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Speaker 1: Hey, and welcome to the short Stuff. I'm Josh and

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Speaker 1: there's Chuck and Jerry's here sitting in for Dave. So

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Speaker 1: that's a short stuff. That's a bingo, that's right.

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Speaker 2: And we're talking about the Shark Arm murder and we

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Speaker 2: need to thank the Dictionary of Sydney, the Sydney Crime Museum,

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Speaker 2: Snopes and Atlas Obscura.

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Speaker 1: Wow you really did that up man.

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Speaker 3: I love that at Let's Obscure site. That's a great,

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Speaker 3: great website.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. Same here, same with Snopes too, they're good too.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, and hey, hats off to the Sydney Crime Museum

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Speaker 3: while we're at it.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, and who could leave out the Dictionary of Sydney.

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Speaker 2: Yes, we're talking about Sydney because that's where the Shark

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Speaker 2: Arm murders took place, infamous crime in Sydney, Australia's history

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Speaker 2: in nineteen thirty five.

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Speaker 3: And this is how it starts.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, a fisherman was fishing off of Coooge Beach and

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Speaker 2: caught a little small shark and then right after that

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Speaker 2: at a larger tiger shark swallowed that smaller shark and

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Speaker 2: so all of a sudden he has two sharks.

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Speaker 3: Because this tiger shark was so big.

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Speaker 2: He was like, hey, this thing, maybe I should take

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Speaker 2: this in to the aquarium bass there in Koujie because

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Speaker 2: it'll be a nice like attraction for people to come

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Speaker 2: see it, Like it was still alive and people can

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Speaker 2: come see this dreadful shark swimming around because sharks had

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Speaker 2: been killing people around the area lately, so he thought

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Speaker 2: it was a pretty good idea.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, just over the course of a couple of weeks,

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Speaker 1: three different men were killed by sharks New South Wales beaches,

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Speaker 1: so that was a big deal to catch this shark

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Speaker 1: that may have been the one or at least one

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Speaker 1: of the ones. And he was right, like there were

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Speaker 1: a lot of people that showed up to see this

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Speaker 1: giant shark. I mean, twelve feet is pretty long, right,

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Speaker 1: big shark, and those tiger sharks they're ba's too. At

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Speaker 1: any rate, the shark was given the people what they

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Speaker 1: wanted to see, you know, like you would swim around

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Speaker 1: along the window and just flip the people off. He

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Speaker 1: had a real bad attitude exactly what they wanted to see,

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Speaker 1: and he was acting pretty normally. And then on April

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Speaker 1: twenty fifth, which was Anzac Day in Australia, which is

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Speaker 1: I taking it as similar to our Memorial Day here

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Speaker 1: in the United States. The shark started acting really weird,

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Speaker 1: like he started getting lethargic and sluggish, like a wet sponge.

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Speaker 1: He seemed disoriented, and then all of a sudden, everything

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Speaker 1: came to a head.

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Speaker 3: Essentially, Yeah, the shark goes.

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Speaker 2: That's usually your part and pukes up a human arm.

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Speaker 2: So everyone freaks out. They assumed initially, of course, like

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Speaker 2: this is probably an arm of another bather that had

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Speaker 2: bad timing and bad luck. But when they did the

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Speaker 2: medical examination, they were like, this was no tiger shark. No, sorry,

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Speaker 2: I just watched Jaws with Ruby, so I had to

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Speaker 2: work at Jaws.

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Speaker 3: Quote in there. Sure she liked it.

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Speaker 2: I was delighted. She didn't love it, but she liked it,

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Speaker 2: Like she hung in there through the whole thing.

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Speaker 1: Was that a happy birthday treat for her to watch Jalls?

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Speaker 3: That's right, Happy birthday to both of you in real

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Speaker 3: time youthday made Ruby.

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Speaker 2: We did all our private birthday stuff and Ruby sent

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Speaker 2: you a video and you sent her.

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Speaker 1: One, which is very sweet.

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Speaker 3: Imagine we'll do that for the rest of our lives. Yeah,

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Speaker 3: so at any rate. Back to the autopsy.

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Speaker 2: Uh, not not some half assed shark autopsy, but a

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Speaker 2: shark an autopsy on this arm. They were like, this

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Speaker 2: was not a shark biting this arm off, Like this

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Speaker 2: thing was cut off with something sharp. It wasn't shark teeth,

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Speaker 2: and it was not surgery either, So I think we

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Speaker 2: have a murder on our hands. And again with jaws,

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Speaker 2: they were like, whatever that shark ate has bound to

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Speaker 2: still be in there. And this arm was in there, uh,

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Speaker 2: fairly well preserved, like you could see a tattoo of

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Speaker 2: a couple of boxers about.

