This episode of *Small Town Murder* explores the harrowing true story of Richard John Sharp, a doctor from Massachusetts, whose life was shaped by severe childhood abuse and emotional trauma. Born into a family where his father, a tool-maker and gambler, beat his brothers and son (but spared his sister), Richard developed a deep-seated need for escape. As a child, he hid in the bathroom and wore his sister’s clothes to feel safe, a behavior that evolved into a coping mechanism for his father’s violence. Later, he married Karen Hatfield, a 17-year-old from Michigan, in secret, hiding both their marriage and her pregnancy from her family. Their relationship quickly descended into abuse, with Richard subjecting Karen to repeated physical violence, including a 48-hour imprisonment, hospitalization after being beaten, and a chilling moment when he whispered, “I want you to die” while she was being treated. Their daughter, Shannon, a young child at the time, also testified to severe abuse, including being grabbed, slammed against a bed, and dragged down stairs. The story contrasts the town’s image of safety and affluence—highlighted by low crime rates and luxury real estate—with the deep, toxic personal trauma that lies beneath. It illustrates how childhood abuse can perpetuate cycles of violence in adult relationships, and how such patterns are often normalized or ignored in society. The narrative is presented with dark humor and satire, underscoring the absurdity and horror of domestic violence while maintaining a respectful, non-exploitative tone by avoiding mockery of victims or their families. The episode serves as a cautionary tale about the long-term psychological damage of abuse and the importance of recognizing and addressing it.
This week, in When a Massachusetts, a doctor and his wife seem to have the perfect life until deep secrets start to emerge, leading to one of them being brutally murdered and the other becoming an absolute public side show. Welcome to Small Town Murder. Hello, everybody, and welcome back to Small Town Murder. Yay! Yeah, indeed, Jimmy. Yeah, indeed. My name is James Petrigallo. I'm here with my co-host. I'm Jimmy Wiseman. Thank you, folks, so much for joining us today on another wild, crazy, insane addition of Small Town Murder as usual buckle up, because it's a crazy one this week. We don't even have to say that anymore. They're always crazy. I'll tell you what, before we get started, though, would like to tell you, head over to to shut up and give me murder.com. If you are listening to this when it's first coming out, first couple days, this weekend get your tickets for live shows in San Jose and Sacramento. That is the 16th and 17th of October. Sacramento's on the 17th, San Jose on the 16th. Get your tickets right now for those. Also, you can get your tickets a few left for Terry Town on November 13th, and a few left for Boston also on November 14th, so actually it's Medford right outside Boston. So get your tickets for that, shut up and give me murder.com. Come see us for a live show, Sacramento, San Jose, different shows, by the way, so you can go to both. They're very close together, and you can see two different shows. That's a lot of fun. Also, Patreon, got to get a Patreon, patreon.com/crime in sports, which is the name of our other show that you should listen to. We promise you don't have to like sports, but Patreon, great, I'll tell you what, from an unbiased perspective, pretty goddamn good show. Two guys who just like shows, that's a good show, those fellows put on over there. So check that out. Yeah, patreon.com/crime in sports is where you get all of the bonus material. All you have to be is $5 a month or above, and you get everything we put out. As soon as you subscribe, you're going to get almost 400 back bonus episodes you've never heard before. New ones every other week, one crime in sports, one small town murder, and you get them all my friends. That is it. This week for crime in sports, we talk about when pilots go wrong, it's basically small plane incidents at sporting events that have happened over the years, and there's a remarkable number of them. Those little planes are dangerous when you want them to fly around and do specific things, and it's crazy stuff. And then for small town murder, because it's that month that we are going to talk about scary movies, the best ones, the ones we like, the ones we hate. There's some terrible. Jimmy is very up on the modern harajon, or also, so he's going to have a lot to say about that. So that's patreon.com/crime in sports, and that's where you get all of that. And in addition to that, that's not enough to give you for only $5 a month, but we give you everything we put out, both small town murders, crime in sports, and your stupid opinions all add free with your Patreon. Add free. It's add free. Jimmy can't beat it. I'll tell you that. I love how Jimmy reacts like he's never heard it before. Really? Are we doing that? No. James, you're out your money. Take your money right out of her pocket. Wow. What are we doing? My kids have to eat. James, what are we doing? Radical. And then for you also get a shout out at the end of the show too. So that sounds like fun. If that sounds good to you, it's going to be a good time. That's what it is. Either way, we have to do the disclaimer. Yeah. This is a comedy show, everybody. It is. This is a comedy show. We are comedians. We are definitely going to talk about murder because that's the name of the show. Death is going to happen. And we have to make jokes. And you go, well, how did jokes go with murder? That sounds weird. Not really. That's the thing. There's plenty to make fun of around a murder. It's, you know, you just don't make fun of the actual murder. It's super simple. And our rule to live by is we never make fun of the victims or the victims' families. Why James? Because we're assholes. But. But we're not scumbags. Super simple. See how that works. That sounds good to you. You were going to hear one hell of a wild story like usual. If you think true crime and comedy should never ever go together, number one, how'd you get here? And number two, give it a shot. You might like it. But if you don't, no complaining later. That's what we're saying. Don't say it. God damn it. Shit. We're not interested. So that's it. I think it's time. Everybody to sit back. What do you say here? Let's go. Arms to the sky. Deep breaths. Clear the lungs. Yeah. Let's do this. Let's do it. All right. Let's go on a trip. Shall we? All right. Yeah. We're doing it. We're going to Massachusetts where. It's a nice place. It is where we will be going next month. We in November the 14th will be in Medford right outside of Boston at the chivalry age. It's a ticket. It's a fun, fun theater and we like it. This is when a Massachusetts, if you're not from Massachusetts, you might not know how to spell that. It is W-E-N-H-A-M, so when them. That's how they do it there. When a Massachusetts. What the fuck is that? Eastern Massachusetts. It's over by the coast north of Boston. It's about 40 minutes to Boston, about an hour and a half to Portland, Maine. That's got to be so nice. It's a nice area. It's like a wealthy area. It's a nice area like that and about an hour to Sharon, Massachusetts, which is our last Massachusetts episode, number 697, the perverted professor. It's always smart people and when we do Massachusetts episodes, it's always like. Offly perverted people. Oh, they're complete perverts, but they have a medical degree, you know, or something of that. A law degree. There's always very educated people up here. It's hard to find. It's hard to find real trash, like, you know, trail, you got to go to the Massachusetts. Yeah. And that's just in Boston. You have to go to Western mass to get that and central mass. So this is an Essex County, area code 351 and 978, it can't hold them with one area code here. Right. A little bit of history. It was settled in 1635 this town. Oh, yeah. It's been a minute. Yeah. It's been a while here, officially in corporate. There is where the, where they showed up. This is one of the first areas. I mean, it's right on the water, the port, the whole deal. This town was officially incorporated in 1643, so it's been a, been a long time here. Actually, well, town. Actual town went, went before, you know, this was even thought of as an independent country. So before that, it was home to the agilom people. They're from the eastern Algonquin tribe and their numbers were greatly reduced. First, before this town was settled around 1617, they're pretty sure from smallpox. So we, we understand how that happened. Yeah. That's, that was kind of how a lot of that went down. We came over with stuff that there, you know, had no immunity for a terrible thing. That was it. Yeah. Now, when them was originally a part of Salem, actually, with the witch trials and all that. Yeah. So that was originally, it's the same area over here. A matter of fact, Salem's minister, Hugh Peters, who I'm sure was a lovely man, not having women murdered or anything like that. Yeah. Man of the cloth. Oh, absolutely. He preached to a group on a hill by the great pond around 1638 to encourage settlement in the area. You, you can even kill women. It's totally fine. As many as you want. We drown them. We fire. We drown them. We burn them. It's, well, it's amazing. So 1774, this is right before the Revolutionary War, the town voted to select 15 men as minute men. So they selected 15 people to, you know, be there guys. And from that time on, loyalists to the crown to England, we're not welcome in venom. If you were, you want to, you don't want to come through here wearing a red coat. You're in deep shit. How about it? I'm going to come for you. In 1909, a steel magnate named Henry Clay Frick, he bought the iron rail property. It's a big home that's still there. It's a historic thing. So that his daughter, Helen, could create a vacation home for the mill girls, checks that work at the mill. I don't know. They need to go on vacation. They need to have ladies night. And so we got to build a place. Yeah. Got to do it with his nickel draft. Yeah. Something. Hey, it's ladies night tonight. Everybody come on in. Helen Frick transferred the iron rail vacation home to the girls clubs of America in 1954 and the town of Wettom bought the house in the 70s. And it's like a museum now, basically. I've heard of the girls clubs of America. Yeah. The boys and girls clubs. So this is just the girls club. Yeah. Yeah. Hey, no boys allowed. If they get in here, it's going to get gross. There's going to be just on the floor. Yeah. Bad stuff. Now, reviews of this town. I've never been to this town. Yeah. It has 4.1 stars on niche. And there's no, there's no reviews less than three stars. They like it. They like it. Here's five stars. We lived in Wettom for 23 years. It is a beautiful, safe, family friendly town with excellent public schools and many private day schools nearby. Although Wettom is not on the ocean, there are many gorgeous beaches nearby. Yeah. It's close to the ocean. The town has a community. It's kind of the life to have up there in it. It's not bad. It's pretty cool. I like that. North of Boston going to Maine.
That's I think that whole but inland like five 10 minutes is the is the answer because once you're on the beach Fuck man. You don't want to be around there on the summer. It's so ugly. Oh around like a tourist beach. I'm like Yeah, yeah, no, I'd love to be by the beach. Just not where there's People I don't want a tourist beach. Yeah, that's I mean I'd like go like up up the coast a little name to where it's less populated right a Mass beach. It's just too much August to to you know, I mean made August. It's just flooded with the worst people just a bunch of guys with red hair punching each other That's all it is yeah drinking in the sun and punching each other till it gets dark. That's that's I went to a bar out on the beach out there that had no cell service. They had a Phone in on the beach. Oh, yeah, it's you call for a cat. It is this it was the scary beautiful beach scary It's bar. I've never been to in my life from those frightening people and there's no you can't call for help. No, we call a phone No, not a cab company. Do you have an ambulance over there to the words I'm hearing are atrocious Yeah, this is just redheads punching each other and then if you go to the Jersey shore That's just a telling guys punching each other. So yeah, but at least their cell service either way Yeah, and they're they can go out in the sun without so much SPF also which helps. I think they're just angry at the burn. They've all received that day The town has a commuter rail and is only a 30-minute drive to Boston a little more than that But that's fine. I guess not how they drive Don't be surprised the people don't be surprised. I guess to see people is what they're trying to say on horseback going down the street The town had a has a huge equestrian community because it's a bunch of rich people rich people love horses and Myopia hunt club borders Walnut Road my favorite parts of Lanham our main street and large row so many lovely historic Homes and stunning lots of land. It's a pretty old little sounds sounds like I can't afford it. That's what that's well Yeah, it's it's fucking pricey. This is this area anything outside of Boston. That's like real nice super pricey Four stars when I'm as acute suburb of Boston located three miles from the North Atlantic ocean It's perfect for retired couples and those wanting peace within a tight-knit community Sounds great. That sounds amazing four stars the houses are very pretty and most look pretty expensive Yeah, that's the that's the key and now this is the worst review I could find in the town Three stars. It's a great place a great quiet place to live It's family oriented and very safe It is a bit pricey, but it's worth it if this is your kind of town The schools are nearby are very academically inclined. Well, I would hope they would be their schools That's yeah, that would help and the taxes here are outrageous and that's where most of it That's yeah, because they say the nice roads and schools. That's what happens Yeah, there are many parks and small businesses as well. That's a bad review Real pricey people in this town five thousand and six Not many it's a pretty small town This is a wild stat for a town of 5,000 people 55.2% women I don't know what did a lot of divorces and they got the houses. I'm not sure what happened here Has to be 45% men. Yeah, 40 not even 44.8 Wow, whoa median age 34 here a lot of kids too a lot of families and a lot of young and young a lot of young people here too Family here 39.6% married so not that much only 4% single with children Meanwhile, it's married with children super high. So that's very low Race in this town 89.7% white 1.9% black 2.9% Asian 4.7% Hispanic Very rates of 57% religious here 50 50 is the normal and no shocker here everybody 48.1% of the people here are Catholic it is as we know Catholics are the baptists of the north everywhere 1.2% Jewish My god, it's been so long. Hi. We got to remember the words here. It's been so damn long Remember to sing our song. That's it's so shocking. It's a well. Let's get it to it here I don't know the words hey, hey, let's do this here Unemployment rate is low here. Yeah, pretty low like half the national average So which I mean there's tons of jobs Boston's right there. Yeah, yeah, if you can't find a job there It seems like that's on you. There's plenty of stuff going on. I don't know I don't live there But median household income here strap in for this 154,375 dollars median Wow, you got to be paid to live in this fucking town 150 150 ready here the home cost cost a living here 100 is regular average here. It's 131 So high and the very high thing is housing median home cost 868,300 dollars median Almost 900,000 dollars median. Oh boy. So if we've convinced you dammit You've done very well for yourself. I guess and you want everybody died and they left you after you want smooth roads and nice schools We have for you the when a Massachusetts real estate report Okay, your average two bedroom rental here goes for 2180 Which is well above the national average. Yeah First house three bedroom two bath 2016 square feet It's nice. It's surrounded by woods in a leafy little neighborhood 2.34 acres. So nice little amount of land there I mean, it's nice inside hardwood floors fireplaces. It's a nice little house nice little family house $750,000 for two and a half acres. That's not bad. I mean for there. I guess it's not terrible Um, they just had a $69,000 price cut actually on that one. So you're looking to get in there 2000 square feet or six two thousand two thousand two thousand two thousand and sixteen square feet That's not so bad. No. Well, here's one that's four bedroom three bath Uh, very nicely done on the inside looks like it was recently redone completely on the inside Otherwise, it's a your basic kind of, you know, that house kind of siding in the Well, few windows up top your basic suburban east coast house four bedroom three bath 3217 square feet One one point nine acres or one point oh nine acres. So an acre one acre one million two hundred fifty thousand dollars. Ah It's got to be in a real nice neighborhood. I would imagine a million out of quarter I guess three thousand square feet is quite a bit of house. That's a lot of house. Yeah. Um, and then finally a five bedroom six bath Tea ball for each and every beehull over here sixty two hundred square feet Fuck very big house nice house Inside looks brand new built in 1997. So it's not an old house two point five nine acres of land one million seven hundred forty nine thousand dollars Wow. It's so much money, but it's so much money. Honestly, that sounds in ground pool really affordable for Massachusetts for Massachusetts for this Still, this is like a mansion in man. It's a huge house six thousand. Yeah, six thousand square feet sub two. That sounds amazing That's insane. That's a lot of house and almost three acres too Um, so yeah, that's not bad there anyway. Uh, things to do in this town. Let's find out the 41st annual Essex clam fest Fucking it. It's clam fest everybody. How many jokes are being made? Yeah, I'm going to clam fest. Ah, who's coming to clam fest with me Just constant. Look at all these clams. Uh, and it's an arts and crafts festival as well All right being a clam fest held annually here Uh, that's what clams do. That's what they do. They gather and do arts and crafts apparently according to New England here It's eleven a.m. to four p.m. in the park come taste capeans finest chowders from noon to one and vote for your favorite So we got a contest. I like that Although the highlight of the day is the chowder tasting competition There's also a great variety of activities including arts and crafts vendors live entertainment and of course food vendors I assume with you the clam themes here Um, so there's lots of stuff to do Let's see eleven to noon. We got the demonstration by the canine demonstration by the Essex police department Right. They're going to put off At least a burlap and have it all my demands aren't given a treat. Either that or have them find something They do that sometimes you do those. Yeah, but I don't know what that has to do with clams Nothing at all. Okay. I'm just showing you that we've got a dog that'll help keep you safe if you have coke in your ass That's it the beer truck opens at 12. That'll be a big uh crowded area there Chowder competition. We have face painting and reptiles Here as as well then yeah from 12 to 2 the coveted noon spot High noon at the park you get live music by You know they're from the area uncharted waters W-A-T-A-H-S uncharted waters they know it there they know their crap is it is it a bunch of John water
