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PODCAST

Conspiracy Theories, Cults, & Crimes

Conspiracy Theories, Cults, and Crimes explores true stories of belief taken too far: murderous cults, criminal cover-ups, mass manipulation, and the conspiracies that still won"t die. Hosted by Vanessa Richardson, three weekly episodes dig into cases like Jonestown, Heaven"s Gate, CIA mind control experiments, and presidential assassinations. This is true crime at the intersection of faith, fear and manipulation.Conspiracy Theories, Cults, and Crimes is a Crime House Original, powered by PAVE

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All Episodes

43:44

CONSPIRACY THEORY: Is Anyone Real Anymore? The Dead...

Conspiracy Theories, Cults, & Crimes ·

2026/10/05

In 2021, an anonymous forum post floated a theory that sounded absurd: the internet effectively died around 2016, and most of what we now see online, the posts, comments, arguments, and trends, is generated by bots and AI designed to manipulate what we think, buy, and believe. People laughed, until the evidence started piling up. Bots surpassed human traffic online for the first time in 2024, more than a third of new websites are now AI-generated, and state actors run thousands of fake accounts to

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38:09

Introducing WHAT THE FACT with Connor Tomlinson and...

Conspiracy Theories, Cults, & Crimes ·

2026/10/04

Fun fact: Did you know Jaws almost never existed because the shark kept sinking while filming? That is Connor Tomlinson just getting started. If that sounds fascinating, you are going to love Rewind Studios’ new podcast out now called WHAT THE FACT hosted by Connor Tomlinson and Carter Roy. It’s produced by the same team that brings you Conspiracy Theories, Cults, & Crimes.Connor and co-host Carter Roy pull three unbelievable true facts every week and tell you the full story behind each one

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35:03

CRIME: Victor Lustig: He Sold the Eiffel Tower Twice

Conspiracy Theories, Cults, & Crimes ·

2026/10/02

In 1925, a con man calling himself Count Victor Lustig read that the Eiffel Tower was costly to maintain. He took a suite at one of the best hotels in Paris and invited five scrap dealers to a confidential meeting. On stationery bearing a government seal, he introduced himself as a ministry official, said the state had secretly decided to demolish it, and offered them its 7,000 tons of iron. One dealer paid, and was too humiliated to report it. So Lustig came back and ran it again. He went on to

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41:02

CULT: The Church Universal and Triumphant

Conspiracy Theories, Cults, & Crimes ·

2026/09/30

In the 1980s, a charismatic woman named Elizabeth Clare Prophet convinced thousands of followers that she was channeling messages from Jesus, Buddha, and a spiritual entity called Saint Germain, and that nuclear apocalypse was imminent. Her devotees sold their homes, quit their jobs, and moved to a sprawling 12,000-acre compound beside Yellowstone National Park, where the church built an enormous underground bunker system stocked with weapons and supplies. On March 15th, 1990, some seven thousand

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44:07

CONSPIRACY THEORY: Aviation Industry Whistleblowers

Conspiracy Theories, Cults, & Crimes ·

2026/09/28

John Barnett spent 32 years at Boeing before going public with alarming claims about faulty oxygen masks, substandard parts, and a corporate culture that punished anyone who dared to speak up. In March 2024, in the middle of giving deposition testimony against the company, he was found dead in a hotel parking lot from a gunshot wound. Less than two months later, Joshua Dean, a 45-year-old quality auditor who had flagged the very manufacturing defects Boeing later admitted to, died within two weeks

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34:33

CRIME: MH370

Conspiracy Theories, Cults, & Crimes ·

2026/09/25

On March 8th, 2014, Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 vanished from the sky with 239 people aboard, disappearing during a routine flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. The plane's transponder went dark, it changed course over the ocean, and then it was simply gone, triggering the largest and most expensive search in aviation history. In the years since, theories have multiplied, ranging from deliberate pilot sabotage to hijacking to a military cover-up, but despite scattered debris washing ashore, the

