September 26, 2019 • 43 mins
Playboy magazine once called Paladin Press “the most dangerous publisher in America.” But the real-life story of the non-fiction press, and the two Vietnam vets who founded it, is stranger than fiction.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, listeners, just a heads up. This is a long
one because we're giving you two episodes in one this week,
so listen for parts one and two. In our very
first episode, I said that I hadn't been able to
get anyone from Paladin to talk to me. We've tried
a lot of former employees and authors, and everybody seemed hesitant.
But over the last two weeks we got some replies.
(00:23):
My name is David du Bro. I worked for Paladin
Press between and two thousand and ten. David grew up
in a suburb outside Philadelphia. A few years after he
graduated from college, he was working in a supermarket and
he needed a change. At the time, I was very
much into fantasy role playing games like Dungeons and Dragons,
that kind of thing. Not necessarily D and D, but
(00:44):
you know, fantasy role playing text based over the internet
called a telnut protocol. He made some friends through this
online game called Amber. They invited him out to Colorado,
and he figured, what the hell, Okay, I'm going to
drive out there and I'm gonna see if I can
make my life out in Colorado. At the time, there
was no monster, there was no linked in, so you
(01:07):
went looking for a real job through the one edge
of the paper. I know it sounds kind of ancient,
but that was what we did. David answered a nondescript
ad for an entry level customer service gig and got
an interview, and that company was paled and press. It
was very kind of secretive, is very kind of hush
hash I didn't know at the time what I was
getting into. So far in this podcast, we've spent a
(01:33):
lot of time on the triple murder for higher case
of Millie and Trevor Horn and Janice Saunders. When we
last left you, Lawrence Horn and James Perry were both
found guilty of murder and conspiracy to commit murder. So
the two men responsible for this crime would be paying
for it for the rest of their lives. Meanwhile, the
media couldn't stop talking about hit Man. Grew some triple
(01:55):
murder shocked the Washington, D C. Area. Today, it has
become the subject of a First Amendment fight over a
how to book. The killer apparently went by the book
This book, hit Man, a technical manual for independent contractor.
It's a very compelling correlation between the way these murders
were carried out and the suggestions in the book. Now
family members want the Murder Manuals publisher to pay. All
(02:19):
that attention introduced a lot of people to Paladin and
its enigmatic owner, Paider Lund. So I go out there
and I do this interview, and the owner of the
company he's there. He's he's wearing these like short pants
and his polo shirt, and he's got a handgun on
the desk. What's funny is that on this upper middle
(02:41):
class Jewish kid from Philly, things like self defense and
martial arts and knife fighting, they're they're not relevant to
my life experience, like guns or what other people do. Still,
he was intrigued, and they showed me a catalog and
they said, all right, well, why don't you take a
look at it and then tomorrow, UM, we'll call you
back if you're still interested. And I did, and I
was like, this is neat stuff. I mean, you know,
(03:03):
I'm a young man. I could either do customer service
for a company that publishes these kinds of books and videos,
or I could be you know, the executive assistant of
you know, the Boulder Philharmonic orchestra conductor. I'm like, all right,
there's no real competition here, So I started that next week.
David says the company wasn't quite what you'd expect from
(03:25):
the content. Peter was very adamant about not hiring a
bunch of Cammi clad wackos, which is, you know how
we kind of called it. There was at least as
many women as men who worked for Paladin Press. The
vast majority of the people worked for Palden didn't have
a real interest in the subject matter, which was kind
of interesting sometimes to work around. But it was amazingly
(03:46):
prosaic how boring the office work was. It wasn't like
everybody was walking around with a R fifteen slung over
his back, that kind of thing. A Washington Post article
from the year David was high described Lund sitting in
a modest office at an old wooden desk, with his
green beret tacked to the wall, piles of manuscripts everywhere.
(04:08):
Peter wasn't a big guy either, but he had this
fierce face, heard these eyebrows, and if he was mad
with you, you would know it. I never played poker
with him, but I imagine I would probably be able
to beat him a few times, just because he wouldn't
keep it off his face. Lund wore reading glasses in
knee high socks. He'd spent half the year residing in
a fourteenth century cottage in the Cotswolds, England, where he
(04:31):
hunted pheasant and trained a race horse named Miss Optimist.
Not exactly what I pictured. This was London his late fifties. Well,
Peter was an engaging fellow in terrorism expert Neil Livingstone
was a consultant for the ABC News show, and he
helped produce an episode about Lundon Palette and Press. He
(04:53):
and a crew flew to Boulder and spent the day
with lund in his office. I found Peter to be
pull eight, unassuming, unpretentious. He ran a very neat business,
very you know, it's very clean and very well organized
and so on. He described the things that he publishes
(05:15):
burning blow books, how to burn things down and blow
things up. He was rather un phased by the notion
that his books might be used by terrorists or killers.
He said that we don't tell people how to use
the information. Honestly, there's a lot we don't know about
(05:35):
paydirt class in Lundon. Even after all this time we
know he was born in nineteen two. Livingstone told us
he was born in South Africa, but he couldn't actually
remember if that was right. He was married four times,
according to a Washington Post article, and didn't have any kids.
His military records are impressive. He served in the U. S.
Army from nineteen sixty four to nineteen sixty eight and
(05:58):
then in the Army Reserve for two more years. He
was recognized as an expert gunner and a sharpshooter, and
he was a decorated veteran, having received the National Defense
Service Medal, Vietnam Service Medal, Purple Heart, Parachute Badge, and
the Bronze Star, among others. And he was quoted in
a Soldier of Fortune magazine article as saying he was
an infantry platoon leader and rose to be commander of
(06:20):
a Special Forces A team and was in charge of
stopping North Vietnamese supply roots. And that's about all we have,
at least about his life before Paladin Lund called himself
a classic individualist, and he really was. You know, he's
wearing his shorts and his polo shirt. He's got this
revolver on his on his desk, you know, and it's like,
(06:43):
this is the closest I've ever been to a handgun
that hasn't been inside a police officers holster. And and
the thing is, he always had a handgun on a
desk until we changed, you know, cleaning services, and then
it became kind of an issue. But he had a
very strong feeling about the First Amendment and how inviolate
it was. I mean, he was you know, he was
who he was, and if he didn't like him, you
(07:04):
could eatch it and die. I'm Jasmine Morris from My
Heart Radio and Hit Home Media. This is hit many.
(07:44):
You know. It was early days of internet when I started.
At the time, we got to order through the mail
and via telephone. Mostly through the mail, we would send
out catalogs for free to anybody. We got plenty of
requests for catalogs from people who were in prison. You know.
I guess it was kind of like a jerk off
magazine for for violence instead of porn, you know. But um,
(08:06):
it just had the products and the covers and stuff.
You didn't have any real content to speak of. Playboy
Magazine once called Paladin quote the most dangerous publisher in America,
and it was a nickname that stuck. It does make
a good kind of tagline, right, that's something that you
can use to impress people who were impressed by that.
