In short
Toby Dorr, “the dog lady of Lansing Prison,” creates the Safe Harbor Prison Dog Program, then becomes romantically involved with inmate John Maynard and helps him escape by hiding in a dog crate during a Feb. 12, 2006 adoption pickup; they flee to Tennessee, crash during a police pursuit, and both are convicted.
Guest backgrounds
Toby Dorr (born 1957) worked at a Kansas City veterinary office; diagnosed with thyroid cancer in 2004. John Maynard was serving a life sentence for a carjacking-related first-degree murder conviction.
Key claims
Toby says the program began after her cancer made her fear dying without meaning. She claims Maynard protected her from threats inside the prison and later proposed escape (UPS box/dog crate ideas). She says she spent $40,000 from her 401(k), bought a $5,000 truck, and used a storage unit without cameras. She claims police found them partly because the truck registration was mailed to the cabin.
Notable examples
dogs sleeping in inmates’ cells; Maynard fitting into a box inside a crate; Tennessee interstate surrounded by dozens of police cars; head-on crash at ~100 mph; Toby sentenced to 27 months; Maynard received an additional 10 years.
Written by AI. May contain mistakes. Listen to the episode to check what was said.
Chapters
Tap a time to open that second in VOCelebrating Criminal's 10th Anniversary
1:02 to 2:12
Reflecting on favorite episodes while on the anniversary tour.
“Whenever people ask me about my favorite past episode of Criminal, and they ask me a lot, I always have one answer.”
Toby Dorr's Story Begins
2:12 to 4:16
Toby shares her journey of becoming the 'dog lady' of Lansing Prison.
“I am better known in the media as the dog lady of Lansing Prison.”
Launching the Safe Harbor Prison Dog Program
4:16 to 6:12
Toby explains how she initiated a dog training program in prison.
“And so I spent most of my time in the recliner watching cell dogs on Animal Planet.”
Living with Inmates and Their Dogs
6:12 to 8:01
Toby discusses the unique environment of the dog program in the prison.
“So we put the dogs right in the cells with the inmates.”
Challenges in Toby's Marriage
8:01 to 8:33
Toby reflects on her complicated relationship with her husband.
“And, you know, so we might as well get married kind of a thing.”
Meeting John Maynard: A Unique Connection
8:33 to 11:58
Toby recounts her first encounter with inmate John Maynard.
“So, I mean, one of the instances is we had just been married maybe two or three months, and my husband was gone every weekend to play golf with his friends, and he'd be gone for eight or nine hours a day.”
Navigating Prison Dynamics
11:58 to 14:03
Toby shares experiences and challenges of working in the prison environment.
“John Maynard claimed that it was his accomplice who had fired the gun, not him.”
Confrontation at the Prison
14:03 to 15:16
Toby describes a tense encounter with a disgruntled inmate and her feelings of vulnerability.
“And he got mad at me and he started screaming at me and he put his fists up and he was in my face and he was yelling at me and cussing at me and saying, you know, you let everybody else wait for their dogs.”
Building a Relationship with Maynard
15:16 to 17:31
Toby discusses her evolving relationship with John Maynard and the emotional support he provided.
“And I'll run the prison dog program, but I'm not going inside the prison.”
The First Signs of Attraction
17:31 to 19:58
Exploration of Toby's growing attraction to Maynard and her internal conflict about it.
“And, you know, it was just kind of like pouring water on a dying plant to hear somebody notice that I was there and I had needs and I was important enough to notice when I wasn't feeling right.”
Show all 22 chapters
Planning the Escape
19:58 to 22:37
Toby and John devise an escape plan involving a dog crate, highlighting their desperation and creativity.
“And then he said, you know, when you come to do a dog adoption, I could hide in a dog crate.”
The Day Before the Escape
22:37 to 24:36
Toby reflects on the tense preparations leading up to the escape, including her secretive actions.
“And then, you know, the next time I come up, he said, you know, I figured out we do it this way.”
The Escape Execution
24:36 to 28:00
Toby recounts the chaotic and tense moments during the dog adoption event and the escape.
“Well, the night before the escape was so tense.”
The Escape Begins
28:00 to 30:00
A narrative of the initial escape with dogs from prison.
“Was there any point that you thought, I don't want to do this.”
A Day of Freedom
30:59 to 38:28
Toby and John experience brief freedom while on the run.
“fully integrated platform that makes your work easier.”
Consequences of the Escape
40:49 to 42:00
Toby reflects on the fallout and her family's reaction after the escape.
“John Maynard was already in prison with a life sentence.”
Family Relationships and Life in Prison
42:00 to 43:54
Toby shares her experiences with family and friendships while in prison.
“Well, my family, you know, my mom, it was awesome.”
Life After Prison and a New Relationship
43:54 to 46:22
Toby discusses adjusting to life after prison and her relationship with Chris.
“But everyone in town knew what she'd done.”
Reflections on Her Past and Apologies
46:22 to 47:29
Toby reflects on her past decisions and the lack of an apology from John Maynard.
