Speaker 1: A note to the listener. The following story contains some
Speaker 1: adult content and language. This box just had a bunch
Speaker 1: of little dresses, and I'm assuming they're yours, either mine
Speaker 1: or your aunt ar Lean's one of ours? And what
Speaker 1: size is that? Um? Seven? It must be mine? Is
Speaker 1: this Hank? That's him, my mysterious grandfather. Wow? Here was
Speaker 1: a car before all of the private detective stuff. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there aren't a ton of those, Beth. Where did you
Speaker 1: find that one? It was in a box, Mark Hughes.
Speaker 1: That makes sense. That was the judge. It was so handsome. No, no,
Speaker 1: not not a judge, my grand The voices you're hearing
Speaker 1: with me are a Phyllis Briggs Turner and her daughter,
Speaker 1: Beth Turner. Phillis owns a breakfast spot just outside of Seattle,
Speaker 1: and Beth is a freelance writer for an online magazine.
Speaker 1: Here they were taking me through some of the belongings
Speaker 1: left behind by Phyllis's late father, Hank Briggs, a private
Speaker 1: detective in the Los Angeles area in the nineteen fifties.
Speaker 1: Can you help me with this? Oh? Yeah, of course, thanks? Mom?
Speaker 1: Was this photo from the war? Uh? No, it's basic training,
Speaker 1: I think, Ah, Jesus, I can't believe we kept all
Speaker 1: of these. There's so much stuff. Hank died just over
Speaker 1: two months ago, and the arrival of all of his
Speaker 1: belongings to Phyllis's house is fairly recent and was somewhat unexpected. See,
Speaker 1: Hank had lived alone for years with little to no
Speaker 1: contact with anyone, so when Phillis and Beth showed up
Speaker 1: to clean out his house, they expected to find just
Speaker 1: a bunch of junk trinkets, old photographs, clothing, and they're
Speaker 1: like but hidden away in the attic of hank briggs home.
Speaker 1: We're missing pieces in one of the most famous unsolved
Speaker 1: murders Hollywood has ever known. From Vot's Popula and the
Speaker 1: Los Angeles, Harold, this is the Angel of Vine. Why
Speaker 1: old heart ain't gain and no ground because my Angels.
Speaker 1: I'm Oscar Simons of the Los Angeles, Harold, and welcome
Speaker 1: to the Angel of Vine. A little bit about me
Speaker 1: and my involvement in this crazy story before we begin.
Speaker 1: Some of you already know me in my podcast, so
Speaker 1: please bear with me. As I explained to those who
Speaker 1: may be listening for the first time, I promised to
Speaker 1: try and make it brief I've always been fascinated by
Speaker 1: investigative police work, specifically when that work reaches its limit,
Speaker 1: where there are no more clues or leads, and all
Speaker 1: information and options seem to have been exhausted. A cold case. Now,
Speaker 1: one of the most famous of these cases is the
Speaker 1: Angel of Vine. Chances are you've heard the name, even
Speaker 1: if you don't know the details now. Like so many others,
Speaker 1: this case has always been of great interest to me.
Speaker 1: It was a gruesome murder for any time period, but
Speaker 1: especially for that time and after the only suspect in
Speaker 1: the case was released from custody, the police work stopped
Speaker 1: in its tracks when it seemed as if there was
Speaker 1: nowhere left to look. Everyone just stopped looking. Everyone except
Speaker 1: for Hank Briggs so Beth for the record, for our listeners,
Speaker 1: Why am I here such deep questions so early in
Speaker 1: the morning. No, Um, you're here because I called you
Speaker 1: about my grandfather's tapes that I found, that my mother
Speaker 1: and I found. And what about those tapes led you
Speaker 1: to me? We have to go back a little. Um. So,
Speaker 1: my mom got a call from the Los Angeles Police Department.
Speaker 1: Right yeah, l A p D contacted Seattle p D,
Speaker 1: who showed up here out of the blue. And what
Speaker 1: do they say that Hanks died peacefully in his home
Speaker 1: in Los Angeles and left everything to me? Wow? Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's your average house call. No, not so much. How
Speaker 1: long had it been since she's senior Valley? Long time?