(08:28):
You know, we didn't call ourselves the most dangerous publisher
in America. We called ourselves the Action Library, and I
think that was a term of art that Peter created,
and that's what it was about. It was about, you know,
action versus danger, which is different. There's a value judgment
and danger when you think about it. Okay, what does
that mean? Dangerous? Publisher? Information isn't dangerous. That's what you
(08:48):
do with it, that's dangerous. Paladin Press was just the
small independent publisher serving a niche audience in a liberal
college town in Colorado, but it would become so influential
in ways that most independent publishers never could and never
would dream of. Unfortunately, Peter Lund died in two thousand seventeen,
(09:09):
so we can't hear from him directly. One person we
reached out to for more insight into Lund's life insisted
that we talked to Robert K. Brown, the publisher of
the Mercenary magazine Soldier of Fortune, who he said, new
Lund better than most. The next day, we got a
call from a Boulder, Colorado phone number and a gruff
but friendly voice on the other end introduced himself is
(09:31):
Bob Brown. Brown is eighty six now. He's sharp, very polite,
and he refers to get straight to the point. He
heard we were doing a story on Paladin and Lund
and he was calling us back because his friend said
we were good people. The call was quick. Brown is
quite hard of hearing, so phone calls are difficult these days,
and he respectfully declined to be interviewed, but he offered
(09:53):
to email us some information on Paladin and Lund and
with an okay, Darlin, the call was over. The two
men met back in the early nineteen sixties. Brown was
about ten years older than Lundon, but they both had
military backgrounds and were attracted to the idea of mercenary
work fighting communism in foreign countries. Most of the time.
(10:13):
Brown mentions lund in his memoir I Am Soldier of Fortune,
it's about these near misses adventures they almost had. There
was the plot to invade Cuba and rescue some refugees
that was back in Miami in nineteen sixty three, But
it plays like a Looney Tunes adventure where their boat
gets stuck in the mud. They didn't pack enough food
and the guns didn't show up. In time, there was
(10:35):
a treasure hunt in Papua New Guinea, gold supposedly hidden
by a crooked priest. The time they tried to parachute
into Peru to deliver aid to a secluded mountain village
buried by a landslide. Brown actually laid the groundwork for
Paladin himself in nineteen sixty three, the same year he
tried to invade Cuba with one. First of all, what
(10:57):
was Paladin Pressed? This was a book company that put
out books for soldiers, put up books on how to
build bombs. Here's Brown on a Colorado public affairs show.
And it was also not very popular, definitely not well.
It was an offshoot of a publishing company I started
way back in nineteen sixty three when I published a
book called A hundred and fifty Questions for Guerrilla. Back then,
(11:21):
Brown called his publishing house Panther Publications. Paladin's website once
said this early work really set the tone for the
publisher's future. Quote it would be first to print books
about controversial or suppressed subjects, and it would also be
criticized for publishing works that some people found objectionable. Brown
(11:42):
is an adventurous and charismatic Vietnam vet with a colorful
military history. We found him on the Army Register from
nine and in various interviews and in his memoir I
Am Soldier of Fortune, Brown talks about serving in the
Army in the fifties and eventually rising to lieutenant colonel
and intelligence. He says he was also kicked out of
(12:03):
the Special Forces twice. He debbled in journalism, picking up
freelance assignments for the Associated Press, and he once told
a reporter that he planned to in script his tombstone
with his motto, slay dragons, do noble deeds, and never never, never,
never give up. When Brown first started Panther Publications, he
(12:25):
was mostly publishing military manuals like the Special Forces Handbook.
They were publishing military manuals because they weren't classified, they
had free material to use. That's Michigan State professor and Larabee,
an expert on bomb making manuals. There's an Army manual
called booby Traps, for example, that really dangerous stuff comes
from directly reprinted army manuals. Or they would somehow take
(12:51):
them and rearrange them and cabled them together in some
way to form new versions of these manuals, Mom has better.
They become a fight on too primas well. It was
definitely a very unsettled time in the culture Vietnam vets.
When they came home, they were not exactly welcomed with
open arms. Paladin has always been pretty ZEITGEISTI One fifty
(13:14):
Questions for a Gorilla by Alberto Bio, who was credited
with training Fidel Castro's fighters, came out just after the
Cuban Missile crisis. They were putting out military manuals during
the Vietnam War. A lot of the interest in these
kinds of manuals is attached in various ways to veterans
who had military experience, who also had read military manuals,
(13:38):
and who brought them home, and they maintained a continued
interest in this kind of military identity. Brown identified a
niche an audience saw them clearly because he was one
of these guys, and then he made and marketed things
for them. Here's how Anne Larabee describes the appeal of
(13:58):
these books. It's a kind of Maverick masculinity. Um. You
can see it in a lot of the Paladin books.
For example, there's a certain kind of masculine identity that
keeps being repeated, and it's this this guy who he's
not beholden to anyone um, He's not beholden to any
nation or any state, or any set of ideas. He's
(14:19):
this maverick who can take care of himself and who
has the violent means to defend himself. But eventually that
tight core audience of disaffected Vietnam vets gave away to
something else, may be less authentic. Again, here's David Dubro.
Most people they buy this stuff, they read it, and
they never do anything about it. They never actually do it.
(14:40):
They just wanted the knowledge. They just wanted to have
the thing and be cool and to know that, hey man,
I've got this information now and it's maybe counterculture and
I can pretend to be a badass. It doesn't mean
that they weren't band asses. I don't know. But the
point is, you know, most people, the vast majority of them,
just didn't practice it. And nine using the name Panther
(15:02):
became a major liability. Two members of the Black Panthers
were convicted and sentenced to life in prison for the
murder of a Nebraska police officer who died opening a
suitcase filled with homemade explosives. Others had been arrested for
planning to bomb department stores, including the Macy's in Midtown Manhattan.
And how were the Panthers learning to make bombs and
(15:22):
wage guerilla warfare? Well, some of their underground publications were
directing subscribers to check out a printing house Panther Publications
Congress noticed in the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, led
by Arkansas Senator John L. McClellan summoned owner Robert K.
Brown to testify. Here's Anne Larabee again. It's kind of
(15:45):
an entertaining mistake that they thought that Robert K. Brown
was a Black Panther, that he had named Panther Publications
after the Black Panthers because that's where they were really after.
We couldn't get the audio of this because it's still
on reel to real, So I'm going to read the
senator's questions, and I asked my husband to read Robert K.
Brown's parts. Senator McClellan began the questioning, do you feel
(16:09):
that by this kind of activity you're contributing to the
violence that is occurring in this country and a building
up of a guerrilla movement in America, no more than
General Motors in respect, possibly to the Black Panthers driving
a General Motors car to conduct a bombing. People advertise
weapons for sale too, but they don't advertise that it
is to be used for murdering people. McClellan looked closely.
(16:30):
In one of Brown's book ads. This says grilla warfare.
