Unlicensed S2 E3: "Minor Chords"
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To hear the rest of the season, head on over to Audible and listen to the whole thing right now with a free trial. Third season is coming in 2025. Enjoy! Since moving into the property at Foothill Gardens, my client has filed numerous complaints with the management regarding loud music, dogs barking, verbal arguments, and excessive sexual noises after 10 p.m., herein referred to as the nuisance.

Investigation has traced the nuisance as originating from your apartment, 4F. My client requests that you cease and desist immediately or face legal consequences under the state of California Penal Code 414. No, wait. 414 is about fighting in public. Is it 412? 412?

Siri, look up "Disturbing the Peace." "Disturbing the Peace" is a 2020 neo-western action thriller starring Guy Pearce. Stop! Never mind. What can I get you, hon? Morning! Hi! Sorry. Could I get a venti caramel frappuccino with extra whip, please? Oh, and do you have sprinkles? Sprinkles would be so awesome. Thank you so much. Unlicensed. Episode 3.

The beaches of San Bernardino County. The first rays of sunlight peek over the San Gabriel Mountains and wash across the empty parking lots of Foothill Boulevard. A hungover Starbucks employee lowers the blinds against the sudden brightness, wondering why they had to build this place with east-facing windows. She sees the cars already lining up at the drive-thru, takes a deep breath, and puts on a smile.

The sun moves higher, illuminating storage units, a cosmetic dental office, a historic Route 66 marker, and at the end of the street, a lone pawn shop with a We Buy Gold banner hanging in the window. Inside the shop, a light turns on above a jewelry case igniting a fire of glitter. Precious gems. A custom necklace reading Charmaine.

An engagement ring, originally purchased at Costco for a marriage that never happened. The love is dead, but the stone still sparks like a living thing in the light. The fluorescent snap-on, one by one, above shelves of sporting goods and power tools and dusty electronics. An AC unit, the only survivor of a house fire. A tablet stolen from a child on a crowded Metrolink train when her parents weren't looking.

A case of rifles and handguns, each with their own story, and none of them good. The electronic chirp of the front door announces the arrival of a young man clutching a Gibson Les Paul guitar. He owes his roommate, Luther, the rent, and if he doesn't pay, he'll be kicked out. He has to pawn Luther's guitar, he tells himself. He'll just get it back out of hock before Luther notices it's missing.

"This is wrong," a voice in his head says as he sets the guitar on the counter to be appraised. But he takes the ticket. He takes the money. As he steps back outside, he feels the warmth of the sunlight on his face telling him everything will be okay. He feels the warmth of the money in his pocket begging to be doubled or maybe even tripled at Morongo Casino just a short hour's drive down the tin.

Two women approach, and even though he already closed the door, he takes a step backward and opens it again for them. "I may be a bad person," he thinks, "but at least I'm a gentleman." The Hollywood pawn in trade is not in Hollywood. It's in Glendora, behind the Foster's Fries not far from my office.

I don't feel bad about getting rid of this stuff. Some of it's a relief to get rid of, like the jewelry I never wear. I'm not even sure why I have it in the first place. The only thing I feel bad about is the watch.

Grady gave it to me when I was first starting out in the business. It was a joke about my lack of punctuality, but it's also a damn nice watch. Much nicer than necessary for a joke. Sometimes people who care about each other have to frame love as a joke, so neither of them will get embarrassed.

Molly gives me an encouraging look, the same look she's been giving me for the last two weeks while we've gone to a parade of free consultations with what she calls the good lawyers. That means they have a four-star review average with a minimum of 50 reviews.

I tried to convince her I didn't need them. "No one knows my case better than I do," I said. "Lou," she told me, "you might know your case, but you don't know the law. I've personally seen you break at least five laws today alone." "That's not because I don't know the laws," I argued. "See, not a great defense," she said.

Sometimes people also say I love you by stopping you from making bad choices, like representing yourself in a felony trial. So in the last two weeks, we've seen 10 different good lawyers. I haven't liked any of them, but we agreed I wouldn't do any other investigation work until I picked one. So I settled on the bullfrog.

