WEBVTT - The Girlfriends S1/E4: Phone Calls from Manhattan 0:00:06.519 --> 0:00:06.880 Novel. 0:00:11.360 --> 0:00:16.400 Hey, listener, in this episode there's mentioned a murder, domestic violence, 0:00:16.760 --> 0:00:19.919 drug abuse, and a dead body, but I do not 0:00:20.120 --> 0:00:24.800 go into graphic detail. You also hear from a tenacious 0:00:24.920 --> 0:00:29.040 cast of women and friends whose fight for justice is 0:00:29.240 --> 0:00:34.680 truly truly inspiring. If you do listen and are impacted 0:00:34.720 --> 0:00:37.600 by any of our themes, you can reach out to 0:00:37.800 --> 0:00:43.120 no More, a domestic violence charity we've partnered with. They 0:00:43.159 --> 0:00:45.959 have lots of great resources to help you or your 0:00:46.000 --> 0:00:49.760 loved ones. You can find them at no More dot org. 0:00:50.440 --> 0:01:05.040 That's no More dot org, mindy, a little louder? Hello, perfect, 0:01:06.800 --> 0:01:10.479 So we're all on record. Yeah, and there goes your. 0:01:10.400 --> 0:01:18.320 Talking them in the car? 0:01:18.640 --> 0:01:23.720 Give me a she's putting her dogs in the car? 0:01:23.800 --> 0:01:24.520 Who does that? 0:01:27.400 --> 0:01:36.679 Mindy? Yes, Carol, we're starting right now. Are you sitting thankfully? 0:01:37.040 --> 0:01:37.280 Yes. 0:01:38.319 --> 0:01:42.160 I've learned so much about Gail recently. Gail was this 0:01:42.240 --> 0:01:48.559 really educated young woman. She was pretty, she was tiny, 0:01:48.680 --> 0:01:51.360 and she actually reminds me a little bit of me. 0:01:52.000 --> 0:01:56.480 That does sound like you, Smart and petitte and attractive. 0:01:56.840 --> 0:01:58.840 You know what else she had in common with us? 0:01:59.000 --> 0:02:01.600 With you and I and our women friends? 0:02:01.720 --> 0:02:03.600 Dark haired? Which Jewish women. 0:02:05.360 --> 0:02:09.880 Besides dark haired Jewish women with great personalities. She not 0:02:09.919 --> 0:02:13.440 only thought, she believed that she could fix him and 0:02:13.480 --> 0:02:15.359 you and I've been there with men. 0:02:15.600 --> 0:02:20.840 I can relate to that. But I don't think I 0:02:20.880 --> 0:02:26.200 can fix them. I think I can fix me to 0:02:26.680 --> 0:02:32.960 adapt to them. And I wonder who was fixing whom here. 0:02:34.040 --> 0:02:34.880 That's a great point. 0:02:36.120 --> 0:02:36.320 You know. 0:02:36.560 --> 0:02:40.280 The other thing I'm not proud of is that I'm 0:02:40.320 --> 0:02:42.760 not happy with some of the laughter we had over 0:02:42.800 --> 0:02:46.639 this situation. Like I look back and I go, what 0:02:46.680 --> 0:02:49.919 the hell was I thinking. It's not that we were 0:02:49.919 --> 0:02:53.320 doing anything wrong. We didn't know. But as I've come 0:02:53.400 --> 0:02:58.119 to No Gail, as I've come to get acquainted with Elane, 0:02:58.720 --> 0:03:02.560 we all have a very common bond and all could 0:03:02.560 --> 0:03:04.720 have been great friends. 0:03:05.720 --> 0:03:11.080 You know, in our weird Harriet the spy way, we're 0:03:11.120 --> 0:03:16.880 hoisting a red flag. There's something dangerous. We are concerned 0:03:16.919 --> 0:03:20.119 about this. I mean, really, Carol, look at how much 0:03:20.200 --> 0:03:21.760 angst we had about doing this. 0:03:22.960 --> 0:03:25.720 Yeah. Yeah, I went kicking and screaming. 0:03:25.960 --> 0:03:28.240 So there is a lot of baggage that we carry. 0:03:28.639 --> 0:03:31.639 Yeah, you know, part of me doing this mindy is 0:03:31.720 --> 0:03:36.160 about like it's just time to own my story for 0:03:36.240 --> 0:03:41.920 christ sake. The domestic abuse or the controlling behaviors of men. 0:03:42.800 --> 0:03:46.440 It doesn't have to define most women. May that just 0:03:46.520 --> 0:03:48.800 be part of our journey. May not that be a 0:03:48.880 --> 0:03:49.840 complete story. 