The Final Exit and Legacy

This is the twenty ninth of September nineteen ninety six I'm doough. The purpose of this tape is to warn you that this planet is about to be recycled and that it's going to happen very soon There's a parable in the Bible about a merchant who finds a pearl of great price. It's the most beautiful thing he's ever seen. So he sells everything, his house, his business, his entire life, just to own it The point of the story is supposed to be about faith. about what you're willing to sacrifice For something you believe in The members of Heavens Gate knew this parable well. They've referenced it in their own writings. They sold everything, their careers, their families, their names, and in the end, They sold their lives too I'm Harvey Yen, and this is Killer Story It's nineteen seventy two Watergate is leaking into every headline, the Vietnam War is still dragging on. America's homes are full of avocado green carpet and wood paneled walls. The country feels tired in that specific heavy way that comes from realizing the future you were promised isn't quite materializing whichich makes this a very good moment for a story about escape Marshall is forty one and by most conventional measures, his life is falling apart His marriage is over, he just got fired from his job as a music professor. He's struggling with his identity, with his purpose, with questions he doesn't know how to answer. See, Marshall grew up in Texas, the son of a Presbyterian minister For a while, Marshall tried to stay inside that structure. He studied theology, he considered becoming a minister himself. He doesn't The reasons aren't tidy, but one truth sits under almost everything that comes later. Marshall bisexual man raised in a deeply conservative religious world. And most of his adult life is spent trying to reconcile who he is with who he thinks. He's allowed to be So He pivots That's when he meets Bonnie Nettles Bonnie is forty four, a registered nurse with four children and a husband On paper, she's got a stable life. Bonnie has always been drawn to the mystical She's inter astrology, seances and spiritualism. she believes she's in psychic contact with a dead monk named brrother Francis gives her spiritual guidance I mean, we all got hobbies, so The details about how Marshall and Bonnie meeet are a little fuzzy. Some accounts say he was visiting a friend at the psych hospital where she worked and others suggest he was there. as a patient Either way. They striuck up a conversation. and something just clicks Marshall later said felt I had known her Forever Bonnie happens to be a self proclaimed astrologer An Marshall has always wanted someone to do his birth chart As it turns out He's got his birth certificate with him that day Once Bonnie reads his chart She says theirir souls link They'd known each other in a past life That's why there had been this feeling of recognition When they first met It's not romantic Both of them are clear about that It's something else Cosmic partnership, they've been brought together for something important They just have to be patient and figure out what that mission is By early nineteen seventy three, patience gave way to action Bonnie leaves her husband and her children in Houston. Marshall cuts off contact with his family, they walk away from their own lives entirely and hit the road. drrifting through the American West, camping in the woods, staying in cheap motels, sleeping in cars, living on almost nothing. They don't call themselves prophets yet For a while, they go by guuinea and pig They believe they're part of an experiment being conducted by a higher intelligence. and they're the test subjects. They spend their days in public libraries piecing together a belief system from the Bible, science fiction novels and New age philosophy He and Bonnie land on a passage from the book of Revelation. It describes two prophets who will appear in the last days to deliver God's message According to Scripture, these two witnesses will prophecy for over three years then They'll be killed O enemies. lie dead in the street Three and a half days and be physically resurrected and taken up to heaven. Coud while the whole world watches To Marshall andbonni, it sounds L like a job posting and they've decided They're the perfect candidates Once they believe they're the two witnesses Everything else starts falling into place They start thinking of the Bible as a coded record of aliens contact with humanity The angels, the crew members of an advanced civilization, the kingdom of heaven, a literal physical place somewhere in outer space, and the cld that will carry them to heaven, That's not poetry That's a spacecraft They start calling their expected martyrdom and resurrection a demonstration They believe it'll happen in public probablyroably on television and it'll prove everything They've been sayane Now They just need So how do you recruit for an alien rescue mission Turns out. You put up flyers. In nineteen seventy five, Marshall and Bonnie print out posters that say things like UFOs Why they are here Who they have come for when they will leave Catchy They're calling themselves Be and Pep and start holding public meetings across the American West, in motel conference rooms, community centers, anywhere they can get space. They claim to represent beings from another planet called the next level. and they're looking for people. to join an experiment In April, they address about eighty people in Studio City, Los Angeles Around twenty five sign up on the spot And here's the thing about those early recruits They're not what you expect They're not runaways or dropouts They're teachers nurses, artists College graduates, people with