“She didn't expect to reply, but he wrote back just a few weeks later.”
The Craziest Story
47:29 to 47:46
Toby describes her life-changing decisions and how she lived through them.
Updates and Show Announcements
47:46 to 49:14
The team shares updates about Toby's book and the show's anniversary.
“This episode was first released in 2019, and after it came out, a few of you wrote us to ask what happened to the dogs that Toby put in her barn during the escape.”
Updates and Show Announcements
49:56 to 51:10
The team shares updates about Toby's book and the show's anniversary.
“so why make it harder with a dozen different apps that don't talk to each other?”
Transcript
Automatic transcript. May contain errors.0:00Lindsey Schweigert:Bloomington, Indiana has always been a town of lifelong learners. Lectures that run long. Dinner table debates that run longer. We're always studying something. But this year, the syllabus changed. We learned about blitzes and blocks, pick sixes and play action. And what the inside of that outside stadium looks like on a sunny Saturday afternoon. We may not always understand the whole thing, but man, if it isn't fun to learn. Visit Bloomington. Learn something new. Support for this show comes from BetterHelp. Summer can feel like a sprint. Kids home, trips to plan, routines flipped upside down.
0:39It's easy to slip into survival mode just trying to get through it. Then suddenly it's over and you're wishing you enjoyed the days just a little bit more.
0:47Lindsey Schweigert:Therapy can help you slow down and actually be present for the moments that matter. With BetterHelp, you can connect with a licensed therapist from anywhere on your schedule. Don't just survive this summer, thrive. Visit BetterHelp.com slash Vox Pods.
1:28Lindsey Schweigert:I have to make this deal. You've already lost. Listen now at Project Swagger.
1:37Lindsey Schweigert:Hi, it's Phoebe. Whenever people ask me about my favorite past episode of Criminal, and they ask me a lot, I always have one answer. So while we were deciding what episodes we wanted to share with you while we're out on our 10th anniversary tour this month, of course we had to include this one. Thank you very much to all of you who came out and saw us live. We had a lot of fun. We're wrapping up our tour, and we'll be back next week with brand new episodes of Criminal. But for now, enjoy Off Leash. Hi, my name is Toby. I am better known in the media as the dog lady of Lansing Prison. You know, people get themselves in predicaments in life, but you really got yourself in one.
2:23I did. I did. And, you know, I was a perfectionist. I never did anything wrong. I never had a speeding ticket. I never didn't stop and count for three seconds at a stop sign. And so I think I just saved all my stuff up for just one thing.
2:39Lindsey Schweigert:I mean, if you're going to go big, go big. I guess so.
2:45Lindsey Schweigert:Toby Dorr was born in 1957. She got married when she was 20 and raised two boys. In 2004, she was working at a veterinarian's office in Kansas City. She answered the phones and scheduled appointments, helped get the animals ready for procedures. She says she's always loved animals. One day, she noticed a lump on the side of her neck. She asked the veterinarian at the office to have a look at it. And she said, you need to go to a doctor right now. And so I did. I made an appointment and they did a biopsy and discovered that it was thyroid cancer. And, you know, even though thyroid cancer is a very treatable cancer, still hearing your name after the word cancer is devastating.
3:36And it kind of causes you to stop and take stock of your life. And I realized that I could go at any minute. and I had not done anything that made my time here worthwhile. And so I realized I didn't want to, you know, leave this earth and not have done anything to have made it a better place because I was here. During her treatment, Toby didn't have much energy at all.
4:07Lindsey Schweigert:She says she could barely pick up a book. I mean, you were just like in this fog, like you were moving through 50 feet of water just to do anything. And so I spent most of my time in the recliner watching cell dogs on Animal Planet. What is cell dogs? I don't know the cell. Cell dogs was a program that ran on Animal Planet for a few years. And it was inside of a prison and they had dogs in there and the inmates were training them. And then they were taking them out for adoptions. And you like dogs. I love dogs. That's kind of an understatement. Yeah. and I thought that would be my dream. I could make a difference if I could do something like that.
4:49If I could start a prison dog program, I know I could change the world. And my husband said, that's just a ridiculous idea. That's only a TV show. They don't do that in real life.
5:02Lindsey Schweigert:So Toby did the closest thing she thought she could. She started taking home the stray dogs that were brought into the vet clinic where she worked. After training them, She'd find them a new home. And then she got a call. I mean, I had just started when someone from the Lansing Correctional Facility approached me and said, Toby, would you consider doing a prison dog program? And I was like, oh my gosh. I thought you'd never ask. Yes, that's right. I've been dreaming about that for months. And I had no idea how to build a prison dog program, but I just figured I knew dogs. I knew how to train dogs.
5:40I would just create it as I go. So I scrambled running around to animal shelters trying to find some dogs. And so on that Friday, which was actually Friday the 13th in August of 2004, I took seven dogs into the Lansing Correctional Facility, and the Safe Harbor Prison Dog Program was born.