0:03:51.400 --> 0:03:59.200 You know, your definition of self changes daily. It's like Hamilton, 0:03:59.320 --> 0:04:03.640 who tells you story? Because after you can't tell your 0:04:03.680 --> 0:04:11.200 own story? Who tells your story? 0:04:11.520 --> 0:04:14.680 I look back on that time and even now. I mean, 0:04:14.720 --> 0:04:16.760 you supported me then, and you support me now. 0:04:17.200 --> 0:04:19.800 And I support you because you're my crazy friend. 0:04:20.080 --> 0:04:20.640 I know. 0:04:22.360 --> 0:04:22.960 I miss you. 0:04:23.080 --> 0:04:23.640 I love you. 0:04:24.040 --> 0:04:25.760 I love you too. And get the dogs out of 0:04:25.760 --> 0:04:36.160 the freaking car would you? From the teams at novel 0:04:36.240 --> 0:04:40.000 and iHeartRadio, I'm Carol Fisher and you're listening to the 0:04:40.040 --> 0:04:44.599 Girlfriends Episode four. Phone calls from Manhattan. 0:05:03.400 --> 0:05:09.680 Got you, I've got you, got you, I've got you, 0:05:10.120 --> 0:05:11.520 got you, I've got you. 0:05:15.560 --> 0:05:18.440 This is what I found out about the days, months, 0:05:18.520 --> 0:05:22.120 and years in New York after Gale went missing. In 0:05:22.160 --> 0:05:25.960 the late afternoon on Monday, July eighth, nineteen eighty five, 0:05:26.560 --> 0:05:29.880 Gail's sister Elaine, called her parents from a payphone from 0:05:29.960 --> 0:05:33.760 the corner of Broadway and seventy fifth Street. She was 0:05:33.839 --> 0:05:36.160 letting them know that she was headed back to law 0:05:36.160 --> 0:05:37.440 school in DC. 0:05:38.000 --> 0:05:41.520 And My mother said to me, have you spoken to Gail? 0:05:41.640 --> 0:05:44.360 Do you know where Gail is? And I said, no, 0:05:44.560 --> 0:05:48.400 I'm driving in a car, you know, to Manhattan. Then 0:05:48.440 --> 0:05:51.799 I'm my way to d see what's wrong? And she said, 0:05:51.920 --> 0:05:55.160 Bob said that she went out and never came back. 0:05:55.200 --> 0:05:58.680 And they had a birthday party in Jersey for his 0:05:58.960 --> 0:06:04.360 sister's child and she never came home. And that did 0:06:04.440 --> 0:06:08.520 seem really odd. Gail was about appearances. The idea that Gail, 0:06:08.880 --> 0:06:11.800 no matter how annoyed she was with Bob, didn't come 0:06:11.800 --> 0:06:16.200 home to attend a birthday party for her nephew by 0:06:16.279 --> 0:06:19.680 marriage in New Jersey was very strange. 0:06:21.920 --> 0:06:24.200 Elaine put the phone down and got back into the 0:06:24.240 --> 0:06:26.880 car to start the five hour drive back to DC, 0:06:29.160 --> 0:06:32.719 and then, over the course of twenty four hours, everyone 0:06:32.720 --> 0:06:39.960 else's phones in New York started ringing. Everyone was saying 0:06:40.040 --> 0:06:44.040 the same thing, where is Gail. 0:06:46.680 --> 0:06:49.840 Elaine called me and asked me if I had talked 0:06:49.880 --> 0:06:51.600 to Gail? And I was like, what do you mean 0:06:51.600 --> 0:06:52.440 if I talked to Gail? 0:06:52.720 --> 0:06:55.760 No, why Abby Bruce, Gail's cousin. 0:06:56.200 --> 0:06:57.920 Hoe down, So now what are you talking about? 0:06:58.600 --> 0:06:59.600 She went out for a job, she. 0:06:59.520 --> 0:07:00.440 Hasn't come home. 0:07:00.880 --> 0:07:02.080 It's been since yesterday. 0:07:02.520 --> 0:07:03.919 What do you mean she went for a jog and 0:07:03.960 --> 0:07:04.760 she never came home. 0:07:04.800 --> 0:07:05.480 What did she have on? 0:07:06.360 --> 0:07:09.120 She had on her running shorts and her T shirt. 0:07:10.720 --> 0:07:14.600 So I went out and started walking around and thinking, 0:07:14.680 --> 0:07:17.240 you know where could she have possibly gone, walked over 0:07:17.280 --> 0:07:23.000 to the park, came back, called my mother, who also 0:07:23.200 --> 0:07:24.800 was like, what are you talking about? What do you 0:07:24.840 --> 0:07:27.840 mean she's missing? So my mother hung up from me 0:07:27.960 --> 0:07:28.920 and called my aunt. 0:07:29.320 --> 0:07:33.520 But when Abby's mom called Sylvia, she was already in hysterics. 