Tony Kiritsis, Richard Hall, and the True Story Behind Dead Man’s Wire: A Conversation with the Makers of Dead Man’s Line

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3.8 • 3K Ratings

🗓️ 15 January 2026

⏱️ 98 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

On February 8, 1977, Tony Kiritsis wired a shotgun to Richard Hall's neck. Then he paraded him through the streets of Indianapolis. What followed was one of the most extraordinary hostage crises in history.

We talked to documentarians Alan Berry and Mark Enochs about their 2018 documentary film on the case: Dead Man's Line. They will talk about the facts of the case, the underlying personalities of those involved, and the aftermath, as well as the recent movie based on the case, Dead Man's Wire.

Here's the website Dead Man's Line: https://deadmansline.com/

Watch Dead Man's Line here on YouTube, it's really good: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUcZXVT6888

Watch the trailer for Dead Man's Line: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQZMFksVFhU

Check out the Kiritsis archive on this YouTube playlist: (Which includes where Tony got the idea from.) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQZMFksVFhU&list=PLOM7Id-wJhsiw145xvgbUQV2GHsHCgM3W

Check out Alan Berry's personal website: https://alancberry.com/

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Transcript

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0:00.0	I'm Anya, and today we'll be talking with some documentarians about Tony Kyritsis and a hostage crisis that shocked Indianapolis.
0:08.7	Content warning. This episode contains discussion of mental illness and violence.
0:13.5	The images sear themselves into your brain. One man is holding a sawed-off shotgun.
0:19.0	He is angry, crying, elated at times.
0:22.6	He's desperate for revenge and attention.
0:25.4	He feels he is the true victim.
0:27.8	The other man, stoic, is hands cuffed before him.
0:32.5	His neck is wired to the shotgun.
0:35.9	One wrong move, and he's dead. Behind them follow a phalanx of police
0:41.2	officers and a gaggle of reporters. This, of course, is the case of Tony Kuritzis. He was a man
0:49.2	from Indianapolis, Indiana, who shocked the Hoosier State and the world on February 8, 1977.
0:56.2	That was the day he went into the office of Meridian Mortgage and wired a sawed-off shotgun to
1:01.7	Richard Hall's head.
1:03.4	What ensued was a 63-hour hostage crisis.
1:07.9	On January 9, 26, a movie based on that event directed by Gus Van Zandt and starring
1:13.6	Bill Scarsgard, Dacre Montgomery, Carrie Elwas, Coleman Domingo, Mihal, and Al Pacino came out.
1:21.5	That's called Dead Man's Wire. It's gotten some good reviews so far.
1:25.6	But before that, there was Dead Man's Line.
1:28.6	This is a 2018 true crime documentary that brought attention back to the case.
1:34.4	It was directed by Alan Barry and Mark Enoch's.
1:37.9	Mark and Alan were kind enough to take us through this disturbing moment of Indianapolis' infamy.
1:43.6	My name is Anya Kane. I'm a journalist.
	...

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