Operation Misty: The Undercover Sting That Caught a Serial Killer

1
00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:05,800
Gary Allen was eight years old when professional started writing alarming

2
00:00:05,800 --> 00:00:12,000
things about him in official files. He was acquitted of murder at 26. He was

3
00:00:12,000 --> 00:00:17,920
convicted of two murders at 47. Everything in between is the story you're about

4
00:00:17,920 --> 00:00:20,400
to hear.

5
00:00:20,400 --> 00:00:45,640
There's a version of this story where Gary Arthur Allen gets stopped early. When

6
00:00:45,640 --> 00:00:49,680
someone in a position of authority looks at the file, looks at the boy and makes a

7
00:00:49,680 --> 00:00:54,480
decision that changes what happens to two women decades later. That version of

8
00:00:54,480 --> 00:00:58,720
the story does not exist. This one does.

9
00:00:58,720 --> 00:01:04,280
Paul England 1981 Gary is eight years old and the professionals around him are

10
00:01:04,280 --> 00:01:09,440
already alarmed enough to put his name into an official file. He has been

11
00:01:09,440 --> 00:01:15,200
referred to psychiatric evaluation not because of a single bad incident or a

12
00:01:15,200 --> 00:01:20,320
rough patch at home but because of a consistent and documented pattern of extreme

13
00:01:20,320 --> 00:01:25,960
unprovoked aggression toward his younger siblings. Again, Gary is eight years

14
00:01:25,960 --> 00:01:30,720
old. It's the kind of behavior that worries people whose entire job is to

15
00:01:30,720 --> 00:01:35,720
stay calm around difficult children. Social workers who worked with Gary used

16
00:01:35,720 --> 00:01:41,080
the phrase split personality and they meant it like a clinical observation. He

17
00:01:41,080 --> 00:01:44,920
could appear cooperative and completely well-behaved one moment and then

18
00:01:44,920 --> 00:01:50,960
become somebody else entirely unrecognizable the next. Between 1982 and '83 he

19
00:01:50,960 --> 00:01:55,640
spent two terms at a residential home called Baynard House. Even in a

20
00:01:55,640 --> 00:02:00,880
structured supervised setting with trained staff, the other Gary kept showing up.

21
00:02:00,880 --> 00:02:06,720
By 14, the trajectory had steepened considerably. He attacked his mother with a

22
00:02:06,720 --> 00:02:10,560
close prop while she was bedridden and recovering from surgery unable to

23
00:02:10,560 --> 00:02:15,760
defend herself. And before you ask me, a close prop is a piece of wood or metal that

24
00:02:15,760 --> 00:02:19,960
props up a clothesline to keep it from sagging. I didn't already know that I had to

25
00:02:19,960 --> 00:02:24,840
look it up. That same year he grabbed a schoolgirl by the throats on the street

26
00:02:24,840 --> 00:02:29,360
and struck her in the head and he forced her to the ground. At 15 while living

27
00:02:29,360 --> 00:02:33,360
within the care system, he attempted to strangle the son of one of his foster

28
00:02:33,360 --> 00:02:38,680
parents. The voice survived. The documentation of this period is extensive and the

29
00:02:38,680 --> 00:02:43,720
institutional response was nowhere near enough. Gary was sending out big signals

30
00:02:43,720 --> 00:02:48,880
about the kind of person he was and was still becoming. He joined the British armed

31
00:02:48,880 --> 00:02:54,000
forces and was eventually stationed in Germany. In the military can genuinely be

32
00:02:54,000 --> 00:02:59,680
a turning point for some troubled people. For Gary Allen, it was mostly just a new

33
00:02:59,680 --> 00:03:04,280
geography for the same behavior. He threatened to housemate with a diver's knife.

34
00:03:04,280 --> 00:03:09,520
He attacked a man with a baseball bat. He boasted to friends about smashing another man's

35
00:03:09,520 --> 00:03:15,040
fingers over a car dispute. And then there's this crazy detail. He threw a

36
00:03:15,040 --> 00:03:20,480
television through a window because a song he liked did not win the Eurovision

37
00:03:20,480 --> 00:03:25,200
Song Contest. Not that it really matters but the song was called Better the Devil You Know,

38
00:03:25,200 --> 00:03:32,280
performed by Sonya at the UK Eurovision in 1993, held in Milstreet, Ireland. She

39
00:03:32,280 --> 00:03:37,480
ended up finishing second and Gary Allen was big mad about it.

