‘Greatest Escapes With Arturo Castro’ Episode 10: Beefalo Buddies

Mental Floss is partnering with FilmNation and iHeartPodcasts to bring you the transcripts for Greatest Escapes, a podcast hosted by Arturo Castro about some of the wildest escape stories across history. In this episode, Lauren Ash (Not Dead Yet, host of the True Crime and Cocktails podcast) takes a wild ride through the suburbs of Connecticut as Arturo pulls a major April Fools twist with this week’s escapee ... and the steaks—er, stakes—have never been higher! Read all the transcripts here.

Arturo Castro: Hey guys, welcome to Greatest Escapes, a show bringing you the wildest true escape stories of all time. Now today, we’re following a heartwarming tale: the story of an escapee who the whole community rallied around—he even got the police on his side! Very impressive.

I’m Arturo Castro, and I’m joined by a fantastic actress and comedian who also hosts the podcast True Crime and Cocktails: Lauren Ash.

Let’s go!

[Theme]

Arturo: Lauren Ash!

Lauren: Oh what a joy in my life. Thank you.

Arturo: Welcome to the show.

Lauren: Oh my gosh. I’m so happy to be here. I was so excited when I saw this come through my email. I was like, “hell yes. I cannot wait.” This is the best.

Arturo: You know, it’s one of those things where—where, you know, the wonderful folks at FilmNation—I love FilmNation. FilmNation is great. I love them. Help me. They have my family hostage.

Lauren: I feel like maybe you are plotting an escape? I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t know.

Arturo: What? Nothing. I love them. They treat me so well.

Carl: Arturo will not be escaping any time soon.

Lauren: Legally, contractually bound. I gotcha.

1. Lauren’s Escape
2. Chapter 1: Buddy Breaks Free
3. Chapter 2: On the Loose
4. Chapter 3: Setting the Trap
5. Chapter 4: Heat Vision
6. Chapter 5: No Cage Can Hold Me
7. Outro
8. Credits

Lauren’s Escape

Arturo: Lauren, I wanted to ask you: Do you have a greatest escape story?

Lauren: You know what’s so funny? I, uh, was with my best friend of 10, sorry, 10? Twenty years last night, Leslie Seiler, uh, we met–

Arturo: Woah!

Lauren: Yes! We met 20 years ago this month. And I said to her, I was like, “I’m doing this podcast and it’s about escapes.” And I was like, “and I can’t think–” and she goes, “Boston.” And I went,
“that’s it.” Immediately she was like—she knew.

Arturo: Please tell me Mark Wahlberg is involved.

Lauren: “Oh Buddy, we’re gonna go—we’re gonna go. We’re gonna get some sandwiches. We’re gonna eat a lobster roll.”

Arturo: OK, so—tell me so what happened in Boston?

Lauren: She and I, again, we met 20 years ago. We—we were best friends, comedy partners, and we were going for this comedy festival in Boston and we were staying kind of far from the venue. And so you had to take a—like an Uber or a cab, but this was kind of at the time when Uber was just starting. So for … for those of us—we were like, “how does it work? Do we have the app?” We were still hailing cabs at this point in the world. OK.

Arturo:  It was hella expensive and like hard to get, I remember at the beginning.

Lauren: Totally. Totally. And so we—we had come out of the hotel and we had so much stuff cause we were doing a sketch comedy show, so I don’t have to tell you: wigs.

Arturo: Wigs.

Lauren: So we’ve got a lot of gear and we’re waiting and we’ve somehow, for some reason, we like, walked a half a block from the hotel and we we’re like, “ah, there’s no cabs. What are we gonna do?” And then this car pulls up, it’s a black car, it’s a nice car. And this guy goes, um, “where are you going?” and we both were like, “um,” and he is like, “I’ll take you.” And it was in this moment that I looked at her and she seemed OK with it. And she later told me that she looked at me and I seemed OK with it, when in reality neither of us was OK with it.

Arturo: Wow.

Lauren: And so we were like, “OK, I guess we’re getting into this unmarked limo car thing.” We put our stuff in, but automatically—now listen, this is pre-me having a True Crime podcast, but I was already—I … I’m very familiar with the Datelines. I know where this could go.

Arturo: I was gonna say, man, like, you know that is like, 101. Yeah.

Lauren: So on my phone I’ve pulled up where we are supposed to be going. Cause again, it’s not our town. And I’m like—and I’m watching and then I have the true horror set in as I watch this man going the wrong way and he gets on a freeway and he’s driving away from–

Arturo: No. Oooooooh.

Lauren: –where we need to go. And in this moment, this is when I—my anxiety brain takes over. And I told her later that I was like—“this is the picture that my brain painted.” I was like: “he was gonna drive us to an abandoned airport hangar, and that’s where we get murdered.”

Arturo: Very specific.

Lauren: Abandoned airport hangar?

Arturo: Yes. Very niche. There’s so many of them. You know—people don’t know, people … it’s a rampant, uh, it’s a rampant abandonment of air, of air hangers in—the east coast.

Lauren: Oh my God. But in this moment—so this is, all this—I’m playing the movie of the rest of the end of my life in my head.

And I’m watching him go past exit after exit, and after the third exit, the further we’re getting from the—from where we’re supposed to be … I’m Canadian. Can I curse on this show? Do we curse?

Arturo: Yeah, f*** it.

