The better up the.
Speaker 1 (11:30):
Reward, agreed, And you know, we have a rule in
crime scene investigation. The more the person has to do,
like the bus ticket, the hostile, the fake ID, the
cell phone, the more mistakes they're gonna make. And this guy,
you know, I'm assuming Atlanta might be the original you
(11:52):
know place that he was at, but who knows where
you know, where he came from from there, So again
I believe they will have a name today.
Speaker 3 (12:02):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I agree with you. But you gotta
have something to compare with the Layton print. Layton print
as the print left at the scene, like on the window,
on the murder weapon, on the protein bar wrapper we
heard it was candy, could be protein bar on the
water bottle that he bought from Starbucks just before the shooting.
(12:25):
But if he's not in the system aphis, if he's
not in the DNA data bag or the fingerprint system,
we don't have anything we can use to get a
comparison and get a name. So I don't know that
this guy has any record, he's got anything. I'm wondering
if it's something like traffic infraction, something like that. He
(12:47):
doesn't seem to me like an armed robber with a
rap sheet, see what I mean?
Speaker 2 (12:53):
I do.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
I keep going back to DC Sniper and Eric Rudol.
That's how this guy comes off to me. And he's
done enough research and maybe he knows enough things that yes,
he's mad at the insurance companies. Then that book's going
to resonate with him.
Speaker 2 (13:09):
Writing on bullets.
Speaker 1 (13:10):
Well, I mean people know about that, from the Civil
War to the mafia to you know, the armed services
where they write on bombs. I mean that's been done.
I mean people have written on you know, shewcasings.
Speaker 3 (13:22):
And he's got a lot of alone time.
Speaker 2 (13:25):
He's got a lot of a loone time.
Speaker 1 (13:28):
And again his anger is his because to me, the
last word to pose, that's the key. To me, that's
his motive right there. Deposed to me, there's two things.
You're either testifying so that means he had a fail
suit against maybe an insurance company, and the other deposed
(13:51):
of course, is being removed from office. So when he
changed that one word, that to me.
Speaker 2 (13:57):
Is his motive.
Speaker 3 (13:58):
I'm just thinking about what you said, all the steps
he took, all the pre planning, and as you said, correctly,
the more steps, the more planning, the more likely it
is you will't make a mistake. This guy had to
make a mistake, just like we saw. Anikobayashi really was
(14:20):
found out after she went to a Greyhound bus station
and used her passport to get from la all the
way to Santa Sedro and then on to Mexico. This
guy took a bus. Now, of course you don't. It's
not as tight at a bus station as it is
like an airport regarding ID But she was leaving the
(14:42):
country and had to show her passport. This guy, I
don't think you have to show any idea to get
a bus ticket.
Speaker 2 (14:51):
Nope.
Speaker 3 (14:52):
So but we're going to find him. We're going to
find video of him at bus station. That means we're
going to find out how he got to the breast station.
Does he have a rental car, did he leave a
car somewhere? Did he take an uber? I mean, when
you think back along his trump it's gonna they're going
to find him.
Speaker 1 (15:16):
If that's where he originated from, was Atlanta, he either
had to leave a car there, take an uber there,
have somebody drop him off.
Speaker 2 (15:24):
And I'm gonna tell you something.
Speaker 1 (15:25):
I took a bus one time from Atlanta to Valdosta
to visit with my sisters at Valdosta State. That's the
longest ride I've ever had in my life that I've
driven across the country. A bus from Atlanta to New York.
He chatted up somebody.
Speaker 3 (15:42):
Yeah, there's a video of him. We are going to
find out who he is. I took the greyhound bus
from making to Athens a lot to see Keith, and
I didn't have a bad experience. But Atlanta to New York,
all those stops along the way, all those rural route stops,
(16:05):
some of them just on the side of the road.
Somebody just be standing on the side of the road
and the bus stops. It's like, how did you know that?
Out in the middle of nowhere.
Speaker 1 (16:14):
And if he's flirting with the clerk at the hostel,
he was flirting with somebody on that bus because he
was on that bus a long time.
Speaker 3 (16:22):
Well, another thing I noticed. I think he's hand Orthodonia.
Did you look at a smile yep, his teeth are perfect.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
Yeah. And he's got a little bit of money. I
mean the backpack getting cheap. He didn't look tight.
Speaker 3 (16:32):
One hundred dollars seventy nine dollars that's tried.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
His jacket looked brand new. I mean he's got one.
Speaker 3 (16:38):
For thirty dollars at Walmart. I know that's right. That's
an expensive photography backpack he's got going on. So he
bought a particular backpack that he thought would blend in
that he could use to store the gun in the AMMO,
and then his probable change of clothes. I think he
took the e bank to Central Park, hustled through Central Park.
(17:03):
Maybe she had clothes. You remember that bank robbery I
had where the guy came out of the bank. It
was OLC and s bank came out of the bank.
He had he had was wearing a quote sewed on suit.
He yanked it off, it just based it up the back,
took off his hat, his wig, his mustache, his fake beard,
threw it all down. Underneath. He had on a pair
(17:25):
of shorts, short shorts, tall athletic socks, and he hopped
on a bike and just pedaled off. As the sirens approached.
This guy on an e bank, I think he dumped
it somewhere in the park, switched clothes and got on
another subway and got out of there. But he would
(17:46):
have kept that backpack in the same shoes, And it's cold,
so I don't know if he kept the same coat,
an army style coat.
Speaker 2 (17:54):
He thought he was going to look like any other
bike messenger.
Speaker 3 (17:59):
Now we're he It may not have been a city bike.
I wonder if he was so I wonder if he
did use a city bike, if you use a credit card,
for beat's sake. But that said, I mean, he did
everything wrong, but he hey, hey, got to give him credit.
He's made this far, that's right.
Speaker 1 (18:14):
But you know, New York City is one of the
best police departments in the world. They've got a lot
of help with the Feds. I'm telling you, we're gonna
know today.
Speaker 3 (18:23):
Okay, So how long do you give it till they
get him.
Speaker 1 (18:27):
They'll know the name by one o'clock today, and I
think he'll be in custody pretty quick.