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Speaker 3: To go at it.

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Speaker 2: They put it out in the newspaper and a guy

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Speaker 2: named Edwin Smith was like, I think that might be

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Speaker 2: my brother's arm. He had this tattoo and he's been

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Speaker 2: gone missing for a few weeks. And the cops are like,

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Speaker 2: all right, they were able to get fingerprints, and they're like, yep,

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Speaker 2: bing baning, we have a winner.

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Speaker 3: That is Jim Smith's arm.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I say that we take a break here and

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Speaker 1: come back and talk about Jim Smith a little bit. Alrighty,

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Speaker 1: So Chuck, we're back, and Jim Smith has just been

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Speaker 1: confirm to be the owner of the arm. But the

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Speaker 1: rest of Jim Smith has not been found, so the

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Speaker 1: cops are approaching this now as a murder. They start

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Speaker 1: looking into Jim Smith's background and they find out that

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Speaker 1: he was a builder, but he was bankrupt. He also

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Speaker 1: made some money on the side, working basically in the underworld.

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Speaker 1: He was a boxer, he was a bookmaker. He also

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Speaker 1: turned out to be a smuggler, as we'll see at

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Speaker 1: the And this was also at a time in the

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Speaker 1: nineteen thirties in Sydney it was like gang land apparently,

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Speaker 1: like there was open gang war in the street for

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Speaker 1: control of Sydney's underworld. It was just that lucrative, right,

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Speaker 1: So I get the impression that if you were bankrupt,

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Speaker 1: you could always turn to Sydney's world of crime and

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Speaker 1: start making some money too, And Jim Smith had done that.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, sounds like it.

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Speaker 2: So investigators found out that his last known whereabouts were

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Speaker 2: he was drinking with his friend Patrick Brady at a hotel.

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Speaker 2: And I want to say crenula, but it may be cronula,

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Speaker 2: Like I don't know, yeah, would be an Aussie will tell.

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Speaker 1: Us when you say Kogi beach. It just dawned on

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Speaker 1: me that, like we hadn't looked up the pronunciations in

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Speaker 1: like that cartoon sweat like jumped off of my forehead.

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Speaker 2: I think it's a kogie because it's two o's, but

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Speaker 2: that might not be right either. But it could bezz Loves,

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Speaker 2: So yeah, it could be coogie.

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Speaker 3: Actually, I will here. I can't wait.

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Speaker 2: We'll talk about it later in a listener mail. Okay,

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Speaker 2: we're looking forward to all the Ozzy pronunciations coming back

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Speaker 2: to us.

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Speaker 1: I think it's koogie because there's the Coogie Beach Sunday

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Speaker 1: at Outback Steakhouse.

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Speaker 3: I don't want to believe you don't.

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Speaker 1: I could see it, so, I mean, that's definitely possible

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Speaker 1: for sure.

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Speaker 2: So Brady, his buddy that he was drinking with. He

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Speaker 2: was also sort of a bad guy. He was an

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Speaker 2: expert forger and the cops knew about him. And there

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Speaker 2: was a cab driver there that had some pretty key information.

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Speaker 2: Which was on the morning after Jim Smith had last

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Speaker 2: been seeing drinking with his friend. His friend Brady had

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Speaker 2: hailed this cab said take me to North Sydney and

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Speaker 2: pull up outside this house and wait for me. And

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Speaker 2: that house turned out to be the house of a

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Speaker 2: guy named Reginald Lloyd. Holmes, who was, as far as

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Speaker 2: everyone knew, generally a respectable boat builder. He had a

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Speaker 2: boat building business. But on the other side of the coin,

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Speaker 2: he was also a, like you said, a smuggler. He

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Speaker 2: apparently had a thing where he would build these speedboats

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Speaker 2: and he would drive around Sydney Harbor and pick up

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Speaker 2: discarded contraband. I guess when the noose was tightening on

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Speaker 2: real smugglers, they would dump like cocaine and cigarettes and

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Speaker 2: other contraband, and he would drive around and or his

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Speaker 2: guys would drive around and pick this stuff up. And

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Speaker 2: I think Brady and Smith were some of these guys

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Speaker 2: at times, or at least Smith was.

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Speaker 1: Yes, Smith definitely was. And I think these were actually

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Speaker 1: like this was like these were planned rendezvous. That's just

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Speaker 1: how they transferred the cargo.

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Speaker 2: Oh, I thought it was like they were in trouble

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Speaker 2: so they would dump their load.

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Speaker 1: I don't know, I don't know. It hadn't occurred to

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Speaker 1: me that they dumped their load.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, just keep going.

