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Morbid

The Matamoros Devil Murders (Part 1)

21 May 2026

Transcription

Chapter 1: What happened to Mark Kilroy during spring break in 1989?

0.031 - 37.945 Ash Kelley

hey weirdos i'm ash i'm alina she's back i'm back and this is morbid this is morbid Are you alive? I'm alive. I'm alive. We made it through. We just had one of those things that, you know, the stomach bug, it just rolls right through. And then it paused and came back, which is really fake. It paused before it hit the last of us, and then it hit the last of us. And then we cleared it on out.

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38.085 - 49.774 Ash Kelley

That's bullshit. And we said goodbye. Glad you cleared it out, though. Appreciate that. We did. We made it through. But man, everybody... Wash your hands. Wash your hands. Bleach your house. Make sure your kids are washing their hands as much as possible.

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Chapter 2: How did Mark Kilroy's friends react to his disappearance?

49.895 - 67.289 Ash Kelley

I know sometimes that doesn't do it, but trust me. I know. Because we're hand washing the house. At least it's getting hot out again. I feel like when it's hot, they don't do as well. Don't thrive. Well, some of them do, but I don't know if this one does. I feel like tummy bugs don't necessarily. Yeah, this one thrives in like cold weather, I think, best.

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67.369 - 88.948 Ash Kelley

Yeah, which of course it's literally about to get cold again. Of course. It's like hotter than Satan's butthole outside. It's true. I got to announce this solo and it didn't quite feel so right. So we just want to remind you one more time that we have a game. We have a fucking game with Hunt a Killer. This feels so much better that you're here and we can talk about it together. I'm real excited.

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89.329 - 104.322 Ash Kelley

It's nuts because I was saying when I announced it, that was our first sponsor that we ever had on the pod. They were the first ones that reached out. Hunt a Killer. I was always a big Hunt a Killer girly and I'm being so for real. I need, I should find.

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104.302 - 122.175 Ash Kelley

the boxes somewhere like the early boxes and it was when they came in those like black plain boxes yep in the early days me and john used to love them especially like before we had kids oh yeah we love that kind of thing that's really cute you played games together yeah we loved games me and drew are still love games the only games that me and drew play are like mario kart

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122.155 - 132.05 Ash Kelley

Yeah, we love Mario Kart, too. We love Mario Kart. We're an equal opportunity game family. Not like a board game house, but I would like to become a board game house. Board games are really fun with kids. I was just playing a board game with your kid.

Chapter 3: What were the initial steps taken by law enforcement to find Mark Kilroy?

132.07 - 137.198 Ash Kelley

Yeah, see? Yeah. Yeah, I got that, like, reading board game. Yeah, it was helping me. I was learning how to read. There you go. Good.

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137.258 - 139.101 Alaina Urquhart

I'm glad.

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139.081 - 165.998 Ash Kelley

But yeah, we're fucking stoked about the Salem Slicer. Salem Slicer. It's very 80s themed. It's very New England. It's Salem, obviously. It's Salem. It's very, like, fake true crime-y. There's a special exclusive podcast episode in the game from us. How fucking cool is that? Which is really fun, and it was really fun to do. They've been great to work with. We had a blast.

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166.018 - 184.883 Ash Kelley

We were part of the whole thing from beginning to end. I know it's crazy that it's actually hitting stores now. Because it's been a while. It's been a while. And it's just like, if you ever wanted to be a detective, now you get to do so. It is, honestly. Hunt a Killer is so fun that way. There's real evidence in there. There's...

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184.863 - 207.968 Ash Kelley

Things you can touch, things you have to unlock, things like you really have to get into it. It's fun as hell, I'm telling you. You have to sit through all the evidence. So right now it's available for pre-order at Walmart. So definitely go pre-order it, please. Do it! And do we have any other biz nasty, Big Red? Biz nasty? I would say, hey.

208.066 - 224.844 Ash Kelley

If you're looking for a signed copy of The Butcher Legacy. Speaking of pre-orders. Speaking of pre-orders. Hey. Go to Premier Collectibles. The link is on my Instagram. Go click it. Premier Collectibles. I'm sure if you type in The Butcher Legacy on there, it'll come up.

225.505 - 225.605 Alaina Urquhart

Yeah.

225.865 - 237.398 Ash Kelley

I'm signing things for them, signing copies, and I will continue until you guys say, hey, you dumb bitch, we don't want any more signed copies. I doubt people will say that.

Chapter 4: What role did the local community play in the search for Mark Kilroy?

237.378 - 254.34 Ash Kelley

I doubt the true blues will say that. I doubt the good people will say that. I have been reading your book all afternoon. I read like a little bit last week. I was reading it out of pedicure and I was like, I'm probably scaring everybody around me. You're just like...

