Murder Unscripted
A Conversation with Phil Claroni - "Hedonistic Killers" (Ep. 2:4)
It's Tuesday and you're listening to "Better Arms with Dennis". What is up everybody? Welcome back to Murder Unscripted. We have a very special guest, special to me, he's special to me. He's my longtime friend, co-EP of Lost Boys of Bucks County. He was, this is the story that I'd covered the past two weeks. Hold up, EP means executive producer. Executive producer, I'm sorry. Executive producer of Lost Boys of Bucks County. So introducing Phil Claroni. Hey, what's up guys? What's up brother? Hi Phil. Hey Melissa, how's it going? Good man, how are you? Doing good. Doing great. You're in Baltimore now, right? I'm in Baltimore. Yep. I'm a Chardon City guy, been here for I think almost four years now. Yeah. No way. And you were, so just for a little clarity, like the reason, one of the reasons Lost Boys even existed was because you used to live here and I guess we're just following news because I mean by this time you were still in, were you in Pennsylvania still when this happened in 2020? No, I was, I was working in Washington D.C. I was an executive producer for Storyhouse Productions, which was the company that produced this story for the Discovery Networks. But you know, everything social media, you know, I'm still linked sort of to the PA scene and yeah, do you want me to go in how I found it or? Yeah, man. I just wanted to talk before we get, before we jump into Lost Boys, like you and I, we've known each other a long, long time. You're probably the colleague that I have just maintained the biggest relationship with over the years. Dude, it's funny because I literally, I was at, I live on a park, a city park and there's like a wine festival and I went through there with my neighbor. I was like, I gotta, I gotta jump, I gotta go to this podcast. And he was like trying to, you know, learn more about it. And I was like, it's with, it's with my buddy, I'm like, who I've worked with for like 15 years. And I was like, you know, actually, he was the first person I ever spoke to in this industry because you were an internship coordinator for forensic files and I quote you as like a 21 year old kid. Right. And I'm like, Mr. Heidock. Mr. Heidock. I mean, you were quite literally the first person I ever spoke to in the business. And I was just thinking, like, I can't believe that after, you know, all these years later that we are still working together, you know, like we, we have to, and it's funny because when you, you talked about me being the first person in industry that you talked to when I met you, I was still so green. I mean, Christ, I was in my early twenties, like, like trying to do this job. So like supervising interns was new to me. That was the first time I'd supervise anyone doing anything. So it was, it was wild. And then you, so what happened, you, you interned with us and then kind of made the leap to AP, sorry, assistant producer, Melissa AP. And that was kind of your first like gig, right? Yeah. I mean, I, I didn't even get the forensic files gig actually. Oh, sorry. You were on the medical side. I was on the medical news side because the, I wanted to be a writer and the forensic file side was more of the production element to the whole thing, you know, the shooting and, you know, the staging and stuff like that. So I actually went in on the news side and they liked me so much, you know, after we graduated a couple months later, they called me for that dual position. Yeah. It was like a floater kind of like a floater PA position and I was their production assistant production assistant. Yeah. And honestly, I got to tell you truth, I was about to quit that job. I mean, I hated it so much. I thought it was, I, I thought it sucked ass. I mean, I agree so much. And I think one of our colleagues was like, she came in the one day and she, she was the associate assistant producer, which is a writing job. And she was like, yeah, don't tell anybody that I'm leaving. And I was like, well, you know what, I'm going to try to get that job, but if I don't get that job, I'm putting this job and going back to the pizza place full time, you know, that's right. It's right. And I, and it just it lined up right. And the rest is history. Yeah. Dude, it's like, so we literally have, I was thinking about it like, I don't know what year that was, but I started to know three and there. So you must have been nine, I think, or nine, yeah, so we probably between us have what 35 40 years of just true crime experience, like, yeah, it's incredible. It's never, you know, I've done a bunch of different genres in my career. But true crime is, you know, it keeps the lights on. I mean, there is such insane demand and a crazy market for it. And, and you know, again, I don't know if you thought this, but I remember like, I remember being like three years in at forensic files and feeling like this ship's not going to last much longer. Like the true crime phase, like I was like, what are we going to do? I'm like, this shit's almost over. And it just grew every year, you know, it was astounding because it did feel like a something that would be short lived. And Christ, here we are how many years later, and you got people like Melissa. So this is the, I've never met a bigger true crime failing. This girl can recite entire shows off the top of her head. She knows like Ted Bundy shoe site, like it's, it's not so like, it's just, it's just the work that we started out all those years ago. I mean, people are still eating it up. I mean, I watch for 100 files, what? You should check out the crime and punishment museum. It used to be in DC. I think now they move somewhere, but it's, it's awesome if you like true crime. I love it. I really want to go out there and, you know, that wouldn't be awesome to see. Yeah. That would be so cool now or something, yeah. I wanted to kind of transition into you. So you started as a system producer and then it kind of grew from there because we got laid off. I was in the first round, the first or second round of layoffs, and then I forget how it went, but I ended up down in working remotely in Silver Spring, Maryland for a company called Sirens, which is defunct now, I believe. But they had an opening too. And I was like, dude, I don't know if you're in the next round of layoffs, but your time might be coming. Like the end looked near. So I was like, there's something down there and that, that kind of, that took off. I mean, you, you really made a name for yourself after that. Well, I remember, it was, it was crazy. It was, it was a day I'll never forget, honestly, because it kind of taught me a lot about how the industry works. Because, you know, I was so young, I think at this time, I think I was like, what, 25, 26? Yeah. And, you know, I just thought like this show would always be there, you know, like I didn't realize that, you know, like, you know, I always knew shows got canceled, but I didn't know, you know, like I didn't know, like a staple like forensic file. I mean, that was their, their bread and butter. And then I think what happened is they re when they rebranded and became true TV. That's when, that's when they started to go sideways. Well, I remember coming, you, you, I think you just had your baby, right? The day Ellie was born, my daughter. Yeah. And I remember, you were, you were only for that. And