careers and families and one early member was a Republican ranch owner who'd nearly won a seat in the Colorado state legislature Another was a respected computer programmer, another, an accomplished violinist These were people who had tried the conventional path and found it lacking They'd been to church, they'd read self help books and they were still searching For something somethingomething they couldn't quite name Beo and Pep offered an answer N not a religious answer, Marshow was actually pretty dismissive of traditional religion To him, churches were part of the problem. What he offered was more like a scientific hypothesis that human beings were capable of evolving into something greater and that he and Bonnie had figured out the method Anden in September, they arrive in Waltport, Oregon Wallport is a tiny coastal town, maybe six hundred people. lighthouses, whale watching, tide pools doesnn't exactly screen UFO group reccruitment hub But in the early seventies, Wallport had become a landing spot for what locals called lost souls from the hippie period People who'd drifted west looking for meaning and settled into communes along the foggy Oregon coast When Marshall and Bonnie post flyers around town, about one hundred and fifty people show up to their motel lecture. That's roughly one quarter of the town's entire population into a single room to hear two strangers talk about spaceships and spiritual evolution Marshall and Bonnie take the stage as Beau and Pete They're dressed alike and have the same cropped haircut Pretty unassuming One former follower says they look just like your folks Only nicer The lecture itself isn't all fire and brimstone Marshall and Bonnie speak calmly They say their representatives from outer space Sent by God. destined to be martyred ation is coming Anyone who wants to join them in the next level has to commit change. and fast It sounds bonkers when you say it out loud, but in that room On that night to people who were already searching for something They couldn't name. It made a strange kind of Sense One attendee later describes the atmosphere as almost ulsive You couldn't explain why you were drawn to it It just were Within days, twenty residents pack up their lives Say goodbye to their families Drive off with a marshall and Bonody They leave behind jobs, mortgages, relationships One woman left her kids with relatives and never came back for them In such a small town, that's impossible to ignore The police launch an investigation. One headline reads, twenty persons reported missing lured by UFO Pied Piper The New York Times picked up the story. Walter Kronkeide reports the disappearance on the CBS evening news But the missing people hadn't been taken anywhere sinister. They'd gone to Colorado to join a gathering of over four hundred people who believed They were about to meet aliens. You might be surprised to learn that meeting never happened Aliens didn't land in Colorado. But it did work out for Marshall and Bonnie because along the way, They picked up some new recruits and heaven's gate is officially B This episode is brought to you by Chime Chime is doing banking a bit differently It's fee free banking designed for you no monthly fees, no overdraft traps, and thousands of fee free ATMs. Plus, there's a bunch of benefits like earning five percent cash back on your Chime card in a chosen category. Chime is not just smarter banking. it is the most rewarding way to bank. Join the millions who are already banking fee free today. Head to chime d. com slash killers. It only takes a few minutes to sign up Chime is a FintTech not a bank. Banking services for Chime are provided by Chime's bank partners. Optional products and services may have fees or charges, state annual percentage yield and cash back for Chime Prime only. No minimum balance required. For more information on APY rates, my pay, Sot mee and travel perks go to chime d. com slash disclosures. On Acorn TV, there's a killer on the loose. Brooke Shields leads an all star cast in the hit original mystery series, You're killing me. I solved mysteries for a living. I think I'm good to go. H been one of your books, Not in real life Catch every killer at the say. You're someone from Vouchfreer whereareaboutouse at the time of the incident. What are you the alibi police That's literally exxactly who I am You're killing me, all episodes now streaming on acorn TV This episode is brought to you by Sweet Green. The day doesn't ask for permission. Lunch window? Gone before you saw it coming. You deserve a break that actually satisfies. Sweet Green's new wraps have got you. Real ingredients, zero shortcuts. Everything you love in one hand. Think Green Godddess Chicken, Garlic aioli, crumbled bacon, corn salsa forty grams of protein. Made to keep up with whatever comes next. New sweetgreen wraps hit different. Order now at order d. sweetgreenot com. Before the break, I'd dropped one of the most notorious French sect names in history. Heaven'scaate A lot of you probably know the way this story ends. You may even remember the TV coverage and news articles or Maybe you've heard the name, but donon't know the whole story You're like me, a nineties kid who was more interested in Nickelodeon than the Eing newews. so I won't tell you how it ends yet No spoilers here, but I do want to tell you how it all happened Because the thing that strikes me about Heaven's gate. is that it's weirdly Normal Sure, there's the alien stuff, but it doesn't feel like what you expect. There's no screaming, no aggression, no wild eyed intensity The vibe is Com Members speak softly They listen carefully. They come across like people who've really figured something out And Marshall isn't the