Bible John: The Ballroom Killer

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October 30, 1969. Two sisters leave a glass-cow dance hall, with two men they just met.

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One sister gets dropped off safely at George Square. The other continues on in that taxi.

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Listening to her companion quote "bible" versus "and condemn adultery" by mourning, she'll

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be dead in her own backyard strangled with her own stockings. And the man who killed her,

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will become the most famous, unidentified suspect in Scottish history. His name was John, at

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least that's what he said.

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[Music]

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Let's talk about glass-cow in the late 1960s because you need to understand this city

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to understand why these murders happened the way they did. While London and San Francisco

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were doing the whole flower power thing, Glasgow was still very much a city of small-covered

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tenements, public washhouses, and working-class struggle. The social scene wasn't sit-ins and

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love-ins. It was dance halls. And the king of all dance halls was the barrel-end ballroom.

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This place had a neon sign you could see from blocks away. A spring-loaded wooden floor

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designed specifically to make dancing more fun. And a reputation.

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Thursday nights at the barrel-end had a very specific clientele. Married people, looking

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for what you might call "extramarital entertainment." Women would take off their wedding rings

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before they even left the house. The whole thing operated on discretion and denial. This matters

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because it tells you something about the killer's mindset. He didn't stumble into the barrel-end

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randomly. He chose Thursday nights at a venue for married women seeking temporary anonymity.

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He was hunting a very specific type of victim. Women, he could judge. Women he thought deserved

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what was coming. Between February 1968 and October 1969, three women died after nights

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at the barrel-end. All burnettes, all between 25 and 32 years old. All mothers, all strangled

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with their own stockings and left partially clothed near their homes or in public view.

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Patricia Docker came first, 25 years old, a nurse. She went to the barrel-end on February

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22, 1968. Her body was found the next day in a lane near her home, beaten and strangled.

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Jemima McDonald was next, 32, murdered on August 16, 1969. Her body was discovered in a derelict

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tenement building. Several people had seen her at the barrel-end that night dancing with

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the tall, well-dressed man in his late 20s with reddish hair. Then came Helen Puttich, 29,

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mother of two. October 30, 1969. She went dancing with her sister Jean and met two men. They

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all left together, called a taxi, and Jean got dropped off at George Square with her dance

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partner. Helen continued on with the man who called himself John. By the next morning, Helen

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was dead in the back court near her home. Police decided these three murders were connected,

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same location, same type victim, same method. They created the narrative of a serial killer

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prowling the barrel-end. And maybe they were right, or maybe they were under so much pressure

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to consolidate the threat that they forced a pattern. Because years later, Joe Bady,

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the detective who led the original investigation, admitted he never had definitive evidence

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linking all three murders to one person. Jean Langford gave the police the only detailed

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description of the killer they would ever get. During that taxi ride from the barrel-end,

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she sat in the back seat with Helen and the man named John. And John talked. He quoted

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the Bible repeatedly. He went on about adultery and how married women shouldn't be in dance

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halls. The performance was so over-the-top moralizing that when Helen turned up dead hours later,

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the press immediately dubbed the killer "Bible John." Jean described him as 25 to 30 years

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old, about six feet tall, with light reddish hair, blue gray eyes, and a smart, modern appearance.

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She said he was well spoken, better dressed than the typical barrel-end crowd. He seemed

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like he didn't quite belong there, which is probably exactly why he chose that venue.

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He could blend in just enough while also maintaining his superiority complex. Based on Jean's description,

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police commissioned Scotland's first-ever composite sketch of a murder suspect, an artist from

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the Glasgow School of Art created a drawing that's been called Scotland's Mona Lisa. Nero eyes,

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unreadable expression. That image got plastered everywhere. Police interviewed 5,000 people,

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took 50,000 statements, followed every lead, and caught nobody. Here's the thing about having such a

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vivid profile. It can work against you. Police became so focused on finding a red-haired,

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well-spoken, Bible-quoting man that they might have missed other suspects entirely. When you've

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got a witness as certain as Jean and an image as striking as that composite sketch, it's easy to

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start seeing what you expect to see. And there's another layer. The original investigation was soaked

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in misogyny. The press and the public spent time questioning why these women were out dancing in

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the first place. Why they were seeking affairs. The focus kept sliding from the killer's actions

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to the victims' supposed moral failings, which is exactly what the killer would have wanted.

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His whole thing was judgment and punishment. Fast forward to the 90s, DNA testing was

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becoming the miracle technology that would save cold cases everywhere. Police had biological

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evidence from Helen Puttuk's murder scene, a semen stain, hair samples, material that could theoretically

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identify the killer decades later. The problem was degradation. The samples were old, poorly preserved.

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The technology wasn't quite up to the task yet. Enter John Irvine McEns. This man became the

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prime suspect. And allegations emerged that he'd been protected during the original investigation

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because he was the cousin of a senior police officer. When McEns died by suicide in the 80s,

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those allegations only intensified. In 1995, police exhumed McEns' body for DNA testing.

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The results came back inconclusive. Not a match, but not a definitive exclusion either.

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The crown officially cleared McEns in 1996, but people believed there was a cover-up, conspiracy theories

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exploded. It took until 2005 for advances in DNA technology to finally, definitively, exclude

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McEns. His DNA did not match the profile from Helen's murder scene. By then, a new suspect had

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emerged. Peter Tobin, convicted serial killer and rapist. He was the right age. He'd been in

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Glasgow around the right time. His crimes involved similar violence. Criminologist started pushing

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the theory that Bible John was definitely Peter Tobin. There were problems, multiple problems.

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First, DNA testing definitively ruled him out. His genetic profile didn't match the biological

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evidence from the puttuck crime scene. Second, and this is the part that really kills the theory.

