The Murder of Dariusz Janiszewski with Anson Maddocks
Legendary Magic the Gathering Artist and friend of the show, ANSON MADDOCKS RETURNS and joins Zevon for this insane story of art imitating life, imitating art...
Find Anson's incredible work here: https://ansonmaddocks.com/
CALL 888-MURDERY, that's, 888-687-3379, to share YOUR Kinda Murdery story or your story of living with a disability or other challenges, and you could inspire an episode of the show!
Sources:
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2008/02/11/true-crime
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2007/sep/06/books.booksnews
https://www.taipeitimes.com/News/feat/archives/2007/09/23/2003380130
Kristen Bell vs. Christian Bale
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Zevon Odelberg is a true crime podcast host and disability advocate. Zevon has cerebral palsy and he wants Kinda Murdery to be welcoming community for people with disabilities and for people living with challenges of any kind. Life can be hard, but being together makes it better.
Speaker 1: Warning, Kind of Murdery contains adult themes, explicit language, and
Speaker 1: descriptions of violence. It is not suitable for anyone, and
Speaker 1: we recommend you stop listening now.
Speaker 2: True crime with a dash of the paranormal, the garish,
Speaker 2: the strange in the darkly comic. I'm Zevan Odelberg, host
Speaker 2: of kind of Murdery, a podcast that's about more than
Speaker 2: just murder. It's my very own pocket dimension, home to
Speaker 2: a curated collection of bizarre and compelling stories, the unsolved,
Speaker 2: the unsettling, and the unbelievable. I cover it all just
Speaker 2: so long as it's kind of murdery. That's right, folks,
Speaker 2: those are facts, just like it says in the intro.
Speaker 2: I am Zevin Odelberg, and this is kind of Murdery. Hey.
Speaker 2: I'm really excited today because my good friend at erstwhile
Speaker 2: co host Legendary Magic the Gathering artist Ansine Maatis is
Speaker 2: here once again to join us. And I am looking
Speaker 2: forward to hanging out with you, but I'm probably looking
Speaker 2: forward even a little more to hanging out with Anson
Speaker 2: if I'm honest. Hey, Hanson, how you do it?
Speaker 3: It's great to see you, hey, is Evan, Folks.
Speaker 2: I bring to you a Polish murder story and it
Speaker 2: is called Jack Sparrow and the Polish Intellectual The Bizarre
Speaker 2: Murder of Darius Janezuski. That's the name of the story.
Speaker 2: And I'll just give a tiny little overview here of
Speaker 2: what we're going to be talking about. This is a
Speaker 2: story of a man who saw himself as a sort
Speaker 2: of a brilliant intellectual, a modern Raskolnikoff, if you will,
Speaker 2: Raskolnikoff being the protagonist from Crime and Punishment, whose basic
Speaker 2: thesis that destroys his life is that the actions of
Speaker 2: a great man, by which he means someone like Napoleon
Speaker 2: or something not necessarily a good man, but a great man,
Speaker 2: transcends morality.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 2: Are you familiar with Raskolnikov Anson.
Speaker 3: I have not read Crime Punishment, but I've heard arguments
Speaker 3: around this character, and I do. I'm glad that you
Speaker 3: know the distinction between a great man and a good
Speaker 3: man well.
Speaker 2: And indeed, with those definitions, the two are very often
Speaker 2: mutually exclusive. Yeah, our killer from today, like Raskolnikoff, posits
Speaker 2: that he can basically do what he wants, that he
Speaker 2: transcends human morality, and unlike Raskolnikoff. He may actually be
Speaker 2: a psychopath because he doesn't seem to nearly have the
Speaker 2: be moral and emotional hell to go through after he
Speaker 2: does awful things. But what makes him interesting is he
Speaker 2: commits a crime, and he, for all intentsive purposes, gets
Speaker 2: away with it for years until he decides to write
Speaker 2: a novel that has disturbing parallels in both the main
Speaker 2: character and the murder committed in the novel, namely that
Speaker 2: the main character resembles the author an awful lot, and
Speaker 2: the murder seems to resemble this previously unsolved perfect crime
Speaker 2: that he apparently got away with. And yeah, I mean
Speaker 2: spoiler alert, I guess, But it's really the details of
Speaker 2: this story that are interesting. I mean, you're gonna kind
Speaker 2: of see the outcome coming, so I don't think I'm
Speaker 2: spoiling the episode ahead of time. But sure enough, it's
Speaker 2: because he publishes a novel more or less about himself
Speaker 2: and his crime that the police catch wind that he
Speaker 2: might be their guy. And that's the story we're about
Speaker 2: to tell now. So if you're ready, please do join
Speaker 2: me and Anson as we uncover what truths we can
Speaker 2: and solve what mysteries we may kind of murderies Jack
Speaker 2: Sparrow and the Polish intellectual The Bizarre Murder of Darius's
Speaker 2: Janetzuski starts.
Speaker 3: Now, cool man, let's get in there and do this.
Speaker 2: Let's hop in the hot tub time machine and I'm
Speaker 2: going to take you back now to a frigid winter
Speaker 2: in Poland. It's December two thousand. We're at a remote
Speaker 2: area of the Odor River where three fishermen discover a
Speaker 2: dead body, initially mistaken for a log. The corpse, with
Speaker 2: a noose around its neck and its hands bound, is
Speaker 2: identified as dare Use Janezuski, a thirty five year old
Speaker 2: businessman from Rocklaw, reported missing by his wife four weeks earlier.
Speaker 2: Janezuski's body shows signs of torture, starvation, and drowning. Despite
Speaker 2: an extensive police investigation featuring scuba divers and forensic specialists,
Speaker 2: no significant evidence is found. Janezuski's described as a gentleman
Speaker 2: and an amateur guitarist. He had a stable personal life,
Speaker 2: no known debts, enemies, or criminal record. He and his
Speaker 2: wife were planning to adopt a child, so he doesn't
Speaker 2: sound at all like the sort of person that would
Speaker 2: have had a murder headed his way, and indeed the
Speaker 2: case remained a perplexing mystery with no apparent motives or suspects.
Speaker 3: You got to wonder if this guy didn't like the
Speaker 3: fact that they couldn't figure out the murder and so
Speaker 3: he doesn't get to display his you know, his genius
Speaker 3: quote unquote.
Speaker 2: I think you're onto something absolutely this guy. Of course,
Speaker 2: we're about to introduce you to in in just a moment,
Speaker 2: so we'll put a pin in that, but we will
Speaker 2: get to him in a moment, this guy being the killer.
Speaker 2: I think you make a strong point answer, which is,
Speaker 2: as the old saying goes, pride goeth before the fall,
Speaker 2: and very often, and this is not just unique to killers,
Speaker 2: ego is what brings you down people. People want to
Speaker 2: be recognized, celebrated, and in pursuit of that, they'll very
Speaker 2: often act against their own best interests. So this is
Speaker 2: the definition of a cold case. And six months after
Speaker 2: Darius Janezuski's body's discovered, the investigation is suspended due to
Speaker 2: lack of leads, and then three years later, Detective Jasek
Speaker 2: Rabluski of the Roklaw Police Department revisits the Janezeuski case.
Speaker 2: He's determined to search for overlook clues. Rabluski is known
Speaker 2: for working late in his modest office, and he finds
Speaker 2: himself drawn to cold cases. He's a detail oriented man.
Speaker 2: He believes that it's just possible that somebody missed something
Speaker 2: that he won't. Jasic is a tall man with an
Speaker 2: unassuming appearance, and he's nicknamed Jack Sparrow by colleagues. It's
Speaker 2: a new nickname because the first and you probably guess this,
Speaker 2: but the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie starring Johnny Depp,
Speaker 2: came out in two thousand and three. So right now
Speaker 2: where we are in two thousand and three, Jason Rabluski
Speaker 2: has appeared and he's just picked up this name Jack
Speaker 2: Sparrow because when you translate Jasic to English you get Jack,
Speaker 2: and Rabluski means quite literally sparrow. So he was in
Speaker 2: Polish actually named Jack Sparrow. Okay, Rabluski considered himself to
Speaker 2: be more of an eagle, so he had a sense
Speaker 2: of self regard as well. The thing about Rablueski, he
Speaker 2: has an approachable demeanor. He's not an intimidating cop. In
Speaker 2: this often leads people to underestimate him, but he does
Speaker 2: relish the chase, and he felt like the Janezuski file
Speaker 2: offered him a new opportunity to delve into a complex
Speaker 2: and unsolved mystery, which is what we are going to
Speaker 2: do now. Rabluski felt that the brutality of the crime
Speaker 2: suggested a personal vendetta, and that Janezeuski's near naked body
Speaker 2: without signs of sexual abuse or robbery, indicated a motive
Speaker 2: that went beyond simple perversion or theft. Now, Janezuski, this
Speaker 2: is the dead man. His mother was a bookkeeper at
Speaker 2: an advertising firm, and she recalled a suspicious call on
Speaker 2: the day of his disappearance. A man called her firm
Speaker 2: and requested large signs, but he refused to discuss the
Speaker 2: details with her and asked instead for Janezuski's cell number.