and what it is, it's gotta be. - What are they gonna do, fucking pink flamingos? That's a movie, how do you cover a movie? - If you are. - I'm not John, who am I thinking of? - Oh, I don't know, a serial mom. - Goddamn it, it's a guy from the band. - It's a serial mom. - No, there's a guy from a band last name "Waters." Goddamn it. - Oh, Roger Waters? - That's it, there it is. - Yeah, pink floider, the who, one of those two, I don't remember. - I think it's pink floider. - One of those two, yeah. So, anyway, got uncharted, water's coming to play. - Sure. - And then brick house will be there from two to four. - Okay. - But. - Alright, do some R&B. - R&B, something, maybe. - From Motown. - Yeah, it's all I can think of as she's a brick house. - Yeah, got it. - Maybe not, I don't know. Then, in the middle of their set, though, they're gonna have to, maybe it's during their little intermission, they're gonna have to step back for a moment from the microphone, because the competition, charter competition, winners were gonna be announced at three. - Get outta here. - Yeah, no shit here, that's right. The clam. - We're gonna break up the music to announce charter winners. - That's right, that's the whole festival. The clam chowder, it's the whole point of this, I guess. - It is. The clam chowder competition will take place on the tennis courts, which is the strangest thing I've ever heard. - I guess, 'cause that's where you can fit the most tables. - I suppose, yeah, just, is that's in the middle? - Is it a eating contestor? Is it a tasting contest? - No, it's a tasting to find the best clam chowder. Yeah, as clam chowder eating contest, we'll get real messy. - Oh, boy. - Come, about minute 15, there'd be some projectile. That would be ugly, nobody knows that. - Somebody gets a bad clam, we're gonna be out of big problems. - Big problem. Then there's also another festival, the Frozen Fest Festival, ice harvest talks. The museum has run, Shane saw ice carving on the front lawn and frozen stories of ice and snow. Basically, this is a festival where you can watch people make ice sculptures, it looks like. - Yeah, nothing could be more boring. - Show me when you're done, I'll be over here. Like, I'll be doing other shit when they're all finished. I'll come look at 'em. - I wanna see it when you've glossed it and I can see through it and it's an angel. - For that matter, I don't wanna watch anyone paint a picture. I don't wanna do any of those things. I don't wanna watch you edit your video. Show me when it's done. - Even when they paint Martin Luther King really fast with just their fingers, no brushes, and then they spin it upside down, but he painted it upside down. I don't care. - Yeah, that's great. - I'm not impressed. - This is the part I care about. - Yeah. - The Dunpart, that's it. Don't care how you paint it. - I love it, and then tell me to turn around. I don't wanna see you get a mess. - Nope. So crime rate in this town, very low. What we're interested in, property crime, about 80% under the national average. About 20% of the usual is what we got here for crime. - Incredibly safe. - Incredibly safe. Violent crime, murder rate robbery, and of course assault. The Mount Rushmore of crime is about 1/3 of the average, about 2/3 low. So it's basically non-existent crime in this town, especially major crime in this town. You might get a kid not, you know, bashing a mailbox with a baseball bat or something, but outside of that, there's not much. - You can leave your bicycle in the front yard. It won't disappear. - No, that's kind of how we are here with this. It's just a lot of rich people, I guess, that don't steal from each other, maybe. I don't know, they don't have to. They're fucking loaded. - You get $2 million at home. - That's crazy. So that said, let's talk about a murder, everybody. Okay, let's talk about some people first here. - Who we got? - Well, let's talk about a man who will become a very successful man later in his career. Richard John Sharp with an E. Okay, so Dick Sharp over here, which is a crazy name. He's born August 23rd, 1954, and he's from Connecticut, originally. He has had a very odd family life. - No. - He'll later become a doctor, like a medical doctor. - Dr. Dick Sharp. - Dr. Dick Sharp over here. - Dr. Sharp, come a dick. - Dr. Dick Sharp sounds like a weird wrestler from the late '70s. Dr. Dick Sharp, they'd call it. So he is the third son, he has two older brothers and a younger sister. Third son of a tool maker who was basically an alcoholic gambling, addicted to gambling, who beat the shit out of everyone in the family. That's dad. - Oh. - Lovely. - A tool maker is a tool maker. - Quality man? - That's like the old, working around metal thing. That's a lot of metal, and a tool maker. - That's a metal man, yeah. - There's too much metal to come home to your family and be nice. Now his dad, in the same way, very arrogant, very smart guy, stingy, real stingy. I don't know how much money the family has either, with four kids working as a tool maker. I don't know if that's a lucrative job in the '60s or not, but. - But even if you've got some cash and your kids need some food for lunch or money and you're not giving it to them, that kind of stingy? - I'm not sure about, but you'd be lucky, I think. Lunch would be the highlight of your day in this family, it sounds like with that way. Dad's name is Benjamin Sharp, and like we said, tool maker and machinist and Derby, Connecticut, and he beat his sons. Didn't beat the daughter though, just the sons. Yeah, it's weird. Sometimes these abusive parents, sometimes it's a gender thing, and sometimes they just pick their favorite that they don't beat, but they beat the shit out of everybody. Sometimes they'll be four kids and they molest three of them and not the other one. It's like, what makes them not molest all of them? I don't understand the psychology of being an abuser like that, I guess, it's not my- - And I won't obviously relate to molestation. However, I do notice after I have a confrontation with my son or a conversation that's a learning lesson, I am absolutely 100% much harder on him than I am my daughter. - Okay, yeah, oh well, but I don't punch him. I won't. - Yeah. - I don't punch the son and not the daughter. It's just I am absolutely- - No, that's true. - The way I choose my words in a conversation with him, I realize after the fact, it's never been made- - Like during it, I'm like, this is totally fun. - Yeah, this is how I should be discussing this. But afterwards, I'm like, what kind of fucking monster are you? - But we have your meaner to him than you are to her. - We all do that, I think though, because we all have this thing of a forum. - Boy, it can take it. - Well, not only that, it's like they need to learn how to take it almost. Whereas girls need to learn how to take it just as much, 'cause the world is just the same for them. - Just to shit it up both of them. - At the same time, we have this thing in our head of, if I mean to her, she will go find a mean guy later on. And then I'll have to kill him. And then that's just a lot of inconvenience. So if I'm nice to her, then maybe she'll find a nice guy. That's kind of how our brains work. Whereas a son, we're like, you need to get it together, man. But maybe that's the problem. Maybe that's why guys are dicks a lot of times is 'cause we're fucking-- - I think it is. - We treat them like, we don't treat them the same. - So much harder on them, yeah. I mean, at the same time, maybe we need to be harder. I'm not sure. - How do you get that? - My daughter's gay, so I can't. I could be super fucking mean to her. - She's not gonna date a bad guy. - How do you get them, though, to, at that point, the boys, like we can be meaner or we can be nice, or just, how do we get them to not rape people? That's what I'd like to get to that point. - That's right there's the sweet spot. - What's that formula? If that's how many we can-- - Hopefully I've put together a good milkshake that doesn't result in that. - I think that depends on how mom is to them. - Oh, that too. But I'm sure you can contribute. We can contribute. - Yeah. - Dad certainly could tell him how to treat women. - We can set a terrible example. That's the we could do, yeah, which is terrible. But I think a lot of that rage comes from just loathing women. Or, yeah, I don't know, there's probably, there's a lot more than just that. - Let's say that, let's say there's a cornucopia of treatment that creates a rapist. - Oh yeah, yeah, there's lots of stuff that goes into that. Obviously, that's, I'm just saying, I wanna do what I can to, that's what we need to figure out. I'm not gonna do that, that would help. - Figure out how to just be so kind to him that he wants to treat the world as such. - Maybe, maybe that's what it is. - I'm not sure, man. So the mom's name is Laura and she is a homemaker and, you know, watches the kids. His brothers are Bob and Benjamin Sharp. Now, Bob and Ben, yeah, that's just, yeah, Ben. But the weird part is, Ben is the second born. So, always strange when they junior up the second kid. I guess maybe the first kid may be named after somebody's father who died or something like that. Yeah, who knows. So. - It does suck though to be looked at as the first born and then dad's, not yet, not that. - Yeah, it was just some murder thing I was watching. That's the way it broke down and I was like, that's weird in the second kid that. So Richard was, Robert was 14 years older than Richard here. And then Ben was about nine years older. So he is much younger than his siblings. Like the parents had two kids having times. They had the mid 40s there where they were early to mid 40s and then later on, like 10 years, 12 years later, they started having kids again 'cause then they had young Richard and then they had a sister named Lori. - You know the time Richard was born? - Little after Richard was born. So yeah, they had two batches of kids there.
Now, okay, the dad is extremely abusive, not just a little abusive, extremely abusive. And think about it at the time, that was not even considered that bad. That's the thing. That was like, yeah, parents beat the shit out of their kids and it was like, well, yeah, you gotta discipline your kids. You were considered lazy if you didn't discipline your kids. The only one he did not beat up is Laurie, the girl. So belts and fists and everything. It's everything. Robert said the oldest of this said that he almost killed me for no reason at all, the father didn't have to do anything. He didn't have to spill paint in the garage. He didn't have to do any of that shit. He just, he came home and a lot of times if you're a drunk gambler and you come home and you had a bad night, you might want to take it out on everybody. Your own dumb fucking decisions and your own stupid shit. Robert remembered being covered in blood from a deep wound to his head at one point inflicted by his father. That's crazy. So that's, that's a lot. And apparently one of the grandfather's committed suicide. And that was like a big dark cloud that hung over the family that nothing was ever the same after the grandfather committed suicide. Wow. A lot of weird shit going on in this family. A lot of undiagnosed mental things and addiction and all sorts of weird shit going on here. It's also a time that you didn't discuss things and you don't get to the root of it and you don't solve problems. So no, you push it down for later going. Yeah, that's the whole family could have used just a big, just a big load of therapy, just everybody. Just one, one good round all around for everybody here. So is a lot. Now the older brothers grew up and moved out of the house, leaving Richard and his younger sister. And that's it. And he never beats up the younger sister, but he needs somebody to beat up. So Richard is the guy. And his father goes after him real, real hard, really hard. He looks to his older brother, the oldest Bob. He's talking to him, trying to like get rescued. Bob's out of the house. He's like, please, Jesus, come help me. Bob's married and has a wife and everything. And Richard described Bob as more of a father than my own father was, because in 14 years is a pretty big difference. Yeah, he can almost be his father. If he's 10, his brother's 24, you know, yeah, that's a, that also means dad's agent. So he better, he better figure it out because he's about to be out of his punch swinging days, you know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, but that's the thing. If you've cowed these children enough, especially the youngest, they're not going to fight back at all because they're scared. That's the problem. And Richard said, I started calling him, meaning Bob, two, three, four times a day. I begged his wife to let me come out, to go visit them, to stay with them for a while, to get the fuck out of the house just for a minute. If nothing was to-- They literally moved away. Yeah, they got the hell away from these people, which I can't blame them. So I mean, by the way, where they live, Derby's like a, it's a mill town that's crumbling, like things don't look good for this Richard's future. If you look at him at this point, he's, you know, getting, he's in from like a trashy family where dad's a gambler and pisses away all the money and beats the shit out of him and-- Tool and dime, yeah. Yeah, doing that, coming home, fucking covered in metal shavings and anger and just knocking everybody out. And, you know, he has this town in the '60s falling apart, crumbling. He had to seem like the most dead-end place in the fucking world. And here he is. With her in like a scummy area of Connecticut, he's got a dirty, Jesus Christ. Grace, no, everywhere. Yeah. Not great. So-- Yeah. And he's just begging his sister-in-law, please let me come live with you guys. And they won't let him. So he's stuck here. Now, around the age of 10, he started hiding in the bathroom to get away from his father. He'd go in the bathroom, lock the door. He realized that if you're in the bathroom, nobody bothers you, essentially. That's the only place he has any sort of refuge is close the door. He'll think I'm shitting for a while. That's good. And then hopefully he'll calm down before I'm done. Yeah. Yeah. Now, Wally spent-- he would spend long amounts of time in the bathroom as the thing was long time. It becomes a jail cell. Hang, yeah. His own self-imposed exile to keep him out of his father's sight, basically. He's more by eight rounds. If you're not in a sight line, maybe he won't hit you. You'd have to come think about it and then come looking for you rather than just see him be able to get pissed off at something. Now, what he started seeing in the bathroom for over lots and lots of amounts of time, as he started just hanging out and he would look through the hamper a lot. There's a hamper in the bathroom where everybody, the kids put their clothes, him and his sister. And he sees Lori's clothes in there, and he starts putting them on. He starts wearing his little sister's clothes. Yeah. Now, later on, he'll say that basically Lori was the kid that didn't get the shit beaten out of her. So this was like his way to-- maybe if he's scared-- feels like Lori, he won't get beat up or something. It's a real weird psychological thing that he's got going on here. But he said he felt so good in his sister's underwear and dresses that basically every time his father went into crazy mode, he'd go lock himself in the bathroom, sit in the corner and dress up like a sister and sit there and his sister's clothes and pretend to be her. Like, that would be his thing. That's how he would escape mentally from this. Imagine being a fly on the wall of that house going-- What is happening here? What the fuck? All the beatings and then this one leave and this is, we don't even know, this is all-- this is just what's going on with Richard. We have no idea the dynamic between the mother and father. It's probably wild. You know what I mean? So there's a lot of weird stuff going on here. And he is doing this not because he thinks it's fun. It's literally an escape from whatever's going on. This is his way of escaping. I'm not a doctor, clearly, but they've done-- No. Even that's got to be awful. A doctor. That doesn't-- Finally. That doesn't sound-- how do you get from A to B there? I don't see even him saying this just makes me feel safe. That doesn't make any sense. It does, though, to those people. I've seen a lot. I mean, the psychology of this type of thing and it's like, you know, it just makes them feel comfortable. It would have had a similar thing, the filmmaker. These aren't the claims, you know what I mean? He's 10 years old. Tell us he care. You know, she's probably-- I realize that. You know. Yeah, but it's just fucking wild that he's putting on-- It's odd. The dirties. It's definitely odd. It's fucking strange that he would be like, I'm going to put my sister's clothes on, but that would be when dad was freaking out. That's what he would do. He said, I always felt more relaxed and safer dressed like that. Meanwhile, if his dad walked in and saw him dressed like that, he'd probably get twice the beating. That's what I mean. 64 and Massachusetts, he'd come in with Connecticut, he'd come in punch and throw him beer cans at you probably, but you're going to catch a Sam Adams. Well, eventually his father did catch him. And the way Richard told it, it didn't go the way you think it would go. He didn't-- His dad like crumbled. No. His dad, he said quote, he didn't say anything about the cross-dressing. He didn't say, why are you dressed like a girl? But he yelled at me for taking my sister's clothes. He went to what you did, which is actually-- I give the guy credit. He didn't make it, he didn't make a big fucking weird deal out of the cross-dressing, but he did yell at him, he don't take your sister's clothes. Those are her clothes. Those don't belong here. You're bigger than her. You're going to tear those. Yeah, it's about stealing more than it's about cross-dressing, which is actually, you know, maybe his dad was pretty progressive. I'm not sure. At age 14, Richard had saved up enough money to buy his own first set of women's clothing. By himself an outfit, not have to steal it from his sister. So from kind of 14 through high school, it's just a merely ad of confusion and there's a lot of kids that are teenagers that are confused about their sexuality. Anyway, even if nothing happened to them, they just-- they're not sure. They're 16, they're 17, they're just not sure. That's totally common for them to have some ambiguity in their sexuality and all that kind of thing. But this-- And also your body is so specific and everybody's so different, you use-- these guys that are doing that for a whole sexual purpose, but there's things that women's products that are leaps and bounds far and away better than men's products. The older and socks, I use all-- I use a lot of women's things. But using a woman's lotion or that-- getting a coffee yourself are pretty not the same thing at all. Psychologically or any other way. It's jamming a coat, text up your ass. What do you-- Yeah. Talk about apples and oranges. That is-- Yeah. That is-- It's not necessarily-- Clamps and cucumbers, we're in a different thing. But if you're using all women's things, yes, there's something interesting about that. But there are women's products that are just far and away better than men's. Yeah, that's true. But yeah, for him, none of that is germane to this guy at all. No, he's started.
