Tapes from the dark side contains descriptions of violence and sexuality.

Listener discretion is advised.

The Welcome to a brand new season of tapes from the dark side. Before we begin today, a distinction must be made. Not all monsters carry the same name, but some have

very similar nicknames. Now, there's David Parker Ray known as the Toy Box Killer, singular. He

crafted his own brand of horror in the deserts of New Mexico, and his story is not the one we're

covering. Our story today belongs to two men,

Lawrence Biddecker and Roy Norris. Together they were known as the toolbox killers, plural,

two men, five girls, one summer of calculated incomprehensible cruelty. Together they prowled

the streets of Southern California in a beat-up

silver van. They called it Murder Mac. Inside, they carried a toolbox, filled with everyday

objects, pliers, a sledgehammer, items you'd find tucked away in a closet, or perhaps

out in your dad's garage. But in the hands of Lawrence

and Roy, these tools became instruments of pain, of domination, of death. FBI profiler John

Douglas, the man behind the behavioral science unit that inspired the show Mind Hunter, once said

that Lawrence Bidiker was the most disturbing

individual he'd ever profiled. And this was a man who had sat across from Charles Manson,

Richard Ramirez, and Ted Bundy. So what made Lawrence, or as we'll call him, Larry, so uniquely

terrifying? To understand that, we need to rewind. Not to the crimes, not

yet. Before we can tell the victim's stories, we have to go backwards, because in this case,

understanding the monsters first makes more sense, in this story at least. Let's begin with the one they called

the brains of the operation, Lawrence Sigmund Biddecker, who went by the name Larry. Larry was

born September 27, 1940 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He was an unwanted child. His biological

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