0:07:34.760 --> 0:07:38.880 I need to find my child. We need to find her. 0:07:40.160 --> 0:07:43.520 I remember her screaming at the top of her lungs. 0:07:43.960 --> 0:07:46.640 So everybody was kind of making phone calls through the 0:07:46.640 --> 0:07:48.840 rest of the day. Anyone heard from her, anyone heard 0:07:48.880 --> 0:07:50.280 no one had heard from her. No one had heard 0:07:50.280 --> 0:07:50.640 from her. 0:07:52.040 --> 0:07:54.560 Next to get a call with Denise, Gale's best friend. 0:07:55.000 --> 0:07:59.120 But it's not a Laine or Abby or Sylvia. He 0:07:59.200 --> 0:08:01.280 called me, it's Bob. 0:08:03.800 --> 0:08:08.840 Scale with you what no bus? She never came home. 0:08:11.000 --> 0:08:15.120 That's when I said, oh my god, I knew right away, 0:08:15.720 --> 0:08:17.920 I said to my husband at that time. 0:08:18.640 --> 0:08:19.520 He killed him. 0:08:22.520 --> 0:08:25.720 On Monday evening, roughly thirty hours after gail Is said 0:08:25.760 --> 0:08:29.240 to have gone missing. Bob went to the nineteenth Precinct 0:08:29.360 --> 0:08:32.360 on East ninety fifth Street and filed a police report. 0:08:33.160 --> 0:08:35.600 He told the officer that he had been arguing with 0:08:35.640 --> 0:08:38.960 his wife, Gail all morning and that around eleven am, 0:08:39.160 --> 0:08:41.560 she stormed out of their home to cool off in 0:08:41.640 --> 0:08:44.839 Central Park. He told them that she had a history 0:08:44.840 --> 0:08:49.000 of depression and suicide attempts, which prompted the officer to 0:08:49.000 --> 0:08:53.800 write EDP in the remarked section of the report. Now 0:08:54.080 --> 0:08:59.880 EDP is shorthand for emotionally disturbed person. Gail is a 0:09:00.040 --> 0:09:04.000 officially designated as New York's Missing Person's Squad number seven 0:09:04.080 --> 0:09:07.520 eight one six, and her case is assigned to Detective 0:09:07.559 --> 0:09:11.760 Tom O'Malley. Tom's first task is to start interviewing people 0:09:12.320 --> 0:09:17.720 Gale's family, her college friends, Denise, Elaine, and they are 0:09:17.840 --> 0:09:19.360 all talking about Bob. 0:09:23.559 --> 0:09:30.360 Bob is acting weird, like some TV station wants to 0:09:30.400 --> 0:09:33.520 put it on the six o'clock news, like two four 0:09:33.640 --> 0:09:37.480 or seven, and he's like refusing to do it and 0:09:37.600 --> 0:09:40.240 asking my mother if she'll drive in from Long Island 0:09:40.280 --> 0:09:43.280 to do it, which is so strange. I mean, he 0:09:43.320 --> 0:09:49.240 lives in Manhattan, where the TV studios are. This his wife. 0:09:51.559 --> 0:09:54.880 In the end, he does the interview, and this is 0:09:54.920 --> 0:09:57.760 the only moment that you'll hear Bob's voice on this 0:09:57.840 --> 0:10:01.280 podcast because he and his attorney he never got back 0:10:01.320 --> 0:10:04.400 to our request for an interview. But here he is 0:10:04.800 --> 0:10:07.400 talking about Gail in nineteen eighty five. 0:10:08.920 --> 0:10:13.640 She's a graduate student psychology, takes out very seriously and 0:10:14.120 --> 0:10:17.880 has patient responsibilities. Has patients were dependent on her, and 0:10:18.040 --> 0:10:21.240 I think, no matter you know what, she wouldn't abandon 0:10:21.240 --> 0:10:21.880 her patients. 0:10:22.200 --> 0:10:23.560 What do you think happened to your wife? 0:10:23.679 --> 0:10:25.720 I don't know. I don't know, but I'm worried. 