doing this to hide from his dad and then started liking it and it's to, no, it's a thing to be done. - No, it's a staycation every day. - Exactly. And he was full of confusion about his sexuality, his identity to know what the hell he was or what he liked or who he was or anything. His dad beat confusion into him essentially. - Yeah. - He said I was just a mess during that whole period of high school. - And you are in the first place and then dad made it worse. - Fuck yeah, no, absolutely. And he's not doing well in school. He's drinking Richard. He's fucking off in school. There's a teenage joy ride that he took drunk and got caught for it, drunk driving while he was doing that. - Wow, drunk. - Yeah, doing that kind of thing. Now back then that would just be they take you home and have your dad slap you around a little bit. It wouldn't be that big of a deal like it would be now. But still, he did that. He's doing shitty in school. The kids picked on him a lot in school too. It's almost like they could tell. The kids are perceptive as fucking if there's something that far different about you. They are going to lock onto it like a top gun radar and shoot a missile at it every time. - They don't know why you're different. - Nope, but they know it's different. - They know you're different and it doesn't matter. It's all you have to be. But yeah, the abuse in the house was wild and basically that's the whole thing that happens. Now, by 1972, a new girl moves to town. Okay, coming in from Mount Clemens, Michigan. Her name is Karen Hatfield. And she's-- - Yeah, last girl going to the fucking town in England. - New England, born October 3rd, 1955, be year younger than him, no big deal. Her parents are John and Patricia. She's got a brother named Jamie, a sister named Kathleen. Now, they move to Shelton, Connecticut, 'cause that's when he lives in Derby, which is right next door to Derby. They both go to Shelton High School, Richard is a senior, she's a junior. Now, he is, by the time, he's like 19, by the time they really meet a couple of years later. And everybody said that, this is the funny part is, people, 19's old for high school, number one. - Yeah. - And they said that he was arrogant and bad-mannered as well. - Oh. - Now, Karen was about to turn 17 and her sister described her as Karen always took care of everyone, that's what everybody says here. Now, Richard was liked her, basically. So Karen's friend, Karen, said he was somebody who was interested in her and was on board to try to, and maybe that's because she's a new person and doesn't know that he's been picked on forever, you know, you'd latch on to that, you don't have a rep with a new girl, essentially. So the thing is, he pays attention to her and that's all that she likes. She likes that he pays attention to her and he's very attentive and very into her stuff. She totally fell for him. Her parents hate Richard, by the way. - Is that right? - Yeah, there is no, like, they're not looking at it going, well, the man will be a doctor someday. They're looking at, he's a jerk off. - Yeah. - From the 19-year-old with bad manners. - Yeah, from this dumpy fucking town who has no future, who comes from a shit family. - But he had a black guy for Christ's sake. - Yeah, and also, what is that? A thong pantyline I see in your jeans? Oh, but that didn't help either, probably. So, Karen's senior year, he knocks her up. - Really? - Oh, yeah. Apparently she finished school with home tutoring, but knocked her up. Now, Richard and her are talking about getting married, but her father, John, will not let Richard move into the house, even though they're getting married and she's pregnant. Doesn't like him. At one point, Karen ended up at her aunt's house, and Richard found her there, and, you know, I guess they were trying to hide her. I'm trying to move her around, like a shell game, and he picked where the queen was going. And, yeah, so he followed the queen and he found it, and he flipped it over, and that's where she was. So, September 1st, 1973, wedding bells are ringing. - Well, we got married. - We got married. We got a kid. - Yeah, she's 17, and they get married in complete secrecy, they don't tell anybody. - That's fucking unbelievable. - That's wild. Didn't tell either sets of parents. - Oh, boy. - So, there's that. Now, she knows, Karen is gonna get a real idea of what she's in for right away, because, until you live with someone, you don't know what they're like. You haven't actually lived with them. - Yeah. - Spending a few hours with somebody at night, getting something to eat, they drop you off. You have no idea what they're about, nothing. - Yeah, you could spend a week with somebody, and still not know. - Still not know, go on vacation, but apparently, once you get married and move in together, that is when shit comes out. During the first week of the marriage, first week, he overslept, apparently, and this is 1973. He blamed Karen for him oversleeping, 'cause it's her fault. I don't know why, but here is a quote from a book here, as far back as 1973 during the first week of their marriage, he had hurled an alarm clock at her face after he had overslept. - So he threw the alarm clock at her because she was supposed to set it, or. - I don't know what it is. Why can't you be an alarm clock and threw it at her? Or, I don't know why, again, too. I don't know if this is his dad's example of taking something that they did, and then taking the rage out on somebody else, or what this is, but it's obviously. - Did he hit her? - Yeah, he threw it at her face and hit her. - Wow. - Now for a 17-year-old pregnant girl, that's not cool. - Yeah, imagine being pregnant in 1973, and you're young person, and you're scared already, 'cause you're fucking pregnant, you're almost 18, and everything else, and then you get married to this guy, where your parents fucking hate, and they say it's gonna be a disaster, and you go, "No, it's not, I love him, and he loves me, and we're gonna have a baby." And then he's throwing a fucking alarm clock at you. And this isn't one of these, like, you know, 2005 fucking small little travel alarm clock. These were. - This has the two rings on it. - Goddamn, speakers, either the bell with that, or a clock radio, that has, like, got wood and shit on it, that weighs three pounds. - And a phone attached to it. - Oh, the phone, speakers, everything, I think, is crazy. - Everything, everything. - Dials and nods. - Electronics and technology. - They stuck right there. - I don't think you can. - That's it. It's either that, or one that's made of metal and glass, with two metal bells at the top. - Yeah. - Either way, not something you want thrown at you, but put it that way. - Things that need a hammer to break it. - Yeah, exactly, a screwdriver to take it apart. - Yeah. - So Richard decides he wants to go to college. Now, Karen is going to work two jobs to put her husband through engineering school. - Oh, she's gonna work while he goes to school and does, like, heavy workloads at school. And this is what people used to do. It's which one of us has a better prospect of making a lot of money, and back then, it would just be the guy is going to go make the money. - Who has the penis? - Yeah, so he would go. I don't know, let's check both of your panties and find out. So, he, you know, she's going to work a lot and he's going to go to engineering school and hopefully then make a lot of money that can support this family. That's the goal that we're doing here. They also, by the way, in addition to hiding their marriage, they hid her pregnancy until it was very clear that she was pregnant. Until she was like doing that shit where she, you know, you waddle and like you, yeah. - One of those where you have to lean your shoulders back to counterbalance your weight. - And with an arm wrapped around it. - Yeah, I got on, she's a, that's when they, when she got up and it took like someone to help her as she's like, did one of those, that's, wow. - That's crazy. So that's when they finally told everybody, like, oh yeah, I guess she is pregnant. Would you look at that? - Right. - Yeah. - And that's the point, at that point, it's like that cousin that comes out as gay that like-- - You're like, and? - We knew who is so obvious. - You're spinning a baton at the front of the parade. We got it. We're in short shorts. We understand. - Right. - No one cared. That's why we didn't say anything. We just said, all right, whatever. - Get a rainbow under your eye. - Who cares? - We'll do it. - We got it. - Yeah. - It's fun when that happens, and you go. - That's when that's some shit. - And? - It's also obvious. - Yeah, go. - And, you didn't need to make an announcement. I mean, it's fine, but, you know, it's cool. Just figured. So Karen then enrolls in community college and studies nursing. And she's working two jobs. She's going to community college. A daughter is born here. - Okay. - Their daughter's name, you'll love this, Jenna. You will love this. - His name's Richard. She couldn't name him after him. - Nope, Shannon Sharp is the daughter's name. - It's where the God. - Shannon Sharp. - Well done. - Not a large black man, a small white girl. - Shannon Sharp. That's amazing. - That's great. - That's so fucking awesome. Probably for Shannon's a little older than that. Probably five, six years older than her. But yeah. - It might be the same age. - Well, in a Shannon coming to league, like 95. So he had to be like 21 and 95. So yes, 74, she could have been similar. - My fifth.
- That's the same age. - They could be a similar fucking age. That's amazing. Yeah, 'cause I think he's like 55 now or something. So anyway, now, Richard, by the way, he said, quote, "I thought Karen planned to put the baby up for adoption later on." He goes, "I thought we were, I didn't even think we were keeping this fucking baby." I thought this baby was gonna be put up for adoption. It's like, well, then why'd you get married? - Right. - So that doesn't make sense. - No, now Richard earns an engineering degree, which is a big deal. You can make some money with that. Then he says, "No, no, I'm not done. "Don't want to be an engineer. "I want to be a doctor." - Well, that was a waste. - Medical doctor. Yeah. - Four years pissed away. - Because that doesn't translate. - I don't think it does. No, I don't know. - I don't think any of those prerex are the same. - Well, either way, you go to college and then you go to, you're gonna have to go to a medical school after that. So, that's sort of pre-med courses you have to do. - Right, that's my point. You gotta do other things before you can go to medical school. - We don't know those things. Hey, everybody, don't know if you've noticed this or not, but neither of us went to medical school. We, neither of us went to college. We have no goddamn idea what we're talking about. We just know that engineering and doctors are different people. Engineers and doctors are different people. - I went to ASU for a couple hours to go to electrical work. - That's fun. - And then get the fuck off campus to their children. - Wave that thing around, yeah. Oh, man. So Richard said, I'd always wanted to be a doctor, but having not done so well in school, I initially thought it was beyond my reach. Now I decided to try. So he gets into school and now he said that after that, he said, "We actually got ahead of the curve, meaning the family. We actually started to be successful. I'm going to medical school, whatever." Now the problem is while all this is going on, he's got a lot going on. He gets his degrees going to medical school. He also starts becoming pretty abusive for what? From what we understand. This is from an affidavit filed by Karen. They will make up, break up, break up, make up, a shit load of times these two over the years. Just one day here, two days there, Karen always ends up going back basically quoting the bigger picture, saying, "I want my kids to grow up in a family where they're successful and have money and go to private, whatever. They're just trying to do all that." So she's trying to say, "If I just ignore getting beat on, it's fine." Which is a terrible thing to do, but a lot of people did that back then. They really did. So 76 here. Karen said that Richard, "Wow, imprisoned her in their home for 48 straight hours beating her the whole time." - Why? - Dude, that's not, that's not like, oh, he got real mad and he was drunk and he punched her, which is still crazy. But this is, you don't-- - Locked the doors all weekend. - You don't realize what you're doing after, say, 20 hours or so of holding someone prisoner and beating them. You don't go, "This is crazy what I'm doing right now," right? Like, no amount of anger in hours that long. - And you're not allowing somebody to leave while continuously beating them is crazy. - You were saying you talked to your son, you say something shitty and then like 10 minutes later, you're like, "What, I do that." - Why am I so mean? - 48 hours, imagine if you just yelled at him for 48 hours calling him names. - And punched him. - Now she was hurt bad enough to need to go to the hospital. - Oh yeah. - Richard went with her and while the doctors are working on her, this is what she put in an affidavit for divorce filings later on. Quote, "He accompanied me to the hospital and while I was being treated, he whispered in my ear, quote, "I want you to die." (laughing) - What the fuck? There's nothing funny about that. - No. - That's the funniest thing I've ever heard. - It's hilarious and crazy. That's comedians, we have to see the dark side of this, but that is to not be like, did you hear that? Did everybody hear that? Totally shit. He just said he wants me to die. This is crazy. - Oh, they're checking your blood pressure. - Yeah. - I want you to die. - He walked and probably kissed her on the cheek and then whispered it and they thought, "What a sweet husband, look at him." Right by his wife's side. What a nice guy. (laughing) He was holding her hand rubbing the top of it gently and he said, "I want you to die." No good, yeah, it's great. You hungry? Can I go get you anything? Are you okay? - God damn it, he's crazy. - He's a fucking whack job and it gets weird. 80 or 81 New Year's Eve, not sure of the year here. One of the two, it's New Year's Eve. They were out at a event or something. They were drinking. Richard got drunk and while they were driving home, he decided he was going to beat the shit out of her in the car as they're driving. - Oh boy. - Which again, I don't know how you do that, but that's a whole set for us. - I guess it's a non snowy New Year's Eve. - It would have to be. They tried to stop at a hotel along the way. Let's just stop 'cause he was drunk and it was late. She said, quote, "We stopped at a hotel, "but we were denied occupancy "because I was covered in blood." They were like, we can't, you know, what are you doing? There's like a wounded person. You should go to the hospital. - She's leading actively. - From the face. - At the, what are your rates tonight? - What? - A hotel refused them service. And two, why would you take her in the office with you if you're gonna be a crazy abusive lunatic and you want a parade or a shower off or something? Look what I did, it's so strange. - Was it that different of a time that? - This is 1981, that doesn't, I mean, I get different, but this is like. - Why? - But the spousal abuse has just accepted that much? - I wouldn't imagine so. I mean, no, I don't think so. But anyway, she said, as a result of this incident, I suffered from a broken nose, a concussion, two black eyes, and a split lip. Imagine what she looked like. - Who he is? - Jack in her, huh? - She looked like fucking Rocky at the end of Rocky 1 for fuck's sake. - That's some Ali Fraser shit. - Yeah, this is terrible. So that's a lot. Now, 1983 comes along, they're still together. - What the fuck? - Which is wild. Now, Shannon Sharp at this point is 10 years old. I guess, that's so hard to say that, and not picture a giant black man. - I realize there's probably a lot of her that exists. - This is same exact spelling, so when I see it, it's just really funny to me, the E and everything. So, she talks a lot of shit. - It's a lot of shit talking, you know, big for a tight end, but quick. So, she's 10 years old. She later filed her own affidavit during a divorce proceedings and said, quote, this is the daughter. Now, this is a 10-year-old, 10. Imagine that we both have daughters. Imagine dating your 10-year-old daughter and doing this. Crazy. Quote, he grabbed my neck and continually slam my head against the wooden bed frame until I could no longer breathe. My next memory is my head hitting the stairs as he dragged me down the flight of stairs, screaming and battering me. A 10-year-old girl. - Bastard had against the bed until she was unconscious, obviously. - Yeah. 'Til she was on drugs. - And then drug her. - That's how she woke up, getting her head bounced off the stairs as she fucking got dragged down them. Now, his father was abusive. Is this his way of like some weird mental thing of like, you don't beat my sister up, but you beat me up. So now I'll beat up again. I don't understand the psychology here. I just don't get it. I'm of the, I'm of the like. - It's a sick man, James. - I don't want things that happen to me to happen to my kids. Not I'm gonna flip whatever happened to me on my kids. Like, I'm not a part of that. So. - I got it. So now I get to give it. I don't understand that. - This is almost, I think, has something extra. I mean, it is the only kid. So it's not like he has a choice. He could beat up a son, but he's choosing to beat up a daughter. But still, this is a, - But he's also beating the wife and that's. - Yes. Is this beating all the women up in the house? That's crazy. - I don't understand lashing out against my family like that. - I don't either. I don't get it. Much more of a, I'll go sit by myself and be depressed for a minute rather than lash out at others. Type of thing. - Yeah. - That's just me. - I can't imagine making wanting to make another person. Let alone a child or a wife or just wanting somebody to feel what you felt when you, you've been through this. You know how that feels. - And I blame myself for everything too. So like I could imagine taking it out on somebody else. I blame myself for shit that you do for fuck's sake. I do, I'll blame myself for anything. One time I just had to unload a toolbox that my mom gave me and that the horrible memories of each tool that I'm pulling out of these boxes that I used as a child and the memories attached to them are horrific. I get away all of it. - Good, that's a good deal. - You don't, and I'm still mad at me about a lot of the shit in there. - I don't blame you. - No, I get my ass better than anybody. - Yeah, I'll tell just from the show, people will, if someone's mad, it takes exception to something you say. I'll say, well blame me because I'm the guy who's got final cut so I could have added it out. That's my fault. I literally say that. Whatever anybody says, blame me because it's my fucking thing. I'm the one cutting it and I'm the one the final say on everything. Yeah, so, I don't know, that's a, we have a weird-- - And I said it and I'm fine with it. - Yeah, we have some weird shit going on here, but I just say blame me because it's easier. - Yeah.
You know, fucking, now others, I don't know. I feel like when you've been abused or when you've been through something, you feel like you can take more than people that haven't. - Well, yeah, absolutely. - Does that make sense? - Yeah. - You just feel like whatever, I don't know, I'll deal with it, I'll handle it. - Very much understand that, yeah. - But I don't understand lashing out at others and blaming, and he's actually injuring other people, especially women, especially your daughter, your ten-year-old daughter, that's crazy. - Women and children. - To not have the instinct to fucking just protect a young daughter as much as possible, is a very strange thing for a guy who ain't not here. - He could easily find a crazy bar and go get drunk and challenge a man. - Yeah, and he doesn't wanna do that, as you'll find out. He's a very thin guy, he's not a very physical guy. That's the other thing, too. He's kind of a, he's a meat guy. I mean, he doesn't, he came up getting picked on and he never said, well, I'm gonna work out and get big and I'm gonna be tough like that. And that part never clicked in. He just finally found someone who's asked he could kick and it's a ten-year-old girl or his wife. Now, Shannon, his daughter also swore that on several occasions, she found that her father had taken her underwear for his own use. Okay, that's creepy, that's fucking creepy. You'd use your daughter's underwear on your own self. - And what's your use? - Waring them. - Yeah, right. - He's fucking wearing them. When she hit her teenage years, he started taking other items of her clothing. Now, he'd been stealing clothes from his wife the whole time, from Karen, but he's also stealing clothes from partial fine clothes missing and, you know, he'll have worn them. So, 1985, the family moves to the Boston area. This is so Richard could continue his medical training. Okay, 'cause he's still trying to become a doctor, that takes forever. In 1985, he became a research fellow at the Wellman Laboratory at Massachusetts General Hospital. He spent about a year under a guy named Dr. Richard Grandstein. Dr. Dick's just everywhere. Wow, everyone's named Dr. Richard. - It was such a popular name. - Such a common name. - It was probably 'til '70s? - Yeah, the '70s everybody started laughing and saying, "Dick, that's hilarious." Before that, no one even noticed somehow. - Everybody had an uncle dick though. - Everybody, yeah. - Everybody. So, from '87 to July '87 to June of '90, he was a resident at the Harvard Academic Department of Dermatology, look at you, all fancy. Now in the '90s, we'll talk about, this is when his career really takes off. From mid '90 to 1993, he was a full-time instructor in Dermatology, seeing patients and making rounds with students, so he's instructing now. - Wow, it's your largest organ, James. - It is, well, maybe yours. - Ah, yeah, well, yeah, but mine has to also cover that organ. - That's right. So, April 26, 1991, this is when shit really gets crazy. Now, maybe you'd go, okay, maybe the abuse before, maybe he felt like his life was spinning out of control, maybe he felt like he couldn't get, still not even close to an excuse, but maybe possibly a reason. By this point, the family's living in the Cambridge area. This is April 26, 1991. He's being successful, the family is thriving, as much as we can see. Richard comes home from work unexpectedly. Now, apparently, according to court records, he found Karen with another man at home. Gee, wonder why she would possibly want to find somebody else. - Was he possibly kissing or not punching her? - Yeah, you think. And also wearing his own underwear possibly. You know, just not stealing hers. Where are women's, if you want, but don't steal them from her. - Sticking off his own underwear. - Yeah, he asked, so she then said, "I want a divorce." He came home quarter in the act apparently, and she said, "Well, I want a divorce." Okay, the next morning comes around. Everybody's still in the house. According to Karen, and really the hospital and lots of other people do, Richard took a fork and stabbed her in the forehead with it. Just pink right in the forehead. - Don't I get it? - That's the noise it would bet. Pink is just, pink, it's not going much further, but stab right in the forehead. - Very shallow stab. - Yeah, stick or does it fall out? Probably falls out. - You probably falls out, but you're gonna have time marks up there. - All four of them. - Stuck of fucking fork, which is just wild black of control of your rage. To just be like, ooh, and just stab some in the forehead, especially it's not even like a directed wound, not in the neck, right in the forehead. - Aiming for an eye though, you think? - Who the fuck knows? I'm not sure, we don't know how big of a forehead she has at this point, so we don't know, might have been a big target or maybe not. So Karen grabs Shannon and flees the house. We don't know possibly with a fork dangling from her forehead. She reported the attack to the police. Here we go, the first time they've come up at all in this story. Richard is involuntarily committed to a psychiatric hospital because of this incident. - Oh. - Yeah, they immediately put him away, she's like. - They couldn't explain it. - I'll fork, he's got to be crazy. - Yeah, and he's a doctor too, so they're kind of, you know, looking at that. He was diagnosed with major depression, with features of anxiety and skitzoid or other personality disorder. - Oh. - Okay, now, two days later, Karen goes back to the police and we're can'ts everything. Didn't happen. - She's been in contact with him at all. - Don't know why I said that, it didn't happen. It has to have been. We know that Richard pressured Karen and Shannon to stop, to we can't everything because, well, he said, not that it didn't happen. He said, they're gonna take my medical license away. - They're gonna have everything. - Basically, everything we've worked for for the last 20 years will be gone. If you don't tell them that this didn't happen. - That's the reason you don't stab people with fork. - That's the thing. - And this is consequences for behavior. - This is that when you're talking about high dollar people and people that make good money and have a lot to lose, this is why you constantly see athletes beating up their girlfriends and then the next day, two days later, the girlfriend recants everything and they go, see, we're just happy the truth came out and they're like, the truth, my ass, the truth is, this guy's gonna get fucking Ray Rice and suspended, and never play again. And if she likes driving around in fancy cars, he told her you better fucking tell the cops that shit didn't happen or else we're gonna be back where we've came from. - If she likes getting on planes from the tarmac with only 12 people on them. - Exactly. - She better change her story. - And that's what they tell 'em and that's what it is and then everybody turns into that. So that's why things never get done with athletes and that's why a lot of their shit never gets reported because they don't want it to be public and neither do the women because they want the money or they want whatever. So either way, it's crazy though that that happens. Now a criminal record for stabbing with a fork, your wife in the forehead, no one's going to you as a doctor and you're probably not gonna be working for Harvard much longer that happens. So it worked, she recanted. They have nothing else to go on. So he leaves the hospital, he's got prescriptions for anxiety and depression medication and that's what he's been diagnosed with and goes right back to the family home. - But he's got meds now. He got, he has meds now and at that point, this is what Richard said from that point on. Quote, whether he takes them or not it's a whole separate issue. - I'm sure. - Quote, I was concerned that she wanted to be back not because she loved me but because I was a meal ticket. Also, you have a family and she's probably seems like a decent person who's trying to keep her family together. Also. - He said it, okay. - But once he starts beating up the kid, the family's over and we're the fuck out of here. Doesn't matter. Stabbing in the forehead, whatever. By 1983, when he was bashing Shannon's head into the bed, that would have been the end of the marriage I would hope. Now, while he was in the institution here, while he was committed, Shannon is like 18 years old at this time. - Yeah. - She's basically an adult. While he's in the institution, she became violently ill after eating some whipped cream. - Oh. - Which is not normal. - No, that's not pretty safe, usually, right? - Unless she just developed some serious lactose intolerance like or she found the one that hasn't been turned over in the fridge, it's just been there. - Well, she was rushed to the emergency room. So this wasn't just like a stomachs a little upset. After she was discharged, she went home and found in the kitchen, her mother's diet bars, whatever the fuck those were for the '90s, had tiny syringe holes in them. Think about that. Dad's a doctor has access to lots of syringes. So she said the bars gave off the same foul smell she noticed in the whipped cream as well. Yeah. So she believed that her father was trying to poison both her and her mother, and that's what happened. No charges ever filed over that that doesn't go anywhere. It's just this is like in the family lore, as he tried to kill us both that time, remember. - Does she tell her mom or does she?