Speaker 1: Not since my mother's funeral. I'm sorry, don't be so
Speaker 1: After that, you had l A. Yes, we flew down
Speaker 1: the following week to meet with the probate lawyer. How
Speaker 1: is that expeditious? Relatively clinical? The afternoon that we arrived
Speaker 1: in l A, the lawyer hand us a check from
Speaker 1: hanks bank account, the keys to the house and keys
Speaker 1: tweet car that hadn't been driven in years. Did you
Speaker 1: go to the house that day? We did that afternoon.
Speaker 1: We didn't meet the realtor there until the next day.
Speaker 1: But when you're hand at the keys to a house,
Speaker 1: do you go see the house? I'm assuming that wasn't
Speaker 1: the house you grew up in. It wasn't. What was
Speaker 1: it like? It was depressing before we even walked in.
Speaker 1: I was starting with that old car, and not like
Speaker 1: old car, like a classic car and eight three colss
Speaker 1: Sierra haven't been maintained in years. The fender was rusted
Speaker 1: cobwebs around the hub caps that the felt from the
Speaker 1: interior ceiling was sagging, depressing. So what was it like
Speaker 1: walking into the house for the first time, Like entering
Speaker 1: any stranger's home. Completely foreign, and it was very dark.
Speaker 1: The blinds were all closed. Not much in the way
Speaker 1: of furniture either, feel very lonely. There was a reclining
Speaker 1: chair in the center of the living room and one
Speaker 1: of those TV dinner stands you know there's. The TV
Speaker 1: was on a loose sight rolling cart old, not antenna old,
Speaker 1: but everything felt old, as if there was a filter
Speaker 1: over everything. I mean, the couch had a plastic cover
Speaker 1: on it. We stepped into a different era and the
Speaker 1: bedroom was completely bare except for the book of poetry
Speaker 1: and the photograph of you, Arolene and Grandma and an
Speaker 1: ashtray ashtrays in every corner. The whole house smelled like
Speaker 1: stale cigarettes and catfood, but there wasn't a cat, not
Speaker 1: that we found anyway. So when did you find the attic?
Speaker 1: We didn't actually know there was an attic the first day.
Speaker 1: We were only there for what maybe fifteen minutes. It
Speaker 1: was when we met the realtor there. I heard her say,
Speaker 1: what's up here? And there was the ladder. It was
Speaker 1: one of those pool string panels in the hallway ceiling
Speaker 1: on the way to the bathroom. So you climbed the ladder,
Speaker 1: and what do you see the trappings of a mad hoarder.
Speaker 1: File boxes, file box upon file box upon file box.
Speaker 1: I mean there were boxes everywhere. What did you find
Speaker 1: in those boxes? We found the tapes? Where was he? Right?
Speaker 1: This guy's wife, you know, they just know, right, she
Speaker 1: just knew he was running around behind her back with
Speaker 1: the neighbor girl, this gorgeous blonde actress from Utah, Mormon
Speaker 1: girl shirked her husband and sister Winds or whatever to
Speaker 1: move to Hollywood and kiss matten the adols, you know,
Speaker 1: the usual. So this guy, he's not even trying to
Speaker 1: hide it, leaves work for a lunch, goes right down
Speaker 1: the street, buys flowers, candy, breath mints, starts driving back
Speaker 1: to his neighborhood. And I'm thinking, well, this job lasted
Speaker 1: a day, right, Maybe I shouldn't lose him. I don't know,
Speaker 1: stretch it out till the weekend or whatever. I mean,
Speaker 1: I got a mortgage in office rent, you know, all right,
Speaker 1: So I'm following the guy, and he drives right past
Speaker 1: the actress is little Bungalow, and I think, Okay, not
Speaker 1: so predictable after all, not this guy. After about half
Speaker 1: an hour, he finally pulls over downtown, right near that
Speaker 1: giant warehouse near sixth. He goes into one of those
Speaker 1: new I don't know, animated buildings, you know, across the street.