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Speaker 1: So either way, that's how he made his money. And again,

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Speaker 1: like he was picking up cocaine in the thirties, that

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Speaker 1: was a huge, huge business in Sydney. Everybody and their

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Speaker 1: brother and their mother and their little sister was on

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Speaker 1: cocaine constantly in Sydney. At any rate, it was shown

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Speaker 1: that Jim Smith worked for Reginald Holmes, and now with

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Speaker 1: this cab driver coming forward, they had the last man

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Speaker 1: to be seen with Jim Smith while Jim Smith was

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Speaker 1: alive taking a cab and acting very cagey, as the

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Speaker 1: cab driver would would later testify to Reginald Holmes's house,

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Speaker 1: and Reginald Holmes was connected to Jim Smith. So now

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Speaker 1: Jim Smith's arm seemed really really connected to Reginald Holmes

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Speaker 1: and Patrick Brady.

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Speaker 3: That's right.

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Speaker 2: So it turns out that Smith and Holmes had a

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Speaker 2: falling out over an entrance scam, and there was the

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Speaker 2: idea that Smith was blackmailing Holmes was like, hey, you're

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Speaker 2: a respectable boat builder, so you don't want this to

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Speaker 2: get out kind of thing, and that cab ride was

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Speaker 2: linked to, you know, the murder and Holmes at that point,

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Speaker 2: So cops got on this theory that Brady had murdered

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Speaker 2: Smith cut his arm off, like he was directed to

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Speaker 2: murder Smith because of the blackmail thing by Holmes brought

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Speaker 2: it to Holmes. It's like, hey, this guy's dead. You

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Speaker 2: thought I'd bring a finger. This is Sydney, here's his arm.

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Speaker 2: So that was the idea. At least Holmes had an explanation,

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Speaker 2: was that Brady brought it to him as like he

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Speaker 2: was going to extort Holmes and was like, hey, I

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Speaker 2: just like killed this guy and here's an arm, Like

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Speaker 2: I really mean business, So you got to pay up.

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Speaker 2: The arm obviously was later just thrown back in the ocean,

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Speaker 2: and the shark hated. The rest of the body everyone

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Speaker 2: presumes was just like weighted and sunk.

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Speaker 1: Probably yeah, it didn't ever come back up. The arm

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Speaker 1: came back up right right, thanks to our shark friend.

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Speaker 1: Problem is, you could put all this stuff together and

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Speaker 1: painted a pretty convincing picture, I guess of Brady and

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Speaker 1: Holmes's involvement in the disappearance and probable murder of Jim Smith.

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Speaker 1: But it was all circumstantial. So as any cop from

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Speaker 1: the thirties in Sydney could tell you, you need a confession.

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Speaker 1: This isn't like Chinatown. This is Sydney, nineteen thirties. We

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Speaker 1: need confessions. We can't convict people on circumstantial evidence. So

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Speaker 1: they started to turn up the heat on those two

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Speaker 1: that's right.

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Speaker 2: They arrest Brady, take him to the police station. They

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Speaker 2: bring Holmes in. He's like, I don't even know this

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Speaker 2: Brady guy. And everything kind of stalled out basically because

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Speaker 2: they know nobody was confessing anything until May twentieth. And

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Speaker 2: this is when Holmes leaves in a speedboat out into

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Speaker 2: the harbor and pulls out a gun to try and

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Speaker 2: kill himself. And he fails at that, but when he

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Speaker 2: falls into the water where he might have drowned at

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Speaker 2: that point, but a rope catches his arm and stops

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Speaker 2: him from drowning. Being plunged in that cold water. I guess,

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Speaker 2: like you know, revived him and he gets back on board.

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Speaker 2: Police are on the scene at this point, and there

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Speaker 2: is a four hour boat chase through Sydney Harbor until

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Speaker 2: finally Holmes is like, all right, like you got me,

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Speaker 2: I'm done.

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Speaker 1: I'm bored with riding around on my boat.

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Speaker 3: Yeah.

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Speaker 1: So that's fairly suspicious behavior, and the cops took it

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Speaker 1: that way too. When they arrested Holmes, he said, you

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Speaker 1: know what, I'm just going to give in entirely here.

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Speaker 1: I'm going to testify against Patrick Brady. He was the

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Speaker 1: one who killed Jim Smith, I'm your guy. I'm going

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Speaker 1: to be a great witness. How about you just let

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Speaker 1: me go take a little drive in my car for

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Speaker 1: a little while. I got to clear my head. And

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Speaker 1: Holmes head was cleared for him. Actually his chest was

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Speaker 1: because he was found shortly after that dead in his

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Speaker 1: car with three gunshot wounds to the chest.

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Speaker 3: That's right.