I call him that because of his deep voice and the way his facial expression never changes. And because I can't remember his name. But all the good lawyers require a retainer. So here we are, pawning my valuables. I hope the broker doesn't think I stole them. I look past him as he examines the watch and turns it into money.

A sign above the register reads, Law Office, with an arrow pointing toward a back hallway. Molly sees it too, and we look at each other with raised eyebrows. When you've got lawyers on the brain, they seem to show up everywhere. That's my daughter's law practice, the clerk proudly tells us, noticing us noticing the sign. She graduated top of her class at Northwestern.

Really? Is she available for a consultation? Lou jokes. At least, I hope she's joking. But no, the clerk tells us to go right back, and Lou is actually doing it. I jog to catch up. The hallway is short and leads to what seems to be a janitor's closet, but a name plaque on the door reads, Tammy Kang, Esquire.

Then I remember our office just has a taped piece of paper hanging in the window and check my judgment. "Hi," says a young woman sitting at a desk, surprised to see us. She quickly wipes whipped cream off her mouth and sets down an enormous Frappuccino. It has caramel drizzle and rainbow sprinkles on top. "Check your judgment, Molly. Check your judgment."

"Your father speaks highly of your work," Lou says, offering her hand. The woman, Tammy, reaches for it, looking confused. "Uh, he does?" she asks. "That's weird. I represented him in small claims last week and we lost. I thought he was still pissed. Uh, do you want to sit down? Oh, let me get some chairs." She disappears for a minute.

leaving us alone. "It can't hurt to talk to someone a little more off-grid." Instead of responding, I show her my phone. I did a quick Google of Tammy Kang, and not only does she have a one-star average review, but the Northwestern that her dad mentioned refers to Northwestern California Law School, an online program out of Sacramento with a reputation as one of the worst law schools in the state. Lou grins.

"Top of her class, though," she says. Tammy returns with folding chairs, and Lou launches into a quick description of the case against her and our background as investigators, a familiar speech we've been telling lawyers for weeks now. Tammy looks very interested, and I'm starting to feel like it's mean to lead her on. "Do you do criminal law?" I ask. "Not yet," she says, "but I've been meaning to branch out."

Maybe we'll be in touch, I say. But uh, we gotta get going, Lou. We have that thing. In Redlands. This isn't a lie. Though there isn't really a time crunch either. We're meeting up with Shelby Haneda of the Pacific Coast Paranormal Commission to check in with their investigation of the missing TikTok kid and see what's been happening with the George Perez murder. "Redlands?" Tammy asks. "You're going to Redlands right now?"

Lou confirms that we are, and before I know what's happening, Tammy is launching into some description of a case she has out in the Redlands area that she hasn't been able to investigate due to car problems. At first, I think she wants us to give her a ride, but no. She's asking us if we can do some investigating for her since we're PIs. She'll pay us, she says.

As I'm trying to wrap my head around the fact that we were supposedly interviewing her for a job, and she has somehow flipped the tables and wants to hire us, Lou says, Of course, we'd be happy to. Tammy opens her desk drawer and hands over a brochure for something called Camp Minor Chords, a non-profit music organization for underserved youth in San Bernardino County.

Tammy's 11-year-old cousin Aaron recently attended their free weekend music camp and returned home emotionally distressed. She won't say what really happened there. Instead, her stories about the place are fantastical and don't make sense. But from what Aaron's mother can tell...

The facilities at the camp were potentially unsafe, and the kids almost went full Lord of the Flies over the course of two days. So, Tammy's aunt, Jennifer Kang, wants to sue. She can't afford a regular lawyer, so she does what the family always does, and asks Tammy to help them out. So far, Tammy's only clients have been family members, mostly pro bono.

This makes her one-star review average on Google extra insulting. Tammy tries not to take it personally. It's all good experience, she tells herself. She'll be a great lawyer someday, and maybe even get some clients who don't share her DNA.

Oh, this place used to be a hot springs resort in the 40s. Molly says, looking up information about the music camp property while I'm driving. But it closed down a long time ago and stayed abandoned until this non-profit bought the land. Molly skims down Minercourt's website, but it's pretty sparse.

It says they host weekend camps, after-school programs, concerts, but there's almost no details. No calendar of events. The charity was founded by a billionaire almond magnate named Linda Norman. Linda Norman. That name is familiar.

