Deep Dive
Shownotes Transcript
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Download the GameTime app today. Last minute tickets, lowest price, guaranteed. What's going on, everybody? I'm Marah. And I'm Tez. And welcome back to Sisters Who Kill. What would you do to avoid the consequences of your actions? Our murderess decides she was going to make her problems disappear. ♪
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Free money. Free money is out there. Just go get it by starting your podcast today. Our players this week are Gregory Howard, the boyfriend and accomplice, Ruth Niedermeyer, our victim, and Inger Lamont.
Our murderess. Ingrid Lamont was born on November 2nd, 1964 to her mother, Doris, and her father, Rudolph Lamont Sr. She was born in Mississippi, but grew up in Florida and attended Boca Raton High School, where she graduated in 1983. After high school, she decided that she was going to attend Mississippi Valley State University. Shout out to the HBCUs. And in 1983, she earned a Certificate of Completion for a Nurses' Aid course.
After her nurse's aid course, she moved back to Florida with the rest of her family and got herself a job as a nurse's aide. She also had a little boy named Everett. In May of 1986, she was working for an elderly patient. Her name was Donna O. Lindsay. That's O period Lindsay, not O Lindsay. She got this gig through a nursing agency and the nursing agency was called A Total Nursing Service.
It's a straight to the point business name. And while she was working for Miss Donna Lindsay, her hands started to get a little sticky. You know how old people just sometimes leave their valuables out? They're not really locking their things up like they probably should. Well, Inger sure did notice. And she was like, you know what? She's not going to miss, say, all this jewelry and all this cash.
So she stole like $8,000 worth of jewelry and she pawned the jewelry for like, sources are different. Some say that she pawned the jewelry for $8,000. Some say that she pawned the jewelry for only $800 and then the cash made up for the rest of it. And let me tell you something about old folks. They may not lock it up, but they know exactly where they shit is. That reminds me of my grandmother Weezer. She'd be like, my mind might be bad, but I know what I got.
Okay. Like old folks would be like, they won't remember your name or how old you are. But if you ask for something very specific in their house, they're like, oh yes, it's under there around the corner. Take two steps to the left. Look under there. You're going to have to dust it off because ain't nobody asked me for this in a while, but they know exactly where their things are. And Donna did as well. Now, when Donna realized that her things were going missing, she called the police. It was time to file a police report.
Now, Inger, she was, of course, still trying to get away with it. So Inger calls the police back, pretending to be Donna and her little old white lady voice. Hello. Oh, I called about...
I called about the missing items. Oh, it was just a mishap. I found my jewels and my money. Oh, my mind is just bad. So she was trying to get away with it. She was trying to get the police off her trail. Well, that didn't work because Donna wasn't, she may be an old lady, but she was about it, okay? And she made sure that Inger got arrested and that she was charged with theft, okay?
For her charge, she pled guilty and she spent three months in jail. So she spent January 1st through March 28th, 1987 in jail.
When she got out of jail, she had three months probation and she had to pay $3,300 in restitution. Imagine being sentenced and having to start a jail sentence on January 1st. I feel like that would just be bad juju for my year. I know, right? I mean, but it is your year. Nothing was changing. Yeah.
He was in there for a year. That was your year regardless. You know? So, I mean, that three months in jail, three years probation, $3,300 in restitution. That's a really nice, like, slap on the wrist. Like, don't fuck with old folks in Florida, right? While she was in jail, she wrote a letter to the Palm Beach Circuit Court. His name was Judge Tom Johnson. And she wrote in there that she was going to be a law-abiding citizen and that she was extremely remorseful for her crime.
So she is out of jail, freshly out after her three-month stay. And she's still young. She's only 22 years old. And three months later, she got herself a job with Ready Nurse, which is a home health company in Port St. Lucie. Okay, we're still in Florida. Now, when she applied for the job, Ready Nurse, they did not know about Inger's criminal record.
And they did not know about the fact that she was on probation. Why do you ask? Because they never checked her references. And I mean, clearly didn't do a background check either.