40
00:03:37,480 --> 00:03:42,040
Picked up a whole television through it out of a window. Now I'm a Buffalo Bills fan. I

41
00:03:42,040 --> 00:03:47,400
have been for the majority of my life. At no point ever have I picked up and thrown

42
00:03:47,400 --> 00:03:53,080
a television set. I've never hit anything with a TV. I've never thrown anything and broken

43
00:03:53,080 --> 00:03:57,960
anything over a Buffalo Bills game. I've had good reason to if you know the history of

44
00:03:57,960 --> 00:04:02,040
the Buffalo Bills, you know what I'm talking about. So we can all agree this is completely

45
00:04:02,040 --> 00:04:09,240
unhinged behavior. On the morning of October 26th, 1997, a group of schoolgirls walking near

46
00:04:09,240 --> 00:04:15,680
the river Humber at North Therapy found a woman partially submerged in the estuary mud. Her

47
00:04:15,680 --> 00:04:21,520
name was Samantha Klass. She was 29 years old, a mother of three. Samantha had grown up in

48
00:04:21,520 --> 00:04:28,000
the care system herself. Had experienced instability throughout her childhood and on into adulthood

49
00:04:28,000 --> 00:04:32,760
and became involved in sex work. Her daughter Sophia would later stand in court and describe

50
00:04:32,760 --> 00:04:39,320
her mother as a million beautiful things. Caring, gentle and strong. Someone who imprinted

51
00:04:39,320 --> 00:04:45,120
on everyone she met. The forensic picture of what happened to Samantha was devastating.

52
00:04:45,120 --> 00:04:52,080
33 external injuries or clusters of injuries to her head and body. Severe internal trauma,

53
00:04:52,080 --> 00:04:57,680
multiple rib fractures. She'd been strangled with the ligature. Her heart had stopped. Evidence

54
00:04:57,680 --> 00:05:03,280
that Alan drove his car over her body before dumping her in the river. Where the tides eventually

55
00:05:03,280 --> 00:05:08,600
carried her out to the North Therapy shoreline. Humberside police launched one of the most

56
00:05:08,600 --> 00:05:13,880
thorough investigations the force had ever conducted to that point. Nearly 7,000 people

57
00:05:13,880 --> 00:05:21,320
questioned. 2,000 men DNA tested. In July 1998, a routine drunk driving stop brought Gary

58
00:05:21,320 --> 00:05:29,160
Allen into the system. His DNA matched biological material recovered from Samantha class. During interviews,

59
00:05:29,160 --> 00:05:34,640
Gary Allen admitted to having sex with Samantha the night she died and denied everything else.

60
00:05:34,640 --> 00:05:39,400
He had sold his car to a scrapyard the very next day, claiming he panicked after hearing

61
00:05:39,400 --> 00:05:44,880
about her murder on the news. There was one problem with that explanation. No media reports

62
00:05:44,880 --> 00:05:51,160
of her murder existed on the day that he sold his car. None. The trial took place February

63
00:05:51,160 --> 00:05:58,920
2000 at Sheffield Crown Court. The jury acquitted him. He walked out of that courtroom a free man.

64
00:05:58,920 --> 00:06:04,880
Within 35 days he had moved to Plymouth and was targeting sex workers. Again, by December

65
00:06:04,880 --> 00:06:09,840
2000 he was convicted at Plymouth Crown Court for two violent assaults, including one

66
00:06:09,840 --> 00:06:16,240
where his victim fought back, bit his hand, and screamed until he ran away. In 2002, serving

67
00:06:16,240 --> 00:06:21,600
that sentence, he sat across from a probation officer named Rosemary Parks and told her

68
00:06:21,600 --> 00:06:28,440
exactly who he was. He said he had a deep hatred of sex workers. He called them scum. He

69
00:06:28,440 --> 00:06:34,040
told her, quote, "I like to frighten them. I like to cause pain. I like to make them cry.