Speaker 2: I guess Janezuski worked for the firm as well, and
Speaker 2: phone records later revealed that this call and a subsequent
Speaker 2: one to Janezeuski's cell phone came from a nearby phone booth,
Speaker 2: so the presumed killer wandered to a phone booth near
Speaker 2: Janezuski's place of business and attempted to call him, and
Speaker 2: when he didn't get him, he got his mother. He
Speaker 2: asked for the cell phone, was given it and called Janezuski.
Speaker 2: Let this be a lesson to everyone to probably not
Speaker 2: hand out other people's cell phones to mysterious callers in
Speaker 2: phone booths. Not that his mother could have missed that too.
Speaker 2: Just don't give other people's information away to strangers. It's
Speaker 2: a good, a good rule to live by. So the
Speaker 2: receptionist at Janezuski's office reported seeing him leave at four pm,
Speaker 2: followed by two men. This means that Rabluski, our police officer,
Speaker 2: considered the crime to be meticulously planned, with the perpetrator
Speaker 2: likely having studied Janezuski's routine to abduct him. The lack
Speaker 2: of detailed descriptions of potential suspects and the organized nature
Speaker 2: of the crime led Rabluski to ponder the possibility of
Speaker 2: there being multiple assailants, that this was a conspiracy of kidnapping, torture,
Speaker 2: and murder. And as Detective Rabluski is obsessively reviewing this file,
Speaker 2: he lights on something that could be significant. He notices
Speaker 2: that while the police had most of Janetzuski's seemingly relevant possessions,
Speaker 2: or at least had been made aware of them. Janezuski's
Speaker 2: cell phone was never recovered, so the detective initiates a
Speaker 2: search for the phone, leveraging new tracking methods, and here's
Speaker 2: our first big clue. Astonishingly, the phone serial number matched
Speaker 2: one sold on a legro, which is an internet auction
Speaker 2: site like eBay, just days after Janezeuski's disappearance. The seller,
Speaker 2: identified as Chris B seven, turned out to be Christian Bala,
Speaker 2: a thirty year old Polish intellectual. Dun, dun, dun. What
Speaker 2: do you think of that? Anthematics?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm still listening. Unfortunately, I'm thinking about similar stories.
Speaker 3: And oh, you know when you read a name and
Speaker 3: you don't know how to pronounce the name. Oh, I
Speaker 3: know that you recognize, you recognize the visual structure of
Speaker 3: the name, you know the letter, how the letters you
Speaker 3: know go together, But you don't have any idea. You
Speaker 3: just didn't even in your head. You didn't make a
Speaker 3: point of making sure that you could pronounce it.
Speaker 2: Sure, you just muddle through and your imagine it. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I do that all the time. I do that on
Speaker 2: this show. Usually I apologized for butchering a name. Most
Speaker 2: likely other times I actually look up how to pronounce it,
Speaker 2: depends how diligent I'm feeling. The first inkling that Detective
Speaker 2: Rabluski has that he may have found a legitimate suspect
Speaker 2: is this sale of Janetzeuskie's cell phone within days of
Speaker 2: Janetzeuski's death by a seller identified as Chris b seven.
Speaker 2: And that seller turns out to be, as I mentioned,
Speaker 2: self styled Polish intellectual Christian Bala, thirty years old. But
Speaker 2: of course, because he's a logical reasonable man to active,
Speaker 2: Rabluski finds it unlikely that Bala, if he was actually
Speaker 2: involved in the crime, would sell the victim's cell phone online.
Speaker 2: That just seems a little bit too stupid, right, Like,
Speaker 2: no way, the guy that actually killed him is going
Speaker 2: to go attach a bunch of self identifying metadata to
Speaker 2: a cell phone and then hawk it on eBay or
Speaker 2: the equivalent of eBay for a couple extra bucks. No way,
Speaker 2: says the cop. Well so none. Nevertheless, he's a thorough man,
Speaker 2: and so he looks more into Bala and discovers that
Speaker 2: Bala at this point two thousand and three, again, we're
Speaker 2: about three years after the death of Janezuski has moved
Speaker 2: abroad and is not easily accessible. He also discovers that
Speaker 2: Bala had recently published a novel entitled A Muck featuring
Speaker 2: sadistic and philosophical themes. Now, Rabliski is more accustomed to
Speaker 2: history books, and he's taken aback by the decadent and
Speaker 2: anti church themes in Christian Bala's novel A Muck. He
Speaker 2: also notes parallels between the novel's murder method and Janezeuski's case. Intriguingly,
Speaker 2: the killer in the book was named Chris, echoing Bala's
Speaker 2: username on the auction site where Janezeuski's phone was sold.
Speaker 2: Really now, I said, if this.
Speaker 3: Guy, I'm sorry, I'm just gonna say, if this it
Speaker 3: sounds like he's just kind of very basic for a genius,
Speaker 3: right well, And I'm even imagining in that theme that
Speaker 3: he might be thinking that Christian Bale is going to
Speaker 3: play him in a movie.
Speaker 2: Right, Oh yeah, perhaps you.
Speaker 3: Know, because his name is just so close right and.
Speaker 2: Right, it makes I would observe that people that consider
Speaker 2: themselves to be geniuses, like explicitly or are willing to
Speaker 2: tell other people such very often, aren't I think they
Speaker 2: end up in the in the Dunning Krueger realm of
Speaker 2: you know, just bright enough to fake it, but not
Speaker 2: bright enough to realize just how uninformed and dumb they
Speaker 2: might be. So the cop notices parallels between the novel's
Speaker 2: murder method and the Janezuski case. He notices that the
Speaker 2: killer is named Chris, and he notices that Chris was
Speaker 2: the name of the user who sold Janezuski's phone. So
Speaker 2: he thinks to himself, you know, this is the first
Speaker 2: real purchase, real clues I've gotten, the first time I've
Speaker 2: been able to sink my teeth into this case a bit.
Speaker 2: So what I'm going to do now is I'm going
Speaker 2: to delve deeper into this book, and I'm going to
Speaker 2: be a literary detective, if you will. So this is
Speaker 2: where he becomes convinced that Bala is his killer, because
Speaker 2: the coincidence is required for an innocent man to sell
Speaker 2: a murdered man's cell phone online and then write a
Speaker 2: novel about a murder that mirrors the murder committed when
Speaker 2: Janezuski was killed with the same username as the one
Speaker 2: used to sell Janezuski's phone. Well, that's just that's too
Speaker 2: many coincidence, is it. It falls into what I call
Speaker 2: the tortured logic test, which is essentially this, if you
Speaker 2: have to do too many unlikely mental backflips to make
Speaker 2: something be true or not true, then you're probably headed
Speaker 2: in the wrong direction. Are you familiar with Okham's razor
Speaker 2: anson the concept of Akham's razor.
Speaker 3: The most likely choice is probably the.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you got the one that's right. The simplest solution
Speaker 2: is usually the correct one. Yes. That means that, in
Speaker 2: the absence of any other clues or suspects, and with
Speaker 2: a significant amount of circumstantial evidence piled up against Christian Bala,
Speaker 2: Detective Jack Sparrow believes that Bala has to be his killer.
Speaker 2: But you can't prosecute someone on just a novel, a
Speaker 2: fictional novel, and a sold cell phone, at least not yet.
Speaker 2: So let's take a moment to talk about our suspected murderer,
Speaker 2: Christian Bala. His academic pursuits and philosophical inclinations were evident
Speaker 2: in his vast collection of books, which really ran the
Speaker 2: gamut from Marxist ideology, which is prevalent, of course, in
Speaker 2: a lot of Polish philosophy departments, given how long they
Speaker 2: under communist domination. And he's also interested in Nietzsche's views
Speaker 2: on truth as an illusion and Wittgenstein's perspective on language
Speaker 2: as a social activity. And all of this hints at
Speaker 2: a complex and rebellious mind. Perhaps Bala himself would tell you,
Speaker 2: a brilliant mind. I'm not just bringing this up for
Speaker 2: local color, but rather because Rabluski found Bala's obsession with
Speaker 2: these various philosophers increasingly relevant as he dealt into the
Speaker 2: novels seeking connections to the real life murder in particular
Speaker 2: post communism. Bala found relevance in these theories because he
Speaker 2: saw parallels in the manipulation of language and facts under
Speaker 2: the Soviet regime. He was also drawn to French postmodernists
Speaker 2: like Derrida and Michelle Fucot, exploring ideas about the instability
Speaker 2: of language and identity, and he went on to develop
Speaker 2: a unique interpretation of these philosophical ideas, which led him
Speaker 2: to experiment with and I like this term. I have
Speaker 2: to say mytho creativity.
Speaker 3: Have you ever seen a like a Polish theater poster.
Speaker 2: I'm not sure that I have tell me about them.
Speaker 3: I would say a lot of them are really brilliant.
Speaker 3: They're they're just really effective. Really, I mean, you would
Speaker 3: hang them on your wall, I think. And it's just
Speaker 3: making me think of like maybe culturally like propaganda. It
Speaker 3: sounds like you might have been sort of fascinated with propaganda.
Speaker 2: You're telling me that them damn comedies were pretty good
Speaker 2: at visual propaganda. That's That's what I'm hearing you say.