It says that is the purpose of it. What other
purpose do you advertise it for? If you did not
say guerrilla warfare and the documents you sent out simply
because we describe guerrilla warfare does not mean that we
are promoting guerrilla warfare within the United States. Sir, By
this kind of publication, you are, in a sense advocating
(16:52):
and encourage guerrilla warfare in the United States. I disagree
with you. I am not encouraging it. You do so
by making available the things that are needed to carry
it out successfully. The book itself does not pick up
a gun, Senator. We'll be right back. After the Senate inquiry,
(17:28):
Panther publications became palid and press. Brown didn't want any
more government types confusing him with the Black Panthers, and
his old friend Peter Lund joined the company as co owner.
In an interview on a Colorado public affairs show, Robert K.
Brown put it this way. I got together with Peter Lund.
He had money, I had none. We put the company
(17:49):
together with his input acation that started palid and Press.
That happened in seventy. Then I sold my interest out
in nineteen seventy. By the time and officially joined Paladin
in nineteen seventy, the FBI had begun investigating how they
came to publish these official military technical manuals. But they
quickly realized these manuals were in the public domain again,
(18:13):
and Larabie the Army tried to pull them back. It
reclassified some of its manuals, and it also wrote to
libraries and he asked them to send back their copies
of things like booby traps and other kinds of manuals.
They tried to haul them back, but it was too late.
They were already well seated out there through these paramilitary publishers.
(18:34):
In addition to asking for these manuals back, officials approached
libraries and asked to see a log of everyone who
had checked out one of these books. The librarians were
up in arms because they really saw it as an
assault on the right to read. And because these books
weren't classified, the libraries owned them. They really took offense
at the Treasury Department coming out and putting them under
(18:57):
some kind of surveillance. The American Library Association took a
very significant stand against government interference in people's right to read.
That was their platform. Here's a moment where Paladin really
does seem like it's fighting the good fight for the
First Amendment, which protects a lot of the freedoms that
(19:17):
have really come to be associated with what America means.
Freedom of religion, the right to peaceably assemble and protest,
and most importantly for our story, the right to free
speech and a free press. It was a platform that
would also serve Paladin Press for decades. Brown and Lunde
ran Paladin together for four years until Brown got itchy feet.
(19:40):
That's how he puts it in his book. He sold
his stake in Paladin Press to lund for just fifteen
thousand dollars and returned to mercenary work, this time in Rhodesia.
Again from his memoir quote, all sorts of adventurers, ne'er
do wells, and fugitives from all over the world were
headed for the land of high a guns. Some intend
(20:02):
on fighting the communist back terrorists, and others just to
kick some butt. Not long after he founded Soldier of Fortune,
that magazine would advertise for Paladin. They advertised the hit
Man Book too, which is actually how detectives believed James
Perry discovered it. Referred to as the Journal of Professional Adventurers,
(20:26):
the monthly magazine published stories of mercenaries fighting wars all
over the world and quickly gained a following. In an
interview with news Max Brown explains what set the reporting
in his magazine apart. Some journalists did appreciate what we
were doing in the quality of journalism we were coming
up with, but certainly the fact that we were involved
(20:46):
in training various and sundry groups, the one that comes
with the mind, of course of the countryes in Central
America and also in El Salvador. Most journalists took exception
of fact that we carried guns everywhere. When and if
we get fired upon, we and uh fuck her back.
That being said, Uh, we really didn't give a who
(21:10):
what the other journalist said, and he was say none,
I'm ever want to challenge us physically in the back
of the magazine. There were also classified ads for things
like ninja lessons, gun silencers, and job ads for guns
for hire. In a man would answer an ad and
Soldier of Fortune to hire a guy to kill his wife.
(21:33):
A jury in a wrongful death lawsuit found the magazine negligent,
although a circuit court of appeals later reversed the verdict.
That same year, four hitmen, also advertising and Soldier of
Fortune killed a man named Richard Braun. Again, a jury
found the magazine negligent and the case was settled out
(21:53):
of court. And shortly after that and Arkansas man suffered
injuries when he was attacked by two men, one who
had advertised in the magazine. When the judge suggested the
magazine ad was not protected under the First Amendment, Brown
settled so in Soldier of Fortune stopped publishing ads for
(22:13):
hired guns, though Brown never claimed personal responsibility for the deaths,
telling the New York Times, I feel I should be
no more concerned about that than the auto dealer who
sells a car that runs somebody down. Peter Lund had
(22:34):
the same view, and while Brown stopped publishing some controversial content,
Lund started publishing it under his helm Paladin actually expanded
way beyond official military manuals and guerrilla warfare books about revenge, mayhem, explosives, survivalism,
and contract killing. Just to be clear, Palat and Press
(22:55):
published books and videos on a wide variety of topics.
One Palatin author described it as ranging from outlandish to legitimate. Training.
By the early nineties, Paladin went mainstream. By then, the
book The Ultimate Sniper was considered an authority and was
required reading for professional snipers and training with law enforcement
(23:15):
in the military. Bob Dole wrote the foreword to a
Paladin book about skiing, and the humorous book Get Even
The Complete Book of Dirty Tricks sat on shelves at
Barnes and Noble. The company was offering seven D print
titles and selling as many as three D fifty thousand
books a year. Lund was employing more than people, and
(23:37):
Paladin was a place where you can move up if
you had the right work ethic and if the boss
liked you. And David was often one of the first
to arrive at the office. You know, I would get
in there and then like Pater's already, He's in that
upstairs office kitchen, you know, frying up pork chops at
five five in the morning, and you know, the joke was,
I mean, like, you haven't lived until, you know, had
(23:59):
pork chops with pay here at five in the morning.
He just loved meat man. He ate a lot of meat.
David was eventually promoted to manager of Paladin's video production department.
Peter was not a guy who gives ada boys. Peter
was a kind of boss who said, black man, you're
doing good. You know you're doing good because I haven't
shake hand you. He preferred to let people do what
(24:20):
they were supposed to do, and then he would do
what he had to do. Lund treated his employees well.
He paid benefits, He threw big Christmas parties, He allowed
employees to take hiking breaks midday, and every other year
he took his workers and their spouses on a retreat
to Mexico. Turnover was low, though we won't get into
it here, it's worth noting that in two thousand seven
(24:41):
Lundon was sued for sexual harassment. It apparently came out
in testimony that lund regularly walked around the office wearing
nothing but a towel, He made unwelcome sexual advances to
female employees, and once while handing out annual bonuses, asked
the women in the office to give him a kiss
before handing the checks. Anyway, David eventually became an author himself.
(25:05):
The first book I ever wrote was a book for
Paladin Press, and it was called The Ultimate Guide to
Surviving a Zombie Apocalypse. Zombies were becoming a big thing,
and I'm like, you know something that the Paladin audience.
I bet there are a bunch of people who are
interested in zombies too, So how do I write a
Paladin book about this kind of subject? Paladin's website once
said quote Lunch seeks out authors who are knowledgeable in
(25:28):
their fields and encourages them to write for his audience.
By publishing books no other publisher will touch, and encouraging
authors to tell their own stories, he has earned their
loyalty and assured their success. Many authors have established themselves
as experts in certain areas, so even when it came
to killing zombies, this had to be expert zombie killing.