Speaker 1: I don't know what they call him. So so now
Speaker 1: I'm hustling to get in after him, because christ I
Speaker 1: lose this guy and he's gone god knows how long,
Speaker 1: which again, not such a bad thing, right, Maybe I
Speaker 1: will make my mortgage after all, who knows, But not
Speaker 1: if I don't get anything on him. So I sneak
Speaker 1: in there and I see him talking to someone on
Speaker 1: the first floor, practically begging this guy to be let
Speaker 1: into the place. I pretend I'm checking the mail and
Speaker 1: the lobby until he goes in, and then one, two three,
Speaker 1: I count the doors in the hall. He goes in
Speaker 1: the number three, so I pop outside. I make my
Speaker 1: way to the windows of the place. One two three,
Speaker 1: I sidled up the window. Three, I grabbed my camera
Speaker 1: and pay him. Got him. You want to know what
Speaker 1: this freaking guy's doing. I got him in a diaper
Speaker 1: being held by a very large woman. He's in this
Speaker 1: big diaper, pacifier in his mouth and every time I
Speaker 1: can you believe? Then, how the hell am I going
Speaker 1: to tell his wife with a straight face? So that's
Speaker 1: what he's been doing. I may to forget about him.
Speaker 1: When I showed the pictures to each his own, I guess,
Speaker 1: but I don't know. Hey, hey, my drinking alone again.
Speaker 1: I'm coming. Charlie's unbelievable, right. Parnell has got to be steaming.
Speaker 1: Didn't even get a full month to celebrate his no
Speaker 1: hit her. Hey, how's aunty? She's killing me? To be fair,
Speaker 1: I wanted to throw all the tapes out with the
Speaker 1: rest of the stuff, decades of case files and this
Speaker 1: entire life that none of us were privy to, but
Speaker 1: Beth insisted on shipping it all here. I never met him,
Speaker 1: I mean I had never wanted to. But when I
Speaker 1: saw all of those boxes, all of his cases, and
Speaker 1: the tapes, all of those tapes there are hundreds of hundreds,
Speaker 1: and suddenly I wanted to hear what my grandfather had
Speaker 1: to say. I wanted to know about him. Would you
Speaker 1: like some more coffee. Thanks. Okay, so you ship all
Speaker 1: this stuff back here and then and then one well
Speaker 1: everything was thrown into these boxes, no logs, no order
Speaker 1: to it, just chucked in a box. And once everything
Speaker 1: was unloaded into the garage and just staring at me,
Speaker 1: I thought, where the hell do I begin? So? Where
Speaker 1: did you start with the ones that I found? With
Speaker 1: the mini phone? For those who who don't know, can
Speaker 1: you describe what a mini phone is? Yeah? So it's
Speaker 1: a clunky handheld recorder about the size of a three
Speaker 1: hundred page paperback, and each tape, that's what you want
Speaker 1: to call it, is a spool of metal wire, basically
Speaker 1: a small reel to reel. But what's really crazy about
Speaker 1: it is that it came with this phone attachment, a
Speaker 1: watch with a microphone and a hole ster. Sounds like
Speaker 1: spy gear totally so. So he could be wearing it
Speaker 1: under his coat or recording you from the microphone and
Speaker 1: his watch. Can I see that? Yeah? Ever, no, you're
Speaker 1: being recorded? Uh wow? Yeah. There's also a foot pedal.
Speaker 1: Must have been for his office. Yeah, the pantilet shows
Speaker 1: it used under a desk. That would make sense. Okay,
Speaker 1: so you find the mini phone and then what So
Speaker 1: I picked one of the tapes, and after a few
Speaker 1: delicate minutes trying to figure out just how to load it,
Speaker 1: I impressed play and there he was my grandfather, and
Speaker 1: there was this immediate sense of urgency and his voice,
Speaker 1: and so I stopped it. Why it was darring. I
Speaker 1: also realized that I didn't have any context. I didn't
Speaker 1: know what I was listening to. I mean, none of
Speaker 1: the information would make any sense to me. What do
Speaker 1: you mean? Well, I knew the name the Angel of Vine.
