[Update] Bianca Rudolph: The Safari Murder

Larry and Bianca Rudolph met as college students at the University of Pittsburgh in the late 1970s. Larry was a dental student, four years older than Bianca. They married in 1982, and Larry went on to open a successful dental practice called Three Rivers Dental. Bianca initially worked at the practice, but after the couple had two children, she chose to focus on raising their family.

By all accounts, Bianca was a devoted mother and a kind, caring person. Larry, meanwhile, was focused on growing his dental practice and making money—which he did very successfully. He also developed a passion for big-game hunting, spending tens of thousands of dollars on expensive hunting safaris around the world.

At first, hunting was Larry's hobby, but Bianca eventually joined him. She became a skilled hunter in her own right and was well-respected in the Safari Club International, an organization with 50,000 members across 26 countries. The couple traveled extensively, hunting in Africa, South America, and beyond.

But behind the glamorous lifestyle was a darker reality. According to coworkers and friends, Larry had been cheating on Bianca for most of their marriage. He had so many affairs that he was even cheating on the women he was cheating with. When a coworker once asked him why he was unfaithful, Larry reportedly compared it to "a rollercoaster at Kennywood theme park"—thrilling and fun.

One of Larry's longest affairs was with Lori Milliron, his dental office manager. The affair began in the mid-2000s and continued for years. Bianca knew about Lori and had confronted Larry multiple times, but he always promised to end it. He never did.

In October 2016, Larry and Bianca traveled to Zambia for another hunting safari. On the morning of October 11—the last day of their trip—Bianca was found dead in their cabin. She had been shot in the chest with her own rifle. Larry claimed it was an accident. He said Bianca had been packing her rifle into its case when it discharged.

But the story didn't add up. The rifle was a Browning X-Bolt, a gun that required significant force to fire. Bianca was an experienced hunter who knew how to handle firearms safely. And there were inconsistencies in Larry's account of what happened.

Within days of Bianca's death, Larry collected nearly $5 million in life insurance payouts. He also began making plans for a future with Lori Milliron. The couple got engaged and started shopping for homes together.

Bianca's friends and family were suspicious, and so were investigators. The FBI launched an investigation, and in 2021—five years after Bianca's death—Larry Rudolph was arrested and charged with murder and mail fraud. Lori Milliron was also arrested and charged as an accessory after the fact for lying to federal investigators.

The trial took place in 2022. Prosecutors argued that Larry had killed Bianca to collect the insurance money and start a new life with Lori. The defense maintained that Bianca's death was a tragic accident. But the jury didn't buy it. Larry Rudolph was convicted of murder and mail fraud and sentenced to life in prison. Lori Milliron was convicted of being an accessory and obstruction of justice and sentenced to 17 years.

The Update:

This episode includes the latest developments in the case, including the trial, the verdict, and the sentencing. Justice for Bianca Rudolph came years after her death, but it finally came.

TRANSCRIPT:

[00:00:00] In October of 2016, Larry and Bianca Rudolph were on a hunting safari in Africa, but what was meant to be another adventure turned into tragedy. On the last day of their trip, Bianca was found dead and suspicion quickly fell on Larry. Their story began two years earlier at the University of Pittsburgh, where they met married and built a family.

While Larry thrived as a dentist, their relationship was marred by infidelity, particularly by his affair with Lori Million in 2006. Larry claimed to have survived a crocodile attack during a safari, but inconsistencies in his story raised suspicions. Then in October of 2016, Bianca was shot and killed in their cabin in Zambia.

Larry's version of events suggesting that it was a suicide or an accident just didn't really hold up, and it led to a lot of questions about what actually happened This week. We will be exploring the mysterious case of betrayal, murder, and deception, [00:01:00] and you can stay tuned for updates at the end of the episode.

In October of 2016, Larry and Bianca Rudolph were enjoying another trip to Africa. The couple enjoyed traveling all over the world together, but this time it was a little bit different. On the last day of their safari hunt, Bianca would be dead and all eyes would eventually be on her husband. Larry. Long before Bianca and Larry were traveling the world on hunting safaris, they were just two young college students at the University of Pittsburgh.

It was in the cafeteria of the university that Bianca met Larry, who at the time was a student at the university's dental school. Larry was four years older than Bianca, and after they both graduated, the couple ended up getting married in 1982. After the wedding, Larry went on to open his own dental practice called the Dentistry.

Initially Bianca worked at the same practice with her new [00:02:00] husband, but eventually the couple had two kids, a son and a daughter, and Bianca chose to spend more time at home than at the office. Those that knew Bianca described her as an amazing mom and a very kind and caring person who would do anything for her kids.

Larry was very dedicated to growing his dental practice and to making money, which is something that he was pretty good at. He made a lot of money. And another thing that Larry loved to do was to spend his money on expensive hunting trips. These sorts of trips really are not cheap. I wouldn't know. But from this research I've learned that these sorts of trips are not cheap.

Yeah. And this couple ended up spending quite a bit of time and money over the years doing this. Larry grew up hunting, but it was something that was new for Bianca, at least at first. She did eventually begin hunting with her husband Larry, and eventually she also became a well-respected international hunter.

The couple were so invested in this type of hunting that by the mid 1990s, Larry and Bianca had joined the SCI, which is Safari [00:03:00] Club International, and that's a group of about 50,000 members across 26 countries. So we don't wanna get into the details of their hunting life, but it's important to note that they were both very skilled with guns and with hunting in general.

And they were both very passionate about the club and hunting. But this isn't a story about hunting. It's a story about relationships and mysteries. Like the mystery of who wasn't Larry having an affair with, according to coworkers and others who knew the couple, Larry began cheating on his wife, Bianca, very early in their marriage, he was actually having so many affairs.

He was actually cheating on the women. He was cheating on Bianca with sounds that just seems exhausting, like so much work. I know. So there was even a coworker that was interviewed by Rolling Stone Magazine who said, he once asked Larry, you know, why are you cheating on Bianca? And Larry responded that it was quote as fun as a rollercoaster over at the Kennywood theme park in quote, which I feel like is a [00:04:00] very, um, specific thing and something he has a lot of knowledge of, right.

But there was one woman who Larry really became smitten with, and this was a woman by the name of Lori Milian. Lori began working at the dentistry back in the early two thousands as a dental hygienist. According to employees at the dentistry at the time, quote, Larry and Lori's affair just seemed like it was very open.

It was just uncomfortable, and you just didn't talk about it. End quote. And the couple didn't seem to be too quiet about it. Between 2004 and 2009, they traveled together at least 65 days a year. Not only was Larry bringing his mistress Glory on these extravagant trips, but he was paying her tens of thousands of dollars in cash and showering her and her children with gifts.

He was also paying her rent on increasingly nice residences in Pittsburgh. And if you're thinking, well, how did Bianca not know her husband was paying for his girlfriend's rent? Well, that's because Larry was giving Lori cold hard cash, and he would [00:05:00] give it to her in a variety of ways, including just putting cash in the safe at his practice for pickup or simply handing her loads of cash.

This again. Sounds like a lot of work to go through. So much work. Oh, I just am not, I'm too lazy to be sneaky. No, yeah, for sure. So Larry's practice continued to grow and so does his relationship with Lori. But in October of 2006, Larry was facing a new challenge while in Africa on a hunting safari.