6:00Lindsey Schweigert:So the idea here would be that the inmates at the Lansing Correctional Facility, you'd leave the dogs with the inmates and they would do the training. How would it work? Well, it was really important to me that my dogs live in the same cell with their handlers because to me that was more of a home environment and I didn't want them to get used to this artificial kennel environment when I was trying to adopt them into homes and I wanted them to fit into the homes. So we put the dogs right in the cells with the inmates. They slept in the beds with the inmates. And anybody who was an inmate at the prison was free to pet a dog.
6:46Lindsey Schweigert:Toby quit her job at the vet clinic because she didn't have time for anything but the prison dog program. She had a barn on her property that she filled with dog kennels. She got up at 5 each morning and spent 15 hours a day shuttling the dogs to the vet and the animal shelter and the prison, teaching the inmates to train the dogs. So you interacted a lot with these inmates. This wasn't just dropping the dog off and then I'll pick it back up in a few months. That's right. I spent a lot of time. I probably spent maybe as much time inside the prison as an officer that was on duty. It became my entire life.
7:24Lindsey Schweigert:What did your family and friends think about this program, your husband? Well, my husband never was much on board with the program. and he didn't like as much time as I spent with it, and he didn't like the notoriety that it brought. So my husband resented it, but, you know, we didn't have a good marriage. And it was just one more way that I did my own thing and he did his own thing. I never did come home and talk to him about anything that was going on because he wasn't interested in it. How long had you been married? We'd been married for 28 years. So we met when I was 15 and he was 16. And we started dating in high school.
8:10And I never really dated anyone else. So we got married when we were 20. We got along. We didn't fight. And, you know, so we might as well get married kind of a thing. And there were several times in our marriage that I realized this wasn't, this had not been a good choice, but I didn't know how to get out. I didn't know how to make a change. So, I mean, one of the instances is we had just been married maybe two or three months, and my husband was gone every weekend to play golf with his friends, and he'd be gone for eight or nine hours a day. And I was really lonely because I was the oldest of seven kids, and I was used to a house that was just bubbling full of things and conversations and, you know, so many activities going on.
9:05And now I was sitting at home alone on Saturday for most of the day while my husband went and played golf. And I felt so lonely. So I made some phone calls and found out where I could take some golf lessons. And when my husband got home on this particular Saturday, I said, guess what? I found a place that I can take golf lessons. And he said, well, Toby, if you want to take golf lessons, the first thing you should do so that you don't waste your money is to find someone to golf with because it's no fun golfing by yourself. And I said, well, I thought I would golf with you. And he said, no, I golf with my friends.
9:51Lindsey Schweigert:So you were lonely and you figured out a way to, and these dogs certainly seem like. Oh man, those dogs loved me, you know, and those dog handlers loved me. How did you meet John Maynard? Well, so I was walking into the prison and I was walking across the prison yard when John Maynard walked up to me, you know, and he just approached me so directly. and most inmates didn't do that. But he just kind of swaggered up and stopped right in front of me, and he stuck out his hand and he said, Hi, I'm John Maynard, and I want to be your next dog handler. You need me in your program, because I'm probably the best dog trainer you've ever met.
10:36And I was like, oh, okay.
10:39Lindsey Schweigert:Toby told him that he would first have to get approval from the warden, like all the other dog handlers. Two weeks later, John Maynard was standing at the gate waiting for her. And I started taking dogs out of the truck, and I would hand them off to dog handlers. And usually I would just hand a dog to the closest person, say, here's your dog, here's your dog, here's your dog. And everybody was thrilled to get whatever I gave them. But John Maynard took every single dog out of the truck, and he evaluated them. And he petted them, and he looked at them, and he ran his hands over their coat, and he walked them around on a leash.
11:15And then he said, I'll take this one. And that was the first time anybody had ever been that direct. And so I was amused by that, I suppose is a good word. What did he look like? John Maynard was about six foot four. And he had a really lanky build. And he had red hair, bright red hair. And he kind of swaggered everywhere he went in the prison, like he owned the place or he was in charge. and he just didn't conform like most of the inmates do. You knew that there was just something different about him.
11:52Lindsey Schweigert:John Maynard was serving a life sentence at Lansing for his involvement in a carjacking when he was 17. A man was shot and killed. John Maynard claimed that it was his accomplice who had fired the gun, not him. A witness supported John's version of events. But because he had been involved in committing the felony, he was convicted of first-degree murder. He'd been in prison for about 10 years when he met Toby. He was 27. She was 48. So there came a time when I was inside the prison when I heard some in—I mean, I would just walk around in the prison by myself, not accompanied by an officer at all.
12:40and I heard some inmates make some sexual comments, you know, kind of under their breath as I walked by and it made me a little bit nervous. I mean, I looked around and I realized, you know, this is a huge prison. There's a million, not a million, but it seemed like a million inmates in there and I was vulnerable. So, I shared with the warden's office that I wasn't comfortable just walking around inside there without an officer or without some protection. So they told me to always be sure I was in the accompaniment of one of my dog handlers because the dog handlers wouldn't let anyone say anything to me or, you know, accost me in any way.
