Danny Casolaro and the Inslaw Octopus

Transcript

on august 10th 1991 investigative journalist danny  casalero was found dead from an apparent suicide   inside of the martinsburg sheridan in west  virginia danny had traveled to west virginia to   meet a source about a mysterious group he called  the octopus in the weeks leading up to his death   danny received multiple threats on his life and  even warned his brother that if anything should   happen to him not to believe it was an accident 

yet only a few days later danny's lifeless body   would be found inside of a hotel bathroom both  of his wrists deeply and repeatedly slashed   hello and welcome to fact and  suspicion i'm your host ben   and i'm your other host dan and tonight's mystery  is the strange death of investigative journalist   danny casalero and we should probably go ahead  and tell you there's a bit of a content warning   with tonight's episode we're gonna be talking 

a bit about self-harm uh suicide and it gets it   gets a little bloody and gruesome at times though  we do feel that all of these details are important   to the case yeah so uh ben uh i think we should  just get started you know tell us more about   danny castellero who was this guy as a person so  we don't know a ton about danny's personal life   but according to his friends friends and family  he was a really outgoing really charismatic guy   uh what we do know is that he had a wide array of 

interests at various times in his life he was an   investigative journalist a published author an  amateur boxer and in his spare time he liked to   raise purebred arabian horses those sound pretty  expensive they are actually looked them up for   the episode on the cheaper end they're around 500  but they can go for up to 50 000 with the average   being somewhere around 2500 so not cheap no i  guess he uh he had quite a bit of invested money   invested in those well you know he did come for 

money his father was a doctor his brother was a   doctor now in the mid 70s he set aside journalism  and purchased a number of computer trade magazines   and he made really good money doing that but  eventually started to miss his time as an   investigative reporter in the late 80s he learned  about the inns law affair through contacts within   the computer software industry and made the  decision to sell his businesses and pursue   a book about the story now i'm going to go into 

detail a little later about the inn's law affair   but for now it's enough to know that it's  the story that led danny down the rabbit hole   he would come to call the octopus danny seemed  to be really interesting guy uh but you know   his death was ruled a suicide right so yeah  would we even have any reason to suspect he'd   want to commit suicide i mean he would be suicidal  you know so it's certainly possible uh his life to   be fair wasn't a bit of an upheaval at the time 

for one uh he was having some money issues he had   recently sold his companies as i mentioned uh but  he'd done so for less money than they were worth   and according to his friends and family  he was uh he was pretty upset about that   i mean it does sound like a bad decision but oh it  was pretty impulsive right the whole decision to   sell the companies and go after this uh this story  back to journalism so it's at least understandable   yeah i just i just still though you know money 

trouble like that he comes from a wealthy family   they're like you think and he has those horses  right i mean right i think he would be okay   yeah you certainly would and not only does  he have the horses uh but his home was worth   several hundred thousand dollars and his  uh both his father and brother uh have   both said that if he needed money that they  could that he knew he could have borrowed   it from them without any issues though they 

were really skeptical of whether he was having   really having money issues or not they said that  if he was concerned about money that it would have   been more long term because he still had money  from the sale of his business but either way   i think it's clear that money issues for danny  not exactly what we would consider money issues   okay yeah so that doesn't seem like something  you'd commit suicide over i mean i'm not i can't   say that for sure i don't i'm not in danny's shoes 

but right i mean it's hard to say what someone   would or would not you know commit suicide over  right uh but on top of the money issues he was   having a hard time uh getting a publisher for his  book so that could be a potential factor as well   and another thing that's usually cited is the  possibility that he had ms i say possibility   because during his autopsy lesions were found on  his brain that are consistent with ms so we don't   know if he ever had a formal diagnosis or not 

and so you know we don't know if it could have   impacted his you know his decision or not right if  he didn't know it couldn't really be a factor and   according to the coroner he probably wouldn't  have been having symptoms at this point anyways   right so i also don't think that even if he had  been given an ms diagnosis and he knew about it   if he wasn't even having severe symptoms i  wouldn't think that would be something he would   end his life over yet either but again i can't 

say i'm not in his shoes but it does seem strange   right especially with how excited he  seemed to be about this story right i mean   like if you you look to danny's notes  like he he thought he had put it together   right yeah like he had like had found the unified  conspiracy theory so tie everything together right   yeah i don't know i don't know i don't know  if these are convincing reasons for suicide   but they're certainly factors though 

right they had to be considered   yeah but so he he died in in martinsburg west  virginia though so what was he doing there exactly   so he had gone to west virginia to meet a  source with information about the enslave fair   now we're not sure if he  ever actually met the source   but we do know that he met a man named william  turner to get documents that he intended to trade   with the source for the information he needed 

do we know what was in those documents uh a bit   according to william turner at least some of  the documents related to an nsa whistleblower   named alan standorf who had died under mysterious  circumstances but other than that it's unclear   do we know if you ever actually met that source  uh we don't so this is actually probably a good   time for me to give you just a brief timeline  of the events leading up to danny's death so   at 2 30 on the 9th he met with william turner 

in the parking lot of the sheridan to get the   documents he needed at 5 30 he had the first of  two conversations with a man named mike looney   who was staying in the room next to danny's it  was described as brief and mostly just small talk   the second conversation happened at about eight  and was considerably longer according to looney   danny told him he was a reporter and he was  there to meet a source and he was expecting   him at about nine o'clock now shortly before 