Yeah, yeah. Told her mom about it. Karen says that sounds awful. We'll have to discuss it with him when he gets home because he's we'll talk about it over dinner. Yeah. He's moving back into the house. So he's coming back. Oh boy. So that became a big deal and the commitment and all of this shit becomes a big family secret for a while until divorce proceedings occur later on. So then they move into a new house. They move north. They settle in a big home at eight great ledge road in West Gloucester. And they start trying to have some semblance of normalcy. They have a son now. Now they have it's been 20 years. Yeah. They had a long time apart. Yeah. Two batches. Same thing. 92. They have a son named Mikey and 95. A daughter named Alexandra. They call her Allie. So we're having another another. So now they have three kids. Two very little and one an adult. And dad's not stable. You fucked. No, I was not fixing anything. Absolutely not. No, no, nothing is getting fixed here. I don't know how they this was all kept together or what. But from 93 till June of 2000, he was a part-time clinical instructor at Beth Israel Hospital. And he died at work. He's great. Everybody. No one has a complaint about him at work. His supervisor here, Dr. Joseph Kvedkar, Feddar, Feddar, whatever the fuck you say that said he was a very, very bright, very directed man and had clear ideas of where he wanted to take his life and where he wanted to go. That's a guy from a Harvard medical school. Another one, Dr. Steve Shama, who was a clinical instructor said that he remembered him as a major donor to the dermatology foundation. He said Richard was one of the most generous people in the state. He would give me whatever I would ask for and called him an upright nice guy upright upright. Yeah. Well, that's gets from the corset and keeps you. Yeah. Keeps you very upright. That's how that works. It's it's very tight back there. Yeah. Keeps you can't help but stand up straight. That's the way it works. A lot of bending happening. So he opens his own dermatology business. And this is where he's going to make his dough money. Money. He's got lasers that take hair off that shit like that. Oh, yeah, that's where the money's at, my friends. So, yep, his first office was at the Cape Ann Medical Center in Blackburn industrial park. And then he moved to an office near O'Malley Middle School. And then he had an office in the Shaw's Plaza on Eastern Avenue. And he had hospital affiliations with Addison Gilbert Hospital and Beverly Hospital. He treated hundreds of patients and they all loved him. Just printing it. Yeah. He was this is from the newspaper. Quote. He's remembered as a smart doctor who helped patients, but also as a doctor who often unnerved patients who would go patients who would go for an office visit for a specific mole or skin lesion, then be asked to remove all their clothes with no bedside manner. Also, let me try those panties on. Those look pretty good while we're here. That's uncomfortable. I have a mold. See, it's right. It's on my cheek right here. Yeah, take your pants off. Don't you take your pants off? And then we'll talk about it. All right. No, I'm the way to. Let's go. Bring them over. I've been to dermatologist bunches of time just because living in the skin cancer capital of fucking everything. You go in and you get checked out and they they strip you down. But I mean, they're the only time they're concerned with anything to look further as if they see something. You know, I mean, they don't go. Yeah. Here's a mole on your neck, pull your dick out. You know, that's what I'm saying. Yeah. I generally, that's the safest area. I have this very specific thing. And he's like, take your dick out. That's real weird. It's just strange. And they found it strange. That's that's that's the area that's covered the most. No, there's very little skin cancer found around assholes and dicks. I would hope so. Talk about luck. Yeah. My assholes never been exposed to the sun and it's fucking how the fuck did that happen? Jesus Christ. I spent my whole life covering my asshole outdoors. This is impossible. And that's probably true right now, but now that Aaron Rogers X is telling people to sun their asshole. It's about to get way back because that's like a very sensitive area. Who would care about the shade of their asshole is an amazing thing. It's not even the shame. It's that's how you absorb the the sun's light. Oh my God. Well, yeah, if anyone who would fuck Aaron Rogers is dumb enough to think that you absorb light through your asshole. Yeah, she's a she's alone. As far as I know too many want to get married to her. She wanted to go fuck some other people for wars. Idiots. I used to sun my asshole when I got to go blow and roll. I have a bunch of relatives who are in their mid-90s. None of them ever take their assholes out. You don't know. I don't. They might have an asshole sun and patio. You don't have any idea of any idea. My 96 year old Uncle Tino could be out there with his ass haul out. We have no clue. Really. It feels like if they were doing that and that's what got them to 97. They'd probably call you and they'd be telling everybody. Yeah, they'd be telling all their friends. So now outside the office, the sharps look like the perfect family. Obviously they're, you know, next door neighbor said you'd think there they are again, the perfect family. That's what the next door neighbor said. He's a doctor wealthy. They have a lot of money. They have a lot of things. The kids look nice. They're dressed nice. You know, not a lot of work though. No, none of that shit. So Karen though, we'll never let anybody know about anything. She's got her sister Kathleen said that Karen never told her or their two brothers about the abuse. He said she didn't share it with any of us because she didn't want us to feel her pain. She also didn't want you to say, are you out of your fucking mind? Get out of there, which is another reason. Then this is funny from the early 1990s here. Okay, this is a wild one. Just from the start to the end of the sentence is crazy. This is from an affidavit from Karen. Quote, my husband and I went out to dinner with my family and he drank to access. Okay, that makes sense. When we arrived home with my family, my husband became belligerent, began parading around the house naked. Okay. And punched my brother, Jamie. That is. Okay. That's belligerent. That's the definition of belligerent. You get drunk, strip off all your clothes and punch your brother in law for no reason. That's fucking the dictionary definition of belligerent right there. Look at my dick, look at my dick. Pow, knocking people out. Yeah. Does he parading around nude? So he's shaken his dick at the end. Oh, you know it. That's crazy. Yeah. You got to really, it's like a strut, like a peacock strut. And for Jamie, it's got to be surprising because I'll tell you what, the last guy you expect to punch in the face is a naked guy. Naked isn't the best way to fight. So you don't expect anyone naked to start a physical fight with you. And if they do, you're very surprised, very surprised. Indeed. Richard can't handle lose, man. No, he is not good on the booze. Now, that'll keep going throughout time here. 1995, Richard founded a company called ClickMed. It evolved into laser hair, like laser laser, which was a chain of laser hair removal clinics. Oh, my makes millions. Yeah. Millions were talking now. Starts really stacking it up. He also ran a medical software company. He held patents and was playing the stock market doing very well in investments doing all this. He is stacking money. By 1997, he made his first million. By January 2000, the family's net worth was estimated at over five million. Yeah, they said the first one's the hardest to make. And then they just start raining on you. I guess money just starts pouring in after that. I never know how that works, but it sounds great. Yeah. What did you make? One million people like, well, he's got a million. They start throwing money at you. That's how it works. Who knew he doesn't need it? We gave him a million. So he clearly deserves all of the others. Why not? Jesus. So Richard really, really hates body hair, as you can imagine. He hates his own. He does the laser shit. Yeah. He's got a hate body hair and think about the psychology here for Richard body. It's all wrapped up in this. He used his laser equipment to remove all of his body hair. His own minus eyebrows and head. His head is the rest of him. Yeah. Clean. Like a turtle shell as Dennis Reynolds would say. Clean and smooth. He then prescribed himself hormones and stole his wife's birth control pills in an effort to grow boobs. Oh. Yes. So now he's trying to grow boobs and his removed all his body hair. You see, that's what gang didn't understand is that you don't have to kill people and make the suit. You'd really just make this the suit. You can make that the suit. That's all you need it to do. Then he got a nose job, apparently. Okay. And so yeah, basically, It's got enough money to do whatever he wants there.
He goes to all of his own clinics as the work done, Karen said he became very obsessive about money, obsessive. He made sure that everything was in his name, everything, nothing's in Karen's name. House is, which is funny because if she files for divorce, none of that matters. But no, no, no, no, no, no, she's still getting half. So he can put it in fucking, how do you do his name? It doesn't matter. She's still getting half. But that's his idea, right? To protect everything? It's just to be able to control. It's just, you know, pull the strings a little bit more. I don't think he's thinking of divorce. I think he's thinking of, I don't want her to spend anything or think she's in charge of anything. One account said that she was micromanaged and controlled by him to a wild extent. Then there's a woman named Linda DeFruscillo. Linda DeFruscillo. Here she comes. Linda DeFruscillo. Linda DeFruscillo. Linda DeFruscillo. Linda DeFruscillo. The fruit. She came in. She ran her own company called A&A Laser and also electrolysis and skincare associates. She was an electrolysis and an electrolyologist, that's how they put it here, esthetician, a professional hair remover. She'll take your hair off. She'd be competition is what she is. Well, no, but they became really good friends and business associates. They would review each other or not review, but refer each other to each other. She said that he became, quote, a dear friend. Now, no, there's no affair or anything is going on just friends with this lady. Business associates. Yeah. 1999 high school reunion time for everybody. I don't know what year or whatever, but she organizes a high school reunion for the Shelton Connecticut classmates. Richard gets really shit faced and super mad that the DJ played Karen's old boyfriends request and not his. So he threw a drink at the disc jockey throws a just how dare a high school reunion DJ dude. He doesn't get a fuck. Yeah. He's been in his mini van with his crater shit and put it down and was this is, you know, with a list of 1979 hot 100 that means his 74 he's like, I wonder why I put here the spinners, I guess a little bit of this, a little bit of that. What do you guys want some Zeppelin like the graduate 74? Something like that. Yeah. That was just a 25 year. Got it. Yeah. Yeah. So anyway, he got mad through a drink at the disc jockey and caused a big mess and they had to. You know, she didn't put away that's a thank fuck for that. Yeah. He's so he'd had been Harvard Medical School instructor who throws drinks at people and stabs people in the forehead before he steals his daughter's underwear. Unbelievable. Very nice. Doing very well. Multimillionaire. And there's a place here called the rum line are you, I'm sorry, are H UMB? I guess that's rum. Rumba? No. Yeah. R-H-U-M-B. There's no way. Oh, I'm not sure. Richard likes to go around and go to bars and shit after work sometimes. Yeah. A local musician knew him, a guy named Alan Estes, knew him through his wife who worked in his medical office. So my wife works for this guy, I got to hang out with him sometimes. Estes also did work on the house as well. He would hire him, Richard would hire him and do handyman shit around the house. He remembered Richard and Karen coming to hear him play at the rum line on railroad avenue. And he said, for a while, he was a fairly social guy. Come out and do shit. Imagine that's the list of your friends that my employer's husband, yeah, who knows? The owner of this place, Fred Shrigley, he said, according to him, sometimes Richard would come in with this Estes guy's wife, his office employee to listen to the music. Now this Fred said, she was a beautiful woman and I think he liked to be seen with her, but he started to get weirder and weirder. In public? In public. The guy eventually had to ban him from the bar. What was he doing? I don't know, but I worked at a bar for a long time. You have to be a problem to get permanently banned from the bar. Yeah, is he like, are they exchanging underwear in public? There's got to be some sort of like threat to other people. Apparently he was, he get extra extra drunk, which was part of it, and he harassed the door man. He would act erratically, just fucking pissing the staff off being a problem. The Estes guy said, everybody was watching him go downhill. He was a successful businessman and a doctor, and he was always walking a fine line of lunacy. A fine line of lunacy is a great name for this episode, which fine line of lunacy. I like that. So anyway, he said that people saw him losing more and more touch with reality as time went on. What is going on? He later wrote a song, Estes, about this whole thing, calling it quote, the ballad of Dr. Sharp, he's like, and he's singing this at the rum line. This is that's like an old country song from like the, the ballad of Wyatt Earp or something like that's crazy. A ballad of Dr. Sharp. He wore, he wore his daughter's underwear, came on through the door. Early 2000. Okay. He's got a lot of pressure. Some of his business deals are going bad, and if you know anything about early 2000, this is the dot com bubble has burst. So if you had a lot of your money in that, some of that has shrunk away. Sure. It's not great. He's being sued by several competitors for different business reasons here. So to keep the money out of reach of people suing him and things like that, he's got to start and money. He's got to start transfers. He transfers almost three million dollars into an accountant Karen's name, not the business, not his Karen. He also put the new house that the family was building and went them in her name as well. Okay. So now she has three million dollars and a huge house. Yeah. A very good day. Yep. He continued to wear makeup, dressing women's clothes. He's doing this all the time throughout all this, by the way. That never goes away. And he would stay out all hours of the night sometimes and no one knew what the fuck he was doing. Apparently, now Karen, and this is by, we're not, we're not sure if this is true, but there's in a documentary they talked about this that Karen's apparently began a relationship with a contractor who was working on the house. She had some kind of a fair there, but we don't know if that's true or not. I wouldn't blame her for Christ's sake. Yeah. Now, Shannon here who is 26 at this point and still living at home, I would have gotten the fuck as far away from these people in this fucking house. There's something moment I turned 18, keeping an eye on mom, right? Or maybe the little siblings, I'm not sure. But she told her mother that I found something in dad shit. Apparently, dad brought home duct tape and rubber hoses, which is an odd combination of shit to bring home. So Karen immediately, at that point, started believing that he was planning to kill her and the two younger children. That's what she started thinking. So she was scared at that point and rubber hoses, we're all dead. We're all dead. Well, what else do you do with duct tape and rubber hoses, I think, is what he, I mean, rubber hoses like, like, I don't know what strangled me, syringe hoses, you know what I mean? Like, yeah, I think so. I think that's what it was. Yeah. From him, I can't imagine. It was stuff chunks of garden hose, but why do you need duct tape in that in your house? Yeah. I mean, there's, there's certainly a way to explain it. I don't know. I think that's the problem, yeah. And if it's coming, if it was nothing else weird has happened now, all of a sudden there's duct tape and hoses, you might give them the benefit of the doubt that they were going to make some weird art project. But this guy, you go, he's going to kill us, holy shit versus anything out of the ordinary is a possible murder weapon. I don't know. Is it only those two supplies in a bag? That's not good. Yeah. That's what he brought home, just those two things, which is very odd. Oh, boy. One day, February 28th, 2000, at seven in the evening, Richard is upstairs in the bedroom taking a nap. Karen takes Mikey and Ali, the two little kids, walks out of the house and checks in on Motel. Oh, he's getting away. Now she went to a motel, even though they have a brand new house, because she didn't, because she thought he was training after. She didn't want him to know where she is. And she wanted to hide out so she didn't want to be found. She didn't want him around later. She called Richard, but didn't tell him where she was, wouldn't divulge that. She said she wanted a divorce, and he said, if you're going to divorce me, guess what? I'm going to divorce you first. I'm going to divorce you that. Take that. And I get half your panties. What do you think of that? You want half my money? I get half of your un-mentionables. Boom. The songs are mine. Half the thugs. Half those frilly bras that you have that kind of see consortacy or nipples through. I want half.
