The Trail Went Cold - Episode 426 - Christine Schultz, Part 2

The Trail Went Cold

Robin Warder

True Crime, Tv & Film

4.5 • 3.2K Ratings

🗓️ 9 April 2025

⏱️ 72 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

May 28, 1981. Milwaukee, Wisconsin. 30-year old Christine Schultz, the ex-wife of police officer Fred Schultz, is shot to death inside her home and Fred’s current spouse, Laurie “Bambi” Bembenek, is soon charged with the crime. Even though Laurie insists that she was framed by the police and the evidence against her was planted and fabricated, she is convicted of first-degree murder and receives a sentence of life imprisonment. In 1990, Laurie manages to escape from prison with the assistance of her new spouse before they are recaptured in Canada, but even though Laurie continues to maintain her innocence, she is allowed to walk free after agreeing to enter a plea of “no contest” to the crime. Was Laurie “Bambi” Bembenek actually responsible for the murder of Christine Schultz or was she the victim of an elaborate frame-up job? Last week, in Part One of our series, we chronicled the events in this case leading up to Laurie Bembenek’s prison break. This week, we will share the rest of the story and provide our theories and analysis about this very controversial and sensationalistic case. Additional Reading: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laurie_Bembenek "Run Bambi, Run" by Kris Radish https://archive.vanityfair.com/article/1991/10/was-bambi-framed https://www.cbsnews.com/news/new-trouble-for-dr-phil-guest/ https://www.chicagotribune.com/2003/01/18/bembenek-case-takes-new-turns-with-dna-and-dr-phil/ https://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/22/us/22bembenek.html https://web.archive.org/web/20141019065121/http://www.milwaukeemag.com/article/6212011-laurieslastdays https://www.jsonline.com/story/life/2023/09/12/lawrencia-laurie-bembenek-run-bambi-run-facts-murder-escape-from-prison-cause-of-death/70794066007/ https://www.jsonline.com/picture-gallery/life/2023/09/07/laurie-bembenek-tried-for-murder-in-1982/70791199007/ "Run Bambi Run" Podcast "The Trail Went Cold" will be appearing at the True Crime Podcast Festival, taking place at the Doubletree by Hilton Hotel Boston North Shore in Boston, Massachusetts on July 18-20, 2025. To get a 20 % discount on tickets, please our specialized promo code, “ROBIN20”, by visiting https://www.truecrimepodcastfestival.com/. “The Trail Went Cold” is on Patreon. Visit www.patreon.com/thetrailwentcold to become a patron and gain access to our exclusive bonus content. The Trail Went Cold is produced and edited by Magill Foote. All music is composed by Vince Nitro.

Transcript

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0:00.0	The
0:07.0	The Hello everyone and welcome to our latest episode of The Trail Went Cold. I'm your host Robin Warder,
0:41.7	and today we're going to be presenting the second of our two-part series about the 1981 murder of
0:47.1	Christine Schultz and the controversial conviction of Laurie Bambi Benbenick. We released part one last week,
0:55.6	which outlined some of the most important facts of the case, and if you haven't heard that episode yet, I suggest you go back and listen to it,
1:00.7	since I shared a lot of information which will be relevant to what we're discussing today.
1:05.4	As a brief recap, the murder of 30-year-old Christine Schultz took place in Milwaukee, Wisconsin during the early morning
1:12.0	hours of May the 28th, 1981, as she was shot to death during a home invasion by a mass intruder
1:18.4	who was seen by Christine's two young sons. Christine's ex-husband, Fred Schultz, was a veteran
1:25.1	Milwaukee police detective who quickly got remarried to a 22-year-old
1:29.2	woman named Lori Ben Ben Ben Beck, who had been given the nickname Bambi, even though she despised it.
1:34.7	Lori had attempted to become a police officer herself, but was fired shortly after graduating
1:39.3	from the academy, and responded by filing a discrimination claim against the city of Milwaukee, as she alleged that the
1:45.9	police department was rampant with corruption and created a hostile working environment for female and
1:51.2	minority officers. Nearly one month after Christine's murder, Lorry would be arrested and charged with the
1:57.4	crime after ballistics tests supposedly showed that an off-duty 38-calibre
2:01.9	revolver Fred kept at their apartment was the murder weapon. Since Lorry appeared to be the only one
2:07.4	with access to the revolver during the time period of the murder, and did not have a verifiable alibi,
2:13.1	but the authorities believed that she was the masked intruder who killed Christine, even though one of
2:17.8	Christine's sons was certain the perpetrator was a man. Lorry was found guilty at trial and received
2:23.3	a sentence of life imprisonment, but she maintained that she was the victim of an elaborate
2:27.6	conspiracy from the Milwaukee PD who fabricated most of the evidence against her and framed her for
	...

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