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48 Hours

Soccer Moms Confidential

48 Hours

CBS News

True Crime, News, Tv & Film, Cbs

3.97K Ratings

🗓️ 19 October 2023

⏱️ 43 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

This classic episode of “48 Hours" explores the investigation of ex-cop turned private eye Chris Butler who staffed his San Francisco Bay area firm with local soccer moms. Butler and his firm of private investigator moms became media sensations — Lifetime Television started a reality show based on the P.I. moms. Reporter Pete Crooks was invited to write about the real-life “Charlie’s Angels,” but the story took a strange turn when he learned from a confidential informant that most of the cases were staged, crooked cops were involved, and that Butler was dealing drugs with top California narcotics cop Norm Wielsch. Butler and Wielsch were also running a massage parlor which was allegedly a front for prostitution. The soccer moms were unaware of Butler and Wielsch’s alleged schemes. Butler was sentenced to eight years in prison and was released in 2019. In 2013, Norm Wielsch was sentenced to 14 years in prison. “48 Hours” correspondent Maureen Maher reports. This "48 Hours" episode last aired on 11/17/12. Watch all-new episodes of “48 Hours” on Saturdays, and stream on demand on Paramount+.

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Transcript

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0:00.0

Hey Prime members, you can listen to the 48 hours podcast, Add Free, on Amazon Music.

0:07.6

Download the app today.

0:10.0

I'm going deep into my wife's family history, digging up the cold case of her murdered

0:14.6

great-grandmother.

0:15.6

And did I mention that I'm looking into whether the murderer was actually the beloved

0:19.5

family patriarch?

0:21.0

Binge all episodes of Ghost Story, Add Free, right now, on Wondru Plus.

0:26.9

According to 48 hours, Add Free, with 48 hours plus, on Apple Podcasts.

0:32.2

Subscribe today.

0:43.2

Every reporter loves to get a great story.

0:46.2

This one was mine.

0:48.0

It was Charlie's Angels meets Philip Marlow meets Orange County Housewives, all wrapped

0:53.4

in the one package.

0:54.9

Before these hot soccer moms, who were also private eyes.

0:59.5

When the media got hold of it, they went wild.

1:02.6

Why do you do this?

1:03.6

Why not?

1:04.6

It's crazy, right?

1:05.6

On the outside, you look like any PTA mom driving carpool.

1:09.4

Okay, no, I want you to read that whole sentence.

1:11.8

But behind the mommy exterior, they are gunpacking, hard-hitting, undercover PIs.

1:20.6

They were like Cub Scout dead mothers in the morning, undercover operatives at night.

...

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