Lauren: So in this moment I was like, something took over in me. And again, fight to the death, I guess came out even though I never predicted it. And I was like, “listen motherf***er, you’re going the wrong f***ing way and you’re gonna get off this freeway and you’re gonna take this turn and you’re gonna wanna …”

And he was like, “OK.” And he did. And then I was like, “listen, from here on out, I am navigating not you.” And I was like telling him where to go and—and he drove us there. And I don’t know what his ultimate goal was. I think it was just taking us for a ride to get more money. I think that ultimately it was not necessarily nefarious, but ultimately, I think what I showed him was, this isn’t gonna be easy for you. This is not gonna be fun. But the best part was we finally arrive at our destination, which should have been about a $15 ride. And he asked for $75.

Arturo: How f***ing dare he. Also, I—I love the idea of you combating a serial killer with assertiveness. Like … that’s like—they’re like, “oh no, I’ve been foiled. Somebody—somebody spoke with distinction.” You know.

Lauren: I guess it depends on the kind of ride that guy’s looking for. Don’t pardon the pun. But again, it’s like, you know—it was like, “this is gonna be too much trouble for you—for you dude. But I’ll never forget.”

Arturo: But you’re right. People want easy prey, don’t they?

Lauren: Yes. But what we have said ever since then—this is the follow up to this—is that it was like, we escaped death—potential death—once. We can never court it again.

Arturo: Yeah. You get the one. You get the one.

Lauren: You get one and that’s it.

Arturo: You’re a Canadian, you might get two.

Lauren: We consider ourselves good global citizens for the most part. We’re just buying karma.

Arturo: That’s right. There you go. You have another brush with death. Don’t—don’t you worry about it.

Like, put yourself at risk. Take that extra shot, jump in that car.

Lauren: Absolutely!

Arturo: Ben, can you gimme that cool, like, chapter music, please. You know when we change chap–

[Notification ding]

Ben? Ben?

[Wrong stinger]

No, man!

Ben: Chapter music?!

Arturo: Like it was more—you remember? It was like more emotional. Like, what did we do last … last one. We’re gonna cut all this out but …

Ben: Yeah, definitely. Um, oh, this one?

[Correct stinger]

Arturo: Yes.

Ben: Like, turn-the-page kind of thing?

Arturo: Yes, please. OK, so I’m gonna go—Ben, give us some good chapter music.

[Wrong stinger again]

God dammit, Ben! We just talked about it!

Chapter 1: Buddy Breaks Free

Arturo: Today, we start inside a prisoner transport rattling down the Massachusetts Highway. They’re being shipped outta state to nearby Connecticut because everyone inside is scheduled for … execution.

Lauren: Oh no. Also, Massachusetts. We’re in the—we’re in the same world here.

Arturo: Yeah, that’s right. And they were all being driven by, uh, an unmarked vehicle. It was August 3, 2020.

Along with the other prisoners, Buddy pulled up alongside the new facility, and they jostled each other nervously as they came to a stop. After four years penned up in Massachusetts, he had been carted to Plymouth, Connecticut, to die.

Lauren: Ugh.

Arturo: What do you know about the death penalty in Massachusetts?

Lauren: Uh, you know what? I should know more. I have a true crime podcast, have for two years, but I—I wasn’t aware that it was in existence in Massachusetts anymore. Am I correct?

Arturo: Well, capital punishment was overturned for state crimes in 1984. Only federal crimes were punishable by death. So Connecticut kept the death penalty for much, much longer.

Lauren: Got it.

Arturo: So in 2020, Buddy was scheduled for execution, but he had different ideas.

OK, so this was the first time the Massachusetts and Connecticut facilities had actually worked together. And the handoff wasn’t really the smoothest. OK? In fact, when he was being unloaded, Buddy saw his chance. Somehow, he was able to slip past the restraints, dodge the guards, and haul ass right to freedom.

Lauren: Oh my God.

Arturo: There was a super thick forest nearby, and Buddy dove into the trees and totally disappeared. So it was an impulsive escape, you know? He saw his opportunity, and he took it. But whoever said that it takes elaborate planning for an escape to be great, right? This one was pure instinct.

Buddy just disappeared in the woods around Plymouth, Connecticut. Now, he wasn’t hiding for long. In fact, multiple 911 calls came in when Buddy was spotted crossing the highway nearby. The police were so quick on his tail, but Buddy wasn’t easy to catch. You know, he was a really big dude, like terrifyingly big, and he was super fast, too. So once he got into the trees, he easily lost everyone who was on his trail.

Lauren: Oh my god.

Arturo: Now the police contemplated lethal force, but said it would only be necessary if Buddy started to roam the streets and threaten the public in Terryville. So it was like a conditional lethal force action.

It was more than three weeks later, on August 27, that the police finally put the word out that he was on the loose. The Plymouth Police posted on their Facebook page that they were working with the two other agencies to recapture the escapee. He had been last seen along Connecticut’s Route 72.

Lauren: So they waited three weeks to alert the public?

Arturo: Yeah, I think it’s because of … yeah, it’s—it’s hard to admit when you pulled a dumbass act, you know?

Lauren: I guess when he did get away, he slipped away so easily. Yeah, I guess maybe that’s a tough thing to be like, “Hey guys, our bad.”

Arturo: Also, I love the idea that they’re like, “we have to announce it somehow. We have to—OK, just put it on the f***ing Facebook page. OK. Nobody reads that one.” They actually printed it on their MySpace page, you know?