Speaker 3 (18:31):
You're getting pretty bold. Do you know the thing about
this guy, I'm the victim. He's a father of two boys.
You know, we're talking about the healthcare system and how
it sucks and how it screws people over. Ah, that's true,
and he was right in there, But he's also the
father of two boys.
Speaker 1 (18:50):
Nancy, bottom line, doesn't matter what your anger is towards somebody,
what your feeling is that you may deserve so or
need something, or you know, something happened. Let's say there
was an illness or a traumatic injury that was something
you did not do. You didn't cause it. It happened
(19:11):
to you, and you don't want to be destitute because
of that. I understand all of that. You still can't
murder somebody. So it's just like you know people say,
with you know Trump, it doesn't matter if you love
him or hate him, you don't shoot the man on
the stage. Murder is just something I'm going to be
against every single time.
Speaker 2 (19:33):
There's no debate. To me, there's no gray area, period.
Speaker 3 (19:38):
Can I get you down out of the pulpit for
a minute and talk about the evidence. What about the
fake New Jersey driver's license. I wonder if the idiot
got it online. Have you ever looked online fake driver's license?
They're really easy to get. I don't want to give
you ideas, but I wonder how we got that fake
Jersey driver's license. So he's on a Greyhound coming from
Atlanta to New York. He's got a fake Jersey license.
(20:01):
I mean, he really has left a trail.
Speaker 2 (20:04):
He's left a big trail. We've got his being of bread.
For Lord's sakes, we're going.
Speaker 3 (20:08):
To have that.
Speaker 1 (20:09):
He had dinner somewhere in New York the night before.
I mean, he's on video.
Speaker 3 (20:16):
I'm going to tell you something. The whole phrase, delay,
deny defend. Okay, now the bullets say delay is deposed,
but delay deny defend is apparently a popular phrase in
the insurance industry. How they get out of paying people
(20:38):
delay deny and then defend.
Speaker 1 (20:41):
Right, absolutely one hundred. That's why I'm saying him changing
that one word.
Speaker 2 (20:47):
He played his hand right there.
Speaker 3 (20:48):
Yeah, deposed.
Speaker 1 (20:50):
When they catch him and when they inevitably interview him,
I guarantee that investigator is going to hammer that right there.
He met with him, He'll say, buddy, I get it.
Like you know, my sister Shelley had a traumatic injury
two years ago.
Speaker 3 (21:06):
Wait, can we talk about it for a moment, because
when you say that, everybody wants to know what it was.
Speaker 1 (21:11):
It is awful. She fell backwards into an empty swimming pool,
and I mean it could have killed her. It's not
for her trying to catch herself on the side of
the pool, which broke her left arm, but it also
corrected her enough. She didn't hit head first, but he
broke both feet, both hills, both apples.
Speaker 3 (21:32):
She fall.
Speaker 1 (21:33):
She was looking forward and telling one sister, you know,
things about the landscape, like where she would put this
flower or a palm tree or something else, and she
just walked backwards while she was talking, like trying to
get the overall.
Speaker 2 (21:48):
View, and just walked right off the earth. That's all
there was to it.
Speaker 1 (21:54):
But again, the first thing they did was deny all
her claims, so they had to fight for that. And
you know, my sister, she has been, you know, fighting
leukemia for years.
Speaker 2 (22:05):
That's just part of it. It's almost like the game.
Speaker 3 (22:08):
My beloved sister, her husband who just passed away, fought
MS for thirty years. He was diagnosed when I had
been out of law school just a year or two.
And Cheryl, he was so brilliant. They met at the
(22:30):
Wharton School, as you know. My sister's a professor there,
and he was getting his MBA and on top of
taking care of him and working full time and raising
two children. I'm sure she had to fight with the
insurance company. It's just it's a full time job. I know,
with my mother having her living with us, it's a
(22:53):
full time job. Just trying to keep off her doctor
appointments straight and which reminds me and she wants some
more coffee. Okay, that's said. That said, he and Lucy
definitely rule the roots. I'm fine with that. I have
a problem with it. It's a full time job, and
(23:14):
I'm just thinking about people out there suffering a catastrophic
illness or or injury like your sister, like both of
your sisters, and also the full time job of fighting
with the insurance company. But that phrase deny, delay, defend, wait, delay, deny, defend,
(23:37):
and that they actually there's a book written about that,
about how awful the insurance industry is. But why this guy?
Why Thompson? Why Brian Thompson. Yeah, I mean he's the
CEO of United Healthcare, so obviously he's a titular figurehead.
But why him? Did he have a peicure involvement in
(24:01):
a case? I don't think so's And there's that algorithm
with which he was associated to deny claims. I don't know,
but I know this. What I do know is criminal.
On how to prove the case that fake ID that
travel on Greyhound the self phone, I mean it's a
(24:23):
matter of time. This guy would have to be out
of the country or really laying low like Rudolph did.
Speaker 1 (24:28):
And Nancy, I know you, and can you imagine when
they talk with the young lady at the hostel. What
did he say to her? Did he say, oh, you
make me smile? And she says, let me see that smile?
Like what prompt did that?
Speaker 3 (24:45):
And I wonder if he had a Southern accent.
Speaker 1 (24:47):
See there he goes, she's going to be able to
tell them, but I know you and you would be
able to tell that jury. Right before he murdered this
man in cold blood on a street, he was flirting with.
Speaker 2 (25:00):
Her and said, and you'll have that phrase.
Speaker 3 (25:03):
You know another thing about this guy? As Thompson crumpled
up against a wall, that Sheeter walked right toward him
and seemingly pointing the gun at him one more time.
Then he walked away and he only started to run
as he was crossing the street. He kept very very calm.
Speaker 1 (25:28):
You remember when Eric Robert Rudolph called now one one
before the bomb went off, there's a bomb.
Speaker 2 (25:33):
In Centennial Park. You have twenty minutes, that's it. And
he walked away, same thing, just walked away.
Speaker 3 (25:41):
And I've always wondered why did he even do that.