9 danny excused himself to make a phone call   and when he returned he told looney that his  source might have blown him off the two talked   until about 9 30 and at 10 danny went to get  a cup of coffee from a local convenience store   and that was the last time he was seen alive  okay so the last time he's seen alive do   we know what time he died we have a rough  estimate so it's estimated he died between   one and four and a half hours before he was found 

and he was found the next day at about 12 30.   okay so that would mean he was found sometime  between 8 30 and 11 30 in the morning   excuse me he was he died sometime between 8 30  and 11 30 in the morning and then he was found   at 12 30. yeah that's correct roughly and he  was found by the maids was that what happened   yeah tell what let me just give you a breakdown 

of the crime scene right that seems like a good as   good a place as any okay so yeah he was found by  two members of the sheridan cleaning staff uh the   scene was apparently so gruesome that one of them  fainted danny was lying face up in the tub both of   his wrists had been repeatedly slashed and there  was blood covering the walls and floor now that   sounds pretty bad it was so inside the tub with  danny investigators found a razor a plastic bag   and an empty beer can i know it's strange now 

on the floor next to the tub were the shards of   a broken wine glass and near the door were two  blood-soaked towels now the blood on that side   of the room was described as heavily smeared on  the floor one of the maids barbara bettinger said   it looked as though someone had tried to clean  the blood up with the towels using their foot   you can probably see why it's understandable that  it was immediately thought to be a suicide and   to add to that there was no sign of forced entry 

danny didn't appear to have any defensive wounds   and there was a suicide note or i should say there  was at least a note that could be interpreted   as a suicide note and i'm sure that there  definitely there was some evidence of foul play   or at least what people expect to be evidence of  foul play isn't that right there was so some of   the first problems were noted by the family and  those concerned the suicide note itself so let   me just read that for you real quick and then we 

can talk about some of the issues the family had   to those i love the most please forgive me  for the worst possible thing i could have done   most of all i'm sorry to my son i know deep down  inside that god will let me in so is that all   of it that's it that's all there is to it okay i  guess the the first issue that the family had was   the fact that danny is or danny was an atheist so  they thought it was really strange that he would   have mentioned god yeah i agree if he's an atheist 

i don't think he'll be talking about god unless he   you know became religious right there at the time  of his death i guess anything can happen right   yeah of course there's also the fact that uh for a  published author and a journalist that the note's   really lacking in in details right and really  short i would say there's no information at all   on that note it doesn't even necessarily say he's  killing himself it doesn't say why he's doing it   and i mean isn't that sort of the purpose of 

a suicide note to to sort of convey why you're   doing this and try to make uh your loved ones  feel better about it you would certainly think   so particularly since he mentions his son right  you think he may not want to give an explanation   so you know of course it's hard to put yourself in  the mind of someone that would you know that would   be in that sort of uh mental state but uh the note  does seem bizarre and the family and friends were   really concerned with it so it's certainly worth 

mentioning beyond the suicide note uh and i think   more importantly there's the nature of the wounds  themselves the the depth and severity of the cuts   danny had between 10 and 12 cuts  ranging from his wrist to his elbow   it was really vicious in fact a parrot one of  the paramedics said that he had never seen such   a brutal suicide and didn't know how danny didn't  pass out from the pain after the first two cuts   some of the cuts were so deep that they'd actually 

gone through the tendon wow okay so there's so   many things about this i don't understand why  anyone would want to put themselves through that   much pain while committing suicide i hey that's  a good point i would think you could make a much   simpler cut i shouldn't say simpler but not as  uh not as deep and still you know have the same   effect and you wouldn't have to cut yourself  all the way up the arm and the other thing i   don't understand is um if you manage to to cut the 

tendons in your arm how would you manage to keep   doing the cutting i mean he had cuts on  both arms right so how did he even manage to   get the other arm cut right the mechanics  of that that don't seem to really work out   and a another problem that the family had  here was the fact that danny was notoriously   squeamish around blood this was a guy that  didn't even like to have his blood drawn   so they had a really hard time believing 

that a that he would have committed suicide   and that b had he chosen to that he would have  gone this route yeah that's that's just oh i   can't imagine i cannot imagine i mean this was  a particularly vicious suicide i mean suicide's   always terrible but this one was was really brutal  and that actually plays into the the one of the   next points because um the pathologist noted a  lack of hesitation marks which in case if there's   anyone not familiar with those a lot of times 

when someone is committing self-harm by cutting   they'll make smaller more shallow cuts to begin  with to gauge the pain and to get their nerve up   and then only later make deeper incisions but  with danny he seems to have just gone straight   to work right i can't understand in someone  that had never attempted suicide before and   was so squeamish around blood that there  wouldn't be some sort of hesitation marks i   there are no reports of danny attempting to make 

suicide before are there no his family said that   he had never even um he'd never even mentioned  suicide before and certainly never tried it   uh now of course the lack of hesitation marks  uh isn't necessarily you know determinative of   anything they're not always present they're just  usually present right okay another thing that does   seem a bit strange in my mind is how the blood  was just all over the bathroom in this case i'm   sure there would be blood but i can't imagine it 