Lauren: Exactly. “It was there. We put it out there.”

Arturo: “Put it up there, man, you know, we—we’ve announced it. You guys just didn’t check, uh, highfive.com at that time.”

Lauren: Oh my god.

Arturo: So for the most part, Buddy was a really talented fugitive. He stayed under the cover of the woods, ate his food super raw, and stayed quiet. Even so, the town of Terryville was told to be cautious. The police said that Buddy was aggressive and a confrontation with him would cause serious injuries. The town was cautioned to keep their distance and call 911 on site.

Now, on Monday, September 1, 2020, the state drone unit—it was basically a couple of gamers down in Connecticut being like, “I’ll do it. I don’t, I got nothing else to do”—as well as local and state officers combed the woods along Judd Road and Route 72 on the north side of Terryville, Connecticut. Buddy had been at large for almost a month by this point. Now the local police captain on the case, his name is Edward Benecchi. Am I saying that right, Overlords?

Carl: That is correct.

Arturo: OK. So Edward Benecchi had previously—I’m sorry, to all my Italian American friends—um, had previously worked enforcement on narcotics, on gangs, and firearms trafficking. Right? But this was something completely new. Buddy was massive and quick, so capturing him was difficult. Some would say he’s the survivalist, you know? Like if he were on a survival TV show game, he’d definitely be the star. How—how well would you do Lauren on–

Lauren: Terribly.

Arturo: –on a survivor show?

Lauren: Horribly.

Arturo: Have you ever seen Alone? Uh, what’s–

Lauren: Naked and Afraid?

Arturo: No. There’s one called—yes, Naked and Afraid—there’s one just called Alone, I think, and it’s like, so f***ing scary.

Lauren: The ones where they drop you in the middle of the woods and you’re completely nude, and it’s like, “figure it out!” I—that is what would happen to me in like, a purgatory situation after death if I—if I did bad things in life. Like, I—I don’t wanna camp, I don’t wanna glamp. People are like, “glamping. It’s fun!”

Arturo: No, I don’t wanna glamp. I wanna shower, man.

Lauren: I wanna shower because here’s my question. How is camping anything other than bragging? It is bragging that I can survive and I don’t—I have no—I can be humble and say I wouldn’t!

Arturo: Well, you—you also realize like, as actors, like how meaningless our skills are in an apocalypse. Like, I mean, we’re—everybody’s like, you know, this comedian used to say this and I love her for it, but she’s like, she’s like—she would be walking around with an almond being like, “can anybody turn this into milk? Can anybody?” And me, I would be like, “yeah, I don’t really hunt or like, dig for stuff, but … ”

Lauren: We just have to hope that people still want entertainment. I think that that’s it. Like you gotta hope that like—I mean, the musicians did go down with the Titanic, so that’s maybe not a great comparison …

Arturo: Yeah. Nobody was like, “get—get—make sure the musicians get in first!” You know. “The music must live on, the music must live on!”

Lauren: “It must keep going! Get the laughs. Give these two a script!”

Arturo: I would learn to tap dance or something super marketable. I’d be like, “you guys need some tap dancing.”

Um, so Ed—this Ed Benecchi—thought that he could corner Buddy because Buddy was also young, you know—in fact, Buddy was only 4 years old.

Lauren: Huhhhhhh!?!?

Arturo: So here’s where we have–

[Corny game show music]

–Lauren, what do you think Buddy actually is?

Lauren: Uh …

Arturo: Number one: We have a sadistic doll possessed by an evil spirit of a serial killer.

Number two: Is he a top secret, early prototype kinetic, robotic system that developed artificial intelligence?

Or number three: a beefalo escaping slaughter.

Lauren: Wait a second. What’s a beefalo?

Arturo: Don’t worry about it. Is it a beefalo? Is it a top secret prototype or a sadistic doll?

Lauren: OK. Well, you said he was big. You said he was young. You said he was able to eat raw food and he could evade things and we couldn’t shoot him. I don’t know what a beefalo is, but part of me wonders if it is a cow-buffalo hybrid that for some reason …

[Ding ding]

Arturo: Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding! You got it! I don’t mean to say don’t worry about it, but they told me I couldn’t tell you what it was.

Lauren: No, I love this game.

Arturo: I am—yeah—I am under contract. They’re so nice to me. I love them so much.

Lauren: I’m, I’m gonna send you a burner phone, OK?

Arturo: I actually—please give me … yeah. Um, I didn’t know what a beefalo was either, but I think the name is f***ing hilarious. So, yeah, it’s a beefalo, [which] is—is a bison mixed with—with a cow I believe, or … right? Am I right? Uh, guys?

Carl: Yes, sir. A beefalo is a bison-cow hybrid.

Lauren: Oh my gosh.

Arturo: Um.

Lauren: OK, this is amazing. I love this turn. This is fantastic.

Arturo: So listen, it turns out Buddy’s only crime was being born a beefalo.

Lauren: Ah!

Arturo: So bison, you know, they’re—they’re lean and mean and cows are docile, but carry less meat, so when they cross-bred in the 1870s, it was supposed to make the perfect healthy meat animal as lean as a bison, but as gentle as a cow.

They have been tested as having higher vitamin levels and more protein than beef. And they were supposed to be easily led from the feedlot to the killing floor. Now you can visit AmericanBeefaloAssociation.com for the full picture, which is actually a thing, which I love.

