0:00 Like the street stuff, I didn't know any of the rules, I didn't know any of the elements and stuff. Uh everything was unfamiliar to me in the jail, so that's when I learned furtherance, you have to have furtherance. Did you feel bad that you earned his trust for a split second and then you backstabbed him? No, not really. Did you feel bad that he was offering something kind to you and then you took him to jail? Yo, we're back with a really exciting episode with Lieutenant Aram Cho, everybody. What was that What was that code 637B? 647B. You got 647B at the JK News office.
0:50 Hey, so we're going to get into something really exciting right now, okay? We want We want to hear some of your sting operations. Yeah, there's not a lot, but I I the the ones I did participate in were pretty cool. Yeah. So, uh What exactly is a sting operation first? So, like you take a needle and No, I'm just kidding. It's one of those when you go Freeze, LAPD! I don't know, that's This should be a good one for one of my videos that I do about historical context in police. I don't know where the term sting came from. But what it is is basically um when you're uh when you're undercover and you're you're falsely producing an environment of crime, like prostitution, right? To bring or a gang sting, a buy, drug bust. Any of those reverse where you're undercover and pretending to be an illicit figure to to bring in a customer is a sting. But I I'll research why it's called a sting. I think it's cuz of the
1:40 band the police. Yeah. Um when he went to Maybe cuz it stings when it happens, I don't know. It is It's like a bee sting. Isn't there the movie with the Redford? The sting, the famous one? Yeah. Isn't Isn't that the whole Is that where it came from? No way, right? I always wanted to do that. you know that stuff? You're too young. On Perplexity, it says a sting operation most likely owes its etymological origin to the bee sting. Just like a bee sting, someone who tries to take honey from a beehive, sting operation involves stinging a criminal when they attempt to commit a crime. Getting where it hurts. So, I told you guys about the um one I did with the bee girl activity at the Korean Koreatown bar. Um I did so well with them, they were impressed at how much I could hold my liquor, I guess. That uh That's that genetic blood. So, in that one, did they did they rush in and in arrest them or did they get
2:31 them in jail? They were building a case, yeah, that was later, yeah. So, speak Speaking of which, that was the first time I learned, too, that I didn't turn red. I didn't know Did you guys You guys know You don't have Asian glow. Yeah, I guess that's a thing, right? Asian people are missing an enzyme that makes them turn red. I look like this. Really? They turn purple. So, they pointed it out to me, they're all, "Oh, you don't turn red." And I said, "Oh." And nobody in my family does, so I think it's a genetic thing. It is genetic. I feel like Koreans don't turn red, do they? Or am I wrong? David does. David David does. David's allergic to everything, though, so sorry. You don't have that that gene, then. Wow. Like my dad turns red and so does my sister, but my mom doesn't and I don't. One sip will turn turn you red, right? Yeah, so it's not in it's not a indicative of how much you had to drink. It's just any kind of drink will turn you red, yeah. You're perfect for that work, though. I was first mind Well, anyways, so it led me to um
3:21 to another undercover gig and uh but I wasn't the bait this time, I was just undercover as a security. So, they took us to this park called Whittier Narrows Park. And um Like where the lake lake is? Yeah, in El Monte. Oh, ████ okay. I grew up racing BMX over there. I caught my first fish at Legg Lake, too. Oh, cool. Uh so, a lot of memories, it's a local park. If you grew up in the San Gabriel Valley, you know I learned how to drive stick there, my dad is the only one who ever did it. There's a lot of duck ████ at the park. Yeah, I always call it the duck ████ park. One of the things I bet you guys didn't know that I didn't know until I found out was it's a place where um men will walk looking for other men to engage in Oh, he does. That's why I call it the duck ████ park. Sexual activity. Whether it's It's a cruising park. Yeah, whether it was prostitution or just two guys wanting to get it on. So, it doesn't always have to be
4:11 prostitution, but it is specifically there out of all lakes? That park had a reputation for that. All lakes are All the Great Lakes. Every lake Lake Michigan Lumberjacks I thought it was a sexual thing if you just walk a certain way and then that's like they're doing it over there, too, bud. Is it the one above the 60 or under the 60? Above the 60. So, my job was So, we had they had def different undercovers placed, right? And my job was to just ride my bike and be security for them. And um this is where I actually learned the term furtherance cuz I screwed up. Um so, as I'm taking a break to go to the bathroom, this guy is walking and he's dressed in the typical What do they call it? Twink, right? The knee sock knee athletic socks, the short gym shorts the gym shirt with a backpack. So, I don't I have no idea if this kid's a real student or an adult playing a
5:02 student playing a fantasy role. Wow. Follows me into the bathroom and says, "Hey, I'll suck your dick." Well, that's forward. So, I'm so excited now, I'm just security, I'm not really a cop I'm not supposed to be the enforcer on this one. So, I said, "Okay, and turn around, you're under arrest." And I called for backup and they come. Oh, cool, man, good job. So, write your report. I write the report and the guy's all, "Well, what did you guys agree on?" I'm like, "He was going to suck my dick." Yeah, but but what were you going to pay him? Nothing. And then did you zip your pants or No, so that's when I Okay, so the elements of 640s and mind you He's like, "You got too excited when you wanted to suck your dick, bro." Even though I was a cop, I wasn't I was working custody. Uh my job was to work in the jail, so like the street stuff, I didn't know any of the rules, I didn't know like any of the elements and stuff.