51-year-old Larry had this terrifying encounter with a crocodile. At least according to his account of the story. It was very terrifying. And this is what he says happened one morning on this trip, Larry walked out of the hunting camp and he headed out with his fishing pole in a rifle. Of course, this isn't Larry's first rodeo or his first hunting trip.

He's done this for years. So he really would have known or should have known that he was not allowed to ever leave the camp without a professional hunter with him. But apparently Larry just did what Larry wanted to do. So off he went. [00:06:00] So when the hunter that was in charge of Larry found out that he wasn't at the camp, he started panicking and of course, immediately starts looking for him.

While he's searching for Larry, he hears a gunshot coming from downstream. And he said that he was immediately surprised at the direction from where he was hearing this shot coming from, because everybody knew that you stayed away from that particular area because it was. Full of crocodiles and it was just way too dangerous to go down there by yourself.

So the hunter rushed back to camp and he finds Larry and he's sitting calmly, you know, bandaging his left hand. And so the hunter later said he, that Larry was very relaxed when he found him and he just told him that he left camp that morning because he just wanted to go fishing by himself. So Larry continued the story and told the hunter that down by the stream he realized he caught a fish.

And so he reached down to grab the fish outta the water and that's when a crocodile jumped up, grabbed the fish and Larry's hand, and then pulled Larry under the water. He [00:07:00] said this crocodile bit his palm and pulled him back into the water and Larry was able to kick the crocodile while he was just trying to kind of escape.

And that's when he managed to fire his gun to signal for help. And that was the shot that, you know, the hunter heard back at camp. Well, so unbelievable story, right? It's because it's, it's really not true. According to those who saw Larry after this crocodile incident, his jeans were barely wet. He has no mud on him, no dirt.

His jeans aren't ripped, but they have these holes in them that look like they may have been cut horizontally and then pulled down. So the damage he has to his jeans doesn't at all correspond to the marks that he has on his legs, plus the marks on his legs look, nothing like crocodile bites, which I can imagine are just like chunks of flesh missing for sure.

But they do look like they've been made from maybe a pocket knife. So the hunter that's with Larry uses a satellite phone to medevac Larry out of the camp. And keep in mind they are way out and there's not any sort of medical [00:08:00] anything. And the only way Larry can be treated for his injuries is to be picked up from this medevac.

So Larry insists that he be flown to this specific hospital in South Africa instead of the nearest large hospital in Lusaka. The pilot requests proof of this medical necessity for this trip. Keep in mind, he's literally having to fly into the middle of Africa. Pick this guy up and bring him somewhere.

He'd like to know that this is actually needed. And so the hunter then ask Larry, you know, can I take photos of your injuries to send it to the pilot? But Larry refuses and says Photos aren't necessary. And so the hunter tells Larry, Hey, the pilot's not gonna fly you to the hospital without proof of this injury.

So Larry eventually allows the hunter to take two photographs of his thumb. At this point, he's already rinsed it with hydrogen peroxide, so you, you probably can't see a whole lot on this picture, but based on what Larry claims to have happened that day, he seemed pretty lucky to get out there with just the tip of his thumb missing.

But when Larry returned to the US, he contacted an [00:09:00] attorney and wanted to make claims on the private disability insurance policies he had taken out. Oh, I see where this is going with him. Yeah. Right. So the attorney did seem confused about why Larry didn't want to continue his work as a dentist after this accident because he just has a small piece of his thumb missing.

It really shouldn't affect his entire career. But Larry insisted that he had nerve damage and lasting numbness, and so he went on to file these insurance claims basically that he could not work anymore. He was a dentist. So typical protocol for a claim like this would be to fully investigate both the injury and the circumstances around which it happened, but it would've cost a ton of money for the insurance company to fly to Africa for this type of investigation.

So the insurance company ultimately took Larry's word for it and they approved his claim leaving him with $30,000 in payments a month for a total of around three and a half million dollars over several years. And following his disability claims, his insurance company would follow up to see if [00:10:00] he had any improvement or if he was able to return to work.

But Larry continued to say that he was unable to do so and he never told them that he was still engaging in this dangerous sport hunting, which required a lot of dexterity. And that's of course the very thing that Larry's claiming he no longer has and the reason he can't do dentistry any longer. So with Larry no longer a practicing dentist, he and his partners at the dental practice separated and Larry went on to start a new chain of dental offices known as Three Rivers Dental, which specialized in sedation dentistry.

Larry became the COO of this new company that included five separate offices, and he went on to hire Lori to work in various executive and administrative roles at these new practices. So on top of the $30,000 he was still receiving in disability payments, Larry was also now really bankrolling on these new practices as well.

So he's just raking it in and he wasn't quiet about how much money he had or was making. Bianca and Larry [00:11:00] lived a very lavish lifestyle, and they even had several homes in several different states. States. To Larry's credit, he was known to pay his employees well, including Lori of course, who he had always been giving mountains of cash to anyway.

But he also paid her a pretty good salary, from what I understand. Yeah. So speaking of money, one huge source of anxiety for Bianca was money. Larry was the family's primary source of income, and he was the sole signatory on all of their financial accounts. Bianca confided in close friends that she had no idea where their money was located, and she was concerned that she had no financial independence and there was a lot of money.

But not all of it was made legally. Allegedly. I'm not an antigen type, but I do have a healthy anxiety about going to the dentist, so I don't wanna add anxiety to anyone else. Just know that his office was accused of doing unnecessary procedures to make more money, and that's really all you need to know.

E. Yeah. I go to the dentist tomorrow, by the way. Yeah. So on, [00:12:00] on top of that, Larry was not well liked by his employees, including his partners who had also caught him embezzling money. At one point in the office though, Larry could have a huge temper. The employees actually would refer to his temper in his outburst as going, Larry, can you imagine somebody if I was like, oh, going Mandy.

Oh my gosh. Going Mandy is just giggling. Yeah, that's what it would be. So one example of going Larry was Larry, in this meeting that they had at the, um, dental practice, he becomes agitated and so he takes out a pin, is screaming, stabs the pin at the wall. Whoa. And when he leaves the room, he rips the exit sign from the ceiling, which then causes sparks to fly from the exposed wiring.

So. I guess giggling would not be enough to go Mandy, but going, Larry seems terrifying to be around and several employees describe these eruptions of anger as a man, [00:13:00] using his power to keep others terrified. And everyone knows someone like this, but Larry's behind a machine that makes him money and money is something he needed to live this life that he really wanted.

In 2012, Larry and Bianca moved from Pennsylvania to Arizona where their daughter was attending college. They purchased a $1.7 million 7,000 square foot mansion right outside of Scottsdale, 7,000 square feet. Just sounds like. I'm just thinking of cleaning, but I think when you have that size of house, obviously you're not the one doing it.

Right. Right. And I feel like you can't even go in certain parts of the house because it's like so far away. So it probably never gets sturdy. I know. Imagine the exercise though, if you did want to just be like, I'm gonna go to the other side of the house today. Right? Yeah. You've closed your rings. No kidding.