Speaker 1 (25:43):
He made the call so that first responders would rush there,
so more would be hurt, and just like this guy,
supposedly he said all.
Speaker 2 (25:52):
Kind of warnings that he was going to do it again.
Not a pro but that's the reason.
Speaker 1 (25:57):
They, to your point, have to look at the wall
or the ex wife, are their letters, are their emails
or their phone calls?
Speaker 2 (26:05):
Is there any proof that happened? What is the proof?
What's the word? You know? Again? You know, did he
use the word aim? Did he use something that.
Speaker 1 (26:14):
Is regional that they're going to be able to say?
And now we've got a handwrite, And now we've maybe
got a bogus email address.
Speaker 2 (26:20):
Or some Gmail that we can trace back. I'm just
telling you, every step you make you leave betrayal. You know.
Speaker 3 (26:30):
One thing I want to point out is I've seen
conflicting reports, and early this morning I was reading the
Times and they refer only to deny and defend. They
don't include the word deposed. So I'm wondering if but
more outlets say include include deposed, more outlets to include deposed.
(26:55):
So I don't know if all three words were there,
but any at all tell me a lot about his personality.
Speaker 1 (27:02):
Well, we know there's three casings because he's shotting twice
and got jammed and he cleared it. So there's I
would imagine there are absolutely three, and.
Speaker 3 (27:11):
I's he wrote all three words on every bullet.
Speaker 2 (27:14):
I want that gun and see what the other one say.
Speaker 3 (27:17):
Well, I agree with that. Yeah, I'm giving you a
hard time, but you're right.
Speaker 2 (27:20):
Yeah, that's all I'm saying.
Speaker 3 (27:21):
Well, Hey, can I just say I kind of miss
the wagon wheel salad I know, right, what was the
name of that place, Mountain Jack, Mountain Jacks. Yes, the
salad wheel, y'all.
Speaker 1 (27:38):
I've never had anything like it, never seen any kind
of display like it.
Speaker 3 (27:43):
But I was disappointed in one way. I thought they
were going to leave the salad wheel at the table
with me, yakay, and I can just eat it. They
came and you had to pick what you wanted off.
It's actually like a wagon wheel with different salad toy, says,
and then they make your salad out of what's on
the wagon wheel. I loved it. I was, you know,
(28:07):
fixated on the salad wheel and actually threw a little
hissy fit when they wouldn't bring the salad wheel to
the bar. So that was the only thing. Not that
I want to be photographed sitting at a bar, because
that has happened before.
Speaker 2 (28:17):
I understood.
Speaker 3 (28:18):
But that said, the wagon wheel Okay, so that's all
I'm saying. I'm going to leave on that note, you
know another, but let me ask you something. Speaking of
Mountain Jackson Delphi, I'm thinking about Libby in Abbey's family
because after the trial and things start to settle down,
(28:40):
and then that hoopla is over and your left with
this empty house. I've been there. I know what it
feels like. So I'm just thinking about them a lot
and what they're going through right now. You know, everyone
was thinking about them and contacting them and reaching out
to them during the trial. It's just flat and I
(29:02):
wonder how.
Speaker 2 (29:02):
They're doing well.
Speaker 1 (29:04):
I did text with Kelsey over Thanksgiving and they're doing
the best they can.
Speaker 2 (29:10):
You know them as well as anybody. They are strong.
Speaker 1 (29:13):
And nothing, nothing in this world. Heals better than a baby.
And I think her fixing to have that second baby.
Speaker 2 (29:23):
That's going to be their focus.
Speaker 3 (29:25):
We need to have another baby, Cheryl, do you want here?
Speaker 2 (29:28):
I would in a heartbeat. Let's do it. I would too.
Speaker 3 (29:31):
I would too. David has given me like the biggest
heory eyeball ever. He's like, no, you know, I wanted
four children and he wanted like maybe one. So I
got two. So I'm lucky. I'm gonna run with it.
Speaker 1 (29:48):
Yours are so brilliant and so accomplished and so amazing.
I mean, Nancy think every level they have been successful,
whether it's academics or sports or community service. I mean,
they are tremendous people. I just feel like you're gonna
bounce back and forth from dorm room to dorm room.
Speaker 3 (30:08):
Just I can only pray. Did I tell you what
their Eagle Scout projects are?
Speaker 2 (30:13):
No?
Speaker 3 (30:14):
Okay, I love the way you act like you're interested,
but I'm going to take that and go with it.
Speaker 1 (30:18):
Let me tell you, not only am I interested, I'm
so freaking impressed by that because they've been doing this
so long and they're going to get, you know, a
letter from the President.
Speaker 2 (30:28):
I mean, an Eagle Scout is a huge accomplishment.
Speaker 3 (30:31):
Okay, hey, do you want to hear first? Lisier? John David,
John David, Okay, John David. He is hand making and
this is not from a kit, which'll might just get
a kit from home. Depaut. He's like, no, I might
loas You's only no, he's handmaking it U And we
spent oh gosh, I don't know how many hours last
(30:53):
weekend painting boards in the carport. He is handmaking benches
out of two by four and they're going to be
near our little Methodist church, but in a spot where
the parking lot is used as a hub for how
do I say work employee transit buses. Say you go
(31:17):
that parking lot and then a transit bus will pick
you up, you know, like a Ford transit bus will
pick you up and take you to your job at
the hospital, okay, or it will take you to your
job at the mall or wherever your job is. There
are people that don't have cars that have to take
a bus to this location and then they sit there
(31:40):
and wait for their employer transit bus to come pick
them up and take them to their job. So those
people have a very long commute, okay. So he's making
a bench for that. He's making a bench for near
a handicap ramp where people come down off that ramp
and if their ride's not there, they may not be
(32:01):
able to stand. So he's been putting a bench right there.
And he's making another bench for pickup and drop off
for a little children at a pre k And there's
a fourth bench, but I don't know where it's going
just at this moment, but I'm just step out of him.
For people that can't just pop in their Audie or
(32:23):
their Volvo and take off to work in the morning
and their climate controlled you know, sound system.
