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Jan. 31, 2026 - Lionel Nation
25:46
What the Hillside Strangler Taught Me About Erika Kirk
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Time Text
Kenneth Bianchi's Legacy 00:10:18
First, I think this is the funniest title I've ever come up with.
And I don't mean to intimate that Erica Kirk is in any way like Kenneth Bianchi, the Hillside Strangler.
I'm not intimating that.
And as you'll see in a moment, there's a reason for it.
But this might be my finest hour.
Just if ever they submit YouTube pieces for some kind of an award, this is the one I want.
Just the title.
And the nominees are for the Hillside Strangler taught me all I knew about Erica Kirk, the winner is first.
There's a lot.
Forgive me for not doing what everybody does.
I know I'm supposed to do this.
I'm supposed to put up the clip and stop it and say, see, now there's nothing wrong with that.
It's great stuff.
I'd rather just tell you about it and say, you've seen it.
Go look at it.
Listen to me.
I don't want to stop by pointing.
I know I should.
I know I should.
I just don't want to do that.
Maybe I'm lazy.
Maybe I want to talk too much.
I don't know.
I just don't want to waste time pointing to something that I know you've seen a million times.
But I want to tell you a little story.
First, I want you to remember my background.
I spent the formative years of my life as a prosecutor dealing with forensics, mental illness vis-a-vis the criminal justice system.
Insanity defenses, diminished capacity, sentencing memoranda, trying to get people off the hook, and trying to fight people who claim to be laboring under some kind of mental fibrillity or something like that.
Okay?
Now, what we have done is we've kind of outsourced this various pictures of Erica.
And she's just a phony.
I mean, say whatever you want.
You can say it.
She's, first of all, I don't think she's, I'm not going to say she's a psychopath, but she really believes her own.
I mean, she really does.
I mean, seriously.
She thinks she is so good.
And she thinks she's bamboozling you.
And I'm telling you, she's not even close.
And when she does that, we're howling.
She doesn't realize it.
I'll bet you anything she says.
Somebody must have said, listen, Erica, I got to tell you something.
What?
They're laughing at you about what?
Well, everything about you.
See how she sits?
Even with the rings, the rings, don't show gold.
Don't show, look at me.
Anyway, it's just sloppy.
But let me tell you a little story about this guy.
And this is a very, very important case.
The Hillside Strangler.
His name was Kenneth Bianchi.
He and his cousin, Buono.
Remember that?
His cousin, Buono.
He was a bad dude.
Angelo Buono, not Victor Bono, who played King Tut in the Batman series.
No, no, he was bad.
But both of these guys were bad.
I mean, the Hillside Strangler.
So Kenneth Bianchi was half.
He was the moiety of the famous Hillside Stranglers.
It was this duo that terrorized LA in the late 70s.
And yes, this is one of the greatest examples of criminals trying to game psychology, kind of the way she's trying to game you.
And he thought he could get away with it because he felt, I'm just, I'm handsome, I'm smart.
Really?
Ted Bundy, the same way.
Again, I'm not saying Erica is a serial killer or a psychopath, but she does have characteristics, I guess as do we all who that accompany this.
Anyway, so Bianchi thought, I can fool these people.
So here's the story.
After the murders, Bianchi fled to Washington State.
Now, in 1979, he was arrested for killing two college students, kind of like Ted Bundy, Washington State, not going to think too.
Anyway, suddenly, like magic, like magic, he developed multiple personalities.
This was big in the old days.
You don't really seem to three faces, Viv, civil, remember civil, people who would, they've tried it a gazillion times.
You really have to know what you're doing.
So under hypnosis, and this is where he, this is kind of what Erica did, because Erica spoke before this.
She became hypnotized by the lens, by her own greatness, all right?
So under hypnosis, he produced alter egos with kind of like soap opera names like Steve and Billy and Kane, Kane, like Kane Mutiny.
And the media ate it up.
I mean, experts were paraded in our television, just like these phony, these body language experts.
You know, this is, they're just, it's a scam.
Yeah, there's something to body language, but to sell it for a TV show.
Anyway, so they brought in these experts and they came on TV and defense teams floated the idea, floated that he suffered from a dissociative, I'm doing the air quotes, dissociative identity disorder, okay?