70
00:06:34,040 --> 00:06:40,360
I like blood. I like to hurt them. I enjoy it. It makes me feel good." He said that for

71
00:06:40,360 --> 00:06:46,920
him the pleasure started in the planning stage. By 2010, Gary Allen was back in the Humberside

72
00:06:46,920 --> 00:06:52,680
area. The police, they were so genuinely convinced that he would kill again that they built

73
00:06:52,680 --> 00:06:59,400
an entire fictional criminal underworld. Operation Misty deployed seven undercover officers

74
00:06:59,400 --> 00:07:05,920
playing members of a fake gang, led by a man that Allen knew as Ian, a hardened criminal

75
00:07:05,920 --> 00:07:12,800
with a lot to hide. Ian spent two years earning Gary Allen's trust through staged crimes.

76
00:07:12,800 --> 00:07:19,720
In one scenario, Allen sat in a getaway car while Ian appeared to beat up an undercover officer.

77
00:07:19,720 --> 00:07:24,600
In another, he was asked to burn some clothing Ian claimed was blood stained after an incident

78
00:07:24,600 --> 00:07:30,120
overseas. Gary Allen burned it and then photographed the burning pile on his iPhone to prove that

79
00:07:30,120 --> 00:07:37,080
he could be counted on. On December 6, 2010, Gary told Ian that he had something to say and

80
00:07:37,080 --> 00:07:42,960
warned that Ian probably would not want to know him afterward. Then he confessed. He said

81
00:07:42,960 --> 00:07:48,400
Samantha Klass had threatened to report him for rape after a condom split. So he killed

82
00:07:48,400 --> 00:07:54,000
her and dumped her in the Humber. 400 hours of recordings. The operation discontinued

83
00:07:54,000 --> 00:07:59,440
in 2011 after Allen attacked a couple of different women and went back to prison again.

84
00:07:59,440 --> 00:08:04,560
Now Gary Allen cycled in and out of the prison system. A woman named Arlene Gralikova was

85
00:08:04,560 --> 00:08:10,320
trying to rebuild her life in Rotherham. She was 38 years old, a mother of four, and had

86
00:08:10,320 --> 00:08:16,800
immigrated from Savakia to England in 2008. She gone through a divorce, a period of serious

87
00:08:16,800 --> 00:08:22,600
hardship, and found herself in sex work during the worst of it. At the time she disappeared

88
00:08:22,600 --> 00:08:28,800
on Boxing Day 2018, she'd been making real plans to return home to Savakia to finally

89
00:08:28,800 --> 00:08:34,480
be close to her family again. Her body was found the next year in April in a stream in the

90
00:08:34,480 --> 00:08:40,240
Parkgate area of Rotherham. She'd been strangled and left in the water. The similarities to Samantha

91
00:08:40,240 --> 00:08:46,880
Klass were precise. A vulnerable mother strangled, discarded near water. Her final moments defined

92
00:08:46,880 --> 00:08:52,720
by a man who had been rehearsing this for decades. Gary Allen left Sheffield Crown Court in

93
00:08:52,720 --> 00:08:57,840
February 2000, believing that he was bullet proof for Samantha's murder. He'd already

94
00:08:57,840 --> 00:09:02,800
been tried and acquitted. Under centuries of English law, an acquittal was a wall nothing

95
00:09:02,800 --> 00:09:09,120
could breach. That was true. Until the Criminal Justice Act of 2003 partially abolished

96
00:09:09,120 --> 00:09:14,400
the double jeopardy rule for serious crimes in England and Wales, making retrials possible

97
00:09:14,400 --> 00:09:19,080
when new and compelling evidence emerged. And the big one here is that the law was written

98
00:09:19,080 --> 00:09:25,800
to be retrospective. It could be applied to acquittals before the law even came into existence.

99
00:09:25,800 --> 00:09:32,880
So, in 2021, at Sheffield Crown Court, Gary Allen faced trial for both of the murders, Samantha

100
00:09:32,880 --> 00:09:39,880
Klass and Arlene Agrolecova. The jury deliberated for two days and returned guilty verdicts on both counts.