Call Grady, I order. Molly looks at me surprised by my tone. Sorry, I was trying to voice command the phone, I tell her. But I can't get the thing to work, so Molly ends up calling the number for me anyway. What do you know about Linda Norman? I ask Grady when he's on the line. He works for McGovern Security, the biggest PI agency in town. This is exactly the kind of information he would know.

He tells me that the Normans are one of McGovern's biggest clients. They own, among other things, innocent almonds, which I might recognize from the shelves of every grocery store in the country. Ron Norman is the face of the operation, a self-made man, as he'll be happy to tell you, and has in every interview he's ever given.

good friends of politicians on both sides of the aisle, and an even better donor as long as they cough up on farm subsidies. And Ron's wife, Linda Norman, the brains of Innocent Almonds. From an old California cattle ranching family, now she's the chief operating officer of both Innocent and their parent company, Norman Acres.

I'm sure I had a case that involved the Normans at some point, but I can't remember what it was. "They're also close allies of the governor," Grady adds, "like, extremely close. They're his biggest donors, huge players in the state." "What do you know about Camp Minor chords?" I ask him, ignoring the warning tone in his voice.

He's never heard of Camp Minor Chords. I tell him it's a charity that Linda runs, and he says she's involved with a lot of charities. She's got this horse rescue farm up in Stockton, Hoof Beats, he thinks it's called. I can tell he's getting more nervous now. He starts skipping the subtext and saying things more directly, like...

Why are you asking? And you're not doing anything involving the Normans, are you? I tell him we're about to drive through a dead zone and hang up. The address Tammy Kane gave us for her aunt and cousin's house is in a tiny city called Mentone, stuck on the end of Northeast Redlands.

We pass farm stands advertising oranges and avocados and honey, telephone poles with signs advertising Jesus and cash for homes. Aaron King's house features a lone palm tree in a dirt yard and a swing set with a view of the abandoned Lockheed jet fuel factory. There's an old travel trailer in the driveway with the mysterious words "Don't Knock"

written on the door. The house itself. A brown prefab has no such warning, so I go ahead and knock. A dog barks from inside, something small like a terrier. The sound is quickly muffled as someone shuts it into another room. Erin Kang herself, age 11, opens the door and lets us in.

Cousin Tammy said you are coming, she greets us. She takes us into the kitchen, where several fans are blasting on high and offers us orange Fantas. Then Aaron says, there's a portal out in the hills. We have to close it before the monsters get out. Molly and I look at each other, deciding on the best response to this declaration. Is your mom home? I'll have a Fanta.

Erin's mom, Jen, comes into the kitchen carrying a chubby toddler. The dog has stopped barking. Sorry, she says as a greeting, setting the kid down. He can walk, but it looks like a relatively new skill. She tells us she has to get on a work Zoom, but gives permission for Erin to fill us in.

"Then maybe we can decide," she says in a whisper, "if Aaron is emotionally disturbed or what."

"We're not psychologists," I try to tell Jen as she grabs her laptop from the table. She disappears into the back hallway, leaving the toddler with us. "Tell us about the music camp, Aaron," Molly says to the older girl while shaking a ring of plastic toy keys at the child on the floor. He takes them from her and sticks them in his mouth.

Erin paces around the kitchen, restless as she talks. And she talks a lot.

She begins by telling us that she is not anything like Anthony. Anthony is a boy in her class who makes up stories for attention. For example, he tells people his family raises sharks in their swimming pool, but everyone knows that he doesn't even have a pool. She wants us to know that she hardly ever lies and she doesn't even like attention. It's a good opening statement.

Maybe I should hire Erin to be my lawyer, I think. Then she launches into her story. Everything started out normally that weekend. The camp wasn't far from Erin's home, 20 minutes into the foothills. Her grandfather dropped her off without speaking to anyone in charge. There were other kids around, it seemed fine. But when Erin went into the main lodge, the whole place looked like it was falling apart.