13:28So just don't walk through the prison alone. Just make sure when you come to the gate, you meet up with one of your dog handlers and ask someone to walk with you the whole time. And so I did that for about a year, and it worked fine until one day I was walking with two of my dog handlers, and I came upon another dog handler who wanted his girlfriend to adopt his dog. And I ran into this inmate in the yard, and it had been about eight weeks since he'd asked me if he could adopt his dog. And I said to him, hey, when's your girlfriend going to pick up your dog? Because I've got a lot of dogs lined up waiting to come in here.
14:06and I need that space. And he got mad at me and he started screaming at me and he put his fists up and he was in my face and he was yelling at me and cussing at me and saying, you know, you let everybody else wait for their dogs. I don't know why you're being this way to me. And so I looked over at my two dog handlers for help and they were looking down at their feet because they didn't want to confront this guy. And I just knew I was going to get hit. And this guy outweighed me by 150 pounds and I didn't know what to do. And so then I looked past this guy who was confronting me and I saw John Maynard kind of swaggering across the yard and he walked up and I just heaved this sigh of relief because I knew now I was safe because nobody was going to mess with John Maynard.
14:57And Maynard just said to him, you know, go on back to your cell. Toby, let me walk you to the gate. And when I got outside the prison, I just fell apart. And I called my contact at the warden's office and said, I am never going back in that prison again. There is no way I will do this. This isn't safe. And I'll run the prison dog program, but I'm not going inside the prison. I'll run it from outside. So on Monday morning, this person, my contact in the warden's office called me back and said, now when you come up to the prison, you just page Maynard. And so I just when I got to the prison, I'd call and say, you know, Paige Maynard to the gate.
15:36And he'd come to the gate and meet me, and he'd walk me to every dog I needed to visit and, you know, stay there through my training sessions. And that was too much time to be spending together with John Maynard.
15:53Lindsey Schweigert:The warden at the prison has said that Toby didn't actually have an assigned escort, let alone an inmate. But she was allowed to wander around the prison alone. He later told a reporter that she'd been around so long and done so much, we just said, when you get here, you've got your ID, you can go do what you need to do. Toby says that each day she and John would meet at the gate. One morning, Toby arrived at the prison exhausted. She'd been at the hospital all night. Her father had had emergency surgery. And Maynard met me at the gate, and he said, Toby, what's wrong with you? I mean, something's going on in your life.
16:35I can see it. Which, you know, for one thing, that was really refreshing to me because nobody else noticed that I was upset. And he said, wasn't your husband there with you? And I said, well, no. He said, you know, there's no sense in both of us not getting a good night's sleep, so I'm just going to stay here, and you go on to the hospital. And, you know, Maynard just looked at me and he shook his head and he said, Why do you stay married to him? And that question, you know, you can't ever unhear that question. And so I started thinking, I don't have an answer for that question. I don't know. Why am I still married to him?
17:16And so, you know, it just kind of opened another door. Were you attracted to him? I was. I thought about him all the time.
17:26Lindsey Schweigert:You thought, well, if John Maynard was my husband, someone would have been sitting with me in the hospital that night. That's exactly right. And, you know, it was just kind of like pouring water on a dying plant to hear somebody notice that I was there and I had needs and I was important enough to notice when I wasn't feeling right.
17:55if I had met someone while I was pumping gas who flirted with me I would have immediately shut them down because I didn't want to get caught up in having an affair or something like that but when John flirted with me I didn't see the danger because he was behind bars this could never grow into an affair. This was a harmless thing, which seems kind of strange, but it felt like because he was in prison, it was so impossible that anything would develop that it was a little bit safer to let something get started.
18:36Lindsey Schweigert:And then it just... Then it just became bigger than anything you could contain. I'm Phoebe Judge. This is Criminal.
18:54He said to me once, if I wasn't in here, would you be with me? And I said, yes, I think I might. And that's when he told me that he loved me and he wanted to escape and be with me. And at first I said, I can't do that. and over time, you know, he just kept bringing it up and then I thought, okay, maybe I could do that. What did he say? He just said, you know, I just love the color of your eyes. It matches your hair so perfectly and you deserve someone who wants to make you the center of their world and that's what I would do and those kinds of things. I bet you hadn't heard that for a while. No, I don't know if I ever heard it.
19:46And then what did he say? And he said, oh, you know, he had some ideas. He said, I could put myself in a box and ship me out through UPS to somewhere, and you could just go pick up the box. And then he said, you know, when you come to do a dog adoption, I could hide in a dog crate.
20:08Lindsey Schweigert:I'm not trying to laugh, but I'm just trying to... Well, it is kind of funny, actually. They started putting together a plan. Toby says she took$40 ,000 out of her 401k to cover expenses. They needed a vehicle, but they couldn't use Toby's car or the prison dog van. So she bought an old truck for$5 ,000. And so I started thinking about where could I keep that truck? I obviously couldn't keep it at my house. And there was a new storage unit that opened, kind of between my house and the prison. and I went one day to look at it, and the guy said, well, we're just opening, so, you know, we don't have our security cameras set up yet.