5:52 Uh everything was unfamiliar to me in the jail, so that's when I learned furtherance, you have to have furtherance. Um so, Did you feel bad that you earned his trust for a split second and then you backstabbed him? No, not really. Did you feel bad that he was offering something kind to you and then you took him to jail? No, but I do remember driving home thinking cuz he was a young person, maybe he was a teenager. I did drive home thinking like what would drive somebody to do that? Like was he abused? Or maybe he had a pimp or something. Maybe a pimp, too, you know, was there any prostitution? like his type. Yeah. I did find out later I was a type for a couple of the uh the the I don't know what you call them, the johns, potential johns. Oh, yeah. They They liked your type. Uh young Asian guy is is a type for some people. And then the only other time I
6:42 Young Asian guy is gay, but backwards. Ooh. Yag. Dude, that is What's furtherance backwards? Not too many letters. Well, fine Asian guy is gaff backwards. Good Good job. But you could say the other way, too. Fat Asian guy, too. Bald Asian There was a lot, there was a lot we could choose from. But the final undercover opportunity I got to work with a with a joint operation between LA County Sheriffs and El Monte PD in a border area at a motel called the Sunkist Motel. So, this was a cool one. When there's a six when there's a prostitution sting the prostitutes are the undercovers, they're cops. So, they're dressed and I'm thinking they're going to be like fancy dresses, hair made They're real
7:34 cops that are Oh, ████ But it was the first time I saw a cop dressed like ooh, you know, like So, they're they're dressed like they're druggy homeless. Yes. And and the only thing that they're doing to attract people is maybe showing more skin. Right? And so, they're the undercovers and I was another security. Um but that was the first time I got to work with El Monte PD and I was like, "Oh, this is pretty cool department." And a lot of the undercovers were El Monte at the time, they had a several females that fit the undercover role to do that. Um the one cool side story to that is in these activities, sometimes they'll bring a food truck to cater. Um and the guy that catered it was it was sponsored by the Teamsters. Sometimes they like helping out the police and this was orchestrated through um the Sheriff's Department. And the guy that did it was like some sort of like advisor to the sheriff and
8:24 he paid for it and he was the West Coast president of the Teamsters named um Oh, shoot. What was his name? Uh the East Coast was John Gotti Jr. That's the East Coast president of Teamsters. And the West Coast one, I just killed the momentum for the story. I forget his name, it'll come to me later. Um Fidel Castro No, but he But he was up there, too, you know, so everybody makes jokes that the mob is associated with the Teamsters and stuff. And when you have a name like dot John Gotti Jr. and you're the president of the West Coast and the East the West Coast if equivalent of that was the ones supplying that. I thought that was kind of cool, like, "Hey, we're kind of doing a criminal thing here." But Have you ever done like a sting with like uh like a federal agency, like FBI or DEA or anything? No, I've never been on an assignment. We do have officers from El Monte PD that they're called task force
9:15 officers and they are embedded in the DEA uh and the FBI. Uh I think we have two DEA officers and one FBI officer that were embedded. Have you ever ever been kicked off of a crime scene cuz they're like, "This is our This is our jurisdiction now." Not with the FBI like you think, oh, FBI's here where the big dogs take over. Um but my first time So, I promoted to detective and I was a corporal. I was a So, this is my second time as a detective. And as a corporal, uh you're like the pseudo supervisor when the sergeant's not there. And of course, my first week that Friday, the sergeant's gone and it's like a holiday weekend or something like that. And um they're all, "Hey, you'll be okay, there's only two people that work. You can be their supervisor." I'm like, "But I don't even know how to be detective." It's okay. Gang is here and they're in experienced investigators. If you have any problems,
