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, along with references to sexual assault.

Listener discretion is advised. If an investigator at some agency reads this book or a parent who has a lost child that they haven't seen for 40 years, maybe there's a connection.

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and it's a deep dive into the unpublished details behind their stories.

For more than a decade, a serial killer stalked teenage boys in Michigan. Ronald Lloyd Bailey

was eventually caught, but the story became more complicated because

of Bailey's experience at one of the state's most respected psychiatric hospitals. Author Rod Sadler

tells me the story in his book, Depraved Obsession. Tell me briefly about your background with law enforcement, because I do think, you know, unlike other authors, this gives you such a unique perspective of a kind of a complicated case.

Well, I was a police officer for 30 years here in Michigan. I started in 1981. I worked for some small agencies for about the first five years of my career.

And then I was hired by the Eaton County Sheriff's Office, which is the west side of Lansing, Michigan, which is our state capital.

And I worked at Eaton County for 25 years until I retired in 2012. As a police officer working for Eaton County,

I was promoted to the position of Sergeant in 1999. I also was our police composite artist

...