violent charismatic leader we've come to expect He's soft spoken Almost fragile. He talks about feeling lost about searching for answers, about a calling. That won't leave him alone and he mixes those confessions just enough cosmic mystery. that people lean in instead of pulling away Right now, Heavens Gate is less of an organized group M a loose collection of like minded people. Marshall and Bonnie actually disappear for months at a time leaving their followers to their own devices There was no compound No armed guards Just a bunch of seekers camping in the wilderness One former member even describes it as I rather Dull routine But there are a few rules, ones that really explain why that member says it's dull The whole point of the group is to kind of t Stop being human See, the way Marshall tells it is like this. Earth is a school. Your body is just a temporary container, a vehicle you're using while you learn your lessons. but the school is closing. spacecraft is coming to pick up the students who are ready to graduate to a higher level of existence No more pain. No more death No more human weakness. So that means you can't really enjoy the human pleasures. There's no reading, no music, no chit chat, and definitely no sex They weren't even supposed to make friends. That was too human So most of the time they sit around in silence even sing. I would have never lasted you You can't hear but everyone's cheering Even with the dull routine, Marshall and Bonnie attract a couple hundred followers by nineteen seventy six But they also realize a crowd is harder to control than a small committed crew The demonstration, their expected assassination and resurrection, still hasn't happened The press is mocking them. famamilies are begging their loved ones to come back home, so they decide to go underground They take the remaining followers into the wilderness The roocky mountains, the high desert of the southwest, living in tents, moving constantly. They're not recruiting anymore oning letting the uncommitted leaf until only the true believers remain Then They rebrand Again, first, new names, Bow and Pep become Dough emty The first and last notes of a musical scale The group is now called the class and members aren't followers anymore. They're students. and they're bodies, o those aren't bodies their vehicles. Temporary containers, and like any vehicle, they have to be maintained with precision See, the members of Heaven's Gate want their day to day lives to mimic what they believe life is like in the next level where people live on spaceships and everyone's a cog in the wheel, happily doing their assigned duty to serve the whole. So That's what life in the class becomes a spaceship simulation on Eth in suburban rentals Marshall creates something called the seeventeen Steps a set of behavioral guidelines covering basically every waking moment There's a procedure for eating, there's a procedure for cleaning, there's a procedure for how to think about your own thoughts. I mean everything is regimented. Members are put on controlled diets. They get assigned sleep shifts two hours of sleep twoo hours awake. O over. They all get matching bowl cuts, Androgynous clothes, no jewelry, nothing that says I'm an individual with preferences Ccause That's the whole point You're not supposed to be an individual anymore You're supposed to be a crew member ready to board the ship whenever it arrives And then There's the sex thing. or more accurately The no sex thing In Marshall's theology, sexuality is basically the anchor keeping you tied to your human body It's the thing that makes you want to stay human. So It has to go. Members are paired up with partners of the opposite sex, not for romance, obviously, but for accountability You and your Czech partner. 're supposed to be together twenty four hours a day, eating together, working together, sleeping in the same room. The idea is to create constant friction Force you to confront your human emotions and overcome them And sometimes, They pair you with someone you're attracted to on purpose. Which means all day every day you're sitting next to someone you find desirable and you're supposed to just Not You're supposed to rise above it Prove you're ready for the next level Fun Some members decide that even having the equipment is too much temptation Eight of them, including Marshall himself undergo voluntary frustration to remove the problem entirely Sgically A former member told Newsweeek that afterward, the guys who did it P put his stop smiling and giggling smiling and giggling for frustration. I need you to understand these people felt like they just leveled up, which is maybe the wildest part of this whole story. It's not that they were forced It's that they were excited Here's the thing about the seventeen steps and the sleep deprivation. and the matching outfits and all of it, okay? From the outside It looks like torture It looks like punishment. Former members don't describe it that way They describe it as Relief No more decisions, no more wondering if you're doing life right, No more anxiety about what to wear, what to eat Who it be You just follow the program Trust the process. for the ship Which sounds nice Uill thingsings Darker turn. Okay, so it's nineteen eighty five and Bonnie, A KAT is quickly succumbing cancer She'd already lost an eye to the disease two years earlier Now Britady In June She dies in a Dallas hospital. She's fifty seven years old. This is a problem, a big one. Remember the whole point of the demonstration? They were supposed to be physically taken up to a spacecraft in their bodies That was the promise Bonnie's dead If her body is lying in a hospital bed instead of ascending to the