She was welcomed onto the roster at Ready Nurse, and she was described by the people there as pleasant, well-groomed, well-spoken. And there was nothing suspicious about this young lady at all. And then she was assigned. Then she had her first assignment. Her first assignment was a retired school teacher named Ruth Niedermeyer.
Ruth Niedermeyer was born on September 12, 1915, in Clarksburg, West Virginia, to Bertha and Charles Niedermeyer and attended Glenville State College. Stay white, y'all. Bertha is not a black woman. I'm going to let y'all know now that Ruth is white.
and she attended Glenville State College in her home state. She worked at Belvedere Elementary School in West Palm Beach, Florida. Her students called her an excellent teacher, but she was also a great friend as well.
She left Florida to tend to her sick mother in West Virginia, but eventually she made her way back to Florida and she started spending her summers in West Virginia to still be close with her mother. You know, she's getting older. She needs to be a part of her life. Make sure we don't regret this time. By age 72, Ruth was retired, a widow, and was ready to soak up the sun in Florida and live her best retired life. After her 35-year-long stint teaching,
She started to express that she wanted to move back to West Virginia permanently. You know, her mom's there. The students were really like the fun part, right? And she might as well just be with family. Yeah, so she wanted to move back to West Virginia. Her mom's there, but her mom was permanently residing in a nursing home at this point. So it's not like they were going to be living together and watching out for each other in that way. And she was getting old herself. She's 72. Now, she had undergone back surgery to correct a debilitating scar.
fine condition and in January of 1988 she underwent hip surgery. She otherwise she was in good health and good spirits but she required a walker to move around her home and even with it she was still barely mobile. Oh I'm so afraid that's gonna be me when I get old. Her surgeries put her hopes of taking care of her mother on hold and in the meantime she just needed to regain her strength and find some assistance in navigating her own home.
Her neighbors and friends were great help, but they're not professional. And Ruth needed constant care, constant help, constant assistance. Instead of taking an ad out in a paper, is that what people normally do? Take an ad out in a paper? I would call it a nurse program. Well, that's what she did. Back in the day. I know, but it seems like that would have been the way it's worded. It seems like that was the more common practice then. Anyhow, this is...
Before the internet was what it was. Today we can put up an ad on Facebook or whatever and da-da-da-da. It doesn't seem weird. Just like that song. What is that song where he puts an ad in the paper and finds love? What is the name of that? I don't even... Is that about putting an ad in a paper? That's hilarious.
Yes, girl, that's about... Go listen to that song all the way through after the show. Don't pause this podcast, y'all. Wait till the show is over. Yeah, instead of putting an ad in the paper, she called Ready Nurse, an agency specializing in experienced nursing care. And that is when Inger Lamont enters her life. So while Inger was working with Ruth and she was starting off at Ready Nurse, she was undergoing a trial period. And...
It was a very short trial period, if you ask me. But in that trial period, she was really kind and really attentive to Ruth. She really passed the trial period with a breeze. And that trial period also included a written test and just showing her certificate from Mississippi Valley. While they were together, Inger would drive Ruth around and would often run errands for Ruth or with Ruth. Sometimes she'd leave her at home. Most of the time she'd bring her around. I mean, bring her with her.
And after working for eight days, someone at Ready Nurse was like, you know, we have this girl out on the field and she is working and she's with a woman right now. And I think I fucked up because I just realized that I have not checked her references. And y'all need to get it together.
And so they go and they start trying to check her references. And they're trying to get a hold of these people that she wrote down on a sheet of paper as her references. No one answers or they're not. I don't know if they're not connected. I don't know if no one answers. They couldn't get a hold of the references after they initially did not check the references. So then let Inger go.
But Inger and Ruth had gotten so tight, so close. And I mean, Ruth was going to take an ad out anyways and hire just so anybody. You might as well hire me. And so that's what Ruth did. Ruth hired Inger and she worked there part time, just not through the agency. There's now not a third party anymore.
