True Crime Campfire

In part one of this story last week, we learned about Utah millionaire Franklin Bradshaw, who over the years had gained both a stupendous fortune and a strained relationship with some of his family—in particular with his youngest and wildest daughter, Frances. Frances had for years been pressuring and manipulating her mom, Berenice, to steer some of the family fortune her way, and whenever Frank got in the way of that, Frances would be furious. At the end of last week’s episode, we met Frances’s own young family, two boys, Marc and Larry, that she was strangely insistent on keeping apart. Marc was the favored son, allowed to stay at home. Frances told him his brother Larry had been sent to a mental institution, but he was in fact just staying with relatives. This was a family of strange pressures and manipulations that would ultimately lead to Franklin Bradshaw being shot dead. This is part two of “The Price of Love: The Murder of Franklin Bradshaw.” Sources: Shana Alexander, “Nutcracker. Money, Madness, Murder: A Family Album” Investigation Discovery's A Crime to Remember, S5E8, “Mother’s Little Helper” Follow us, campers! Patreon (join to get all episodes ad-free, at least a day early, an extra episode a month, and a free sticker!): https://patreon.com/TrueCrimeCampfire https://www.truecrimecampfirepod.com/ Facebook: True Crime Campfire Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/truecrimecampfire/?hl=en Twitter: @TCCampfire https://twitter.com/TCCampfire Email: truecrimecampfirepod@gmail.com MERCH! https://true-crime-campfire.myspreadshop.com Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/true-crime-campfire--4251960/support.

All the money in the world can’t buy peace of mind. Family life, with its jealousies and rivalries, carries the same pressures no matter the size of the bank account—but when wealth is measured in millions, those pressures can twist into something far darker. Arguments over favoritism, inheritance, and control—the kind of disputes most families recognize in small ways—become battles with stakes that can determine the course of lives. And when greed collides with resentment, and morality is already thin on the ground, the results can be catastrophic. This week’s story is about what happens when the bonds of family are tested not by love, but by money.  Sources: Shana Alexander, “Nutcracker. Money, Madness, Murder: A Family Album” Investigation Discovery's A Crime to Remember, S5E8, “Mother’s Little Helper” Follow us, campers! Patreon (join to get all episodes ad-free, at least a day early, an extra episode a month, and a free sticker!): https://patreon.com/TrueCrimeCampfire https://www.truecrimecampfirepod.com/ Facebook: True Crime Campfire Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/truecrimecampfire/?hl=en Twitter: @TCCampfire https://twitter.com/TCCampfire Email: truecrimecampfirepod@gmail.com MERCH! https://true-crime-campfire.myspreadshop.com Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/true-crime-campfire--4251960/support.

The Buddha said, "Believe nothing, no matter where you read it or who has said it, even if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and common sense." Ignore that advice, and you might find that you're clouding your vision--that instead of seeing what's really in front of you, you're filtering everything so it fits in with your beliefs. An unwavering, unquestioned belief in anything--a philosophy, an institution, or a person--can lend us strength sometimes, but it can also make us vulnerable. And there are plenty of people out there just waiting to exploit that vulnerability. This story is about two of them, each with a very different MO, and the havoc they wreaked in the lives of the people around them. Sources The German newspaper BZ (translated from German to English): Blackmail Sect: Now Former Members Speak Out by Romeo Regenass, Nov. 12, 2008 Documentary "Seduced and Blackmailed" by Aldo Gugolz and Romeo Regenass Time: https://time.com/archive/6945942/the-swiss-gigolo-and-the-german-billionaire/ NBC News: https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna29594154 The Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/mar/09/bmw-blackmailer-jailed Telegraph: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/italy/5051613/Religious-leader-denies-blackmailing-woman-in-Swiss-gigolo-case.html Forbes:https://www.forbes.com/2009/03/09/scarbi-klatten-bmw-markets-faces-celebrity-blackmail.html The Standard: https://www.standard.co.uk/hp/front/gigolo-who-seduced-bmw-heiress-boasted-he-read-women-like-a-map-6824827.html Follow us, campers! Patreon (join to get all episodes ad-free, at least a day early, an extra episode a month, and a free sticker!): https://patreon.com/TrueCrimeCampfire https://www.truecrimecampfirepod.com/ Facebook: True Crime Campfire Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/truecrimecampfire/?hl=en Twitter: @TCCampfire https://twitter.com/TCCampfire Email: truecrimecampfirepod@gmail.com MERCH! https://true-crime-campfire.myspreadshop.com Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/true-crime-campfire--4251960/support.

We deal with a lot of real-life horror stories, and because it’s real life, they’re often chaotic and cruel. Justice might ultimately be served, but more often than not, the victims are already cold in the ground. If someone is dead-set on killing you, there’s a very good chance they’ll succeed. In the most satisfying fictional horror stories, of course, there’s a survivor, someone who faces the monster or killer and lives to tell the tale, someone who finds deep wells of courage and resilience inside themself and defeats the horrors the world throws at them. And these stories are not only limited to fiction. Sources: Investigation Discovery's Surviving Evil, S3E7, “The Bathtub Killer” A&E's Cold Case Files, S4E24, “Déjà Vu/Secret in the Well” People: https://people.com/bathtub-killer-dateline-nbc-murders-texas-8659842 Court papers: https://www.casemine.com/judgement/us/591471c6add7b04934373412 https://multco.us/news/susan-walters-who-fended-hitman-provides-guidance-multnomah-county-crime-victims-portal Willamette Week: https://www.wweek.com/news/2016/08/17/a-hit-man-came-to-kill-susan-kuhnhausen-she-survived-he-didnt/ Investigation Discovery's Nothing Personal: Murder for Hire, "This Man Brainwashed His Friend into Killing His Pregnant Wife" Oregon Live: https://www.oregonlive.com/politics/2014/06/portlander_who_hired_hitman_to.html The Gift of Fear by Gavin de Becker Follow us, campers! Patreon (join to get all episodes ad-free, at least a day early, an extra episode a month, and a free sticker!): https://patreon.com/TrueCrimeCampfire https://www.truecrimecampfirepod.com/ Facebook: True Crime Campfire Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/truecrimecampfire/?hl=en Twitter: @TCCampfire https://twitter.com/TCCampfire Email: truecrimecampfirepod@gmail.com MERCH! https://true-crime-campfire.myspreadshop.com Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/true-crime-campfire--4251960/support.