{"podcast":{"title":"Foul Play: A Historical True Crime Podcast","slug":"foul-play-a-historical-true-crime-podcast-51278","podcast_index_feed_id":51278,"rss_url":"https://feeds.redcircle.com/4cf5f57c-0bea-454e-8dc3-f263c362d278","website_url":"https://redcircle.com/shows/foulplay","image_url":"https://media.redcircle.com/images/2026/2/16/21/cbfd1140-ea5b-4393-97e9-8f2f9ac2f953_00-main-artwork-original.jpg","author":"Shane L. Waters, Wendy Cee, Gemma Hoskins","episode_count":315,"summary":"Foggy gaslit streets. A quiet courtroom. And crimes that history tried to bury. Foul Play is a historical true crime podcast that investigates the most chilling murder cases from the 1800s and early 1900s across the United States and the United Kingdom. Hosted by investigative crime journalists Shane Waters — who pioneered crime podcasting in 2008 — and Wendy Cee, each season unravels one complete criminal case through original research, court records, and primary source material. This isn't sensationalized true crime. Every season of Foul Play puts victims first — their names, their stories, their humanity — before examining how murder investigations unfolded in an era before modern forensics, when justice was far from guaranteed. From Victorian poisoners in London to Gilded Age killers in America, Foul Play brings historical true crime to life with cinematic storytelling and relentless accuracy. Every fact is verified. Every claim is sourced. Every story is told with the gravity it deserves. New seasons of this historical true crime podcast release throughout the year, with episodes dropping weekly on Tuesdays. Hello, friend. Welcome to Foul Play.","last_synced_at":null,"page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/foul-play-a-historical-true-crime-podcast-51278"},"episode":{"title":"Maryland & Indiana: Forbidden Desires, 1878-1889","slug":"maryland-indiana-forbidden-desires-1878-1889","published_at":"2026-04-07T09:00:46+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/foul-play-a-historical-true-crime-podcast-51278/maryland-indiana-forbidden-desires-1878-1889","show_page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/foul-play-a-historical-true-crime-podcast-51278","url":"http://mythsandmalice.com","audio_url":"https://audio3.redcircle.com/episodes/2e23e1ce-3f1a-4cf8-b2a7-7e010632b8ad/stream.mp3","summary":"Content Warning: This episode contains descriptions of gun violence, intimate partner violence, poisoning, and discussions of coercive control in same-sex and heterosexual relationships. Crisis resources are listed at the end of these notes. Historical Context In Indiana, public pressure forced an exhumation four months after Hattie's death. Organs shipped to Chicago forchemical analysis revealed large quantities of strychnine. Pettit was arrested and charged with murder. The trial in Crawfordsville drew journalists from across the Midwest. Lew Wallace — the author of *Ben-Hur*, a former Union general, and a member of the military commission that tried the Lincoln assassination conspirators — attendedregularly from the gallery. The jury convicted Pettit and sentenced him to life in prison at hard labor. He died oftuberculosis in 1893, the same day the Indiana Supreme Court granted him a retrial. Elma Whitehead, who funded his defense and fled the state to avoid subpoenas, was never tried. Lilly Duer was captured in Baltimore and tried at the Worcester County courthouse in Snow Hill, Maryland, in May 1879. She was housed not in jail but at the National Hotel across the street — jail being unsuitable for a woman of her standing. The jury convicted her of manslaughter. The sentence: a five-hundred-dollar fine and no prison time. For shooting a woman in the face. The Investigations Indiana, 1889: While Hattie Pettit visited a friend in South Bend, her husband moved into the home of Elma Whitehead — the wealthiest woman in the county, daughter of church patron David Meharry. Pettit proposed to Elma, and she accepted. When Hattie returned on July 12, she was poisoned with strychnine on at least three separate occasions over five days. The poison produced violent convulsions…","meta_description":"Content Warning: This episode contains descriptions of gun violence, intimate partner violence, poisoning, and discussions of coercive control in same-sex…","key_points":[],"chapters":[],"topics":[],"duration_seconds":1797,"processing_state":"not_requested","actions":[{"name":"request_transcript","method":"POST","url":"https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/foul-play-a-historical-true-crime-podcast-51278/episodes/maryland-indiana-forbidden-desires-1878-1889/transcription-requests","description":"Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode."},{"name":"read_markdown","method":"GET","url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/foul-play-a-historical-true-crime-podcast-51278/maryland-indiana-forbidden-desires-1878-1889.md","description":"Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource."}]}}