And remember, like we said earlier, now that she's working with her freelance, the government can't regulate it. And they liked each other. Ruth didn't have a problem with Inger and Inger sure didn't have a problem with Ruth. And she seemed to be really helping her out. Now, you guys know that old habits die hard and Inger's hands were still sticky as hell. And she saw Ruth's checkbook and was like,
Here we go. Jackpot. Within days, she started writing herself checks from Ruth's account. One thing about old folks is they know how to balance a checkbook, okay? Something that all of us should learn how to do. It's like cursive and calligraphy. They don't teach that shit no more. Yeah, they don't teach cursive anymore. Calligraphy was like an elective. I didn't take cursive. I mean the calligraphy. But definitely cursive is my favorite. Anyways, anyways.
Old folks know how to balance a checkbook. Old folks know how to balance a checkbook. And that's a fact. And Ruth started noticing that her money was dwindling. And she is like, what in the world is happening? How am I losing all my fucking money? Like, somebody must be, you know, they got scams on old people. So she goes to the bank. So Inger, of course, goes with her to the bank. She's sitting there talking to the bank lady. And she's like, I just don't know what's happening. I don't know where all my money is going.
They talked to the accountant. They talked to the accountant. I don't know what the solution of that conversation was. But when they go back to the house, there is a stranger running out of Ruth's house, just robbed her house. They're like, oh my goodness, how could this possibly happen? Of course, Miss Ruth, she calls the police. They get a police report and nothing came of it. But it was crazy.
Because her house just got burglarized. Now, within four months of working for Miss Ruth, Inger had stolen $15,000. And Ruth was like, you know what? I think I figured out who done did it. Ruth didn't confront Inger right away. She was kind of debating back and forth on which route she should take. You know, how should she approach her? Um...
So she kind of sat on it a while. On March 2nd, 1988, she actually called Ready Nurse to tell them of the theft, which included money and other things around the house. And you know who it is? This Inger lady y'all introduced me to. Remember, Inger is no longer employed by Ready Nurse. A representative says that they'll have somebody come over and investigate Ruth's claim. But
Ruth then calls back at a later time and says, oh, it was a mistake. The matter is straightened out. And that was the end of that. And they probably felt like they dodged a bullet. They was like, damn, we done introduced her to this girl we didn't check out.
Now this girl's still in her shit. Shoulda did your job. On Friday, March 4th, this is two days later, a friend brought Ruth some breakfast, and it was a nice morning. Ruth's wearing this light blue house dress with white trim and slippers, and Inger arrives at the house a bit later. Inger's boyfriend, Gregory Howard...
And two to three other men are waiting outside in a van. Now, it gets to be around 3 p.m. and Ruth and Inga are sitting in the living room together and the phone rings. It was Dorothy Bocanfuso, a representative from the City Federal Savings and Loans.
Dorothy was calling to tell her that her nurse's aide had just withdrawn $5,000 from her account. At this point, Ruth's suspicions are confirmed. Like, of course, my nurse aide is at the bank withdrawing $5,000. She's taking all my fucking money, you know?
What's new about today? So she whispers into the phone and she's asking Dorothy, hey, um...
Can I talk to you a little later? Now's not a good time. Very suspicious. Like, basically, Inger's sitting right here next to me, girl, so we can't have the conversation about how she's stealing from me right now. And Inger knew that somebody was on the other line talking about her. You know how you know somebody talking about you? You know. She knew it was her. Now, remember, she's got boyfriend Greg in the car with three homeboys sitting in a van. So...
She showed up to work with the shits and this phone call didn't necessarily make things better, right? She's supposed to be distracting Ruth while the niggas come in and get what they want out the house. And that's when, according to Inger, Greg comes in and hits Ruth over the head with a brick. Ruth falls to the ground and Greg hits her again. Now, Inger also strikes Ruth in the back of the head and then begins strangling her with a plastic bag.
They clean up the house real good and they throw Ruth's purse in the dumpster. They throw their cleaning supplies and stuff away in another dumpster. They kind of spread out the evidence. The next day, Inger attends a wedding and did a little retail therapy because she's all shooken up by the events. So the next day, March 6th, Inger gives Greg $20 and she's like, listen, you need to go to Home Depot and get a chainsaw. Greg buys a chainsaw and $3.
boxes of garbage bags, those big heavy-duty garbage bags. Now, Inger says at this point, she sat out in the living room and kind of watched guard as Greg dismembered Ruth's body. He then stuffed the body in garbage bags along with air fresheners and other smell goods. And then they put those garbage bags into a trunk. And then they took that trunk to Inger's daddy's house.