Speaker 1 (32:30):
And the reason I wanted to ask about his is
I saw him working on the back of his truck,
standing and measuring.
Speaker 3 (32:35):
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, And yes, I'm gonna make him
wear safety goggles. He had them. I got them for him,
but I turned my back and he took them off.
And then of course I saw the perfect photo and
I can't be bothered with safety goggle. But yes he
has safety goggles. At least. See my little rescious sweet
flower she is and I may call on you. You're
(33:00):
gain to help. She is hand making one hundred please,
full size like double bedsized blankets for the homeless to
hand out in the winter months, probably in January one hundred.
Part of the whole Eagle thing is you can't just
(33:22):
make your family do it. You have to lead your
troop or other groups. You have to solicit them, enlist them,
and arrange these work times like you've got a work
crew and create. You can't just do it on your own.
You have to have group effort. That's part of it,
(33:42):
the leadership part. So it's a big undertaking. I think
I should have my eagle for Pete's sake. But I
just want to tell you something else. You know, when
I grew up doing four h which we loved in
you know, rural Georgia, but girls can he eagles, then
that's something called silver skirt out or something like that.
(34:04):
But now girls can be eagle. I am so proud
of Lucy. I don't know what to do.
Speaker 2 (34:08):
I am so proud. It's so impressive.
Speaker 3 (34:11):
Well, it's just that when we knock on some wood
to make sure that they both get through. That got
the dog going, Okay, I gotta go. I got bad
people to put.
Speaker 2 (34:19):
In jail right behind you, sugar. People love love you,
love you,
Welcome to the Crime Roundup. I'm Cheryl McCollum and I
am joined by the peerless Nancy grayce and y'all, we
are talking about the murder of the CEO of United
Healthcare in New York City.
Speaker 2 (00:23):
The victim, Brian Thompson, was a father.
Speaker 1 (00:27):
Of two, was in New York City for a conference.
Speaker 2 (00:32):
The weapon appears to be a well ride.
Speaker 1 (00:34):
It's a World War II weapon that has a permanent
silencer on it.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
Y'all.
Speaker 1 (00:40):
That's a British Special Forces weapon. Again, this person is
playing the part of a hitman. He's not a real hitman. Morning, honey.
Speaker 3 (00:50):
You know what, can I just tell you I have
walked that same exact spot a million times, fifty four
fifty fifth on the west side. Now over there, Cheryl,
as you know from visiting me in New York so
many times, that's where all the rich people live, you
know that, right the west side, southwest side, and uh,
(01:14):
because you know all those years at Court TV and HLN.
The hardest part is for US East Siders to try
to get over to the west side and get the
crosstown traffic, and it would actually be faster. David and
I have a joke it's like, should we take a
cab or do we have wait? How did it go?
Should should we walk or do we have time to
(01:36):
take a cab because trying to enter cross driving across
town would be so it would take an hour from
me to get from Court TV on the east side
to hill In on the west side. Anyway, so I
would pass walk exactly where this happened, which I'm sure
of sending shock waves to the upper west side. But
(01:59):
the morning what an a whole technical legal term because
all day am I I can't make it out from
his nose up I gotta have more. I was looking
at his hands, determined he was right handed. I know
that they can determine exactly how tall he is from
(02:20):
It sounds difficult, but let's just say he's standing by
a GMC a GMC, okay, a GMC, and you know
exactly how tall the GMC is, and then you extrapolate
you can figure out exactly how tall someone is. That
that's how it's done. It's not brain it's not brain surgery.
(02:42):
So we know a lot about him. We know where
he got the gun, and we know he's a free
because it's a World War two replica blah blah blah
blah blah. But then this a hole flirts with the
hostile worker who says, let me see that's SMA, and
he pulls down his mask and we see his whole face.
Speaker 1 (03:04):
I mean, really, And Nancy, I wanted to ask your
opinion about something. We don't often get a calling card.
It happens, but they're rare, so when they do happen,
I tend to focus on that. And this person, this killer,
carved words into the shellcasings deny, defend, depose.
Speaker 2 (03:32):
What do you make of that?
Speaker 3 (03:34):
Well, they're taken almost verbatim from the title of a
book which we talked about on Crime Stories. It's the
book decrying the insurance industry. And this guy, I don't
think that he came up with the algorithm himself, but
he advanced the use of an algorithm that denied people's claims.
(03:57):
And can I tell you my dad, as you know,
was a heart patient. He started he had his first
coronary thrombosis when I was just a girl. And he
managed to live till eighty seven, and he was in
and of the hospital. He had two open heart surgeries.
(04:20):
He was airlifted to University of Alabama because his state
was so fragile even Emery wouldn't take him. And I
mean he had stints. He had as I call him
Rodeo routers. He kind just everything you could possibly think of.
And we would be on pins and needles waiting to
(04:41):
see what the insurance company was going to cover. He
was lucky. He worn't with Norfolk Southern his whole life.
And I'm a freight agent and so he had great insurance.
But we would be on pins and needles. I mean
there he is working for the railroad and my mom
a payroll clerk with us in school. You know, we
wouldn't have been devastated. We would have lost our house
(05:05):
that my grandfather built. We would have, you know, because
of insurance. And do you know that this morning, across
the country, it's really freaky. I'll get back to him
flirting in a moment. I mean, really, a man flirting
and shows his face and he's about to go commit
a murder. Really, you gotta get you just have to
(05:27):
have Starbucks and a bottle of water and candy before
you murder somebody. But now all across the country, these
sick tributes are appearing even outside the hotel where he
was gunned down. These tributes there people are happy. Well,
there was a balloon outside the hotel this morning and
(05:50):
taped to the balloon and said CEO down over the
image of a smiling star, and party poppers were found outside.
That's outside the Hilton Hotel in Midtown.
Speaker 1 (06:02):
Well, I knew some folks were going to make him
out to be some Robin Hood. But you know, like
I told my children when they were little, Robin.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
Hood's a criminal. He stole from people.
Speaker 3 (06:11):
Bottom line, I'm not going to get into Robinhood with
you because I have my own thoughts on that and
they are quite divergent from yours. But in this, I mean,
this is the cold blooded murder of a father and
a lot it's been made about this stranged wife, and
I mean you do have to look at her. Of
course you have to look at her. I mean, there's strange.