just spraying all over the entire room that way   doesn't that seem strange to you yeah i mean it's  a good point i mean i suppose you could appeal to   arterial spray but even that's not particularly  convincing because it seems like the the tub or   the water would have shielded some of it but  you know of course i guess that depends on   where exactly his wrists were when he  cut them i'm not an expert on this at all   i would i would imagine that he would have to have 

his arms outside of the tub for that to happen and   probably facing outward a bit which seems like  a strange way to be sitting i would think now   interestingly the investigators had a theory  about how the blood might have gotten across the   room that way but let's cover a few of the other  anomalies first and then we'll get to that though   spoiler alert it's not particularly convincing  well i'd like to hear it anyway well so first   you know i mentioned that inside the tub with him 

was a bag a beer can and a wine glass or the wine   glasses on the floor right the wine glass or the  glass was on the floor so there was the bag in the   beer can inside the the tub with him now first  point there danny had no alcohol in his system   so first it seemed strange that you know there  were so many alcoholic beverages laying around   with especially with an empty can in the tub okay  so so there's definitely a beer can in the tub   and we're sure there's an alkaline system that 

they did a full talk screen and everything right   they did so uh all they found were minute traces  of hydrocodone and uh tricyclic antidepressants   but no no alcohol at all and and when i say my  newt i mean that it's likely that he'd taken   these days before though i should point out that  even these top screen results should be taken with   a grain of salt because interesting fact danny's  body had already been embalmed before the autopsy   and his family wasn't consulted in fact they 

weren't even notified of his death until several   days later okay i don't know about state laws in  west virginia but i'm fairly certain that it's   not legal to embalm a body without the family's  permission that's my understanding as well but   no one got in trouble for it the the point i  was going to make about the absurd theory from   the investigators so you've got the bag the beer  can uh the shards of glass on the floor and then   the the blood on the other side of the of the room 

right okay so this is how they explain this or at   least the theory they came up with so danny's in  the tub at some point he cuts his wrist and puts   the plastic bag over his head either to hasten  his death or is like a backup means right okay   now according to them they believe that at some  point he became uncomfortable with the bag on   his head and so he stood up and rip the bag  off possibly slinging blood across the room   and shortly thereafter he passes out or collapses 

from blood loss and when he does so he falls back   into the tub and knocks over the wine glass  which they suppose was on the lip of the tub   shattering it on the floor there are so many  things wrong with that right okay firstly if you   have cut your arm so many times and you're  obviously in a lot of pain from that   why would you bother taking the bag off your head  i mean it is because it's it's bothering you it's   uncomfortable to you and you have all these 

injuries already who would who after cutting   their wrists particularly as deeply and as  viciously as he had would be concerned about   the about how comfortable the bag was right  and why would you stand up to take it off   another good question that don't really have an  answer for and it seems like there was evidence   there that they needed to explain and so they  came up with the only scenario they could   imagine that would be even remotely plausible 

well i mean there's there's more than just that   like would he with all that blood loss would  he have the strength to stand up we have the   balance to stand up and you know what like his  tendons his tendons were cutting his arms right   so every time i've been in a tub and tried to  stand up from it that i can recall i use my   arms to push myself up right that sounds awful  okay how would he even do i mean that would be   immensely painful if it was even possible with the 

tendon damage oh that oh that that sounds horrible   i did not need that mental image thanks for that i  hadn't actually considered that but that yeah that   that doesn't seem possible at all and in their  theory he had definitely already cut his wrists   right he would had to get the blood  across the blood across the room   so i then that theory makes absolutely no sense  to me but i mean yeah i agree that's just another   item on the list so right so let's let's move on 

to to the next one so there is some evidence that   there may have been someone else in the room  so i mentioned the the bloody towels earlier   and i i said that barbara behringer described it  as though someone had tried to wipe up blood in   the floor you know with their foot well who could  have done that i mean did danny get out of the tub   after cutting his wrist after taking the bag off  and go and try to wipe up blood and experience was   that part of their theory that he he also whatever 

they actually don't mention that but but it's   still something that needs explaining and it could  suggest that there was someone else in the room   on top of that there's the small issue with  the fingerprints so when the room was dusted   fingerprints they found two sets danny's and one  unidentified set underneath an ashtray in the room   this is a hotel room right yes obviously the  it must have been the cleanest hotel room   in history barbara and her friends must have 

been fantastic at their jobs i mean the only   thing i can think of is that every piece of  furniture was completely covered with fabric maybe   right you know and that's one of those that at  first glance well they didn't find anyone else's   fingerprints you know it might seem to suggest  that the evidence that it was in fact a suicide   but like you think about that for two seconds wait  why wouldn't there have been other fingerprints   this was a hotel right that makes absolutely 

no sense so it seems like it was wiped down   you know that that could be the suggestion there  right or they just didn't really check very well   for fingerprints i don't know well given the  quality of investigation we've gotten with   this one that is absolutely a possibility  worth entertaining okay i i believe that   and then something else that could relate to the  possibility that someone else was in the room   is the fact that a sheridan employee 