we had been, we had been down for a few months, a lot of months, a lot of months. And, and to their credit, I mean, nowadays, no production company would ever keep you on for as long as this company, they paid us to essentially do nothing. I mean, we were researching and I think Ed and I were like ordering, like, save by the bell biography, save that book about screech, screech books, the dust and diamond books, you know, we read it, dust and diamond in the back of all things. Nothing to do. It was my stories. Like we have like 60 stories. There were so many stories. We just got to produce them. Yeah. And I remember quite, quite vividly that, you know, we, I came in one day and I remember passing our executive producer's office and she was a very difficult personality. And I remember looking left in her office was totally cleared out and this was nine o'clock in the morning. So I was like, Oh shit, there is stuff going down right now. Like, and so I was like, well, I'm still alive, but we got in and you were still on sabbatical. And I remember, you know, everybody kind of got these, um, everybody got like an email at once. And it was like report, report to the ball pattern to or something like that. And I was like, Oh man, are they like going to line us up and shoot us or what? Dude, I would have preferred that at the time. I was so nervous about what was like, just killing it. And then, you know, you know, you know, what happened with you, you know, unfortunately, I made it to round two, but it was, um, you know, you, you kind of set the tone for what I was going to be in that when you found sirens media, um, you know, I had a choice to kind of sort of stay in that little small little area of true crime and this sort of research and pitch mode, or I could, you know, go into the field, interview, you know, people who were, you know, families of victims, detectives, um, you know, work with directors of photography, you know, work with other producers. So, you know, by you sort of, you know, blazing that trail, so to speak, it kind of got me the next job, which quite frankly, I don't even know if I was qualified. I mean, I knew my ability and I knew I could do it, but, you know, I thought that to be honest with you, I mean, it was a huge, it was a huge jump, you know, in responsibility. It was and I was so proud of you because like, I don't, I was hoping you made it to Spielberg level because I'm like, dude, go shoot for the stars. Just hire me. I don't give it. Like, I was so happy for you that you started and it helped that you were in a position in your life where you could move down to D.C. where people wanted people on the ground and in the office and you could face to face and that, I think that helped a lot. I was not willing to move anywhere because I was married at the time, so I was like, I'm stuck in Pennsylvania. And, you know, to some extent, you know, I have, you know, whether it's right or wrong or, you know, to some extent, I have maintained that flexibility. And, you know, I am married, but I don't have kids and that is a huge, if we're just talking about production, you know, having the ability to, I mean, literally the start of this year, I got a call on Friday to go interview a murderer in Dallas on Tuesday. I was on a plane on Monday, I literally talked to a murderer on Tuesday and then I fly back to Baltimore on a Wednesday, you know. You can't necessarily do that when you have, you know, kids or, you know, even, even, you know, my wife, you know, she completely understands, you know, I've had, I've had girlfriends before where it was just like, what, what do you mean you might be fine to Dallas? You know, like, if you want these nice dinners, I mean, I don't know, maybe, maybe this is like going way off of what this podcast is supposed to be, but this is the raw version of Philpra. It's unscripted. No, we love it. You know, but it's, it's, it's a very demanding life and it can be transient. I mean, when I first got married, I got the highest paid job I've ever had for now defunct network Quibi and do you know, you know, Quibi? So for your audiences that might, might have blinked and missed this network, it only lasted like a year or two, everything had to be under 10 minutes. And that's what a Quibi was anything under 10 minutes. Um, I think it stood for like, quick, quick bite, quick bite, quick bite. Yeah. That's it. And so I have an agent and an agent calls me and he's like, yeah, he's like, you know, there's a gig in St. Louis for 13 weeks. And it was like, I think they paid me like $55,000 to do an hour of content. And they gave me like a downtown, like, you know, studio, they gave me, I think, four or five round trip flights home, but I had to spend 13 weeks away from my wife, you know, and my dog and it sucks, you know, that's where you and Melissa share a, neither of you have kids, but you both love animal, like dogs. Oh, yeah. Melissa. I was totally, I was totally depressed, like, yeah, I was, you know, I was, I was making money hand over fist. And I was like, I was quite literally writing for Jeffrey Katzenberg, who's the creator of Shrek, right? He's, he is a Hollywood icon, right? Yeah. You know, he's, he's giving me notes on a script. Like, here I am. I'm like, all right, I'm, I'm working with big dogs right now, right? And I'm like, and this sucks because I'm like a thousand miles from home, you know, and I'm just sitting here and I'm just writing, you know, true crime stories. So it's like, you know, um, Melissa from the fan perspective, I mean, like, it seems like awesome, but sometimes it can just be, it's just sometimes it's just a shitty job. You know what I mean? Like, and the pay makes up for it, the pay, the, the, that's the only thing that makes it bearable. Like, you, you go through it, but you, you're making amazing money, like money you've never seen. Like, that's why forensic files, that's why they could pay us for a year to do nothing. Cause it was like peanuts. Right. Right. Yeah. I mean, what, what, I mean, it comes sometimes it comes fast, like, you know, next week, like, I'm, I'm doing two days of work at the national spelling bee conference. Oh, wow. That's awesome. Yeah. I'm like, what, what is this? Was there a murder there? Yeah. I can still do it. You know, and then like, I, I, and Matt and I'm writing a show called for my man. Unbelievable. Unbelievable. Yeah. So you really don't know, you really don't know what is, you never, you never know what's going to come across, you know, your desk. And that's, that's where this, the, the case that I was covering the loss boys for the past two weeks, like, it came, it came across like, I don't know many cases like this where you get to follow along and then work the, like help produce it later on. Like, I know for me, this thing, this thing captivated the headlines for like, probably a week. Cause that dig was three days. I mean, there was a week where it was like us living in the area. Melissa, you probably too, just remember this. Oh my God. I couldn't turn like the news on without just that. Like, and I was staying at my grandparents that week and then they lived in Southampton, which like, isn't far from there. And it was just like everywhere, everywhere you went, people were talking about it. Like you went to act me and people were talking about it. It was, it was everywhere. And then