20:54That won't be for a month or two, but, you know, once we get them up, this is how it's going to work. And so I thought, well, this could be the perfect place because there's no security cameras to see me come and go.
21:06Lindsey Schweigert:Meanwhile, John was working on his part of the escape, Figuring out how to fit himself into a dog crate, they decided that he would have to get himself into a cardboard box inside the dog crate so no one would spot him. The box couldn't be any taller than three feet or it wouldn't fit. John was six foot four. He tried a dozen different ways to try to fit in this box. And every time he'd try, the box would bust. so nothing worked and so he said one night he dreamed about how to fit in this box and so he got up and he tried it and it worked and somehow he pulled one leg over his head and one leg behind him and fit in this box and he told me that while he was in that box he was hyperventilating because he couldn't breathe there wasn't room enough to breathe very well.
22:06And so, you know, it was scary for him to be folded up into that box.
Read the full transcript
22:13Lindsey Schweigert:Well, so he put this box inside of the dog crate. Yes. And then he got inside the box, which is already inside the crate, and then closed the box and closed the door. Well, I think he would have had to tell someone to close the door if it wasn't closed, because I don't know how you could have closed the door yourself while you were in a box. I think he probably had a little help, don't you? Well, it wouldn't surprise me. And then, you know, the next time I come up, he said, you know, I figured out we do it this way. And finally, I said, you know, I think that could work. I think that might work.
22:48I think we could pull this off. And so to me, when I was talking to him about it, in some ways, it was kind of like a game, you know, to figure out what would work and what wouldn't. But then all of a sudden we had come up with a plan that was real enough that it was doable. And then, you know, all of a sudden we were setting a date. And it just seemed like overnight, okay, all of a sudden we have a plan.
23:18Lindsey Schweigert:I mean, I guess when the first option is shipping yourself out in a UPS box, actually the dog crate seems like pretty practical. Yes, it did. Toby says that John told her that he lost 25 pounds so he could fit in the box. They picked a day Toby was scheduled to be there to pick up dogs for adoption, February 12, 2006. It was a Sunday, and it would be cold. They figured most people would just want to stay inside. Fewer people to see Toby load the van. Toby had told prison officials that she needed to pick up some equipment she'd stored in a box in a spare dog crate. She and John arranged for the crate to be loaded onto a wagon and rolled out to the van.
24:09So the plan was I would get there and he would be down in the wagon at the adoption gate by 1030. I would pick up all the dogs for the adoption. I would pick up John Maynard and then we would leave. And I would take the dogs back to my house and leave them in the barn. And then we would head to the storage unit and get the truck. What was the night before the escape like? Well, the night before the escape was so tense. There was so much riding on. Every single thing falling into place the next morning. And I did a prison dog newsletter every week for the prison dog program. and I emailed it out and it went to thousands of people all across the country.
24:56And I felt so compelled to finish that task. You know, the escape was on a Sunday and Sunday's the day I sent out the newsletter. So I stayed up late on Saturday night writing the newsletter for that week. And I sent that newsletter out. So I didn't finish that job till after midnight that night. and my husband went up to bed. He said, well, I'm going to go to bed. And he walked up the stairs to go to bed and I looked up at him and I said, goodbye. And I thought, oh crap, I said goodbye. He's going to pick up on that. He's going to ask me, why would I say goodbye? He's just going to bed. I should have said goodnight, but I said goodbye.
25:41And he never said anything and he just went up and went to bed. And then I thought, okay, I'm doing the right thing then. You know, I can't believe he didn't notice that slip of tongue. That was all you said to him. That's all I said. Goodbye. Yeah. Then I got up the next morning and it was snowing and the van was, you know, sliding on the snow. And on any other normal day, I would have canceled the adoption event because it wasn't worth getting out in that weather. But I couldn't cancel this adoption. So I got there early because I was nervous and I, you know, I didn't know what else to do. So I got there early and my dog handlers were all lined up behind the fence with their dogs.
26:34And it was a cold day. The wind was blowing. Nobody wanted to be outside. and they were standing behind the fence with their dogs and they were kind of stomping their feet and, you know, looking at the gate and waving at me to like, hurry up, open the gate and get these dogs and let us go back to our rooms and be warm. But I couldn't open the gate until I saw the farm wagon there because if I loaded all the dogs and then we just brought the farm wagon, you know, it would be under more scrutiny because it would be the only thing happening. And we kind of needed to have the chaos of all the dogs getting loaded in crates and jumping around and barking and and then this crate getting loaded in at the same time.
27:19Well, I'm waiting there and I'm thinking, where is that farm wagon? You know, why isn't it here? Why is he late? He knew how important this timing was. And and I had just about decided that I was just going to open the gate and load the dogs and I was going to leave and go to this dog adoption. And he was on his own. Whatever was going to happen, you know, he was going to deal with it because I couldn't wait anymore. And just as I thought that, I looked up and that farm wagon came around the corner. And when I saw it, I gasped out loud because the weight on it was so heavy that the tires were nearly flat.