actually saw a man leaving danny's room   in the same time frame that it appears that  he died during um she described him as a male   in his 30s with an excellent suntan wearing a  fashionable t-shirt dark slacks and deck shoes   i cannot imagine that the police could possibly  rule this as suicide when they have evidence that   someone was leaving his room an unknown person  leaving his room around the time of his death   that's pretty easy when you ignore any information 

that's inconvenient to your uh to your theory   i mean it seems like they just worked backwards  from the uh from from their conclusions right   one great example of that has to do with the  uh blood spatter analyst a doctor henry lee   a blood spatter analyst was brought in  and also concluded that it was a suicide   but here's the problem lee never  actually saw the crime scene his opinion was based on a photo array of the 

scene and a video reenactment which by the   way the fbi refuses to turn over despite numerous  voyage requests okay a video arena is that a video   reenactment of the two housekeepers walking in on  the scene what's the video reaction what what kind   of reenactment well it's a good question because  we don't exactly because we don't know what's   in it i mean it seems strange because you would  think that if you know for whatever reason you   were going to make a video reenactment you would 

probably base it on what the bloodspanner analyst   had to say like it doesn't seem like you would  give him this video and try to bias his opinion   you know if you cared about not biasing  his opinion right that makes no sense it's   i don't understand that at all oh and there are  other problems too so uh the photos that lee   was given didn't contain the bloody towels  that were witnessed by barbara bettinger   were they not complete photos of every inch of the 

room well that's a good question maybe they didn't   have the pictures or maybe they just chose not to  turn them over perhaps they had already decided   this was a suicide and didn't want to overburden  the good doctor with any extraneous information   and and we can be pretty confident that those  towels were there because not only did barbara   bettinger see them but a member of the cleaning  crew that was brought in by the sheridan   called they scrub one of their employees ernie 

harrison was later interviewed and he recalls   throwing the towels away personally so my  goodness so we know the towels existed yeah they   thrown away they weren't in an evidence bag  somewhere i know it seems to defy a reason   right what were the towels even doing there  obviously it's not his fault i mean the house   it seems like they shouldn't have been there  anymore because the investigation of the room   was already done right they wouldn't call in 

a cleaning crew if they needed to preserve   any more evidence right the sheridan had  been given permission right to uh to call   in the clinton crew you know the the police were  done they had everything they needed and somehow   they left the buddy tiles okay so i'm sorry let  me just try to straighten out these facts because   good luck i'm really confused at this point  they brought in a blood spatter analyst yes   but he didn't get to see the scene of the crime 

no okay so in most cases i know of you know i've   looked into several true crime cases before and  in almost all of them the blood spider analyst   actually visits the scene of the crime and sees  the actual blood spatter instead of just seeing   photos of it certainly seems reasonable right and  i mean you know i used to watch dexter a lot too   and he seemed to always go to school that's as  good as a medical degree there right exactly   right so um beyond that you would think if he was 

working off photos he would need photos of every   square inch of that room but obviously he wasn't  provided that if the towels weren't in the photos   exactly and you know maybe maybe you  could say that this was an accident or   you could say that uh that they genuinely  believed that the towels were not relevant to   the crime scene but it does seem suspicious that  they omitted one of the few details that could   suggest the presence of another person right right 

that's it's ridiculous and then they gave him a   video reenactment which right that's obviously  improper procedure you can't give an analyst   that's supposed to make an unbiased opinion  a video showing what you think happened right   and it gets even harder to give them the benefit  of the doubt because uh dr lee found out much   later that these same police officers had lied  to him on other occasions about other about other   crimes so you know it's really difficult 

to give them the benefit of the doubt here   it sounds like the entire investigation was  was just a joke it certainly seemed to be now   this was not the only investigation and you may  think oh well that's great this one was bought   so surely the next one's much better except  it's not it's arguably worse than the original   how could it possibly be worse than that well  let's get to that real quick so the second   investigation was conducted by judge john bua who 

was appointed to investigate danny's death by the   justice department now i'll i'll explain later  why this is the case but for now let's just look   at some of the the issues with it okay okay so  the first is the way they ignored the information   about danny's death threats okay now as bizarre as  this might seem the booa report actually suggests   that danny faked the death threats he received in  order to make his suicide appear to be a murder   how would he fake the death threats well so 

here we are the report accomplishes this by   citing only a single death threat which was  received by danny's housekeeper olga macros   on the monday before dany's death the idea being  that danny had already decided to kill himself   and staged this call for theatrics the  report says that macros could not recall   any other specific occasions on which mr casolero  received such a call even though she was at his   house nearly every day yet according to the 

original police reports danny had received   death threats going back months long before he  could have reasonably planned this out monkross   described one where the caller threatened to cut  dany up into pieces and feed him to sharks like   something out of a movie and this really is just a  consistent theme they just ignore any information   that does not fit the suicide narrative well hang  on ben that seems like much more than ignoring   information to me i mean obviously you have the 

the police reports from the first investigation   that show that she had witnessed  firsthand several of these death threats   and then the bull report claims that she said  she only saw one like it says absolute lie okay   so to be absolutely fair to the poor  report we don't know for certain if   they had access to those police reports even  if they didn't it seems like they asked her   it seems like they must have interviewed her 