And kept it over there.
This story is sponsored by Illuminating Intersectionality, a new three-part video series brought to you by Target's Black Beyond Measure platform and hosted by Fran of Hey Fran Hey and the Friend Zone podcast, Chef Jade of All Jades, and Dr. Takiyah Robinson of the Getting Grown podcast. This series features dynamic discussions about identity, power, and intersectionality as a tool for honoring the beautiful complexity of black womanhood.
Conversations cover topics such as race, class, and socioeconomic status, education, food and food access, cultural expression, and more. In addition, brilliant black women-owned companies like Mente Cosmetics, Essie Spice, and Partake Foods are highlighted. Check out Illuminating Intersectionality on the Loudspeakers Network's YouTube page. We've...
seen episode one episode two just came out and this week's episode is coming out Monday November 21st 2022 you can also join the conversation live on Twitter where everybody's going to be tweeting live the host Fran Dr. Robison Chef Jade as well as the Target founders KJ Miller of Minted Cosmetics and
Essie Bartell of Essie Spice and Denise Woodard of Partakes Food. And some of your favorite black women's social media personalities like Crystal West, Sylvia O'Bell, Scottie Beam, and Jasmine Lawson all will be tweeting live. Make sure you follow and use the hashtag IIBBM. What's the hashtag, friends? IIBBM. And hashtag Black Beyond Measure to share your perspectives.
Once again, this story of Sisters Who Kill is sponsored by Illuminating Intersectionality, a new three-part video series brought to you by Target's Black Beyond Measure platform, hosted by Fran of Hey Fran Hey and the Friend Zone podcast, Chef Jade of All Jade, and Dr. Takiyah Robinson of Getting Grown podcast, and you can check it out on the Loudspeaker Network's YouTube page.
They'll be back live tweeting this Monday, 6 p.m. Be there, be square. Don't say I didn't warn you. Streaming October 6th on Paramount+. First place I learned about death was the Pet Sematary. Dead things buried in that land would come back. There's something else. Something's wrong with Timmy. He needs time to adjust. That's not Timmy. Something's talking through him.
Sometimes dead is better. Pet Cemetery. Bloodlines. Rated R. Streaming only on Paramount+. Now, the banker did what she was told, and she called a half hour later, and nobody answered the phone. Now, knowing that she was in the room with the person who she suspected was stealing her money, she was like, I might want to call the cops. And she does. And the cops go to Ruth's house, but she was nowhere to be found.
They look through the neighborhood and there is no signs of Ruth. Several neighbors say that they saw a very suspicious van on Ruth Street around the time that the bank official said that she called. And the officers took it very seriously from the jump. You see, some of these were Ms. Ruth's former students. And it was like, uh-uh.
Not my teacher. Not her. Well, when the police officers were looking at Ruth's house, they were like, okay, there doesn't seem to be any sign of forced entry. And the neighbors are telling us that sweet old Miss Ruth, she keeps her door unlocked because, you know, her hip's bad. So if somebody knock on the door, she's just yelling at them to come in. She can't get up and go open the door every single time somebody comes in. Locking her door is an inconvenience at this point. But they were like, you know what? You know who'll be over here. She got an aide. Maybe you need to talk to Inker because...
We also did see Inger today. So the police, they go to see Inger and Inger, she's living with her boyfriend, Gregory Howard. And this is March 5th, the very next day after Inger went missing. I'm going back in time. Right now, the body is... Oh my God. Right now, the body is at the house that the police are questioning her at. I just put that together. Oh shit.
Okay, y'all caught up with me? And she is just like, no, I have no idea about anything about Ms. Ruth's missing. I can't even believe there's something wrong. I don't even go in for a couple of days. I'm not due to go see her. I can't believe that something is wrong. I can't believe that she's missing. And the police are like, okay, she seems like she's genuinely shocked or whatever. They leave. So that same day, still March 5th, a 15-year-old boy, he was going dumpster diving and he found some very interesting things tied up in a plastic bag.