yeah, for you guys to then take that and work on that, like something that obviously you didn't know the victims, but like, it, it becomes personal when like, you know where they were, you know, peddlers village, like, you know the places that they were at. And like, it's so cool that you guys then got to put something together for that. And I mean, maybe I think it's super cool because I love the documentary. I've seen it a hundred times, but I just think that's awesome. And it gives it so much more of a personal touch. Yeah. I think, I think the personal connection was what really helped me sell it. And, you know, when I say sell to your audience members, I mean, I quite literally sold this project to discovery networks. And you know, that is not something that I was trained for. I didn't know how to do that. But as Ed will tell you, because Ed's got this too, I mean, you get this sense of story by doing this stuff, right? And you kind of know what's going to work and you kind of know what's not going to work. And, you know, to your point, Melissa, like I had, you know, I grew, I grew up probably about an hour away from where this all happened. But I knew this area, you know, my mom used to take me to rice's market, which quite literally was right next to where these kids were murder, you know, and a capital of the world. Exactly. Heather's village, as you said, was something else familiar with. I was going to ask so for the listeners, how do you even talk to me about the process and keep it, you can keep it brief, just give me the broad strokes of how you sell a show. You have an idea. So the Lost Boys is happening all around you, cases wrapping up and you're like, I'm going to, this is a story that people need to hear. What's next? It is very much. I mean, this is going to sound like totally cliche, but it is really like who you know. I, we had some contacts at Discovery, but I had met somebody at Sirens where you and I worked at, and he had left that company while still there, and he went to Discovery to, you know, work for Investigation Discovery, you know, in a development capacity. Development, for those who don't know, is, you know, what we call a show that's not airing on TV, but, you know, we're trying to sell it and develop it. Okay. So I, and again, like, I didn't really know him. I just knew him as like the guy that, you know, like when it was like snack time or bagel time, you know, like I still have in there now, you know, I'd be like, hey, did you like see this crazy football game or something, you know, like total water cooler type conversation I had with this individual? And you know, you have, you have to be, you have to really put yourself out there because like you could not be shy. And, you know, I, I think I had like four or five meetings with him before I pitched him any idea that he was even remotely interested in. So you know, it was very much like, I had to like, it was, it was courting. It was a courtship like, you know, I pitched him like 10 ideas that I thought were really good. And he was like, nope, nope, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah. And then this Cosmo de Nardo story pops up on my social media. And I'm like, that's the fucking one. That's the fucking story I'm going to sell. I know they're going to want that. You know why I know they're going to want that because everybody fucking wants that. And I knew it. I knew everybody was going to want that story. And you know, we had some meetings, they were like, okay, I like that. And you know, and you're writing, and you're writing, and you're pitching, and you're pitching. And you know, you're meeting tons of people. And then they say, you know, get me this person, but no, I want this person. And you have to present them with like basically every single thing they possibly want to say, okay, we're going to buy the rights to this story. That doesn't even mean that they're going to make the show. So they'll give you $5,000 to buy the rights of the story. And then they go give you a laundry list of shit that you have to do for them to just buy it. So it's literally the whole process, the sell this one, two hour special, which I think at the time we were floating it as a it was three, dude. It was a I saw the pitch deck. The I still have the pitch deck in my like the in my thing and said three by 60. So this was pitches at three hour and didn't they knock it down to a one hour? And then when we got it was a one hour, it was a one hour. They floated the idea of a 90 minute movie and then they did two hour special. Right. Because I remember eventually a same thing as a movie when the game kind of changed when that when that leaked D'Nardo audio came out when it's like, we have this now. What can we do with it? And they just kind of stuck to the two hour, right? And I mean, that was, I mean, I was in court that day when that leaked. So you wouldn't hear the story behind that. Sure. Yep. So that the crazy part about that was we're sitting here and we're trying to get a production schedule in line. So production schedule is when you're telling the network this thing is going to be done. Now you know how the judicial system works. So your production schedule is based off of when this fucking murderer is going to be put behind bars, right? So we had two murderers in this case. So I'm sitting there and I'm, I am, I am shaking and like practically pissing my pants because, you know, originally we have thought this was going to be done, right? Like wham, bam, thank you ma'am. And then all of a sudden it's like, oh, this could be years. And it's like, what the hell do you tell the network? They just thought this thing for like a million bucks, you know, and it's like, and how do you tell them like, oh my God, well, everything that we were told may go down the toilet. So we're, we're in, I'm preparing to go to, I'm in Washington DC and prepared to go to Bucks County for the, for the hearing. And one of the prosecutors, I'm sorry, one of the family's attorneys calls me and I'm like, Hey, what's up? And he's like, Hey, this is like totally, you know, um, this is totally hush, hush right now. But I'm telling you right now that I would be very surprised if this case isn't completely resolved by tomorrow. So he's like, and that's all I can tell you. So I'm like, Oh shit, I'm like, they're taking a plea deal, right? So I'm like, we're safe. I'm like these guys are because they, everybody knew they're going to go away forever, right? Like they clearly did it. So I'm like, so I'm around in the troops, right? I'm getting, you know, I'm getting my director, I'm getting my director of photography in line. I'm getting my sound crew, you know, I'm calling everybody I know over there and be like, Hey, guy, crash on your couch. Like I'm going to come up tomorrow, whatever, blah, blah, blah. I don't know what's going to happen. And we go into court, Leonardo goes first, killer mastermind, pleads guilty, he's in, he's in jail for the rest of his life, right? It's over with. And then crats goes. And the whole entire side for crats was empty, not a single person, it was completely empty. Every single person. But they remember these, these, the, the Nardos were related to him. Yeah, I was going to say weren't their moms like cousins or sisters or something? They were cosmos, it was cosmos cousin, you know, and his entire family