And that he wasn't responsible.
It was Kane.
He did it.
But then, but then there was a skeptical psychologist, like one of you, like maybe you, like maybe me, who watched Erica do something.
We said, no, no, no, no.
Did you see this?
Did you watch her do this?
Did you see her reference this?
You'll come up with something she never even thought of.
But it's like, yeah.
So this rather dubious, incredulous, skeptical psychologist stepped in.
So during a hypnosis session, Bianchi reached out, I don't know what I'm doing this for, reached out and grabbed a tissue box, a tissue, to wipe his face.
And the expert said, gotcha.
Just gotcha.
He's faking it.
Nobody saw this.
Nobody knew what they were saying.
What do you mean he's faking you?
He's faking it.
Got him.
That small move blew the whole performance.
Because people in true deep hypnosis do not initiate purposeful physical actions like that.
It showed conscious awareness and voluntary control.
He was faking it.
That's it.
That's it.
Done.
That one little thing.
And all of the experts who came in and were on the shows, like Donna Hue or whatever they were, they said, oh, oh yeah, we didn't see that part.
That's what we're doing.
We're reviewing this.
So they tested him further by introducing fake symptoms during these sessions.
So Bianchi immediately adopted them, proving he was improvising.
It became clear he was rehearsing, he was performing and manipulating the process.
Sound familiar?
Again, I'm not saying she's a serial killer, but you see the parallels?
And the result of this, well, the split personality defense collapsed.
And Bianchi confessed.
He flipped on his cousin Angelo, who was really the bad guy.
And he took a plea deal.
He got life in prison, and Buono was later convicted and died behind bars.
The takeaway here, the takeaway, this case exposed how easily pop psychology can be weaponized when courts and media and so-called experts get starry-eyed.
And it was the late 1970s.
It was a peak era of fad, you know, diagnoses and Aston courtroom theatrics.
And one smart skeptic and a tissue box ended the charade.
One person, one person, enter Candace.
Candace.
She did it.
Everything was fine.
You might have thought to yourself, well, you know, this Erica, look, she may not be perfect, but, you know, after all, her husband was, that's right.
And then people, I don't know what was worse.
I think hearing the audio was worse than seeing it.
I think hearing radio, thoughts, whatever, theater of the mind, I think it was worse than the visual, the zoom, whatever, you know, with the matted hair and that kind of stuff.
I shouldn't say matted here, but you know what I'm saying?
She deliberately looked, you know, kind of roughed up.
It was the sound.
And I, if I ran this, I would do, we would have a pilot kind of a model jury, and I would do, and we've done this before, just put it up, just listen to them.
Watch Reactions 00:02:32
You know, you can get anybody you want.
You can put the evidence on in a courtroom.
Say, what do you think about this?
Watch their face.
Watch their face.
Watch women's reactions and men's reactions.
Women will get, will give you a different take because of, I'm going to say this, a woman's intuition, a woman's perspective, completely different, different mindset than men.
And if you don't know this, I don't know what to tell you.
The parallels are perfect.
Bianchi and Erica thought they love me.
No, no, they have been, you know, during that time, there was people, you know, these handsome people.
Richard Ramirez, Night Stalker, who, by the way, smelled his B.O. was so rancid, so fetid.
His teeth, you know, with the pentagram.
I mean, women loved him until they got near him.
Ted Bundy, poof, and Bianchi, oh, Bianchi thought I've got movie star looks, curly hair, the mustache.
You know, they thought they were like Lyle Wagner.
I'm dating myself, right?
Erica, thanks.
Right?
She really does.
Go back.
I'm watching old videos of her.
I guess she's doing the beauty pageant, giving her opinion things about legalization of marijuana, the perils of pornography, a lot of things.
And realize, first of all, she's not exactly, she's not, she's not Niels Bohr.
You know, she's not exactly the wunderkind when it comes to off-the-charts mentation.
I mean, she's not an adult, but she's just, she's all fluff and she just thinks she's just, she reminds me of people like, remember, you remember Van Oi, but there were people like Mary Hart and Phyllis George and Betty Furness and people they would bring there and they would just great at just being the smiling I don't know what it is.