There were a couple of teenage counselors, but no actual adults. They were supposed to have music lessons, but they were just boxes of instruments laying around with no one to teach them how to play. They mostly used the recorders and kazoos because they seemed the easiest. Meals were cereal. There weren't any planned activities. The campers wandered around the hills exploring. That was fun at first, but then things took a bad turn.

Clicks formed. Fights started breaking out. And then, on the last day, Erin was off by herself and saw something that really scared her. In a grove of trees, there was a giraffe. It would be strange enough if it was a normal giraffe, but this giraffe looked evil. Erin tried to run away, back to the camp. That's when a portal opened up in the ground right in front of her.

"It was like a giant black hole," she said. There was a cosmic shrieking sound, and when the portal finished opening, she could hear monsters inside moaning and groaning, trying to get out. She heard strange demonic music, too. She ran past the portal and made it back to camp just in time for her grandpa to pick her up. No one believed her story, but they believe she's been frightened by something. She's had nightmares about the experience ever since.

In each nightmare, the monsters get closer to the surface. She knows that the portal is still open out there and that really horrible things are going to crawl out of it unless we do something to close it. I think we need to call the Ghostbusters or something. Erin concludes her story. Molly and I share another look.

"It just so happens that we know the Ghostbusters," I tell Erin. "The local chapter," Molly adds. We got permission from Jen to take Erin and meet with some other investigators out at the Music Camp property to have a look around. We don't tell her that the other investigators are members of something called the Pacific Coast Paranormal Commission.

We end up at a crumbling 1940s lodge in the hills, bordering a sprawling almond orchard on one side and hilly canyon land on the other. Broken wooden stairs lead down into empty rock pits that were once hot springs pools. One of the windows on the lodge is broken and boarded over. The front porch slants to one side, slowly being swallowed into the ground.

Nothing about this place gives youth camp vibes. The doors are locked, so we can't look around inside. But the amount of negligence involved in this entire operation is already mind-blowing to me, especially since there are children involved. I'm angry, and I can tell that Lou is too. We channel our anger into the work, collecting as much photographic evidence as we can for Tammy.

I hope she and Jen sue the pants off this place. Interdimensional portals or no. How tall was the giraffe? Shelby Haneda, founder of the PCPC asks Erin. She has arrived with her co-investigator and social media manager, Benjamin Dumaine, and a woman my age with owlish glasses named Neda. Neda is wrestling with some equipment while Benjamin gleefully takes videos around the property.

Shelby asks Erin questions and records her answers into a notebook. Erin seems less agitated here than she did in her own kitchen, even though we're now at ground zero of her recurring nightmares. There's a lot of restorative power in having someone take you seriously. "And where did you see the portal?" Shelby asks. "I'll show you," Erin says. We follow her down a dirt trail behind the lodge.

It's not long before we see the head of a giraffe peeking out from between the trees. Erin clutches at my arm. "Then let's go." "It's not real," she says. "She's right. It's smaller than life-size and made of hard plastic. The paint is chipped and weathered. We move closer." To Erin's credit, it does have a somewhat demonic expression on its face. "It's from Pharaoh's Lost Kingdom," Nada speaks up.

We turn to look at her, and for a moment, I feel like I'm about to be asked to go on some kind of side quest to recover a talisman from a mummy's tomb. "The old water park in Redlands," she clarifies. "It had an Egyptian theme. Got torn down a while ago." She tells us that during the demo, pieces of it were hauled off as souvenirs by various townsfolk, and you'd just come across them sometimes.

A friend of hers has a pyramid out in his alfalfa field. It's a weird Redlands thing, but it's not paranormal. I take Erin's picture in front of it. She's smiling now. "Maybe the portal isn't real either," Erin says hopefully. But as it turns out, the portal is very real.

A black hole yawns across the earth, at least ten feet wide. It goes so far down, you can't see the bottom. The walls are sheer and there is only darkness within. Aaron looks pale, but approaches the chasm with the rest of us. "You actually saw this open up in front of you?" Shelby asks. "And there was nothing there before?" Aaron nods firmly.

There were exploding sounds, she reiterates. And then she heard the voices of monsters from deep within the earth and weird music. And then she ran. We listen for sounds, but don't hear anything except afternoon cicadas. "Maybe the monsters already got out," Erin says, fearfully. The air above the pit feels cold compared to the heat of the day.