heavens, then What exactly are they all doing here But Marshall proves he can adapt He tells the grieving group that Hannie didn't die grraduated early Her vehicle was too damaged to hold her soul so she moved on to the next level ahead of schedule She's up there now on the spacecraft paring. for their arrival It's a brilliant pivot, honestly It takes what should be a catastrophic failure turns it into evidence. that the mission is more urgent than ever From this moment on The theology shifts The next level isn't a place you travel to in your body place you reach by leaving body Behind. And one more thing happens after Bonnie dies that I need to tell you about Shortly after her death Marshall comes to the group with a strange offer He'll give each member one hundred dollars to buy something for themselves After years of sharing everything, of giving up all personal possessions, the question is baffling What do you even buy for yourself When you've been told that wanting things is a human weakness Eventually, Marshall gives them the answer. They should each buy Gold wedding ban And then he holds a ceremony. Group wedding where every single member marries themselves to him From this point forward, the loyalty isn't just to the message It's to Marshall himself. This summer, Prime Video takes you back before legally blonde, before law school and into the world of Elle Woods in high school. Set in nineteen ninety five, this Gemini vegetarian knows exactly who she is until her family moves from Belair to Seattle. 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Enjoy up to fifty percent off select styles, from personalized pieces to must have favorites made for the summer, timeless designs that shine with you through every moment. Whver the summer takes you. shhop in store or online. Now through july sixth. Terms and addition apply. Visit pandora. net for details Alright, when we left off, Bonnie had just died, Marshall had pivoted the theology to explain it, and married himself to all of his followers Things are about to get But first They need money. So, the group moves out of the wilderness and into suburban rentals And They get jobs They become modoto employees, cooks, programmers, warehouse workers. they don't drink, they don't smoke, they don't date Never miss a shift, never complain. every boss's dream, honestly They also get really good at computers. By the early ninetyies, they're running a web design business called Higher source Clients describe their work as clean and professional goodood enough to keep them under the radar. Think about that for a second By day, they're building websites for San Diego businesses by night They're preparing to leave the planet That's commitment to a side housele, I gott to say In nineteen ninety three, Marshall places an ad in USA todayoday. The headline reads, UFO Colt resurvices with final offer. The ad warns that Earth is about to be recycled because humanity has failed to evolve. This is the last chance. to escape The language is urgent. Apocalyptic This is your last chance to escape before the planet gets wiped an cost them thirty thousand dollars The response A few curious people Mostly mockery. They hold recruitment meetings across the country over twenty states in nine months. but attendance ten thirty or forty people at most And when they try to spread their message on early internet forums They basically got roasted by trolls Even in nineteen ninety three, the internet was brutal By nineteen ninety five, they've built their own website purple text on a black background Very web one point zero, very my nephew built this in his garage. But the message stays the same The end is coming The spacecraft is on its way. Are you ready to graduate In nineteen ninety six, astronomers discover comet Hill bobs heading towards Earth For scientists, it's a predictable celestial event. happens roughly every twenty five hundred years. prettyty to look at. Good excuse to buy a telescope Nothing to worry about for heaven's gate It's a signal they've been waiting twenty years to receive See, there's a rumor circulating on the early internet that a spacecraft is hiding in the comet's taail The rumor starts when an amateur astronomer calls into the late night radio show Coast to Coast AM. He claims he's photographed a large object following the comet prorofessional astronomers quickly identify it as just a background star By then The conspiracy has taken hold Marshall latches onto it hard He becomes convinced the spacecraft is real. Bonnie is a board waiting to pick them up Cet's closest approach to Earth is scheduled For late March, nineteen ninety seven That's their window After twenty five years of waiting The ship is finally coming October the group rents a mansion in Rancho Santa Fe. seeven bedrooms, nine thousand two hundred square feet, pool, tennis court, seven thousand dollars a month neighbors describe the new tenants as quuietest people on the street Polite. friendly, almost invisible. They have no idea What's happening inside? In december nineteen ninety six, members of Heavens Gate thrreow a Christmas party. And I mean a real party, garlands, lights, stockings, wrapped presents, a talent show where people juggle and perform tricks, a choir conducted by Marshall himself. You know, for a group that' spent two decades rejecting human attachments It's surprisingly festive. In January, once they set their exit date They rent a charter bus and take a pilgrimage. Beach, Oregon near the site of that first Wallport meeting where everything started They visit CWorld the San Diego Zoo They hit the Las Vegas Strip staying at the Statosphere hotel Probably because the architecture looks Like a flying saucer Their