Episodes

  • Coming Soon: My Fugitive

    Coming Soon: My Fugitive
    Mar 19 2021
    Nina Gilden Seavey was twelve on May 4, 1970, the day an Air Force building in St. Louis burned to the ground. Her dad represented a young man arrested in connection with the fire: Howard Mechanic. Facing serious federal time, Howard fled and became one of the longest-running fugitives in U.S. history. As an adult, Nina picked up the trail. What ever happened to Howard Mechanic? This eight-part series is the tangled story of her search for answers. Hundreds of Freedom of Information requests. Hundreds of thousands of pages of documents. FBI surveillance and confidential informants. Russian moles, conspiracy theories, and the murder of a civil rights icon. And the sacrifices America makes in the name of national security. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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    6 mins
  • 01: The Fire

    01: The Fire
    Mar 30 2021
    Our story begins in St. Louis, where host Nina Gilden Seavey recounts how the FBI surveilled her family in the 1970s to keep an eye on her father, Louis Gilden, a civil rights attorney at the time. We also learn about Howard Mechanic, one of Gilden’s clients, who was a student at Washington University. After an ROTC building was burned to the ground during a campus protest, Mechanic becomes a prime target of the investigation. What made St. Louis such a hotspot for FBI activity?  To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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    30 mins
  • 02: The Assassination

    02: The Assassination
    Apr 6 2021
    While Nina searches for Howard Mechanic, she discovers the story of another fugitive from Missouri: James Earl Ray. In 1967, Ray escaped from the Missouri State Penitentiary and went on to assassinate Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Why didn’t the FBI follow all the leads in investigating the possibility of a St.Louis-based conspiracy to kill King? To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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    38 mins
  • 03: The FBI

    03: The FBI
    Apr 13 2021
    The shadow of J. Edgar Hoover’s FBI looms over this story: from surveillance of left-leaning student protestors to harassment of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. We learn about Hoover's anti-communist fervor, and how that led to decades of FBI abuses. We also meet Stanley Levison, a communist sympathizer whose friendship with King is considered by Hoover to be a threat to American security. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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    32 mins
  • 04: The Activists

    04: The Activists
    Apr 20 2021
     In this episode, we return to St. Louis. Nina learns about the FBI's harassment of her father's clients, Percy Green and Jane Sauer, whose left-leaning groups were targets of COINTELPRO. Howard Mechanic and the student activists at Washington University are also on the FBI's radar, and there are informants among them. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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    31 mins
  • 05: The Trials

    05: The Trials
    Apr 27 2021
    Howard and others are arrested by the FBI and put on trial by the feds. For reasons neither Nina’s father nor his clients understand, St. Louis is the only place in America where student protestors are facing federal charges -- and the verdict is too much for Howard to bear. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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    28 mins
  • 06: The Fugitive

    06: The Fugitive
    May 4 2021
    Howard goes underground and emerges as Gary Tredway. He gets married. There are dangerously close calls, but he gets away with it for decades -- until a reporter uncovers the truth. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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    44 mins
  • 07: The Spies

    07: The Spies
    May 11 2021
    After 11 months in prison, Howard is granted a pardon. But Nina has more questions. How is Howard's story connected to the other threads she has pulled? We go back to 1975, and the Church Committee's suspiciously truncated investigation into the possible conspiracy to kill Dr. King. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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    28 mins