Show Notes
It’s kind of a Criminal Minds-style cliché to have a murderer be motivated by his sexual inadequacies, but truth is sadly often much worse than fiction. Mark Errin Rust was a sexual predator, rapist, arsonist, and murderer who was convicted of the sexual assault and murder of two women, 30-year-old Maya Jakic, and 18-year-old Megumi Suzuki. Maya Jakic had been murdered and left in the bushes outside the old Payneham police station in Adelaide, South Australia, in April of 1999. Calls were made to triple 000 by Rust to report the body, but the police could not locate it. Frustrated, Rust left a note on a police patrol car again stating that there was a body at the old station, and this time, police found Jakic. She had clearly been sexually assaulted. Her killer, however, could not be found. Megumi went missing in August of 2001, after she failed to return to her student accommodation for six whole days. As a part of the search effort, police put information about Suzuki and Maya Jakic on a website dedicated to finding missing persons. On that website was audio of the 000 call Rust placed about Maya Jakic’s body. Even in 2001, information travelled fast around the internet, and the audio was eventually heard by a man named Steve Rust, who now had to confront the fact that his brother, who he had known to have some prior criminal offences, was likely a sadistic murderer.
EPISODE NOTES: Mark Errin Rust had a small dick.
Okay, there’s more to it than that. He suffered from a disorder known as Klinefelter syndrome, which meant that he had an extra X chromosome, resulting in infertility and a shrivelled and deformed, um, package. Throughout his life, Rust took out his frustration with his inadequacies on women. He loved nothing more than to expose himself to unsuspecting women and got off on their horrified reactions. He followed women from the age of 13, and was arrested for gross indecency and arson, and eventually rape. He was in prison for the rape of a woman in 2001 when police showed up at his cell and re-arrested him for the murders of Maya Jakic and Megumi Suzuki.
Maya Jakic had been found in April of 2001 dumped in the bushes outside the old Payneham police station. Rust had left a note on a police patrol car notifying them about the body, but the police were not able to uncover the identity of her killer at the time. Megumi Suzuki had gone missing in 2001, only 13 days before Rust would be arrested for the rape of a woman in an office building. In jail, Rust bragged to another inmate about the murder of Suzuki, saying he had dumped her in a skip, and that he had taken her personal CD player with him into prison.
The inmate didn’t have much loyalty to Rust and fully ratted him out. The police were finally able to locate Megumi’s body, buried underneath 10,000 tons of trash, at a nearby dump in December of 2001. Rust showed little remorse for his crimes, and when asked why he killed Megumi, he responded, “because I did”. Luckily for humanity, he was sentenced to life in prison for the murders.
Our main source this week was the classic Aussie criminal investigation show Forensic Investigators, season 1 episode 7, which can be found on Youtube.
Read more about the case on the trusty Murderpedia here http://murderpedia.org/male.R/r/rust-mark-errin.htm
News articles about Rust’s (thankfully denied) application for a non-parole period can be found here Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/murder-in-the-land-of-oz. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/murder-in-the-land-of-oz. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
More from Murder in the Land of Oz
As the final installment of our First Nation's themed season, we are talking about January 26th. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/murder-in-the-land-of-oz. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/murder-in-the-land-of-oz. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
We are back after a (what turned into a much bigger than intended) break!
