Podbit · Last Podcast On The Left
The FBI, Secret Service, and DEA set up a blockade at O'Hare Airport, monitored incoming flights for days, and raided the Black House on Halloween 1980 — all based on a fabricated tip about a Kennedy assassination plot. They found a bored 50-year-old. He told them he admired Senator Kennedy and was morally opposed to drugs.
Where this was said
At 1:26:20 · chapter starts 1:24:20
The 1970s were, in retrospect, the last fun years of the Church of Satan. As the '80s began, the FBI received a fantastical informant tip claiming LaVey was the go-between in a plot to murder Senator Ted Kennedy involving 8 kilos of hash paid to the Chicago Mafia. The FBI, DEA, and Secret Service set up a blockade at O'Hare Airport and raided the Black House on Halloween 1980. They found a 50-year-old man sitting at home who told them he admired the Kennedys and was morally opposed to drugs — which was, bizarrely, the truth. [1] — Marcus Parks "The FBI, Secret Service, and DEA set up a blockade at O'Hare Airport, monitored incoming flights for days, and raided the Black House on Ha…" 1:26:20 More damaging than the raid was the book Michelle Remembers, published that same year, which claimed to document genuine Satanic ritual abuse and was taken extremely seriously. The McMartin Preschool case followed in 1983 — 300 allegations, zero convictions, seven years of trial, possibly the longest in California history. The media largely sided with prosecutors and regularly named the Church of Satan as a main culprit. Anton LaVey, rather than responding, simply retreated further into himself.
On Halloween 1980, the FBI, Secret Service, and DEA raided LaVey's Black House over a false informant tip about a plot to murder Ted Kennedy — and found nothing.
Diane Hegarty left LaVey in 1984 after years of abuse — without her, LaVey had no one to manage the church and became an increasingly isolated, lazy recluse.
A man used ChatGPT as a de facto lawyer, sharing self-incriminating details in his chats. When the transcripts were subpoenaed, the judge ruled no attorney-client privilege applied and admitted the chats as evidence against him. AI first passes are useful — treating AI as your counsel is dangerous.
CIA operative Edwin Wilson armed Muammar Gaddafi with 10,000 machine guns and 20 tons of C4 hidden in barrels of mud and flew them to Libya himself. He was sentenced to 52 years and served 12 in solitary. He was also a founder of the same arms network Oliver North contracted for the Contras.
Kim Dotcom's legal nightmare had nothing to do with copyright infringement. He donated to WikiLeaks and Julian Assange — and the US government charged him under RICO statutes, seeking 186 years in prison as payback.
More than a decade after his indictment, the US is still trying to extradite Kim Dotcom from New Zealand — even after he suffered a stroke. He cannot be convinced the authorities are on his side; only the legal process, run by his lawyers, keeps him free.
The illegal wildlife trade and the drug trade aren't just parallel industries — they actively overlap. Smugglers force-fed cocaine to boa constrictors to evade customs, packed drugs beneath layers of live animals in crates with spitting cobras on top, and exploited the chronic under-resourcing of US Fish and Wildlife inspection teams.
Mario Tabraue was sentenced to over 100 years in prison for murder and drug trafficking. He served 12. Nobody — not even the DEA agent who put him there — knows why he got out. That agent, Larry Lovelace, now lives in rural West Virginia with a gun within reach every night, still expecting retaliation.
Anson Wong from Malaysia was the Pablo Escobar of the global reptile trade, supplying rare animals — including Komodo dragons — to buyers across the world. He was caught in a sting, extradited to the US, and served the longest wildlife crime sentence at the time. The animals seized from him went on to stock some of America's biggest zoos.
Zelig Williams landed a role in Hamilton at just 19 while still in college — a rare achievement in a world where most Broadway dreams die young. By 28 he was a veteran ready to mentor the next generation, until he disappeared without a trace on October 3, 2024.
Season 5 of Dateline: Missing in America brings six new unsolved mysteries. The show is explicitly asking listeners to engage — because a detail someone remembers might be the break investigators need.
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