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Foul Play: A Historical True Crime Podcast

Foul Play: A Historical True Crime Podcast

Historical true crime. Seasonal investigations.

Shane WatersWendy Cee

Hosted by Shane Waters & Wendy Cee

322 episodesSerial

Latest Episode

Rhode Island & North Dakota: Who Killed the King?

Foul Play · Series 40

Rhode Island & North Dakota: Who Killed the King?

Season 40: America's 250th Anniversary -- 50 states, 25 double-feature episodes. This is Episode 13, covering Rhode Island and North Dakota with two true crime cases from the 1880s and 1890s that circle the same question: who do you believe when the dead cannot speak? October 1885. A wealthy Black businessman in Newport, Rhode Island, is found dead at his kitchen table -- two gunshot wounds, unchewed bread still in his mouth. The city calls it suicide before the day is over. Eight years later, a hired hand in North Dakota murders six members of the family that trusted him, and a fifteen-year-old girl walks barefoot to town to report it. Both killers were inside the circle. Both were trusted. Both destroyed the people who let them in. This episode examines what trust costs in a country still deciding which lives deserve investigation and which can be dismissed with a shrug from the mayor's office. The Victims Benjamin J. Burton was the wealthiest Black businessman in Rhode Island when he was killed in October 1885. He had arrived in Newport around 1845 from Connecticut and spent four decades building a baggage transfer empire -- the Original Express and the Bellevue Avenue Express Line -- moving trunks between the wharves and the Gilded Age mansions. Burton was a civil rights organizer who helped desegregate Rhode Island's public schools in 1866, working alongside Isaac Rice and George T. Downing. He was fifty-nine years old. He had been eating breakfast when he was shot. Daniel and Barbara Kreider were a Mennonite farming family who had relocated from Lancaster County, Penn- sylvania, to a homestead southeast of Cando, North Dakota. Daniel was born in 1856; Barbara came from one of Lancaster County's most established Mennonite families -- the Rissers, whose meeting house had been in continuous operation since the 1700s. By summer 1893, they had eight children. Four of those children -- Bernice, thirteen; Murbey, eleven; Mary, nine; and David, seven -- were killed alongside their parents on the morning of July 7, 1893. The Crimes In Newport, Burton's son-in-law Allen Dorsey -- a medical student at the University of Pennsylvania, one year from finishing his degree -- shot Burton at 63 Levin Street on October 6, 1885. The wound sequence was medically damning: a shot to the head first, a shot to the heart second. No powder burns. Unchewed bread in the victim's mouth. The city ruled it suicide anyway. The coroner signed off. The mayor ridiculed the idea of murder. In North Dakota, Albert Bomberger -- a twenty-two-year-old hired hand who had lived with the Kreider family for five years -- killed six family members with a shotgun in thirty minutes after the eldest daughter, Annie, rejected his advances and her father told him to leave. After the killings, Bomberger forced fifteen-year-old Annie to cook his breakfast while the bodies lay in the rooms around her. He ate, ransacked the house, beat Annie with a rope, and fled toward Canada on a stolen pony. The Investigation In the Burton case, Newport's official investigation went nowhere. The community Burton had spent forty years building ran a parallel investigation through church and civic networks. Seven weeks later, Burton's younger daughter Emmie came forward and named Allen Dorsey as the killer and Maria Dorsey as complicit. Her testimony made prosecution possible. The trial began in late June 1886. Allen and Maria Dorsey were convicted and sentenced to life. Emmie was also convicted -- she had served as lookout -- and died of consumption in the prison infirmary within six months. In June 1887, the Burton case was presented to the American Medical Association at their 38th Annual Meeting as an example of physical evidence clearly indicating murder that official authority chose to read otherwise. Annie Kreider walked to Cando barefoot. No shoes, no horse, no telephone. Her testimony was the entire foundation of the prosecution. Bomberger was captured at Deloraine, Manitoba, three days later. The threat of lynching was immediate -- the Grand Forks County sheriff moved Bomberger to a more secure jail. On November 21, 1893, Bomberger was arraigned. Two days later, he was sentenced to death. The entire court proceeding lasted fifteen minutes. He was hanged on January 19, 1894 -- the first legal execution in North Dakota history. Historical Context These two historical murder cases sit at the edges of American justice in the Gilded Age. In Rhode Island, the system initially failed a Black man whose physical evidence was dismissed by the same city he had served for decades. In North Dakota, a state just four years old produced a fifteen-minute guilty plea and a death sentence in two days -- justice delivered under the shadow of a lynch mob. Allen Dorsey was pardoned in 1912, moved to New York City, worked as a waiter, and died in 1918. Annie Kreider lived until 1960, carrying that July morning for sixty-seven years. Our Sponsors: * Check out Kensington Publishing: https://www.kensingtonbooks.com Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