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Tobin had an airtight alibi for the last two murders. He married his first wife in Brighton on August

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6, 1969. That was 10 days before Jemima McDonald's murder on August 16. Marriage,

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certificate proves it. He was still living in Brighton on October 30 when Helen was killed.

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He would have had to travel back to Glasgow without his new wife knowing, commit murder,

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and get back to Brighton. When you add up all the details of it, the timeline doesn't work.

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So Tobin could have theoretically killed Patricia Docker in February 1968 before he moved to Brighton.

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But he's forensically excluded from Helen Puttuck's murder, and he has a documented alibi for being

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in another city during the other two. Some people still think he was involved. The science and the

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timeline say otherwise. In late 2022 and early 2023, journalist Audrey Gillian released a BBC

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podcast called Bible John, Creation of a serial killer. The series focused on the victims as real people.

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It tore apart the misogyny that defined the original investigation, and it brought the John Irvine

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Macins cover up allegations roaring back. Gillian's podcast claimed that the officers involved in the 1995

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exhumation were certain of Macins guilt despite the inconclusive DNA results, and that police chiefs

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buried his name because of family connections. Police Scotland responded in October 2023 by

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confirming that they were reviewing the podcast claims. Family members of the victims were contacted.

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Alan Motley and Jemima McDonnell's son called it a bombshell and expressed hope that the police

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would finally admit the original investigation was botched. The fact that a podcast could force a

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formal police review tells you something. Sometimes outside pressure is the only thing that moves the

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needle. In 2024, Australian historian Dr. Gillian Bavain Mizzy published a book called Bible John a new

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suspect. Her suspect is John Templeton, a Glasgow printer who died in 2015. She says she's 100%

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convinced based on circumstantial evidence. There's a complication. Templeton was interviewed by police

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in 1969 right after Helen Puddick's murder, and he was ruled out. So for this theory to hold,

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police Scotland would have to accept that they made a massive mistake in the original investigation

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and missed the killer when he was sitting right in front of them. That's hard to swallow,

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especially without definitive DNA confirmation. Police Scotland confirmed they're also investigating

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the claims in her book, whether it leads anywhere depends entirely on whether modern forensic

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technology can extract a usable genetic profile from that degradated 1969 seamen stain.

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Here's what we know for certain. Someone left biological evidence at Helen Puddick's murder scene.

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That genetic material represents an unidentified male. Every theory, every suspect, every book

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and podcast has to answer that DNA profile. John Irvine Mckins excluded. Peter Tobin excluded

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and Alibide. John Templeton still under investigation, but he can only be confirmed or eliminated

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through DNA comparison. The science is both the barrier and the solution. Investigative genetic

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genealogy could theoretically identify Bible John, but it requires a high quality genetic profile.

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And after 50 plus years of degradation, nobody knows if that's even possible with the evidence

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that exists. So where does that leave us? Three women dead, a witness who gave an incredibly

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detailed description, a composite sketch that became iconic, decades of suspects who didn't pan

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out, and a killer who may or may not have been a single person. Because that's the other possibility.

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What if Bible John, as we understand him, only killed Helen Puddick? What if the docker and

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McDonald murders were committed by someone else? The lead detective in the case thought it was possible.

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The pressure to create a unified narrative might have linked cases that shouldn't have been linked.

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Bible John has been Scotland's boogie man for over 50 years, but Patricia Docker,

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Jamima McDonald, and Helen Puddick weren't killed by a ghost story. They were killed by a man,

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a man whose genetic profile still sits in an evidence locker somewhere, waiting for science to

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finally be good enough to tell us who he was. Until then, we're left with that composite sketch.

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Those narrow eyes staring out from a cold case file, Scotland's Mona Lisa, a face without a name,

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a killer without justice.

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Thanks for listening to 10 Minute Murder, bingeable true crime stories. I'm Joe,

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on the host, and here are a couple of emails, first one's subject, a true crime confession.

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Uh oh. Hey Joe, any time a friend recommends a new true crime show, I judge it by whether the host

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sounds as calm as you do. If they're too hyped up, I'm out. I didn't realize I had a narration

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energy preference until your podcast. Rita in Evansville, Indiana. Rita, that's a bigger compliment

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than I think you realize. I like to think that I'm the anti-Nancy Grace. I'm not over the top

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and sensationalized. I'm just the person that I actually am in real life. Calm and pretty chill.

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So thank you for recognizing that, I suppose. Next one, subject, question about researching cases.

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Hey Joe, do you ever run across a case that instantly ruins your day? I imagine digging through

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court documents isn't always sunshine, so I figured I'd ask how you keep your head straight during

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the heavier ones. Colton in Roanoke, Virginia. Colton, thank you for the email and yeah man,

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every day I'm reading about true crime cases and every day there's a constant reminder these are

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real people. These are real stories. These are real court cases. These are real people that died.

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And that honestly bums me out every time I'm reading about this. I'm not reading about it going,

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"Oh what a cool thing I can talk about on the podcast." No, I'm not doing that. I mean I do put it

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on the podcast, but I'm not thinking, "Man this is so cool, I feel horrible for these people and it

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does ruin my day." But to answer your question, the way that I get through the heavier ones is comedy.

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Pretty often I go to sleep listening to an audiobook that isn't true crime or stand-up comedy.

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And that kind of resets my whole brain. Thanks for the email and hey if you are a brand new listener

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to the podcast, welcome and make sure you hit subscribe right now and go to 10minutemurder.com.

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There you can read the blog, sign up for the weekly newsletter, and contact me like Colton and

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read it did. OG listeners, I love you with my whole heart. I'm so glad to have you as listeners.

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Continue to share this show with your friends and your family and rate and review it wherever

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that's possible. And that's going to do it. That's your episode for today. Thank you again for listening

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to 10minutemurder. See you next time.

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[Music]