0:10:29.920 --> 0:10:33.400 Detective O'Malley started to build up a pretty damning picture 0:10:33.440 --> 0:10:37.840 of Bob. Multiple people tell him about Bob's controlling behavior, 0:10:38.240 --> 0:10:43.600 the strangulation, and the cat incident. O'Malley wanted to interview him, 0:10:43.880 --> 0:10:47.000 but he knew he had to tread carefully. He didn't 0:10:47.040 --> 0:10:49.880 want Bob to think he was a primary suspect and 0:10:50.120 --> 0:10:54.040 lawyer up too soon, So during a casual phone call, 0:10:54.400 --> 0:10:57.600 O'Malley invited Bob down to the station for a chat. 0:10:58.200 --> 0:11:01.120 This is a note from Detective O'Malley ally's police report 0:11:01.160 --> 0:11:05.000 from that day that my producer Anna found. It's dated 0:11:05.160 --> 0:11:10.880 July thirteenth, just six days after Gale went missing. I 0:11:10.960 --> 0:11:13.680 then asked him if he ever attempted to strangle his wife, 0:11:14.040 --> 0:11:16.199 and he said, very abruptly, he did not want to 0:11:16.240 --> 0:11:19.760 talk about it. When asked of any incident with the cat, 0:11:19.840 --> 0:11:21.920 I received the same abrupt type answer. 0:11:22.200 --> 0:11:22.280 No. 0:11:23.360 --> 0:11:27.080 As we concluded, doctor Breenbaum said this doesn't look right, 0:11:27.240 --> 0:11:29.840 and people are going to start to wonder. When I 0:11:29.880 --> 0:11:33.000 asked him what he meant, he said, it's obvious, isn't it. 0:11:35.160 --> 0:11:39.800 After that interview, Tom reached out to Elaine. 0:11:39.120 --> 0:11:43.320 And he said, Bob was not forthcoming. It's so weird. 0:11:44.200 --> 0:11:47.760 Bob doesn't want my help. Bob does not want me 0:11:47.800 --> 0:11:52.599 to find your sister. If my sister was leaving him 0:11:52.880 --> 0:11:55.880 and going to live with some guy, going to live 0:11:55.920 --> 0:11:59.599 with some girlfriend, going to Bora, Bora, or wherever the 0:11:59.640 --> 0:12:03.560 heck she was doing, the first one she would have 0:12:03.640 --> 0:12:08.240 called would have been me. She might not have called 0:12:08.280 --> 0:12:11.240 me to admit that she was going to stay married 0:12:11.280 --> 0:12:15.080 to the psychopath, but she certainly would have called me 0:12:15.720 --> 0:12:19.320 to tell me she was leaving him, and I would 0:12:19.320 --> 0:12:21.240 have been there to do all the things she needed 0:12:21.240 --> 0:12:25.080 me to do. I mean, please, she was dead. She 0:12:25.200 --> 0:12:28.320 was dead or he hurt her terribly and he had 0:12:28.320 --> 0:12:29.520 her hidden somewhere. 0:12:33.640 --> 0:12:36.920 The next day, exactly a week after Gail went missing, 0:12:37.360 --> 0:12:40.559 Bob and Gail's friends and family headed to Central Park 0:12:40.679 --> 0:12:44.800 to distribute some missing posters. I'm looking at one right now. 0:12:46.000 --> 0:12:48.440 The portrait of Gail is in black and white from 0:12:48.440 --> 0:12:52.880 the photocopier. In it, her hair is layered and shoulder length. 0:12:53.200 --> 0:12:56.280 She's smiling, but in that way where your eyes are 0:12:56.320 --> 0:12:59.520 being blinded by the sun, or you don't quite want 0:12:59.520 --> 0:13:03.400 your photo taken. And on the poster they've written her 0:13:03.440 --> 0:13:07.400 height five to three, her weight one hundred and seven pounds, 0:13:08.000 --> 0:13:12.400 brown hair and hazel eyes, a graduate student at Long 0:13:12.440 --> 0:13:17.400 Island University, last seen at eleven am July seventh, nineteen 0:13:17.440 --> 0:13:21.480 eighty five, and they offered a reward for any information. 0:13:23.240 --> 0:13:25.839 I'm telling you this gives me chills. It just it 0:13:25.920 --> 0:13:27.200 must have been terrifying. 0:13:30.160 --> 0:13:32.960 Part of me knew she was dead, but part of 0:13:33.000 --> 0:13:36.120 me wanted to find her. Part of me wanted to 0:13:36.160 --> 0:13:38.880 find her alive and know that she was still out 0:13:38.920 --> 0:13:39.800 there somewhere. 