So Larry continued to keep flying back and forth frequently to attend his business at Three Rivers Dental Group, and of course then to be in Scottsdale. So the prosecution would later claim that this move was designed to further isolate Bianca from [00:14:00] her friends and to give Larry a way to be in Pittsburgh and with Lori, but without Bianca knowing about it because she was in another state entirely according to court documents.

Lori was not happy about just being Larry's girlfriend and she was starting to pressure him about leaving Bianca. The two of them would regularly argue about Larry's refusal to just get a divorce, and Lori was agitated that Larry continued to travel with Bianca, even though, you know, of course they are a married couple, but still she's like, I don't want you going on dates with your wife or whatever, like the equivalent of that, you know, like trips and going on, you know, doing all this stuff and traveling together.

But Larry actually had considered getting a divorce from Bianca, at least before talking to one of his friends about it in 2011. According to Larry's friend who knew all about Larry's extramarital affairs, Larry had reached out to him to get his advice on possibly divorcing Bianca. The friend told him during the conversation that it wouldn't be a great idea because Larry would lose half of his money in a divorce at minimum.

According to the [00:15:00] friend, Larry responded that it would be impossible for him to be able to live well off half of his money, which makes sense because at that time, Larry was giving a lot of his money to Lori, including these cash payments of $60,000 in 2015 on top of her salary of $73,500 that same year.

So eventually Larry called this friend another time for some more advice, and this time he. Asked about his thoughts on getting a postnuptial agreement. And so the friend laughed of course, and says, you know, I really highly doubt that anybody would ever agree to sign such a thing, because yeah, obviously, who's gonna be like, you've been married already.

And imagine if your spouse came up to him and was like, Hey, can you sign this paper now that says like, you're not gonna take my money if I divorce you. Like, nobody's gonna sign that. It sounds like the friend was going, Mandy, when he heard about this and just laughing. Set off. So the pressure is on Larry at this time to include Bianca in the family finances.

Bianca and Larry eventually go on to create this [00:16:00] trust document that includes a plan of distribution of their wealth in the event that one or both of them die. So at this time, Bianca signed a will indicating she wanted to be cremated at the time of her death, although her friends and family would later say that was not something she wanted.

She was a very devout Catholic, and they said that this. Was, you know, diametrically oppositional to what she wanted. In March of 2016, Bianca travels to see the couple's daughter in Pittsburgh, and their daughter actually became a dentist, and she worked at one of Larry's practices. So when she travels back home to Arizona, Bianca finds a hair clip in her bed that doesn't belong to her.

And so she tells this friend about it, who also worked as a personal assistant to the couple about this hair clip that she finds in her bed. So she says that this friend who we're gonna call Heather, you know, do you think that Larry's having an affair? Heather, who has literally been managing Larry's emails, knows that he's been having this affair with Lori.

And so she [00:17:00] tells Bianca, yeah, I know. And Bianca is distraught as you can imagine, but she says, you know, I don't believe in divorce and says I will do anything to save my marriage. She's also terrified that if she and Larry were to divorce that she would have nothing and she would be destitute. So she knew that Larry had forged her signature on various financial forms over the years, and he's very good at it.

So he could potentially do that again if he wanted to. Right. So eventually Bianca says that she doesn't wanna get a divorce, but she might have to consider it anyway. She decided that she wanted to confront Larry about his affair, and she and Heather even role play how they thought this conversation might go down.

So armed with Larry's login information given to her by Heather. Bianca goes through Larry's emails and reads a ton of emails between her husband and Lori. She prints out several of these emails and even gave some to Heather for safekeeping. And Bianca later recalled to Heather what happened when she did confront Larry about the affair?[00:18:00] 

She said that at first he denied it, but eventually after he saw the evidence that Bianca put together, he did admit to having the affair and agreed to end the affair. But of course, Larry did not end the affair. He just made it look that way to Bianca. So continued lying to her. Essentially, he went so far as to tell the staff that if anybody called asking if Lori worked for the company to tell them that she no longer dead.

Later, Bianca told Heather that she knew Lori was still working for the company because she had a friend of hers call and ask for her. And the person that answered the phone reluctantly told her that, you know, Lori does still work there. But still, Bianca wasn't interested in getting a divorce from Larry.

She really wanted to stay and make things work out. And in August of 2016, she and Larry had booked this reconciliation trip to Zambia, Africa. On September 27th, 2016, Larry and Bianca head to the Kafue National Park. On this trip, they took a 3 75 [00:19:00] Remington rifle and a Browning, a five semi-automatic 12 gauge shotgun with them.

The trip was scheduled to end on October 11th, so that Bianca and Larry could fly back to the States to attend Bianca's nephew's wedding. Bianca was really looking forward to this trip and she couldn't wait for the opportunity to connect with her family, and they even had a trip to the Grand Canyon scheduled for shortly after.

The couple arrived to their hunting camp and they settled into a two room cabin consisting of a single bedroom and a bathroom. Employees welcomed the Rudolph's and perform their usual pre hunt weapon test. They test fired both the shotgun and the rifle to make sure they were working properly. The employees found no problems with either and when not in use.

The shotgun was emptied of all ammo and stored in a soft fabric case manufactured by the Allen company. So apparently the way these trips would work is one spouse would be the hunter, and so on this trip it was Bianca's turn. So she would carry the Remington rifle while Larry was tasked with carrying a shotgun to protect the group [00:20:00] on these hunts.

According to those who saw the couple on the trip, they really seemed to be in great spirits. They were laughing, kissing, and hugging during their time there. So on the last hunting day of the trip, which was October the 10th, Bianca still had not yet quote unquote bagged the animal that she was hunting.

And the couple headed back to camp. A professional hunter named Mark watched as Larry unloaded the shotgun onto the seat of the Jeep and handed it to Mark's apprentice, who then took the gun, put it in the soft case, sitting on the gun rack and zipped it up. The group then returned to camp, and the attendants all picked up their firearms from the back of the Jeep and put them in the Rudolph's cabin.

Larry encouraged Bianca to extend the trip since she still hadn't gotten the animals she was hunting, but Bianca was looking forward to getting back home to be able to attend her nephew's wedding. The next morning, the couple was up at around 5:30 AM to pack their bags. That's when Mark, the professional Hunter and Spencer, another guide heard a gunshot go off in the camp.[00:21:00] 

Some people also said that they heard Bianca scream, but not everybody in the camp claimed to have heard that. But Mark and Spencer immediately ran to the Rudolph's cabin and they found Larry distraught next to Bianca, who was lying at the foot of the dresser in the bedroom where she was bleeding from her chest.

The two men said that Larry was slumped over Bianca and was yelling for help. Mark ran off to get the medical kit to give to Larry, but he was unable to stop the bleeding. Mark recalled seeing the shotgun and the expended shotgun shell on the floor, and he said that the shotgun was inside of a partially zipped case and it was lying near the door.

Spencer, who, as we said was the guide later told CBS that Larry was crying and he said, let me just kill myself because my wife, she has committed suicide. She has killed herself. I want to kill myself Also, he also ran down to a nearby river and said that he wanted to jump in and drown himself, but Spencer was able to calm Larry down [00:22:00] and get him to come back inside the cabin.

And we have so much more to get into about what happened here after a quick break, to hear a word from this week's sponsors. So before the break. Bianca's been found. She has been shot. Larry's saying she took her own life running down to the river, saying he can't live without her and is ready to throw himself in the river.