10:05 go to the detectives or ask them. So, about 11:00, everybody's busy, probably having lunch, but working their cases. I get a call from the watch commander saying, "Hey, somebody from Alhambra the watch commander from Alhambra PD says there's a guy that says he wants to confess to a murder to his um mom that occurred 12 11 12 years ago." I'm like, "Okay." In my head, cuz I just came from patrol, I'm thinking it's a 5150. I'm just going to listen to the story, write him up for mental observation, put him away. When I get there, uh the watch commander, female watch commander from Alhambra says, "Hey, this guy says uh he wants to confess to a murder that occurred in your city." And uh I said, "Okay, I'll take it from here." Cuz I don't want to look incompetent, like I don't know what I'm doing. I'm dressed like a detective. So, I'm like, "All right, come with me." She's like, "Okay." So, I take him. I cuff him. I put him in the backseat where there's no cage or anything. I'm so naive to this point. I'm like, "You
10:55 want to show me where this happened?" Thinking it's not going to happen. And he drives me to the cross streets are Lashbrook and Cortada. And he says, "Oh, this this house." It's a It's a group of townhouses. This house right here. I'm like, "Okay, sit in the car." I knock on the door, hoping nobody's going to answer. Knock, guy answers. I'm like, "Oh, hey um this guy in my backseat says he wants to confess to a murder that occurred 11 years ago and said he buried his mom in your backyard." He said, "Oh, where?" Hold on, go ahead. Mind you, I didn't even ask Miranda. Cuz I don't know, all right? So, I didn't even I asked him questions that were not admissible. So, I'm like, "Hey, where'd you bury your mom?" She said, "Oh, if you open the slider, right there. Just Just a few feet in front of the house." I'm like, "Okay." So, I go to the guy and say, "Hey, it's just uh 3 ft in front of the thing." Why I just put a cement pad there? I'm like, "All right, sorry to bother
11:45 you." He said, "Well, I don't want If there's a dead body back there, I don't want it I don't want a dead body back there. You're going to You guys will dig it up, right?" I'm like, "Oh, yeah, sure." So, I call my watch commander. I'm like, "Hey, this is what we got." He's all And he admitted to it, not knowing that I didn't ask Miranda. He says, "Yeah, man." Oh, yeah, call city yard. Call I mean, call public works and they'll bring the jackhammer. Get the guy to do a consent to search. And the guy said, "Yeah, I don't want um a thing." I And I'm trying to think ahead, right? Like, "Okay, I'm smarter than this. Let me bring the guy in and just have him point it out exactly." Guy comes in and he gets It gets to the slider, gets down to his knees, and with his hands cuffed behind his back, bends forward and says, "I'm so sorry, Mom. I'm so sorry, Mom." So, I'm like, "Okay, what's going on here?" This guy's kind of making it believable now. Um call public works. And And because I'm the supervisor detectives, patrol watch commander doesn't want to overstep my
12:35 toes, and he's kind of letting me run with it. So, I call public works. And about 3 hours after breaking up cement Oh, they they brought the jackhammer out. And this is another moment that I think I'm smart. Jackhammer would have been done in 30 minutes, but I I had them use hand tools cuz I if there was a body, I didn't want them to break the body up, right? So, hand tools. And these poor guys on a holiday weekend, they were on They were the on-calls in the sun using picks and hammers and shovels and stuff. After about 3 hours, I'm getting ready to call it cuz I'm pretty embarrassed now. Um the guy's like, "Hey, it's kind of weird that there's a weed barrier 3 ft below the ground." I'm like, "Yeah, that is kind of weird." So, I look down. It's a black piece of plastic. And I I do one of these things, and I see a kneecap. Holy ████ So, I'm like, "All right, everybody stop." I call homicide. Homicide comes, and they're all "So, tell me what happened." So, I tell
13:26 you them the story. And the guy looks at me um Zumwalt, Boyd Zumwalt. I'll never forget his name. Detective, half-Asian guy with gray eyes, did been a homicide detective for like 25 years, pulls me aside and goes, "At what point did you get the search warrant?" I'm like, "Ooh, at what point was I supposed to get a search warrant?" "Did you Miranda the guy?" I'm like, "Oh, I didn't do that." "You brand new detective?" I'm like, "Yeah." He's like, "Yeah, he's like, don't worry. We'll just start everything from the beginning. You didn't know." And so, yeah, I got bailed out of that. And homicide basically took So, he still admitted still Damn. Yes, so what happened was Remember when the Aztec calendar said the end of the world was supposed to happen? 2012? Yeah. Okay, so it was 2012. Um December. He thought it was going to um he thought the end of the world was going to happen. And he lived in Seattle. And um he came down to confess to it cuz he didn't want to die