So March 9th 2000, okay, we've got divorce proceedings here. He files for divorced first in the Essex Pro bait and family court. Karen had readily agreed to divorce to so she's happy to do this around the same time an employee of his a long time employee named Suzanne Cross and quits the office because she resigned because she learned that his wife had left him and was hiding from him. So she thought that he was probably dangerous, dangerous or just not the best guy to work for early April 2000. That's when Karen and the kids move into the new house in Wendem, okay. Now, the apparently it's in her name, but Richard talks about it as a house he owns because they're married. So whose name it says is really pretty irrelevant here legally anyway. So he regarded it as his and for her, it's the only place they ever she ever lived without him outside of her parents house. So she likes it. A neighbor said that I had talked to her and saw for a few months. She said Karen said that she just didn't want him here. Now Shannon is working as a laser tech in her father's practice. She works for him. She works for him. Yeah. And didn't move to Wendem with the mother. She stayed in the fucking house with the dad. This is wild. She's the one who found the duct tape and rubber roses for Christ's saying she's like, I'll stick around. So we're not sure, but it's Karen and the two little kids in a big new house here. Now that same month, Richard's got a receptionist that he's been seeing on the side. We assume he's been seeing in the on the side because he moves her into the into the house with him with the daughter, with the daughter, I guess, yeah, unless she went and got an apartment. I'm not sure. This is Paula Hiltz, H-I-L-T-Z. So they move her into the Gloucester house. He, by the way, at this point is also now taking shitloads of pain killers all the time in addition to drinking. Yeah. So he's got an addiction problem. He's fallen apart here. Yeah. Yeah. Now Karen, she's starting to have a little renaissance while she's out. Oh, fucking a rebirth. She's friends are socializing and she's enjoying her freedom and being not have to worry about him stabbing her with a fork or his skid marks in her underwear. Yeah. Or his dick marks in their underwear either one or both equally bad. So Karen hires a high profile divorce firm here. They file for a court order of protection under the Massachusetts abuse prevention statute, a Supreme Court justice later said in May 2000 that the request of Karen Sharp supported by her affidavit and after an expartee hearing, the judge and the probate and family court issued in a separate action and abuse prevention order against Richard Sharp. So not allowed to come over. On May 30, the order is extended again. And then on June 12, the judge extends it indefinitely. Oh, there's no end to this. No. So I think it had to be reviewed every couple weeks and then then after the last one, they can review it indefinitely. So there's two more affidavits, one day to June 9th and one day to June 12th and then from Karen and that's what led to the indefinite thing here. She said that basically he had verbally and physically abused her on a number of occasions there was proof and witnesses and shit. So now apparently the same day the judge appointed a guardian for the chill art guardian adlight him for the children and also sealed the case at Karen's request with Richard's agreement. Sealing is very important because Richard wants none of this to be public. Yeah. And really neither does Karen. So I mean, he keeps pregnancies and marriages to secure it. He doesn't want this out. No. And this would be everything in here is what he does, drug use, drinking abuse, cross-dressing, what he's doing. So marriages and pregnancy are generally happy things that you tell everybody about. He's keeping that secret. He's going to keep this secret. No shit. So Karen's motion also said that to get it sealed, he said the affidavits may be extremely detrimental to the parties and their minor children. Basically, she didn't want the kids to read about this shit. Right. Anywhere. And he didn't want anyone to know about it. So. He doesn't want anybody to read about. No. So the order bars him from the Wendem house. Now according to the prosecutors and Karen's family, he violated it constantly. Never would listen. No. He's like, fuck that. This is my house. His whole thing is, this is my house and you're spending my money. Yeah. So I'll do what I want. That's his whole crazy plan here. Apparently in the months here after that, he kept breaking the thing, the restraining order. Karen also suspected he had hired a private investigator to follow her. Oh, she filed an affidavit saying, I believe I'm being followed at my husband's directive. Okay. Also, they describe, you know, being in the hospital more than months, broken nose, split lip, black eyes, the whole motel incident. She said she was scared to death of her husband and unhappy quote about the cross dressing. That's not good. Her own family said they didn't know about it. Like we said before, now March 5th, 2000. This is less than a week after Karen walked out and four days before he filed for divorce. So before it was escalating, Richard Sharp fell down a flight of stairs. He was carrying a laser diode at the time. He's carrying one of his laser machines. Right. So he fell with that. He suffered a concussion, which is really ridiculous. By the way, he's a laser broken. I have no idea about the laser, but he's drinking. He's taken pain killers and taken tumbles down the steps with very expensive medical equipment, which seems stupid. The times walking downstairs that you seem like you'd probably be most careful. You would imagine so. Yeah. He's as careful as he could be. And it's not happening. So he wants to have her served with the divorce papers, but couldn't find her. She's in the motel. So he wanted this done big time. So there's a guy he talks to and he tells this guy quote, I want this is the guy who was approached said, he said, I want you to break into a hotel room. And he showed me the key. He said that Karen had up to $100,000 of his cash and other financial documents that she had stolen. So he wants him to steal it all back. Yeah. So Richard also his business is fucking falling apart. He starts inflating invoices to make more money. So he starts, which is highly illegal. Can't do that at all. Taken pain killers drinking his businesses are falling apart being sued by competitors. His wife is suing him and divorcing him. It's a mess. He's been thrown out of the bar. He likes his employees are quitting because he's a scumbag. Right. It's a lot that musician said quote, everyone was watching him go downhill crash and burn. I mean, like a fucking just right down on the ground. So when she got the, the abuse prevention order on May 17th that we talked about, she said in her, in her filings quote, he also prescribed himself hormones and stole birth control pills in an effort to make his breast grow. And then said also he's having me followed. So there's a lot here. In the spring of 2000, while all this is going on, Harvard is gone now. They quit on them. They quit on them. The dermatology department, not because he's an idiot. Yeah. Because he doesn't really, they just pay him for nothing, basically. The dermatology department reviewed its list of part time faculty and found 30 people who were not involved in anything, but listed as part time faculty and probably some kind of a check. Yeah. They said there were 30 people who weren't really actively involved. We sent them all a letter telling them if they felt differently, they should contact us to provide us with evidence of their value. Otherwise, we're not going to pay you anymore. Yeah. So his appointment was terminated in June of 2000. So there's a lot. At one point here in June of 2000, he wanted a gun. He wanted a rifle. He said, Oh, looking for a rifle. Now Paula Hiltz has an ex boyfriend who is a shitload of guns. So Richard goes over to that guy and tries to buy a gun from him and the guy won't sell him a gun. He said, No, I don't know if he just doesn't want to sell his guns or doesn't want to sell his guns to him, but that's probably what it is. Everybody wants to sell every. I'll sell you anything I have for the right price. You don't even price exactly. Yeah. None of the, they're not all family heirlooms. This is no, like, you know, great grandfather used this at fucking cold harbor in 1863. That's my family has nothing of that. No, fuck you don't own anything. Not at all. No. As soon as it got lost coming across the ocean, at some point, probably whatever we had from back then, I think they all came over here. Panyless. Oh, yeah. And easy way to get away from it all. No shit. So July 14, 2000 carrying it's ready for a night out and this is a
her first real big night out, just going to party and have some fun here, just live 14. Yeah. She left Michael and Alexandra who are seven and four at her house at the Wendham House with the babysitter, a Kristen Dormitzer who's 19 years old. You see pizza being ordered for sure. She left extra pizza cash without a doubt. Go to sleep, my boyfriends coming over. That's. Yep. Yep. After a little effort, eat that pizza, go crash out. I'm gonna get figured out your love seat. Yeah. So, she went out with her brother Jamie and his girlfriend for dinner with friends and they also went on a moonlight harbor cruise. So, she's having a flight at night. They could punch. He got nude punched this guy, right in the face. Poor Jamie. Yeah. Now, there's different accounts of where this harbor cruise was. Some people say Boston harbor, some people say it was Luster Harbor, so we're not sure. At some point Karen talked with her brother and Jamie here and now Jamie said Karen seemed more optimistic than he had ever seen her. Yeah. She's feeling good. You get optimistic on a boat. It feels good. Yeah. After a nice dinner and a couple glasses of wine, they start feeling optimistic. So, it's life's easy. This is great. Now 7 p.m. though, that same night, we'll go over to Richard and say she's having her night and we'll find out what his night is. What's his bar? What's his harbor cruise like? Well, he met Paula Hiltz for dinner at the Halibut Point restaurant in downtown Gloucester. According to everybody's timelines, he already took a bunch of prescription drugs that evening for his anxiety, depression and pain, so a bunch of different ones. Yeah. And on top of that, he kept drinking a shitload over dinner. He kept drinking red wine with dinner, with fish, too. Strange. So, not a good combo. Now 9.15, Richard pays the check and takes Paula Hiltz to the Blackburn tavern for more drinks, because that's what he needs, obviously. At 10 o'clock, they leave the tavern. On his way home, he insisted on stopping at Paula's ex-boyfriends house, the man who refused to sell him a rifle months earlier. He said, "I have to stop there." I can pitch it now. Apparently he got out of the car. She stayed in the car and we don't know what happened. So keep that in mind, okay? Now about 11.40 p.m. in Wendham at the Wendham House, that Karen's been living in here. It's Karen Jamie and Jamie's girlfriend all return to the house. The babysitter's there, she's about to leave, you get home, babysitter leaves. So she is in the front foyer talking to the babysitter. I'm sure asking what happened. Would they eat? Time they go to bed? Were they good? At that point, Jamie and his girlfriend went to check on the children who were asleep in the TV room. Right when that's going on, a car pulls into the driveway. They can see the lights and everything, a car pulls in. Lights go off and engine turns off. It's not someone just turning around in a driveway or something. We have a visitor. The next thing you know, the door's not locked because they just came in and then the babysitter is going to leave and everybody's in the foyer. So no one's locking the door right there. All of a sudden the door opens. Yeah. Now Karen's standing there with the babysitter and all that kind of thing and it's fucking Richard at the door. Fair list. Yeah. Fucking smooth as a baby's bottom. She said, she's Karen said, what are you doing here? And said, you're not supposed to be here. Have restraining water. You're not supposed to be here. At some point she said, oh my God and turn to run because he pulled a rifle out, a rifle, a rifle and shoots and hits her once with the rifle. Now, where did he hide that? Got it behind him or something? Yeah. You're not the other half in the door frame. Surprises are with a rifle. Surprises are with a rifle, shoots her, she goes down. Uh-huh. Okay. Now, Kristen, the 19 year old babysitter grabs the two kids and pulls them into where, Jimmy? Bathroom. Bathroom. Yeah. Guess what they're doing? Yeah. Hiding from their father's rage in the fucking bathroom. They might as well just switch clothes at that point, like make it all connect full circle here. Around. Yeah. Yeah. So, that's what's going on. So, Jamie calls 911 and says I have an emergency. There's been a shooting at 19 Hull Street. Let's get somebody over here now. There's somebody here that might be dying in my arms. Okay. Let's get somebody. Sounds like a pep talk. Come on. Let's get somebody over here right now. Let's do this, everybody. We got this. Let's do it. All right. Lend him on three. Yeah. Let's go and let him. So, do he shoot her and take off? He shot her just took off. Shot her. That's all he was after. Didn't shoot Jamie. Didn't shoot Jamie's girlfriend and go after the baby said her shot her once in the back and took off. Huh. So, the dispatcher says, is your sister still breathing? Where was she shot? Yeah. Jamie says, I don't know where she shot. I'm holding her. I'm trying to talk to you. I'm trying to hide from bullets. I don't know where she's been shot. Like this is a stressful thing. How about you get an ambulance over here and they can figure out where she's been shot? The ambulance and cops send them fast. When he said, quote, we need an ambulance for my sister right now. And they said, where's the person with the that has the gun? Yeah. And he said, we don't know. We're held up in the house. We need emergency people here and we need police officers. The best you have, state police, whatever you need to do. Get up here now. The best you have. Don't send Bill. He sucks. Send the good guy. Who's good at this? Send officer of the month, the last 12 of them. Don't send the one you send when someone like loses their dog or like fuck that guy. Don't send him. No traffic cops ladies idiots. So the dispatcher says, do you know who shot your sister? And he said the shooter is Richard Sharp. Dr. Richard Sharp is the shooter just to be a super specific about it. Doctor. The doctor. So the police arrive minutes after the call. This is a rich neighborhood. The cops come fast. Dispatch goes out at 11.45 that night. The officers pulled into the driveway. They didn't know if the shooter is still on the property because he said on the phone, I'm trying to hide from bullets and it's a big new house and they go, Jesus Christ, there could be, we don't know who's in there. What's in there? Yeah. It's pretty crazy. So the front door opens directly into the foyer and that's where they find her. She's on the floor in the front hall with her brother holding her. Like Rocky holds a polo creed and Rocky for when he dies, it's going to be okay. It's going to be okay. That was so sad. I was like, before I was told in Bob, I wanted to know why I was so much sadder with the polo. I gave two shits about that fucking mumbly douchebag with his shrimp. Shut the fuck up. I love to. I don't care. I hated everything about Forest Gump. I wanted everyone in there to be set on fire. Forest. Bob. Lieutenant Dan. No, he wasn't. He was annoying shit. Bob, Bob, Bob had clear mental issues. Fuck off. Exactly. Imagine being stuck next to that asshole forever and fucking strangle him. But he knows every kind of shrimp, James. It's all he knows. Fuck him. And fuck for us, too. He keeps going. That was so sad. We got it. We got it. We got it. Bob, Bob. Come on. Eventually diminished and he's dying from the country. He's dumber than a polo and a polo got hit in the head constantly. We're an American flag trunks up four masters. Yeah. That was the saddest thing ever. Dying for America. That's, yeah. He's dying. He's in Sly's arms. That was a big deal. For kids. Yeah. Kids are age. That's one of the sadder things. Yeah. We're a whole God. We're a thing in America and dying for it. Yeah. Here comes James Brown. Next thing you know, he's dead. Yeah. Follows dead. So anyway, they, like I said, they find her. They rush her to Beverly Hospital sometime around midnight. Now this is one of the two hospitals where Richard, like he was really aided, actually. Yeah. Yeah. Trauma surgeons work hard to save her, but she is pronounced dead of a single gunshot wound. Now seven-year-old Michael had been woke up, woken up by the shot. Fucking it. Yeah. That's loud. And later on, he said, why did my father shoot my mother? Why did he do that? I never, ever want to see my father again. Oh. He's mad at him. Yeah. Don't blame him. The wound is, there's a lot of different accounts of what the fuck the wound is, by the way. Court TV, the AP, and another, and the Harvard paper, all described it as a shot to the chest, but then a later television documentary described at the bullet as striking her in the back. So front or back, either way, it's, it's going to be a chest wound, either way. Hole in the torso. Yeah. The other thing is what gun was used because there are some people that say that they found a 22 caliber fragment, but the rifle that they believe that Richard took from Paula Hiltz's boyfriend earlier that night was a 30 caliber weather bee. So they don't understand that. It's odd. Look later on that comes out that we got a lot of quotes from said a 22 caliber rifle was unloaded into Karen's chest.