But when Larry's finally calm enough to talk, he tells a different story. He claims that Bianca shot herself by accident while packing the gun into its case, although he did say he wasn't actually in the room at the time he was in the bathroom suffering from a bad case of the, well. You know the rest we're not gonna say it, but those were literally his words.

Mark and Spencer insisted that Larry report the shooting to the police, and so they covered Bianca's body with a blanket and they drive for 80 minutes to the police station in Momo. During this long ride, Larry tells Mark that Bianca's death was an accident and that he found her dead when he came out from the bathroom after hearing the gun go off.[00:23:00] 

Furthermore, Larry has this elaborate story of his own about how Bianca could have shot herself. So he's like giving them. His own theories, I guess he speculated that Bianca had a hard time fitting the gun into the case, so she may have tried to force it in by resting the barrel of the gun up against her chest while she reached down to zip the back up, and so Larry's theory was that Bianca could have accidentally hit the trigger, causing the gun to go off.

This of course, is a very detailed and also very, very farfetched story, but Larry repeated the whole thing to the Zambian police service. His formal statement, read quote, I went to bathe while my wife started packing. I suddenly heard a gunshot. And when I went out of the bathroom in my towel, I found my wife lying on the floor in the bedroom.

The bullet penetrated through the chest, and I suspect the firearm must have been left loaded from the previous day's activities. And this happened while she was trying to pack the firearms in their appropriate pouches. I immediately [00:24:00] informed Spencer and Mark over what transpired. I tried to resuscitate her, but it was in vain.

So Mark and Spencer are surprised by this version of the story because Larry told them Bianca's death was a suicide, not an accident, and Larry was fully dressed with shoes on and everything. When Mark and Spencer got to his cabin, 15 seconds later after hearing this gunshot, he's not wrapped in a towel.

Like he literally just tells the police. So an investigator has some questions about Larry's statement as well, and so the investigator observed the scene and they questioned how it would even be possible for Bianca to have shot herself based on her wound and where the gun was in relation to her body.

The investigator expressed doubt that Bianca had accidentally shot herself, and police said that they would look into it, but ultimately they never did. Zambian police services investigators went back to the camp with Larry, mark and Spencer, and they were able to take photos of the scene and they observed Bianca's body.

Then they declared her death an accident. [00:25:00] The police commander believed Larry's story about the gun going off by accident because Larry seemed sorrowful and also said that he was innocent. So duh. Obviously that means he must be innocent. So the commander also said, what amounted to, well, I wasn't there, so I just have to take Larry's word for it.

Now it's important to note here that police investigative services in Zambia are nothing like what they are here in America. They just simply do not have the training and resources that other countries do, which is precisely why it could be seen as a great place to murder your wife and get away with it.

Jewelry was removed from Bianca's body and given to Larry before her body was transported to mumbo. Even though the death was ruled an accident, the shotgun was still taken for ballistics testing so that it could be examined by an expert. Zambian authorities ordered that an autopsy be performed due to the questionable circumstances surrounding Bianca's death.

And when Larry found out there were planning to do this, to have an autopsy, he actually tried to put a stop to it. He [00:26:00] wasted no time informing the US Embassy that his wife had died abroad, and he actually called them at about four 30 the same day it happened and talked to a man that we'll call Dave.

Larry immediately told Dave that he wanted his wife to be cremated, and Dave informed Larry that there really was only one funeral home with a Western style crematorium in all of Zambia. So instead of contacting them to set it up, Larry ended up contacting another funeral home called FSG, ideal Funeral Home, and he asked the branch manager there how he could prevent an autopsy from being performed on his wife.

The manager at FSG Ideal Funeral Home told Larry that it was not possible and that anybody who had died under some odd or questionable circumstances was supposed to be autopsied by law. It was at this point that Larry offered him a cash bribe in return for his help in getting the autopsy called off.

But the funeral, uh, director refused, or the manager refused and Bianca's autopsy was still performed the following day. [00:27:00] Bianca's official cause of death was determined to be hemorrhagic shock and a gunshot wound to the left side of her heart caused by the shotgun that was fired from around one meter or 3.2 feet away.

Pathologists in Zambia don't usually conclude the manner of death, so he didn't get to decide whether or not Bianca was murdered, but he did make a note that the police told him the death was an accident. Later that day, Larry spoke to Dave again about the quickest way to have Bianca cremated. At this point, Larry's not even notified the family that Bianca's died and the children were getting concerned because they haven't been able to get ahold of their parents, but it would still be quite some time before Larry told him what was going on.

After the autopsy, Zambian authorities issued what's called a coroner's authority for burial, which allowed Larry to make arrangements for cremation and Bianca's body was transported to FSG Ideal Funeral Home. Remember we said there's only one funeral home that did these Western style cremations. That [00:28:00] place is called St.

Ann's Funeral Home, and Larry learned about the place from Dave who worked for the embassy. So Dave was shocked when he found out that Larry had decided not to have Bianca's body brought to St. Ann's, and he soon found out that Bianca was going to be cremated by the staff at FSG ideal the next day. And something about this really just didn't sit right with Dave.

He thought things were moving way too quickly and that it was shady. So he actually alerted the FBI. Later that day, Dave and two other people from the embassy went to ID Bianca's body, take photos and preserve any potential evidence. Dave was able to confirm Bianca's identity and he examined her wound as well.

All signs really pointed to Larry's many lies at this point. Dave observed that Bianca's wound was not consistent with being shot from point blank or contact range, but instead it looked like the gun had been fired from a distance of about six and a half to eight feet away. It definitely didn't look to him like Bianca had shot herself on accident or on [00:29:00] purpose.

When Dave returned to the embassy, he described an angry phone call that he got from Larry who was upset that embassy officials had taken photos of Bianca's body and he was calling them to demand that these photos be deleted or be destroyed. Larry used intimidation tactics when talking to embassy officials, which was something that he did often when he wasn't getting his way.

We talked before about going Larry and the way he would kind of lose his temper and rip things outta the walls and just try to be intimidating. So Larry declined to meet with Dave at the embassy office to discuss his concerns. The shotgun that killed Bianca was returned to Larry on October 14th. After being examined by the ballistic experts, the gun really checked out.

The firing mechanism was in good condition, and it passed a drop test. The gun never misfired at all during any of these tests yet. Bianca's death was still ruled in accident. Once the autopsy was done and the ballistics results came back, the police wrote a report that essentially said that the shotgun had been loaded from the [00:30:00] hunting activities of the previous day, and that normal safety precautions just weren't taken at the time of packing the firearm away, causing this accidental fire.

So this is particularly interesting because the employees at the camp watched Larry unload the shotgun the night before. It was actually against the rules to load your weapons in camp. So this was something that they always made sure was done before everybody went back to their rooms. So also, Bianca had done this many times before.

She was a very experienced shooter with plenty of knowledge relating to gun safety, and there's just no way she would ever put herself in a situation where she had the muzzle of a gun pointed at her own chest. Larry tried to get Mark to keep the shotgun in Zambia, but the laws wouldn't allow for the transfer of the ownership of the gun.

So Larry was forced to bring the shotgun back to the United States with him when he finally returned home. Bianca was cremated later that day. So Dave met up with Larry in person and gave him the certified Report of Death and many supporting documents, including the [00:31:00] report from Zambian Police that talked about how Bianca's death was accidental.