Speaker 3: It is a thing. You know, if your side is
Speaker 3: being tried for war crimes, you know, the propagandists can
Speaker 3: be put to death. You know, it's that it's that
Speaker 3: serious of a powerful tool.
Speaker 2: All right, Blame the propaganda machine. That's who really killed Janazuski.
Speaker 3: I don't know. I just think it's interesting that you
Speaker 3: can you can see a lot of good art in
Speaker 3: these these posters that I'm then thinking of.
Speaker 2: On this topic of mytho creativity. You know, Anson, you
Speaker 2: of course, are a legendary artist, greatly associated with the
Speaker 2: fantastic game that I play and love, Magic the Gathering.
Speaker 2: You have drawn many iconic mythological creatures in your day.
Speaker 2: In fact, I don't know if you can see on
Speaker 2: the zoom. But I am wearing my official ansinmatics Lana
Speaker 2: war Elf, the bone headed or skull headed punk rock
Speaker 2: elf that you know probably was the card that caused
Speaker 2: me to first fall in love with your art. But
Speaker 2: could you expound upon the idea, this idea of mytho
Speaker 2: creativity in art sort of creating a new identity and
Speaker 2: in your case, perhaps a visual identity that belongs to
Speaker 2: you and sort of building your your own truth that
Speaker 2: could maybe be truer than true. I don't know if
Speaker 2: I'm babbling here, but have any thoughts on mythological creation
Speaker 2: as it relates to your own work.
Speaker 3: Do you mean using it as an inspiration or trying
Speaker 3: to create something that is a new stepping out of mythos?
Speaker 2: I think as it relates to our killer or possible
Speaker 2: killer Christian Bala, I think what I'm saying is the
Speaker 2: idea of being inspired by existing mythology, using that inspiration
Speaker 2: to create your own mythology that perhaps then could even
Speaker 2: or does even replace the real truth or the realness
Speaker 2: of a thing in your own mind or others, becomes
Speaker 2: sort of more human than human, or more monster than monster,
Speaker 2: if you will. I think that's what I'm talking about.
Speaker 3: That's interesting, Okay. I had to do a minotaur for Magic.
Speaker 3: I did not know that there would be other depictions
Speaker 3: of minotaurs in the game. At the time I was
Speaker 3: doing the game, I thought this game was I mean,
Speaker 3: I knew that there might be so expansions later, but
Speaker 3: I was thinking of it more. If you think of
Speaker 3: like face cards in irregular deck of cards, they're very
Speaker 3: straightforward representations of the thing that they're supposed to represent,
Speaker 3: and I thought that I was going to be doing
Speaker 3: something more like that. So the minotaur has a labyrinth
Speaker 3: built into his decor, his tribalistic scarification on his body, indeed,
Speaker 3: and I thought that that might be a good way
Speaker 3: of depicting what the minotaur is about. In the depiction
Speaker 3: of the minotaur itself.
Speaker 2: That's mytho creation right there. Yes, okay, that's the Herluin Minotaur. Yeah. Man,
Speaker 2: you did a fantastic job on that card. And I'm
Speaker 2: not the only one who thought so. In fact, the
Speaker 2: Herluin Minotaur was as close as there could be in
Speaker 2: the early days of Magic to being the mascot for
Speaker 2: the game. Today, people may have heard about the Black
Speaker 2: Lotus as being a very famous card, or there are
Speaker 2: other cards that maybe today are more famous in pop
Speaker 2: culture awareness. But at the time and the time being
Speaker 2: the release of limited edition Alpha and Beta, the Herluin
Speaker 2: Minotaur really was like the mascot of the game. And
Speaker 2: I say that because the art was featured on the
Speaker 2: outside of the boxes. They made essentially letterman jackets that
Speaker 2: said Magic the Gathering with the Heurlu Minotaur on it. So,
Speaker 2: whatever your process was there, the thing that you created
Speaker 2: resonated not just with the fan base but with the company.
Speaker 2: It was the first thing that they put all over
Speaker 2: their consumer merchandise.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, the game was so popular so fast
Speaker 3: that anything associated with it had the stretch marks on
Speaker 3: the growth of that game. Are they go? You get
Speaker 3: drawn into it as one of the artists working on it,
Speaker 3: It's like you can see one of your pieces get
Speaker 3: taken and just like they're trying to go, what can
Speaker 3: we do with this? And it goes everywhere and you
Speaker 3: kind of just have to sit back and hope that
Speaker 3: it does well.
Speaker 2: And I mean, you're absolutely right about how marvelously quickly
Speaker 2: the popularity of the game exploded. I mean even today
Speaker 2: and we're thirty years later. Eventually, Wizards of the Coast
Speaker 2: that makes Magic was sold to Hasbro, and Hasbro is
Speaker 2: a massive toy company. Of course, they are now the
Speaker 2: parent company for Wizards and for Magic, and even today,
Speaker 2: you know, with physical toys and games being less popular
Speaker 2: than they once were because of all the digital and
Speaker 2: video diversions that we have to pick from, Magic remains
Speaker 2: one of the only profitable or most profitable sectors of
Speaker 2: Hasbro's overall business, which is why they're printing sets about
Speaker 2: every other week now and just trying to squeeze every
Speaker 2: last nickel out of us poor enthusiasts. But you know,
Speaker 2: the people listening to this show are true crime and
Speaker 2: murder enthusiasts, and some of them are probably about ready
Speaker 2: to stick a fork in their eyeball and really want
Speaker 2: me to get back to the to the story at hand.
Speaker 2: But please, folks, don't blame Anson. I'm the one that
Speaker 2: led him down this particular primrose path because I'm such
Speaker 2: a fanboy. So let's get back to our murder story.
Speaker 2: But thank you Anson for sharing your thoughts. They were
Speaker 2: captivating to me and I you.
Speaker 3: Know, let's save these listeners and see what you can
Speaker 3: do to salvageis.
Speaker 2: But let's let us get back to the back to
Speaker 2: the story. So this idea of mytho creativity, we talked
Speaker 2: about how Anson has used it to great impression effect
Speaker 2: and beautiful artistic success. Let's talk about how our erstwhile
Speaker 2: probably the killer at least for now because they don't
Speaker 2: have any other suspects, Christian Bala and how he used
Speaker 2: mytho creativity and essentially what he would do is he
Speaker 2: would rowactively started to try to create a mythos around himself,
Speaker 2: weaving tales about himself that we're not necessarily true, but
Speaker 2: were perhaps a derivative of the truth or an augmentation,
Speaker 2: a steroidal version of the truth, and he wanted to
Speaker 2: see if they would be accepted as truth by others.
Speaker 2: As he blurred the lines between the real person, the
Speaker 2: real character, and the persona he crafted, he was led
Speaker 2: to remark that an autobiography of his would be filled
Speaker 2: with myths. When I read this thing about my autobiography
Speaker 2: would be filled with myths, I thought of the weird
Speaker 2: al biopick starring Daniel Ratcliffe, which is presented like any
Speaker 2: other Hollywood movie about a famous person biopic that you
Speaker 2: might see but the entire movie is very intentionally completely false.
Speaker 2: Nothing that happens in that movie actually happened to weird
Speaker 2: Al Yankovic, and weird Al was very involved in creating
Speaker 2: the movie, so functionally weird Al chose for his biopick
Speaker 2: to make, and this is fitting a parody of his
Speaker 2: own life. He invented his story as something that was
Speaker 2: plausible and would seem to the viewer, at least in parts,
Speaker 2: to be what really happened, but none of it did.
Speaker 2: So it seems that Christian Bala was going for a
Speaker 2: similar thing here, not to conflate weird Al with a
Speaker 2: heinous murderer. By the way, love weird Al, not a killer.
Speaker 3: I'm sure he would love to be conflated with that.
Speaker 2: All right. So Christian Bala was embraced a rebellious lifestyle,
Speaker 2: boasting about brothel visits and rejecting conventions. Bala claimed he
Speaker 2: would live furiously, though not for long, very consciously projecting
Speaker 2: the image of a libertine. Some people saw Bala's behavior
Speaker 2: as juvenile, while others were captivated. Libertines are often captivating.
Speaker 2: Despite his wild tales, though despite the mythos he was
Speaker 2: creating around himself, Those close to him described him as
Speaker 2: kind and principled, So maybe he was just kind of
Speaker 2: a nerd who wanted everybody to believe he was one
Speaker 2: of the cool kids. Well that remains to be seen.
Speaker 2: In nineteen ninety, contrary to his libertine image, Bala married
Speaker 2: his high school's sweetheart, Stagia Stanislava. His mother disapproved, feeling
Speaker 2: Stagia was unsuitable, but they married and the couple had
Speaker 2: a son named Casper in nineteen ninety seven, the same
Speaker 2: year that Bala graduated with top marks and started a
Speaker 2: PhD in philosophy. However, financial pressures led him to start
Speaker 2: a cleaning business, but he was a philosopher, not a businessman,
Speaker 2: and his business and then his marriage faltered. He filed
Speaker 2: for bankruptcy in two thousand, the year Janezuski was killed,
Speaker 2: and his marriage ended primarily due to his infidelity, so
Speaker 2: he got back to his libertine ways anyway. Post separation,
Speaker 2: he traveled to the United States in Asia, teaching English
Speaker 2: and scuba diving, a stark contrast to his earlier academic
Speaker 2: and philosophical pursuits, and then while abroad, he focused on
Speaker 2: writing this novel, the novel that piqued the interest of
Speaker 2: Detective Jack Sparrow amuck. In a Muck, the protagonist, Chris
Speaker 2: embodies postmodern nihilism, rejecting notions of truth and God. The
Speaker 2: narrative parallels crime and punishment, with Chris, like Raskolnikov, questioning
Speaker 2: moral truths, but unlike Raskolnikov, Chris does not seek redemption.