But the point is that Buddy the beefalo was literally bred for slaughter. But he was not planning to be merchandise. Nay! Not Buddy, my friend. In fact, his initial escape was just the beginning.

Give me a moo sound, will you?

Lauren: Me?

[Moo]

Lauren: Oh.

Arturo: No, Lauren.

Lauren: I love that I thought that you were saying it to me. I was like, “oh, OK, yep. Moo? Yeah, of course!”

Arturo: She was about to “yes, and” it. No. Um–

Carl: Lauren, you’re welcome—you’re welcome to make any sound effects you would like.

Lauren: Thank you so much.

Arturo: Yeah. Sorry Lauren, but I wouldn’t ask you so—so succinctly. I would be like, “Lauren, do you mind?”

Chapter 2: On the Loose

Arturo: So, Lauren, now that we know the escapee is actually a beefalo, what we’ve got is a really lighthearted story, right?

Lauren: Yes!

Arturo: This happened early in the pandemic, and to me, I don’t know, it really showcases, the— like, the power of community, and how we all needed a little optimism and a little comedy in that time, you know? So let’s have some fun with it. Yeah!?

Lauren: A hundred percent.

Arturo: Now, Buddy’s escape was pretty unusual. The slaughterhouse he ran away from was a full service facility. You know, they did the slaughtering, and the butchering, packing, and shipping out cuts of primo beefalo. Everywhere. You get a beefalo, you get a beefalo! That’s all they did.

They were the real pros and they weren’t used to their animals escaping. So obviously, neither were the local cops. After the police put out an APB on Buddy, Captain Ed … Bighetti, what is it? Michetti? Overlords?

Carl: Benecchi. Yeah.

Arturo: OK, sorry. Captain Ed Benecchi, um—captain Ed Benecchi gave a statement to the press. He said that at one point there was an officer who had cornered Buddy, but in Ed’s words, I quote, “Yeah, he approached the animal, but the animal put his head down and started to paw the ground aggressively or scratched the ground real aggressive-like, so at the time, the sergeant tactically relocated, which is another term for he had retreated it from the area.”

What, what—what excuse, what excuse would you make to save face when you’re basically telling people that an angry moo-moo freaked you out? You know?

Lauren: An angry moo-moo. I like that term a lot. I mean, I think, uh—I think it’s fair to say I felt like I was gonna be charged, but I guess my question then would just be—and I know this isn’t answering your question directly—but if he’s kind of menacing to you, then I feel like you do have permission to use deadly force because the whole point was, right … so. It kind of feels like in that moment you gotta come up with something else, which I guess then I would just be like, “I am a vegan, I’m a vegetarian and couldn’t ethically, so ... ”

Arturo: I have found Buddhism, uh, in that moment where he was stomping on the ground.

Lauren: Right.

Arturo: But, so I can imagine them being like, “yeah, you know, I was just, uh, I made a tactical retreat.” They always love to talk in military terms. I’m like, “so you—so you ran away to a store?” “No. Yeah, it’s called the Tactical Retreat.”

Lauren: “I made a tactical retreat. I did a, uh—I did a bit of a tumble into a ditch, was what it was, uh, if I’m being honest.”

Arturo: Evasive maneuver, kind of John—John Wick style. I’m like, “oh, so you jumped into the bush? Yeah, yeah, yeah…”

Lauren: “Turned my ankle pretty bad, actually. I was laid up for a couple weeks with that.”

Arturo: I don’t know what the Connecticut accent sounds like, but the—I think this is just what I’m gonna keep it as. So keep in mind though, Buddy was almost a thousand pounds in weight. So we can forgive him for, for—for the tumble. For the very brave tumble.

Lauren: Of course.

Arturo: As word spread, reporters started asking Terryville residents what they thought of the escape, if some of them were afraid or if they felt a little different about it. So one of them said:

Ben: “They wanna make steaks in burgers from this animal. We don’t want that!”

Arturo: One Plymouth resident who put food out in their backyard for Buddy said:

Tory: “Well, good for him. He knew it was coming. And now he’s out venturing.”

Arturo: So this guy was from the very deep south of Connecticut.

Lauren: Of course.

Arturo: That’s right. So as the word—as the word about Buddy spread, he got his Connecticut neighbors on his side, which is actually really cute. Locals created this Buddy t-shirt. And on September 12, a Buddy the Beefalo Twitter started spouting off, right?

The first tweet was “on the run and having fun. Hashtag live large, hashtag beefalo balling.”

[Laughs]

What—which … OK, which team are you in? Are you on, Lauren? Is it beefaloballing or just beefalo bolognese. Like what do you … ?

Lauren: No, it’s beefalo balling. Look, I was a—I was a vegetarian for nine years. I came back to the dark side.

Arturo: You told me this.

Lauren: Yeah. Um—which is fine. But the—but the point is, is that I do feel a couple of things. One, I’m like, “yeah, he—he’s an animal. He’s running.” I can’t fault him for that—wouldn’t you? I would—I mean, again, I ran away from a unmarked car.

But the point I think that is bigger for me is just, it’s interesting to … to make a disconnect that it’s like, well, there’s also hundreds of others. Like, he’s just the one that got away. Like, if you are opposed to him being killed, you kinda have to extend it …

Arturo: Then we gotta pardon everybody. What do you want, a beefalo population to go out of control? And people were like, “I didn’t even know a f***ing beefalo existed up until like—like, I don’t know.” Like, you’re forcing me to like, make a stance on something I just found out exists. So, OK. I don’t know. This beefalo is the beefalo. But also, you know, like if he wants it bad enough, I’m like … you kind of root for, you root for the underdog, don’t you? Or the under-buff…

Lauren: You do—you root for the under-buff.