14:16 um with that on his conscience. So, the whole story happened uh There's a lot of kookoo ass ████ in this world. 12 years ago, um he's sitting at home playing video games. And uh Dad lives in Seattle. Mom and Dad came to America from Vietnam married, but shortly got divorced after. No other family in America. Dad moves to Seattle. Son stays with Mom in El Monte. He's for whatever reason having a bad relationship with Mom or having a bad day. Mom's in the bedroom and tells him, "Hey, stop playing video games for 5 minutes and go get some food." Gives him money to get food. And he's like so perturbed that he has to stop playing his video game. He goes and grabs a kitchen knife, goes upstairs to her bed, and stabs her multiple times. As a matter of fact, when he dug up the skeleton, the skeleton was dug up kind of like in the fetal position. And you can see uh on this uh bone here on the chin, the one of the
15:07 scar marks from the clearly. Like the knife come in through the back? Just straight to the face as he was as he was facing her. There was a There was a gash. So, um he killed her on the bed. And he's like And he goes back down and finishes the video game. He's like, "You know what? I got to do something here. I can't believe what I did." So, he goes to Home Depot and hires some day laborers to dig a pond in the backyard. He pays them $100 to dig a pond. And then he says, "Hey, just dig a pond." Sends them on his way. Drags Mom down with the mattress. You know, pulls the whole mattress and drags her down the stairs. Takes her to the backyard. Puts her in the hole and buries her. And they notice the mattress is covered in blood. So, he puts the mattress on top of the thing and lights it on fire. The back neighbor looks over the wall and goes, "Everything okay?" He's like, "Oh, this is a Vietnamese custom that we do where we And And he's like, "Okay." And he just goes and lets him do do call the cops or anything.
15:57 Um and then as family would call to ask for Mom cuz you know, it's it was 5 years before he decided to move to Seattle. Um probably cuz he was underage. I think he was 15 or 16 when he DID THAT. WHOA. DAD'S LIKE, "HEY, can I talk to your mom?" "Mom's at work." Okay. And doesn't know any better, right? Family would call from Vietnam. Oh, you know, she's sleeping cuz of the time change or she's at work. And nobody thought anything of it. They would just think she was busy trying to make a living for their family. And could have gotten away with it. It was only the fact We didn't even know there was a murder. There was no missing person. There was no murder. He just admitted to it. And that's how I kind of made my claim to fame with the detectives. And the last time I was there, I told you the investigation became kind of became my thing. Well, it started off rocky, and that was my first investigation. So, like because you didn't get the Miranda and because you didn't get the search warrant, if right when um
16:47 that other detective was like, "Did you get this? Did you get this?" And you said no, if you went back to that guy and were like, "Hey, I need to do the Miranda now." And he was like, "I don't know what you're talking about." How would that complicate it? Right. So, I So, luckily he didn't because everything up until that point was considered kind of consensual. I thought I was taking him for a mental thing. So, the cuff wasn't because he was arrest under arrest. He was being cuffed because or detained. He was being cuffed for because I he was mental at in my opinion. And as he's making these statements, it was spontaneous. He didn't have to say anything. So, I'm like And I'm I'm asking clarifying statements, too. I'm like, "So, you said you buried your mom back here?" "Yeah, exactly right here." "Well, where?" So, all those things were completely admissible cuz he wasn't under arrest or detained at that time. And the defense did try to fight that. But the court saw it my way. Our our our And And experienced homicide detective did kind
