Best of 2024: Israel Keyes Pt. 1
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What are the warnings viewers should know before listening?
So due to the nature of this killer's crimes, listener discretion is definitely advised. This episode includes discussions of animal abuse, rape, torture, kidnapping, and murder. Consider this when deciding how and when you'll listen.
There is no one who knows me or who has ever known me who knows anything about me, really. They know... They're going to tell you something that does not line up with anything I tell you because I'm two different people, basically. And the only person who knows about what I'm telling you, the kind of things I'm telling you, is me.
How long have you been two different people?
A long time. 14 years.
That's Israel Keys. And this is the story he never wanted to get out. I'm Vanessa Richardson, and this is Serial Killers, a Spotify podcast. You can find us here every Monday. Be sure to check us out on Instagram at Serial Killers Podcast. We'd love to hear from you. If you're listening on the Spotify app, swipe up to share your thoughts. This is part one of our three-part series on Israel Keys, the serial killer who may have murdered upwards of 11 people across the United States. His spree lasted for over a decade before he was finally apprehended. Over the next three episodes, we'll be welcoming Josh Hallmark, an expert in this case, to lend us his insight. And we'll also be hearing Israel Keys' chilling interrogation by the FBI.
Stay with us.
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Before we get into this story, amongst the many sources we used, we found the book American Predator by Maureen Callahan and our interview with Josh Hallmark, host of True Crime Bullshit, extremely helpful to our research. The audiobook edition of American Predator is available for Spotify Premium subscribers in our audiobook catalog, where you can check it out after listening to this episode.
We all change how we act, compartmentalize, hide pieces of ourselves as we move through different spaces. In that sense, Israel Keyes was no different than the rest of us. But none of us are born examining our actions in real time, guessing what others are thinking about us. That's learned.
When Israel was 14, his sister had a cat and he took a bunch of his friends out into the woods. This is... Hi, I'm Josh Hallmark, the host and executive producer of True Crime Bullshit, the investigation into Israel Keyes. I've been researching Keyes for 10 years now and producing the show for five.
He's spoken to many of Israel's friends and loved ones, as well as eyewitnesses, FBI agents who've worked Israel's case and some of the world's most prominent criminal psychologists. He's talking about a turning point in Israel's childhood.
So when Israel was 14, at the time his sister had a cat and he took a bunch of his friends out into the woods and tied a rope around the cat and then tied it to a tree. and shot the cat and watch it tangle itself up around this tree as it tried to flee him.
He watched as the cat died.
And to Keyes, this was the funniest thing in the world, but as he looked around, he saw that his friends were horrified by it.
Those friends never talked to Israel again, which taught him two lessons.
A, that he was different from others, but B, that he had to conceal these things that entertained him or amused him or that he perceived as different or other because people would judge him and respond poorly to it. And I think that really fundamentally set up his criminal behavior for the future and how he in public would take on one identity that was separate and different from his true identity.
So for the next 20 years, the world only knew the side of Israel he curated. He grew up as the second oldest of 10 siblings in a family who lived off-grid, no heat or electricity, no access to public schooling or modern medicine. They didn't trust government oversight and hunted for their own food. Israel in particular developed a love of hunting.
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