Speaker 2: His actions in a Muck are extreme and unrestrained by morality.
Speaker 2: He engages in satomasochistic relationships, commits blasphemy, and even murders
Speaker 2: his girlfriend in a brutal scene. In a Muck, Christian
Speaker 2: Bala extensively manipulates language to underscore its ambiguity. There's a
Speaker 2: chapter entitled Screwdriver, which is a play on words symbolizing
Speaker 2: a tool, the cocktail orange juice and vodka, and the
Speaker 2: protagonist's sexual conduct. He himself is a screwdriver. Even the
Speaker 2: murder of the girlfriend Mary by Chris is framed as
Speaker 2: a linguistic play, further blurring the line between reality and fiction.
Speaker 2: Bala completed A Muck in two thousand and two, embedding
Speaker 2: elements of his life into Chris's character and thus intertwining
Speaker 2: his identity with his fictional character. He even engaged with
Speaker 2: readers as Chris Online. He even sold janet Zouski's cell
Speaker 2: phone as Chris Online, further merging author and character. An
Speaker 2: interviewer's question later about releasing one's darker psyche, a question
Speaker 2: to Bala, was met with a response that playfully suggested
Speaker 2: that Chris might be the real identity, not Bala. So
Speaker 2: it sounds like he's gone somewhat full Batman two face here,
Speaker 2: and perhaps even himself doesn't know which one is the
Speaker 2: real one. Who's driving the who's driving the ship? I
Speaker 2: don't know who is driving.
Speaker 3: I'm a little disturbed that this is very similar to
Speaker 3: this idea that I try to I tell people things like, well,
Speaker 3: you know, you can use a screwdriver to build something
Speaker 3: or to kill somebody.
Speaker 2: So, despite its controversial content, or perhaps because of it,
Speaker 2: a Monk received mixed reviews. Some praised its realism and
Speaker 2: called it a masterpiece of illusion which sounds like a
Speaker 2: poster for a David Copperfield show in Vegas, while others,
Speaker 2: including a Polish newspaper and Bala's own acquaintances, criticized it
Speaker 2: for lacking any literary merit and just basically being a
Speaker 2: safari of disgusting human behavior. Bala's former philosophy professor and
Speaker 2: an ex girlfriend were shocked by the crude language, so
Speaker 2: it was like an M and M album in the
Speaker 2: late nineties. This crude language contrasted sharply with his earlier
Speaker 2: academic work. Now Bala's friends believed the novel was his
Speaker 2: way of breaking societal taboos through fiction. In an interview,
Speaker 2: Bala emphasized his disregard for convention, so he went out
Speaker 2: of his way to tell the interviewer just how punk
Speaker 2: Rocky was. He said he was aiming to awaken readers
Speaker 2: to the world's flaws through the novel's graphic scenes. He
Speaker 2: didn't say this, but basically what I hear him saying
Speaker 2: is like, none of this is gret are disgusting in
Speaker 2: and of itself. I'm not endorsing any of this behavior.
Speaker 2: I'm making you aware of the ugly flaws in the
Speaker 2: world by telling you about it. I gotta be honest
Speaker 2: with you. I'm really starting to hate this fucking guy
Speaker 2: just for his like self satisfied intellectual hypsterrism. It's like,
Speaker 2: fuck off, dude, that's just my gut react.
Speaker 3: You know, if he had any balls at all, he
Speaker 3: would have told people that it was true, and please
Speaker 3: go ahead and critique my work now, yeah, and see
Speaker 3: where it gets at.
Speaker 2: Well, just the whole thing's at least so far is
Speaker 2: it's feeling so sophomoric that sort of just like I said,
Speaker 2: self satisfied anyway, you get my point. I just kind
Speaker 2: of want to kick him right in the kneecaps and
Speaker 2: nee him in the.
Speaker 3: Nuts, because he's a stooge.
Speaker 2: In all seriousness. Whenever I'm watching or reading, and any
Speaker 2: artistic creation, whether it's a movie, a book, a play,
Speaker 2: a piece of art, probably my least favorite quality that
Speaker 2: anything can have, and hopefully I'm not guilty of it
Speaker 2: in this podcast, I could be. But when you feel
Speaker 2: like you can hear the creator in the background of
Speaker 2: whatever you're consuming saying, oh man, I'm such a genius.
Speaker 2: This part's so great, this thing about this is so great. God,
Speaker 2: I am going to blow these fuckers away with my genius,
Speaker 2: that's the worst quality that any artistic creation can have.
Speaker 2: In my opinion. I've been told by people who are
Speaker 2: more well read and familiar with it than I am
Speaker 2: that there's only one author who is overtly that way.
Speaker 2: And still managed to be a worthwhile genius. And that
Speaker 2: would be James Joyce famously who wrote The Dubliners, but
Speaker 2: most famously Ulysses, who said, at the time, I am
Speaker 2: going to pack this book Ulysses full of so many
Speaker 2: literary illusions and references and devices, et cetera, that college
Speaker 2: professors and PhD students will be unpacking it for centuries.
Speaker 2: And the only reason he gets a pass is because
Speaker 2: that is exactly what happened. So I guess even if
Speaker 2: he's a pompus hipster asshole, he pompus hipster asshole Babe
Speaker 2: Ruth style and called his shot and actually pulled it off,
Speaker 2: you have to kind of respect that it's true. Back
Speaker 2: to the story at hand. So a muck.
Speaker 3: On me for eating during this recording.
Speaker 2: Hey, I'm just happy you showed up, brother. I actually,
Speaker 2: you know what, I've come to a point where I
Speaker 2: feel like that sort of human realism, if you will,
Speaker 2: is probably entertaining as opposed to a problem like how
Speaker 2: often do you get to hear anthematics talking with his
Speaker 2: mouth full?
Speaker 3: Anyway, there's all that should be left after you eat
Speaker 3: a pair? Oh yeah, just the central process hero?
Speaker 2: What all right? So?
Speaker 3: The only pair that really really tastes great.
Speaker 2: I'm going to leave that one there. So achieved disturbing realism,
Speaker 2: with its protagonist Chris becoming so convincingly sinister. The book's
Speaker 2: grotesque and psychopathic tone led some to view Bala himself
Speaker 2: in a similar light. During an online conversation, a friend
Speaker 2: express concern that the novel reflected poorly on him, suggesting
Speaker 2: that Chris's thoughts might be Bala's own. However, Bala dismissed
Speaker 2: this idea, stating that only a fool would believe that
Speaker 2: fiction is real. So if only a fool would believe
Speaker 2: that fiction is real, and the foolish police used this
Speaker 2: foolish belief to catch you, what does that make you?
Speaker 2: Fools used a foolish belief to bring your ass down,
Speaker 2: So what's a notch below a fool?
Speaker 3: A good writer would go with it. It would be like, yeah, thanks, Yeah,
Speaker 3: I appreciate the compliment. It sounds like he was trying
Speaker 3: to be a chicken shit they saying, only well believe
Speaker 3: this is.
Speaker 2: Real, even though his entire intellectual pursuit was to blur
Speaker 2: the lines between reality and fiction and see how successfully
Speaker 2: he could get other people to believe that the myth
Speaker 2: was real. He's now like talking shit about his own audience.
Speaker 3: M that's ridiculous.
Speaker 2: So Captain Jack Sparrow Detective Rabluski he scrutinized a mock
Speaker 2: underlining passages and noting discrepancies and similarities with the Janezeuski case.
Speaker 2: While the murder in the novel involved a female victim
Speaker 2: and differed in method, a chilling parallel emerged. Chris mentions
Speaker 2: selling a Japanese knife used in the murder online, mirroring
Speaker 2: the sale of Janezeuski's phone on the auction site, a
Speaker 2: detail which was not publicly disclosed. Additionally, Chris hints at
Speaker 2: having killed a man in the past, further arousing Rabluski's suspicions.
Speaker 2: Now somebody might say, hey, is that really a parallel?
Speaker 2: I mean, a cell phone is not a knife. However,
Speaker 2: if you'll recall, how did the murderer lure Janazuski to
Speaker 2: his kidnapping and eventual death by calling his cell phone?
Speaker 2: So I don't think it's too much of a college
Speaker 2: essay literary leap to make a fairly compelling argument that
Speaker 2: the cell phone itself was the first murder weapon, or
Speaker 2: at least the chain of events that led to the murder,
Speaker 2: was the first tool. The first weapon used by the
Speaker 2: killer was the cell phone. So I would argue that
Speaker 2: there is more of a parallel between the cell phone
Speaker 2: and the knife than there may appear to be on
Speaker 2: the surface. What do you think of that? Do you
Speaker 2: buy that? Or does that sound like horseshit to you?