Larry asked a lot of questions about the Privacy Act and how applicable it was to Zambia. Specifically, he wanted to know who could get information about Bianca's death, including the police reports Dave offered to help Larry break the news to his kids about their mother's death. But Larry insisted that he wanted to tell the kids in person so he could be there to grieve with them, but that's not actually what Larry had in mind at all.

Larry did book a flight back to the US, but his destination wasn't anywhere his kids were. He actually booked his return ticket to Phoenix while his kids were living in Pennsylvania and Florida at the time, literally thousands of miles away from Phoenix. So Dave asked Larry some questions again, including what kind of shotgun it was that Bianca was killed with.

Larry said he didn't know for sure, but he said it was an antique. This is all wild. The stuff that he's lying about or you know, not giving information on because the guy, they know this stuff. Right. These are [00:32:00] literal experts in the field. Right. To be like, you can't fool them. Exactly. So he once again went over what happened that morning and he told Dave that he was in the shower when he heard the gun go off and when he emerged from the bathroom, he was joined almost immediately by Mark and Spencer.

Dave still doesn't believe the story, but he couldn't really do anything more than to tell the FBI about his concerns Before Larry boarded his flight back to the us he sent an email to Bianca's brother pretending that she was still alive and saying that she and Larry decided to extend their trip and would be missing the wedding.

Larry did not notify his kids or any of Bianca's family that she was killed. But Mandy, he did tell one person he told his mistress, Lori. Oh, that makes sense. Yeah. So Larry sent her a text saying that there had been an accident, but according to Larry, she never responded to the message. So it was October 17th when Larry landed back in Phoenix.

Upon arriving, he called his adult son and [00:33:00] broke the news that his mom died in an accident. On their trip, Larry told his son that he needed to then tell his sister, oh my gosh. Which I can't even imagine, like, oh my gosh. Larry's son was distraught and called the US Embassy in Lusaka, asking for more information or just some kind of a confirmation that any of this was even true and that his mom was really dead.

Meanwhile, Larry actively avoided talking about it or answering any questions about Bianca's death. He even told everybody at work not to talk about her, and he forbade everyone from bringing sympathy cards or flowers or anything like that to the office. First of all, how do you do that and not think that it's suspicious?

Right? I get like maybe it's so painful that you don't want to see that stuff, but people are just. Trying to be helpful. Like that does not make a bit of sense. That only seem suspicious. Definitely. So Larry was so paranoid that he actually installed cameras everywhere in the offices and he would review the tapes to see if anybody was talking about [00:34:00] Bianca behind his back.

And then if he heard anything, he would confront the employees. First of all, I would quit on wild. The spot like that is just crazy wild. So for example, one time he saw these two employees whispering to each other, so he asked them what they were whispering about and they just told him that one of them, you know, the other one was asking for a tampon, like, please mind your business, sir.

Uh, but this type, oh my gosh. Yeah. So, but this type of behavior continued. He was like spying on his employees, eavesdropping on their conversations, inserting himself, and then like freaking out if he thought anyone was talking about the fact that Bianca died or was killed. And like, of course people are gonna talk about the fact that a hundred percent, it's just crazy that he was doing all this.

So Larry had many tricks up his sleeve to avoid talking about what actually happened. Bianca's funeral was very rushed and it happened with very little notice. And Larry didn't even have a traditional Catholic mass or any of the other formalities that people expected would be at her funeral. After the funeral, Bianca's brother and one [00:35:00] of her cousins asked Larry for more information about what happened, and Larry said he would tell them anything they wanted to know.

But of course, that was a lie. He distanced himself from Bianca's death even further by claiming that he was actually outside of the cabin when he heard the shot. Bianca's brother asked to see the documents related to her death, and at that point Larry started to become really flaky. He refused to show the documents and kept putting off responding to his brother-in-law at all.

The day after Bianca's funeral, Larry bought his mistress, Lori, a ticket to fly in from Pittsburgh the next day. But then he canceled that ticket and instead he bought a flight for another woman to join him on a trip to Vegas for a few days at the end of October. Whoa. Yeah. He was like, I'm second thought, Lori.

I don't actually wanna see you. There's someone else. Oh gosh. Yeah. But then after his little trip to Vegas with Mystery Woman, um, he bought another one-way ticket, uh, this time for Lori to fly to Phoenix to join him there on Halloween. So from there, Lori and Larry spent the [00:36:00] whole month of November together, bouncing between Phoenix, Idaho, and Pittsburgh.

They did spend some time apart during the holidays, but by the time New Year rolled around, Lori was openly living with Larry in Phoenix, and their relationship remained out in the open. From that point on going back and forth between Larry's different residences. My gosh. Meanwhile, Larry had money on the brain.

Specifically, he was thinking an awful lot about Bianca's nine life insurance policies through seven different companies. The Rudolph's had set up that revocable trust we talked about earlier in April of 2016, and each of Bianca's life insurance policies was to be paid to the revocable trust. But the terms of the trust made Larry the ultimate beneficiary to the policies.

Larry got to work submitting claims and by November 14th he had requested payments from all policies. He didn't submit documents that may have raised any questions, and he falsely represented that Bianca's death was as simple accident. However, the insurance companies did hire a private investigator to look into [00:37:00] Larry.

The PI tried calling Larry, but as soon as the PI said who he was, Larry hung up the phone and he refused to answer any further calls from him. So in an effort to keep certain information a secret, Larry tried to persuade witnesses to stay loyal to him. In one example, he promised a loan mark $20,000 for a business.

Eventually, though the questions caught up to Larry in December of 2016, he was interviewed and during his account of Bianca's death, his story changed once again. This time he said that he and Bianca had woken up early to finish packing for their flight home. Larry said he headed to the bathroom to get ready for the day while Bianca stayed in the room and said she was going to pack up the firearms while Larry was using the restroom.

He said it was between five 15 and five 30 when he heard the gunshot followed by Bianca screaming and when he ran out of the bathroom he found her on the floor. Larry also claimed that he performed CPR at that moment. Three months later in March of [00:38:00] 2017, the same insurance company had a chance to speak to Mark himself who told them that Bianca was a very experienced hunter who absolutely knew what she was doing.

He also said he personally saw Larry unload and clear the shotgun the night before Bianca's death. He said he hesitated to speculate, but he seemed to think it was probably not possible for someone Bianca's size to reach the trigger of a shotgun from the end of a full length barrel. But he did agree that Bianca could have leaned over to push the gun into its soft sided case, which was a tight fit.

In the end, Larry managed to defraud all of the insurance companies receiving a total of $4,877,745 in payouts. That is insane, but that's not even all Larry File claims on the jewelry that Bianca had on when she died. Now, remember we said they actually gave him the jewelry before even taking Bianca's body?

Well, now he's claiming that the items had been [00:39:00] lost, so the insurance company wrote him a check for over $15,000, which Larry successfully deposited into his account. The funds from the life insurance policies were used to help finance a luxurious lifestyle for himself and his new girlfriend Lori.

Millions were spent on a custom built home in Arizona, a condo in Cabo, and numerous luxury cars. And Lori had absolutely no sympathy for the Rudolph children in the wake of their mother's death either. She actually taunted them and called one of them, quote, mentally challenged and she ridiculed them for not being able to support themselves financially and for even thinking that they should get any money.