left. This kid had no one. And but that's why this thing leaked was because this Craig Penglace, the, the denartos, it was, I think it was denartos attorney. One of the attorneys thought that crats was going to take a plea. This thing was in the bag. Let's send this out. No big deal. And then he does it. Then he's like, I'm going to trial. It's like, oh, what happened, what happened is they thought it was in the bag. He sent it to a reporter, nobody understood why he sent it to the reporter. There was rumors about it. Like I heard rumors that, you know, like he got money and then I heard one that he was like trying to sleep with the reporter or something. I don't know if we can say all this. But there was absolutely no reason for this guy to leak this tape, right? This was a sealed document that only, like only like seven people had access to, right? And then, and then crats, shocks, everybody in the courtroom says, I'm not taking the plea deal that we just worked out. And I can see it on, I can see it on the prosecutor's face. He comes back and he looks frustrated and I'm like, fuck me. I'm like, this is this kid. But at the time, I'm like, you know, Donardo fled. So I think we can still do it, right? And they're like, no, we can't do it unless both of them were guilty. And, um, and then later that night, this confession leaks to the national media, it goes viral. And it was just like, and, and, and honestly, the whole thing kind of went out of control from there, I think. It did. And the thing that was fascinating to me is I've never had the chance, you know, when we do these crime shows, 1987, Ethel, so it's always past tense, you know, so to live in the moment and to like be working a story as it's unfolding was wild because we were like on constant high alert for anything interesting, like, so challenging, right? Yeah. Cause you don't know, you don't, there's no formula. It's like evolving and you don't know where the end is. You're not just producing your, like, you're quite literally like, you're, you're talking to, you're talking, you're getting information from people that even the cops don't know. Like I was literally knocking on this dude's Cosmo Donardo's like ex-girlfriend. It was like the only girl that ever showed him any attention in his life. And I'm in Ben Salem, which, you know, has some real CD parts, right? Like, and, uh, or maybe it wasn't Ben Salem, I can't remember where it was, but I'm in like this. I might have been real shady, like, clearly government housing building. And this girl was supposed to meet me, right? And I know she's inside the house. I know she's inside the house because I literally put my ear up to the door and could hear them moving and I, and I, I literally sat in my car outside of her apartment for, like, six hours. Wow. Like, literally because I was like, if she's going to come out that door, I'm going to stick a mic in her face and try to get some sound bites about who this freaking crazy guy was because he was a nut job. Oh, absolutely. We started out stories about them from, you know, we, we had, we had reporters that were talking to all these people and they were talking to us. You know, there was, there was so much information. There was so much information about this dude that did not even air in this documentary. That's the crazy part of it. I mean, this guy was a nut job. I've shared some of it with Melissa kind of behind the scenes just, like, this is the stuff that you didn't, because I love showing her things. It honest to God, it's porn for Melissa, like, if she really is, to see things that, that are like, that she falls in love with this documentary and then to be like, check this out. And she's like, Oh my God. So it's just, it's a, it was so, this could have been eight hours. If you really got into every single aspect of, of, of what went on in this case. Yeah. I mean, there was, I mean, you know, I, from one of the police officers told us, I remember that he had a hunting shed on his property and when they went inside that hunting shed, it was just like rotten deer carcasses in the shed. The things that went on, like Phil next week, we're actually going to get into the, do you remember the Philly magazine article that came out about Cosmo? So we're going to, we're going to talk, we're going to really get into some of the psychology of him because this, I don't know if I told you, but this block that we're doing is about hedonistic killers, which is kind of like thrill, thrill killers. So it's just a little bit. So we're going to talk about the psychology of it, but I mean, this kid had this fine line between mental illness and just, just complete psychopath. I don't know where it lies. It's somewhere in there, you know. Yeah. I mean, I think he's like a modern day killer. I mean, these kids like lived their life on social media and he had these delusions of grandeur. You know, I think he wanted to be, I think he was like, you know, growing up in this like sort of, I hate to say it because it's like my favorite show ever, but like, you know, he kind of grew up in this like sopranos era, you know, like where, you know, I think he wanted to be like this big tough guy. He's from the Northeast, you know, he had Italian family. His dad was, you know, wealthy, though there was some debates about that as well, but seemingly was pretty wealthy. And I think he just, you know, I don't think anybody liked him. Yeah. I don't think anybody liked him. There was rumors and I don't know if it's true, you know, but there was rumors that when he was arrested for this murder, his parents threw a pool party. Oh my God. I've never heard. I don't know if it's true, you know, there are a lot of these things sort of took on, you know, a certain local legend that we interviewed a lot of people that I knew as soon as they were talking to me, it was bullshit. Yeah. And we talk about, I have this in my notes of things I wanted to talk to you about. So I come on this project, you're, you're knee deep in it at this point. You're like, Hey, this is taken off. I need somebody. So Phil brought me on because I was local, like it was just like, Hey, you can be there and back. Like that's how I was able to go back and forth to Doyle's town for this trial every day. But the first people I ever, when I hooked up with you and our DP, were the Coleman's these people who were like, they, they owned this mansion, not far from the, like within your shot of the farm. Yeah. And it was across the street. It was across the street with Jim Toomey. They lived like right next to Jim Toomey, the old Philly. But he, but they're all sort of, we live next to Jim Toomey. Here's the list of neighbors, a baseball player and a serial killer. Oh my God. So they're floating in their bowl and they're like, well, I remember hearing at X time, I forget whatever time they said, we heard gunshots and we're like, we did these whole interviews, like full sit down interviews. And then we're like, check in the case file. Like none of this makes any sense. So they had to get caught. Oh my God. Yeah. They were, they were. It was funny. Cause I knew that I knew we were going to get rid of that interview. I knew we weren't going to use it because ABC news ran with them. You know, they ran with this bullshit. They were, they're saying Saturday we heard gunshots. We heard gunshots. And then we were, there was