Arturo: Oof. Wow. I’m gonna—the comedy community is gonna write me a very strongly worded email about that one.

Lauren: I loved it.

Arturo: It was clear Buddy had the sympathy of the public, right? The Plymouth Police saw their chance to get people on their side. So rather than trying to capture Buddy to return him to the owners, they came up with a very different plan. They will capture Buddy so that they could set him free.

[Singing] “We’re here, we’re tumbling and we’re doing a tactical retreat and we’re setting Buddy free. Hallelujah!”

Lauren: But how? I have a lot of questions. Set him free?

Arturo: Yes.

Lauren: He’s grew—he was born into captivity. Like, he’s … I guess he’s proven he can survive. I shouldn’t judge.

Arturo: Wow. I guess you’re proving that you’re on beefalo bolognese side.

Lauren: Never. Never.

Arturo: I guess like maybe setting him free would be like relocating him to—to a farm would be my guess, as opposed to just like letting him frickin’ roam on the–

Lauren: Because then it’s like now we’ve got a wild beefalo population, like “uh oh. It’s beefalo season.”

Arturo: Uh oh. He’s gonna—it’s suddenly you can get all sorts of weird sh*t like, uh, a beefa-lonkey, like he just starts mixing with everybody. A beefa-shepherd.

Lauren: Adorable though. It’s gonna be so cute.

Arturo: Yeah. A beefa-corgi. It’s gonna be really f***ing weird.

Lauren: Oh no, the legs.

Chapter 3: Setting the Trap

Arturo: So when the cops told the slaughterhouse that they didn’t want to bring Buddy back, that caused a little bit of an issue, right? Because they were told that a thousand pound beefalo would bring in about $6000 worth of meat.

So that was a really steep price, but the police decided that they were up for the challenge. So they launched a GoFundMe to buy Buddy from the slaughterhouse.

Wow. Anything else to do in this town, you guys? Or like—you’re raising money?

Lauren: It was the pandemic. It was early pandemic. They needed a project.

Arturo: I’m sure homelessness is not a problem that you could help by a GoFundMe. No, no, no. Let’s set—let’s set this beefalo free.

Lauren: Yup.

Arturo: Meanwhile, they stayed on Buddy’s trail, right? Captain Ed put his police dog Sarick into service to track Buddy down.

[Dog sniff]

Now … is that a sniffing, Ben? Wow. It is so inside my ear. Wow. I feel weird.

Ben: That wasn’t me sniffing. That was an actual dog.

Arturo: Guys, I feel weird.

So during the day, Captain Ed would pursue his normal police duties and in the evenings he was off his shift. So he would take Sarick and the two of them would collect the latest leads. Then they would head out to track Buddy.

Lauren, is this a heartwarming primetime sitcom or what? Like, you know, off-duty captain, his trusty hound, turned private eyes in animal rescue?

Lauren: I guess it’s just for me, it’s … [laughs]

Arturo: Tell me. Give it to me!

Lauren: I have a lot of questions. First of all, are we eating buffalo like beefalo? Like are they selling beefalo? Is beef … ?

Arturo: That was the first thing that I thought. I was like, $6000 worth of it. Like …

Lauren: How—who’s—I have never heard of this in my life. It feels to me like this is a way that they somehow save money breeding cows. And we—we don’t know. And this is part of like, the Big Beef Conspiracy. That’s what the first thing is for me. The second thing is, is that in a world—in a country where so many peoples—and I’m—look, we don’t have to get political, but like, I just can’t believe that this beefalo lived this long. Like, I just … it feels impossible to me!

Arturo: Yeah, you’re like, “feed them to the masses.” Well with—with so much food that goes to waste, I’m sure … I’m sure like, one beefalo won’t make the difference, but yes, I hear you, uh, completely on your concerns. So let’s turn to my overlords to see how much beefalo is … is in our food.

Carl: Beefalo is in every pound of beef that you could buy at the supermarket. In fact, beefalo is used to make tofurkey. Every pound of tofu that you buy is half beefalo.

Arturo: Every—wait, every pound of turkey that I buy is half f***ing beefalo?!

Carl: Have you ever tried to buy a zucchini at the grocery store? You were actually trying to buy a log of beefalo.

Arturo: Was that a joke? Were you making a funny? [Pause] Wow. I was like, “oh my God.” Did you—did you think he was serious, Lauren?

Lauren: Why am I so shocked? We’re being lied to by the government. What a shocker about what’s in our food? Oooh. What a concept.

Arturo: So we’ve all been eating beefalo and we did not know it existed? Got it.

Lauren: This is like Soylent Greens, but for real. Have I? That is the 1970-ish reference I bring to this show. You’re welcome.

Arturo: Thank you for bringing that.

Lauren: I’m elderly. I’m an elderly human.

Arturo: So, so, OK, so we got the captain. Is it a cute sitcom? Is it an obsession of a man? We don’t know.

But this went on for weeks and then months, right? Then finally—so the guy would do his police stuff during the day and then at night, chase Buddy down.