September 22, 2026·34m

About Foul Play: A Historical True Crime Podcast

Foggy gaslit streets. A quiet courtroom. And crimes that history tried to bury.

Foul Play is a historical true crime podcast that investigates the most chilling murder cases from the 1800s and early 1900s across the United States and the United Kingdom. Hosted by investigative crime journalists Shane Waters — who pioneered crime podcasting in 2008 — and Wendy Cee, each season unravels one complete criminal case through original research, court records, and primary source material.

This isn't sensationalized true crime. Every season of Foul Play puts victims first — their names, their stories, their humanity — before examining how murder investigations unfolded in an era before modern forensics, when justice was far from guaranteed.

From Victorian poisoners in London to Gilded Age killers in America, Foul Play brings historical true crime to life with cinematic storytelling and relentless accuracy. Every fact is verified. Every claim is sourced. Every story is told with the gravity it deserves.

New seasons of this historical true crime podcast release throughout the year, with episodes dropping weekly on Tuesdays.

Hello, friend. Welcome to Foul Play.

What Listeners Are Saying

“Great host and superb episodes!”

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Current Series: 40

13 episodes

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Series 39

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The chilling case of Dr. William Palmer, Victorian England's most prolific poisoner, who used his medical knowledge to murder for insurance money in the Staffordshire town of Rugeley.

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Classic Foul Play Archive

252 episodes across 34 series

Series 35

4 episodes · February 5, 2025

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Series 34

10 episodes · October 10, 2024

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Series 33

25 episodes · March 6, 2024

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Series 32

3 episodes · February 14, 2024

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Series 31

2 episodes · January 31, 2024

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Series 30

1 episodes · January 10, 2024

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Series 28

3 episodes · November 15, 2023

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Series 27

2 episodes · November 1, 2023

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Series 26

3 episodes · October 4, 2023

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Series 25

2 episodes · September 13, 2023

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Series 24

2 episodes · August 23, 2023

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Series 23

2 episodes · August 2, 2023

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Series 22

3 episodes · July 5, 2023

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Series 21

2 episodes · June 13, 2023

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Series 20

4 episodes · May 17, 2023

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Series 19

3 episodes · April 12, 2023

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Series 18

3 episodes · March 22, 2023

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Series 17

3 episodes · March 1, 2023

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Series 16

3 episodes · February 1, 2023

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Series 15

8 episodes · December 4, 2022

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Series 14

3 episodes · November 2, 2022

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Series 13

5 episodes · September 28, 2022

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Series 12

4 episodes · August 31, 2022

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Series 11

4 episodes · July 6, 2022

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Series 10

3 episodes · May 25, 2022

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Series 9

4 episodes · April 13, 2022

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Series 8

3 episodes · April 1, 2022

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Series 7

3 episodes · February 2, 2022

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Series 6

5 episodes · April 25, 2021

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Series 5

4 episodes · February 24, 2021

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Series 4

2 episodes · January 13, 2021

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Series 3

20 episodes · April 7, 2020

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Series 2

95 episodes · September 17, 2018

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View Series 2 Page →

Series 1

9 episodes · January 2, 2014

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Specials & Bonus Episodes

32 episodes

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Meet the Hosts

Shane Waters

Shane Waters

Founder & Host

Investigative crime journalist who pioneered crime podcasting in 2008. Shane brings nearly two decades of storytelling experience and a deep commitment to giving victims' stories the rigor and respect they deserve.

Wendy Cee

Wendy Cee

Co-Host

Wendy's personal experience as a family member of a murdered victim allows her to complement her sharp commentary with emotional depth in her storytelling.

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