this like, very specific line. She said, we realized they were hunting humans. Yeah. I was like, you know, they actually were murdered on Friday. So you're a little day, you're a day off. You might have heard somebody else. You can keep hunting humans. But I feel like she thought of that line and was like, oh my God, they're totally going to use this. And the funniest part about it is we're all from Pennsylvania. Right. I mean, how many times do you hear people shooting guns? Like I heard two today. Yeah. Yeah. Everybody's hunting. Everybody's shooting in their backyard. Pennsylvania. Everything, everything is 45 minutes away in Pennsylvania, you know, everybody has land. Everybody has, you know, playgrounds. So these people, you know, they're only association with this entire thing, whether they live next door, and they tracked out a news van and the news people, you know, interviews. But we were, Ed and I were interviewing them and I was like, nothing I said is true. I love it. So we've got that interview pretty early and we had lunch and we just decided, you know, I was probably going to be one. I mean, we could have, we could have used them for like, this thing doesn't happen here. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And the end, we just scrapped the interview. It was not worth it. So one thing I want to make sure we get into is for all the bullshit that existed in this case, there were, there were four families who were incredible. And, and I do mention in our, our kind of when I'm, when I'm breaking down this case that we weren't able to get Tom Mayo's family. And that was kind of challenging, but we, we tried. It wasn't for lack of effort. But talk to me about your relationship. I know that I'm personally not so much anymore, but close with the Patrick's and, and Mark Sturgis's family. But talk to me about your, I know you were closer than I was with the Finnek arrows, but also the Patrick's. I mean, these people opened their homes to us while this was going on, like they, they, there was no resolution yet, but they, and all of these people were so gracious and allowing us to, to kind of get the story and to, and to talk to them like human beings. And so talk to me about your, your perspective on these four families. Yeah. I mean, you know, played and simple, the story, the documentary does not happen without them. And my, I've been doing this, you know, I can, I can sit here and laugh about some things, but I've been doing this for long enough that, you know, when you talk to a family member, it is your job as a producer to make sure that their story is told in a way that they're going to be, you know, I don't want to say happy because I don't think they're ever happy, but I think it honors the memory that, you know, they have in their, in, in their minds, and you want to be respectful and, you know, I'll be completely honest with you. Um, there was probably a three to four week period where we absolutely received no response from any family member, I mean, naturally, right? But not a single family member would return a call and they were being bombarded. And I'll tell you how I got the family, I'll tell you how I got the family. It's a real interesting story and it involves a high profile character in this, but that I watched and this is part of the job. I mean, I was watching the story unfold and there was one lawyer, his name is he's highly visible Philadelphia guy named Tom Klein. Yeah. You know, Tom Klein, he has the long gray hair, he sits courtside on the 76 every, watch a Sixers game and you'll see him courtside every single game, single like LeBron James comes up to this dude and like, yeah, high five, you know, he's always on TV. The law firm has commercials on like every other commercial. Yeah. He's literally Drexel named their law school after this guy. I mean, he is, and he's a good, he's a really good guy. And, you know, I saw that he was the spokesman for, he wasn't the lawyer for every family member, but he knew all the represent representation that these family members had. And he's like, and he was obviously the most high powered attorney, you know, you're talking about a multi-millionaire here. And so he became the face of this whole thing. And he has obviously such a unique profile, right? Yeah. There's no missing him. So I'm sitting, it was this, it was his hearing I was telling you about, you know, and I'm sitting there in the hallway just outside the courtroom with my, my camera guy and my sound guy. And I see Tom, the lawyer go into the bathroom and I'm like, fuck it. I'm following. As my chance. So I go into the bathroom. Oh my God. I take a leak next to this guy, you know, and we're both at the sink and I just literally wash my hands, try my hands off. And I'm like, Tom Klein, I'm Phil Quironi, I'm with Storyhouse Productions. And I just gave my little elevator pitch and it worked. He liked me. Oh my God. He's like, call me, let's see what we can do. And you know, he's probably not going to like hearing this, but the funniest part about this whole story is, you know, I got, I got his attention and eventually it got me the family, but he's, I walked out of the bathroom first and then he walks out of it. And my sound guy and my camera guy, you know, they're like sitting here, they're local too. So they're like so invested in this story, right? And they're like, how did it go? And my sound guy, like he was from Philly, he's lived in Philly, but he's like from Ukraine or something. And he's like, he's like, it's not the guy you put, she's like, he's got toilet paper on his shoes. Oh my God. And he walks in, he walks in the court with fucking toilet paper hanging on his hair. Oh my God. Oh my God. I could not believe it. But that interaction, the family would have never done this without Tom Kline giving his endorsement and even getting his endorsement, we had to call and it would, I would be remiss if I didn't, Colin Burke was the first person he's Tom. He worked with Tom Kline, Colin Burke sort of, you know, I had, I still have a good relationship with him, you know, he's a Philly fan, I'm a Philly fan, more Facebook buddies. They were the ones who were receptive to this piece. And I got to tell you, the first time I met Dean's family, Dean's father, Anthony, to this day, I wish that I could have met him under different pretenses. Yeah, what a good dude, because I enjoyed talking to him so much. And I hate it. I hate it the fact that I had to sell him on something that he didn't want to do. Yeah. But that, that his lawyer said we should do this because he was such a good guy and he and I had such an instant, I mean, he's just, I just always wondered what it would be like if I had a chance to speak to them, you know, under different circumstances, like, you know, like if we were just talking about the Phillies at a bar, you know, or, you know, if, you know, I had them over for, you know, like, neighborhood Schindig or something like, and that's, that's a really hard part of the job, because you do have a job to do, right? Yeah. And you have to get their story if you feel so guilty about it, because you will never know what they're going through if you're lucky, right? You will never understand and they're so broken, you know, they're so, and they, Dean's older brother has had a baby, I follow that, you know, and, and I think the, the thing that made