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38:09

CULT: The Rosicrucians

Conspiracy Theories, Cults, & Crimes ·

2026/09/23

In the early 17th century, mysterious manifestos appeared in Europe announcing the existence of a secret brotherhood called the Rosicrucians, said to possess hidden knowledge of alchemy, mysticism, and the deepest secrets of the universe. Whether the order truly existed or was an elaborate hoax has been debated for centuries, but the legend inspired real societies, esoteric traditions, and endless speculation about suppressed ancient wisdom. In this episode of Conspiracy Theories, Cults, &

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49:18

CONSPIRACY: The Mad Monk Who Controlled the Romanovs

Conspiracy Theories, Cults, & Crimes ·

2026/09/21

In the final years of Imperial Russia, a mysterious peasant mystic named Grigori Rasputin rose to extraordinary influence over the royal Romanov family. Trusted by the Empress for his apparent ability to ease her son's illness, Rasputin became a figure of endless rumor, accused of everything from manipulation and debauchery to holding secret sway over the crumbling empire. His dramatic murder in 1916, said to have required poison, bullets, and drowning to finally kill him, only deepened the legends

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32:25

CRIME: The Murder That Started World War I: Franz...

Conspiracy Theories, Cults, & Crimes ·

2026/09/18

On June 28th, 1914, Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, was shot and killed alongside his wife on the streets of Sarajevo by a young nationalist named Gavrilo Princip. The assassination was the work of a shadowy network of secret societies bent on breaking apart the empire, and within weeks, it plunged the world into the catastrophe of World War I. A single act of violence had toppled the fragile balance of power holding Europe together. In this episode of Conspiracy

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37:31

CULT: The Thule Society: The Secret Group That...

Conspiracy Theories, Cults, & Crimes ·

2026/09/16

In the aftermath of World War I, a secretive occult group emerged in Germany called the Thule Society, blending Norse mythology, racial mysticism, and extreme nationalism into a dangerous new ideology. Its members believed in a master race descended from a mythical northern homeland, and their obsession with ancestry and bloodline would seep directly into the beliefs of the fledgling Nazi Party. Though the society itself faded, its ideas and several of its members helped shape one of history's

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46:54

CONSPIRACY: What Is Denver Airport Hiding?

Conspiracy Theories, Cults, & Crimes ·

2026/09/14

Since it opened in 1995, Denver International Airport has been the subject of some of the most enduring conspiracy theories in America. Built years behind schedule and wildly over budget, the airport is famous for its unsettling apocalyptic murals, a towering demonic horse statue with glowing red eyes, cryptic dedication plaques, and a sprawling network of underground tunnels. To believers, these details point to secret bunkers for the elite, headquarters for shadowy organizations, or something even

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43:16

Introducing History’s Greatest Mysteries, a new...

Conspiracy Theories, Cults, & Crimes ·

2026/09/13

A History Channel original podcast brought to you by Rewind Studios, History's Greatest Mysteries examines the top theories surrounding the world's most enigmatic unsolved mysteries. If you love Conspiracy Theories, Cults, and Crimes, then you’re gonna love History’s Greatest Mysteries. Each episode unpacks these puzzles with contributions from top historians, authors, scientists, and researchers. From unsolved crimes to lost and buried treasures, and the deaths and disappearances of famous figures,

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37:48

CRIME: Who Killed JonBenét?