(06:31):
I live in two mega mansions less than a mile apart,
but they seem to be to have been getting along
fairly well. And of course you have to point out,
you have to it's part of any investigation that she
may very well have known his itinerary. But it ain't
hard to find your Oh my goodness, your Rubbi GoF
on Mes said, ain't. But because even I just it
(06:56):
took me less than thirty seconds to go online and
where the entire day was laid out online for that
executive forum. And you know how rich people are. They
love free food, anything free. I mean, you know, so
you know he was over there at that breakfast, that's
(07:17):
where he was going. Predictable.
Speaker 2 (07:20):
There are some things that you think was this a hit?
Speaker 1 (07:24):
And then there are other things that make you think, no,
this was a single person that has targeted this victim.
Speaker 3 (07:30):
It's not a hit. Oh he's not a pro. He's
not a pro. What a pro wants to get in
and get out? Why would you go to the trouble?
What did you take it to Cave Jewelers and have
the bulletsing grave? For Pete's sake? Why would you leave
a calling card? Pros don't want to get caught. They
don't even that's just gone. You never see them. This
guy's a deer in the headlights right for the surreillance
(07:52):
exactly because there's twenty six thousand cameras, literally twenty five
five hundred surrellance cameras in Manhattan alone. I think he
caught most of them.
Speaker 1 (08:03):
Agreed, a pro would have done a kill shot. It
would have been for the neck up. He wouldn't have
had to fire twice and he hit him in the
leg and hit him in the leg. And a pro
wouldn't have sent letters of warning beforehand, and there wouldn't
have been any messages on the shellcasing. So for me,
this kind of rings to like DC Sniper or Eric
Robert Rudolph.
Speaker 2 (08:24):
This seems revengeful.
Speaker 1 (08:26):
This seems like somebody next level that is sitting at
home in their basement, you know, engraving these shellcasings because
they are so angry.
Speaker 3 (08:35):
And you do know he took a greathound bus from
our home the atl Correct.
Speaker 1 (08:41):
I was going to ask you that too, because again
he did some planning, just like Eric Robert Rudolph. He thought, Okay,
I'm not going to take a plane because I want
to take a gun, the gun that I've selected. So
he thought, I'll take a bus. I'll stay at a
hostel with a fake ID. They'll never know who I am,
they'll never track me down.
Speaker 3 (09:00):
Yeah, other than that fingerprint I left on my candy
wrapper waits and the water bottle at the Zillbron and
now we're willing to cell phone may not be a burner,
it may actually be his phone.
Speaker 2 (09:14):
And y'all, I'm going.
Speaker 1 (09:15):
To go back to Eric Robert Rudolf for a second,
because he did a lot of planet He did a
lot of research and building of those bombs. Before the
Olympic Park bombing, he had his plan to escape when
he hit that Nanda Hala forest.
Speaker 2 (09:29):
Natany would like to have never found him. It took
seven years. You know.
Speaker 3 (09:32):
I've got it in for Rudolph, right because number one,
I were at the Olympic bombing that night, was until
four am with our friend Al Dixon taking witness statements.
And then when he set off the simultaneous bombs at
the abortion clinic, some of that shrapnel actually hit my investigator.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
I mean, we'll all never get over that, you know.
But here's the deal.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
When you watch him when that gun jams and he's
able to stay with it, clear and then re engage,
he does have some knowledge of that weapon.
Speaker 2 (10:04):
There's no question. Still not a pro.
Speaker 3 (10:07):
Goodness now, and that taking the pro stans. I mean,
I've always been watching too many movies. What does this
guy do for a living? How can he be gone
this long from work and or family? I mean, which
tells me he probably doesn't have one. And again, in
(10:29):
playing to his vanity, he flirts with the clerk at
the hostile the youth hostel, and that's how we end
up seeing his whole face I mean, and his big smile.
Just his behavior before is I don't know, I find
(10:52):
it irreconcilable with what he did. This guy hanging out
at Starbucks drinking a bottle of water got to have
his candy fix, leaving behind a cell phone, and there's
now a video of him coming up off the underground
subway and walking almost jauntily to the murder. And then
(11:12):
he is a flirty moment with a hostile clerk just oh,
which ends up with us getting its full on face.
Speaker 1 (11:20):
If you know that guy, that is obvious who it is,
if you know it.
Speaker 2 (11:26):
So I'm really kind of surprised we don't already have
a name.
Speaker 3 (11:30):
The better up the.
Speaker 1 (11:30):
Reward, agreed, And you know, we have a rule in
crime scene investigation. The more the person has to do,
like the bus ticket, the hostile, the fake ID, the
cell phone, the more mistakes they're gonna make. And this guy,
you know, I'm assuming Atlanta might be the original you
(11:52):
know place that he was at, but who knows where
you know, where he came from from there, So again
I believe they will have a name today.
Speaker 3 (12:02):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I agree with you. But you gotta
have something to compare with the Layton print. Layton print
as the print left at the scene, like on the window,
on the murder weapon, on the protein bar wrapper we
heard it was candy, could be protein bar on the
water bottle that he bought from Starbucks just before the shooting.
(12:25):
But if he's not in the system aphis, if he's
not in the DNA data bag or the fingerprint system,
we don't have anything we can use to get a
comparison and get a name. So I don't know that
this guy has any record, he's got anything. I'm wondering
if it's something like traffic infraction, something like that. He
(12:47):
doesn't seem to me like an armed robber with a
rap sheet, see what I mean?
Speaker 2 (12:53):
I do.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
I keep going back to DC Sniper and Eric Rudol.
That's how this guy comes off to me. And he's
done enough research and maybe he knows enough things that yes,
he's mad at the insurance companies. Then that book's going
to resonate with him.
Speaker 2 (13:09):
Writing on bullets.
Speaker 1 (13:10):
Well, I mean people know about that, from the Civil
War to the mafia to you know, the armed services
where they write on bombs. I mean that's been done.