He found a prescription vial with Roof's name on it, a bloodstained bath towel, a brick that was broken into, and papers that had like phone numbers and names on it that just happened to relate to Roof. One of them was Inger's phone number. Now, when the boy found this, the news of this missing teacher wasn't in the news or anything yet. It had just happened. It was the very next day. It wasn't until five days later when her name started being blasted on the news as a missing person.
that he turned all these items into the police. So some evidence sure was found, including, remember, Inger's phone number on a piece of paper. Now, on March 10th, now I caught you back up to Tazi's story, they're moving the body to Inger's parents' house. Her brother Rudy helps her because he don't know what's in there. He actually tries to open the trunk. He's like, what is this trunk that you got? Like, he tries to open it. She slams it shut. And she's like, do not open.
Look in here. Do not. I repeat, do not go in there. Open the trunk. Okay? Don't go in there. And Inger's parents are like...
Girl, what the fuck is this trunk? You have a place to stay. Like, why are you even bringing it over here? At first she's like, oh, it's just old clothes that I need to donate. Like, it's nothing. And then they're like, it's kind of a little weird. She's like, she's like, actually, it's just some old meat. And they're like, old meat? Well, you're going to have to get that shit out of here. So after a few days of her leaving a trunk full of meat in her parents' house, it starts to fucking stink, as you could imagine, because it's flesh. And her parents are like, what is this? And she's like, you know what? No worries. No worries.
A good cleaning will fix this up. She gets two people in the neighborhood to come and help her take the trunk from inside of the house because it's so heavy inside of the house to the yard. I don't know if it was the front of the backyard. The news articles did not specify. And from there, she takes out each part of the body, lays it out on the lawn.
gets some detergent, gets the water hose, scrubs the inside of the trunk, shiny new, and then takes the bags of flesh and puts them back in the trunk, sprays a little bit more Febreze, closes the trunk, adds some little, what do they call it?
What they do on Pose on the very first season when she killed that man, them little pine trees that you hang in your car, put a whole bunch of those in there or something like that. A whole bunch of smell goods. I don't know exactly what she put on bullshit, y'all, but put a whole bunch of smell goods and put it back in her parents' house. Of course, this did not outweigh the smell of decaying flesh. Finally, her dad, Rudolph, he had had enough. He had had a fucking enough. So on Saturday, March 12th,
Her father was sick and tired of that shit and decided that he was going to open the damn forbidden trunk. Why the fuck is this trunk so special? I love her, but no. It's a trunk in my house. I'll open a damn trunk if I want to. You the man of that house. Opens the trunk and he immediately knows that it's a dead body. He's like, what the fuck? And he calls the police.
He calls the police around 4.30 p.m. Investigators come and they take out the body. They're examining everything. And they're like, okay, we can tell by this chopped up body that whoever did this had no medical skills. It was dissected disgustingly. It's really bad. Her body was so mutilated and so decayed that the only way that they were able to identify her was by the serial number on her hip implant.
Those always get me. Also in the trunk was a t-shirt with the name Inger on it. Police also learned that Inger had purchased the trunk one week before the murder. At first, they're questioning her dad and they're like, okay, what do you know about this case? What do you know about this body? He's like, I don't know anything. I called y'all. I don't know what to tell you. And at this point, Inger is nowhere to be found because of course they're looking for her now. Now, Rudolph Sr., her dad,
They were going through it. First of all, A, they didn't commit this crime. B, him, his junior, his wife, Doris, and their youngest daughter, they had to find friends and families to stay with. They couldn't stay at the house. And after that, they couldn't even find a company that would fumigate the house. I can't even go back in my own home. On March 15 at the Red Lobster, a $10 traveler check was found in the employee's restroom.
Now, one of the employees says it was on the floor and was like, who leaves money on the floor like this? He shows the check to another employee who recognizes Ms. Ruth's name from the missing woman turned dead body that was playing in the news. And he was like, oh, we need to call the cops.