You know? Meanwhile, their father has collected almost $5 million from life insurance after their mom passed. And yeah, here's the new girlfriend. Like, oh, how dare you guys not be able to afford to take care of yourselves? Like, just like terrible, terrible stuff. So Lori implied that she might have to use her influence over Larry to get him to stop financially providing for the kids.

She said quote, I have a hundred percent you [00:40:00] don't. I have the money. You're a sucker. End quote. Whoa. Yeah. Terrible. But what Larry and Lori weren't aware of was that the FBI had been closely watching since October of 2016, after a friend of Bianca's called the FBI's legal branch in South Africa to ask them to investigate Bianca's death.

So this friend named Patty reported that she thought there was foul play because she knew of Larry to be an unfaithful spouse and knew about, you know, all these situations where he had been, um, unfaithful to his wife. So according to Patty, Larry had verbally abused Bianca in the past, and they had many fights over money.

She later said in another interview that Larry didn't even bother telling his own kids about their mom's death for a week, and that many of Bianca's friends and family didn't even know that she passed away until her funeral. Oh my gosh. Yeah. So Patty also pointed out. You know the conundrum that Larry was in, knowing that he could not divorce Bianca because he didn't wanna lose any of his money, [00:41:00] but also Bianca was never gonna divorce him either because of her commitment to her religion.

The information Patty told the FBI is what really opened this Pandora's box as to the many possible motives and reasons that Larry might actually want to murder. Bianca others corroborated what Patty said. So the FBI quietly opened an investigation into Bianca's death. They interviewed numerous people over the next five years.

They reviewed documents, pictures, and forensic tests and all these reports, and they interviewed more and more witnesses. They found out through Mark's ex-wife that Larry had actually paid an official to expedite the cremation of Bianca's body. Though she said she didn't know the person's name or their exact role in this.

They also interviewed a woman that worked for Larry who had been privy to his affair with Lori and who was allegedly told by Lori in the summer of 2015 that Lori had given Larry this ultimatum, leave Bianca and sell the dental offices within a year, or Lori [00:42:00] was out of there. And we have more to get into after one last break to hear a word from this week's sponsors.

So before the break, we are talking about this lady Patty, who's now reached out to the FB. I said, something's not right here. You know, Larry's been having all these affairs and it ultimately really started the ball rolling on this five-year process of the FBI really looking into Bianca's death. But the FBI didn't reach out to Larry himself until April of 2017 when they called and asked if he'd be willing to come in and talk to them about his wife's death.

Larry though, didn't like that idea. He angrily said quote, why would I wanna do that quote? And he declined to come in. He promised to send in some documents related to Bianca's death, but he never followed through on that. So the FBI continued looking into it and interviewing people regarding Larry's personality, his temper, and what people thought he was capable of doing if he felt wronged.

They learned about at least two [00:43:00] instances where Larry's impulsive anger turned into a more deliberate action. One former employee of his told the FBI that in 2015, Larry offered him $25,000 to quote unquote do a job, AKA kill someone and the ex-wife of Hunter. Mark said that Larry asked her husband to find a Nigerian guy, which is his words, to go to the US and scare an unknown person.

Mark's ex-wife was also scared of what Larry would do if he found out she'd been talking to investigators. One of the most incriminating things that the FBI learned about wasn't until February or March of 2020, Larry and Lori were at this high-end steakhouse in Phoenix and they were regulars at this restaurant and one of their regular bartenders saw them come in through the back door.

The bartender noticed that the couple appeared to be having an argument or some sort of an uncomfortable conversation. Suddenly there's a break in the background music at the bar and the bartender heard Larry say, quote, I killed my effing [00:44:00] wife for you. So the bartender actually contacted the FBI and told them about the incident, which I think says a lot 'cause this isn't the FBI coming to him and saying, have you ever heard them argue?

Or blah, blah, blah. He was like, oh no, I heard this in a drop in the music. And it was very clear and I know something's wrong. So a few months later, in August of 2020, the FBI wanted to interview Larry and Bianca's son. And it was a short time later that Larry secured counsel who then took over dealing with the FBI on his behalf.

Larry must have been feeling the heat at this point because one day he randomly blurted out to an employee that he was probably going to jail, but still as close as they were, they were still so far away from making an arrest another year passes, and in August of 2021, the FBI attempted to interview Lori Larry's outta the country at the time, so it was a pretty good opportunity to try and corner Lori and talk to her.

So they showed up at her house, but she refused to answer [00:45:00] the door, and she ended up booking a ticket out of town on a whim. Over the course of this very long investigation, the medical examiner for the FBI looked over all the materials, pictures, and reports before concluding that in their opinion it would be physically impossible for Bianca to have accidentally fired the shotgun.

It was believed that the muzzle of the gun was at least two feet away from Bianca when it was fired. At this point, they wanted to try and track down the murder weapon. Remember, Larry tried to leave it in South Africa, but he ended up having to bring it back to the US with him. So when the FBI asked Larry where it was, he said he didn't have it anymore.

He said he actually kept the gun for about a year after the shooting. But in 2018, he took it apart, boxed it up, and paid a trash collector to come take it with some other trash that he was getting rid of before he sold his house. So without having the actual gun, the FBI decided to obtain a shotgun of the same make and model from a private seller.

And they also got the same type of soft sided case that was seen in [00:46:00] photographs of the crime scene. They also got ammunition matching the one that was used in Zambia. Next, the FBI set out to test every single one of Larry's stories and theories, the suicide, the accidental discharge theory, everything that Larry said, they wanted to try and test if it were even possible.

So tests showed that the shotgun was not even a tight fit in the case that it, you know, was used for it, but it actually slid right into the case, meaning there wouldn't be a reason for Bianca to have been forcing the gun into the bag at all. In another test, they set out to prove that Bianca would've never rested the muzzle of the shotgun on her own chest.

The way Larry alleges this incident could have happened. They did what they called a reach study using 15 female volunteers, and they tested multiple scenarios. In one scenario, the subjects were handed the shotgun and the soft case, and told to place the gun inside the bag and zip it shut. None of the subjects placed the butt of the shotgun on the ground with the muzzle pointed at themselves, and none of the participants had any struggle or problem getting the gun [00:47:00] into the case or getting it zipped closed.

I love those kind of things that they too. That like you're just like, yeah, absolutely. That makes total sense. Right? And like it just goes to show that like no one would ever do do it the way that you are describing it happened. Right? That would just be like completely un unrealistic. So in another scenario, the volunteers were told to leave the gun partially zipped into the case, and then while keeping the gun fully inserted into the bag, they were to put the barrel of the gun to their heart.

And while keeping the gun at a 90 degree angle, they were to try and finish zipping up the bag. So this was to determine whether or not the women could even reach the trigger from that position. And guess what? They couldn't. So in conclusion, it was determined that Bianca could not possibly have shot herself by accident, and that there was at least a couple feet of distance between her and the gun when it was discharged.

So things started to unravel for Larry and Lori at the end of 2021. On December 16th, the government filed a complaint alleging that Larry had committed mail fraud when he mailed in some of the life insurance forms. They said since he was now [00:48:00] believed to be responsible for Bianca's death, he should have never been able to collect on the policies, which made him a fraudster.