Speaker 1: I had heard of it, but not much else. So
Speaker 1: I turned to the internet technology just to get the
Speaker 1: basics about the case. Your blog came up with the
Speaker 1: most recent article about it, and after a quick read,
Speaker 1: that's that's when I knew I might be in over
Speaker 1: my head. And that's why you're here. So you saw
Speaker 1: the crime scene, botus, I did. Jesus Christ. A warning
Speaker 1: to the possibly squeamish. What you're about to hear is
Speaker 1: Hank reading Detective Lieutenant Robert Perkins report of when he
Speaker 1: first arrived at the crime scene. The victim in question
Speaker 1: would later be identified as Marlene Murray Evans, dubbed by
Speaker 1: the media the Angel Levine. Body was lying souppine let's
Speaker 1: face up in the parking lot, head pointed south, feet
Speaker 1: pointing to the north. The legs of the victim were
Speaker 1: crusted and the arms were pointing downward each of the
Speaker 1: forty five gray angle with the poems facing up towards
Speaker 1: the sky. Victims ribs were protruding outward from behind the
Speaker 1: torso and I either side of the body at a
Speaker 1: forty five degree angle, pointing solid blood, presumably the victims
Speaker 1: was splattered on the pavement outward from each rib directly
Speaker 1: over the head of the body formed a semi circle
Speaker 1: of twelve bones. Jesus, there were no visible ascerations of
Speaker 1: bruises that would indicate a struggle anywhere on the front
Speaker 1: of the body. Seems that the victim had been killed
Speaker 1: at a different location. No kidding, Perkins, as it appears
Speaker 1: to have been cleaned prior to being placed here. What
Speaker 1: kind of sick o. It's like he was getting the
Speaker 1: camera ready, Dad, That poor girl's parents further warning. What
Speaker 1: follows is from the autopsy performed on March six by
Speaker 1: Dr John Lemery, Los Angeles County Corner. In the report,
Speaker 1: it states all of her details. She was five ft
Speaker 1: six weighed pounds. She had brown hair and hazel eyes.
Speaker 1: G L seventy residue was found on the front of
Speaker 1: her central and lateral incisors, as well as the underside
Speaker 1: of her upper right, second and third molars. Like with
Speaker 1: Perkins report, there was nothing out of the ordinary when
Speaker 1: it came to the front side of Marlen's body. Her
Speaker 1: back is a whole other story. The body had been
Speaker 1: cut longitudinally, that is to say, vertically, from the base
Speaker 1: of the skull to just above the sacrum. The trapezius
Speaker 1: and latissimus dorside muscles of her back had been peeled
Speaker 1: away and removed. Her ribs were then peeled outward, and
Speaker 1: the twelve bones above her head were the twelve intact
Speaker 1: vertebrae of her entire thoracic spine, her wings, and her halo.
Speaker 1: The body had been drained of its blood, except for
Speaker 1: the amount splattered at the crime scene, which was later
Speaker 1: assumed to be Marline's as it matched her known blood type.
Speaker 1: Lemery also noted that there was extensive echymosis or bruising
Speaker 1: at the sites where the muscles had been removed, which
Speaker 1: means she was alive during this If there is any
Speaker 1: good news here, and I'm trying to find some. It
Speaker 1: is that the official cause of death was ruled an
Speaker 1: overdose from a combination of two barbeto It's pento barbatral
Speaker 1: and Cicco barbatal sedative used for a wide range of
Speaker 1: conditions from insomniato epilepsy. For Marlene to have had enough
Speaker 1: of these in her system to cause her death, it
Speaker 1: is safe to say that she was not aware of
Speaker 1: what was being done to her, and that is the
Speaker 1: good news at least I choose to believe that. Now
Speaker 1: we do know the body was cleaned. But I want
Speaker 1: to go back for a second to when I mentioned
Speaker 1: something called g L seventy that was found on her teeth.
Speaker 1: So what is g L seventy. Well, g L seventy
Speaker 1: was a compound found in glee toothpaste that supposedly fought oder.
Speaker 1: Think about that for a second. She's been essentially dissected, right,
Speaker 1: her body intricately mutilated beyond belief, and the killer takes
Speaker 1: the time during all of this to brush her teeth.