So finally in the fall, the owner of a local apple orchard, Nate, called the police station cause he had spotted Buddy under his trees. Now, that gave Captain Ed an idea. Working together with Nate, Ed decided to stop chasing Buddy and instead, now that he knew where he was, they would bring Buddy to them.

What would be your best, uh, beefalo trap design? What are you gonna like, lure beefalo with?

Lauren: I mean, ultimately something that looks like a female beefalo. So I’m gonna take a like an old–

Arturo: It’s always that, isn’t it?

Lauren: –a leather couch. I’m gonna put some lipstick on it, some fake eyelashes—you know what I mean?

Arturo: Ooh. I bet you there’s like—I bet you there’s like a thrift store in Portland that has just such a design, you know?

Lauren: I guarantee that, actually.

Arturo: They’re like, “we’ll turn your, your couches into cows and then we’ll bring ‘em back to life in a ceremony.”

Lauren: Exactly. And then we just plant a speaker there and—and pump some female beefalo mating sounds or … or whatever. And easy peasy, no problem.

Arturo: Which is a, it’s coincidentally DJ Khaled’s next remix. It’s mating, female beefalo sounds. “D-D-DJ, DJ Khaled.”

Um, I wonder if the female beefalo is also called a “beefalo.”

Lauren: Oh, great question. Or is it a beefala?

Arturo: Give it to me, Carl. It’s called “beefala”?

Carl Nellis: It is called “beefalita.”

Arturo: Beefalita, alright!

Lauren: Oh my gosh … (singing) “Beefalita, I’m waiting for you!”

Arturo: Wow. So many ’90s hits in my head at one time.

Lauren: Again, elderly.

Arturo: So their luring plan started with a big ass animal trailer, right? One big enough to hold Buddy if the beefalo would actually go inside. But that was surrounded by cattle fencing circled up around the trailer to create a coral, right? A corral, I believe you guys call it, I call it a “coral.” F***ing sue me.

So leading towards the trailer, an open gate on the far side offered Buddy a way in, right? So Captain Ed got urine from a female cow, a beefalita, to use as [a] lure to draw a Buddy into the cage alongside some hay and some grain. So you were totally right, kind of, Lauren.

Lauren: Listen, I—I was a little more creative about it. Again, the end of the world, I’d like to think that that’s what the artists bring. Creativity.

Arturo: That’s right. Be like, “give this woman a couch. She’s gonna lure some dinner.”

So I—I wish we had the recording of that conversation. Right? Like, if you had to approach the owner of a cattle herd, like, how would you go about asking for like cow piss—like female cow piss.

Lauren: Well, I guess they have to hope that one of the female cows used the bathroom in the night and didn’t flush the toilet. You know what I mean?

Arturo: Yeah, there you go. But yeah, I just imagine that conversation like, “hey, uh—hey, how you doing? Hey, God bless you. So how’s your mother? Good, good, good. So listen, I’m gonna need a, a little bit of, uh, animal smells, you know, for some sniffing. You got any, uh, you got any cow piss lying around?” “What kind of cow piss?” I don’t know, a female, female cow—female beefalina cow.”

Lauren: I also—I wanna hear the conversation with his wife or partner about this. Like, “how was your day?” Like, “oh, I gotta go down there. I had to source some, uh, female cow piss. I’m laying a trap.” It’s like, you have been chasing this thing for a month and a half!

Arturo: Ed and Nate sat together in a truck nearby holding onto a rope that held together the gate, right? So if Buddy arrived to check on their trap, they would just pull the rope and close the gate, and Buddy would be locked inside.

Now, 30 minutes later, there was a commotion just at the end of the clearing, a rustling from between the trees, and Ed and Nate sat in stone cold silence trying not to move.

I just gotta say also, you know, how they say, like, men invented golf just so—just so they could have an excuse to go on walks together? I feel like this is like, their version of bonding be like, “yeah, we’re just gonna catch a cow.” And it’s like, “yeah, but like, if we wanna talk about feelings while we’re doing it, like why the f*** not, you know?” So–

Lauren: “I guess I just never felt seen growing up, I think is what it is.”

Arturo: “Yeah. Yeah. So yeah, let’s go catch a beefalo. And let’s talk about some sh*t.”

So from—so from this commotion and the clearing out stepped our pal, Buddy.

He approached the corral, he spotted the open gate, and he walked inside. He made his way to that pile of piss and grain. And that’s when Ed and the farmer sprang their trap. They jumped out of the truck and heaved the gates shut by pulling the rope.

But these men had underestimated Buddy. As the gate clanged shut, he bolted—not out the gate, nay, but directly through the cattle fencing.

And the moment was caught on video. The large steel panels are thrown into the air and scattered around the trailer like they were barely more than cardboard.

Lauren: I’m so invested in this story. This is such a great one. I can’t even tell you. This is chaos.

Arturo: It’s got love, it’s got romance, it’s got–

Lauren: It’s got everything you need. I also want you to know I was taking notes at points cause I was like, “there’s some points of this that I gotta come back to.”

Arturo: Yeah. So Buddy the beefalo stayed on the loose, but Ed—Captain Ed had more tricks up his sleeve.

Chapter 4: Heat Vision

Arturo: Now in interviews, Captain Ed said that Buddy had become his white whale. He was determined to capture the beefalo at almost any cost. Fortunately, the police GoFundMe had scooped up over $9000. So all the expenses were covered in under a day. Now all that was left to do was catch the beast. Lauren, would you have contributed to the hashtag beefalo balling GoFundMe?