But then the news copy called it a high-powered rifle, which is not a 22 rifle it's literally the lowest powered rifle You could fucking commercially buy I believe one of the very I mean it's certainly not a lot of powder behind it No It goes it bounces around a lot. It's not a lot of through and throughs because of the fucking, you know, whatever So the thrill rates and the 30 calibers those things go right plus it's yeah It's a hunting rifle. It's meant to shoot something much bigger than a woman in her foyer from three feet away and far Right, so so if you if you catch that bullet me. Yeah, on launch from me to you was not a distance to Not getting through and then the vacuums pulling everything out right out the other side You have a big old exit there, so Anyway, we don't know because We'll never even find the murder weapon here. That's the other thing what so the police by the way when he said Send you the best you have send good people. That's smart because the Wendem Police Department had not handled a murder in over 20 years at this point Oh my god, so they don't really have a lot of great, you know You know a whole system they do for this season Yeah, so they call the Massachusetts state police because they're like we're just gonna fuck this crime scene up probably right I don't know how to do this. We don't have a routine At that point, they're like well, we got to find Richard So an APB is put out for Richard and his 2012 to four runner as well He's called armed and dangerous obviously photograph goes out to all the law enforcement You know in multi-state area. They do Connecticut. They do everywhere newscasts in New England are putting his picture out there But the other thing the police dispatcher also passed along a warning to all the officers This is him. Here's his description. Here's his picture, but he might be dressed as a woman also Right, he'll look much different if he's fully dressed as a woman So you might have to so basically they have no description look at everybody everybody possible Which if you could just narrow it to a gender that's great No, I mean just at least that's half split it right down the middle But now they have no idea so they're driving around the street literally looking at every woman every guy Staring at people trying to figure it out. They don't know. They're like is that woman just ugly or is it a guy named Richard right who's not Doctor or not. Yeah, who's not trans or anything He's just a guy who thinks he looks better women's clothes. Yeah, so anyway, there's dirt check in the mouth now Saturday morning They the detectives talk to Paula Hiltz. This is the next day She's at her ex-boyfriend's house there the one who got the rifle stalls the Richard's relationship with her is going very well It's going great. Yeah She walked them through Richards whereabouts from dinner onward went to hell a bit point The blackburn tavern stopped at the ex-boyfriend's house now. He's got a rifle missing all of that Now this will be good for everybody actually because for the prosecution later on it puts Richard at the house where the rifle went missing Two hours before the shooting which is great Yeah for the defense though it she talked about how much drinking and pills that he took and how he's been a fucking Wack job later on yeah, which is going to help the defense later. So The missing gun though they said that the boyfriends a gun collector and A on that night a 30 caliber weather be rifle disappeared from his house Detective searched Richards home in Gloucester. They searched his office and they retraced his route to see if If he left from here and went this way and they retraced it out Where would he get thrown out of a window even and they said the weapon was never found no matter what they did they could not find With Massachusetts nobody stumbled across there's a lot of water had to had to go in a dumpster then a dumpster a creek You know what I mean? There's plenty of these little bridges a little creeks. You could chuck it out of and who knows Or yeah, just a you know a Chipotle fucking dumpster that'll right no one's digging in that tell you that much a lot of dunks around there Oh, yeah, nobody's digging in a Duncan's well. They will you can get donuts. They're great. Oh Yeah, but they're covering coffee grounds. They put them in a big bag. Do they yeah? I got one time. Yeah, we didn't we were out at like four o'clock in the morning We were out at like four o'clock in the morning and we went to a place and it was the changing of the donut guard The guy came in with all the new donuts So the guy was bagging him up and my friend goes, what are you gonna do with them donuts? Yeah, he goes and fucking throw him out he goes What would they like and he goes? I would have sold them 10 minutes ago. They're fine You're just you know, whatever I got new ones and he goes we get all those And the guy goes I guess I don't fucking care and hand it over a Giant clear garbage bag like Santa sack full of good probably 80 90 100 donuts in it more than that price It was fault. I thought you were about to tell me you jumped in a dumpster. Oh They had them in a bag to throw them out and say if you found that it's jackpot. We sat around For hours eating that shit. It was awesome We had everything so 815 p.m This is where Richard is because we can't find Richard at this point here During all this Richard was contacting people on the night of the killing trying to build an alibi Calling people are going to their house calling people and trying to build an alibi Which is interesting He ends up showing up 815 p.m. in Tufton, Borough, New Hampshire Where he goes to a set of rental car cottages at 19 mile bay Which is Lake Winnipezaki? Yeah, so you know Bill Murray and Richard Dreyfus going all around there He asked the owner's son For and his wife for a room and they said they had nothing available. You should try down the road at the Pineview Lodge Okay, so he drives a couple miles to Pineview checks in room 12 using his own name Okay brilliant Hide now. Yeah Now at 11 p.m. Old Chuck Delorio who is the owner's son at the first place that didn't have any vacancy He's watching the late news on TV. Oh They put up a picture And the guy's name and he goes I know that fucking guy. I saw that guy three hours ago. That's the guy that came up here Um, so rather than he waits about 15 minutes and then he calls his mother for advice What should I do much? I call a cops and this guy or what do I do here? Turn this fucking guy in or what? I mean, I want to mine my own fucking business and everything but I just seems like a lot I'm gonna be a stand-up guy, but I also yeah people safe his mother called the police. Oh, I'll call the goddamn police and Police called the Pineview Lodge and they said yeah, we got that guy. We got a Dr. Richard Sharpies in room room 12 So the New Hampshire State Police SWAT team surrounds the motel By the way, torrential fucking downpour pouring outside. Yeah, they have to evacuate the entire motel Everybody stands out in the rain for an hour and a half Then they shoot pepper spray grenades through the window. Oh, fuck to draw them out basically. Yeah So this is the a lieutenant and a sergeant said I remember that night in New Hampshire. This is the lieutenant He was strange that night. He showed no remorse. It was pouring buckets of rain that night It was torrential. They evacuated as many people as they could from the motel And through in the biggest can of tear gas I ever saw in my life. He came right out. It dissipates fast That'll be in there a while. He came right out. They put him to the ground and took him away He said just a few syllables. He wasn't upset. He wasn't screaming or crying. It was like okay, you got me Now they said also That they all were aware that he might have been dressed as a woman But he wasn't at the time, but when they took him to the ground they realized that he had Fucking be cups like he had some tits on them. They were like yeah, they were like is this guy growing tits like wow Yeah, just odd because it didn't fit in. He's not like a fat guy. So it's odd Now they searched the room They found he made two purchases on the way up here by the way. Yeah a six pack of beer at a rope. That's what he has And it that is he's gonna get drunk and jump off the bed. That's the most basic suicide kit ever put together. Yeah A sixer and a rope a rope Jim not a gun. Yeah, just a sixer and a rope. Yeah, that is old school But instead he got drunk and fell asleep Before he could kill himself and he woke up to the room filling with tear gas. Oh no. That's what happened Now They sit him down. They had talked to him. Um, he claims that he didn't remember much about that night He says that you know, maybe A vague compulsion he had that he could remember to reunite with his family. Uh, that's why maybe he drove there He's not sure. He is not denying that he shot these people that he's just gonna say yeah, I did it I just he's like I don't really remember my mind was in a different place. Um, yeah He described the shot basically as something like like that he saw happen rather than that he did Like here's the thing that I you know realized happened tonight really
fucking weird. A lot of inconsistencies and what he said, he claims that he did not remember pulling the trigger. Oh, he said that he does remember that he got rid of the rifle and the ammunition afterwards, but he doesn't remember where he put them. Ah, and I got rid of that, but I don't know. He said he was in a dissociative haze. Yeah, yeah. It's not the fucking remote man. This is a guy, this is your murder weapon. Yeah. Dissociative haze, enough to drive to New Hampshire and try to check into multiple hotels and all of that kind of shit, but he didn't have a real big, you know, he wouldn't have a plan here going forward. Now, while in custody, he's held without bail, enters a plea of not guilty. The same day, the Massachusetts Board of Registration and Medicine suspends his medical license. Oh no, it's over. It's over. That's it. At the jail, basically, he just crumbles to nothing at the jail. He curls up in a fetal position, refusing to move. That's what he does. Just, I can't do it anymore. I'm just gonna stay here. It's over and he knows it. The official said, this guy's gonna fucking, if I've ever seen anyone be suicidal, it's this guy. It's like that guy, yeah. Yeah, maybe we should give him his rope if he wants to pull it off. So he's moved to the Bridgewater State Hospital, which is a state psychiatric facility for prisoners. This is when now everything comes out. Everything comes out. The beatings. The pictures, they have full color pictures are all published of him and dresses with fishnet stockings on. He dresses like a fucking, like a street prostitute. So is the other thing. He didn't dress like a, he wasn't like, I'm gonna look like I'm going on a job interview, like a nice lady on a job interview. He's like, I want to be a slut. That's what I'm going to be. I am a slut, slut, slut, and I'm doing it. That's what he did. - That is interesting. - Yeah, it's interesting. Court TV said his arrest through national attention when photographs of him wearing slinky dresses and fishnet stockings were widely publicized. Surprise locals learned that Sharp had a pension for cross dressing. Nobody knew about it. Yeah. - Lot. - J. Edgar Hoover. - Yeah. - A lot of headlines, the cross dressing dermatologist and, you know, worse. And a lot of people tried to also act like he was gay, but there's nothing to do with that. - No, there's no gay. - There's no gay in between that. - Yeah. - I mean, some gay people can be cross-dressers, but cross-dressing doesn't make you gay. - Right. Not all of those dressers are gay. - No. So several outlets, including the Boston Globe, associated press, they all reported he was still on the Harvard faculty. - Currently. - So they released a statement quote. - They have to. - He is not a faculty member at the Harvard Medical School. There's gonna put that out there. - Please stop saying it. - Yeah. - They asked his old research supervisor, Dr. Grandsteen. You know, did you see any of this coming? You know, could you, he said it would be sexy to say, oh yes, he seems strange. Or as every newspaper seems to find someone to say, oh, he was a regular guy, I couldn't believe it. I never expected he would kill anybody. But what does that mean? Who do you expect to kill people? Like, honestly. - Why do you say sexy? - Can we say interesting? - Yeah, I get it. - Sexy with the, yeah, I get it. - It's so interesting that he used that word. - Yeah. Now, for Richard, he hates this. He hates this. - Oh, everybody knows. - Everybody knows, but the prosecution doesn't really love it either because it makes him look really fucking weird. And that's kind of what he's leaning into. It just makes him look like an odd guy. So basically, his defense lawyer said, I want the jury to see a mentally ill man, not a tabloid fucking cover. So how do I do that? July 20th 2000, Karen's family files a wrongful death suit against her. On behalf of the three children, they ask for $100 million. I don't know if they think they're suing Bill Gates over here. - Who are they? - $100 million. This fucking guy. Also, the family babysitter files her own $5 million civil action for the trauma of watching the killing against him too. Shannon Sharp said, it's funny every time. - On the heels of back to back super balls. - Yeah, I said, what? Maybe I should hang them up. He said, it should be clear that I have no doubt in my mind that my father's actions are unforgivable. That's good. Late July 2000, Karen's lawyers had spent all this time trying to get the serstrating orders and the divorce shit and all that kind of thing, but they have all this documentation saying she was scared to death, every goddamn thing you can imagine. So they have a lot of documentation, basically, that they need, but at the same time, he's also got shit that's saying he's like a whack job, which is not what they fucking want here. But they said we took every precaution, we filed restraining orders, but it goes to prove that restraining orders are no defense against a speeding bullet. That's a fact. You can get a restraining order, but that doesn't actually stop anybody from doing anything. - Yeah, it doesn't stop somebody hell bent on doing damage. - No, it doesn't. So everything goes public here. July 25th, 2000, that is when a judge, I believe, unseals the divorce and restraining order files and the media latches on to it. And they're like, oh, we got it all now. Yeah. - Oh, the juice. - Oh my God. Now the reasoning for releasing it was the couple's expectation of privacy has been surrendered once their situation became a matter of legitimate public concern. - Yeah. - That's what the judge said. They said the public's right to know clearly outweighs the interest, which any party to this case or any other individual might have in protecting the impounded materials. Richard fought it, saying that we shouldn't do this. They appeal. An appeals court justice agrees with him in part and reseals 3D affidavits, then a supreme judicial court unsealed everything again. So he appealed again in November of 2000, the court ruled against him. And they said the sharp contended, the Sixth Amendment rights are presumptively preeminent. And that releases of the, that the releases of the affidavit would be, quote, especially prejudicial to him because the new source of information carries the impromptor and prometor of the probate court. - Sure. - So basically, yeah, that wasn't adjudicated in this court. So why are we doing that? So yeah, they said the court, the document does not obtain greater validity, validity merely because it's filed in court. The affidavits of Karen Shart might actually be viewed by potential jurors as self-serving, giving the highly contentious nature of the sharps divorce. That's what the Boston herald said. 'Cause basically there's a big lawsuit 'cause Richard wants to keep it sealed. But all of the local media are on the side of unsealing it. So they're all fighting against it. So he's suing like all the media people. Boston herald is really one of them. They said it is of considerable importance for the public to be in a position to evaluate why in order may or may not have been successful in protecting a victim of domestic violence. - Right. - That makes sense. The court also noted what the children wanted, though counsel for Karen's estate, the two minor children apparently supported termination of the impoundment order. Richard tried to invoke their privacy and they said, "No, we're good. We don't need you to fucking fight our shit for us. We got this." - You agree about you. - So yeah, you got way more to worry about than us. They have a big memorial for her by the way. Her ashes were buried at Mount St. Peter Cemetery in Derby, where she's from, and all that kind of thing. Shannon went to the memorial, but the two little kids didn't. They thought it was too traumatic for him or what. So finally July 25th and 6th, that's when all the newspapers and a Boston TV station, that's when everything is opened. So that's a big deal. Winter of 2000. Okay, he goes to a fellow inmate and he says, "Listen, I need to escape." Richard. - Jail? - Yes. - Yeah. - He said, "Listen, I need to escape. If you help me, I'll give you a million dollars." - A million. - A million. So he said that also, part of that million isn't just trying to help me escape, but it also is helping me on the outside. Keep me underground. He asked, "This is a career criminal." He was a criminal saying that, "Will you contact associates? Do you have associates that would even kill police if necessary?" Is what he asked. - Oh. - Like really get me out of here. February 14th, 2001, he writes a Valentine's Day letter to Shannon. I don't think this is gonna be received. Well, he said, "Shannon, I loved dear Shannon. I loved your mother. I miss her terribly. I cry every day. I want nothing but the best for you, Mike, and Ali. The only thing that gets me through each day is the thought that my children made.
need me. She's like, I don't need you at all. No, I think we're good. And assume from the minute you slammed her head into a wooden bedframe, that's the end of being needed. Now he wants contact with his two younger children, Michael and Allie, Mikey and Allie, but relatives oppose the request that basically Sharp has requested his two children be evaluated by a psychiatrist to show that they can handle it. And so that's what goes on there. July 2001, they they place him in isolation because he's now making threatening phone calls to one of his daughters. So he's threatening probably Shannon, we would imagine. So he's placed an isolation so he can't do that. So he goes from, I want to see my kids do well kill my kids. Yeah, he doesn't like being rejected. Wait till I fucking escape. So pretrial here, you know, he's trying to get a couple of things suppressed and everything like that, but his main thing is he is pleading insanity. Yeah, I mean, yeah, you have to. We've just had a big insanity case in Massachusetts. So this is kind of, you know, germane to that whole thing here. Fucking choice do you have? Now the law of insanity in Massachusetts because this is the, it doesn't matter. You can say you're insane or whatever, but the exact letter of the law state to state is what really matters because that's what they're going off of like we said in Georgia, watching that Chloe driver case. Yeah. She killed her baby and then stabbed herself in the throat, really trying to off herself. And she was fucking seeing shit and hearing voices. And she had like the worst life of anybody that ever happened. And the only thing the prosecutor asked everybody was, I mean, they gave this harrowing tale. And then she just goes, did she think her baby was going to hurt her? And the answer was known, she got no further questions. And that's what she said to the jury. It doesn't matter how bad of a life she had. It doesn't matter whether it's fair, it doesn't matter anything. All that matters is by law, by law, it broke law in the three syllables and fucking idiot. Unless that baby, unless she was in fear that baby's life was going to kill her. That's the only time she could have done it. And blah, blah, blah, blah. So they found her guilty. So it's a different state to state. That's that's a crazy one. That's ridiculous, a ridiculous stupid law. So this one. Okay. Apparently Massachusetts doesn't use the right from wrong test by itself. Not, you know, did you know the difference? Yeah. Yeah. Did you know the consequences of your actions? Did you know the difference? It's a standard was set by the Supreme Judicial Court in that state 1967 asks whether because of mental disease or defect, a defendant lacked substantial capacity, either to appreciate the wrongfulness of his conduct or to conform his conduct to the requirements of the law. Okay. So that's all is do they lack capacity to do that? Not any other thing. That's all. That's all. So a defendant can know perfectly well that shooting someone is wrong and still would be found not criminally responsible if the mental illness left him unable to stop it. So that's why there's the two prongs to that. I know it's wrong, but I can't stop. Exactly. So there's a piece of peanut butter stuffed pretzel. Same thing. I know it's wrong. So the court TV intro, by the way, the pretrial profile said Dr. Richard Sharp was a millionaire. He was a cross dresser who prescribed himself hormones to alter his body. He stabbed his wife in the forehead with a fork. Then he killed her. That's what's so far. It sounds like that all happened in two weeks, doesn't it? He married her. So they don't happen that night. Still run to our pop dollar birth control bills stabbed her in the forehead with a fork and then shot her. That's what it sounds like all all at once. That is a fucked up novel. That didn't happen. It was also really hard not to use that as our opening. That would have been very funny as an opening because it's wild. But no, we try to at least tell the truth to here. So the lawyers here, we have the first assistant district attorney for Essex County. His theory was, this is about money and control, not about illness, not about anything else. Money and control. He said that Richard killed his wife because he believed she had stolen $3 million from him and stood to take millions more in a divorce. That's not what happened though. Well, he put $3 million in her name and then she left. So he's saying this was a way to try to control her and get that money back and all that. In his head, this is what he was doing. This is that's exactly that's what they're saying. The defense, though, here they have Joseph Beliero. He's one of Boston's best known criminal defense attorneys and he said that his job is to explain a lifetime of bizarre behavior and mental illness rather than evil, basically. He said, quote, he wasn't a cross-dresser in the sense that he had an alternative lifestyle. That's what he told them. He was a normal guy. He was just like the bra once in a while. He wasn't like he was out cruising the streets for dudes to pick him up. It wasn't what he was doing. Some guys paint toy house furniture. He just happens to wear panties. That's what he's into. So he picked Freeman there. He pictured this little tool for the last. He got stamed glass right here. So on the night of July 14th, the defense said all of this, all of his mental illness, all of his problems and his lawsuits and everything collided with red wine and prescription medication. Basically, his family leaving him and he couldn't tolerate it. His brain broke and he's at her home broke this one broke it. The wood bridge is over. He said that he drove to when he wasn't. He didn't have any plan. Even though he stopped and got a rifle on the right. He said it was the compulsion to reunite the family. That's what it was. It was a compulsion and the noise woke him up a little bit and then he ran to New Hampshire. He had a six pack in a rope. This is the behavior of a man trying to die, not the behavior of a man trying to get away with something. He wanted to go die in there. Now, their strategy, too, is that basically they have to trash Karen as well. And they do. They say, "We got it. There's no choice." They said, "Sharp lawyers have implied that Sharp's wife Karen was no angel. During the murder trial, they have portrayed her as a cruel woman who had affairs and left her husband as soon as she got his millions." That's how they portray her, which still not allowed to kill him. It might be true in all. You still can't kill somebody. I understand that frustration. There is no law that says, "Well, if he really pissed you off enough, then I get the murder." That's not part of it. They said, "Even so, defense lawyers argue that a full portrait of the victim blemishes and all is essential to suggest why the unthinkable happened." One said, "It puts the attorney in an extremely difficult position because you don't want to trash the victim, but you want to put it in context." That's his lawyer talking. They said, "Did things that occurred during the marriage or the divorce trigger something in him?" Now, there's a state psychiatrist who says, "He believes that Richard's faking everything." Oh, malingering. The whole thing. Psychiatric conditions for years. He's been faking at the whole time. Fake, fake, fake, fake. Doesn't matter, which is a pretty stupid thing to say. Ballsy, yeah. It's ballsy. Richard, by the way, while people are testifying, he has some seriously wild fucking body movements and shit in court. He holds his head, closing his eyes, makes a big spectacle of himself a whole lot. It's a thing. He's always doing that kind of shit. Court TV reported that he had two outbursts during trial, which might be good for him because he's saying he couldn't control his rage. He can't even control his grief. Go either way. The defense can say, "Look, even in court, he can't control himself." He's on TV for Christ's sake. He can't control himself. The prosecution can say, "When testimony comes out that turns against him, then he acts like a dick." The defense shrink is Dr. Ablow here. He said that this guy's a very famous guy's written books and all sorts of shit. I felt like that was a familiar name. He wrote a Scott Peterson book. That's why. One of them. Did you read it? No, but I think he was probably interviewed a lot, probably. He said, "Sharp lack the ability to conform his behavior to the law." Richard's sharp, according to him, suffered from such an array of psychiatric disorders and a frantic fear of being abandoned that he couldn't stop himself from fatally shooting his wife after they separated. That's what he said. He said that Richard was insane. At least when he killed his wife, insane. He did it in front of other witnesses. He's obviously not going to get away with it. Right. They said he suffered abuse as a child. At times, he's been violent himself because of that, and he was so dependent on his wife of 27 years to provide a facade of normalcy.