Speaker 3: Hanson literary Shenanigans. I don't know.
Speaker 2: Rabluski Now, now that he's really convinced that Bala has
Speaker 2: really just written this hot mess of a novel about
Speaker 2: himself and the murder he committed, Rabluski takes the unconventional
Speaker 2: step of distributing copies of a Muck to his t
Speaker 2: and instructing them to analyze and interpret it for any
Speaker 2: clues or parallels to reality. Now, he cautions his squad
Speaker 2: to act discreetly, because, for one thing, Bala's living abroad,
Speaker 2: making direct police intervention challenging, and Rabluski's very aware that
Speaker 2: apprehending Bala, should they feel like they've proven that he's
Speaker 2: the killer, will be very difficult unless Bala voluntarily returns
Speaker 2: to Poland. I mean, a guy sold a cell phone
Speaker 2: online a cell phone which he could have gotten at say,
Speaker 2: a pawn shop. After the killer pond it as just
Speaker 2: a possibility, and then a guy writes a bizarre stream
Speaker 2: of consciousness postmodern rip on crime and punishment. That's not
Speaker 2: the kind of evidence that you can initiate like an
Speaker 2: interpall action with You don't want to go to the
Speaker 2: United States government and be like, hey, so let's spend
Speaker 2: millions of dollars extraditing this guy because we have this
Speaker 2: far from incontrovertible evidence perhaps perhaps perhaps he killed someone.
Speaker 2: And yet, I mean, I was pretty much sold, to
Speaker 2: be honest with you, that Bala was guilty as soon
Speaker 2: as he sold the guy's cell phone online and then
Speaker 2: wrote a novel about a murder with lots of parallels
Speaker 2: committed by a murderer with the same user name as
Speaker 2: the guy who sold the dead guy's cell phone. Because that,
Speaker 2: like I said, doesn't pass the torturous logic test for me,
Speaker 2: for that not for him to be the killer, especially
Speaker 2: in absence of any other suspects. So I'm right there
Speaker 2: with Captain Jack Sparrow. And yet probably a good thing
Speaker 2: that the legal system requires more than a certain gut.
Speaker 3: Okay, I mean, well, think about artists that you know,
Speaker 3: create depictions of really horrific things. You know, they would
Speaker 3: be bad if they write on trial for everything they painted.
Speaker 2: It certainly would, wouldn't it. Anson Mattox, master of horror
Speaker 2: in art?
Speaker 3: Eh?
Speaker 2: You know? And to this point right now, and this
Speaker 2: is not the first time this has happened. It's scary
Speaker 2: for the hip hop community. A quite successful and famous
Speaker 2: rapper named Young Thug is currently on trial for essentially
Speaker 2: racketeering charges, essentially like organized crime charges, and they do
Speaker 2: have a lot of from what I understand, they have
Speaker 2: a lot of real hard evidence against him. But there's
Speaker 2: also been quite the outcry because the judge ruled the
Speaker 2: prosecution could use Young Thug's rap lyrics as evidence against
Speaker 2: him in the trial, meaning as a means to paint
Speaker 2: his character as the type of man who would commit
Speaker 2: these crimes. And on the other hand, as it relates
Speaker 2: to this particular story that we're telling, you want to
Speaker 2: catch an awful killer, and if they write a book
Speaker 2: about their murder and that helps you catch them, I'm
Speaker 2: not going to say, well, don't catch them. You shouldn't
Speaker 2: be suspicious at all because it's just a book. Let's
Speaker 2: try to catch the killer that committed this awful crime.
Speaker 2: So the next thing they did, as law enforced and
Speaker 2: often does, is they focus on quietly building a profile
Speaker 2: of Bala and comparing it with Chris in the novel.
Speaker 2: And we haven't even talked about all the parallels yet.
Speaker 2: And Captain Jack Sparrow notes several both Chris and his
Speaker 2: main character were deeply interested in philosophy. They'd faced marital
Speaker 2: and business failures, they traveled extensively, They'd had issues with alcohol.
Speaker 2: I mean that applies to a lot of people, I'm sure.
Speaker 2: But a significant breakthrough came when Rabluski found a police
Speaker 2: report about Bala being detained for an incident involving a
Speaker 2: church statue that was remarkably similar to an episode in
Speaker 2: a Muck in Court because spoiler it again, Bala will
Speaker 2: go to court for the murder of Janezuski. His friend
Speaker 2: Powell recounts the incident. He and Bala had been drinking
Speaker 2: all night and running out of alcohol, they went to
Speaker 2: buy more. On their way back, they impulsively stole a
Speaker 2: statue of Saint Anthony from the church, intending to use
Speaker 2: it as a drinking companion. This real life event closely
Speaker 2: mirrored a scene in a Muck where the protagonist and
Speaker 2: his friend are caught by the police where they stolen
Speaker 2: statue in the novel. Chris, the killer and protagonist in
Speaker 2: the novel, reflects on the absurdity of facing prison for
Speaker 2: a minor offense while having committed far worse deeds without consequence.
Speaker 3: This part of it is actually interesting, the fact that
Speaker 3: he wouldn't be as worried about writing about something that
Speaker 3: was a minor offense, but if that ends up being
Speaker 3: a hook into leading the investigators to his worst crimes. Absolutely,
Speaker 3: and that he's in the book he's talking about the
Speaker 3: character being outraged at.
Speaker 2: Just right reading between the lines, he's going, I'm going
Speaker 2: to go to jail for jack and a statue when
Speaker 2: I fucking murdered someone.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Well, And that's the thing, right, is that this is
Speaker 2: less about whether a novel should be admissible as evidence
Speaker 2: in a crime, and it's more about all the ways
Speaker 2: in which it reads as sort of a winking confession.
Speaker 2: I think one thing that would be criminals, or if not,
Speaker 2: would be criminals people who sort of think that they
Speaker 2: might be able to get away with something or might
Speaker 2: be smart enough to get away with something. I think
Speaker 2: one of the giant logical fallacies that they may fall
Speaker 2: into that I think Bala falls into here is one
Speaker 2: may become aware of like what is and isn't admissible
Speaker 2: in court, or what can and cannot be used as
Speaker 2: evidence in court, and you think that you're safe, like
Speaker 2: say you are going to text somebody about doing something illegal,
Speaker 2: and you use some euphemism for the illegal thing, and
Speaker 2: you're thinking to yourself, Haha, they can't possibly prove that
Speaker 2: when I said pizza, I meant batsalts, so I'm good.
Speaker 2: But really, law enforcement is dedicated. The machine is inexorable
Speaker 2: and very often all the time. And that's what happens
Speaker 2: in this story is for the suspicion to be turned
Speaker 2: on you because you may be correct that this particular
Speaker 2: thing that caused the suspicion to be turned on you
Speaker 2: is not something that in and of itself is going
Speaker 2: to bring you down. But once you've drawn the eye,
Speaker 2: they will find something else that does bring you down.
Speaker 2: That's why it seems it seems so preposterously dumb to
Speaker 2: sell the cell phone with a username that turns out
Speaker 2: to be the name of the killer later, because sure,
Speaker 2: can they prove you killed someone with a username in court? No,
Speaker 2: but they can start looking into you, and that's what happens,
Speaker 2: all right. Yeah, So essentially the police decide they're going
Speaker 2: to use a muck as a roadmap to the Janezuski murder.
Speaker 2: And the more they look into it, the more parallels
Speaker 2: they find. And they still they're a little light on
Speaker 2: stuff to take to court, but they are increasingly convinced
Speaker 2: that Bala is their man. Further investigation reveals that Bala,
Speaker 2: under his Chris b Online alias, had browsed a police
Speaker 2: manual titled Accidental Suicidal or Criminal Hanging on an auction site.
Speaker 2: Once they're looking at you, then it's like, oh, and
Speaker 2: this was just one month before Janezuski's abduction that he
Speaker 2: was looking into this manual, which details the difficulties and
Speaker 2: techniques of hanging a human. But there's no proof that
Speaker 2: Bala actually purchased the book, and Rabluski realized that he
Speaker 2: needed to build a strong case against Bala, and he
Speaker 2: would need more than circumstantial evidence. Now that Janetzeuski murder
Speaker 2: was then a featured story on the Polish forty eight
Speaker 2: hours esque news magazine nine to nine seven, but despite
Speaker 2: widespread viewership, it failed to turn up any leads where
Speaker 2: all the way in two thousand and five, now Bala
Speaker 2: is still abroad, sustaining himself through travel articles, English teaching
Speaker 2: and scuba diving. Then he emails a friend from Micronesia
Speaker 2: says his paradise, and then later that year Rabluski Jack
Speaker 2: Sparrow learns that Bala is in fact going to return
Speaker 2: to Poland. So on September fifth, two thousand and five,
Speaker 2: shortly after his return, Bala claims he was violently abducted
Speaker 2: in Choge Now by three men who handcuffed and blindfolded him,
Speaker 2: believing he was wealthy and targeting him for ransom. He
Speaker 2: describes the experience as harrowing of he was beaten, he
Speaker 2: was threatened, and he was fearing for his life, but
Speaker 2: eventually he realizes he wasn't kidnapped. He was in police custody,
Speaker 2: having been apprehended by Rabluski and his team. But Rabluski says, no, no, no,
Speaker 2: I we use standard legal procedures. There was none of
Speaker 2: this torture and beatings, etc. Bala was brought to Rabluski's
Speaker 2: office in Roklaw, and Rabluski was mindful of the character
Speaker 2: Chris and a muck who coldly rationalized brutal actions, and
Speaker 2: the potential for complexity and duplicity in Bala's character. In
Speaker 2: his interrogation, Detective Rabluski cautiously approached the subject of Janezeuski's murder,
Speaker 2: initially focusing on all his business and relationships. When he
Speaker 2: confronted Baala about the crime, Bala denied knowing Janazouski or
Speaker 2: having any involvement in the murder. He then questions him
Speaker 2: about similarities and parallels between his own life and that
Speaker 2: of and what happens in the novel, and Bala of
Speaker 2: course admits to incorporating aspects of his life into the books, which,
Speaker 2: if not at all criminal. Most artists incorporate aspects of
Speaker 2: their lives into their work, especially if they're any good
Speaker 2: at what they do. I mean, one of the first
Speaker 2: things you learn is write what you know? What do
Speaker 2: you think about that? As a great artist yourself? And
Speaker 2: so do you incorporate aspects of yourself and your own
Speaker 2: life into your work knowingly or otherwise?