101
00:09:39,880 --> 00:09:45,680
For the class family, it was justice they had waited 24 years to see. Her daughter Sophia

102
00:09:45,680 --> 00:09:52,280
said, at least for us, there are no more questions. Mr. Justice Goose sentenced Allen to life in prison

103
00:09:52,280 --> 00:09:58,600
with a minimum of 37 years, calling him wicked and extremely dangerous. A man whose warped

104
00:09:58,600 --> 00:10:03,640
view of women made it unlikely he would ever be able to be safely released. Gary Allen

105
00:10:03,640 --> 00:10:08,720
would likely die in prison. The eight-year-old boy who alarmed every professional around

106
00:10:08,720 --> 00:10:15,640
him became exactly what they feared. Two women, Samantha Klass and Arlene Agrolecova, mothers

107
00:10:15,640 --> 00:10:20,600
and daughters and sisters, paid the price for every year the system moved along without

108
00:10:20,600 --> 00:10:31,200
stopping him. Thanks for listening to 10-minute murder, bingeable true crime stories. I'm Joe,

109
00:10:31,200 --> 00:10:37,840
I'm the host, and here's an email subject quick question. Hi, Joe. Quick question. What kind

110
00:10:37,840 --> 00:10:45,200
of microphone do you use for recording? My husband's guess is the SM7B. Is he right? Also, I love

111
00:10:45,200 --> 00:10:50,640
the new True Crime Blueprint podcast. Thanks for everything you do. It brightens our day. As

112
00:10:50,640 --> 00:10:55,960
weird as that sounds considering the topics. Monica in Washington, DC. Monica, thank you

113
00:10:55,960 --> 00:11:02,640
for the email and thank you all for listening. And the answer is no. I do not use a sure SM7B.

114
00:11:02,640 --> 00:11:07,440
I have used it. Let me back up and say I have used it once or twice on the podcast years

115
00:11:07,440 --> 00:11:11,840
ago. When I first started the podcast, I thought if I'm going to be serious about this thing,

116
00:11:11,840 --> 00:11:17,000
I should get the microphone that all of the big name pod like Joe Rogan uses a sure SM7B.

117
00:11:17,000 --> 00:11:20,720
In case you don't know what microphone that everyone's talking about, a lot of the big

118
00:11:20,720 --> 00:11:26,960
name people that you see videos of podcasters, they're using a sure SM7B. So I bought that

119
00:11:26,960 --> 00:11:30,760
thinking if I'm going to be serious about podcasting, I should get that microphone. I didn't

120
00:11:30,760 --> 00:11:35,360
like it. I didn't think it worked for my voice, so I sold it. And I started using the microphone

121
00:11:35,360 --> 00:11:41,040
that I've had for a very long time because before the podcast, I did voiceovers. The chances

122
00:11:41,040 --> 00:11:46,400
that you've heard my voice before on TV commercials, on radio commercials before this podcast ever

123
00:11:46,400 --> 00:11:52,080
existed is very high because that's what I did with this current microphone that I use.

124
00:11:52,080 --> 00:11:56,120
And this is all super boring to the people that don't care about microphones, but I use

125
00:11:56,120 --> 00:12:03,000
a Sennheiser MKH416. Now I have been considering getting a different microphone to use for this

126
00:12:03,000 --> 00:12:08,520
podcast, considering being the keyword because microphones aren't cheap. And I've been using

127
00:12:08,520 --> 00:12:13,480
this one for a very long time. It's never let me down. So why would I change to a different

128
00:12:13,480 --> 00:12:18,720
microphone? Who knows? In this room that I'm sitting in my studio at home, there are probably,

129
00:12:18,720 --> 00:12:23,920
I don't know, eight microphones. And I only ever use this one mic. Alright, hey, if you're

130
00:12:23,920 --> 00:12:28,080
a brand new listener to this podcast, welcome. Make sure you hit subscribe wherever you're

131
00:12:28,080 --> 00:12:33,000
listening right now. Check the episode notes of this episode that you're listening to right

132
00:12:33,000 --> 00:12:37,960
now. You're going to find some links and also a place where you can go and check out my new

133
00:12:37,960 --> 00:12:43,600
podcast that Monica mentioned True Crime Blueprint. Pretty stoked about it. It's going really

134
00:12:43,600 --> 00:12:48,200
well and I'm enjoying doing it and I hope you enjoy listening to it. True Crime Blueprint,

135
00:12:48,200 --> 00:12:53,880
wherever you listen to this podcast, chances are it's available there too. True Crime Blueprint.

136
00:12:53,880 --> 00:12:57,560
And that's going to do it. That's your episode for today. Thank you again for listening

137
00:12:57,560 --> 00:12:59,800
to 10 Minute Murder. See you next time.

138
00:12:59,800 --> 00:13:09,800
[Music]