(25:50):
What I did was I did research, I talked to people.
I I got information from the books and videos and
magazines that I've read, and I colliated it into this
book about how to Survive a zombie apocalypse. Taking survival
skills and handgun skills and knife fighting and everything else
and combining into this thing where okay, this is how
you get yourself out of this fictitious cham And like
(26:13):
some other Paladin authors, David took up a pseudonym F
Kim O'Neill Dave dubro. Video guy doesn't have credibility, whereas
of a made up, you know, army veteran who's actually
seen a real zombie. You know, he does have credibility.
I mean, he's right. But there was another reason some
authors did this. Every once in a while, a few
(26:33):
people wrote books under pseudonyms just because they didn't want
to get in trouble. In the Paladin catalog, there are
lots of macho sounding pen names like Ragnar Benson, George
Hayduke Rex Ferrell. I mean, like it or not, somebody
who hasn't thought about this kind of stuff, right, You say,
hey man, you know, they say, so what do you do?
And I say, well, you know, I worked for Paladin Press.
(26:54):
You know we're a publisher. Oh yeah, what do you publish?
You know, books, videos on Marshall, it self defense, that
kind of thing. Oh yeah, what kind of titles Oh well,
you know, like put them down, take them out, My
fighting secrets of fulsome prison. Oh my gosh, what are
you guys doing. I'm like, that's awful, that sounds terrible,
that's wrong with you. There are a bunch of people
were just going to be turned off by that and say,
(27:15):
you're the writer of a book like that, you know,
maybe it doesn't quite grease the social skids the way
you would think. All of this reminds me of that
correspondence I found from Rex Ferrell, something we haven't talked
about since the first episode. Quote, by the way, an
answer to your question and that of Mr Lund. I
get my materials from books, television, movies, newspapers, police officers,
(27:39):
my karate instructor, and a good friend who is an attorney. No,
I am not a hit man. I don't even own
a gun. But don't tell anybody. But even though some
of Paladin's authors weren't experts at all, sometimes the consequences
of sharing their expertise we're very real. We'll take another
(28:00):
look at Paladin in part two. Stay with us. These
are how to guide on how to do nothing more
than create violence, chaos, anti government, bigoted violence. They teach
(28:23):
you how to build bombs, they teach you how to
build guns. They provide you know, motivation and encouragement. That's
Vincent Suffalu, a retired special agent for the Bureau of Alcohol,
Tobacco and Firearms and the author of a book called
Rats Snakes about his career as an undercover officer. He
worked mob cases, drug trafficking, and contract killing. That's why
(28:47):
we called Vince in the first place. He actually posed
as a hit man many times, so he has a
unique view into this world. The people who who I've
approached in an undercovered capacity have come from every walk
of life. We asked him, who tries to hire hitman?
For the most part, I'm usually a little bit baffled
(29:07):
that the middle income soccer mom, or the local football coach,
or your regular neighbors um would even consider taking an
act like that. But yes, it's amazing how many people
I've talked to about murdering a loved one. It's it's
a little disturbing, needless to say. So when he says
(29:31):
he's seen a lot of Paladin books, including Hitman in
the Wrong Hands, I'm going to believe him. I've come
across the book in the hands of all types of gangsters,
subversive groups, why supremacist groups, biker groups, drug dealers, you know,
anti government, protest type groups. It's not something we would
(29:54):
necessarily look for, but it's something we would recognize immediately
upon executing a search warrant or being Say, if I
walked into an undercover environment working some sort of case
and somebody had that book and or the Anarchist Cookbook,
I'm I'm already drawing conclusions about this person that their
(30:16):
level of seriousness is a little bit higher than maybe
just bluster or you know, running their pie hole. We've
been narrowly focused on Hitman throughout this podcast because of
its linked to the Horn Perry murders, but the influence
(30:39):
of Paladin books in general is much much wider. Reminds
me of something I've said before. This isn't just one story,
it's fifty. Well. I created the fictional company Hawkeye Enterprises
in a separate town from the university town where I
was at the time, believing that was the kind of
(30:59):
name that would seem right up the alley of people
at Paladin or Soldier of Fortune and others whose mailing
lists I might get on criminologist Dr Park Deats has
spent more than a decade studying Paladin, Soldier of Fortune
and other publishers putting out similar books. It seemed to
me that it was wise if I was going to
(31:20):
be digging around in an arguably dangerous network of people,
to shield my family and friends from what I was
up to there. And I got on every wacky mailing
list you can imagine. Some of it was legitimate, but
some of it was also unlawful solicitations. For example, one
(31:41):
particular person who was well known in those circles had
a publication in which he was offering to sell mail
order cyanide. And this is in the wake of the
Thailand All tamperings, which in two became the second most
publicized crime in his tree. The Chicago Thaile and All murders,
(32:03):
as they became known, were a series of deaths caused
by product tampering when someone laced taile in all capsules
with potassium cyanide. Among those killed a twelve year old
girl and three people from the same family. The crime
sparked a number of copycat incidents and deeds. Was hired
by the Food and Drug Administration and the pharmaceutical industry
(32:25):
to investigate, and I looked for where someone could learn
to do such a crime and found the only source
for such information at the time to be Paladin Press
publications and publications by a handful of other publishers of
similar materials. He's referring to publishers like Loompanics and Delta Press,
(32:49):
though Paladin has been described as the principal publisher of
this kind of content. According to Deeds, the poor Man's
James Bond, published by Paladin, gives recipes for assium cyanide
and sodium cyanide. He believed that book and a couple
other Paladin titles had inspired the title and all killings.
(33:10):
The culprit was never found. Lund had a memorable response
to Dietza's findings that in the wrong hands, Paladin books
could be dangerous. He told author Eric Larson, quote, I
really can't be bothered by him. If you take two
(33:31):
hundred thousand people, you're gonna find two or three who
don't wear underwear, four or five who cultivate Bonsai trees,
six or eight who have shaved their heads. There's no
statistical validity to the man's conclusions. It's as if you
went to a party last night and met five people
who were divorced and decided the divorce rate had gone
up catastrophically. Here's Lund in a rare appearance he made
(33:54):
on sixty Minutes with Mike Wallace. Why do you publish
these things? It's market driven? My absolutely again, terrorism expert
Neil Livingstone, he had this very warped view that he
wasn't doing anything morally questionable. It was just business and
(34:19):
it was great that he can have such a business
in the United States. He wasn't there to decide who
could and could not buy his books. What you're saying is,
no matter what pain has caused, I'm a defender of
the First Amendment and my right to make money from
these books. I'm saying that ideas and knowledge don't kill people.
(34:41):
People kill people. We've been talking about how the content
in these books could have and have had consequences. But
what if this content wasn't allowed? What about those consequences.
We're talking about censorship and maybe your but Paladin, it's
(35:01):
such a fringe example. Well, the Freedom Forums National First
Amendment ombudsman Paul McMasters once said, that's where you fight
the First Amendment battles. You fight them on the fringes,
or you fight them on the frontiers, or the next
thing you know, you're fighting them on your front porch.