Five days later, Larry and Lori flew to Cabo, but their escape plan was foiled when Larry was arrested by Mexican immigration authorities. Upon landing the next day, the government filed a criminal complaint that alleged Larry committed male fraud and foreign murder. He was taken to Colorado and arrested by FBI agents in the US that same day.

Lori though she stayed in Mexico for almost a week. When she returned on December 27th, she was served a subpoena to testify in front of a grand jury on January 5th, 2022. Lori said a number of misleading things to the grand jury, including that she was just friends with Larry and she continued to minimize the relationship they had during her testimony.

Lori said they were travel companions and she denied ever asking Larry to leave his wife. She said she did write into work with Larry but didn't leave work with him very often, and they only emailed occasionally. These are all things that can be [00:49:00] verified, so it's wild to me when people lie about this sort of thing.

She said she didn't recall ever depositing cash from the practice into her personal bank account either. She said that Larry paid her salary and gave her lots of cash because he wanted to help her, not because there was an affair going on. She said she didn't even know why he gave her all that money.

Crazy. Funny enough, Larry later testified that he gave her all that money because she was his girlfriend, so that's true. Probably should have gotten that story straight. So among the information that Lori manipulated or withheld was that time at the bar when Larry Flatout said, I killed my wife for you.

After her grand jury testimony, Lori was charged with accessory to murder after the fact obstruction, and five counts of perjury. She stayed out on bond, but she had to wear an ankle monitor. After the indictment, Lori moved stuff out of the house. She shared with Larry, including the urn with Bianca's ashes inside, which was then packed into a cardboard box and stuffed into the back of a storage unit where it was [00:50:00] inaccessible.

And Lori refused to cooperate with Bianca's family when they requested the earn. And she said she'd only give it to the government agents. Okay, but what a weird thing, like why I don't even, it's a bad it's power thing that, that is such a weird thing to do. It doesn't even make any sense, even in like the best of circumstances.

Like why would that be a thing that you're withholding from the family? Like what is it to you that they wanna have her remains like, I don't even get that. It's fully a power thing completely. Like there's, there's no reason she would even want them. She puts it in storage. She doesn't even want it. So Lori also stole $200,000 in cash.

80 ounces of gold coins and jewelry that was Bianca's and later refused to give the items back when Bianca's children found out they were missing. Lori was ordered not to have contact with Larry, which was a rule she did not follow. She actually talked to him on the phone multiple times a day. So Larry and Lori actually had a joint trial, which began in early July of [00:51:00] 2022.

Larry was 67 years old, and Lori was 64 at the time. The trial was held in Denver in a federal court, and the Rudolph children were present for every day of the trial and sat on their father's side. Prosecutors told the jury that Larry planned the murder in advance and that it was callous and deliberate.

He killed Bianca to regain control of his life. After she asked for more, more, say in their finances, and then demanded that he fired Lori, who of course is who Larry really wanted to be with. Prosecutors said that at about 5:30 AM on October 11th, 2016, Larry unzipped the shotgun case and put one round in the chamber, pointed the shotgun at Bianca's chest and pulled the trigger from one to three feet away.

The shot killed Bianca within minutes. Prosecutors also said that Larry came back to the US and then falsely claimed that his wife had died of an accident so that he could collect $4.8 million in life insurance and go live happily ever after. With Lori, they said Larry intentionally chose Africa as the place for the murder because he [00:52:00] believed he'd get away with it there.

He took advantage of the fact that Zambian authorities wouldn't be able to investigate him thoroughly due to lack of resources and training. Furthermore, the prosecution said they believed that Lori not only knew about Larry's plan to murder Bianca, but she encouraged it too. Lori was informed about Bianca's death before Bianca's own kids and family even were, and she also misrepresented her relationship with Larry and other important details in an effort to help him get away with the murder.

The defense insisted that Bianca shot herself by accident and told the jury that the couple had a good relationship and Larry had zero motive to hurt his wife. They said that at the time Bianca was shot, Larry had between 13 and $15 million, so another $5 million from Bianca's. Life insurance wasn't really a good motive for the murder.

The defense also drove home the fact that Zambian officials had ruled Bianca's death in accident, and so did the insurance companies who paid out Bianca's life insurance. They said the Feds brought charges five years after the fact when they had no real evidence beyond speculation and conjecture.[00:53:00] 

Larry took the stand to testify and he spoke for two and a half hours about how he was innocent and he never shot his wife. He spent most of the time explaining away all the things he'd done. He said Bianca knew of his affair with Lori and she was fine with it because they had an open Don't ask, don't tell relationship.

I don't think that's what that phrase means. He also said the shotgun was mistakenly loaded the night before, but he didn't remember who loaded it. That seems very wild. He admitted that he paid a trash company to come pick up the murder weapon and take it away. Even though he knew the FBI was watching him, he claimed to not know or realize that he was actually under investigation.

Did he think they wanted to be besties with him? Right. And Larry admitted that he went to Vegas right after Bianca's funeral, but he didn't mention bringing anyone with him. He very much painted himself as this grieving husband who just went to Vegas by himself. Prosecutors later brought up the fact that he did have a woman with him, but Larry said he quote, didn't spend any time with her end quote.

Wow. Imagine being [00:54:00] that woman. I know. I know. He admitted that he was regularly seeing Lori after Bianca's death, but said she was just a good friend to him. When asked about the night at the bar, when he was overheard saying he killed his wife. Larry said that was a misunderstanding. He said that the real statement was, quote, the FBI thinks I killed my f-ing wife for you not, I killed my f-ing wife for you.

So I can, words are important. Yeah. I mean, I mean, that's a good argument. Yeah. I, I'll give him that. So Larry choked back tears and testified that he did not kill Bianca on August 1st, 2022. After deliberating for a day and a half, Larry was found guilty of foreign murder in male fraud. Lori was found guilty of accessory after the fact to murder obstruction to a grand jury and two counts of perjury.

She was acquitted on the other three counts of perjury. Both Larry and Lori are scheduled to be sentenced in February of 2023. So just a couple of months from now, Larry is facing life in prison or the [00:55:00] possibility of the death penalty, and his fate will be decided on February 1st. Lori remains out on house arrest until her sentencing on February 8th.

She is facing 35 years in prison. Recently, a prosecutor sent a letter to the judge requesting that Larry be sentenced to life in prison. And we are going to end this episode with me reading, um, some of this statement that, uh, prosecutor sent to this judge says, quote, the murder was over in minutes, but the defendant's obstruction lasted for years from the time of the murder right up and through his time on the stand.

In this trial, Larry acted out his disdain for courts and justice by constantly reinforcing the fiction that Bianca was responsible for her own death, heedless of the crime's emotional toll. He lied to his closest family, obstructed their efforts to obtain closure, and otherwise sought to diminish Bianca by claiming she wasn't a very good hunter at all and had carelessly shot herself with a nearly four foot long shotgun.

He offered a bribe to a Zambian mortuary manager for help calling off his wife's autopsy. He used veiled threats and [00:56:00] intimidation to try and get incriminating evidence. Photos of his wife's injuries destroyed. Fully aware that the murder weapon would be of interest to investigators. He took steps to dispose of it.