to have the information that she says that she   knows of no other right i agree i'm just trying  to give them every possible benefit of the doubt   just to be fair it gets much more difficult  to give than the benefit of the doubt is   the section about the missing briefcase all  right so what's going on with the briefcase   all right so the briefcase is one of the more  intriguing mysteries surrounding danny's death   now i mentioned earlier as you'll recall that 

danny had received documents from william turner   that he intended to trade for information  from his source right yeah okay but here's   the problem no documents were found after  danny's death that's that's pretty weird it   is this seems like a conundrum but the bua reports  solution to this is simple no documents were found   so obviously they never existed so they're just  ignoring the the word of william turner not just   william turner as it happens this requires 

them to ignore multiple credible witnesses   to the contrary first of course there is william  turner who is adamant that he gave danny documents   then there's danny's housekeeper olga who  helped him pack for the trip to west virginia   now she told police that danny left with a  briefcase that was either dark brown or black   and that she asked him specifically what was in  it and that he replied quote all of my papers   now olga said that this made sense because he had 

been typing for the last two days before leaving   which by the way that means it's likely that danny  had at least part of his manuscript with him at   the time then there's barbara bettinger one of  the two cleaning ladies who found danny's body   she was asked by police if she noticed a  briefcase or papers in danny's room at any point   and she said that she had seen a briefcase  on his desk with paper sticking out of it so   her statement corroborates not only olga's claim 

that danny had a briefcase but the papers she saw   were from the same day that william turner claims  to have given danny documents yet according to the   bull report only one unnamed employee claims  that they may have seen danny with a briefcase   and from this the report concludes that  danny never had a briefcase or any documents   so they're just ignoring everything that all  three of these witnesses said well they're at   least ignoring william turner because again it's 

difficult but giving them the benefit of the   doubt to be absolutely fair it's another situation  where they may not have had access to those police   reports but as you said before it seems like they  still would have interviewed the people right   you would think so they're just again it looks  like they started with a conclusion and just   worked their way to it as best they could even  if it meant ignoring extremely credible witnesses   they either did that or did a very very lazy 

investigation right it's either ignorance or   incompetence right that seems like the only two  options here that's that's one thing i can think   of so then we've discussed some of the problems  with danny's death and the ensuing investigations   but to really understand why so many people  believe he was murdered you need to understand   the story he was investigating at the time the  enslave affair right and this is kind of a rabbit   hole isn't it it is i would say he fell into 

it but really it's more like he was led into it   uh but we'll get to that in a moment so enslave  was a computer software company that developed   a powerful piece of software called promise  which was stolen by agents of the us government   danny initially learned about inn's law through  his contacts within the computer software industry   and sometime after he began looking into the  case he was contacted by a man named michael   reconnesciuto who claimed that he was personally 

involved in the theft of promise and more that on   behalf of the justice department and cia he had  modified the software with a back door for the   purposes of spying now according to reconnaissauto  promise was then sold to other countries including   israel canada and australia just to name a few  through a government contractor called haedron   now here's the thing about reconnaissauto he  appears to be something of a pathological liar   but he gets just enough right that it's hard 

to write him off so i'm going to stick to   claims that have been independently verified  and luckily most of the inn's law fair is   really well documented thanks to the court  cases and the house judiciary investigation   so uh this promise software what exactly  does that do what uh what's it for why   do they want it so bad okay so promise stands  for prosecutors management information system   now in the early 80s government agencies had 

begun updating the more powerful computer hardware   but their databases were still  on software from the 60s and 70s   one of the major problems was the inability of  various government agencies to share information   there was a department of justice database an fbi  database an irs database and so on so they were   looking to upgrade this is when they discovered  promise software capable of integrating all of   these various databases now as the name implies 

it was created specifically as a case management   software for prosecutors but it was capable of  creating databases for practically any purpose   for its time it was incredibly powerful  its big selling point was was that it   was capable of turning huge amounts of raw  data into usable information or as we'll see   actionable intelligence and as luck would have it  promise was developed with a grant from the law   enforcement assistance administration or the 

leaa meaning that it was open source or free   okay so i thought that enslave owned  promise though is that not correct   so enslave owned one version of promise and  i'm going to get to that in just a moment okay   okay so the doj offered ins law a 9.6 million  dollar contract to install and manage the software   in 20 us attorney's offices across the country  now this was just a test run if things went well   it would eventually be installed in the remaining 