me the happiest when this was all said and done is that, you know, they all called me and they really loved the piece, you know, they really loved the story and they were nervous, you know, they didn't know, they didn't know, I mean, you don't, I don't want any shows, you don't know if they're going to screw you or not, you know, they can make you look terrible, I mean, whatever you wanted, but, you know what, Phil, as someone who's seen it several times, I want you to know, and I say this actually in, when we, when we talk about the case, Dean's dad, it came across so clearly how much he loved his child and it was so genuine because like, he knew he wasn't perfect, like he knew that, like he also just had so, like it just came across so much love for him and I really liked that he wasn't like, oh my god, my son was a saint, like he was so real about it and you could kind of relate to that because no one's perfect and you're like, yeah, I did that dumb shit and just the fact that his dad knew that but just so loved him, like he said at one point, like he's my best friend and like, yeah, you guys did such a good job of showing that and it really does come through like that and you know what, Melissa, it means so much for me to hear you say that because we could have easily presented him as an angel. We could have easily, we could have easily left out the fact that, you know, there was a moment in this cut and I fought for it and it was a moment of him getting arrested, one of his buddies, so Dean's parents gave us like, you know, 50 or 60 clips of home video from this kid's Facebook, they collected it all and showed it at his funeral and they gave us the disc and there's this shot of him getting arrested for riding dirt bikes and he winks at the camera and we all went back and forth, you know, is this inappropriate to put this kid getting arrested and I was like, you know what, like this is who this kid was, right, and I was like, and we're going to keep it in, you know, we're going to keep it in because I knew the dad and I was like, the dad, I knew that he might not like it but I knew that he would understand that it was the truth and I talked to him after and he said, you know, you could have left it out but he goes, but that's who my son was. Yes, and he just loved him so much regardless, like such an unconditional love that I think only a parent understands with their child and I, as someone who watched a lot of true crime, I thought it was refreshing because if I have to hear how someone lit up a room one more time, I'm going to go crazy. He was still to the earth. Yeah, it's the same shit. Well, and the thing that stuck out to me, this was the first like real documentary I've gotten to work on because these shows are so quick to pick up on any little tidbit and make it a hook, make it a red herring. So it would not surprise me if this were presented on a different network that they would be like, what was Dean doing that was like Dean was doing these bad things. Would someone have gotten mad at him for writing down the street and making a whole block out of his life just, but you know, the thing was is, you know, you have such little control if the network, because they're paying for it, right? But if the night from the beginning was like, that's not going to be what this is. And if you want this to be that, then, you know, we're not going to sell it to you, right? Like, now we were going to sell it to him, but we presented it, we were going to sell it to him as this is going to be a straight up documentary. This is not going to be this stupid bullshit wise of knives crap that, you know, you put on certain, you know, an ID is not all that IDs ID has silos, right? They have the wise of knives crap. And then they have, you know, the real investigative stuff, they just did the Nickelodeon piece, which I thought was really, really good for them. I thought it was a really hard hitting edgy investigative journalistic piece that I think ID should continue to do. I agree. Because they've got so such a factory where they didn't go back out exactly. Exactly. Lucky stuff. You know, ID has some really good stuff and this, this was, this was one of those things where you're like, hey, we want this to be one of those. And two IDs credit, they acknowledge that that's what this was going to be. You know, we were never going to turn this into like, well, he'd be back in time for long. Sure. Well, you know what I mean? Yeah. Or is it the seven deadly, you know, like, you know, it was never going to be that. And I'm so glad ID, you know, I was able to identify that. I felt like we weren't locked into the, the who done it like we usually are like it's it's we at the same time, though, we had it had to be a mystery. Like it because you do have these boys disappearing. So it's this, it's this knack of taking things that are happening quickly and fleshing them out. So like that all happened in what, at the course of 36 hours, all this stuff happened, but we were able to take it and make an hour. The first hour was just about these boys managing. What the hell is going on? You know what made it work was the fact that the families were so good, right? Absolutely. Like they, they ID bought this for mystery, mystery, mystery, mystery, mystery. They said that fucking word so many times to me. And I'm like, the story is about these families who lost everything, you know, and we have it on camera. We have these people. So, you know, we shot those family interviews. We shot those so early because we're like, we didn't know if we were going to get another chance to do them. Right? Like I was like, get the crews and I'm like, you know, we could have ID at that point. We're like, we just want to see the family. You don't have to spend money on that. I was like, no, I'm like, we're going to spend money on this and get, you know, the fancy lighting setups and all that stuff. Because I don't know if these people will have the strength to ever go back on camera again. Uh huh. And you know what? We used all those. And we went back and we did some, you know, like, um, verite style interviews and stuff like that. Just for the listeners. What's a verite interview? Um, you know, we did like very like handheld, um, on the fly. We call it. Yeah. On the fly, um, in the moment, um, there was a clear, um, time transition. You could. You know what? There's Melissa. Do you have a picture? There's a picture, um, that I took behind the scenes of Phil, we're doing a verite scene with Megan Freer, who was our kind of featured detective. You can see it's very relaxed. It's very, she's wearing casual clothes. I think she just wrapped up a shift and we all went out to some bar to get pizza afterward. It was like very just casual, but you're, you're taking her out of the chair and you're not having this talking head interview. You're getting her in a, in a more like comfortable setting and it just adds like a realism. Yeah. Yes. ID was so, um, fixated on her on, on getting her attached to this. And I don't know if you remember Ed, but I mean, she was not. She was attached verbally and that she said she would do it, but she did not sign the paperwork to be attached to this for a while. And I remember she was receiving in a war, I was living in Washington, DC and she was receiving an award for bravery from Jeff sessions in Washington, DC for this