And people are thinking, do you believe?
Are you do you believe this?
Do you think that we think we're buying this?
And as in the as in the case with with Bianchi, it's been, I've been, it hit me tonight.
This has been in the back of my mind for the longest time.
Phony Moments Noticed 00:12:54
When people screw up.
When people screw up.
Here's something.
When you're interviewing somebody and you want to get something out of them, you never take somebody in and you never attack them.
So where were you?
You weren't there, were you?
You weren't in Cincinnati at the time.
You couldn't have been there because you didn't have the car.
And they just, they tighten up and they don't say anything.
What you do instead, you say, please talk and act as though you, remember, there's nothing in the law that says you can't fool people.
There's nothing in the law that during interrogations, they wanted story one, they wanted Saddam Hussein to feel like you were identifying with him.
When he walked into the room, they stood up because he was the president of the king or whatever the hell he was.
And with Erica, the way I would do it, oh, I would be the worst.
If I interviewed her, oh my God, I would say, you have a friend, girl, you go.
So what would I do?
I would tell her things that she wants to believe.
Not how about your kids, what about the fact?
No, You have been the exemplar, the model of power.
You have been able to take, please forgive me, beauty.
And that would probably kill me to say that, but I would say, please.
I'd even pretend like I would say, please don't, don't, you, you, you, you are the example of beauty and power and genius.
And you have been able to mix that.
Please, I'm in awe of you.
And to bring in the spirituality.
You know, and this is where she would really open up.
I would say.
And you sat back and you let Charlie shine.
Parentheses.
You were really the star.
Or you were just, you were equal, as equal a star as anybody else.
You were.
You were.
You showed something that nobody else understood.
You did it.
How did you do it?
So I would basically tell her what I know she would want to hear.
And her guard would drop.
And she would just say, oh, I have found a home.
I have found a friend.
You understand me.
And then I'd say, want a tissue?
Anyway, see what I'm saying?
She's not going to go on any TV shows right now.
She's so caught up in her own perspective, she wouldn't even recognize what you were doing.
She wouldn't get it.
How are you?
What has been your strength?
You have been put into the position, not only Erica, have you been blessed with a pulqueritude and a style and a grace.
Unseen, non-parallel, inimitable in modern society, at least during our times.
But you are a mother figure, a leader.
Women, men, they admire you.
Stewarding the helm of this huge corporation with your leadership and your ability to add humanity, to reach out and to show them, I cry so you can cry.
You tell her what she wants to believe herself.
Now, most people, you and I, would say, what do you do?
What is it?
What are you making fun of me?
We'd see right through it.
Listen to what I'm saying.
We'd say, I'm getting out of here.
Who is this?
Not Erica.
No.
It's very stepfordy.
It's almost like when you've been in a cult for a long enough period of time.
And I'm not going to think she's in a cult, but remember years ago when Tom Cruise, you know, did the whole, Matt, you're glib.
Remember that he was the, I think they told him, tone it down.
He was the Scientologist who was against, you know, psychiatric, whatever it was.
But he basically said, you know, tone it down, tone it.
Okay.
He almost seemed, when he was on Oprah, Dad, he was still to an extent, he's, you know, hypers, almost manic.
But when you're in something for a long time, it changes you.
And one of the reasons why people in the entertainment business become insufferable and hard to deal with is the fact that they are, they live in a world where people are telling them all the time, you're so great.
You're so wonderful.
I can't believe I'm meeting.
And that's when they say, give me the M ⁇ Ms without the green or whatever.
I mean, there's nothing.
They live in a world that you don't live in.
It's their world we're just living in.
Remember that joke?
Same thing with Erica.
She just doesn't get it.
And I promise you now, I promise you, she would not understand what we're saying right now.
She does not understand that we see right through her.
And much like Bianchi, the hillside strangler, it takes somebody to just notice something.
Notice this.
Remember during the initial parts of the assassination, there were folks who were experts in ballistics and they saw flashes, which could have been another shooter and exit wounds.
Well, watch this.
And like I said, this was a trial.
I would have a jury just sit there and say, what do you think?
What was the moment?
And I want you to have a little clicker, little button.
And every time you see something, every time you get a particular moment, just hit it.