74 offices across the country now to address your   previous question around the same time inslaw  developed an upgraded 32-bit version of promise   using private funds meaning of course the company  owned the rights to this version of the software   now obviously when the doj  learned about this version   they wanted it but they didn't have the rights  to it because this one wasn't open source   enslave was actually looking to sell this one 

i understand so they were going to have to pay   them for the new version and then probably have  to pay them also to install it and maintain it   and everything else well you know if ends law even  wanted to sell it to them right i mean it's theirs   so here's what the government did they discovered  that enslave was having serious financial   difficulties and they used this information to  gain access to the upgraded version of promise   they demanded that inn's law turn over the 32-bit 

version in case they were unable to fulfill their   contractual obligations the idea was look  we're paying you nearly 10 million dollars   and you could go bankrupt before you can complete  your end of the deal so we'd like you to install   the 32-bit version so in the event that you  do go bankrupt at least we have the better   version of the software is compensation and this  seemed fair to enslav all they asked in return   was that the government agree that ends law owned 

the proprietary rights to the upgraded version   and that the government not distribute the  software beyond the bounds of the agreement   so insula was saying sure we'll  install the upgraded version   as long as you recognize that we still own it and  you don't distribute it and the government agreed   with one caveat that ends law could prove that  the enhancements were indeed funded privately   and again this was fined within's law because 

they knew they could prove it and this is where   the chicanery starts see you may have noticed a  bit of a loophole in the agreement that was made   well i suppose if the government they could always  just say i don't see this as sufficient proof that   this was developed with private funds well i lock  your heads out and that's close um instead they   just refuse to look at it period once they once  they got access to the upgraded promise they just   refused to even look at innslaw's proof much less 

validate it just stopped opening the mail i mean   basically that seems to be the case now  when enslaved protested as you know you   might the government began to withhold payment  placing an already financially unstable company   near to bankruptcy and from this point this is  when the doj went in for the kill i mean it's   clear that there was a concerted effort by agents  of the us government to force ins law to sell   promise and failing that to destroy the company 

entirely almost everyone assigned to the deal   within's law by the doj had personal vendettas  against enslave for example lowell jensen the   deputy attorney general at the time had created a  competing software to promise called daylight the   two programs competed for a number of lucrative  contracts in the mid-1970s and promised one out   now jensen hired a man named madison brewer to  oversee the innslot contract there's just one   small problem there brewer had just been forced to 

resign from innslaw for inadequate job performance   what a coincidence right this is ridiculous you've  got jensen who already has a grudge against inn's   law because they put him out of business now  it seems that he's trying to put them out of   business he hires a guy they just fired probably  hates inn's law even worse than jensen does right   that seems about reasonable yeah to manage the  case at the at the least this is a huge conflict   of interest and i can't believe the doj doesn't 

have guidelines preventing that well actually   you know it's not a conflict of interest daniel  and we know this because the doj's office of   professional responsibility ruled that it wasn't  so i just wanted to put your mind at ease there no   conflict of interest thank you so much i'm so glad  to hear that they took this into consideration   right okay so the government is obviously  putting the screws to enslave right   yeah they're they're withholding the payments 

and enslave is in huge financial trouble   well magically a representative of hadron which  again was ran by reagan associate earl bryan   placed a call to end's law and offered to  purchase the company when hamilton refused   he was told that hadron had powerful friends  in the government and that he could either sail   or he would be forced to sail and he  wasn't wrong attorney general edwin   meese was close friends with earl o'brien and 

miese's wife was a major investor in hadron   well there's another conflict of interest  now i can't say for sure whether the office   of professional responsibility investigated  that one but my guess is it's probably not   so now shortly after this allendeco a new york  investment bank with business ties to earl bryan   helped finance a company called sct which then  also attempted to buy inslaw when hamilton again   refused sct contacted enzlo's customers and told 

them that the software company was going bankrupt   which as you might expect didn't do wonders for  enslave's already failing financial situation   it's ridiculous that has to be illegal it seems  like it right now it does now after this latest   effort to sabotage enzlost business they file a 30  million dollar lawsuit against the doj so they had   enough enzo's attorney lee ratner came up with a  really interesting strategy that actually paid off   sort of so he filed suit in bankruptcy court under 

the theory that the doj was acting as a creditor   and exercising control over a debtor's property  which is illegal the data being ins law   and the property the promise software itself i can  see that that makes sense to file it that way uh   it does seem to and ratner claimed for years that  it was in fact a legitimate use of the code but   we'll get to whether that's the case or not in  a minute so judge george bason heard the case   and he found in favor of insult in his opinion 

he said that the doj had stolen promise   and attempted to bankrupt inn's law through  quote trickery fraud and deceit his ruling   relied on testimony from justice officials  and internal documents outlining the plot   he ended up awarding enslav 6.8 million  dollars in damages uh basin even accused   justice officials of lying in court now being a  bankruptcy judge he couldn't bring perjury charges   but recommended to several congressional panels 

that they conduct an inquiry so the doj appealed   obviously and a federal district judge upheld the  ruling claiming that there was convincing evidence   supporting the bankruptcy court's findings  however eventually the dc circuit court of appeals   overturned the ruling on the grounds that  the bankruptcy court lacked jurisdiction   but things soon got even worse for insaw you  see during the court battles with the doj   the irs got into the show and began repeatedly 

auditing the company the agency even requested   that judge basin liquidate enslave but basin ruled  against them for this and for his previous ruling   basin was punished his reappointment to the bench  thought to be a foregone conclusion was blocked   and he was replaced with s martin teal who by the  way was the very irs lawyer who had requested that   enslav be liquidated that's insane what happened  did the doj offer to cut the irs in or something   who knows i mean officials from across the 

government seem to have it out for end's law and   the house judiciary committee as we're about to  get into found that very thing so there actually   was a house judiciary committee investigation  into this yes so jack brooks uh chairman of   the house judiciary committee ended up launching a  three-year investigation into the end's law affair   now let me just read you a little  bit from the committee's report okay   quote actions against sins law were implemented 