that the prospect of losing her was unthinkable for him. She's a facade. That's a great way to put it. She's like wearing a, you know, like a fucking CGI fucking, like, just your face sticking out. Totally different thing. He said she is his lifeline to normal tea. Normal tea, not normal tea. Interesting. She is the thing between him and absolute disintegration as a person. And he gives a list of psychiatric and personality disorders from which he said sharp suffers. Now this is the one that the state said he faked all these. These are intermittent explosive disorder, which sounds like you shit yourself sometimes. After skyline, shilly, I've seen you have intermittent explosive disorder. We've had to pull off the highway. It makes a lot of doubt to Skyclub for you to have intermittent explosive disorder. Turnfike chicken does that to her. Turnfike chicken eggs, major depression, alcohol-related disorder, narcissistic personality disorder, OCD, and the big one borderline personality disorder. So problem. Those are, if those are all true, that's a lot of shit wrapped up in one person. That's really hard to. Yeah, if you've never been diagnosed with all of that at once, that would be devastating to learn. And also, I opening to know why you can't control your behavior. Yeah, exactly. And on the other hand, in court, you look at it as that's a guy he's paying to come out here and say this in court. And that's what the, I never understand that when the prosecution's expert witnesses testify, they're just people who are experts in their field who are telling you what the real is. They're still, they're getting paid to be there and everything. But nobody ever brings that up. But the defense attorney, the number one thing they always ask is not defense attorney, but the defense experts is how much are you getting paid for this? Like the fact that you are being paid for your experts. Yeah, they go, why would I do it for free? This is my job. Like you wouldn't say you didn't fix my car right because you got paid to fix it. Like you would make no sense at all. Yeah. Why the fuck would you fix it for free? You put you put anifres in the in the power steering. What are you being paid for this? We're being paid for this. So this doctor said all of these are serious together. They're devastating. That's the plan. They said the borderline is the big one. He calls it a tremendously disabling condition that features impulsivity, difficulty controlling anger, and chronic feelings of emptiness. People that are borderline generally start shit a lot. They start drama. They need drama. They find it. They start it. They have to have it. Because of that, he said at the time of the murder, sharp was in the throes of a dissociative psychotic state brought on by an intense desire to get his wife back. I really wanted something and couldn't have it as what he said. We've seen our kids have those. They've got to fall on the ground. They hit the ground and kick their feet. That's called a fifth. Yeah. No, it's called a dissociative psychotic state, apparently. Now there is dissociative psychotic states, but not just because you want something. Yeah. It's not when it's not over a butterfinger. No, it's super strange. So they said one feature of borderline personality is identity disorder. In Sharp's case, he feels more comfortable dressing as a woman, takes birth control pills, has cosmetic surgery to alter his appearance. All that shit. He said he interviewed sharp 11 times and given Sharp's mental state, he said he could not have premeditated his wife's murder. Couldn't even have put, he could be possible. He could put the thought of I'm hungry and I want dinner together. Let's go out to dinner. He can put that thought together. He can put the thought of there's gun that I want in that house. So I'll stop here and steal it. I need a six pack and a rope. You put that on together. My balls feel good in this form of nylon. He can put that together, but he can't put together the intent to go over there with a gun, which is interesting gun kill person. That's odd. He said that his anger explodes without warning and he said he doesn't just get drunk. He gets crazy. He gets annihilated. In a clinical term, crazy. Psychiatr shouldn't use the word crazy unless they mean what they mean. So he said that, I guess at first when he first met him, he didn't even call himself his real name when the psychiatrist first sat down with him. He called himself Clark Rockefeller. Made up a bunch of shit and he said eventually he'd told me the truth. But he'd made up like a whole childhood that didn't exist. That was like a nice childhood where he was like wealthy and rode horses and all this shit. Yeah. Yeah. So he said it's a strange thing. He said whenever the truth has more of a voice in the judicial process, that's a good thing. I encourage a dog at pursuit of personal truth. That's what he said. And he published a self-help book, this psychiatrist in 2007, titled Living the Truth. Yeah. And he also wrote. Now on Rago, we get drunk. I'm going to, that's it. Let's go out and get crazy. Get crazy. That's like clinical. Let's go get crazy. Let's get clinically crazy up. Clinically nuts. Fucking nuts on the Gregus. We did that once or twice. Yeah. We have definitely done that together a few times. So during his cross-examination as they cross on this guy now, the DA tried to insinuate that perhaps maybe old doctor Richard smarter than you and maybe pulled one over on you. Oh, fuck. How about that? I mean, you're both doctors, but man doped you. You idiot. Probably this guy, but the psychiatrist said no. He said that your psychiatrist misread his severe discomfort being analyzed pointing to his habit of touching and rubbing his face, which he did constantly. And he said, this picking he does with his face is almost what you might do if you wanted to reassure yourself that you're there. He's concerned that his own veneer might crack like an egg, like a Humpty Dumpty style. He's gonna crack and fall still together. Yeah. Is this together? Am I good? They also made a big deal out of this guy's $300 an hour fee. Yeah. Charges. Yeah, that's the thing. They said that which he charges for interviewing, reviewing records, making diagnosis and testifying. He said he spent about a hundred hours, but he's been paid about $7,000 by Sharp. So that means fucking 23 grand. A bit. Yeah. So that means that no matter what he says, it's not to be believed because he's getting paid for his work. Right. Which is what like I said, like the state guy doesn't also get paid to be here, you know. So he has no choice. He's saying I killed them, but I'm crazy. He has to testify. Has to. Awesome. And he's gonna on the stand. He constantly frantically rubs his forehead. Yeah. Really weird manner. He's always got his hand on his forehead. He'd squeeze his eyes shut real tight in a weird way. He blamed all of his weirdness on his childhood basically, which seems right. He said his father called him every pure, pure mutation and combination of profanities you could imagine every day hated him. He said that he was regularly picked on by bigger boys. He said I invariably got beat up on a regular basis to the point where it was almost a joke. He said that when he found his sister was the only child his father loved, he tried to emulate her by wearing her clothes. So maybe his father would love him. He says he said at times it relaxed me. At times I thought it was fun and at times I thought it was erotic. I thought it was hot. Yeah. Times it just like that tight squeeze on my dick. I like seeing my balls and women's clothes. It looks hot. I see them hanging out the sides of my leg there. That sounds perfect. You're put a song on backwards. Fuck it. Yeah. That's what I'm talking about. Karen and I would sort of use that as a way of playing together. Now he's saying that he did this with his wife. He was like I'm going to put my panties on and then we'll get down to business. I don't know if that's we don't know what will go on in people's bedrooms obviously. Well it's dead. So she can't fucking argue that. No. He admitted to taking female hormones to relieve stress. Wow. And said he has undergone six cosmetic surgeries including love handle liposuction, a nose job and the removal of all hair from his face and legs and his face face. Not eyebrows. He did the beard. Did the beard. Yeah. Hard to look like a like a proper lady with a hard heavy five o'clock shadow. So he admits to all that and he has lawyer walked him up to the moment of the shot and said and did you hear a loud sound. Did you see something? He said I heard the gun go off. I heard the noise. They said what did you do after you heard the gun go off? And he says I think the um noise sort of woke me up a little bit. I just heard the noise and left. So that's his story. What am I doing here? I got to go. I'm crazy. He didn't realize I was standing there.
the door with a gun, even though I specifically went and got the gun on the way here, just snapped. Yeah, just snapped. And then as soon as I snapped, just as easily, the noise of the gun snapped me right back. And I got a sixer in a rope and I'm ready to go. And on up to the lake and find a little slinky motel to end it. Perfect. Yeah. In the closings, the prosecutor asked the jury to quote, stop listening to the experts. Oh, this is the what's wrong with our entire fucking world right now as people go, just think, just use your own common sense. Do your own research. No, you don't even know how to research. Some people who devoted their lives to this topic. So knowing everything about this subject, literally, you read an article and saw YouTube videos, so you know more. This is pre-YouTube video, but this is the fucking problem. You read the experts. You know everything. You know, you feel the strain. Yeah, listen to experts because they know more than you, even if you read something, it's the done and Kruger thing, what the it's fucking anyway. There's also a lot of times a publication has a reason to write what it's writing. Stop it. Read medical journals. And if you can't read and understand those, then shut the fuck up and trust an expert. You can't understand them because you don't have the training to. That's why we bring an expert in because you can't understand the guy in the jury who does welding. And that's no offense to welders. That's just unless you went to fucking medical schoolers. You don't know what you're reading. Well, welders who think they're doctors. Yes, welders who think they're welders. Great. Yes. Defensive to welders who read something and then go try to convince other people. Yes. Of medical shit that shut up and weld in my car. welders are telling me not to get not to get my kids' measles shots. You shut the fuck up and well, you idiot. Pick up the stick. Well, the fucking friends. Let's go. So he said, put aside the psycho babble. That's what he called it. Psycho. So it's not even, even though you called your own expert psycho babble, psycho. Okay. Child abuse is not an excuse, he said. He described him as a calculating murderer who had planned the insanity defense in advance, which he called why he called it the perfect crime as what he was trying to do. He said he spent years around in and around psychiatry. He's been already committed once he knew exactly what you guys would want to hear. And then he said, he's faking it. Oh, my ring. Faking it. Bullshit. The defense lawyer said, you know, he was destroyed by his childhood. He killed Harry Karen in a haze of drugs and alcohol gripped by an uncontrollable rage that culminated years of madness, depression and sexual confusion. Can't get out of it. Wow. Now the truth is somewhere in the middle, unfortunately, in reality. And the verdict comes through. It is six men and six women on the jury. Okay, that's good. Yeah, 10 hours of deliberation. And and by the way, there's no question about the abuse. They brought in his siblings who testified under oath that his father was savagely beating him. So all of that kind of shit. It was true. He was committed and diagnosed in 91 with all the same things that this doctor saying he has all that kind of shit. They they never found the rifle and everything like that. So who knows what they're going to pick? They choose guilty of first degree murder. Period. First. No insanity. No nothing. They also convict him of a possession of an unlicensed firearm and violating a restraining order. Okay. And speeding probably and bring a stop sign on the way to New Hampshire. Failure to yield. The prosecutor said they paid close attention to the evidence and they disregarded what the government felt was a fabrication of an insanity defense. I think he is crazy, but also he can't go kill your wife. I think he's got a lot of problems. Yeah. I don't even know that he's crazy. I just know he's got a lot of mental problems. Well, I mean, he's been diagnosed as being crazy for 20 years. Yeah. So I mean, it's all documented. Yes, but the the effort to but doesn't matter, I think here. Right. And the effort to cause this situation was it's calculated. You can't be crazy and make those decisions. Well, yeah, and I don't think I don't think crazy factors into this at all. Yeah. Him going over planning. It doesn't really. He told her 20 years ago in her fucking waiting room at the hotel at the hospital. Yeah. I want to kill you. I want to kill you. I want you to die. That's what he said. So on the courthouse steps here, Karen's sister spoke for the family. She said Karen Sharp is a loving mother. The best sister anybody could have. She was a wonderful daughter and friend. By the way, this sister will become legal guardian of the children. Oh God. So she's going to watch them. She also addresses the defense's attempt to put Karen on trial, including the contractor, a fair claim. She said, quote, you got a sense of a lot of things that weren't Karen Sharp in the courtroom. But the prosecutor and his people were able to convey to the jury that she was not that person. Which I don't think she knew what the fuck was going on with Karen. She didn't know about the abuse. So I don't think she would have told her about an affair either. Seems like Karen was a private person who didn't tell people about this shit other than her lawyer. Seems like Karen may have been even a little bit embarrassed of how her business worked out. And I absolutely don't want to fucking just go tell everybody. No, no. I think she's a smart person too and doesn't want people to think she's dumb, even though she's not. She's smart. So it feels like a failure in some ways. As relationships fail, even if it's not your fault completely, it still feels like a failure, because you entered into it in the first place, which was at some point a decision you made got you here is what you can't help but thank you. Now there's no three children involved in this. Yeah. So one of the jurors that they interviewed afterwards said, it would have been a much tougher case for me to decide if he didn't put himself on the stand. So that doesn't work. Unless you're a great witness, don't do it. Just don't fucking do it. They said his testimony was the nail and the coffin for me in terms of really understanding whether he was saying the night of the murder. They were ready. He's ready to quit the guy or at least say guilty by his side. Yeah. And this fucking guy. Yeah. Another juror said he was clearly faking his mental illness, but they didn't realize that till he was on the stand and it was obvious because he's up there. You put someone up there for two days. Every little cracks going to fucking show. And it's it's wild. We were just watching. Yeah. We're just watching this documentary about this lady who was accused and convicted of killing her ex-husband and her ex-husband's girlfriend in Topeka, Kansas. Right. It's a small town actually. We could do the case. But she was a they accused her of like she lived in Denver. They accused her of like driving 800 miles, killing them, turning back around and going back home. Okay. But it's like 11 shots were fired. They all hit targets. Wow. These were moving targets, which you have to do a great shot. The weaponry, like the bullets they found were like Israeli made nine millimeters that are used for oozes and it's like automatic weaponry. So somebody with an automatic hit 11 times on moving targets. And this lady is not like that at all. So anyway, they convicted her and then they fucking then they they have a hung jury on the second trial after she gets overturned. Then the third trial's coming up and it's all set for her to be acquitted and she fires her attorneys and said, I'm going to represent myself and fucked up the entire fucking thing. Fucked it up, put herself on the stand where they just excoriated her over little lies and little you told this person that but you told this person that and she got convicted of first degree murder again. Because she was sitting by her. She didn't even have co-counsel. It was just her. She's sitting at a table by herself going through paperwork. It looks like nobody believes in me. I'm all by myself. I couldn't even get anyone to represent me as with that looks like she made a visual eye that for the jury to look at too. Yep. That sucks. It's so dumb. So anyway, the jurors didn't believe her sentencing comes around. Lots of people talking about how great Karen was and what a dickhead this guy is and that she had to put up with this shit. Now she's dead. And the judge says, you sir may fuck off life without parole. Oh dang. Bye bye, dickhead forever. That's it, man. Forever. Now as he's being led from the courtroom, he yeah. He yells, I love Mikey and Ali. There's two kids. What about Shannon? That's fine. Yeah. No, he never mentioned Shannon. I love Mikey and I remember he threatened to kill her from job. Yeah. I love Mikey and Shannon. Then they lead him a little more and he goes, I love Karen. His wife that he killed, which is no shannon. The hilarious TV Joey Butterfucka movie with him going, I love Mary Joe all the time. That's the same thing that's going on. Hey, I love Mary Joe. I love Karen. Oh, man. By the way, the drink that he had, that psychiatrist gets just savaged by people. Really? They really, really, really hate anyone trying to defend themselves unless it's them. That's the way court works for people. If you even defend yourself, how dare you. But if it was them, just fight for my life. Take the punishment. Real weird. This guy said, this is a blow. Prosecutor sometimes tell me, you think of this as a thriller,
rather than a real legal case. Now that I've had a talk show, people say, is this just grandstanding for you? But I like to think of the work I've done in the media as an opportunity to convey ideas I deeply care about to a lot of people. Apparently he had a syndicated talk show that they viewed in 2006 and last year. - Is it Kenneth Able? - Keith. - Keith. - I think he's on Howard Stern show. - Maybe he might have been. - I think he is. - That's possible, yeah. - Yeah, he's involved in all these high profile cases. So yeah, it's become easier to gloss over people's problems and provide kissy solutions. And it ended up looking like all other talk shows that have come and gone. That's what somebody says who is a senior producer for the program. Today, he frequently speaks on different news shows from topics ranging from serial killers to people's mental states. He recently appeared on Howard Stern show. - There you go. It's not air therapy with a self-described alien abductee. That was in 2007. - Dr. Able did Riley Martin's thing 20 years ago, right? - Yeah. - Yeah, that's about that time. - Riley's dead. - Now after his conviction, Richard went to maximum security president, Cedar Junction in Wall Paul. Within weeks, he's talking to an inmate named Norman Wattney. And he starts asking, you know, fucking, he started asking, how'd you get in here? How'd you get in here? And he found out that he's kind of a lifelong criminal or whatever. And this Norman Wattney said, he asked me straight out if I knew anybody that could take care of the DA. - Why, he wants to kill the district attorney? - The highest attorney in the life. - Want to kill DA Weiner. That's who he's after. So according to this Wattney, Richard said he would only pay after he saw a specific item. He said, I must see Weiner's obituary in the newspaper before I'll pay you a dime. A prison security, as we'll find out, there was a, basically he went and told on him. - Yeah. - I went and told on Richard. So then he wouldn't wear a wire though. So they had a guy listen, like concealed inside ductwork, listening to they, they had a cop up there, listening to the conversation. And he said that he heard Richard asking for this. And he said he seemed pretty relaxed. Like this wasn't like a, oh shit, I'm real nervous talking about it. July 2, or January 2002, the Salem probate court approved a $5 million settlement on the wrongful death suit. - Oh, fair to the family. - Yep. According to the reports, most of what remained of the sharp fortune afterward estimated around a million dollars was directed to Michael and Ali, obviously, who were raised by Karen sister and brother-in-law, with Shannon helping as well. March 2002, Richard tries to kill himself in prison, but he's unsuccessful. He's gonna keep trying that. His only visitor throughout all these years, one person keeps showing up for him. - Miss Clitz, Clutz. - It's De Fruskyo, De Fruskyo. - Oh, it's her? - Yeah. - Linda De Fruskyo. - Really? - De Frusky. - She keeps showing up. She visits him in prison, don't worry. She's got ulterior motives, it's all right. She said she was the daughter of a criminal and had been visiting prisons long before Richard went into one so she wasn't uncomfortable. - She's familiar. - She's like, I gotta find someone like my dad here and I found him. She kept notes on whatever was at hand. Post it, snapkins, a paper plate one time. These scraps of paper become a book that she's gonna write later. - What? - Oh yeah, she's there to write a book. - Is her ex-husband the one that would hang out with him? - No, no, no, no, no. That was the SD, the musician guy. - Got it, right, right. - Yeah, this is just somebody that's the business associate or owned her own shit. She, August 2007, he's on trial again for solicitating the murder of District Attorney Weiner, which is not good. The Commonwealth's case rests on Norman Watney, a Lawrence man who's serving seven to nine years for aggravated rape and assaults on correctional officers. - You only get seven to nine for that? - Great guy, he said, well, yeah. He's been in prison for nearly 10 years and is due for release in December 2008. He was given a suspended sentence for aggravated rape in the early 90s. - Oh. - Aggravated rape, suspended sentence. - When he violated terms of his release, he was ordered to serve five to seven years and he was given additional time for attacking correctional officers. Now, this Watney said that within weeks of Richard's arrival at Cedar Junction, he had asked Watney about the DA. Watney said, I said, I'd look into it. I'd make a few phone calls. He told me money was no object. At first, I didn't know if he was serious. He asked me if an assistant district attorney disappeared before his appeal, what would happen? He's literally trying to not as revenge to help him in his appeal. I told him, I didn't know. He asked me straight out if I knew someone who could take care of the DA. So now they, but this guy they put up here as a convicted rapist who goes after corrections guard. So, you know, it's a lot. Now, the two men eventually greed, eventually greed to $20,000 to do the job. Money's no object, $20,000. According to Watney, though, he said he would only pay after he saw Wiener's obituary in the newspaper, a prison security officer Jeff Smith testified he had monitored one conversation from inside concealed duck work and said that was when he said sharp seemed pretty relaxed. Watney said sharp refused to make a down payment on a hit and wanted to read the obituary first. Watney reported his conversations with sharp about killing Wiener, two prison authorities, and that's how this came about. No money till I get the obituary. No money till I get a clipping. Yeah. The his defense attorney, by the way, same defense attorney from his trial, yeah. Attacked Watney all over the place. Pointed out that he had lost all prison privileges just before he went to security with the story. So this might have helped you get out of everything, get your commissary back. She told him that he had manipulated a vulnerable new prisoner as well. She told the jury that he fucked with some vulnerable new prisoner. Quote, he was preyed to other criminals who knew that what the system was about. He was a doctor. He was wealthy. He was a celebrity prisoner. An easy target. This lawyer said that Watney was a problem in mate who was just attempting to regain privileges such as phone calls to his four children that had been taken away from him. Quote, he is a violent and threatening predator and he is proud of it. This so-called scheme makes no sense whatsoever and said the logic doesn't make sense. Appeals in Massachusetts first to remurder cases are automatic and weener was retiring from the DA's office anyway so killing him would mean nothing. There's another guy going to show up. They're always another guy. That's like, we killed the big drug dealer or the big terrorist. Okay, in four minutes now they're replaced. Yeah, there's always a new one stupid. Always every time they don't go, well, fuck it. The leader got killed so let's all pack. Well, now they'll never do that ever, ever, ever again. Nope, verdict comes in here, not guilty. Really? Not guilty, 'cause there's a scumbag. Yeah, it's just his word versus his and they're like two scumbags can't call it not guilty. All right. So he goes to MCI, nor fuck. He appeals the murder. The appeal is going on. It's being handled by an appellate lawyer named Michael Traft. He's talking back and forth with Traft as a 2009 appeal is happening. Yeah. I'm going to appeal is being set for 2009. January 5th, 2009. 726 PM. He is found deadness. God damn it. According to the Department of Corrections spokeswoman, quote, he tied a bed sheet to the top bunk. Of course he did. His way was going out, was hanging. He knew he was going. He was not going to do that. He's not going to be there till he dies. He's going to die. Yup. And Robert Weiner, the guy he allegedly wanted to kill, said, whenever a person takes their own life, obviously you feel badly for that person. But my true sympathy is with Karen Sharma. She died needlessly. Shot in the back. His lawyer was super surprised actually. His lawyer said there was no indication that he was in any way despondent or at any contemplation of suicide. No idea he was mentally ill. I mean, obviously he's fine in there. Yeah, just must be going great. He had two documented suicide attempts prior to this. His lawyer said, but was still shocked. He's tried to kill himself before. He's stuck in prison forever. Two times in the joint. In the joint. When they caught him, he was actively trying to kill himself. Super surprised. Shot. Open your fucking eyes. Shocking. Well, no. This lawyer says he suspects foul play as a matter of fact. He said, I would be surprised that he committed suicide. So he said that they recently talked about that he'd been tutoring other inmates. Yeah. He told the newspaper that Sharpe had been relatively positive in his communication. And another guy, a nationally known forensic psychiatrist Dr. Michael Wellner, said it is my hope that the local authorities conduct a careful psychological autopsy to ascertain the possibility of murder versus suicide. This guy gets cheated on and thinks every time that the guy is gay. It's a super gay. Yeah. Shall we go to hang out with this guy? He must be gay. He must be real gay.