0:13:41.920 --> 0:13:49.640 They papered the park with missing posters. Except my mother 0:13:49.760 --> 0:13:55.719 told me it felt weird. It felt like there were 0:13:55.720 --> 0:14:01.800 two camps. There was Bob and his friends, and there 0:14:01.960 --> 0:14:06.240 was my mother and father and Gail's friends, and it 0:14:06.320 --> 0:14:09.000 didn't feel that they had the same mission. 0:14:11.920 --> 0:14:14.440 At one point, Bob was handing out posters to passing 0:14:14.520 --> 0:14:18.480 joggers with Gail's college friend Marianne. When she asked him 0:14:18.480 --> 0:14:21.000 where he thought Gail might be, he said, I think 0:14:21.040 --> 0:14:23.920 she's on a shopping spree at Bloomingdale's. You know what 0:14:24.000 --> 0:14:28.280 a jap she is? Now, for those of you unfamiliar 0:14:28.320 --> 0:14:32.360 with the term JAP, it means Jewish American princess, and 0:14:32.560 --> 0:14:36.200 just in case it's not clear, it's a condescending term. 0:14:37.880 --> 0:14:40.840 Bob then suggests that Gail may have been overly affected 0:14:40.840 --> 0:14:44.640 when writing her recent paper on depression, but Marianne disagreed 0:14:44.640 --> 0:14:47.880 with him. Gail didn't seem depressed when she last saw her. 0:14:48.760 --> 0:14:52.600 Marianne's stance seemed to annoy Bob, at which point he 0:14:52.720 --> 0:14:55.360 pointed over at the gate and he said, how do 0:14:55.400 --> 0:14:57.920 you know she just didn't climb that gate? How do 0:14:57.960 --> 0:15:00.920 you know Gail isn't lying at the bottom of that reservoir. 0:15:02.200 --> 0:15:06.080 At one point, the New York Post did a story 0:15:06.120 --> 0:15:10.880 on it, and there's everybody holding the missing posters in 0:15:10.920 --> 0:15:14.480 front of their chest. Bob is holding it in front 0:15:14.480 --> 0:15:18.640 of his face as if he doesn't want people to 0:15:18.680 --> 0:15:22.960 see him, just like he didn't want to go on camera. 0:15:24.320 --> 0:15:27.600 After distributing posters, Denise and a group of Gail's friends 0:15:27.600 --> 0:15:31.000 went back to Gail in Bob's apartment. It was then 0:15:31.160 --> 0:15:36.080 that they all started quizzing, Bob, where's Gail, When did 0:15:36.080 --> 0:15:39.280 you last see her? What were you arguing about? 0:15:41.120 --> 0:15:44.480 He acted like, oh, so upset Gail's missing. 0:15:46.160 --> 0:15:49.120 The group of women started looking around for clues. 0:15:49.480 --> 0:15:52.800 And that's when we said, where's the rug that used 0:15:52.840 --> 0:15:53.320 to be here? 0:15:54.560 --> 0:15:56.800 This was a beautiful. 0:15:56.200 --> 0:15:59.760 Asian rug, and Bob said, oh, it had to be 0:16:00.600 --> 0:16:01.960 the cat got sick. 0:16:02.120 --> 0:16:05.640 We all looked at each other why but he was 0:16:05.800 --> 0:16:11.320 so stone cold. It's not as if he displayed any 0:16:11.360 --> 0:16:15.480 emotion at all, so there was like nothing to react to. 0:16:16.440 --> 0:16:19.520 At one point, the phone rang, but Bob decided not 0:16:19.640 --> 0:16:22.720 to pick it up. When the answering machine kicked in, 0:16:23.240 --> 0:16:27.040 Gail's voice played out into the entire room, telling the 0:16:27.080 --> 0:16:31.760 caller to leave a message. It must have been heartbreaking. 0:16:40.680 --> 0:16:44.120 Along the way, Bob continued to share his theories. He 0:16:44.280 --> 0:16:46.920 talked about Gail's drug use and how perhaps that's how 0:16:46.960 --> 0:16:48.200 she had gotten into trouble. 