(35:25):
So for the most part, Paladin Press was safe. But
Livingstone also goes on to say this evidence of intent.
Later on, if someone carried out a crime. Is it
true that Timothy McVeigh ordered one of their books? I
think I read that somewhere. Yeah, he did, but he
would have found it totally useless. That's Tom Kelly, a
(35:46):
press lawyer who represented Paladin. Timothy McVeigh, the domestic terrorists
who murdered one d sixty eight people in Oklahoma City bombing,
was found to have owned several Paladin books, including one
called Homemade C four A Recipe for Survival. Now it's
worth noting that C four was not the explosive that
(36:08):
McVeigh used. He built a truck bomb using nitrogen fertilizer,
but the book was used in his trial as evidence
that he had the knowledge to build explosives. In fact,
Paladin's own finance director Dana Rodgers, had to read the
catalog description from the witness stand quote. Serious survivors knew
the day may come when they need something more powerful
(36:30):
than commercial dynamite or common improvised explosives for blowing bridges,
shattering steel, and derailing tanks. They need C four. Oh wait,
here's another one. Remember the fifty one day standoff between
federal agents and the members of the Branch Davidians, a
religious cult back in. This siege ended with a massive
(36:53):
fire that took over the Waco, Texas compound, killing seventy people.
This raid was made possible by a search warrant, which
was secured in part because agents heard the head of
this cult was trying to get his hands on the
anarchist cookbook, the most notorious how to book on making
explosives and weapons, among other things, and it was distributed
and advertised by Paladin Press. I actually found a list
(37:19):
of quote crimes involving Paladin Press publications and some court documents.
I'm just going to read them to you. Here goes
the murders committed by America's first female serial killer, Sylvia
Secrist Kip Kinkle of Springfield, Oregon, who killed his parents
before engaging in a shooting rampage. The murder of talk
show host Alan Burg by the Order in Colorado attempted
(37:42):
spousal homicide by William Chancellor in Texas, murder of a
grocery store manager by Stephen Red in California, spousal homicide
by Michelle Williams in Ohio. Extortion and loan sharking by
Lawrence Tubiolo of Arizona, Attempted bombing by Robert A. Strickland
in Florida, Solicitation of murder by Robert G. Lees of Washington,
the manufacturer of fifty illegal silencers by Carl Genova of
(38:05):
New York, Triple homicide by Dana Yule of California, Murder
and attempted murder by package bomb by Dominic Perry in Australia,
Triple homicide by Tony Dwong in California, robberies by Terry
Adams and Matthew Taylor, and Tennessee letter bombs by Raymond
neil Best in Alberta, Canada, Attempted bombing of police chief
by Terence Rolls in Alberta, Canada. For murders by Lester
(38:28):
Leroy Bauer Jr. Of Texas, and triple homicide at the
Mildred Horn residents in Maryland. Multiple murders, bombings, robberies, extortion
and Paladin Press was protected under the First Amendment in
(38:49):
every single one of these cases, that is, until the
murders of Million Trevor Horn and Janice Saunders. That's the
case that changed legal history. Peter himself, you know, he uh,
it was funny. He kind of went through a change
over time from an adventurer himself. You know, he was
(39:09):
a former Special Forces, a team leader in Vietnam. He
was a man who was used to violence and had
actually seen it, you know. I mean, there's a difference
between somebody who has to put sights on somebody and
pull the trigger versus somebody who doesn't. And it's not
necessarily a good thing or a bad thing, it's just
a thing. And that's something that Peter had to do.
And not only that, the cultural shift over time, I
(39:29):
think he got kind of disillusioned with He was very
much a man of the seventies and eighties and not
so much that the two thousand's people moving away from
can do more towards what can you do for me?
Um I think helped him shift away from that. I
first started looking into this story back in two thousand fifteen,
(39:51):
when Palette and Press was still very much in business.
That's when I made my first call to their offices
and Boulder and the very mention of the book. Hitman
ended that versation quickly. But I'd always imagined someday I'd
be able to interview Peter Lund for this podcast. I
was going to keep trying, and then in June two
thousand seventeen, he died suddenly on vacation in Finland. Apparently
(40:14):
he was on his way to Russia. He was seventy
five years old. I was shocked. The official Paladin statement said,
quote Petar was always a doer, and we at Paladin
take comfort in the fact that he died doing what
he loved most. A lot of Lund's life is a mystery,
and his death is going to remain one. Two. A
Soldier of Fortune social media post said that he had
(40:36):
been found unconscious in his hotel room and could not
be revived. He lost sight in one eye a few
years back, they said, but otherwise had no serious health issues.
A post on guns dot Com said he was quote
killed while on vacation. It's a weird word choice. Killed.
Less than six months later, word went out that Paladin
(40:57):
Press was shutting down. They put out a another statement
saying thanks for the trust you placed in us for
the past forty seven years. It has been quite a ride.
We reached out to LUN's wife, who also helped him
run Paladin. She was in charge of the business after
he died and ultimately made the decision to close the doors.
(41:18):
She declined an interview. You know, he could have just
been on a nice, leisurely trip with his wife. But
the myth of Peter Lund, of the man who kept
a handgun on his desk, who almost invaded Cuba, who
fought for the First Amendment for information to stay free
no matter the cost, The myth of the most dangerous
publisher in America. It's never gonna die. The editor of
(41:43):
AMMO Land News wrote, quote, who knows what Peter was
up to in Finland on his last trip, but I
am comforted to know he remained dangerous right to the
sudden end. Next, on hit Man, I represent a woman
(42:11):
named Bobby who was the survivor of an attempt to
murder attack by a would be hitman who had bought
a book about how to do that. The other time
hit Man was used horrifying scene in Sue in which
this young would be killer man had a cerreted type
wire that was used to slip throats, and he went
after with that in the battle to get it off
the shelves. Forever. This ship cannot be protected by the
(42:33):
First Amendment. That was the legal principle that we follow. Literally,
this ship can't be protected. That's a slippery slogan because
there will be always someone who is discussing, astounded and
agreed by the content of someone's speech. Hit Man is
(42:57):
a production of I Heart Radio and Hit Home Media.
It's produced and reported by me Jasmine Morris. This episode
was reported by Michelle Lands. Marc Lotto is our story consultant.
Executive producers are main gesh Hatiki Door and Me. Mixing
by Michelle Lands and Jacobo Penzo. Our fact checkers are
Austin Thompson and not Sumi Ajisaka Special thanks to Lucas Riley.
(43:19):
Our theme song by Alice McCoy and additional music written
and produced by the students at DIME powered by the
Detroit Institute of Music Education.
Hey, listeners, just a heads up. This is a long
one because we're giving you two episodes in one this week,
so listen for parts one and two. In our very
first episode, I said that I hadn't been able to
get anyone from Paladin to talk to me. We've tried
a lot of former employees and authors, and everybody seemed hesitant.
