This is exactly right.

The courtroom isn't just about justice. It's about power and money and some truly bizarre loopholes.

I'm Michael Foote. And I'm Melissa Malbranche, and we've got a brand new show called Brief Recess, Illegal Podcast.

Every week, we talk about wild tales from court, trials gone wrong, and cases and rulings that shape our world.

Today we're going to be talking about stolen antiquities, all the weird things Melissa found at in a state sale, the crazy conversations I had with the bouncer and J.K. Rowling. We make the complicated clear and the serious, surprisingly fun. From the exactly right network, new episodes of Brief Recess drop every Thursday. Watch Brief Recess on YouTube. Listen to Brief Recess on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

This story contains adult content and language.

Listener discretion is advised. I mean, there's so much wrapped up in the acts with this streak of insurgent power,

something where people who are disempowered can take it back under the guise of labor and use it to strike out.

I'm Kate Winkler Dawson, a nonfiction author and journalism professor in Austin, Texas.

I'm also the co-hosts of the podcast, Buried Bones on Exactly Right.

And throughout my career, research for my many audio and book projects has taken me

around the world. On Wicked Words, I sit down with the people I've met along the way,

amazing writers, journalists, filmmakers, and podcasters who have investigated and reported

on notorious true crime cases. This is about the choices writers make, both good and bad,

and it's a deep dive into the unpublished details behind their stories.

When Rachel McCarthy-James and her father wrote their best-selling book,

The Man from the Train, Rachel became fascinated with axes.

Were they actually good weapons during murders? What what kind of killer would use them? She wrote about the story of the axe in her book,

Wackjob, the history of axe murder. And yes, we talk about Lizzie Borden. Tell me about what your first

interest was with axe murderers. I have to assume it goes back to, you know, the book that you did with your father.

The Man from the Train, yes. Give me a brief overview for anybody who doesn't know that story. And then, you know, I know you were a researcher and then a writer on it.

Of course. Yeah, it's really kind of the companion piece of the origin story for this book

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