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254.32 - 284.327 Ash Kelley

i was just like there's just blood dripping off the cover and people are like what are you reading what's going on there is that is that okay but i love it yay i elena always has me read like when she's writing so with the first two i read a lot of chapters before the final product yeah but i obviously then still read the books and that was fun and i still loved them but with this one you didn't have me read as much as you were writing so it's like a completely different reading experience i love that's been really fun because i forget the twist

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284.307 - 303.931 Ash Kelley

Yeah, that's it. I know you were like, I know there's a twist, but I don't. I'm like, ha ha ha. I know. I was like, I'm not going to tell you. I know. I'm very excited about it. I'm getting very close to the end. I'm like more than halfway through. I'm very excited. If you guys, I'm telling you, get into it, man. Get into it. Yeah. Get into it. Please. It's fun. I swear. I swear.

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304.692 - 309.684 Ash Kelley

And I'll love you forever. That's nice. make sure you go pre-order The Witcher Legacy.

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310.046 - 310.227 Alaina Urquhart

Period.

310.247 - 328.424 Ash Kelley

And if for some reason you're like, fuck that, I don't want a signed copy, but I would like a copy of the book. I get it. Sure. Why not? Okay. If you want to do that, go to butcherlegacy.com. Buy it anywhere you want to. And get it anywhere the fuck you want. You can pre-order it anywhere you want. The world is really your oyster. It is.

Chapter 5: How did the investigation evolve into a federal case?

328.644 - 346.129 Ash Kelley

And I'll keep making sure it's your oyster. You can't. We should be specific. You can't buy it at like an IHOP. No. Or like a Denny's. Hey, that's an idea. Okay. Yeah, there you go. See if you can talk to your literary agent about that one. I'm going to try to get it in anywhere. Okay. So let's go. International House of Pancakes, here she comes. Here I come.

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348.072 - 368.043 Ash Kelley

We are sloth happy because this is later. We are. And I feel like we never record this late. No, we don't. But life happened. Life sure happens. Life has continued to happen. Yeah, it keeps on happening. I like that life keeps happening. Yeah, that's great. But sometimes it gets crazy. But sometimes it's just hard to fit everything in the day. All right, everybody. So look at your stopwatch.

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368.143 - 387.711 Ash Kelley

The episode's about to start. Okay. All right. You can say that it's about to start now. Okay, there you go. There's your minute mark. Thanks so much, whoever you are. So we are going to be talking today. This is going to be a two-parter. A two-parter? A two-parter. It is true crime. Yeah, it's true crime. It's true crime. So this is a very tragic case. Very interesting, though, I will say.

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387.751 - 425.973 Ash Kelley

I don't know this case. Yeah. Yeah. We'll get into right when they're getting hot on the case, but not quite there yet. And then we'll pick up again in part two. Oh, I love that. So let's talk about Mark Kilroy first. He was born on March 5th, 1968 in Chicago, Illinois. He was the oldest of two children born to Jim and Helen.

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426.794 - 457.49 Ash Kelley

And not long after he was born, his parents decided they wanted to leave the city for a slower pace of life. And they ended up moving to Texas, Santa Fe to be specific. Okay. Aww. Aww. He also was always a good student.

Chapter 6: What connections were made to drug trafficking and organized crime?

457.57 - 472.907 Ash Kelley

He avoided drinking. He didn't do drugs. When he was in high school, he joined the Santa Fe High School baseball and the basketball team. And he was involved in student government. He was involved in Boy Scouts. But he always made sure to spend enough time on his studies at the same time.

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473.027 - 493.717 Ash Kelley

So he's like involved in all these different extracurriculars, but also managing to be a good student at the same time. Yeah, which is not easy. No, it's not. Now, when he graduated from high school in 1986, he was accepted at Southwest Texas State University. And he had a brief stint there before he ended up transferring to Tarleton State University. And that was on a basketball scholarship.

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494.879 - 512.526 Ash Kelley

Sports had always played a really big part in his life. But after a few years, it became clear to him that this wasn't going to be his whole life. Like he wasn't going to be in the NBA. Yeah. So he transferred to a third school, this time the University of Texas, and he ended up deciding to study medicine there. Oh, wow. Yeah. That's a big deal. It is.

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513.347 - 525.083 Ash Kelley

Now, even though their lives had led them in separate directions, Mark and his core group of friends from high school still managed to stay in touch through their college years. And whenever they were home on school break or anything like that, they always got together.

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525.063 - 550.21 Ash Kelley

Now in late winter of 1989, Mark and his friends Bradley Moore, Bill Huddleston, and Brent Martin started planning details for their spring break vacation. They were stoked about this. As soon as the semester ended, they were going to meet back in Santa Fe and take off together for a few days on South Padre Island, which is a resort town not too far from the Mexican border.

550.19 - 563.342 Ash Kelley

For Mark, that year was more exciting than the usual spring break trip because it also coincided with his 21st birthday. Oh, what a lucky thing. And remember, he didn't really drink or do drugs or anything like that. So he's 21 now.

563.362 - 564.563 Alaina Urquhart

He's waiting for it to be legal.

564.663 - 580.197 Ash Kelley

Yeah, he can have a little drinky poo if he wants to. And what better time to have a drink than spring break? Of course. They had all attended spring break festivities in South Padre before, but this was the first time also that Mark and his four high school best friends were going to be visiting together. So that was also like an exciting thing.