But over the last two weeks we got some replies.
(00:23):
My name is David du Bro. I worked for Paladin
Press between and two thousand and ten. David grew up
in a suburb outside Philadelphia. A few years after he
graduated from college, he was working in a supermarket and
he needed a change. At the time, I was very
much into fantasy role playing games like Dungeons and Dragons,
that kind of thing. Not necessarily D and D, but
(00:44):
you know, fantasy role playing text based over the internet
called a telnut protocol. He made some friends through this
online game called Amber. They invited him out to Colorado,
and he figured, what the hell, Okay, I'm going to
drive out there and I'm gonna see if I can
make my life out in Colorado. At the time, there
was no monster, there was no linked in, so you
(01:07):
went looking for a real job through the one edge
of the paper. I know it sounds kind of ancient,
but that was what we did. David answered a nondescript
ad for an entry level customer service gig and got
an interview, and that company was paled and press. It
was very kind of secretive, is very kind of hush
hash I didn't know at the time what I was
getting into. So far in this podcast, we've spent a
(01:33):
lot of time on the triple murder for higher case
of Millie and Trevor Horn and Janice Saunders. When we
last left you, Lawrence Horn and James Perry were both
found guilty of murder and conspiracy to commit murder. So
the two men responsible for this crime would be paying
for it for the rest of their lives. Meanwhile, the
media couldn't stop talking about hit Man. Grew some triple
(01:55):
murder shocked the Washington, D C. Area. Today, it has
become the subject of a First Amendment fight over a
how to book. The killer apparently went by the book
This book, hit Man, a technical manual for independent contractor.
It's a very compelling correlation between the way these murders
were carried out and the suggestions in the book. Now
family members want the Murder Manuals publisher to pay. All
(02:19):
that attention introduced a lot of people to Paladin and
its enigmatic owner, Paider Lund. So I go out there
and I do this interview, and the owner of the
company he's there. He's he's wearing these like short pants
and his polo shirt, and he's got a handgun on
the desk. What's funny is that on this upper middle
(02:41):
class Jewish kid from Philly, things like self defense and
martial arts and knife fighting, they're they're not relevant to
my life experience, like guns or what other people do. Still,
he was intrigued, and they showed me a catalog and
they said, all right, well, why don't you take a
look at it and then tomorrow, UM, we'll call you
back if you're still interested. And I did, and I
was like, this is neat stuff. I mean, you know,
(03:03):
I'm a young man. I could either do customer service
for a company that publishes these kinds of books and videos,
or I could be you know, the executive assistant of
you know, the Boulder Philharmonic orchestra conductor. I'm like, all right,
there's no real competition here, So I started that next week.
David says the company wasn't quite what you'd expect from
(03:25):
the content. Peter was very adamant about not hiring a
bunch of Cammi clad wackos, which is, you know how
we kind of called it. There was at least as
many women as men who worked for Paladin Press. The
vast majority of the people worked for Palden didn't have
a real interest in the subject matter, which was kind
of interesting sometimes to work around. But it was amazingly
(03:46):
prosaic how boring the office work was. It wasn't like
everybody was walking around with a R fifteen slung over
his back, that kind of thing. A Washington Post article
from the year David was high described Lund sitting in
a modest office at an old wooden desk, with his
green beret tacked to the wall, piles of manuscripts everywhere.
(04:08):
Peter wasn't a big guy either, but he had this
fierce face, heard these eyebrows, and if he was mad
with you, you would know it. I never played poker
with him, but I imagine I would probably be able
to beat him a few times, just because he wouldn't
keep it off his face. Lund wore reading glasses in
knee high socks. He'd spent half the year residing in
a fourteenth century cottage in the Cotswolds, England, where he
(04:31):
hunted pheasant and trained a race horse named Miss Optimist.
Not exactly what I pictured. This was London his late fifties. Well,
Peter was an engaging fellow in terrorism expert Neil Livingstone
was a consultant for the ABC News show, and he
helped produce an episode about Lundon Palette and Press. He
(04:53):
and a crew flew to Boulder and spent the day
with lund in his office. I found Peter to be
pull eight, unassuming, unpretentious. He ran a very neat business,
very you know, it's very clean and very well organized
and so on. He described the things that he publishes
(05:15):
burning blow books, how to burn things down and blow
things up. He was rather un phased by the notion
that his books might be used by terrorists or killers.
He said that we don't tell people how to use
the information. Honestly, there's a lot we don't know about
(05:35):
paydirt class in Lundon. Even after all this time we
know he was born in nineteen two. Livingstone told us
he was born in South Africa, but he couldn't actually
remember if that was right. He was married four times,
according to a Washington Post article, and didn't have any kids.
His military records are impressive. He served in the U. S.
Army from nineteen sixty four to nineteen sixty eight and
(05:58):
then in the Army Reserve for two more years. He
was recognized as an expert gunner and a sharpshooter, and
he was a decorated veteran, having received the National Defense
Service Medal, Vietnam Service Medal, Purple Heart, Parachute Badge, and
the Bronze Star, among others. And he was quoted in
a Soldier of Fortune magazine article as saying he was
an infantry platoon leader and rose to be commander of
(06:20):
a Special Forces A team and was in charge of
stopping North Vietnamese supply roots. And that's about all we have,
at least about his life before Paladin Lund called himself
a classic individualist, and he really was. You know, he's
wearing his shorts and his polo shirt. He's got this
revolver on his on his desk, you know, and it's like,
(06:43):
this is the closest I've ever been to a handgun
that hasn't been inside a police officers holster. And and
the thing is, he always had a handgun on a
desk until we changed, you know, cleaning services, and then
it became kind of an issue. But he had a
very strong feeling about the First Amendment and how inviolate
it was. I mean, he was you know, he was
who he was, and if he didn't like him, you
(07:04):
could eatch it and die. I'm Jasmine Morris from My
Heart Radio and Hit Home Media. This is hit many.
(07:44):
You know. It was early days of internet when I started.
At the time, we got to order through the mail
and via telephone. Mostly through the mail, we would send
out catalogs for free to anybody. We got plenty of
requests for catalogs from people who were in prison. You know.
I guess it was kind of like a jerk off
magazine for for violence instead of porn, you know. But um,
(08:06):
it just had the products and the covers and stuff.
You didn't have any real content to speak of. Playboy
Magazine once called Paladin quote the most dangerous publisher in America,
and it was a nickname that stuck. It does make
a good kind of tagline, right, that's something that you
can use to impress people who were impressed by that.
