4.7 • 8K Ratings
🗓️ 11 May 2024
⏱️ 53 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Note: This episode contains descriptions of violence and suicide and may not be appropriate for all listeners.
In 1989, Chuck Stuart called 911 on his car phone to report a shooting.
He said he and his wife were leaving a birthing class at a Boston hospital when a man forced him to drive into the mixed-race Mission Hill neighborhood and shot them both. Stuart’s wife, Carol, was seven months pregnant. She would die that night, hours after her son was delivered by cesarean section, and days later, her son would die, too.
Stuart said he saw the man who did it: a Black man in a tracksuit.
Within hours, the killing had the city in a panic, and Boston police were tearing through Mission Hill looking for a suspect.
For a whole generation of Black men in Mission Hill who were subjected to frisks and strip searches, this investigation shaped their relationship with police. And it changed the way Boston viewed itself when the story took a dramatic turn and the true killer was revealed.
This week on Reveal, in partnership with columnist Adrian Walker of The Boston Globe and the “Murder in Boston” podcast, we bring you the untold story of the Stuart murder: one that exposed truths about race and crime that few White people in power wanted to confront.
To hear more of The Boston Globe’s investigation, listen to the 10-part podcast “Murder in Boston.” The HBO documentary series “Murder in Boston: Roots, Rampage, and Reckoning” is available to stream on Max.
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0:00.0 | I'm here to tell you about a great mystery. |
0:04.0 | That mystery is you. |
0:07.3 | As the host of a podcast called Hidden Brain, |
0:10.1 | I explore big questions about what it means to be human. |
0:14.0 | Questions like, where do our emotions come from? |
0:17.0 | Why do so many of us feel overwhelmed by modern life? |
0:21.0 | How can we better understand the people around us? |
0:24.0 | Discover your hidden brain. |
0:27.0 | Find us wherever you get your podcasts. |
0:30.0 | From the Center for Investigative Reporting in PRX, this is reveal. |
0:37.0 | I'm Al Ledson. |
0:39.0 | Today, we're starting the show by going back a few decades to a notorious crime that holds lessons for today, |
0:46.4 | lessons about race, class, crime, and punishment. |
0:51.1 | It's October 23rd, 1989 in Boston. |
0:55.0 | Charles Stewart makes a 911 call from his car phone. |
0:58.8 | Boston recorder emergency, 510. |
1:01.1 | My wife's been shot, I've been charged. Where is this sir? |
1:04.0 | I have no idea I'm off. |
1:05.0 | I've been coming from Fremont bringing the women's hospital. |
1:09.0 | Chuck and Carol Stewart started the night at a birthing class. |
1:13.3 | Carol is seven months pregnant. |
1:16.1 | Chuck tells the dispatcher there was a man with a gun and he forced him to drive to an |
... |
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