Wow, other reactions, a partner in the law firm that represented Karen in the divorce said he hoped Sharp's death Bring some closure to this nightmare for the three sharp children Remember Alan Estes who wrote the ballot of Dr. Sharp. Yeah He said quote how tragically it all went down He showed up at the door while the two kids are in the house and took their mother's life I saw a very messed up person from day one and the son I wrote is one of desperation y'all want to hear it. They're like no, no, no, he's like that starts strumming like Spotify y'all I'm sure it is An 80-year-old former patient of his said quote What does someone do with himself serving a life sentence? I just don't know I thought of sending him some books at first, but I decided I just didn't want to do that his wife is gone and someone's raising their children The whole thing is terribly sad. Yeah, haven't you ever seen The rikers document anytime they ask him. What are you doing? They go time? Time. Yeah, I'm just sitting here doing time, man It's yeah, he's gonna get through and I don't know. I think that's harder on smart people too because the brains work more They can't just sit there and go duh for an hour and pass the time Yeah, that's some people can do that some people can't so two books republished about the case the first is and this was quoted heavily through our story John Glatt G-L-A-T-T is the author twisted is the story of the book published in 2003 and This is how it opens quote Darken brooding and given to uncontrollable fits of violence doctor Richard Sharp was a self-made millionaire who had earned five million dollars from his various dermatology businesses Then the jacket copy says he had a successful career a selfless wife and three loving children when high school Sweetheart's Karen and Richard Sharp married they shared an interest in medicine a desire for family and a dream for the future for Karen That dream became a nightmare. Oh Jesus of course And he also says inside call it says quote a heavy drinker who self-medicated with a cocktail of prescription medicines The 45-year-old doctor was also a transvestite who got turned on by dressing and his daughter's underwear even swallowing Karen's birth Control pills to sprout womanly that breasts on his slender body calm down. There's some wild out nations Yeah, that is a 2003 there. Then the second book is Linda DeFruscio's cornered That's cornered Dr. Richard J. Sharp as I knew him a 266 page memoir is what it is not a reconstruction of the crime a story of their friendship is what it is Her jacket copy says quote. He was someone who's genius. She admired immensely a business associate Dear friend who committed a terrible crime both of those things were true at the same time That's the problem with Richard Sharp, right? She also yeah, she also explained on the advice of her literary lawyer. She changed almost all the names and In some cases people's professions and towns She also cut out what she called very juicy details That she thought could be read at that her lawyer thought could be read as damaging and libelous So you're not getting shit out of her except if you like this guy nothing Linda's a little odd by the way In the same interview she describes the first time she saw Richard's home in Gloucester And which is the big house that they lived in before that and he said before he was incarcerated Richard Sharp lived in a gorgeous house near the sea in Gloucester, Mass the first time I saw it I recognized it as the house I've always dreamed of After he was incarcerated. I had the chance to buy it and I did She bought his house. She bought his fucking house, dude She is like Weird that's a weird lady right now something with that one in my opinion. Allegedly. That's a little strange So there you go everybody that is when a Massachusetts what a What a fucked up story. It's a fucking wild story and some lady gets shot for nothing. I mean, honestly She should have left the out of it after the alarm clock. Yeah, well again She was a 17 year old pregnant girl. So maybe not she's not probably done left when he said I want you to don Yeah, if only if only he just wouldn't the only that one night You know what I mean no ovulation occurs something happening to stop that whole thing. So anyway There you go if you enjoy that show get on whatever app you're on and tell us about it Tell the world about it more importantly, please, it helps so much. We don't know why because give us five stars on whatever app Netflix double thumbs up is the way to do that So thank you for doing that. Thanks for watching. Thanks for hanging out with us It's really awesome and if you're listening you can watch us on Netflix. Yeah, and if you're watching us on Netflix You can listen. We have over seven this is episode seven forty three So there's so many episodes to listen to check them all out Also head over to shut up and give me murder dot com right get your tickets for live shows come see us at a live show This weekend if you're listening right when it comes out October 16th San Jose, California get your tickets the next night October 17th Sacramento, California get your tickets Those will be different shows by the way two totally different murder stories Yeah, you can go to both in here two crazy shows and other some people doing that. So have a caravan from fucking San Jose, the Sacramento. It's fun A bunch of people come from Dallas too Inter that's so weird. Yeah, that's cool. Then no on November the 13th in Terry town That one's almost sold out, but there's a few tickets left for that then in Boston on November 14th You know mentford actually just outside Boston. 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It's pretty fucking crazy stuff then for small town murder Scary movies we're gonna talk about it's October Scary movies horror movies our favorites our least favorites which ones are supposed to be good which ones aren't better than other areas there'll be a discussion of scary movies. So check that out. See if your tastes align up with hours either way patreon dot com slash crime in sports is where you get all that and on top of everything you get Everything we put out all of our shows all ad free as well crime in sports your stupid opinion small town murder all ad free And then on top of that you get a shout out which is right goddamn now Jimmy Hit me with the names of the people who would never steal our undergarments Or shoot us for no goddamn reason Jimmy hit me with them right fucking now this week's executive producer of a Gary Howard checking Gary Bayley 10 Tennessee. Oh boy. Is that Gary's getting around Nathan Ashley guess happy. I don't know if that's a birthday or anything. I don't think so Curtis in Jackson Tennessee. Where where where's that? I don't know that's Curtis happy hours in Indian all Mississippi wherever the fuck that is Jesus everyone is in the middle of nowhere this way. He says yeah Wow, and also CC's grandma. Thank you guys for what you're doing. We can't do without you other producers this week Peyton Meadows Liz Vasquez and Janice Hill. Thank you. Matthew Shamblin Cassidy Guerrille David would know last name killing time Smith with no last name Hanora Gaffney levitt Gayle Lena Martin Nicole Dexter Beck Dufrin Duf Duffrin Jacob Sessions Tammy would know last name Shelby Huggins Gribbs chuggled uh Niki hoarth and Susan Glines Luke Rateria Elizabeth Brickhouse Katelyn O'Ment D block Gayle Boyce Eric BB Mike smathers Crystal Kershaw Lewis and Claire Christina local low budget doctor. Oh, we don't want those. Let's get the high budget ones when we can who you're gonna call the buster Deer with no last name Lisa with no last name psycho cupcake Mickey with no last name Andy Marcee Marceye Valerie Rydell Emma with no last name Niki Huffed Hufft Who fed She's all lacquered up Alexis Grunig Ryan Turner Jason Garrish uh Garrish maybe Travis Peterson a man to Sutherland Kristen Krippin Yeah You got it Brandy Spees perhaps maybe it spies, but it's probably Spees based on just our history of knowing how that word is pronounced Shawna Quavis Jenny Hill live Brasimio Jessica would know last name Lynn Gurkin Gurking Whatever it is uh-huh that could be pronounced jerking. That's a G. Oh that could go a lot of different ways Maggie Korkowski cat attorney cat attorney Jesse Sencebaugh Tara with no last name Chris with no last name John crisp Kristen champ Eric the cleric Melanie with no last name sharing Meeks Joe Lusky Daniel Gilbert Andrew Dewey Jen with no last name Connor
I would know last name Brian Taylor, Nevin would know last name, Brian Kite, Heywood, Jeblomy James. - Wow, that's a good friend of mine. - Jeblomy, perhaps. I don't know if it's Jeblama. - Of the Newport Jeblomies? - I believe so. - Okay, good, that's actually-- - Yeah, there's a lot of them in that family all named Heywood. - It's very amazing. - Brian Titus, Kendall Joe Doros Zisco, six or so, six or so, stay lost. Vanessa Reed, Yvette V, Brooks M, Marcus Lee, Kelly Hawkins, Archie would know last name. MJ would know last name, Donna Dittman, Michelle Turner, Mama Mary Sarah would know last name, Dan Spanky, Michael Linville, Lauren Meyer, Rebecca Hasse, Hasse Hase, John Martin, Neil Reynolds, Christine Tinsley, Paxy Monroe, Rochelle Elizabeth, Emily Pivitt, Povite, Pivitt, Michael Peterson, Nicole Boone, - Staircase. - Heather Dorn, say it again. - Is that the Staircase guy, Michael Peterson? - Yes, that's why, the Peterson's, they're a murder, I don't know my group. - Yeah, I'll bet there's more Peterson murderers than Jeblomy's. - Then the Jeblomy. - But they're Archie. - The Jeblomy. (laughing) - Heather Dorn, Angela Riley, Matt Brock, Sophie Gori. Yeah, Gori, Matt Dimes, Matt Dennis, Melissa Walker, Lori Stewart, Eric Young, A Slyzo, is that an L, L Slyzo? Ryan Walton, Day Day, we would know last name. Day Day, David Katherine, Hubanthal, Jennifer Trip, Michael Stabiel, Stabiela, Melinda, Melinda Minor, Karen Copeland, Snow White, James, Snow White, is now a producer of the H. - No, no, she woke up. - Wow. - She really has an interesting podcast. She started one with those fucking eight dudes. Is it eight, eight, right? - Seven. - Seven. (laughing) - Eight including her, it's an eight, it's an eight someone they get together, but there's only seven of them. - Snow White and the eight to a party. - Yeah, you know, all eight of them. (laughing) - Snow White and the seven dwarves and fucking Kevin Hart. - You wonder why I don't depend on your statistical knowledge. (laughing) - I'm pretty good at numbers. (laughing) - That's great. - That's Jennifer Trip, I did. Katherine Copeland, Snow White, there she is. Kelsey Karan, Karen, perhaps. Hutch, 86, Morgan Zond, Tyler Grasel, Karee, Karee Hodges, Karee Hodges, Anthony Parsons, Stan Phillips, Christopher Zervos, Debbie Shale, Shalee, Shelley, Marcos, Quinn Koza, Kingoza, and all of her patrons, we love you. - Thank you so much everybody. You've got damn wonderful bastards. - You're unbelievable. - You're unbelievable, we appreciate the shit out of you and everything you do for us and it's gonna say to us, but nobody does anything to us. They're just for us. That's good, we appreciate that. So thank you for doing that. Thank you for coming back week after week after week, you want to find us real easy to do that. Shut up and give me murder.com is the place to find that. Keep coming back and seeing us again. And until next week everybody, it's been our pleasure. Bye. (upbeat music)
Podcast Summary
Key Points:
The story centers on Richard Sharp, a doctor from Massachusetts, who grew up in a deeply abusive household with a violent father and a history of cross-dressing as an escape mechanism.
Richard’s childhood trauma, including physical abuse and emotional neglect, shaped his psychological development and contributed to later abusive behavior in marriage.
Richard married Karen Hatfield, a 17-year-old from Michigan, in secret, hiding their pregnancy and marriage from families, with Karen’s parents strongly disapproving of him.
Their marriage was marked by extreme domestic violence, including a 48-hour imprisonment, multiple beatings, and one incident where Richard whispered, “I want you to die” while she was in the hospital.
The abuse escalated over time, with Karen and their daughter Shannon, age 10, both testifying to severe physical violence, including head injuries and being dragged down stairs.
The case highlights the contrast between a seemingly affluent, safe town and a deeply toxic personal history, where wealth and stability do not equate to safety or emotional health.
The narrative blends real-life abuse patterns with dark humor, emphasizing the normalization of domestic violence and the psychological toll on victims.
The story underscores the long-term impact of childhood trauma, showing how abuse cycles persist into adulthood and relationships, especially in families with histories of violence.
Summary:
This episode of *Small Town Murder* explores the harrowing true story of Richard John Sharp, a doctor from Massachusetts, whose life was shaped by severe childhood abuse and emotional trauma. Born into a family where his father, a tool-maker and gambler, beat his brothers and son (but spared his sister), Richard developed a deep-seated need for escape. As a child, he hid in the bathroom and wore his sister’s clothes to feel safe, a behavior that evolved into a coping mechanism for his father’s violence.
Later, he married Karen Hatfield, a 17-year-old from Michigan, in secret, hiding both their marriage and her pregnancy from her family. Their relationship quickly descended into abuse, with Richard subjecting Karen to repeated physical violence, including a 48-hour imprisonment, hospitalization after being beaten, and a chilling moment when he whispered, “I want you to die” while she was being treated. Their daughter, Shannon, a young child at the time, also testified to severe abuse, including being grabbed, slammed against a bed, and dragged down stairs.
The story contrasts the town’s image of safety and affluence—highlighted by low crime rates and luxury real estate—with the deep, toxic personal trauma that lies beneath. It illustrates how childhood abuse can perpetuate cycles of violence in adult relationships, and how such patterns are often normalized or ignored in society. The narrative is presented with dark humor and satire, underscoring the absurdity and horror of domestic violence while maintaining a respectful, non-exploitative tone by avoiding mockery of victims or their families.
The episode serves as a cautionary tale about the long-term psychological damage of abuse and the importance of recognizing and addressing it.
FAQs
The episode is set in Weymouth, Massachusetts, a town east of Boston known for its wealthy residents, strict family values, and low crime rate. It's also near the coast and has a strong historical background, including ties to early colonial settlement and the witch trials.
Weymouth has a high median household income of $154,375, with a median home price of around $868,000. It's also notable for having a 55.2% female population, a median age of 34, and a very low crime rate—only 20% of the national average for property crime.
The story follows Richard Sharp, a man from a deeply abusive family, who grows up hiding from his father by dressing in his sister’s clothes. After marrying Karen Hatfield in 1973, he becomes a violent abuser, subjecting her to physical abuse, including locking her in for 48 hours and whispering to her, 'I want you to die.'
Richard’s abuse from his father and the trauma of hiding in the bathroom led him to develop a self-soothing behavior of dressing like his sister. This pattern of emotional escape carried into adulthood, where he used similar psychological coping mechanisms in his abusive relationship with Karen.
Richard’s abuse includes throwing an alarm clock at Karen’s face, imprisoning her for 48 hours while beating her, refusing to let her leave during a hospital visit, and threatening to kill her during a drunken drive home. These incidents show a pattern of escalating domestic violence.
The episode highlights how Richard’s upbringing under constant physical and emotional abuse led to a cycle of violence in his marriage, where he replicated patterns of control and abuse—showing how early trauma can directly influence adult behaviors and relationships.
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