(08:28):
You know, we didn't call ourselves the most dangerous publisher
in America. We called ourselves the Action Library, and I
think that was a term of art that Peter created,
and that's what it was about. It was about, you know,
action versus danger, which is different. There's a value judgment
and danger when you think about it. Okay, what does
that mean? Dangerous? Publisher? Information isn't dangerous. That's what you
(08:48):
do with it, that's dangerous. Paladin Press was just the
small independent publisher serving a niche audience in a liberal
college town in Colorado, but it would become so influential
in ways that most independent publishers never could and never
would dream of. Unfortunately, Peter Lund died in two thousand seventeen,
(09:09):
so we can't hear from him directly. One person we
reached out to for more insight into Lund's life insisted
that we talked to Robert K. Brown, the publisher of
the Mercenary magazine Soldier of Fortune, who he said, new
Lund better than most. The next day, we got a
call from a Boulder, Colorado phone number and a gruff
but friendly voice on the other end introduced himself is
(09:31):
Bob Brown. Brown is eighty six now. He's sharp, very polite,
and he refers to get straight to the point. He
heard we were doing a story on Paladin and Lund
and he was calling us back because his friend said
we were good people. The call was quick. Brown is
quite hard of hearing, so phone calls are difficult these days,
and he respectfully declined to be interviewed, but he offered
(09:53):
to email us some information on Paladin and Lund and
with an okay, Darlin, the call was over. The two
men met back in the early nineteen sixties. Brown was
about ten years older than Lundon, but they both had
military backgrounds and were attracted to the idea of mercenary
work fighting communism in foreign countries. Most of the time.
(10:13):
Brown mentions lund in his memoir I Am Soldier of Fortune,
it's about these near misses adventures they almost had. There
was the plot to invade Cuba and rescue some refugees
that was back in Miami in nineteen sixty three, But
it plays like a Looney Tunes adventure where their boat
gets stuck in the mud. They didn't pack enough food
and the guns didn't show up. In time, there was
(10:35):
a treasure hunt in Papua New Guinea, gold supposedly hidden
by a crooked priest. The time they tried to parachute
into Peru to deliver aid to a secluded mountain village
buried by a landslide. Brown actually laid the groundwork for
Paladin himself in nineteen sixty three, the same year he
tried to invade Cuba with one. First of all, what
(10:57):
was Paladin Pressed? This was a book company that put
out books for soldiers, put up books on how to
build bombs. Here's Brown on a Colorado public affairs show.
And it was also not very popular, definitely not well.
It was an offshoot of a publishing company I started
way back in nineteen sixty three when I published a
book called A hundred and fifty Questions for Guerrilla. Back then,
(11:21):
Brown called his publishing house Panther Publications. Paladin's website once
said this early work really set the tone for the
publisher's future. Quote it would be first to print books
about controversial or suppressed subjects, and it would also be
criticized for publishing works that some people found objectionable. Brown
(11:42):
is an adventurous and charismatic Vietnam vet with a colorful
military history. We found him on the Army Register from
nine and in various interviews and in his memoir I
Am Soldier of Fortune, Brown talks about serving in the
Army in the fifties and eventually rising to lieutenant colonel
and intelligence. He says he was also kicked out of
(12:03):
the Special Forces twice. He debbled in journalism, picking up
freelance assignments for the Associated Press, and he once told
a reporter that he planned to in script his tombstone
with his motto, slay dragons, do noble deeds, and never never, never,
never give up. When Brown first started Panther Publications, he
(12:25):
was mostly publishing military manuals like the Special Forces Handbook.
They were publishing military manuals because they weren't classified, they
had free material to use. That's Michigan State professor and Larabee,
an expert on bomb making manuals. There's an Army manual
called booby Traps, for example, that really dangerous stuff comes
from directly reprinted army manuals. Or they would somehow take
(12:51):
them and rearrange them and cabled them together in some
way to form new versions of these manuals, Mom has better.
They become a fight on too primas well. It was
definitely a very unsettled time in the culture Vietnam vets.
When they came home, they were not exactly welcomed with
open arms. Paladin has always been pretty ZEITGEISTI One fifty
(13:14):
Questions for a Gorilla by Alberto Bio, who was credited
with training Fidel Castro's fighters, came out just after the
Cuban Missile crisis. They were putting out military manuals during
the Vietnam War. A lot of the interest in these
kinds of manuals is attached in various ways to veterans
who had military experience, who also had read military manuals,
(13:38):
and who brought them home, and they maintained a continued
interest in this kind of military identity. Brown identified a
niche an audience saw them clearly because he was one
of these guys, and then he made and marketed things
for them. Here's how Anne Larabee describes the appeal of
(13:58):
these books. It's a kind of Maverick masculinity. Um. You
can see it in a lot of the Paladin books.
For example, there's a certain kind of masculine identity that
keeps being repeated, and it's this this guy who he's
not beholden to anyone um, He's not beholden to any
nation or any state, or any set of ideas. He's
(14:19):
this maverick who can take care of himself and who
has the violent means to defend himself. But eventually that
tight core audience of disaffected Vietnam vets gave away to
something else, may be less authentic. Again, here's David Dubro.
Most people they buy this stuff, they read it, and
they never do anything about it. They never actually do it.
(14:40):
They just wanted the knowledge. They just wanted to have
the thing and be cool and to know that, hey man,
I've got this information now and it's maybe counterculture and
I can pretend to be a badass. It doesn't mean
that they weren't band asses. I don't know. But the
point is, you know, most people, the vast majority of them,
just didn't practice it. And nine using the name Panther
(15:02):
became a major liability. Two members of the Black Panthers
were convicted and sentenced to life in prison for the
murder of a Nebraska police officer who died opening a
suitcase filled with homemade explosives. Others had been arrested for
planning to bomb department stores, including the Macy's in Midtown Manhattan.
And how were the Panthers learning to make bombs and
(15:22):
wage guerilla warfare? Well, some of their underground publications were
directing subscribers to check out a printing house Panther Publications
Congress noticed in the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, led
by Arkansas Senator John L. McClellan summoned owner Robert K.
Brown to testify. Here's Anne Larabee again. It's kind of
(15:45):
an entertaining mistake that they thought that Robert K. Brown
was a Black Panther, that he had named Panther Publications
after the Black Panthers because that's where they were really after.
We couldn't get the audio of this because it's still
on reel to real, So I'm going to read the
senator's questions, and I asked my husband to read Robert K.
Brown's parts. Senator McClellan began the questioning, do you feel
(16:09):
that by this kind of activity you're contributing to the
violence that is occurring in this country and a building
up of a guerrilla movement in America, no more than
General Motors in respect, possibly to the Black Panthers driving
a General Motors car to conduct a bombing. People advertise
weapons for sale too, but they don't advertise that it
is to be used for murdering people. McClellan looked closely.
(16:30):
In one of Brown's book ads. This says grilla warfare.
It says that is the purpose of it. What other
purpose do you advertise it for? If you did not
say guerrilla warfare and the documents you sent out simply
because we describe guerrilla warfare does not mean that we
are promoting guerrilla warfare within the United States. Sir, By
this kind of publication, you are, in a sense advocating
(16:52):
and encourage guerrilla warfare in the United States. I disagree
with you. I am not encouraging it. You do so
by making available the things that are needed to carry
it out successfully. The book itself does not pick up
a gun, Senator. We'll be right back. After the Senate inquiry,
(17:28):
Panther publications became palid and press. Brown didn't want any
more government types confusing him with the Black Panthers, and
his old friend Peter Lund joined the company as co owner.