Speaker 3: You know, if I can culp it, I think it
Speaker 3: just happens intentionally.
Speaker 4: Maybe maybe you all have an idea that the concept
Speaker 4: itself of the idea is kind of fascinating, and you
Speaker 4: want to like explore it and look at it from
Speaker 4: different angles and stuff and see if it really is
Speaker 4: that interesting. Yeah, anytime I'm trying to figure something out,
Speaker 4: you know, get a the visual representation of it, I
Speaker 4: have to think about it from as many different perspectives
Speaker 4: as I can.
Speaker 2: Which is of course going to be informed by who
Speaker 2: you are and the experiences that you've had. I mean
Speaker 2: it inevitably informed. I mean, when you create art, whether
Speaker 2: it's a novel, a piece of graphic art or a
Speaker 2: painting or whatever kind of art it is, you have
Speaker 2: created something, you have given birth, it's of course who
Speaker 2: you are is going to be somehow embedded in that.
Speaker 2: So I guess that's sort of the argument for the
Speaker 2: police reading too much into the book, but maybe they didn't.
Speaker 2: When Captain Jack Sparrow asks Bala about selling the cell phone,
Speaker 2: he says, I can't recall how I acquired it. I
Speaker 2: might have bought it at a pawnshop. He then agrees
Speaker 2: to take a polygraph test, answering no to key questions
Speaker 2: about his involvement in the murder and his acquaintance with Janezuski.
Speaker 2: The examiner notes potential attempts by Bala to manipulate the test,
Speaker 2: and the results are ultimately inconclusive, so he does kind
Speaker 2: of fail a polygraph right after that. Again, Rabluski really
Speaker 2: feels like he's got his man, but he also knows
Speaker 2: that it's a pretty weak case, so he continues to
Speaker 2: look into Bala for more concrete evidence and a definitive motive.
Speaker 2: His examination of Bala's passport reveals travel stamps from Japan,
Speaker 2: South Korea, and the United States, aligning with page views
Speaker 2: from those countries on the nine to nine to seven
Speaker 2: shows website about Janetzouski's murder. So Bala says, I know
Speaker 2: nothing about Janezeuski. I know nothing about the murder. But
Speaker 2: he's shown to have specifically browsed and read about this
Speaker 2: murder from multiple different countries while he was living abroad.
Speaker 2: So again, whether that's really evidence, who knows, But there's
Speaker 2: a little bit of like, what are the odds that
Speaker 2: this murder you have nothing to do with, this man
Speaker 2: you know nothing about, but you're so you're so damned
Speaker 2: compelled by it that while you were in the United States, Japan,
Speaker 2: in South Korea, you were online reading everything you could
Speaker 2: possibly consume about the Polish TV show about the murder
Speaker 2: and about the murder. HM. That seems pretty suspicious as well,
Speaker 2: especially when you're traveling right right right.
Speaker 3: You know, there's so much other, so many other things
Speaker 3: to keep your attention.
Speaker 2: What are the odds that you even know that Polish
Speaker 2: forty eight hours did a show about this particular murder
Speaker 2: when you're busy scuba diving in Japan. If you're an
Speaker 2: innocent person who had nothing to do with it.
Speaker 3: All those things lined up make you know some more
Speaker 3: compelling reasons to go after I mean, there must have
Speaker 3: been a ton of evidence.
Speaker 2: Okay, let's talk about some more of the evidence. So
Speaker 2: now we're going to talk about that time, the time
Speaker 2: in two thousand, just before the murder of Janatzouski, and
Speaker 2: what was going on with Bala at that time. Interrogations
Speaker 2: of friends and acquaintances revealed mixed perceptions. Some viewed him
Speaker 2: as bright and interesting, but a deeper investigation into Balla's
Speaker 2: life during nineteen ninety nine and two thousand, the period
Speaker 2: of his business and marital collapse, which also coincided with
Speaker 2: Janezuski's murder, painted a darker image. Bala's behavior during this
Speaker 2: troubled time was erratic. Friends in a babysitter described him
Speaker 2: as increasingly vulgar, intoxicated, and aggressive, particularly towards his wife, Staga,
Speaker 2: accusing her of infidelity. Post separation, Bala remained possessive, monitoring
Speaker 2: Staja's phone calls and displaying controlling behavior. A significant incident
Speaker 2: occurred at a New Year's Eve party in two thousand,
Speaker 2: where Bala reacted violently, believing a bartender was flirting with Stagia.
Speaker 2: His drunken threats and mention of having quote dealt with
Speaker 2: such a guy unquote was alarming, requiring several people to
Speaker 2: restrain him from what witnesses described as going quote a muckquote.
Speaker 2: In parallel, the investigation team made a breakthrough regarding the
Speaker 2: suspicious phone calls made to Janezuski on the day of
Speaker 2: his appearance. Tracing the unique number of the calling card
Speaker 2: use at the public phone booth, they connected calls made
Speaker 2: with the same card to Bala's family, girlfriend, friends, and associates.
Speaker 2: This discovery significantly, as you might imagine, strengthened the case
Speaker 2: against Bala. Now he is directly connected to the phone
Speaker 2: call made to Janetzuski that led to Janezuski's kidnapping and presumably,
Speaker 2: though you're not allowed to presume his murder, another critical
Speaker 2: connection between Janetzuski and Bala emerged through Malgorzata Drozol. Malgarzada
Speaker 2: was a friend of Stagia. She recalled seeing Staja in
Speaker 2: a Roklaw nightclub called Crazy Horse talking to a man
Speaker 2: with long hair and bright blue eyes in the summer
Speaker 2: of two thousand. She then identified the man as Darius Janezuski,
Speaker 2: our murder victim. This revelation linked Bala directly to Janezuski,
Speaker 2: suggesting a personal connection and providing a potential motive propelling
Speaker 2: our investigation forward. Staja, Bala's ex wife, initially refused to
Speaker 2: cooperate with the investigation, possibly due to fear of Bala,
Speaker 2: belief in his claims of persecution, or concern about betraying
Speaker 2: the father of her child, all legitimate. However, upon being
Speaker 2: shown sections of a Muck, she recognized unsettling similarities between
Speaker 2: herself and the character Sonya, and agreed to speak Stasia
Speaker 2: confirmed meeting Janezeuski at Crazy Horse and going on a
Speaker 2: date with him, which ended abruptly when she learned he
Speaker 2: was married. Weeks later, Bala confronted her in a drunken state,
Speaker 2: accusing her of having an affair with John Azuski. Bala,
Speaker 2: claiming knowledge of their interactions and the motel they visited,
Speaker 2: became violent. After Janezuski's disappearance, Stasia questioned Bala, but he
Speaker 2: denied involvement. Despite his volatle behavior, she couldn't believe he
Speaker 2: was capable of murder, but her revelations helped Rubluski interpret
Speaker 2: the cryptic last line of a Muck as referencing a
Speaker 2: murder driven by blind jealousy. Bala's trial, so they did
Speaker 2: finally feel like they had enough to bring him to trial.
Speaker 2: Bala's trial in Roclaw on February twenty second, two thousand
Speaker 2: and seven attracted a diverse audience, including philosophers, lawyers, and journalists.
Speaker 2: The case, involving a murder potentially foretold in a novel,
Speaker 2: garnered significant media attention. Judge Lydiahjenka presided over the trial
Speaker 2: with a jury comprising another judge and three citizens Janazeuski's
Speaker 2: family was present, while a visibly anxious Teresa Bala, Christian's mother,
Speaker 2: sat in the back. The trial encapsulated not just a
Speaker 2: criminal case, but a debate on postmodernism's implications and the
Speaker 2: intersection of fiction and reality. Bala's father, too distraught by
Speaker 2: his son being on trial, did not attend. In the courtroom,
Speaker 2: Christian Bala stood in a cage, which I guess is
Speaker 2: how they do it in Poland. It's wild.
Speaker 3: It's like the shields in a bank that protected the tellers. Yeah,
Speaker 3: I think I saw a picture of it.