0:16:49.040 --> 0:16:50.640 Listen, I'm not going to say my sister didn't do 0:16:50.680 --> 0:16:54.880 any drugs. My sister had patience, and she was a 0:16:54.920 --> 0:16:59.280 graduate student, and then she had this prestigious internship. My 0:16:59.360 --> 0:17:03.160 sister was not someone who had a drug problem. I'm 0:17:03.200 --> 0:17:06.480 not saying my sister never did any drugs, but that's 0:17:06.560 --> 0:17:07.560 not who she was. 0:17:08.640 --> 0:17:12.680 Everything the Cat's family knew started to stack up Bob's 0:17:12.720 --> 0:17:15.760 past behavior, the fact that Gail was going to leave 0:17:15.840 --> 0:17:18.879 him that very night, the way she apparently left with 0:17:18.960 --> 0:17:22.760 hardly any belongings, and yet nobody had seen or heard 0:17:22.760 --> 0:17:27.120 from her. They had become convinced that Bob killed Gail. 0:17:27.560 --> 0:17:30.240 With only a week or two left before sitting for 0:17:30.280 --> 0:17:33.600 her bar exam, Elaine had to make a hard call. 0:17:34.240 --> 0:17:37.919 I'll never forget. I was taking the Peeper Lar Review 0:17:37.960 --> 0:17:41.720 class and I called John Peeper and I told him 0:17:41.720 --> 0:17:45.399 what I was going through. He said, don't take the 0:17:45.400 --> 0:17:49.040 word exam. I can't do that, which was sad for me. 0:17:53.400 --> 0:17:56.159 For Elaine, this was no longer a missing person's case, 0:17:56.200 --> 0:17:59.800 but a homicide investigation. And if she wasn't going to 0:18:00.200 --> 0:18:05.320 for the bar, then she'd settle for putting Bob behind bars. 0:18:08.000 --> 0:18:10.560 Of course, I was a heartbroken that I did not 0:18:10.640 --> 0:18:14.879 know where my sister was. But it wasn't because I 0:18:14.920 --> 0:18:19.240 couldn't bear the truth that my sister just left for 0:18:19.320 --> 0:18:23.240 another life and ignored her sister. It's because the facts 0:18:23.680 --> 0:18:30.960 surrounding the situation made it impossible. She left her pocketbook, 0:18:31.240 --> 0:18:33.560 you know, there with cigarettes, and she lives in a 0:18:33.560 --> 0:18:36.600 building with doormen. There's a fire department on the same 0:18:36.680 --> 0:18:39.440 block where they all whistled at my sexy sister. She's 0:18:39.480 --> 0:18:43.160 allegedly wearing a tank top and short shorts. Nobody saw her. 0:18:43.520 --> 0:18:47.479 We would fall asleep without hanging up the phone. She 0:18:47.560 --> 0:18:56.359 did not go somewhere without talking to me, and I 0:18:56.480 --> 0:19:03.879 began the one to two years us of proving that 0:19:04.040 --> 0:19:29.680 Bob killed my sister. There's my notes on what I did. 0:19:31.080 --> 0:19:33.000 These are all the notes on all the phone calls 0:19:33.000 --> 0:19:37.600 that I've had. The missing posters in here. 0:19:39.000 --> 0:19:41.920 When Elaine first arrived back in New York after dropping 0:19:41.960 --> 0:19:45.439 out of law school, she immediately started collaborating with the 0:19:45.480 --> 0:19:47.639 detectives from the Missing Person's Unit. 0:19:48.600 --> 0:19:51.760 It took the form of a deep relationship with Tom 0:19:51.800 --> 0:19:54.960 O'Malley and literally walking the beat with him, I mean 0:19:55.080 --> 0:19:58.560 sitting there and missing persons with him, brainstorming with him. 0:19:59.080 --> 0:20:01.360 They would talk about the calls Tom would get from 0:20:01.359 --> 0:20:07.440 people responding to the missing person's reports. A man who 0:20:07.440 --> 0:20:10.240 claimed to see Gail sitting in a yoga position in 0:20:10.280 --> 0:20:14.160 front of a brown stone near Washington Square. A doorman 0:20:14.280 --> 0:20:17.160 from an apartment on fifty second Street thought he saw her, 0:20:17.640 --> 0:20:20.720 but later he changed his mind. And a man said 0:20:20.760 --> 0:20:23.640 he saw her and her friend at eighteen eighth Bagels 0:20:23.640 --> 0:20:27.439 on East eighty first Street. She was spotted uptown on 0:20:27.480 --> 0:20:32.320 the subway, downtown through Soho, and wandering around Tudor City. 0:20:33.600 --> 0:20:36.760 None of these sightings could be verified by the detectives, 0:20:37.280 --> 0:20:41.399 but they also could not be dismissed ultimately, though the 0:20:41.480 --> 