27:57and I thought how does no one not notice that I mean a couple of dog dishes and some leashes aren't gonna make enough weight to make those tires flat like that but nobody noticed nobody said anything so I opened the gate told the inmates to start putting their dogs in their crates and I went around and open the side door of the van and two or three guys had pulled the wagon down and they picked up the crate and slid it in, and I shut the side door. I walked around to the back of the van and made sure that all the dogs were in their crates, and the crate doors were shut, and I closed the back doors to the van, and I took the adoption papers from the handlers, and I got in the truck, and I left.
28:41Lindsey Schweigert:Was there any point that you thought, I don't want to do this. I'm not doing this. Well, I was thinking that when I had decided I I was just going to go ahead and go without picking up John, you know, and tell him to open the gate and I'm just going to go. But then I saw the farm wagon and realized that it was too late to not go. So you drove away. And how long was it before John got out of the box? Well, I drove off the prison grounds and then I turned on to the city street and I said, you know, I hollered back. I said, John, are you here? And he didn't answer. And I thought, oh, good. This didn't work after all.
29:26You know, I can just still go to an adoption and I can just be a normal person. And so I started driving. And then when I got on the city street, all of a sudden, I, an arm popped out of that box and, and I heard him laughing and John Maynard popped out of that box and he said, drive drive
29:56Lindsey Schweigert:we'll be right back
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31:43Lindsey Schweigert:First, they took the dogs to Toby's barn, which she turned into a kennel. She says she knew a volunteer was scheduled to be there later that day. And then Toby drove to the storage unit. John took the keys to the truck. And he drove the truck out of the storage unit, and I backed the van into the storage unit, and we closed the storage unit door, and I got in the truck, and we left. They drove all night to get to a lakeside cabin in Tennessee that Toby had reserved under a made-up name. John hadn't been outside prison since he was 19. You know, John was really interested in eating fried chicken and a lot of foods that he wasn't able to get inside prison.
32:29And, you know, he played the guitar, and I brought my mandolin with me, and so he'd play music, and we just talked a lot. and that lasted for a day or two. And then, you know, John said, you know, I don't want to just stay in this cabin. I want to go out and see things. Let's go do some stuff. And I thought, I told him, well, you told me we had to stay hidden. We couldn't be out doing things. And he said, well, nobody's going to find us. They aren't going to have any idea where we are. I want to go to Nashville. Let's go to Nashville and look at some guitars. And so after that first day, almost every day we went somewhere and did something, kind of like we were on vacation.
33:07Lindsey Schweigert:Were you happy? No, I can't say I was happy. I was scared. I was scared and maybe regretful is a word. You know, the first day in the truck, John took all the cash from me. And there was only one key to the truck, and he had the key to the truck. And then somewhere along the way, after we left the prison, he took my cell phone and threw it into a lake. So I didn't have a phone. I didn't have any cash. I didn't have a key. I didn't have any way to get anywhere on my own. And so I kind of felt like there was no escape from my escape. I felt like I was having to be careful of what I said or what I did and I just felt like it was a lot more volatile than I expected.
34:11Lindsey Schweigert:Sometimes I have these dreams at night where I've done something terrible, something really bad has happened and I think oh no, oh no, if only this could not be true. And then I wake up and I'm so happy. The happiest I ever in my life. It's like the difference for you though. Was it, were you, did you think when you went to bed sleeping, oh, everything's okay. And then you'd wake up and you'd realize, oh no, this, I actually went through with this. Yes, I did. And then I would think, Toby, it can't be as bad as you think. You know, there's some good things. You know, John bought you candy for Valentine's day.
34:48That's a good thing. Think about those things. Don't think about these times when he got mad. You know, just try to focus on the good things because this is where you are and you need to make it be a good thing because you don't have a way out.
35:04Lindsey Schweigert:One day, Toby and John put on some wigs and went to the mall in Chattanooga. They wanted to see a documentary about lions. John bought Toby a book at Barnes & Noble where the red fern grows. As they were walking out of the store, they walked past two police officers. They didn't draw attention to us, but they followed us. We got on the interstate to head back to the cabin. And as we drove up over this hill, I looked over to the right, and I saw all these cars stopped on the entrance ramp. And there were police cars there blocking the entrance ramp and not letting anyone come on the highway. and I was looking over there at it and thinking that is an unusual sight I have never seen anything like that before and I said I was still looking over at the ramp and I said to John there must be a big accident up ahead and they need to keep the highway cleared to take care of this accident and John said oh no Toby this is for us and I said what's for us and I turned around and looked out the front window, and the whole highway was filled with police cars.
36:17There was black and white cars, blue sheriff's cars, green cars, black SUVs, every kind of police car you've ever seen. There was just this mishmash of everything on the interstate in front of us, and they were all lined up in every lane, and they were driving really slow, and there had to been maybe 30 or 40 or 50 police cars.