I mean people have written on you know, shewcasings.
Speaker 3 (13:22):
And he's got a lot of alone time.
Speaker 2 (13:25):
He's got a lot of a loone time.
Speaker 1 (13:28):
And again his anger is his because to me, the
last word to pose, that's the key. To me, that's
his motive right there. Deposed to me, there's two things.
You're either testifying so that means he had a fail
suit against maybe an insurance company, and the other deposed
(13:51):
of course, is being removed from office. So when he
changed that one word, that to me.
Speaker 2 (13:57):
Is his motive.
Speaker 3 (13:58):
I'm just thinking about what you said, all the steps
he took, all the pre planning, and as you said, correctly,
the more steps, the more planning, the more likely it
is you will't make a mistake. This guy had to
make a mistake, just like we saw. Anikobayashi really was
(14:20):
found out after she went to a Greyhound bus station
and used her passport to get from la all the
way to Santa Sedro and then on to Mexico. This
guy took a bus. Now, of course you don't. It's
not as tight at a bus station as it is
like an airport regarding ID But she was leaving the
(14:42):
country and had to show her passport. This guy, I
don't think you have to show any idea to get
a bus ticket.
Speaker 2 (14:51):
Nope.
Speaker 3 (14:52):
So but we're going to find him. We're going to
find video of him at bus station. That means we're
going to find out how he got to the breast station.
Does he have a rental car, did he leave a
car somewhere? Did he take an uber? I mean, when
you think back along his trump it's gonna they're going
to find him.
Speaker 1 (15:16):
If that's where he originated from, was Atlanta, he either
had to leave a car there, take an uber there,
have somebody drop him off.
Speaker 2 (15:24):
And I'm gonna tell you something.
Speaker 1 (15:25):
I took a bus one time from Atlanta to Valdosta
to visit with my sisters at Valdosta State. That's the
longest ride I've ever had in my life that I've
driven across the country. A bus from Atlanta to New York.
He chatted up somebody.
Speaker 3 (15:42):
Yeah, there's a video of him. We are going to
find out who he is. I took the greyhound bus
from making to Athens a lot to see Keith, and
I didn't have a bad experience. But Atlanta to New York,
all those stops along the way, all those rural route stops,
(16:05):
some of them just on the side of the road.
Somebody just be standing on the side of the road
and the bus stops. It's like, how did you know that?
Out in the middle of nowhere.
Speaker 1 (16:14):
And if he's flirting with the clerk at the hostel,
he was flirting with somebody on that bus because he
was on that bus a long time.
Speaker 3 (16:22):
Well, another thing I noticed. I think he's hand Orthodonia.
Did you look at a smile yep, his teeth are perfect.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
Yeah. And he's got a little bit of money. I
mean the backpack getting cheap. He didn't look tight.
Speaker 3 (16:32):
One hundred dollars seventy nine dollars that's tried.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
His jacket looked brand new. I mean he's got one.
Speaker 3 (16:38):
For thirty dollars at Walmart. I know that's right. That's
an expensive photography backpack he's got going on. So he
bought a particular backpack that he thought would blend in
that he could use to store the gun in the AMMO,
and then his probable change of clothes. I think he
took the e bank to Central Park, hustled through Central Park.
(17:03):
Maybe she had clothes. You remember that bank robbery I
had where the guy came out of the bank. It
was OLC and s bank came out of the bank.
He had he had was wearing a quote sewed on suit.
He yanked it off, it just based it up the back,
took off his hat, his wig, his mustache, his fake beard,
threw it all down. Underneath. He had on a pair
(17:25):
of shorts, short shorts, tall athletic socks, and he hopped
on a bike and just pedaled off. As the sirens approached.
This guy on an e bank, I think he dumped
it somewhere in the park, switched clothes and got on
another subway and got out of there. But he would
(17:46):
have kept that backpack in the same shoes, And it's cold,
so I don't know if he kept the same coat,
an army style coat.
Speaker 2 (17:54):
He thought he was going to look like any other
bike messenger.
Speaker 3 (17:59):
Now we're he It may not have been a city bike.
I wonder if he was so I wonder if he
did use a city bike, if you use a credit card,
for beat's sake. But that said, I mean, he did
everything wrong, but he hey, hey, got to give him credit.
He's made this far, that's right.
Speaker 1 (18:14):
But you know, New York City is one of the
best police departments in the world. They've got a lot
of help with the Feds. I'm telling you, we're gonna
know today.
Speaker 3 (18:23):
Okay, So how long do you give it till they
get him.
Speaker 1 (18:27):
They'll know the name by one o'clock today, and I
think he'll be in custody pretty quick.
Speaker 3 (18:31):
You're getting pretty bold. Do you know the thing about
this guy, I'm the victim. He's a father of two boys.
You know, we're talking about the healthcare system and how
it sucks and how it screws people over. Ah, that's true,
and he was right in there, But he's also the
father of two boys.
Speaker 1 (18:50):
Nancy, bottom line, doesn't matter what your anger is towards somebody,
what your feeling is that you may deserve so or
need something, or you know, something happened. Let's say there
was an illness or a traumatic injury that was something
you did not do. You didn't cause it. It happened
(19:11):
to you, and you don't want to be destitute because
of that. I understand all of that. You still can't
murder somebody. So it's just like you know people say,
with you know Trump, it doesn't matter if you love
him or hate him, you don't shoot the man on
the stage. Murder is just something I'm going to be
against every single time.
Speaker 2 (19:33):
There's no debate. To me, there's no gray area, period.
Speaker 3 (19:38):
Can I get you down out of the pulpit for
a minute and talk about the evidence. What about the
fake New Jersey driver's license. I wonder if the idiot
got it online. Have you ever looked online fake driver's license?
They're really easy to get. I don't want to give
you ideas, but I wonder how we got that fake
Jersey driver's license. So he's on a Greyhound coming from
Atlanta to New York. He's got a fake Jersey license.
(20:01):
I mean, he really has left a trail.
Speaker 2 (20:04):
He's left a big trail. We've got his being of bread.
For Lord's sakes, we're going.
