399: The Life & Crimes of Robert Spears w/ Jerry Jamison

Most Notorious! A True Crime History Podcast

Erik Rivenes

True Crime, History, Education

4.7 • 2.8K Ratings

🗓️ 23 July 2025

⏱️ 109 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

"Doctor" Robert Spears was arguably one of the greatest con artists of the twentieth century, and very likely a mass murderer. In thirty nine years of grift, he had 25 aliases, 28 arrests in 20 cities, and was imprisoned close to a dozen times. He performed, without any medical degree, abortions on countless women, and in 1959 tricked his best friend into taking his place on an airplane. That plane exploded in mid-air, killing 42 passengers, and allowed Spears to briefly escape his legal woes and start a new life under yet another new identity. My guest is Jerry Jamison, and his book is called "Vanishing Act: A Crashed Airliner, Faked Death, and Backroom Abortions". He share details of this too-crazy-to-believe-but-still-true story with me on this latest episode of Most Notorious. The author's website: https://jerryjamison.com/ Jerry Jamison on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/jerryjamisonauthor/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	On the new Crime House original podcast, Killer Minds,
0:04.1	we're diving into the psychology of the world's most complex murder cases.
0:08.7	From serial killers to cult leaders, deadly exes, and spree killers,
0:13.4	we're examining not just how they killed, but why.
0:16.9	Killer Minds is a Crimehouse Studios original.
0:20.0	New episodes drop every Monday and Thursday.
0:22.6	Follow wherever you get your podcasts.
0:28.6	If you like this podcast, can we recommend another one?
0:31.6	It's called Big Picture Science.
0:34.6	You can hear it wherever you get your podcast podcast and its name tells part of the story.
0:39.0	The big picture questions and the most interesting research in science. Seth and I are the host.
0:45.6	Seth is a scientist. I am Molly and I'm a science journalist and we talk to people smarter than us
0:51.0	and we have fun along the way. The show is called Big Picture Science
0:54.1	and as Seth said, you can hear it
0:56.0	wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome, everyone to the most notorious podcast. I'm Eric Rivenis. We've got quite the epic
1:30.5	tale ahead of us, so kick back and get ready for your jaw to drop at least once or twice.
1:37.1	That's my prediction anyway. I am so pleased to have Jerry Jameson with me today.
1:43.5	He is a prolific author with 30 books to his name,
1:47.7	including fiction and nonfiction. He has been an award-winning advertising copywriter for nearly
1:54.7	40 years with 30 national writing commendations. And he is here to talk about his most recent book called
2:03.1	Vanishing Act, a crashed airliner, faked death, and backroom abortions. So great to have you
2:12.0	on the show, and thank you for joining me. Well, thank you. I'm looking forward to. I'm looking
	...

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