Errol Morris

Criminal

Vox Media Podcast Network

Society & Culture, True Crime

4.7 • 39.4K Ratings

🗓️ 25 September 2020

⏱️ 45 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Early in his career, Errol Morris read about a shocking series of alleged insurance crimes in a small town in Florida, which some referred to as “Nub City.” There were allegations that men and women were mutilating themselves -- removing hands and feet -- in order to exploit accidental dismemberment clauses in insurance policies, and collect money. It was very difficult to prove that these injuries were intentional and not accidental. As one insurance official put it, “it was hard to make a jury believe a man would shoot off his foot.” When Errol Morris told an insurance investigator he wanted to go to Florida to make a documentary about it, the investigator said, “Don’t even think about it.” Errol Morris went anyway. Today, the story behind the “Nub City” movie he couldn’t figure out how to make, plus his memories of making The Thin Blue Line, his work as a private detective, and meetings with Ed Gein, James Grigson, Randall Adams, David Harris, and Herbert Mullen. Say hello on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Sign up for our occasional newsletter, The Accomplice. Follow the show and review us on Apple Podcasts: iTunes.com/CriminalShow. We also make This is Love and Phoebe Reads a Mystery. Artwork by Julienne Alexander. Check out our online shop. Episode transcripts are posted on our website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Support for this show comes from Krakan.
0:03.0	Krypto is like the financial system, but different.
0:07.0	It doesn't care where you come from, what you look like, your credit score,
0:11.0	or your outrageous food delivery habits.
0:13.7	crypto is finance for everyone everywhere all the time.
0:18.4	Krakhan, see what crypto can be.
0:21.3	Don't invest unless you're prepared to lose all the money you invest.
0:25.0	This is a high-risk investment and you should not expect to be protected if something goes wrong.
0:30.0	This episode contains adult language and descriptions of violence.
0:35.0	Please use discretion.
0:37.0	I used to say about Nub City is if they would do this to themselves, think about what they would do to you.
0:44.6	That was going to be my tagline for the movie. If they would do this to themselves
0:50.1	just think about what they would do to you.
0:53.0	Errol Morris is an Academy Award winning filmmaker and writer.
0:57.0	He's perhaps best known for his 1988 documentary The Thin Blue Line
1:02.0	about a wrongful conviction in a murder case. He's also made
1:06.7	movies about a pet cemetery, a lion tamer, and the US government's actions in
1:11.2	the Vietnam War. But there's one movie he's always wanted
1:15.3	to make, that he tried to make early in his career, but never figured out how.
1:20.9	I remember one weekend I'm reading the New York Times magazine and there's an article
1:26.1	about an insurance investigator named John Healy and he's talking about his crimes, working as an investigator.
1:37.2	It's a half a paragraph in the article.
	...

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