Now, this employee bathroom trash wasn't thrown out very often. I guess it's like slow traffic or whatever in there. So they didn't really have a good idea of how long that check had been in the bathroom. Now, at this point, the police have already put out bulletins asking for Inger's whereabout in relation to Ruth's dismembered body. Inger turns herself in on March 16th.
of 1988 and gives conflicting statements during a six-hour interrogation. Inger tells the police that the trunk appeared on her back porch on Wednesday the 10th. Not only did this magical trunk just appear on her back porch, but the trunk was covered in ice and pork or beef or something. Like somebody gave her food for a barbecue or something. Now she says...
Now, I do remember that two days before on the 8th that some men were trying to sell me some meat and I told them I didn't want it. Next thing I know, two days later, I'm sitting here with a chunk of ice and meat. And when I dig underneath it, there's Miss Ruth's body. She says, I don't know how it got there. I don't know how her body ended up in the trunk. I don't know how the trunk ended up on my patio.
But what I do know is that you guys have put me out as part of her disappearance. So, of course, when her body shows up on my porch, hell yeah, I'm scared. You want to know what took me so long? That's what the fuck took me so long. Now, she continues to tell the police that it was her boyfriend robbing Ruth and that they had planned the robbery. And then Ruth surprised him, which made him kill her to cover his tracks.
But finally, she breaks and she tells the investigators the full story that she had been stealing from Rue for some time. And at this point, she had about $15,000 of her dollars. She knew that she needed to act fast when the bank official, Ms. Dorothy, called about the $5,000 check and...
She knew that Ruth was going to call the police if she didn't do something about it. The Palm Beach County Medical Examiner found Ruth's cause of death to be asphyxiation. Police used Ruth's statements to uncover Ruth's purse, which also contained her ID. Inger was arrested. She was arrested and charged with theft, forgery, assault, kidnapping, robbery, assault, battery, and first-degree murder.
Detectives requested that her bail be denied, and she stood there calmly, quietly, as the judge denied her bail.
When the news hit the community and the newspapers and everybody around Miss Ruth, people were in shock. I mean, like her neighbors were like, I mean, she was a really nice lady. I wouldn't consider her a rich lady. I mean, she was a friendly lady, but, you know, she's a retired teacher. So how much money could you really be making? One of her other one of the other ladies was like, she was just my favorite bridge partner.
partner. Like, it just didn't seem possible that something would happen to her. Now, Inger, she was getting ready to...
And she decided that she was going to get an attorney. And the attorney that she got was Robert Ullman. And Robert Ullman said that she planned on pleading innocent. He said that there were some very strong racist racial biases in this case already. He said, quote, here we go. We have a black female. She may have a prior record for grand theft. Here we have this white lady.
That's well known in the community. So, of course, you're going to automatically assume she is this monster. We will be fighting this in court. Their team hired Stephen Symes, which was the forensic consultant, because they were trying to figure out if the chainsaw had actually dismembered Ruth. And so to do this, oh my gosh, you guys, it's...
to do this, they like reenacted it. Because you know, when you're getting ready for trial, you're gathering all your evidence, you have to be able to reenact these things for the jury, right? So as their team is trying to get ready for trial, they decided they're going to practice
In a public parking lot. And so, of course, that draws in a crowd. Some people were like, oh, my God, they use Roof's actual legs out there to reenact it. The news outlets were out there and it was a big humbo jumbo for them to be practicing on a lamb's leg.
for what they were going to show the jury. Now, since Inger had given her statement before she actually arrived at the police station, they were arguing that it wasn't a confession. They said she was shaken up. She was scared. Her lawyer said, quote, she was frightened out of her life when she gave that statement and she wasn't lucid when she gave the statement that she did this crime. Since she confessed,
but it wasn't while she was actually at the station, then it's not really a confession. Of course, she was just giving them whatever they wanted to hear. Inger's boyfriend, Mr. Gregory, he got a little lucky because it turns out there were no evidence aside from Inger's statement connecting him to the murder. When he was subpoenaed, he invoked his...
