Hey, I'm Steph and this is not today.

Hello and welcome or welcome back. I wanted to let you know that bonus episode number 45

is out now over on our Patreon. We're talking about a 16th birthday party invitation that got

taken over online and it turned into a Project X event that tens of thousands of people were invited to. When that event finally did happen, it turned into a Project X event that tens of thousands of people were invited to.

When that event finally did happen, it turned into a riot outside of a 16-year-old's home.

What should have been a normal 16th birthday party turned into the destruction of a small town in the Netherlands

and cars flipped over and on fire.

You can get access to that episode and 44 others and vote

on stories you want to hear at patreon.com slash not today podcast. But today I'm going to be telling

you about a woman who used her charm and quick thinking to not only save the life of her six-year-old

son, but escape a horrific fate herself that so many met at the hands of

the Casanova killer, Paul John Knowles. Before we begin, I want to give a content warning for

child abuse and neglect and sexual assault and rape. Listen to discretion is advised. But with that

said, let's get into the case of Barbara Maybe Abel and how she survived

one of the most heinous serial killers of all time. Paul John Knowles was born in Orlando, Florida,

on April 25, 1946, to parents Thomas Jefferson Knowles and Bonnie Strickland, and was one of seven

children. For Paul's entire life, his family

struggled, and they lived in a house that was far too small to accommodate the family of nine.

They didn't even have a bathroom inside. The whole family shared an outhouse in the backyard.

Thomas Knowles was an angry and violent man who would beat his children when they were bad,

which was often because they were children. The abuse was constant in their household,

and he scared his children into silence about his abuse by telling them,

...