0:20:44.280 detectives already had a pretty good hunch who the last 0:20:44.280 --> 0:20:45.639 person to see Gail was. 0:20:47.880 --> 0:20:50.320 I'll never forget. I was having a drink with Tom 0:20:50.359 --> 0:20:53.359 O'Malley on one of those investigator cop bars and less 0:20:53.440 --> 0:20:57.200 Wolf came in and walked over and greeted us. 0:20:57.680 --> 0:21:00.720 Less as a private investigator that Bobbitt hired to search 0:21:00.760 --> 0:21:01.400 for Gail. 0:21:01.840 --> 0:21:03.879 And as he walked away, Tommy said, yeah, he's been 0:21:03.960 --> 0:21:10.639 hired to, you know, hide evidence. Bob knew he did it. 0:21:10.760 --> 0:21:12.960 Bob wasn't hiring someone to help find Gail. He knew 0:21:12.960 --> 0:21:13.959 exactly where Gail was. 0:21:14.800 --> 0:21:18.119 We couldn't confirm this, but whatever way you slice it. 0:21:18.160 --> 0:21:21.040 For Elaine, the official route didn't seem to be leading 0:21:21.119 --> 0:21:24.720 to anything, so she tried a different tack. She offered 0:21:24.720 --> 0:21:27.000 to pick up some of Gail's stuff from Bob's place. 0:21:29.640 --> 0:21:33.720 I was hoping that I could engage him in some way, 0:21:34.359 --> 0:21:35.680 and I thought that it. 0:21:35.680 --> 0:21:36.680 Sounds so idiotic. 0:21:37.000 --> 0:21:40.840 Now he might break down and I'll never figure out. 0:21:40.880 --> 0:21:44.680 I got up there and all of my sister's stuff 0:21:45.760 --> 0:21:50.920 was in big trash backs. He didn't want her underwear, 0:21:51.480 --> 0:21:57.560 he didn't want her perfume, he wanted her bike, her skis, 0:21:58.960 --> 0:22:03.359 he wanted some expense and sieve crystal platter that my 0:22:03.480 --> 0:22:07.840 aunt had bought them as a wedding gift. I argued 0:22:07.880 --> 0:22:11.359 with him, you can't have that. I called my aunt 0:22:11.359 --> 0:22:14.560 be on the phone and I said, Be, tell him 0:22:14.640 --> 0:22:19.960 he has to give me the bowl. And I handed 0:22:20.040 --> 0:22:23.480 him the phone and he let me take the ball. 0:22:24.119 --> 0:22:27.760 And I realized I had made the biggest mistake. Had 0:22:27.760 --> 0:22:32.320 I left the stuff. It may have haunted him. Instead, 0:22:32.960 --> 0:22:38.199 I was taking out the trash. 0:22:39.920 --> 0:22:42.760 By this point, Bob had been interviewed a few times 0:22:42.800 --> 0:22:47.320 by Detective O'Malley and his partner, Detective Dolcis. At first 0:22:47.359 --> 0:22:50.320 it had been on a friendly, voluntary basis, but it 0:22:50.359 --> 0:22:53.560 was becoming a parent that they were no longer treating 0:22:53.600 --> 0:22:58.000 Gale's disappearance as a missing person's case. After five or 0:22:58.000 --> 0:23:02.240 so interviews, he lawyered up and became increasingly hard to reach. 0:23:02.800 --> 0:23:05.760 Whenever the cops or Gail's friends and family tried to 0:23:05.760 --> 0:23:12.959 call him, they got his answering machine. Time passed and 0:23:13.000 --> 0:23:17.200 still nothing. The Cat's family endured their first family gatherings 0:23:17.240 --> 0:23:22.600 without Gail, their first young Kaipoor, the first passover, and 0:23:22.680 --> 0:23:26.199 with each passing day, the family's grief cemented and the 0:23:26.240 --> 0:23:36.040 wider public forgot about Gail. So Elaine started writing letters 0:23:36.040 --> 0:23:39.640 to the editors and journalists of New York papers from 0:23:39.640 --> 0:23:41.760 the perspective of her grieving mother. 0:23:44.880 --> 0:23:49.919 My name is Sylvia Katz. My daughter gil Katspiarram disappeared 0:23:49.960 --> 0:23:54.440 from her apartment. Nobody has heard from her. My son 0:23:54.480 --> 0:23:57.520 in law has been asked to take a lie detector 0:23:57.560 --> 0:24:01.760 test along with other friends with Gaels, but unlike her 0:24:01.760 --> 0:24:06.439 friends who said yes, my son in law has refused twice. 