ledger notes, they budgeted nineteen hundredars for gambling They ended the trip in the black winning almost sixty dollars from the tables, plus the twenty bucks they found on the sidewalk So you know Good trip overall In the final weeks, they prepared They sew matching uniforms, black fabric, long sleeves, pleadating on the front. Almost like Tuxedo shirts On each left shoulder, a triangular patch that reads Heevven skate Aw team Be they're not dying They're going on a mission. They buy thirty nine pairs of matching sneakers, black and white Nike deceades Marshall chose them because he liked the way they looked and reportedly got a great deal in the bulk order Those sneakers will become One of the most haunting images of nineteen ninety seven Now they're collectors's items. People sell them online for thousands of dollars thirty five members sit for what they call Eit videos They're calm almost cheerful They speak directly into the camera ike the recording a birthday message for a relative The exit happens over three days in waves fifteen. Then fifteen. Ben Ni The members mix phhenob Barbital into applesauce or pudding Wash it down with vodka They lighte down and they're assigned bunks, and someone stays with each person until the breathing stops then covers them up with a purple shroud. Purple was Bonnie's favorite color There's no record of hesitation, no one is running, no one is screaming. Investigators will later say that the detail that haunts them the most is not the death itself. Oh And here's something that rarely makes the news. The doors aren't locked. Multiple exits, No guards. Anyone who wanted to leave could have walked out at any time They stay because leaving means missing their only chance to graduate Marshall is nearly the last to go He waits until most of the others have crossed then assigns two people to stay alive long enough to handle his body When he takes the poison, they follow the protocol Lay him out Arange the shroud position his belongings, he's just one more passenger boarding the ship. And then they follow him For three days, the house sits silent Delliveries pall up on the porch, then a former member named Rio Di Angelo receives a package in the mail. VHS tapes, floppy disc, a letter By now, you should be aware that we have exited our vehicles Rio drives down from Los Angeles. he needs to see it for himself When he arrives and confirms what he already knows He calls nine hundred eleven and reports A mass suicide Shockingly, you can find the video of the San Diego Seriffs discovering the crime scene online Detectes film bunk beds lined up against the walls each with a body covered in a purple shroud. They're dressed the same way down to the black Nike sneakers on their feet Camera lingers on clipboards Schedules and label tapes. All left exactly where they were used Everything looks deliberate Everything looks Finished Detectives find schedules, lists, receipts, pages of instructions. They find every pocket containing exactly five dollars seventy five cents five dollars bill and three quarters A former member later explained It was a reference to an old Mark Twain story Pass to ride the tail of a comet to heaven Initially, reports claimed all the deceased were male That's because of the haircuts Everyone had the same short Androgynous cut eventually, authorities confirmed twenty one women and eighteen men Age is twenty six to seventy two One investigator says, scenes like this usually show signs of hesitation. Someone panics, someone fights, someone tries to run Nothing like that Some former members later said They regret it leaving the group before the end. They believe the others completed What they were meant to do and that they themselves failed foollow through Today the mansion is gone demolished. Artifacts from the suicide scene, including clothing, bunk beds, and personal items are primarily housed and on display at the Museum of Death in Los Angeles attracts A lot of tourists And then there are the exit videos Still online. Still watchable thirty five people looking into a camera Calm Cheerful Explaining why They're about to die If you want You can watch them right now And the website, oh, it's still live Same purple texts, same clunky graphics like a time capsule from one Titanic was in theaters That's maintained by two former members in Arizona who answer emails and ship out VHS taps to this day. to them. The away team isn't gone. They're just on assignment the rest of us are still here still carrying the weight of being human. Still hoping the next self help book or morning routine or life hack will finally turn us into we're supposed to be Maybe that's the real lesson Not that some Finge groups are dangerous. We already knew that the hunger driving people toward them. isn't as foreign as we like to believe We all want to level up We all want to believe there's a version of ourselves that doesn't hurt because in doubt doesnesn't feel stuck We all want someone to tell us that there's a system, a program, a path, and that if we just follow the instructions closely enough will finally become the people we're supposed to be. The members of Heaven's Gate weren't stupid, they weren't crazy. they were searching for something real Connection, purpose Trcendence And they found someone who claimed to have the answer. The difference is, most of us don't sell everything for the pearl Most of us hedge our betets We keep one foot in the normal world just in case Thanks for tuning into Killer Stories. a Spotify podcasts, new episodes release on Mondays. If you like today's story a wantce learn more, we drop some of our favorite sources in the episode description. Until next time, I'm Harvey Ken. Stay safe out there