Benjamin gets on his belly, with his arm outstretched toward the hole's opening, trying to record an EVP with his phone. Shelby and Neda show Aaron the ELMO and explain that it's a device used to detect a paranormal presence through changes in electromagnetic fields. They turn it on, and it starts beeping, the needle jumping wildly back and forth. Then it shuts itself off and won't turn back on.

Erin's eyes go wide. "There's been some wiring issues with that model," Shelby admits, putting it back in its case. She tells Erin, "You should always use your own powers of deduction first, anyway." And if we look around, there are a lot of other clues about this pit's existence.

Shelby points out exposed tree roots, the foundation of an orchard shack with a huge crack in it, the way the ground slopes under our feet, the fact that the hot springs dried up, the colder temperature above the pit, and of course, the cracking explosions and groaning monster voices that Erin heard, the sounds bedrock makes when it collapses in on itself. Interdimensional portals may exist, Shelby says,

But this is not one of them. This is a sinkhole. She explains some key differences between sinkholes and portals, including the fact that sinkholes do not contain monsters or paranormal beings of any kind.

"Sinkholes are extremely dangerous though," she says. "In fact, we should all probably move away from it immediately. It can continue collapsing any time. We definitely have to call someone at the county about this." We walk back to the lodge, contemplating the odd yet natural phenomenon. "What about the music?" Erin asks suddenly. "I heard music coming out of there. It was really weird."

Probably some of the other kids at the camp trying to play Taylor Swift on recorders, Benjamin offers, distorted by the wind. Erin doesn't look so sure. I got something over here! Neda's excited voice interrupts. She has gone ahead of us and is using some other kind of ghost-sensing device to take readings around the dried-up hot springs. I think it's a ghost! I say sharply. I don't want her scaring Erin all over again.

But Erin smiles. "Don't worry," she tells me. "I don't mind normal ghosts." She turns towards Neda. "Hi, ghost," she says to the dry springs. "I hope you're okay." In 1951, when these hot springs were bubbling over with rich mineral water, this place was known as the Hollywood Oasis, an exclusive hideaway where movie stars could come to relax.

Until one night, when a young actress named Myrna Whitlock fainted and drowned in one of the pools. Starlet boils to death. Shortly after this tragic accident, visitors began to report seeing Myrna's ghost sitting by herself in the hot springs late at night and then evaporating into steam. The Hollywood Oasis went out of business soon afterward and sat abandoned for years.

The story of Myrna Whitlock has since been lost to time. While Benjamin, Nada, and Aaron play with ghost equipment over by the hot springs, Molly and I have a conference with Shelby on the sagging porch of the lodge. "We've been trying to track down this 'It's Hocus Pocus' person," Shelby says, "but it's been a lot of dead ends so far. They're practically a ghost themselves."

Shelby's referring to the troll who regularly commented on Ouija Bird's videos, I remind Molly. Molly asks if Shelby really thinks this hocus-troll really had something to do with Birdie's disappearance.

Shelby isn't sure, but reiterates that Hocus's aggressive behavior toward Birdie online was well known in the ghost hunting TikTok community. And ever since her disappearance, Hocus has been posting about it obsessively, acting like they want to help find her. It's definitely suspicious behavior.

We promise to do whatever we can to help them trace Hocus. Though, just like Bertie, they seem extremely skilled at keeping their identity hidden. Then it's time to go. We promised Aaron's mom she'd be back for dinner. Before we leave Mentone, Molly and I notice red-painted letters on a rusted water tank that read "Mentone Beach."

Since we're miles from the ocean, our curiosity gets the better of us. We follow the signs and park off Highway 38, then make our way over rocks to a water district pond about the width of a car. The words "No Swimming" are stenciled on the nearby pavement. A broken surfboard sticks out of the dirt.

The town of Mentone may be desolate, but it has a sense of humor. Molly sits on a rock and takes off her shoes. She dips her toes in the water. I sit next to her. If Camp Minor Chords is run by billionaires, why have a music camp in an abandoned building? Why is the website so shitty? Why don't they have trained professionals teaching the kids?