0:24:06.600 --> 0:24:10.320 He was the last person to see Gail. Therefore everything 0:24:10.359 --> 0:24:14.600 that is known comes from him. He is uncooperative, as 0:24:14.680 --> 0:24:18.199 is his family. We are very frustrated, and so are 0:24:18.240 --> 0:24:25.439 the police. Please help us. Part of what I was 0:24:25.480 --> 0:24:29.360 trying to do is really in good faith, get evidence. 0:24:30.520 --> 0:24:32.080 Part of what I was trying to do if I 0:24:32.119 --> 0:24:37.280 couldn't get evidence, is make sure that every single place 0:24:37.359 --> 0:24:42.760 that Bob was people knew the truth. So by the spring, 0:24:43.840 --> 0:24:48.440 I sent letters to every doctor that worked with Bob. 0:24:48.480 --> 0:24:50.760 And at that point he was in a three hospital rotation, 0:24:51.440 --> 0:24:54.160 and I sent them to all three hospitals. I used 0:24:54.160 --> 0:24:56.680 a reverse phone book at the New York Public Library. 0:24:56.680 --> 0:25:01.440 This is way before happy web stuff sending a letter 0:25:01.520 --> 0:25:05.360 to every single person in the high rise apartment building. 0:25:06.160 --> 0:25:08.919 Elaine started coming up with their own leads, talking to 0:25:08.920 --> 0:25:11.320 people the police hadn't even interviewed. 0:25:12.200 --> 0:25:16.800 The woman downstairs told me that it was terrible living 0:25:17.119 --> 0:25:20.560 under them. They fought constantly, especially on the weekends when 0:25:20.560 --> 0:25:25.000 he was home, and it was awful. And what was 0:25:25.240 --> 0:25:31.000 interesting about that day was how quiet it was, except 0:25:31.040 --> 0:25:37.200 she heard furniture moving, but it wasn't enough. There came 0:25:37.240 --> 0:25:43.320 a time, the Missing Persons and the Homicide Bureau and 0:25:43.359 --> 0:25:46.040 they all put their hands up and said, we just 0:25:46.080 --> 0:25:51.200 don't have the evidence. Lady. I remember thinking double jeopardy. 0:25:51.320 --> 0:25:53.879 They're hoping for a better case, and if they do 0:25:53.960 --> 0:25:56.520 it now and they fail and they ever get really 0:25:56.600 --> 0:26:02.240 good evidence, he will be walking around with impunity being 0:26:02.280 --> 0:26:06.040 able to say I beat it. And I think that 0:26:06.080 --> 0:26:10.399 really would have killed us. But my cousin, Hillard Weiss 0:26:10.560 --> 0:26:14.439 worked for the Legal Aid Society and he got the 0:26:14.520 --> 0:26:16.720 DA's office to investigate. 0:26:17.680 --> 0:26:21.080 In August nineteen eighty six, a year and a month 0:26:21.160 --> 0:26:24.080 since Gale went missing. The case was passed on to 0:26:24.200 --> 0:26:30.600 the Manhattan District Attorney's office, but after just one year, 0:26:31.119 --> 0:26:34.199 the investigation came to a halt and the case was 0:26:34.280 --> 0:26:35.879 dropped yet again. 0:26:37.800 --> 0:26:40.840 So at the point at which they said we're not prosecuting, 0:26:41.680 --> 0:26:44.240 I had nothing left to lose, and I began a 0:26:44.240 --> 0:26:49.680 different campaign. I would call him and I would say, 0:26:50.920 --> 0:26:53.600 I know you killed my sister. Everyone knows she killed 0:26:53.600 --> 0:26:55.879 my sister, and you're not going to get away with that. 0:26:57.520 --> 0:27:00.119 And I'm going to keep on leaving these messages. Yes, 0:27:01.119 --> 0:27:03.600 and every time you have a new girlfriend, she's going 0:27:03.680 --> 0:27:10.160 to hear these messages. I was dying for him to 0:27:10.200 --> 0:27:13.959 sue me for slander. We might not have had beyond 0:27:13.960 --> 0:27:17.320 a reasonable doubt for a criminal courtroom, but if he 0:27:17.520 --> 0:27:22.119 sued me, I would get him under oath and a 0:27:22.200 --> 0:27:27.200 deposition and a civil suit. He would have to prove 0:27:27.640 --> 0:27:39.920