through the project manager brick brewer from the   beginning of the contract and under the direction  of high-level justice department officials   the evidence demonstrates that high-level  department officials deliberately ignored enslaved   proprietary rights and misappropriated its promise  software for use at locations not covered under   contract with the company it goes on to say that  quote several individuals testified under oath   that enslaves promise software was stolen 

and distributed internationally in order   to provide financial gain and to further  intelligence and foreign policy objectives   wow those findings seem pretty damning to me they  they they are okay so after the committee came to   these conclusions does that mean that inn's law  finally got some financial reparations for all   this unfortunately no so as you'll recall their  the ruling in bankruptcy court was eventually   overturned and then the supreme court refused 

to hear the case but before we get to the rest   of that answer i'd like to read to you a  quick list of the crimes that the committee   found were likely committed by high-level  justice officials and private individuals   let's hear it okay conspiracy to commit an offense  fraud wire fraud obstruction of proceedings before   departments agencies and committees tampering with  a witness retaliation against a witness perjury   interference with commerce by threats or violence 

racketeer influenced and corrupt organizations   violations or ricoh transportation of stolen  goods securities and monies receiving stolen   goods well the doj would think they'd know better  than all that just a small list of infractions   but now more to answer your question  about whether they received compensation   the report did in fact ask now  attorney general william barr   to quote immediately settle ins law's claims 

in a fair and equitable manner and recommended   that he appoint an independent council to  fully investigate the matter and yes that is   the current william barr because he was  also a.g under george bush now barr refused   and instead appointed retired judge nicholas  bua who was to report directly to william barr   and this is the origin of the second investigation  into danny's death so its quality isn't exactly   surprising i mean the doj was investigating 

itself and this is also why of course ends law   never got the money they were owed obviously the  doj doesn't want to point the finger at themselves   well yes that's why they didn't appoint an  independent counsel instead got a retired   judge who was to report directly to william barr  such a joke it really is didn't you mention that   version of promise was sold to other countries  yes what what happened with that like do we are we   sure that happened yeah we can be we can be pretty 

certain i'd say so let's begin with israel okay so   there's the story of dr ben orr for starters in  february of 1983 dr ben orr attended an inn's   law presentation for the 32-bit version of promise  he claimed to be a public prosecutor from israel   and was really impressed with the software he  was certain israel would purchase it and told   inslaw to expect a call well the call never  came and dr orr was never heard from again   and there's a good reason for that as it turns out 

you see dr ben orr never existed in reality he was   raphael eaton head of israeli counter-terrorism  and records discovered during the house judiciary   committee investigation show that a doctor ben orr  left the justice department with a copy of promise   just two months after that enslav presentation  that seems like pretty solid evidence to me it's   pretty firm now to be perfectly fair right both  the justice department and israel maintained that   this was the leaa version like the the free 

version right okay but according to a former   israeli spy arie bimanashi it was certainly the  updated version he claims to have attended a   presentation of the software in tel aviv but it  wasn't end's law doing the presenting rather it   was earl w brine again the head of hadron which of  course corroborates what reconnaissauto originally   told danny and it makes sense because this was  the same company trying to force enza into sailing   now so you might say well can we trust arie 

ben monashi one piece of evidence to suggest   that we should not only does he corroborate  what reconnaissance said but he was also the   whistleblower for the scandal that we would come  to call the iran contra affair wow oh yeah and   he also worked directly under rafael eaton seems  pretty credible to me yeah and he was absolutely   in a position to uh to know what was happening  i mean i think we have every reason to trust him   i would say so as well okay so that that's israel 

i'd say there's pretty solid evidence that israel   had this software right and then of course there's  canada and this is actually my favorite story so   canada claims of course like every other  government in this scenario that they never   had the software in fact canada says they never  had either version which makes it really bizarre   if they sent two letters to innslaw requesting  extensive manuals on the promise software   so how do they explain sending the letters 

well the official explanation is that it was an   accident i mean how that makes any sense i have  no idea so they sent a letter asking for a manual   on a piece of software they never had that's  correct well you know according to canada anyways   i mean maybe canada just doesn't lie  enough to be any good at it i don't know   need to take some lessons from u.s intelligence  i think right so that's basically the entire   end's law debacle now there are other bits of 

information back there or entire rabbit holes   you can fall into but the this is the information  that has been pretty thoroughly documented   well it seems to me with just the hard evidence  we've presented here it's very evident that   the doj cheated ins law tried to put him out of  business and stole their software yeah i mean i   think that's just about incontestable not only did  they judge find that another judge agreed with it   and then there was the house judiciary committee 

uh report also found that so yeah i mean i   think that's pretty solid and it seems to go  pretty deep i mean it went at least as deep   as to meece right i mean because his  wife was a major investor in hadron   exactly so he had to be involved and he was really  good friends with earl w bryant so exactly and   then the next attorney general barr right at least  tried to cover it up i mean yeah and that's that's   one of the really sad parts about this case right 