Conspiracy Theories, Cults, & Crimes ·

2026/09/11

In December 1996, 6-year-old beauty queen JonBenét Ramsey was found murdered in the basement of her family's home in the quiet mountain town of Boulder, Colorado, in a case that would become one of the most controversial in American history. A bizarre ransom note, a badly mishandled crime scene, and a swirl of suspicion around her own family turned a private tragedy into a national spectacle, with the media declaring the Ramseys guilty long before any evidence could. Nearly three decades later,

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36:16

CULT: Power in the Woods: Bohemian Grove

Conspiracy Theories, Cults, & Crimes ·

2026/09/09

Deep in the redwood forests of Northern California lies Bohemian Grove, a private retreat where some of the most powerful men in the world, presidents, business titans, and political power brokers, have gathered in secret for more than a century. Each summer, members of the exclusive Bohemian Club convene for two weeks of camping, revelry, and a strange opening ritual called the "Cremation of Care," performed before a towering stone owl. That secrecy has fueled decades of speculation, from rumors of

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38:02

CONSPIRACY THEORY: Did the CIA Invent Modern Art?

Conspiracy Theories, Cults, & Crimes ·

2026/09/07

During the Cold War, the CIA quietly turned modern art into a weapon. Convinced that America needed to prove its cultural superiority over the Soviet Union, the agency secretly promoted abstract expressionist painters like Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko, and Willem de Kooning as symbols of American freedom. Through a front group called the Congress for Cultural Freedom and a network of fake foundations, the CIA funneled millions of dollars into touring exhibitions across Europe, partnering with the

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36:41

CRIME: LSD & Mind Control: Operation Midnight Climax

Conspiracy Theories, Cults, & Crimes ·

2026/09/04

In the 1950s and 60s, at the height of the Cold War, the CIA launched a secret program called Operation Midnight Climax as part of its notorious MKUltra mind-control research. Operating out of safehouses in San Francisco and New York, agents used sex workers to lure unwitting men, then dosed them with LSD without their knowledge and observed the results through one-way mirrors. The goal was to study whether psychedelics could be weaponized for interrogation, coercion, and control. What unfolded was

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42:24

CULT: God's Drug Empire: The Brotherhood of Eternal Love

Conspiracy Theories, Cults, & Crimes ·

2026/09/02

In the late 1960s, a group of California idealists calling themselves the Brotherhood of Eternal Love set out to change the world through psychedelics, believing that LSD could bring about spiritual awakening and universal peace. Inspired by figures like Timothy Leary, the Brotherhood started as a hippie collective but soon became one of the largest drug-smuggling operations in the country, trafficking massive quantities of LSD and hashish across the globe. What began as a utopian dream drifted

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55:35

CONSPIRACY THEORY: Brazil's UFO Cover-Up: The...

Conspiracy Theories, Cults, & Crimes ·

2026/08/31

In January 1996, the small Brazilian city of Varginha became the center of one of the most famous UFO stories in South American history. Multiple witnesses, including three young women, reported seeing a strange creature with a large head and red eyes lurking in the streets, while others claimed the military had captured one or more living beings and recovered a crashed craft. As soldiers reportedly swarmed the area and a young military police officer who allegedly handled a creature later died

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50:46

Real People. Real Crimes | Introducing CRIMES OF...

Conspiracy Theories, Cults, & Crimes ·

2026/08/30

Reddit is an endless archive of humanity’s most disturbing, bizarre, and deeply human stories. If you love Conspiracy Theories, Cults, & Crimes, you are going to love CRIMES OF REDDIT with Alexis Linkletter and Sabrina Deana-Roga.Every Tuesday, one host brings a set of true-crime stories while the other reacts in real time with no prep, no spoilers asking the questions on everyone’s mind. They pull at every thread until the whole twisted picture comes into view. It’s dark, it’s messy, and the

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42:49

CRIME: Chico Mendes: Killed for the Trees

Conspiracy Theories, Cults, & Crimes ·

2026/08/28

Chico Mendes was a Brazilian rubber tapper who became one of the world's most important environmental activists, organizing peaceful resistance against the destruction of the Amazon rainforest. By the 1980s, he had drawn international attention to the violent clash between cattle ranchers clearing the forest and the communities who depended on it to survive. His activism made him a global symbol of the fight to save the Amazon, and it also made him a target. In December 1988, Mendes was shot and

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