Speaker 3 (20:08):
To have that.
Speaker 1 (20:09):
He had dinner somewhere in New York the night before.
I mean, he's on video.
Speaker 3 (20:16):
I'm going to tell you something. The whole phrase, delay,
deny defend. Okay, now the bullets say delay is deposed,
but delay deny defend is apparently a popular phrase in
the insurance industry. How they get out of paying people
(20:38):
delay deny and then defend.
Speaker 1 (20:41):
Right, absolutely one hundred. That's why I'm saying him changing
that one word.
Speaker 2 (20:47):
He played his hand right there.
Speaker 3 (20:48):
Yeah, deposed.
Speaker 1 (20:50):
When they catch him and when they inevitably interview him,
I guarantee that investigator is going to hammer that right there.
He met with him, He'll say, buddy, I get it.
Like you know, my sister Shelley had a traumatic injury
two years ago.
Speaker 3 (21:06):
Wait, can we talk about it for a moment, because
when you say that, everybody wants to know what it was.
Speaker 1 (21:11):
It is awful. She fell backwards into an empty swimming pool,
and I mean it could have killed her. It's not
for her trying to catch herself on the side of
the pool, which broke her left arm, but it also
corrected her enough. She didn't hit head first, but he
broke both feet, both hills, both apples.
Speaker 3 (21:32):
She fall.
Speaker 1 (21:33):
She was looking forward and telling one sister, you know,
things about the landscape, like where she would put this
flower or a palm tree or something else, and she
just walked backwards while she was talking, like trying to
get the overall.
Speaker 2 (21:48):
View, and just walked right off the earth. That's all
there was to it.
Speaker 1 (21:54):
But again, the first thing they did was deny all
her claims, so they had to fight for that. And
you know, my sister, she has been, you know, fighting
leukemia for years.
Speaker 2 (22:05):
That's just part of it. It's almost like the game.
Speaker 3 (22:08):
My beloved sister, her husband who just passed away, fought
MS for thirty years. He was diagnosed when I had
been out of law school just a year or two.
And Cheryl, he was so brilliant. They met at the
(22:30):
Wharton School, as you know. My sister's a professor there,
and he was getting his MBA and on top of
taking care of him and working full time and raising
two children. I'm sure she had to fight with the
insurance company. It's just it's a full time job. I know,
with my mother having her living with us, it's a
(22:53):
full time job. Just trying to keep off her doctor
appointments straight and which reminds me and she wants some
more coffee. Okay, that's said. That said, he and Lucy
definitely rule the roots. I'm fine with that. I have
a problem with it. It's a full time job, and
(23:14):
I'm just thinking about people out there suffering a catastrophic
illness or or injury like your sister, like both of
your sisters, and also the full time job of fighting
with the insurance company. But that phrase deny, delay, defend, wait, delay, deny, defend,
(23:37):
and that they actually there's a book written about that,
about how awful the insurance industry is. But why this guy?
Why Thompson? Why Brian Thompson. Yeah, I mean he's the
CEO of United Healthcare, so obviously he's a titular figurehead.
But why him? Did he have a peicure involvement in
(24:01):
a case? I don't think so's And there's that algorithm
with which he was associated to deny claims. I don't know,
but I know this. What I do know is criminal.
On how to prove the case that fake ID that
travel on Greyhound the self phone, I mean it's a
(24:23):
matter of time. This guy would have to be out
of the country or really laying low like Rudolph did.
Speaker 1 (24:28):
And Nancy, I know you, and can you imagine when
they talk with the young lady at the hostel. What
did he say to her? Did he say, oh, you
make me smile? And she says, let me see that smile?
Like what prompt did that?
Speaker 3 (24:45):
And I wonder if he had a Southern accent.
Speaker 1 (24:47):
See there he goes, she's going to be able to
tell them, but I know you and you would be
able to tell that jury. Right before he murdered this
man in cold blood on a street, he was flirting with.
Speaker 2 (25:00):
Her and said, and you'll have that phrase.
Speaker 3 (25:03):
You know another thing about this guy? As Thompson crumpled
up against a wall, that Sheeter walked right toward him
and seemingly pointing the gun at him one more time.
Then he walked away and he only started to run
as he was crossing the street. He kept very very calm.
Speaker 1 (25:28):
You remember when Eric Robert Rudolph called now one one
before the bomb went off, there's a bomb.
Speaker 2 (25:33):
In Centennial Park. You have twenty minutes, that's it. And
he walked away, same thing, just walked away.
Speaker 3 (25:41):
And I've always wondered why did he even do that.
Speaker 1 (25:43):
He made the call so that first responders would rush there,
so more would be hurt, and just like this guy,
supposedly he said all.
Speaker 2 (25:52):
Kind of warnings that he was going to do it again.
Not a pro but that's the reason.
Speaker 1 (25:57):
They, to your point, have to look at the wall
or the ex wife, are their letters, are their emails
or their phone calls?
Speaker 2 (26:05):
Is there any proof that happened? What is the proof?
What's the word? You know? Again? You know, did he
use the word aim? Did he use something that.
Speaker 1 (26:14):
Is regional that they're going to be able to say?
And now we've got a handwrite, And now we've maybe
got a bogus email address.
Speaker 2 (26:20):
Or some Gmail that we can trace back. I'm just
telling you, every step you make you leave betrayal. You know.
Speaker 3 (26:30):
One thing I want to point out is I've seen
conflicting reports, and early this morning I was reading the
Times and they refer only to deny and defend. They
don't include the word deposed. So I'm wondering if but
more outlets say include include deposed, more outlets to include deposed.
(26:55):
So I don't know if all three words were there,
but any at all tell me a lot about his personality.
Speaker 1 (27:02):
Well, we know there's three casings because he's shotting twice
and got jammed and he cleared it. So there's I
would imagine there are absolutely three, and.
Speaker 3 (27:11):
I's he wrote all three words on every bullet.
Speaker 2 (27:14):
I want that gun and see what the other one say.
Speaker 3 (27:17):
Well, I agree with that. Yeah, I'm giving you a
hard time, but you're right.