Fifth Amendment and refused to discuss the case, claiming it's his right against self-incrimination. Due to no other evidence except for she said he was never charged. Police never said if the other men involved would be suspects and Inger's lawyer argued that at 108 pounds, investigators should know that Inger is physically unable to dismember Ms. Ruth's body with a chainsaw. He
He said, quote, one female will be physically unable to kill someone with a chainsaw, put them in a trunk, drag the trunk into a van, take that trunk out of a van and then put it into a house. He's like, she's not doing it. Her lawyer also argues that Inger has always had permission to sign checks on Miss Ruth's behalf. So what is this forgery you're talking about?
He said he believed that the police charged her in retaliation for refusing to confess. On April 14th, a grand jury indicted Inger on first degree murder, burglary with assault and battery, robbery with a deadly weapon, kidnapping, four counts of forgery, four counts of uttering of forgery, and grand theft. Inger was also hit with more trouble after prosecutors told the court that one of her cellmates informed
officials that Inger had confessed to the murder in prison. She said that Inger told her all about it and Inger told her that when she was hanging out with Miss Ruth, she heard Miss Ruth
talking to the bank teller Dorothy on the phone and she was like oh shit I gotta get her so at this point Ingers attorneys they kind of shaking in their tube socks a little bit they not sure if they're gonna be able to actually pull this trial off at the time at least
Florida was a death penalty state. So we're really playing with your life right now. So they decided that they were going to come up with a plea deal. They were like, OK, if Inger pleads guilty, hear me out. She pleads guilty to second degree murder, plus all that other stuff that we can give her for
um second degree murder charge with no cap now there's a maximum of like 22 years and they're like just don't give her a cap the court will figure out what they want to actually give her sentence right so on june 7th 1989 inger stands in front of the judge and inger pleads guilty to second degree murder
Burglary with a solder battery, robbery with a deadly weapon, forgering, uttering a forging, and grand theft. At the sentencing hearing, Judge Thomas Schultz wanted to know why she did it. He said, why did you do it, young lady?
And she kind of stood there and was like, I, you know, I spent a lot of time thinking about it. And I don't know. She said that. And then she kind of turned back to her lawyers. Like, she really wasn't expecting this question from the judge. She thought that she was going to plead guilty and kind of get it over with. And Judge Schultz, he was not satisfied with that answer. And he said, what?
We can let the jury decide this if you'd like. You know, we can have this go to trial and I can deny your plea. I asked you, why did you do it? And she kind of stands there and she's like, I made a statement to the police already. She stands there a little bit longer, kind of gathers her loins, takes a deep breath. And she's like, I knew what was going to happen.
My boyfriend was going to rob her. I left the door open to help him do it. He says, so you did it for money, material gain. She says, yes. He looks down at her and says, was it worth it? She looks down and says, no. All right, y'all, it's time for. Well, I'm not black. I'm OG. I ain't do it. But if I did, this is how I would have got away with it.
I ain't do, but if I did, I'm still in smaller amounts. Don't want to do red flags. $1,500 in less than three months is a lot. What do you expect this lady to live off of? It was four months, and I did the math, and it was $3,750 a month. I'm going to know if $3,750 was missing from me every single month. Damn straight up. I ain't got no bill that big. Praise the Lord. Okay? I ain't do it, but if I did...
I wouldn't have had your boyfriend be doing this crime for you. And I really feel like that first time that they came home and the place was getting robbed, that was definitely her boyfriend as well. We were all in agreeance, right? Mm-hmm. That is allegedly ain't about to be in charge, but those are my opinions. Be smooth, man. Anyways, I ain't do it, but if I did, don't know why you thought that like spraying spray was going to cover up the smell of decaying flesh, but-
I would have found a better way of making sure that it did not smell like decaying flesh in a home that was not mine. In your parents' house, bro? I ain't do it, but if I did in your parents' house? Why you gotta drag them into it? That's so inconsiderate. I ain't do it, but if I did, there was a shirt in the trunk with your name on it. Too bitter. That was wild. Like, with your name on it. I ain't do it, but if I did, there's gotta be something in between offing you and...
That phone call where you got caught, y'all could have talked it out, maybe returned some funds or whatever, something. You did it a lot less time if you had just went in for the forgery, though, I'll tell you that much. Right. I would have definitely rather owed this lady some money than murder. Way more. I ain't do it, but if I did, when they didn't have anybody for your references...