because you know ends law was getting nowhere   while mies was attorney general and partially  they were hoping that with the next administration   that you know maybe they would finally get justice  and then of course they ran into william barr   i mean wrong attorney general for the wrong  attorney general just you come to the wrong   place my friend if you're looking for justice  and it's just it's it's just a real shame because   they were waiting on the next on the next 

justice apartment and then they got that one   so i mean the justice department clearly had no no  intention of ever admitting guilt or finding fault   they just wanted it to go away and eventually  it seems to have i mean there's no chance that   enzo will ever get the money they wrote now  no and i can see why someone will kill danny   castellero over this i mean this this goes deep  right and this is just the stuff that we can   safely say is is demonstrated right i mean 

if if even half of the stuff that uh michael   reconnaischudo says happen then it's would be  unquestioned that he was murdered right but   this in itself this this entire enzo affair is  more than enough i would say to get someone off   i would think so too i mean the attorney  general doesn't want accusations like that   pointed against him i know right so so now we  have the entire story so i guess the question is   was danny killed or did he commit suicide i can 

understand an argument for him committing suicide   same i suppose if he felt like his story wasn't  going anywhere he felt desperate about it he   had money trouble maybe he knew he had ms at the  time right those are reasons that i can understand   someone committing suicide definitely and  then you know maybe when uh when he thought   that his source had blown him off that was  just the last straw right i can see that but   i really don't think that was the case there's 

just too much evidence against suicide for me   i tend to think so as well like you i can i think  there is a plausible case for suicide i mean just   in the circumstances of danny's life at the time  right but there's so much that seems to contradict   it that it's it's hard to conclude that that was  the case if i had to say i'm not really certain   but i lean towards him having been murdered i  almost feel like maybe it was his source that   actually murdered him that would make the most 

sense right you know he just didn't blow him off   he met him that would explain why the documents  were gone and it would explain or it might explain   who the uh employee saw leaving his room well  and it would also explain you know how someone   got into danny's room to start with yeah of  course why there was no forced entry right   beyond all that i just the murder scene itself the  amount of blood the crazy thing with the plastic   bag and the absurd theory that the investigators 

had i know it it almost seems like they were told   that they had to relate to suicide so  they had to come up with some crazy idea   right so at the very least it seems like the  investigators reached an initial conclusion and   refused to back away from it right that they only  paid attention to evidence that supported that   claim like just serious confirmation bias and that  is being charitable and i agree i feel like this   was more than the confirmation bias but i've got 

to say in several of the cases that we've looked   into and discussed together that seems to be a  recurring theme with with the police there's a lot   of confirmation bias they find a theory and they  don't want to steer away from it that does seem to   be common right and at some point it just gets  harder and harder to continue to give them the   benefit of the doubt now i think we have to keep  in mind is these are drastically different cases   across across different times involving different 

officers in different locations so it's easy   i think for us to do to read a bunch about a bunch  of disparate cases and find a lot of issues and   then just you know get exasperated with the police  but you know i think we have to bear that in mind   right that these these cases are separated by  years and miles that's true and even if the police even if i'm giving the police the benefit  of the doubt that they're just being lazy   i'm not giving the dog the benefit of that 

excuse the doj the benefit of the doubt here oh   oh no starting with me his wife is an investor in  hadron his assist er his deputy attorney general   had a competing software against promise and laws  and then he appoints madison brewer who was a   disgruntled employee i mean there's no  way to give them the benefit of the doubt   they were clearly out to get enslaved definitely  and i think there's no way that the bulla reports   botched investigation was just laziness he had 

been under orders for what he was going to find i   mean i i tend to think so as well i mean why would  why would he be under orders to report directly   to william barr why would william barr  ignore the recommendations of the house   judiciary committee it's hard to come up with  with reasonable answers to these things right   i don't i don't see one other than the fact that  they just want to keep it covered up i mean nobody   wants to think you know that there's government 

corruption but i mean i think that's just a pop   dream that the alternative right and i'm going  to say i think there is a great deal of evidence   that danny caslero was murdered maybe just for  this end's law affair i think that's enough to   get him murdered right right so even if you  ignore everything else right right ends all   in itself is enough no i do find just the all the  craziness in the case to be compelling to believe   there was something more to this octopus no i do 

too and i would suggest anybody interested to do   further reading because a lot of what we know  that i didn't cover here is information that   was provided by like former spies there there's  a vanity fair piece that discusses a lot of this   a wired magazine piece that covers some there's a  lot of really good sources out there that discuss   some claims that were made by like say anonymous  intelligence officials and if that stuff is true i   would have no problems at all believing daddy was 

solved no and but this another but this is enough   as just about every journalist who looked into it  concluded you know they didn't know whether danny   was killed but one thing they all mentioned it  seems like is that this case in itself if there   was nothing else for the octopus was enough to  drive someone insane or to get them murdered   i i agree i'm going to say i cannot say for  certain that danny casalero was murdered   by evidence it's impossible to rule out 

suicide but i really think he was murdered   same i i tend to agree you know i like to give  people the benefit of the doubt but at some point   they just make it almost impossible well then i  i guess that just about covers it all then right   i think so anything else you want to add any  other questions i think we've answered all the   questions that i had all right i guess that just  about covers it then all right well folks thank   you for listening to the first episode of fact 

and suspicion and we hope you continue listening