Using untraceable means that would ensure it could never be forensically analyzed by the FBI. Then he cynically represented to the jury that he was actually cooperating with law enforcement and as a key part of his defense, attacked the FBI's failure to analyze the murder weapon that he made unavailable.

The defendant capped it all off by lying to the jury and the court during his testimony. Our system of justice was established specifically to thwart and deter crimes. Like Larry's his cynical efforts to manipulate that system and avoid accountability so that he could gratify his petty grudges and vices deserve the maximum punishment.

End quote. I don't even know, Melissa. Honestly, this is such, like we said, this is the craziest story. Um, I mean, I know what my opinion is, but he certainly has not been sentenced just yet. He has not been sentenced. I know that the kids do not believe he was [00:57:00] responsible for it. So out of respect for them, I don't wanna give too much of my opinion, but I understand why if it's your parent is dead and the other one is convicted, it's hard Yeah.

Of murdering them. It's hard. Yeah. It doesn't do any good for us to really say what we think happened. No, it doesn't. But I think the jury has spoken and, um, I respect their views. Absolutely. So, Mandy, I remember when this story first came out when we were talking about it, there was. I don't know. There was something like very sinister, obviously, about this guy and so sad because you know, they have these two kids and are just like, I have never understanding these stories.

Like how do you reconcile that? Like if you're. Parent has died, the other person's being accused, like, you want to believe that person, right? Like how can that person have killed your other parent? But like as we, it goes against everything psychologically that you are trained to think about your parents and that you want to believe [00:58:00] about your parents.

Like you have to, you have to really bend a lot of your own thought processes to even understand what has happened in that case. Absolutely. And I think that some people never get there and you can understand how, like you just choose to believe what you wanna believe. But um, we have some updates in the case that we wanted to share.

And the first being that in August of 2023, Larry Rudolph was finally sentenced to life in federal prison for the murder of his wife Bianca. But that's not all on top of his life sentence. He actually will also serve an additional 20 years for defrauding multiple life insurance companies. And if that wasn't enough, which I don't think it will ever be enough, he's been ordered to pay back almost.

$5 million in restitution, a $2 million fine and a $200 special assessment. I love when they throw up like petty numbers. Just random. Yeah. Like $200. They're like, sure, why not This too. Um, not to mention though, he's forfeiting the assets that he gained through his crimes. He's going to lose a [00:59:00] lot of that whole lifestyle that he is working so hard to protect.

It is really hard to believe, but after everything he did to manipulate and deceive, he is finally facing some actual consequences. And it's now been years since Bianca's death, and even longer since Larry started lying about what happened in Africa. But now the truth has finally caught up with him. And as we were saying before, the saddest part about it is his own children, Julian and Anna Bianca, who of course were swept up in this whole thing and stood by their father, believing that he was telling the truth when he was claiming his innocence.

You know, they believed him right up until the evidence just became. Too much to even deny. Julian actually spoke out publicly for the first time after his dad's sentencing, and honestly, it's very gut wrenching just to hear his perspective because he said for so long he didn't believe his dad could be guilty of something so horrific.

Larry was even calling him from prison, but he very rarely picked up. [01:00:00] And of course you can't imagine this emotional rollercoaster that he must have been on. Like learning about his mom, knowing his dad's going through this and being charged for this, and then also trying to reconcile the father that he knew versus the man who the evidence is now saying he is.

That would be, uh, just really, really tough. And Julian did always have questions about what happened in Africa, but Larry just kept insisting that everything was an accident. And since Julian wanted to believe him so badly, he, you know, kind of convinced himself that his dad just wasn't capable of doing something so monstrous.

And like we, like I said earlier, like who would want to believe that their parent was capable of something like that. But once the trial did start and Julian got to see the photos from the crime scene and listen to the testimony, it became clear to him that his dad was lying and that the truth was just far worse and a much bigger nightmare than he could've ever imagined.

Julian also said that there was nothing that could have prepared him for what he saw in [01:01:00] court. And he said, you know, the visuals, the testimony, all of it is horrifying. And of course. Watching your dad's life unravel. But hearing all these things, because you know in court they're not bringing up any of the good things you did.

This is like, of course, all the terrible things and it's so much worse than you even realize. And of course you're hearing things you don't wanna believe about this guy, your dad who raised you. Exactly. And even more to add even more insult to injury, it's, you know that Julian and his sister have both sworn to support their father before the trial, and they even wrote affidavits asking for his release.

Wow. So they're like on record, you know, really championing for him and truly believing in his innocence. But now in the face of this evidence, Julian says he can no longer stand by that statement. And he had to admit that everything his father had said was a lie. And I just cannot imagine like not just realizing it, but then having to go on record and say like, yeah, I made a mistake.

Like, you know, like this is, yeah. It's just. [01:02:00] I don't even have words for what it is and like trusting anyone after that. Like how, how can you trust anyone if your own dad would do this? Of course. It's incredibly painful to hear Julian say all this, especially because he's torn between that the love is he had for his dad and this truth that comes to light.

And he says that every day in the trial he saw something new that broke his heart. And of course that's such a powerful thing to admit because it's not easy to confront what his dad's done, especially because what he's done is the worst thing he could have done, you know? Yeah. But Julian really wasn't just heartbroken.

Um, he also did express some gratitude to the people who had helped uncover this truth. Uh, he said that he was eternally grateful to the federal prosecutors and to the FBI agents who had been working tirelessly on the case and. Honestly, for a lot, I feel like just being able to find gratitude helps a lot of people kind of find that closure and heal.

Just to be able to say like, you know what? This is [01:03:00] not the answer and the outcome that I wanted, but at least it is the truth and the truth always, even if the truth is not what you want. Like the truth is always gonna be the one thing. You need the truth. Like my mom used to always say when I was a kid, right?

She would say the truth will set you free. Which of course meant something different when she's trying to tell you not to, um, lie about like eating cookies or outta the cookie jar or whatever. But I always, it's one of those mom phrases that I always hear in my head and I'm like, no, that's actually true.

Like the truth actually will set you free. You know, you get what it means. It's kind of just like, that's always the one thing. It doesn't matter how bad the truth is. Like I just wanna know the truth. So now with Larry's sentencing, the children can finally, truly start to process their grief and, you know, they have this knowledge now that what they've uncovered.

Is the truth, and they don't have to keep searching for answers anymore. So even though it's not an easy road ahead, at least they're no longer stuck in this darkness and this uncertainty of just not knowing, right? And so of course for Larry, though, his fate is sealed, the lies, the [01:04:00] manipulation, the murder, it all finally caught up with him.

And he may have lived this lavish lifestyle for a while, a long while, but now he has to pay for the price of his actions. And the saddest part though, for him, I guess, would be that all the money in the world couldn't buy his freedom. Now, well there are some things that money definitely just can't buy, and I guess freedom is one of them, and that's probably a very good thing that you can't buy your way out of jail.

But of course if there are any more updates, we will let you guys know. As the legal process continues. I'm sure there will be appeals and who knows What else? I don't think, uh, it's ever over for this guy. So we will keep you up to date. Guys, thank you so much for tuning into this update episode. We will be back next week.

Same time, same place. New thing. Have a great week. [01:05:00] Bye.