case. And her boss, Joe Bartarillo, who I met very early on, he was a great dude, he gave her permission to get on a camera with me, just a cell phone video and I could, and I can capture who she was because the network wanted to see her. So we captured her on a quick cell phone interview, I interviewed her in the hotel on my cell phone. Again, this is like very much just casting, right? Melissa. Like, you know, actors go in for auditions and true crime, they want to see how these people talk about a case on camera. So you go in there, you stick a cell phone in their face and you get them to talk and then you put some sound, you put some images on it and it's very salesy, right? And I met her at this hotel in Washington, DC, like quite literally like a five minute walk from where I was living actually kind of seemed like they, you know, and I talked to her for 20 minutes, we put music and stock B roll, you know, on it. The next day we set it to ID and they bought it. They bought the rights to the story, I think, in a week, you know, and then I think a year and a half later I was in Paris, France with my wife and we're actually walking down the red light district and I get a call from my guy at ID and he's like, hey, do you have a moment? I'm like, I'm literally not, I only, I only activated my international plan in the event that you would call me because I was expecting a call from, right? And he's like, hey, we're buying the show and I was like getting a green light to do the show in Paris, France, it was pretty, it was like, I'm like, let's go buy a lot of champagne. Yeah, three years of following this, you know, it was and then the hardest part was yet to come because then you got to put it all together, right? And I think the network fell in love with the heroine, the female protagonist, you know, and it was this, but on the flip side, Megan didn't want to be that. She was so, she's the most humble person, like, she's so sweet and she's a Philly cop that came to the outskirts. I think to, I don't know necessarily her motivation for coming to the country, but I mean, it definitely wasn't as busy, but I think it was those Philly street smarts that kind of led her to turn Gary Farrister to find this car, like pursue this and don't stop. It was like two in the morning. They were still working it. Yeah. Yeah, they could have easily gone home and not done any of it. I say that in Ed's when we're talking about Ed, I'm like, I did not know that they, like, they were out there at 2 a.m. and I was honestly like, holy crap, like, I would have thought they would have been like, I will deal with it in the morning, like, or next shift can deal with it. That's how urgent it was. I mean, it was just this frantic and it was popping all over the county and, like, there were puzzle pieces forming in four different quadrants that no one was putting, like each agency, no one was talking to each other because they didn't know they were related yet. So it was like coming together differently for different people. So it was just a very bizarre case. And then, you know, getting back to what we were talking about, the family, I don't know if I am exactly, so Dean's family was the first family that we really, I really connected with, and then we met the Patrick's, Jimmy's grandparents. And they were just, you know, fantastic people. Sharon, Sharon, you know, she, I think, yeah, I think you're in there. I think she wanted us to stay the night and, like, she did. She was cooking. There were always fresh baked goods on the way to the table. I love her. And Sharon, for me, so Sharon, we, when I had gone back to meet with her for something, we were doing something else. She had given me two or three, maybe photo albums of Jimmy. And I'd never been entrusted with something like that. It's like, this is every memory you have of your grandson, and you're going to let me have them. So it's like, that just shows the level of trust, but it, and the trust that we have to build with participants to make these things work. And it is a very real trust. Like we don't, these companies are factories. They're cranking out stories, they're not on the front lines with these people. So we need to establish these reports. And I know, and I can speak for myself, and I can speak for Phil too, but these are real connections that we make with people because you have to. It makes you a better producer. Yeah. You have to. And that comes across, like, that documentary is so well done. And you can tell that the families, they're very open. They're very candid. They're very raw. And they're definitely, like, now that I know you guys, and kind of how it works, like, I can tell the trust was definitely there because they were so raw, and like, they were just like, you know what, this is what happened, and this is how we feel, and they let it all out. And I don't think they would have done that if you guys were just, hey, we're here to do this. Tell us your story. And the best part is we could call them, if Phil or I could call them tomorrow, any of them, and just be like, we're, we want to come hang out, have dinner, they would, they would all do it. And that trust exists years after, you know. One thing, you know, I tried to do, and we tried to do, but I think, you know, we could see ourselves a little bit in these kids in some way or another, you know, each and every one of them I could relate to in some way, you know, the one regret I had in all this was. So hard, but Tom Mayo's family just was so, we talked, we took his uncle out, you know, we broke bread with his uncle. Were you at part of that? Yeah. At that pizza shop. Yeah. And we talked to him for about two hours. And he was good. Wow. He was obviously so broken by this. And the one thing I, the one regret I had in this whole piece was is we, I hope it didn't come out in the filmmaking, but Tom, Tom Mayo kind of did feel like somebody who was kind of thrown in at the end of all of the, you know, after every kid you find out is murdered, you know, and we're like, and then there's Tom. And we were able to talk about Tom through Mark because Tom were best friends. So it worked from a storytelling standpoint. But one thing that always bothered me was that there was nobody from his camp talking about him, but at the same time, I want the viewers to know that we did not get that. We did not. We tried to get a voice for him and they just, for whatever reason, you know, there is never a wrong reason to not want to talk about these things on TV. Right? Like, I mean, somebody doesn't want to do it. I think it's very important for your viewers to know. And that I think you can attest like, when somebody doesn't want to do it, Ed and I are not sitting there like, oh, man, we got to, you know, like that's the answer. You know what I mean? All them again. But, but networks, network execs don't always get that and like it's because they don't deal with that. They're like, well, we have, we have to have them. And then you're, you're in this shitty position where you have to put your morals and your values aside. It's the dirtiest part of the job. It really is because these aren't, this isn't like we're trying to get a restaurant on board for diners, drive-ins and dies. Like, we're, this is a murder about human beings and it's, who's lives are ruined, by the way. Yeah. There's no, we talk about this all the