Speaker 2: Huh. Interesting. Wild. So in the courtroom he stood in
Speaker 2: a cage, facing a potential twenty five year prison sentence.
Speaker 2: The prosecution to picked it a Bala, akin to as
Speaker 2: a Muck protagonist Kit Chris, a morally unshackled hedonist driven
Speaker 2: by jealousy to murder. Evidence included files from Bala's computer
Speaker 2: detailing his sexual exploits and emails mirroring the language used
Speaker 2: by Chris and a Muck. A psychologist testified about the
Speaker 2: sadistic parallels between Bala and his fictional character. Bala meanwhile,
Speaker 2: engaged directly with witnesses, often questioning the stability and interpretation
Speaker 2: of their testimonies. As the trial progressed, however, Bala's defense
Speaker 2: shifted towards empirical arguments. He emphasized the lack of direct
Speaker 2: evidence linking him to Janezeuski's kidnapping, murder, or disposal of
Speaker 2: the body. He insisted on his innocence, stating that he
Speaker 2: never met Janezeuski and that there were no witnesses to
Speaker 2: prove otherwise. He argued that his personal life incidents were
Speaker 2: being manipulated into a fictional narrative driven by the prosecution,
Speaker 2: aligning with his defense attorney's view that the case was
Speaker 2: more of a novel plot than reality.
Speaker 3: So they're accusing each other of the same thing, basically.
Speaker 2: Well, the plot of my novel is does not mirror
Speaker 2: the murder, but the plot of my trial mirrors a novel.
Speaker 2: I'm yeah, I'm not sure that's the line of reasoning
Speaker 2: I would want to go down. So like, my novel
Speaker 2: doesn't mirror real life at all, but this part of
Speaker 2: real life that's going against me is totally mirror as
Speaker 2: a novel. Uh yeah, I wouldn't. So there, I don't
Speaker 2: think that's the if. Then you want to push forward
Speaker 2: with you.
Speaker 3: Want to push people away from that whole.
Speaker 2: Yeah prospect, Yeah, novel equals real life is what you're
Speaker 2: trying to argue against. What's good for the goose is
Speaker 2: good for the gander. Christian. So, the case was finally
Speaker 2: handed to a jury and Bala, in a statement expressed
Speaker 2: his belief in an acquittal. In the courtroom, as the
Speaker 2: verdict was read, Bala maintained a composed posture until the
Speaker 2: decisive word guilty was announced. So he was guilty, and
Speaker 2: he went to prison, and he went to a prison
Speaker 2: in Roulaw known for overcrowding, poor conditions in violence. So
Speaker 2: there's a great writer for The New Yorker named David
Speaker 2: Grahan who wrote an article about this case, and his
Speaker 2: work was an important piece of my research putting the
Speaker 2: story together. He wrote an article called a Postmodern Murder
Speaker 2: Mystery back in two thousand and eight about this case.
Speaker 2: He would go on to interview Christian Bala while Bala
Speaker 2: was in prison and in the prison visiting room, and
Speaker 2: he said that Bala resembled an American student, contrasting sharply
Speaker 2: with his current circumstances, and Bala would describe his situation
Speaker 2: as a Kafka sparse, speaking in fluent but heavily accented English.
Speaker 2: He was clearly physically and emotionally infected by his incarceration,
Speaker 2: and he vehemently maintained his innocence, attributing his conviction to
Speaker 2: the controversial nature of his novel A Muck and stating
Speaker 2: that his situation was akin to Solomon Rushdie's being persecuted
Speaker 2: for provocative literary work. That is not at all fair
Speaker 2: to Solomon Rushti. No, it seems pretty frick and clear
Speaker 2: that Christian Bala actually killed this guy. Salomon Rushti just
Speaker 2: wrote a provocative novel. Ball is like, I'm just like
Speaker 2: Solomon Rushdie. I wrote a provocative novel. You're like yes,
Speaker 2: And I wrote a provocative movel Yes, and you killed someone.
Speaker 2: You are not just like Solomon Rushti. Okay, but that's
Speaker 2: what he asserts, and he insisted that the novel was
Speaker 2: intended to offend and provoke, separating his personal beliefs from
Speaker 2: those of his narrator Chris. Again, he's conveniently leaving out
Speaker 2: that the novel is what kipped the police off to him.
Speaker 2: The novel is not the key piece of evidence. It
Speaker 2: was the bread crumbs. It was Yeah, it was the
Speaker 2: breadcrumbs that led to him. It was not the key
Speaker 2: piece of evidence that led to his conviction. That would
Speaker 2: be selling the cell phone call, the last known calls
Speaker 2: to Janezeuski coming from his calling cards, the fact that
Speaker 2: his wife went on a date with Janezeuski, the fact
Speaker 2: that he personally threatened Janezuski, et cetera. Et cetera said
Speaker 2: that he had already taken care of someone else who
Speaker 2: tried to date his wife, Like, there's plenty of actual
Speaker 2: evidence that has nothing to do with the novel. He's
Speaker 2: blaming the bread crumbs. But anyhow, I don't mean to
Speaker 2: rant and rave here.
Speaker 3: You're right, it's focusing on it too much.
Speaker 2: He's probably write well, you'd think, but wait for it.
Speaker 2: When David Grant brings up the actual evidence against him,
Speaker 2: such as the cell phone and the calling card, Bala
Speaker 2: suggests a conspiracy to frame him, and mentions that he
Speaker 2: filed an appeal. Now, like other real or imagined sociopaths, again,
Speaker 2: we have fallen into the realm of extreme ego and
Speaker 2: self regard. He's a philosophy student with a failed cleaning
Speaker 2: business who was abroad supporting himself teaching English and scuba diving.
Speaker 2: There's nothing wrong with any of that, But please explain
Speaker 2: to me how, Christian Bala, are you so important that
Speaker 2: anyone private citizen, police officer, or whomever would be undertaking
Speaker 2: a conspiracy which involves multiple anyones to frame you for
Speaker 2: the murder. It's not like you have a billion dollars
Speaker 2: or some property or some prestigious government position or something
Speaker 2: that anybody would want to take or destroy. But there's
Speaker 2: a conspiracy to get you. They're all out to get me,
Speaker 2: sure they are. He does file an appeal, highlighting inconsistencies
Speaker 2: in the trial, including differing medical opinions on Janezuski's cause
Speaker 2: of death, a judge's uncertainty about whether he acted alone
Speaker 2: or with an accomplice. But he's even more forthcoming when
Speaker 2: talking about his book A Muck And While in prison,
Speaker 2: Bala's obsession with A Muck had intensified. He carried an
Speaker 2: annotated copy full of diagrams and literary influences. Here he
Speaker 2: thinks he's the next James Joyce, revealing his deep engagement
Speaker 2: of the book. Even behind bars, he would read passages
Speaker 2: alowed to fellow inmates. Now the unresolved question of why
Speaker 2: someone would commit a murder and then detail it in
Speaker 2: a novel. It's like he's actually going to be helped
Speaker 2: out a little bit by the fact that what he
Speaker 2: did was so unbelievably stupid. People still can't believe he
Speaker 2: would have actually done this, and so to some people,
Speaker 2: he seems more innocent because of that. They're like, well,
Speaker 2: he can't possibly have killed someone and then wrote a
Speaker 2: novel confessing his crimes. I mean, who does that? Who
Speaker 2: sells the murdered man's cell phone within a couple days
Speaker 2: of killing him under the username for his future confession
Speaker 2: novel That there's no way he's that dumb. He must
Speaker 2: be innocent. I mean, there's an irony there. He behaved
Speaker 2: like such a jackass that maybe he didn't do it.
Speaker 3: That'd be nice to get away with something like that.
Speaker 3: If that was enough to get somebody.
Speaker 2: Off of the start acting really really dumb. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: As we had mentioned, Crime and Punishment. In Crime and Punishment,
Speaker 2: Dostoevsky explores the notion that criminals air due to lapse
Speaker 2: in judgment and crucial moments. However, much was written years
Speaker 2: after the murder, suggesting a different motive than just errors
Speaker 2: and crucial moments. If indeed Balla was guilty, some thought
Speaker 2: that maybe he sought to confess yes, subconsciously or otherwise,
Speaker 2: or just to gain notoriety. One thing's for sure. Because
Speaker 2: of the trial, A Muck gained popularity, and as of
Speaker 2: two thousand and eight when it was set for a
Speaker 2: new edition with details and the trial. But let's get
Speaker 2: down to the part of this conversation that interested Bala
Speaker 2: himself the most, because I think this is telling about
Speaker 2: who he is and by extension, what he did. He
Speaker 2: was more fascinated with creating the perfect story than with
Speaker 2: creating the perfect crime, and he discussed his sequel to
Speaker 2: A Muck, which he named de Lyric, a play on
Speaker 2: lyrics and delirium. He lamented the loss of his manuscript
Speaker 2: for de Lyric, as his computer containing the draft was
Speaker 2: seized by the police. And this is important conspiracy seized
Speaker 2: by police by the police as they were arresting him
Speaker 2: for murder. But this little detail is important. The police,
Speaker 2: when they seized his computer, found evidence that Bala was
Speaker 2: gathering information about Stasio's new boyfriend, potentially indicating that he
Speaker 2: was planning another crime, just like he was planning another book.