Speaker 1: Like Hank said, it's like he was getting her camera ready. Hollywood,
Speaker 1: California not just the home of glitz and glamour. No
Speaker 1: beneath the limousines and mink coats looks a dark underbelly
Speaker 1: of crime, narcotics, and yes, even murder. The Angel of Vine,
Speaker 1: a murder straight from the pages of a dime store thriller,
Speaker 1: has captured the minds and fuelled the nightmares of the
Speaker 1: nation and baffled law enforcement in Los Angeles. And how
Speaker 1: could it not the life of Marley Marie Evans just
Speaker 1: twenty three years old with a burgeoning film career, and
Speaker 1: did tragically on March nine nine in an empty part
Speaker 1: lot just north of Hollywood Boulevard. Her body mutilated, her
Speaker 1: life cut short, and her killers still at large. And
Speaker 1: with numerous false confessions, countless individual's questions, and no viable
Speaker 1: suspects on the horizon, will the Angel of Ning be
Speaker 1: one Hollywood tale to go without a third act? Oh,
Speaker 1: late time, we'll tell. After my first interview with Beth
Speaker 1: and Phillis, I reached out to a self proclaimed expert
Speaker 1: in the case and asked him if he wouldn't mind
Speaker 1: meeting me at the scene where it all started. David, Yep,
Speaker 1: Hey you you ask her? Yeah, nice to meet you.
Speaker 1: Yeah you too, Yeah, thanks for meeting me here of course. Hey,
Speaker 1: welcome to dead Hollywood Tours. That's what I do. Man.
Speaker 1: So you want to know about Marlene Ribbons Huh, the
Speaker 1: grizzly unsolved murder of a young actress, the angel as
Speaker 1: they call her. Well, they found her right over there
Speaker 1: in that parking lot. Yes, sir, flayed imposed and angelic
Speaker 1: staring at the heavens. You know what I find amazing
Speaker 1: is how many crazy theories people have about the murder.
Speaker 1: How many? Why can you tell me one? I'm sure
Speaker 1: people love to latch onto the idea of a southern
Speaker 1: California that they've heard about. When it comes to cases
Speaker 1: like I don't know, the Manson family or the Zodiac Killer.
Speaker 1: Everyone wants to attach a half naked, wacko culture, a
Speaker 1: hooded madman whose m O is always somehow satanic rituals.
Speaker 1: And you don't think that that was the case here, Oh,
Speaker 1: absolutely not. The likelihood that Marlene Maray Evans was a
Speaker 1: sacrifice to a secret society is as plausible as the
Speaker 1: idea that she was murdered by the FBI, the CIA,
Speaker 1: and the mafia. Interesting, how can you be sure? Well,
Speaker 1: because because of the care and the attention paid to
Speaker 1: her body, the ribs made to look like wings, and
Speaker 1: the use of her spine to create a halo. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's all too clean, man, it's the theatrical. It's too
Speaker 1: much of a presentation. I mean, I certainly don't think
Speaker 1: the killer had Ernie Newburn in mind as the dude
Speaker 1: that was going to find Winder. I mean, here's this
Speaker 1: laborer on his way to treat himself to some pancakes,
Speaker 1: a through pars and instead of staying on Yucca, which
Speaker 1: I would have done, takes the lot that cuts through
Speaker 1: from Ivart de Vine and finds himself an angel, you know,
Speaker 1: pancakes for any of that day. I mean a construction worker.
Speaker 1: She was found by a freaking construction worker who panics,
Speaker 1: grabs every other worker on the job to confirm that
Speaker 1: what he's found is in fact a dead girl, and
Speaker 1: by the time the cops show up, it's a zoo.
Speaker 1: I mean, if if you're gonna lay a body across
Speaker 1: from an active construction site before dawn on a weekday,
Speaker 1: there's no question she was absolutely meant to be found
Speaker 1: and seen by the public. I mean, once the press
Speaker 1: in this town got wind of the crime scene, they
Speaker 1: nearly destroyed any evidence in that lot, trying to scoop
Speaker 1: each other. I mean, can you imagine trying to keep
Speaker 1: that lot safe from a mob of reporters. That's a
Speaker 1: ton of space to block off from vultures, let alone
Speaker 1: comb for evidence with flashing bulbs going off and question
Speaker 1: is being yelled at that you don't have the answers
Speaker 1: to It must have been absolute mayhem, absolute mayhem. And
Speaker 1: Hollywood ate it up. I mean, not just Hollywood, everyone
Speaker 1: ate it up. I'm still leading it up. I mean,
Speaker 1: have you heard those awful newsreels from back then? I have, Yes, Yeah,
Speaker 1: they're they're pretty colorful, colorful, they're grotesque and if you
Speaker 1: ask me, which you are the only benefit of the killer.