Because it's a tax shelter. I figured that out on the drive here this morning. Molly looks confused. It's a way for rich people to move their money around into barely existent charities that, in the end, just funnel the cash back to themselves. It's kind of like money laundering, but legal, I explain. Molly shakes her head.

A kid could get hurt out there, she says. Then... You know what Mentone is named after? Mentone, France. It's a resort city on the French Riviera. We look out over the muddy pond, the rocks, the sunset going down over the 38, and burst out laughing. Finally, Molly stands and helps me to my feet.

We make our way back to the car and say au revoir to Mentone.

We meet Tammy back at her, um, office in Glendora. She thanks us for everything we did today, especially for helping her little cousin feel better. Jen is going ahead with the lawsuit, and Tammy is really excited about it. She's never won a case before, she tells us, but she feels confident about this one thanks to our work. She's sure they can at least get the camp shut down with the evidence we sent her.

She says she'd love to work with us again sometime and that she'll Venmo us our fee. She might not be the most professional lawyer, but her enthusiasm is contagious. I smile until Lou says, "Don't worry about payment. I was thinking, how would you feel about a barter investigation work for legal work? I want you to represent me, Tammy, if you still want to take my case."

What the hell, Lou, I say, when we're back in Lou's car. I like her. I like her too, but the point was to get you a good lawyer. She literally just said she's never won a case. That just means she has a lot to prove. So she'll work harder than any of those five-star guys. You have to trust your gut sometimes. My gut says Tammy. Ugh. I can't really argue with Lou's gut, because it's usually right.

"I guess a bad law school is better than no law school," I finally say. That's the spirit. She drops me off at my car in Azusa, and I continue the long drive back to Northridge. I'm already exhausted from all the driving today. I hope I don't fall asleep at the wheel. Then I get a message from Jamie, and suddenly I'm wide awake again.

We got so preoccupied with Tammy's case that we didn't even have time to check in about the George Perez murder. Jamie tells me the police have made no progress, and he's not even sure there's a real investigation happening. It's bouncing back and forth between the cops and the sheriff, and no one seems sure who the case belongs to. It's been two weeks, and no one has even interviewed him.

All he wants is for the police to investigate this properly, find out who did it. Not that it would make this right or bring Jamie peace, but it would be something. All he wants is a gesture toward justice, and the police won't even give him that. "I don't have a lot of funds," he says, "but I'd really like to hire you guys to work on it, if you have the time."

I don't want to take his money, but I do want to help Jamie find out who killed his friend. I can't imagine how awful it must be for him, losing someone so close and feeling like no one cares. I know Lou is interested in the case too, especially since it seems to be tied up with Birdie's disappearance.

It might be nice to get to know Jamie better too, I think. Then immediately tell myself not to think things like that. I wish I could trust my gut like Lou, but I just can't seem to let myself when it comes to certain things like other people and myself.

Unlike Molly, Jamie doesn't try to stop himself from thinking about his growing interest in her or a potential spark between them. It might not be realistic, but it feels nice. It's better than thinking about what happened to George. As he goes about his evening chores, he hears a howl in the distance and double-checks the latches on the chicken roosts. Edgar the Peaceful, Jamie's faithful if cowardly farm dog, stands at the edge of the field.

beyond the field, into the canyon, onto a piece of property with mysterious ownership, and down through the outstretched arms of an ancient walnut tree, a coyote investigates the scent of old blood on the ground. He found a human body here recently and had a few nibbles. It belonged to a man named George Perez. Although the coyote doesn't care about things like names, all he knows is it wasn't bad. Not his favorite.

Good enough to continue checking back here nightly just in case more bodies show up. Unknown to the coyote, several other human bodies do happen to be nearby, almost right under his paws. Hidden many feet below the ground.

Hey, Jeffrey Cranor here. Are you horror movie averse like me? You kind of want to know what happens, or you want to figure out which horror films could be right for you? Well, my friend Cecil Baldwin loves horror movies, and he's helping me love them as well, one film at a time, in a random order. Maybe he can help you too. Listen to our weekly podcast, Random Number Generator Horror Podcast Number 9, wherever you get podcasts. Just search Random Horror 9, and you'll find it. Oh, and hey...

Boo.