time, Phil, how there's no closure, I think, is a bullshit word. Like, it closure means that something is over. This is never, like, you think the patchers are going to wake up and be like, oh, I just forgot about Jimmy now. Like, it's everything's fine. Like, it's, there's no end. Yeah. Yeah. Even Richard, you know, they have so much strength, right? Yes. But they are so, they're all, every family member we talk to is, is, you know, completely devastated by this. But Sharon and Richard, you can, you can just hear it in their voice. Oh, they broke me. Oh, absolutely. Um, and, and they all, all the parents, you know, I, I, you know, Dean's, Dean's parents were so, they, they obviously were devastated, but they were, you know, they still had another son to raise, you know, and, and, and that doesn't make it easier. But they were a little stronger, you know, a little more like we're, we can take this, even though it's the worst thing that ever happened to us. And you know, I, unfortunately, I was, you know, Ed was such, Ed played such a pivotal role in this whole thing, because, you know, after a while driving from Philly to DC, I was like, you know, this is just, I mean, I had so much stuff to do, cause I wasn't just making this show. I mean, one thing I was, you know, also producing like 20 hours of television for another shot, you know, so Ed, Ed, you, um, Mark's family, I mean, that was all you, man. I mean, you literally, you, you forged those connections and I thought, um, Mark's mom was great. And you know what, just going back to Tom Mayo for a second, I feel that we got to know him because, um, Mark's mom, I'm blanking on her name, um, Amy, Amy, Amy did such a good job describing him. And I thought that was so sweet because I think as kids, we all had a best friend who's like parents were like our parents, and vice versa. And because like, I, I thought it was really special that she was able to describe him because it was almost like her, her other son, you know, that really, she gave Tom a voice. Exactly. She did. Mm hmm. Otherwise he would have been a total afterthought and not by any fault of our, not like we didn't try. It just was the circumstances. And they were Tom, Tom and Mark were so funny. I mean, there was like that one photo of, I think Tom was hugging Mark, you know, because Mark was bigger than Tom. Yeah. Yeah. And you know, they were the goofy, they were the goofy kids in it. And, um, you know, all these kids were like so much cooler than I was, you know, like Jimmy was like, Jimmy had like tattoos and, you know, you could tell like he was athletic and the cool kid. Oh, you were so cute. Yeah, everybody said Jimmy's cute and then you know, Dean's the bad boy right in dirt bikes. Yeah. Um, and you know, you got Mark and Tom where I kind of like the goofball kids. I mean, like this was, this was very much like the cast of like a Stranger Things show, you know, like it was like, it was like, and, and, and I hate to say that because, you know, this, these are real people, but if you're looking at it from a development sense, I mean, this is why this show sold, you know, 99% of shows don't go to television. You know, I mean, you have like a point, 8% chance of something getting on the air, right? It's so hard. It is microscopic chance. And, you know, this got through because it just literally checked every single box in terms of, of, you know, what you want in a documentary. And it does really mean the world to me, Melissa, that, and, and I'm sure Eddie feels way too, but that to have your work appreciate it, it feels great because you don't hear that that much. Right. Right. Oh, I totally, when I found out that like Ed worked on that, I totally fangirled out like it was like better than meeting Madonna. Yeah, this is what you're getting, you're getting right here. I was so proud of this and so proud of us and proud of you for the work you did. And I think it's a, I think it's a story that I'll never forget. It was like I said, it was the first kind of real piece that I got to work on and, and to be able to sit through the trial and to do some of these things was, was just things that I'd never done, you, you report on all of it, but to be immersed in it was, was a whole new experience that that opened my eyes to a lot of stuff. So I really appreciate you coming on to, to kind of talk, talk us through this. And if you're open to it, man, anytime you have an open forum here, if there's a topic we want to talk about, you just name it for real. I want to talk to you about, and the murder you talked to, like, I think that's fascinating. I want to know everything. I want to know if you walked in and like immediately felt the evil because people say that about murder. So you're going to be back on like soon. We'll talk offline and just see what that's all about, and we'll do a segment on it. And I don't mean to cut us off, we try to keep these bad boys around and out. Yeah, no, I'm rambling, man. No, I love it. We could talk for hours about lost boys alone. So until next time, brother, I love you, man. Thank you so much for being on. I love you too. Congratulations, guys. This looks awesome. Thank you. Good. Thank you. You know, I think you guys are going to have like an amazing successful show here. I love what you're doing. And yeah, get me on next time, I'll play some more stories. You got it. Let me know. There's too much. Yeah, I think you're good. Unscripted. All right. See you, dude. There you have it. I'm in love. There you have it. Phil Cloroni. So that is, that is, call him and have him tell me bedtime stories, but like about his actual stories. He's got stories. He's definitely got stories. But yeah. So that's, that's Phil. And partnered up for a long, long time and just have so much fun on this journey together. So, and it is weird that we're like podcasting. I remember sitting in the, the, uh, bullpen at forensic files, reading books about screech and now it was a bullpen 20. It's like, like a bunch of cubicles, like just where everybody's just like a new picture in old newsroom. Yeah. No, okay. Um, but so anyway, that, that's lost boys next week. We are going to dig into, it's such a fascinating case. So we're going to kind of stick with some of it and talk about the psychology behind, cause Cosmo de Nardo in our opinion is defines hedonistic killer and there was a Philly magazine article that came out after this case ended that was mind blowing. I could not, could not believe what I was reading. So we want to dig into that a little bit, tell you more about Cosmo and kind of just wrap up our block on, on hedonistic killers and then we'll, we'll talk all about what's next. So that is it for us. Well, thank you for listening. Thank you for tuning in. If you liked us, please consider leaving us a review, follow us on whatever podcast I have your listening to. We are on Facebook. We are on TikTok. We are on Instagram all at murder unscripted. You can check us out at murder unscripted pod.com or you can email us at murder unscripted pod at gmail.com. Don't ask why there's a pod in there, just that there just is. We just threw it in for fun. Just phone it. Other than that, we hope everyone stays safe. We love you. Thank you for listening and remember perverts don't wear signs that say they're perverts. It'd be weird if they did. It would be. Bye. [MUSIC] [MUSIC] [BLANK_AUDIO]