Speaker 1: The grandiosity of the drama on that scale of reporting
Speaker 1: just created more hysteria. Little known fact where poor old
Speaker 1: Ernie found her in that parking lot. He was actually
Speaker 1: closer to Ivar Marlene Marie Evans is actually the angel
Speaker 1: of Ivor. That's not as catchy, is it? So the
Speaker 1: reporters use angel of vine everybody knows fine Hollywood and
Speaker 1: Vine bang instant headline. Everybody's hooked. My mother used to say,
Speaker 1: all he cared about was that dead girl meeting the angel?
Speaker 1: It makes more sense now, So what else can you
Speaker 1: tell me about Hank? We know he was a police officer.
Speaker 1: What my mother used to call him a professional peeping tom.
Speaker 1: But yes, he was a cop for many years until
Speaker 1: he left the force. Do you know what? Something to
Speaker 1: do with politics within the department. They wanted to make
Speaker 1: an example of him, and so he left. After that,
Speaker 1: he opened his private detective agency. Spends less and less
Speaker 1: time at home. My mother kicks him out. G was
Speaker 1: a tough cookie, understandable. I can't say a blamer, said
Speaker 1: just a second meeting here, I'm not going anywhere. Yeah,
Speaker 1: how can I help you? Hank breeze? That's what it
Speaker 1: says on the door. May I see that's what it's
Speaker 1: there for? You come? Highly recommended, Mr Briggs. Urban was
Speaker 1: especially pleased with your discretion. You don't strike me as
Speaker 1: a Hollywood type. I'd like you to help me find
Speaker 1: someone how You're gonna have to be a little bit
Speaker 1: more specific, Mr Briggs, I want you to help me
Speaker 1: find whoever killed Marley Marie Evans. The Angel of Vine
Speaker 1: was a case with little to no information surrounding it.
Speaker 1: There were no prints, no clues, few suspects, and nothing
Speaker 1: connecting it to any other victims in any other cases.
Speaker 1: The investigation had such a dead end that the entirety
Speaker 1: of the l a p D gave up after eight months.
Speaker 1: I want you to think about that for a second.
Speaker 1: The l a p D gave up any hope that
Speaker 1: they would catch Marlene Marie Evans killer. And here we are,
Speaker 1: decades later, with an entire attic filled with audio recordings
Speaker 1: of an ex cop turned private detective who got closer
Speaker 1: than anyone to solving the murder and didn't tell us all.
Speaker 1: I want to know what made Hank Briggs the guy
Speaker 1: for the job. I want to know how he found
Speaker 1: a trail that no one else could. And more than anything,
Speaker 1: I want to know if he can tell the world
Speaker 1: who killed. The Angel of Vine. The Angel Levine is
Speaker 1: a podcast produced by Vox popular on behalf of the
Speaker 1: Los Angeles Harold. Thank you for listening to the Angel
Speaker 1: of Vine. If you'd like to support us, please leave
Speaker 1: a review and tell your friends to subscribe. The Angel
Speaker 1: of Vine is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and
Speaker 1: all major podcast apps. If you can't wait for the
Speaker 1: next episode of the Angel of Vine. Starting tomorrow, you
Speaker 1: can listen to episodes two through five exclusively on Stitcher Premium,
Speaker 1: as well as Angel Levine bonus episodes, extended episodes, and
Speaker 1: add free episodes. Go to Stitcher Premium dot com slash
Speaker 1: Angel and use promo code Angel to get your first
Speaker 1: month of Stitcher Premium free. The Angel Levine is directed
Speaker 1: by E. Ryan Martz, written by Oliver Vacare, Story by E.
Speaker 1: Ryan Marts, Jason Somwalt and Oliver Vacare. Sound designed by
Speaker 1: Joel Robbie. Produced by Vox Populi in association with Forever
Speaker 1: Dog Podcast Network. This episode's performances by Joe Manganello, Constant Zimmer,
Speaker 1: Camilla Ludington, Alan Tudeck, Nolan North, Eric Bowsa Cree Summer
Speaker 1: and Oliver Vacare. Angelis is performed by Desy Dennis Dylan
Speaker 1: piano and arrangement by James Harper, composed by Matt Dennis
Speaker 1: Lyrics by Earl Brent from downtown Los Angeles. This has
Speaker 1: been the Angel Levine. You'll hear more from us soon.
Speaker 1: Oh is my Joe? H excuse me? While I did
Speaker 1: supppear