Dog, your boyfriend couldn't have pretended to be a reference and picked up the phone for you so you could have had a reference to have that job? Tazzy has picked up the phone and done a reference for me to have a job. You ain't have one person to do that. Why would your references not answer the phone? You could have been your own reference. You seen that episode of Law Notary SVU with Robin Williams?
No, I haven't seen the episode. It's great. But anywho, he was his own alibi because he had a switch phone and they kept calling his thing and he would be a guy from the fisherman shop and he was a lady from the diner or some shit like that. But he just kept doing accents and being different people. So it was like all his alibis check out. I don't understand. He was his own alibi. So good. Tazzy. Yeah. You didn't do it, but if you did, would you have pled guilty?
It really depends on how much confidence I got in my lawyer. But I'll gamble. Well, that brings us to parole and no parole, where she is out. After serving 37 years, would you have let her out? Because they gave her 72. I'm sure that hearing—I mean, they gave her 75. I'm sure hearing 75 is like, damn. Yeah. But she only served 31. Yeah. I would be interested to know what she did in her time there.
it's kind of hard to gauge her because the story she tells is she didn't have any part in it, right? But also evidence is saying, for all we know, you're the only one who had a part in it because nobody else's evidence is showing up. So it kind of makes you wonder, has she even told the truth yet? And I think, you know, if it's what she says it was and he comes in, he did all that,
I think eventually, yeah, sure, that's fine to parole her. But I think if it was, it's been a lie and no admission this whole time, then you really didn't do the first step needed for redemption, right? And you know what's wild about this case? And we didn't, we haven't said it yet. There was more than anger involved. And her boyfriend, as far as we could tell in the articles that we read, he had not been charged with this crime. Yeah. Yeah.
Only her. She's the only one who went down for it as far as we know. Only her. The articles that were written, at least while she was on trial, he had not been charged. Yeah. I do feel like that's unfair. Unfair as fuck because... So you believe that they did help her? You don't think she did it on her own? Yeah.
I don't think you could do that. I mean, maybe. But if they was already there, why wouldn't they? Yeah. Even if you ain't need their help. They was already there with the shits like you were. Yeah. But she's out now living her best life after serving all that time. She's only she's 58. And you think 58 is is is it's not even. Oh, do you think that she should have got out? I was thinking about it. I don't really know.
I really don't know. I think it's hard to tell with this plea. I feel like maybe she should have gone for a retrial. I think it's hard to tell with this plea because we don't have confirmed stories or evidence or that deep, deep insight. We just got what she told us and the facts that were released. So, I mean... You know what? I'm going to back it up a little bit. I didn't do it, but if I did, I think I would have taken it to trial for real, for real, because they actually had...
some pretty convincing evidence, but I think her attorneys ended up getting scared, honestly, because the media was really picking this story up. And it was, there wasn't a lot of maybe like TV, there was a TV coverage. I can't find it anymore, but it was old. Like people were really talking about this. This is a big story. And it was more, it was about to be a trial by media. And if she lost her
She would lose her life. But if she could find a way to be having a lesser charge...
But the way to do that, somebody else would have to be in custody. No, I didn't pre-plan for her to be murdered. We wanted to rob her. I have a history of stealing, not a history of murder. It's an argument that could have been put into play. And they said when they looked at the body that whoever hacked it up had no medical experience from how horrible it was. I am a CNA.
I have a certificate. I at least know a little bit. That means that I couldn't have chopped her up. See, there's all these things that you may have gotten away with going to trial and getting second degree murder. It's only what, give or take, what, an eight year sentence? What was the max for a second degree? 22. And she served what, 31? Mm-hmm. I mean, I guess you take them extra nine years and... That's almost a decade. Yeah.
Nine years of your life. It's what gamble. Yeah. It's definitely a hard, like, which one do you take? And choosing the wrong one when you're already being criminalized in the newspapers, when everybody knows your name, when you. Yeah, no, I probably would have took the plea. Go ahead. That's what she did. Now she lives. I mean, she lives. She's out living. She's doing her thing. But like, she took that plea so that she could eventually have that. Because if she didn't, they would have put her on death row.
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