Whoops we covered another cult. Coming for ya, Jo Thornely. Chantelle McDougall, her six-year-old daughter Leela, her partner Simon Kadwill, and their housemate Tony Popic went missing in July of 2007. Simon was the leader of an internet-based doomsday cult, who believed that through death, a chosen few would ascend to a new plane of reality and usher in the new Aquarian age of existence. So you know, normal stuff. They told friends and family they were moving to Brazil, but their was no activity on their passports. Their disappearance left police stumped. Had they committed group suicide, or had they gone even further into isolation and completely segregated themselves from society? Our main sources this week were the coronial inquest completed in 2017. You know we love an inquest document! https://www.coronerscourt.wa.gov.au/_files/Felton,%20G;%20McDougall,%20C%20J%20and%20L;%20Popic,%20A%20K%20%20finding.pdf News articles about the case can be found here https://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-12-06/cult-leader-simon-kadwell-inquest-begins-into-missing-family/9205656 and here https://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/real-life/news-life/cult-leader-simon-kadwell-inquest-hears-police-failed-to-investigate-report-of-dead-flesh-smell/news-story/b828be6ad139699e509c94ce62bc5292 The website for Simon’s “work” can be accessed via the Wayback Machine here https://web.archive.org/web/20071103141354/http://www.thenewcall.org/book_sdp.htm Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/murder-in-the-land-of-oz. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/murder-in-the-land-of-oz. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Okay, yes, every show and their dog (or podcast cat) have covered this case. But we just had to jump on the bandwagon. You may be familiar with the murder of Dee Dee Blanchard from the documentary Mommy Dead and Dearest, or the hit TV show now on Hulu The Act, or just generally from having an internet connection at any point in time over the past four years. The internet is obsessed with this case, and for good reason – the horrific murder of Dee Dee Blanchard shocked the world, not because of the brutality of the crime – but because of the scale of the abuse that Dee Dee afflicted on Gypsy, her daughter, who she had raised to believe was sick with a whole medical textbook of illnesses. Once Dee Dee was dead, the truth came out – nothing was wrong with Gypsy. She was a victim of Munchausen by Proxy, and was horribly abused by the person who was meant to care for her most. EPISODE NOTES: Friends and neighbours looked at Dee Dee and Gypsy Rose Blanchard as a perfect mother-daughter pair. Dee Dee was dedicated to her sick daughter, and Gypsy was in turn loving and devoted to her mother. When Dee Dee was murdered in 2015, people were horrified. Who was going to take care of poor Gypsy now? But as the truth came out, and Gypsy – along with her boyfriend, Nicholas Godejohn – was charged with her death, people were horrified to discover that Dee Dee was not what she seemed – and neither was Gypsy. Gypsy had every disease under the sun, from cancer to muscular dystrophy. She was confined to a wheelchair, had tubes all over her body, and had no hair and barely any teeth. She never properly attended school and was in and out of hospital constantly. But none of her ailments were real. Dee Dee was forcing Gypsy to be sick, lying to her about her real age, and physically and mentally abusing her to keep up the sickness routine, so that Dee Dee could keep reaping the benefits of having a sick child. While Gypsy and Nicholas Godejohn were both ultimately convicted of Dee Dee’s murder, many people believe that Gypsy acted in self-defence, and did what she had to do to escape from one of the most horrific situations of abuse conceivable. Read Michelle Dean's incredible longform article on the case here https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/michelledean/dee-dee-wanted-her-daughter-to-be-sick-gypsy-wanted-her-mom More info about the case can be found here https://www.yourtango.com/2019322839/who-nick-godejohn-new-details-gypsy-roses-boyfriend-man-murdered-dee-dee-blanchard?fbclid=IwAR0c95is1g2caWJ1wSQX9CobuA8rK30l_Z5BDjfW4AAdf-CpbE2IlcVH7kA Information about the case and also Munchausen by Proxy can be found here https://www.yourtango.com/2019322870/what-munchausen-syndrome-by-proxy-story-gypsy-rose-blanchard?fbclid=IwAR28fu87X_aWdA9iOnfoLHevQ_bfIyiMeabBSbHo-T2YajOWh8ey3vd7YKI For some info on Hulu's stunning new show The Act (this is not a sponsored episode but also – sponsor us, Hulu?) head here https://www.marieclaire.com.au/the-act-tv?fbclid=IwAR2Ohe3PFiupYeS2rfTO3Ux9LoluGAiYbzWQMNMiQJz8RCg5iwvChcyUMHM