So you'll be able to say, that's the part.
That's the part.
Notice things.
What is she wearing?
What is she wearing?
How is she highlighting?
Nobody told her.
Say, Erica, lose the rings.
Why are you wearing that?
I know they're yours over it.
They don't know that.
It's like when you go to a lawyer's office, never wear gold.
They'll charge you more.
You know, when you go to know how to look.
Give people the right impression.
Know everything.
Know what you're giving off.
Know what you're suggesting.
How are you coming across?
The crying.
She has no idea.
She has become so, you know, I'm sure you've cried before.
And during lachromation, as it is called, when the tear ducts flow, the tear ducts and nose and mucus.
I don't get into it.
Are all connected?
That's why you need it.
You got to blow your nose when you cry.
Boo-hoo!
They're connected.
You don't normally cry, just one eye and not the other.
You don't merely dab your eyes, you can't speak.
Your diaphragm becomes almost spasmodic.
You cry.
She never has that.
She gets right through the speech.
Right through it.
But with this.
So that's her thing.
The looking up.
There was a video.
I don't know who it was.
She's very, very good.
There's so many great people analyzing this.
And there's a woman who's at, she teaches acting.
And she says, this is poor acting technique.
Even on the stage, this doesn't work.
But notice how she always gets through it.
You always hear, you never hear, what?
What was that?
Well, she's crying.
And it's the same identical cry.
She doesn't realize it.
So what I'm saying, not to belabor the point, much like Kenneth Bianchi, much like the Hillside Strangler, much like people who think they are smarter than you.
It's a delusion they have.
They are possessed with something.
They are not a mere mortal.
Think about what I've said.
And again, let me clarify this.
I'm not suggesting she's a serial killer.
I'm not suggesting she's a psychopath.
I'm just saying you can learn a lot, as I have.
I've spent a lot of times, a lot of times watching courtroom.
I've been in, oh, by the way, speaking of which, the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory, 1900 and whatever it was.
Terrible case.
Look it up.
Max Stoyer cross-examined a woman.
It was a story about these women in lower Manhattan.
They worked at a factory, kind of like a sweatshop.
And a lot of these women were immigrants and they worked there.
And apparently, the charge was that the owners of this factory chained the fire escape because the women were going out for smoke breaks instead of sewing or whatever they were supposed to do.
Well, the fire broke out.
They couldn't get out and they died.
They burned.
It was horrible.
And there was one woman, one survivor inside a closet.
Now, think about this.
She was inside the closet.
And outside, she heard the noise and the sound.
She got into the closet.
She locked the door.
There was no room.
People were pounding on the closet.
And she's thinking to herself, what am I supposed to do?
There's not an escape.
If I open the door, I die.
You die.
We all die.
So she could hear her friends, the screams and the moans and the scratching at the door.
And then it all dissipated.
And it eventually became silent.
So she takes the stand.
And I mean, it was just, oh my God.
So Max Stoyer, who was the representative of the company, says, tell me the story again from the top.
And either he made her go through it one time or at least one time.
So he's listening, listening, listening.
He says, ah!
You changed the word.
You said many and whatever.
So he implied everything was rehearsed.
Everything.
You said it exactly the same way.
You're a phony.
Now, that doesn't mean these people weren't killed.
It's nice that he impeached the witness, as we say.
But the point is, he heard that.
He noticed that.
And it had an effect like there certainly was a fire, but we're going to take what she says with a grain of salt because she's been rehearsing this.
She has said this thing repeatedly.
It takes a very, very good person.
You would hope possessed with the truth.
But you really have to know what you're doing before you go before the world and in front of some of these brilliant people like you.
And you are brilliant.
That's all, my friends.
What do you think?
Have I gone too far?
Do you see any comparable story moments?
I think you have.
Do me a great race.
First of all, accept my thanks for being a part of this.
Please like this video.
Please like this video.
Please subscribe to her Noble Proud channel.
Please hit that little bell so you're notified of live streams and new videos.
And also in the comment section, what were the parts of her testimony, either the audio or the video or both, that you thought was indicative of something phono, phono, phony, or phono, where there was the tissue moment where you thought, oh, did you see that?
What was that moment?
Thank you, my friend.
Thank you.
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