Speaker 2 (27:20):
Yeah, that's all I'm saying.
Speaker 3 (27:21):
Well, Hey, can I just say I kind of miss
the wagon wheel salad I know, right, what was the
name of that place, Mountain Jack, Mountain Jacks. Yes, the
salad wheel, y'all.
Speaker 1 (27:38):
I've never had anything like it, never seen any kind
of display like it.
Speaker 3 (27:43):
But I was disappointed in one way. I thought they
were going to leave the salad wheel at the table
with me, yakay, and I can just eat it. They
came and you had to pick what you wanted off.
It's actually like a wagon wheel with different salad toy, says,
and then they make your salad out of what's on
the wagon wheel. I loved it. I was, you know,
(28:07):
fixated on the salad wheel and actually threw a little
hissy fit when they wouldn't bring the salad wheel to
the bar. So that was the only thing. Not that
I want to be photographed sitting at a bar, because
that has happened before.
Speaker 2 (28:17):
I understood.
Speaker 3 (28:18):
But that said, the wagon wheel Okay, so that's all
I'm saying. I'm going to leave on that note, you
know another, but let me ask you something. Speaking of
Mountain Jackson Delphi, I'm thinking about Libby in Abbey's family
because after the trial and things start to settle down,
(28:40):
and then that hoopla is over and your left with
this empty house. I've been there. I know what it
feels like. So I'm just thinking about them a lot
and what they're going through right now. You know, everyone
was thinking about them and contacting them and reaching out
to them during the trial. It's just flat and I
(29:02):
wonder how.
Speaker 2 (29:02):
They're doing well.
Speaker 1 (29:04):
I did text with Kelsey over Thanksgiving and they're doing
the best they can.
Speaker 2 (29:10):
You know them as well as anybody. They are strong.
Speaker 1 (29:13):
And nothing, nothing in this world. Heals better than a baby.
And I think her fixing to have that second baby.
Speaker 2 (29:23):
That's going to be their focus.
Speaker 3 (29:25):
We need to have another baby, Cheryl, do you want here?
Speaker 2 (29:28):
I would in a heartbeat. Let's do it. I would too.
Speaker 3 (29:31):
I would too. David has given me like the biggest
heory eyeball ever. He's like, no, you know, I wanted
four children and he wanted like maybe one. So I
got two. So I'm lucky. I'm gonna run with it.
Speaker 1 (29:48):
Yours are so brilliant and so accomplished and so amazing.
I mean, Nancy think every level they have been successful,
whether it's academics or sports or community service. I mean,
they are tremendous people. I just feel like you're gonna
bounce back and forth from dorm room to dorm room.
Speaker 3 (30:08):
Just I can only pray. Did I tell you what
their Eagle Scout projects are?
Speaker 2 (30:13):
No?
Speaker 3 (30:14):
Okay, I love the way you act like you're interested,
but I'm going to take that and go with it.
Speaker 1 (30:18):
Let me tell you, not only am I interested, I'm
so freaking impressed by that because they've been doing this
so long and they're going to get, you know, a
letter from the President.
Speaker 2 (30:28):
I mean, an Eagle Scout is a huge accomplishment.
Speaker 3 (30:31):
Okay, hey, do you want to hear first? Lisier? John David,
John David, Okay, John David. He is hand making and
this is not from a kit, which'll might just get
a kit from home. Depaut. He's like, no, I might
loas You's only no, he's handmaking it U And we
spent oh gosh, I don't know how many hours last
(30:53):
weekend painting boards in the carport. He is handmaking benches
out of two by four and they're going to be
near our little Methodist church, but in a spot where
the parking lot is used as a hub for how
do I say work employee transit buses. Say you go
(31:17):
that parking lot and then a transit bus will pick
you up, you know, like a Ford transit bus will
pick you up and take you to your job at
the hospital, okay, or it will take you to your
job at the mall or wherever your job is. There
are people that don't have cars that have to take
a bus to this location and then they sit there
(31:40):
and wait for their employer transit bus to come pick
them up and take them to their job. So those
people have a very long commute, okay. So he's making
a bench for that. He's making a bench for near
a handicap ramp where people come down off that ramp
and if their ride's not there, they may not be
(32:01):
able to stand. So he's been putting a bench right there.
And he's making another bench for pickup and drop off
for a little children at a pre k And there's
a fourth bench, but I don't know where it's going
just at this moment, but I'm just step out of him.
For people that can't just pop in their Audie or
(32:23):
their Volvo and take off to work in the morning
and their climate controlled you know, sound system.
Speaker 1 (32:30):
And the reason I wanted to ask about his is
I saw him working on the back of his truck,
standing and measuring.
Speaker 3 (32:35):
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, And yes, I'm gonna make him
wear safety goggles. He had them. I got them for him,
but I turned my back and he took them off.
And then of course I saw the perfect photo and
I can't be bothered with safety goggle. But yes he
has safety goggles. At least. See my little rescious sweet
flower she is and I may call on you. You're
(33:00):
gain to help. She is hand making one hundred please,
full size like double bedsized blankets for the homeless to
hand out in the winter months, probably in January one hundred.
Part of the whole Eagle thing is you can't just
(33:22):
make your family do it. You have to lead your
troop or other groups. You have to solicit them, enlist them,
and arrange these work times like you've got a work
crew and create. You can't just do it on your own.
You have to have group effort. That's part of it,
(33:42):
the leadership part. So it's a big undertaking. I think
I should have my eagle for Pete's sake. But I
just want to tell you something else. You know, when
I grew up doing four h which we loved in
you know, rural Georgia, but girls can he eagles, then
that's something called silver skirt out or something like that.
(34:04):
But now girls can be eagle. I am so proud
of Lucy. I don't know what to do.
Speaker 2 (34:08):
I am so proud. It's so impressive.
Speaker 3 (34:11):
Well, it's just that when we knock on some wood
to make sure that they both get through. That got
the dog going, Okay, I gotta go. I got bad
people to put.
Speaker 2 (34:19):
In jail right behind you, sugar. People love love you,
love you,
Host
Sheryl McCollum
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