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Speaker 2: So now that Holmes is dead, basically the whole case

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Speaker 2: against Brady falls apart because that was, you know, the

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Speaker 2: key link, this this cab driver. Like they had that testimony,

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Speaker 2: but that wasn't enough to you know, to convict anybody.

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Speaker 3: So it did, I think.

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Speaker 2: Go to trial, but it was a pretty quick trial,

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Speaker 2: and the judge was basically like, you know, we can't

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Speaker 2: do anything but a quit at this point because all

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Speaker 2: we have is circumstantial evidence. Right, So you'd think it

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Speaker 2: might be over at this point, but it's not. Because

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Speaker 2: it turns out that Smith had been a police informant

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Speaker 2: or what they call a fizzer or a fiz gig

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Speaker 2: I guess in Sydney at that time, and he had

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Speaker 2: informed on a guy named Eddie Wayman, and it looks

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Speaker 2: like Wayman turned out to be the trigger man because

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Speaker 2: he had gotten rated out basically by Smith.

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Speaker 1: That was a theory for sure. An author named Alex

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Speaker 1: Castle's advanced that theory because Eddie Weyman was definitely the

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Speaker 1: kind of person to do that. He was a very

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Speaker 1: dangerous person in the Sydney underworld at a time when

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Speaker 1: the Sydney underworld was basically nothing but dangerous people. That's

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Speaker 1: possible because remember here, like, we have no idea still

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Speaker 1: to this day, who killed Holmes. Yeah, it was possibly

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Speaker 1: Brady because he was certainly the one to gain the

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Speaker 1: most from it. But we just don't know another.

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Speaker 2: Kid's in the cocaine business too, So there could There

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Speaker 2: were probably all kinds of people that wanted him dead.

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Speaker 1: Right, and he had shown that he was willing to

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Speaker 1: talk to cops, right, And since Jim Smith had shown

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Speaker 1: that he was willing to talk to cops by renting

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Speaker 1: out Eddie Weyman, another theory is that both of them

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Speaker 1: were just rubbed out, as you know, part of the

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Speaker 1: normal business of Gangland Sydney's at Sydney in the nineteen thirties, right,

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Speaker 1: that they were just stool pigeons who were both murdered,

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Speaker 1: and it just so happened that those murders were wrapped

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Speaker 1: up into this shark arm murder caper.

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Speaker 3: That's right.

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Speaker 2: There still one more theory, and this came from Atlas Obscura.

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Speaker 2: I don't know if they made it up or whatever,

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Speaker 2: but it was on their website at least. But they

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Speaker 2: in their article they said they think they pulled a

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Speaker 2: Fletch or Holmes. Did they think Holmes hired a hipman

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Speaker 2: to kill him in a weird like suicide, to get

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Speaker 2: rid of him and spare his family the scandal of him,

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Speaker 2: you know, being this big criminal, and to get you know,

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Speaker 2: some clean insurance money that they could collect upon his death.

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Speaker 1: Is that what Fletch does, and confess Fletch.

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Speaker 2: No, in the original Fletch, that's what Tim Mathoson does.

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Speaker 3: He hires Fletch to kill him.

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Speaker 1: I see, I see.

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Speaker 3: I know that you hated Fletch, so you probably don't remember.

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Speaker 1: I need to go back if I can stomach it

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Speaker 1: and watch some of the works of Chevy Chase and c.

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Speaker 1: If I still dislike him as much, I wonder if

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Speaker 1: I will even more. Yeah, I'm curious, all right, I'll

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Speaker 1: let you know how it goes.

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Speaker 3: There were some good ones. There were a handful of

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Speaker 3: really good Chevy Chase movies.

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Speaker 1: In my opinion, the one I remember liking the most

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Speaker 1: seems like old times.

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Speaker 2: Oh yeah, well that's Neil Simon. So oh okay, that's

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Speaker 2: Chevy Chase. Even if you hate Chevy Chase, you got

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Speaker 2: a Neil Simon script at the root of that one.

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Speaker 1: Speaking of Neil Simon, I watched for you. Asked me

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Speaker 1: the other week or so ago which movie I've seen

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Speaker 1: the most, and I watched rewatched Murdered by Death again.

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Speaker 1: I was like, this one is definitely up there. I've

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Speaker 1: seen Murdered by Death a lot, and it's still it

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Speaker 1: holds up every single time you watch it.

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Speaker 3: All right, well, I still haven't seen that. I need

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Speaker 3: to check it out.

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Speaker 1: Oh really yeah, okay, well let me know what you

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Speaker 1: think I will. All right, well, in the meantime, short stuffs.

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Speaker 4: That one stuff you should know is a production of iHeartRadio.

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Speaker 4: For more podcasts My Heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app,

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Speaker 4: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.