36:41Lindsey Schweigert:What did you think? I thought, who do they think we are? That they need all this. You know, all they had to do is turn on their lights and we would have pulled over. And so John said to me, he said, Toby, you're in this too. You should have a say. What do you want me to do? And I said, well, John, if they turn on the lights and ask you to pull over, you have to pull over because that's the law. And he said, okay, then if that's what you want to do, that's what I'll do. And just then a police car went around us really fast and pulled in front of us and slammed on their brakes. And John got mad and he said, they're trying to kill us.
37:20I'm not stopping. I'm going to run until we run out of gas. And I looked over at the speedometer and I saw that we had three quarters of a tank of gas. And I thought to myself, I can't make it through three quarters of a tank of gas. And so John took off and he was driving like crazy. And he was squeezing between these police cars and squeezing around these semi trucks. And when John realized he couldn't move forward, he drove across the median and back into the southbound lanes. And the funny thing is we had all these sirens going and all this noise and John was talking the whole time and I couldn't hear one thing and it was like it was slow motion and there was no sound and then John pulled off the shoulder of the road onto the shoulder to pass the semi truck and then another car cut in front of him so he pulled off into the grass and when he pulled back up on the highway he lost control of the car and we sped across the interstate and hit a tree at 100 miles an hour head on and I was praying that God would just let me die in that wreck because I knew I couldn't deal with what was to come and I just wanted to be done and I didn't die I didn't even get hurt other than bruised so we crashed into this tree and the the steam's coming off the hood of the truck and and all these police cars are coming at us and men are running through the woods with machine guns and screaming at us, and John got out of the truck, and they arrested him right away.
39:02Lindsey Schweigert:Toby had a hard time getting out because her door was smashed. Once she did, she fell on the ground, and when she looked up, she remembers John trying to run around the truck to see her. He was handcuffed and dragging officers behind him. He said, Toby, Toby, Toby, are you okay? Are you okay? And I said, yes, I'm okay, I think. And that's the last thing I said to him.
39:32Lindsey Schweigert:We'll be right back.
39:51I've definitely already been here. Now, was it left, right, or right, left?
39:58Lindsey Schweigert:Well, maybe I'll cut a path out and find my way back later. But it wasn't like that. I filed a claim in under two minutes on the Geico app, and they handled it from there. It was taken care of almost as quickly as it happened. It feels good to get help quick. It feels good to Geico. Support for this show comes from CoreWeave. Everywhere you look, AI is expanding what we thought was possible. and at the center of it all is CoreWeave. Medical research and diagnosis, education, complex visual effects for movies, science and technology breakthroughs. CoreWeave powers AI pioneers around the world with purpose-built tech, building what's never been built before.
40:36Lindsey Schweigert:CoreWeave is the essential cloud for AI. Ready for anything, ready for AI. To learn more about how CoreWeave powers the world's best AI, go to coreweave.com slash ready for anything.
40:52Lindsey Schweigert:John Maynard was already in prison with a life sentence. A judge added 10 more years for the escape. Toby was sentenced to 27 months in prison. I was charged with aiding and abetting a felon, taking contraband into the prison, and then I was also charged with a federal charge of providing handguns to a felon. Did you? Well, yes, there were handguns in our house, and I made them available to John, and I pled guilty for, you know, John told me that we'd be carrying a lot of cash, and somebody would want to take it from us. And if we just had a gun with us, that all he'd have to do is show the gun, and people would leave us alone.
41:41Lindsey Schweigert:She told us it was a dumb move in the middle of a bunch of other dumb moves. She found out later that the reason the police knew they were in Tennessee was because she'd had the registration for the truck mailed to the cabin. She says she, quote, wasn't a great criminal. How did your family react? Well, my family, you know, my mom, it was awesome. My mom loved me unconditionally. She came to visit me in prison every week, every chance she could get. My dad died about three or four weeks after we were arrested. So he came to the jail and saw me a couple of times, but he passed away. And my sisters and I have not been able to reestablish our relationship.
42:36And my sons and I never did reconnect and have a relationship either. How old were your sons? My sons were 25 and 21.
42:48Lindsey Schweigert:That's horrible. It's terrible. It was hard. Toby and her husband hardly spoke at all. He filed for divorce the day before she went to prison. What was it like to be in prison? You know, I was terrified of going to prison. I had spent a lot of time inside the men's prison, and I knew how violent it could be. But I discovered that a women's prison is a lot different than the men's prison, and it isn't nearly as violent. It's more like a high school drama on steroids. But there were times inside prison where I found relationships with some of the other women inmates to be the strongest relationships I've ever had in my life.
43:33You know, people that really cared about what happened to you and wanted to help you in any way they could. And I think it was inside prison where I learned that what a true friendship could look like.
43:48Lindsey Schweigert:You weren't lonely when you were in prison. I wasn't. No, I wasn't. After she was released from prison, Toby went to live with her mother back in Kansas City. But everyone in town knew what she'd done. She said that other people pointed at her in restaurants. So she found a job in Boston and moved there. And it was there that she met her future husband, Chris. They'd only known each other a week when Chris found out that a friend of his was in jail. And he said he was going to write a letter to him in the jail. And I said to him, well, you need to know his inmate number or the letter won't get to him.