580.177 - 599.393 Ash Kelley

As soon as Bradley finished up his exams around noon on March 10th, he jumped in his car and jumped in it too. And he drove to Austin to pick up Mark. And they headed to Santa Fe to meet up with Bill and Brent. Okay. It's also very funny to me that there's Bradley, Bill, Brent, and Mark. Yeah.

Chapter 7: What were the significant findings at the ranch related to Mark Kilroy's case?

624.396 - 642.643 Ash Kelley

Well, it does. It feels like one of those like, you know, those shows or movies you see where it's like the group of friends. and it's their last summer at home before they all head off in different directions. Yeah. And you want it to end well. Like this is supposed to be like, you know, a summer where you get like, you have fun and you let loose. Yeah.

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642.663 - 661.002 Ash Kelley

It's like supposed to end with this like happy ending. It's supposed to end all together. And now that you're beginning to talk, I do know this. Okay. I do know this. I think we talked about it on Crime Countdown. You know what? That actually makes sense, because the name... I believe. I think you're right. The name sounded really familiar to me. Yeah.

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661.522 - 677.363 Ash Kelley

And all of a sudden, I was like, wait a minute. We talked about so much on Crime Countdown, and there was, like, such little bursts of information. Snippets, exactly. So, every now and again, I'm like, did we talk about that? Yeah, I'm like, did we do a whole episode on that? And then I'm like, no, we didn't. I know, exactly. So...

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677.343 - 696.1 Ash Kelley

It was late by the time they reached Santa Fe, but the four boys decided they didn't want to waste any time. So they started making their way to South Padre around midnight. In total, it took about nine hours for them to get there, including two stops along the way. But there was really no time to rest. As soon as they checked into the hotel, they showered, they ate, and they hit the beach. Yeah.

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696.22 - 708.821 Ash Kelley

This is their last trip. Let's go. They got to make the most of it. Now, with roughly a quarter of a million students expected at South Padre that spring break, the entire area had been transformed in anticipation of all these kids' arrivals.

709.441 - 746.123 Ash Kelley

According to journalist Gary Cartwright, the weekend attractions and offerings included beer companies sponsoring an unprecedented variety of entertainment, including free movies, free concert, free calls home, Which like, please just think about that. Yeah, which is wild. And surf simulator rides. Yeah. So it's just like all kinds of things going on. Yeah, again, it's just like let loose.

746.604 - 765.543 Ash Kelley

It reminds me of like just that little like snippet reminds me of Saved by the Bell when they go on that like beach vacation. Oh my God, yes. Right? Yeah. For some reason that episode sticks out in my head. It might have been a series of episodes. It's like Saved by the Bell, and then it made me think of Gilmore Girls when they go on spring break.

Chapter 8: What shocking developments occurred during the investigation?

765.963 - 783.051 Ash Kelley

I don't even remember that. Yeah. You can count on Alina to pinpoint a specific Gilmore Girls reference. Oh, yeah. Absolutely. Wild. Yeah. So Mark and Brad took advantage of the free phone calls home, and they let their parents know that they all had got there safely, and they were just hanging out on the beach.

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783.031 - 793.146 Ash Kelley

Later that night, they met up with a group of girls who traveled from Purdue University, and they just spent the night drinking and hanging out in their adjoining hotel rooms until dawn, getting to know each other, just having a good time.

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794.007 - 814.338 Ash Kelley

Within a couple days of their arrival, the four guys had kind of settled into a routine of waking up early, hitting the beach, going back to their hotel rooms for a little nap before starting the evening's round of drinking. Like, typical vacation. Yeah. And occasionally the routine was interrupted by an event like the daily Miss Tan line contest. Miss Tan line. I love it.

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814.638 - 833.586 Ash Kelley

But for the most part, it was just a lot of sun, a lot of drinking, a lot of fun. So this was pretty much what they expected, but none of them had expected it to get old quite so fast. And by Sunday, March 12th, they decided they wanted to change it up a little bit. Like they were like, okay, why don't we go like sightsee? Why don't we go to Matamoros, Mexico, just over the border?

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833.826 - 851.867 Ash Kelley

We're so close to Mexico. It would be so fun to travel. Yeah. So that night, Mark and his friends stopped at the Sonic Drive in Port Isabel for dinner. There they met a group of girls from the University of Kansas who were also on their way to Matamoros. So they all decided, okay, let's go together. And the girls followed behind as Brett drove to the border.

851.847 - 869.181 Ash Kelley

After parking their cars on the Brownsville side of the bridge, they all walked across the border into Matamoros and they just spent the night kind of bar hopping and they specifically landed at one bar called Sergeant Peppers. Okay. Once they got back to their cars early the next morning, the two groups said their goodbyes and they went their separate ways.

869.161 - 878.472 Ash Kelley

Now, they all had so much fun in Matamoros that night. So after a day at the beach, the next day, they all decided, why don't we go back into Mexico again? Like, that was so much fun.

878.812 - 879.032 Alaina Urquhart

Yeah.

879.173 - 896.653 Ash Kelley

So they did, and they arrived a little after 10 p.m. It turned out that Mark and his friends were not the only one with that plan, though. By the time they arrived in the small border town, the sidewalks were crammed with nearly 15,000 students. Holy shit. All of whom had come to party and celebrate spring break.

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