Lauren: You know, honestly, the more I think about it … maybe, I don’t know. It was a time—we gotta remember this time, though. This was September 2020. We all needed a hero. We all wanted something, you know, and maybe–

Arturo: That’s true.

Lauren: –the community felt, you know, brought together by all of this. I think it’s just because it’s uh, you know—again, it’s like there’s just so many of them, but I guess only the one got away. So maybe he is special and I should be more supportive of Buddy specifically.

Arturo: Yeah. Also, I love the irony of like, you know, the local townspeople watching this on the news and like, rooting for Buddy while, like, eating a f***ing 12 ounce steak. You know? They’re like–

Lauren: I know.

Arturo: “Oh man, I really hope he makes it out. I never had any beefalo in my life, but you know,” And little did they know that that’s beefalo that they’re eating.

Lauren: It is.

Arturo: We’ve all been eating beefalo.

Lauren: You said this has been going on since 1870. That I wrote that down. I was like, “this is the greatest kept secret in the world. We’ve been eating beefalo!”

Arturo: That’s right, and we revealed it. I love that this is gonna like—what if this is the last strand of sanity that the world was like leaning on. Like, once this is revealed, everything just f***ing snaps outta place and every–

Lauren: That’s it. It’s over. Yep.

Arturo: The apocalypse starts.

Um, so. Captain Ed decided that he had a working strategy. He met with Nate and they agreed that Ed could rebuild the trap and use it again. So they built it again, stronger this time, and filled it again with grain and water to lure Buddy in. Then they kept watch and despite their first encounter, Buddy did come back … probably because Buddy did not believe in their f***ing skills. They’re like, “yeah, dude. OK, yeah, gimme some grain. I’ll be OK.”

And not just once. Ed and Nate kept the corral stocked and Buddy started coming back regularly for the food and water. This just feels like they just had a pet, to be honest. This just like—this just feels like now you just have–

Lauren: This is like feeding a stray cat. It’s always gonna keep coming back. You know what I mean? It’s just—yeah.

Arturo: A big old stray cat. So Captain Ed started spending his evenings after work waiting for Buddy to appear. The police chief said that Captain Ed did not hunt Buddy during working hours and quote, “Hey, if my captain chooses to chase a beefalo on his own time, he can do that. It’s a free country.” He’s also Steven Segal—uh, little known fact.

So his weird hobby didn’t jeopardize his work, but his boss doesn’t really sound thrilled about it, right? So when Ed and Nate were staking out the trap—more and more, this is sounding like they just wanted to bond, you know?

Lauren: Yeah.

Arturo: F*** it. So when he—he was taking out the trap, rather than staying in Nate’s truck, Ed would lie down inside the animal trailer itself. He set up cameras pointed at the makeshift pen where he hoped that he would trap Buddy. He even borrowed night vision goggles from a fellow police officer, and used a thermal camera from the police department inventory so he could spot Buddy when he was nearby and track his approach.

According to one article, he supplied all of his own batteries for the police equipment he was using to keep watch for the runaway. OK, buddy. So–

Lauren: Does he have a bunker? Is he hoarding batteries? Is this all part of this? Does he have children? I wanna know so much about Captain Ed’s life.

Arturo: Um—so Ed was obsessed with the hunt, right? And as the months got colder, he found himself lying in the frigid steel trailer. He would get home from work, eat dinner with his wife, and then get up, bundle up in his jacket, and head for the orchard where he would lie and wait for Buddy.

Now, his wife came out with him a few times in the eight months that he was hunting Buddy down. But it was his obsession, not hers. And in an interview she said that she mostly hoped that he’d just be safe, you know?

Um, so—so Ed caught the buffalo many times … on video. The recordings of his surveillance camera show Buddy repeatedly stepping into the pen, grabbing his food, and then hightailing it out of there. Again, honestly, do they—does this sound like they even want to catch the beefalo? You know, they just wanna play with cool surveillance gadgets away from their families, don’t they?

Lauren: You know, if I may, I’d like to quote—to quote hit major motion picture Batman: The Dark Knight.

Arturo: Yes, please do.

Lauren: Which is, you know, “I’m like a dog chasing a car. If—if I caught it, I wouldn’t know what to do with it.” I’m paraphrasing. The point is: if and when…

Arturo: You know, I was like, “wow, I missed that particular line.”

Lauren: Thank you very much. I’m very prolific and have a great memory for quotes.

The point is, uh, you know, it’s—“sometimes you just wanna watch the world burn.” That one doesn’t connect at all, but I just wanted to prove I know a quote. The point is, I just am very curious to see how this story ends and if he does catch it, it’s like—then what? Like … it’s like, what’s the next thing?

Arturo: I got you. So in an interview, Ed chalked it up to Covid, right? He said it was 2020 and there was nothing better to do than lie in the cold trailer and wait for a cow—which to be honest, fair enough, buddy.

So this carried on throughout winter, OK? Buddy cut a path in the snow to the corral, where he knew there was always food waiting. OK? But Ed and Nate could never keep him inside the corral, or coax him into the trailer. The beefalo just refused to get caught. Until …

One day in the spring of 2021. Buddy didn’t show up for his daily feeding. He was gone … gone … gone. But by then the whole town knew that Ed was the man on the hunt for Buddy.