Speaker 2: Oh shit, And now we're getting into the realm of
Speaker 2: sort of Hollywood or really just serial killers. But you
Speaker 2: can imagine if this was all a season of Dexter,
Speaker 2: and if he had not been caught because of a muck,
Speaker 2: would he be the killer that goes and kills someone
Speaker 2: and then writes a book about it. And that's what
Speaker 2: his books are, that's his brand.
Speaker 3: But of course that writer looks for inspiration.
Speaker 2: Yeah, through heinous violence. If this were a Hollywood script,
Speaker 2: I think anyone would extremely question the believability of. Honestly,
Speaker 2: how many books can you write about murders you actually
Speaker 2: committed before you get caught? And indeed, Christian Bala didn't
Speaker 2: make it past one, but he was planning two. Now.
Speaker 2: Of course, can't prove that he was actually planning to
Speaker 2: kill another person just because he was writing another book,
Speaker 2: or that the book was linked to a few, but
Speaker 2: it sure seems that way that the book with the
Speaker 2: sequel and the new manuscript also contained evidence researching his
Speaker 2: wife's new boyfriend, given that he killed the last guy
Speaker 2: he perceived to be her new boyfriend. Bala expressed his
Speaker 2: determination to complete the lyric following the appellate court's decision. Remember,
Speaker 2: he had filed for an appeal. Now, the appeals court,
Speaker 2: to the surprise of many wait for it, overturned the
Speaker 2: initial guilty verdict. Although the judges recognized a strong connection
Speaker 2: between Bala and the murder, they pointed out inconsistencies in
Speaker 2: the evidence, such as differing medical testimonies that necessitated a retrial.
Speaker 2: It's okay, everybody, don't get your pitchforks out yet. I
Speaker 2: guess the Polish legal system moves quite a bit quicker
Speaker 2: than the American legal system because that trial happened rapidly.
Speaker 2: Christian Bala went to retrial for the murder of Janazouski
Speaker 2: in December of two thousand and eight. He was again
Speaker 2: found guilty and continues to serve a twenty five year sentence.
Speaker 2: There you have it, he was convicted twice.
Speaker 3: Well, and where is he imprisoned?
Speaker 2: A prison in Roclaw, Poland?
Speaker 3: Who commit crimes?
Speaker 2: And if you do, don't write a novel about it.
Speaker 2: Also remember that he was into this idea of mytho
Speaker 2: creativity and saying that if he wrote an autobiography, it
Speaker 2: would all be made up, etc. Before he was arrested,
Speaker 2: he made a point of floating the idea himself that Chris,
Speaker 2: the protagonist from A Muck was more Hymn than he was.
Speaker 2: In other words, maybe I'm really Chris, not Christian. By
Speaker 2: the way, Chris and Christian, this seems like a really
Speaker 2: obvious connection, But in my research notes, Chris is spelled
Speaker 2: hrs and Christian is spelled more like a Polish spelling.
Speaker 2: I guess, I mean, maybe that would be in Cyrillic,
Speaker 2: but Christian, as in Christian Bala is spelled krystia n.
Speaker 2: So maybe I'm a jackass. But having consumed all this
Speaker 2: information visually, and I kind of just now connected Chris
Speaker 2: American spelling to Christian with a krys, or even the
Speaker 2: fact that Bala is a B, so he's he's Chris B.
Speaker 2: Chris B ed, Chris B. I feel like I should
Speaker 2: have figured that out before we even started recording. But
Speaker 2: I mean, come on, not to put too fine a
Speaker 2: point on it, Christian Bala, Chris B Chris B.
Speaker 3: Like he's just really really egotistical and he just didn't
Speaker 3: want to stray too far from himself.
Speaker 2: He couldn't. There's no better name in the entire universe
Speaker 2: than Christian Bala. And I'd hate to denigrate my my appellation. Man,
Speaker 2: It's really something.
Speaker 3: There's another thing though, It's like if he's just made
Speaker 3: up a new name for a character, that'd be fun, right,
Speaker 3: But it's almost like he was trying to make sure
Speaker 3: that he didn't slip when he was being the character.
Speaker 3: He didn't slip and accidentally, you know, say his name
Speaker 3: instead the characters, right.
Speaker 2: Just the fact that he himself was like, I don't know,
Speaker 2: maybe Chris is me, maybe Chris is more me than
Speaker 2: I am. That was his whole deal. And then when
Speaker 2: he goes to jail, he's like, how could you possibly
Speaker 2: think that Chris is me? It's like because you did? Yeah, No,
Speaker 2: I mean he's trying not to slip, or it's that
Speaker 2: false confidence of like, well, I'm smart and I know
Speaker 2: the law. So they can't possibly convict me for writing
Speaker 2: a novel with a character that has my initials. Who
Speaker 2: could commit a murder? No, again, they can't, but they can.
Speaker 3: Find you think you want to read that book or
Speaker 3: not read.
Speaker 2: Not read that book? I mean I think if it
Speaker 2: makes somebody want to read the book, that's fine for me.
Speaker 2: First of all, I don't know if in Poland they
Speaker 2: have the same laws as in America, where you're explicitly
Speaker 2: not allowed to profit directly from a horrific crime. Right,
Speaker 2: I'm not sure about that. Somebody looked that up for me. Ay,
Speaker 2: I don't really want to read the book because I
Speaker 2: don't want to support this gross person. But the posting
Speaker 2: kind of murdery is kind of enough darkness in my
Speaker 2: life for me. I have a very vivid imagination and
Speaker 2: don't need to go into the particular hellscape of this
Speaker 2: guy's mind. And also just the fact that he's so
Speaker 2: self satisfied makes me Regardless of what his book was about,
Speaker 2: it could be about gardening tools, and I don't want
Speaker 2: to read it. I'm not interested in reading anything by
Speaker 2: anybody who's like patting themselves on the back for being
Speaker 2: a genius the whole time. No thank you. In my experience,
Speaker 2: most decent people are affected, and may perhaps not crippled,
Speaker 2: but deeply affected by a significant amount of self doubt.
Speaker 2: And when somebody doesn't seem to have any that's what
Speaker 2: they call a red flag. As far as I'm concerned, you.
Speaker 3: Think it would make them ripe for the darwin Wards.
Speaker 2: Indeed, well, I mean, granted he's still alive. But if
Speaker 2: he had been given the death penalty and executed, I'd
Speaker 2: say this guy could get nominated for a Darwin Award.
Speaker 2: It kills, somebody writes novel about it, busted, because he
Speaker 2: wrote novel about it executed, that's a legitimate Darwin Award. Granted,
Speaker 2: Darwin Awards are usually more focused on physical stupidity, but
Speaker 2: I'd go for the nomination. Do you have a favorite
Speaker 2: Darwin Award story? Hanson?
Speaker 3: Oh, geez, I don't know. They all sound so outrageous
Speaker 3: that they're all just kind of fun, you know, because
Speaker 3: you don't know the people that it happened to, and
Speaker 3: he just it's sort of like a joke, you know.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I know there was.
Speaker 3: One about somebody some guys are at a concert or something,
Speaker 3: and I can't remember all the details of it, but
Speaker 3: they're trying to get over a fence to get into
Speaker 3: the concert and something about their car going over the
Speaker 3: edge of a cliff and do you.
Speaker 2: Know that I don't know that one. The one that
Speaker 2: sticks in my mind though, is also a car and
Speaker 2: a cliff story. It was like a giant cliff over
Speaker 2: a river and somebody noticed some kind of just like
Speaker 2: like melted metal slag stuck to the side of the cliff.
Speaker 2: And basically what they were able to reconstruct was that
Speaker 2: somebody had taken like a full on jet engine, like
Speaker 2: a like a jet engine for like essentially a fighter jet,
Speaker 2: like a really powerful jet engine. Yeah, and strapped it
Speaker 2: to their car, like a white chevelle or something, and
Speaker 2: fired that sucker up and essentially, you know, and this
Speaker 2: doesn't seem that surprising in hindsight, but got totally airborne,
Speaker 2: just like jets do, and hit the side of the
Speaker 2: cliff so damn hard that they just exploded and all
Speaker 2: that was left was like steel slag glued to the
Speaker 2: side of the cliff. That's the one that I've remembered
Speaker 2: ever since I was.
Speaker 3: A kid of survival research laboratories, you know, the he
Speaker 3: makes wonder if maybe it was an experiment and maybe
Speaker 3: nobody actually died in it. Who the hell would put
Speaker 3: themselves in something.
Speaker 2: Like somebody kind of like our killer from today's story,
Speaker 2: who seems to be psychotically convinced that nothing could possibly
Speaker 2: go wrong. All right, Well, I appreciate you being here
Speaker 2: so much, my friend. It's been an absolute blast recording
Speaker 2: this episode with you. For Ansinmatox. I'm Zevan Odelberg and
Speaker 2: this has been kind of murdery.
Speaker 4: Oh no.
Speaker 1: If you like the show, please subscribe, review and tell
Speaker 1: your friends. You can find us on social media at
Speaker 1: kinda Murdery or email at kindamurdery at gmail dot com
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