44:30And he looked at me and he said, how would you know you need to know the inmate number? And I said, well, I just do. And so he went home that night and Googled me, and he came in the next day and he said, we need to talk. I want to hear your whole story. And so, you know, almost from the start, he knew my story.
44:53Lindsey Schweigert:Three years after Toby got out of prison, she says she started talking to John Maynard again. She and Chris even sent him Christmas baskets and visited him once. She says she wanted closure and that she felt sorry for him. Eventually, they talked less and less. Did he apologize? No, I don't believe that he did. I've thought about that, and I don't think he did. You know, I think what he said was, you knew what you were getting into. which I don't really think I did know, but no, he didn't apologize. I mean, this is the question. Did this guy care for you, or was he just using you? What do you think?
45:45You know, honestly, I think it's probably a little bit of both. I do think he cared for me, but I've since come to appreciate that if you love someone, you don't ask them to do something that puts their life in danger.
46:01Lindsey Schweigert:After his arrest, John Maynard wrote a letter to the Kansas City Star. He said, I love Toby and was 100 % committed to her. Why did I stay with her once I was out if I was just manipulating? I love Toby with all that I was. In her last few months in prison, Toby wrote an apology letter to the former warden of Lansing Prison. She didn't expect to reply, but he wrote back just a few weeks later. He said, I felt a lot of different emotions, but anger and resentment were not among them. Initially, it was fear for your safety, then more a sense of frustration, and to be completely honest, some feelings of betrayal.
46:49Lindsey Schweigert:I do, however, still believe you to be a decent, kind, and caring person who made some bad decisions for reasons that are beyond my knowledge. You know, sometimes we hear about people fantasizing about blowing up their lives or thinking about blowing up their lives. You really did it. I did it. You're right. I certainly did. There is no doubt of that. It's the craziest story I've ever heard, and to think that I lived it is kind of hard to grasp sometimes. But it happened. You know, it's real. The dog lady of Lansing Prison is you. That's me. That's right.
47:46Lindsey Schweigert:This episode was first released in 2019, and after it came out, a few of you wrote us to ask what happened to the dogs that Toby put in her barn during the escape. Toby told us they were all later adopted. Toby Dorr wrote a book about her story in 2022. It's called Living with Conviction. All this month, we've been bringing you some of the most popular episodes of Criminal as we celebrate the show's 10-year anniversary with our live tour. Next week, we're back from the tour with brand new episodes. Criminal is created by Lauren Spohr and me. Nadia Wilson is our senior producer. Katie Bishop is our supervising producer.
48:29Lindsey Schweigert:Our producers are Susanna Robertson, Jackie Cicicco, Lily Clark, Lena Sillison, Sam Kim, and Megan Kinane. Special thanks to Rob Byers and Courtney Rigdon. This episode was mixed by Veronica Simonetti. Engineering by Russ Henry. Julian Alexander makes original illustrations for each episode of Criminal. You can see them at thisiscriminal.com. And you can sign up for our newsletter at thisiscriminal.com slash newsletter. If you like the show, tell a friend or leave us a review. It means a lot. We hope you'll join our new membership program, Criminal Plus. Once you sign up, you can listen to Criminal episodes without any ads and get a bonus episode each month.
49:14Lindsey Schweigert:To learn more, go to thisiscriminal.com slash plus. That's thisiscriminal.com slash plus. We're on Facebook and Twitter at Criminal Show and Instagram at criminal underscore podcast. We're also on YouTube at youtube.com slash criminal podcast. Criminal is part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Discover more great shows at podcast.voxmedia.com. I'm Phoebe Judge. This is Criminal.
49:52Lindsey Schweigert:Support for this show comes from Odoo. Running a business is hard enough, so why make it harder with a dozen different apps that don't talk to each other? introducing Odoo it's the only business software you'll ever need it's an all-in-one fully integrated platform that makes your work easier CRM, accounting, inventory, e-commerce and more and the best part Odoo replaces multiple expensive platforms for a fraction of the cost that's why over thousands of businesses have made the switch so why not you? try Odoo for free at odoo.com that's O-D-O-O dot com
50:33Lindsey Schweigert:Support for the show comes from Retool. Too many companies run critical operations on duct tape spreadsheets, Slack workflows, and whatever else they could cobble together. Not because they want to, but because building internal tools means weeks of waiting on someone else's backlog. That's where Retool comes in. Build custom internal tools just by describing what you need. Prompt something like, build me a revenue dashboard on our Salesforce data, and Retool actually builds it on your company's data in your cloud with enterprise security built in. Go to retool.com slash Vox. We all need to retool how we build software.
From the publisher
One day in 2011, Lindsey Schweigert’s roommate came home to an open garage, a missing dog, and an overflowing bathtub. Lindsey remembers waking up in police custody.
Ramya Nagesh is the author of A Practical Guide to Insane and Non-Insane Automatism in Criminal Law – Sleepwalking, Blackouts, Hypoglycaemia, and Other Issues.
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