17:37 of guide me to how to word those reports and stuff. Okay. So, even if he would he stopped talking at that point, it would have still been okay for you? Um yes, cuz if I made him if I coerced him at that time, if he said, "I don't want to talk or I want a lawyer." And I still asked him questions and he answered them, then they would be inadmissible. But you got to remember the whole thing started because a tip came in from the other agency saying he came into the station saying he buried his mom. So, he wanted He was voluntarily Damn, that's And that's the only thing that salvaged this entire case. Yeah. And And then he thought the Mayan calendar was correct, but then it didn't even happen. So, is he just in jail now going, "Man." And it was You said it was 11 years ago that he did this? 11 years prior to it. 11 or 12 years prior to that, yeah. 11 years that body was just in that in that ground. Could And if there was no Mayan calendar uh you know, threat of ending the world, he would have never said anything to
18:27 anybody. And he ended up moving to Seattle with his dad. And that person that moved in they re-cemented that whole There was no patio back there. Um it was just It was dirt and grass, and he wanted a kind of a cement landing. And the landing was probably like maybe 4 ft by 6 ft. they just went on top of the dirt. So, they didn't make any like Right. Yeah, it was just a free-floating slab, right? It was just a free-floating slab. So, that when he stepped out from his slider, he can step on cement instead of the grass. And then they had to break through the cement. Yes. And you made them do it manually with pickaxes right? I'm thinking I'm the But you know, in retrospect, it was the right decision. Um Would they have broken through into the body, you think? With a jackhammer? Like the type that they had probably had a 2-in spear end into it. So, probably, right? Cuz I don't know if they would
19:18 have stopped had they at the cement part. Um Maybe they would have gotten through the dirt to loosen it. I don't know. Damn. Wow. Mayan calendars. Thanks to the Mayan I didn't know that was a Vietnamese thing. So, burning mattresses. You burn a sleep number every every 11 years. Anthony never brought that up ever. They sacrifice Tempur-Pedic all the time. Those Vietnamese hardcore believe in Mayans. Yeah. Holy ████ being a cop is a little heavy. And then they all burn Sealy mattresses. Yeah, dude. It is crazy, man. Cuz you got to think on the fly. I feel like it's an improv. Yeah, and mind you, I didn't I I didn't have training. I wasn't trained yet. It was just like How are Without training. You passed tests? Yeah, so you you you get you get promoted to detective, right? And then the training starts after that. Your training never stops. You always go to
20:08 different schools. But the basic detective school, once you get promoted, it's not like there's an opening you can go to detective school. You have to kind of wait for an opening. And meanwhile, the detective senior detectives will train you. I see. You go along with them. But it was a holiday weekend, and so it was thin. And they're like, "Oh, you'll be fine. Just don't take any you know, nobody expected a call like that to come in." Did Did they give you ████ for like a little bit after that? Like, "Aha, you bad boy." No, because It was a huge deal. For 3 days, they had the What are they? The coroner forensic investigators out there, and they have They look like when you go to a uh a dig site where they have the grid grid lines, and then you have those those scientists that use the little duster Yeah, they did that for 3 days to pull this body out. Oh, man. Cuz you have They wanted to preserve as much
20:59 evidence and stuff. Can you guys still live at that house afterwards? I don't know, bro. I'd be like, "Man, no wonder it was haunted." The forensic excavators is what they called it. But yeah, so I was there for 3 days as the lead detective now. Not the lead, but the lead for my agency. Homicide took over. But yeah, it was it really catapulted my cuz I didn't I didn't know what I didn't know till maybe about a year after it, right? And Boyd Zumwalt was kind of um being nurturing with me. Didn't want It was a cool case for him, too. So, it wasn't if Had it been like your run-of-the-mill drive-by shooting, and there's a gangster involved, he he's done a dozen the dozens and dozens of those. Probably would have scolded me a little bit more, and I would have made our whole agency look incompetent. But when I told him, "This is literally the third day I've been a detective. I've never been trained." And then he's all, "And you got handed this?" And kind of took me under his
21:49 wing. That's pretty good. That'd be tight if when when they got there, and they're like, "How did you know the body was here?" And you were like, "I just had a feeling."
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