So soon the telephone was ringing down at the police station. It was a different local farmer calling in to report. As it turned out, after 250 days of freedom, plus a bale of hay and 10 pounds of grain every single day through the winter months, Ed discovered that he no longer had to bring Buddy in.

After a whole winter playing catch me if you can with Captain Ed. Buddy was found where he really wanted to be, and it wasn’t in the makeshift corral with a chilly cattle trailer and a weird dude lying in it.

In fact, Buddy had caught the scent of another local cattle farm and it brought him wandering over. This time, he spotted a cluster of female cows. He jumped the fence into the pen, trapping himself with the ladies inside. [Singing] “Ladies, I know I’ve been out in the wild for far too long, but I hear this is a prime place for lady cow piss.”

Um [clears throat]. Sorry.

The local farmer marched them inside, locked them up and called Captain Ed to let him know that the fugitive had finally given up the game. Maybe all those nasty reports about him being aggressive were a bit off the mark. It seems like Buddy, what he really was, was lonely.

It was Buddy himself who decided that his rampage to the woods of the Connecticut wilderness was over. So Buddy, he found his people.

Chapter 5: No Cage Can Hold Me

Arturo: So once Buddy was caught, the money from the GoFundMe paid for the vet to check him out, and then they shipped him down south. One of the officers said that they raised enough money in a single day to pay the vet, plus the transportation, and repaying Nate for all the food he brought through the winter.

Buddy was taken in by Critter Creek Farm Animal Sanctuary in Gainesville, Florida. They required a short quarantine adjustment period where Buddy got used to the climate. So they could make sure he wouldn’t bring any diseases to the other animals.

Now are you hearing me? They tried to lock Buddy up in a solitary pen, but it failed. Buddy escaped twice!

They should have pretty much known better by this point, don’t you think, that like, Buddy does not like being locked up, man. He’s a lonely guy.

Lauren: No, he’s made it quite clear and he’s been evading—he’s been evading all capture for a really long time. Like, you gonna—gotta keep him in a barn or, I don’t even know what, but this is–

Arturo: No, you just—you just gotta keep the cow piss flowing. That’s all you gotta do.

So eventually he—once he was let out into the main pasture to mingle with the other cows and even a bison named Cinnamon, Buddy calmed down.

Finally, Buddy was lonely no more! Or … no moooore? Oh!

Lauren: [Laughs]

Arturo: In April 2021, Captain Ed drove down to visit Buddy at the Sanctuary in Florida. Apparently he tried to feed the beefalo bananas, but Buddy kept his distance. It’s a little sad almost watching Captain Ed try to entice Buddy over. Our best beefalo boy just will not be moved no matter what Captain Ed offers him. I guess in some ways the real chase goes on.

Outro

Arturo: And that’s our story. Lauren, what’d you think?

Lauren: This is amazing. I think that this was incredible. I loved the misdirect, I loved all the details. I loved the fact that early on in the story I was going, “what crime did this convict commit? Like, how dangerous of a—of a convict is—?” I was taking notes, I was doing what I do during my normal show.

Arturo: No, yeah—and I’m just glad we have a really fun escape story for once with a happy ending and everything.

Lauren: Love it.

Arturo: Because, you know, this show doesn’t really get a lot of those.

And also, you know, in solidarity with Buddy, we’re actually going to make a donation to the Critter Creek Farm on behalf of Captain Ed. So it’s a real win-win here!

Lauren: Aww, that’s so kind.

Arturo: We, to be honest, it’s a cool, it’s a—it’s cool as any hobby, man. Like I—I learned how to play chess, so that’s, you know.

Lauren: A hundred percent.

Arturo: Some people chase cows, some people play chess.

Arturo: Uh, uh, where can listeners find your show, Lauren?

Lauren: You can find us anywhere that the podcasts are available. True Crime and Cocktails. Uh, you can find us on all the socials also, uh, if you look for that name.

Arturo: To really go out with a bang. I’m gonna ask, uh, Ben to play us some of that sexy ’70s music he was playing and I wanna ask you, Lauren, to, to sing with me and say goodbye.

[Singing]

Lauren: Ooh. Let’s do it.

Arturo: Yeah. Beefalo, can you feel the Moomoomoomoomoo-mahhh.

Lauren: You’re going to run awayyyyy.

Arturo: Is it coral or corral?

Lauren: Gonna eat a large bale of hayyy.. Oooh!

Arturo: Lauren, thank you so much!

Lauren: Oh my God, this was too fun, truly.

Arturo: Goodbye everybody. See you next week!

Credits

Arturo: Greatest Escapes is a production of iHeartRadio and FilmNation Entertainment, in association with Gilded Audio. Our executive producers are me, Arturo, Alyssa Martino and Milan Popelka from FilmNation Entertainment, Andrew Chugg and Whitney Donaldson from Gilded Audio, and Dylan Fagan from iHeartRadio.

The show is produced and edited by Carl Nellis and Ben Chugg, who are also, respectively, our research overlord and music overlord. Our associate producer is Tory Smith, who is our other overlord.

Nick Dooley is our technical director. Additional editing by Whitney Donaldson. Special thanks to Alison Cohen, Dan Welsh, Ben Ryzack, Sara Joyner, Nicki Stein, Olivia Canny, and Kelsey Albright.

Hey, thank you so much for listening, and if you’re enjoying the show, please leave a rating or review. My mom will call you each personally and thank you, and we’ll see you all next week.