In an interview on a Colorado public affairs show, Robert K.
Brown put it this way. I got together with Peter Lund.
He had money, I had none. We put the company
(17:49):
together with his input acation that started palid and Press.
That happened in seventy. Then I sold my interest out
in nineteen seventy. By the time and officially joined Paladin
in nineteen seventy, the FBI had begun investigating how they
came to publish these official military technical manuals. But they
quickly realized these manuals were in the public domain again,
(18:13):
and Larabie the Army tried to pull them back. It
reclassified some of its manuals, and it also wrote to
libraries and he asked them to send back their copies
of things like booby traps and other kinds of manuals.
They tried to haul them back, but it was too late.
They were already well seated out there through these paramilitary publishers.
(18:34):
In addition to asking for these manuals back, officials approached
libraries and asked to see a log of everyone who
had checked out one of these books. The librarians were
up in arms because they really saw it as an
assault on the right to read. And because these books
weren't classified, the libraries owned them. They really took offense
at the Treasury Department coming out and putting them under
(18:57):
some kind of surveillance. The American Library Association took a
very significant stand against government interference in people's right to read.
That was their platform. Here's a moment where Paladin really
does seem like it's fighting the good fight for the
First Amendment, which protects a lot of the freedoms that
(19:17):
have really come to be associated with what America means.
Freedom of religion, the right to peaceably assemble and protest,
and most importantly for our story, the right to free
speech and a free press. It was a platform that
would also serve Paladin Press for decades. Brown and Lunde
ran Paladin together for four years until Brown got itchy feet.
(19:40):
That's how he puts it in his book. He sold
his stake in Paladin Press to lund for just fifteen
thousand dollars and returned to mercenary work, this time in Rhodesia.
Again from his memoir quote, all sorts of adventurers, ne'er
do wells, and fugitives from all over the world were
headed for the land of high a guns. Some intend
(20:02):
on fighting the communist back terrorists, and others just to
kick some butt. Not long after he founded Soldier of Fortune,
that magazine would advertise for Paladin. They advertised the hit
Man Book too, which is actually how detectives believed James
Perry discovered it. Referred to as the Journal of Professional Adventurers,
(20:26):
the monthly magazine published stories of mercenaries fighting wars all
over the world and quickly gained a following. In an
interview with news Max Brown explains what set the reporting
in his magazine apart. Some journalists did appreciate what we
were doing in the quality of journalism we were coming
up with, but certainly the fact that we were involved
(20:46):
in training various and sundry groups, the one that comes
with the mind, of course of the countryes in Central
America and also in El Salvador. Most journalists took exception
of fact that we carried guns everywhere. When and if
we get fired upon, we and uh fuck her back.
That being said, Uh, we really didn't give a who
(21:10):
what the other journalist said, and he was say none,
I'm ever want to challenge us physically in the back
of the magazine. There were also classified ads for things
like ninja lessons, gun silencers, and job ads for guns
for hire. In a man would answer an ad and
Soldier of Fortune to hire a guy to kill his wife.
(21:33):
A jury in a wrongful death lawsuit found the magazine negligent,
although a circuit court of appeals later reversed the verdict.
That same year, four hitmen, also advertising and Soldier of
Fortune killed a man named Richard Braun. Again, a jury
found the magazine negligent and the case was settled out
(21:53):
of court. And shortly after that and Arkansas man suffered
injuries when he was attacked by two men, one who
had advertised in the magazine. When the judge suggested the
magazine ad was not protected under the First Amendment, Brown
settled so in Soldier of Fortune stopped publishing ads for
(22:13):
hired guns, though Brown never claimed personal responsibility for the deaths,
telling the New York Times, I feel I should be
no more concerned about that than the auto dealer who
sells a car that runs somebody down. Peter Lund had
(22:34):
the same view, and while Brown stopped publishing some controversial content,
Lund started publishing it under his helm Paladin actually expanded
way beyond official military manuals and guerrilla warfare books about revenge, mayhem, explosives, survivalism,
and contract killing. Just to be clear, Palat and Press
(22:55):
published books and videos on a wide variety of topics.
One Palatin author described it as ranging from outlandish to legitimate. Training.
By the early nineties, Paladin went mainstream. By then, the
book The Ultimate Sniper was considered an authority and was
required reading for professional snipers and training with law enforcement
(23:15):
in the military. Bob Dole wrote the foreword to a
Paladin book about skiing, and the humorous book Get Even
The Complete Book of Dirty Tricks sat on shelves at
Barnes and Noble. The company was offering seven D print
titles and selling as many as three D fifty thousand
books a year. Lund was employing more than people, and
(23:37):
Paladin was a place where you can move up if
you had the right work ethic and if the boss
liked you. And David was often one of the first
to arrive at the office. You know, I would get
in there and then like Pater's already, He's in that
upstairs office kitchen, you know, frying up pork chops at
five five in the morning, and you know, the joke was,
I mean, like, you haven't lived until, you know, had
(23:59):
pork chops with pay here at five in the morning.
He just loved meat man. He ate a lot of meat.
David was eventually promoted to manager of Paladin's video production department.
Peter was not a guy who gives ada boys. Peter
was a kind of boss who said, black man, you're
doing good. You know you're doing good because I haven't
shake hand you. He preferred to let people do what
(24:20):
they were supposed to do, and then he would do
what he had to do. Lund treated his employees well.
He paid benefits, He threw big Christmas parties, He allowed
employees to take hiking breaks midday, and every other year
he took his workers and their spouses on a retreat
to Mexico. Turnover was low, though we won't get into
it here, it's worth noting that in two thousand seven
(24:41):
Lundon was sued for sexual harassment. It apparently came out
in testimony that lund regularly walked around the office wearing
nothing but a towel, He made unwelcome sexual advances to
female employees, and once while handing out annual bonuses, asked
the women in the office to give him a kiss
before handing the checks. Anyway, David eventually became an author himself.
(25:05):
The first book I ever wrote was a book for
Paladin Press, and it was called The Ultimate Guide to
Surviving a Zombie Apocalypse. Zombies were becoming a big thing,
and I'm like, you know something that the Paladin audience.
I bet there are a bunch of people who are
interested in zombies too, So how do I write a
Paladin book about this kind of subject? Paladin's website once
said quote Lunch seeks out authors who are knowledgeable in
(25:28):
their fields and encourages them to write for his audience.
By publishing books no other publisher will touch, and encouraging
authors to tell their own stories, he has earned their
loyalty and assured their success. Many authors have established themselves
as experts in certain areas, so even when it came
to killing zombies, this had to be expert zombie killing.
(25:50):
What I did was I did research, I talked to people.
I I got information from the books and videos and
magazines that I've read, and I colliated it into this
book about how to Survive a zombie apocalypse. Taking survival
skills and handgun skills and knife fighting and everything else
and combining into this thing where okay, this is how
you get yourself out of this fictitious cham And like
(26:13):
some other Paladin authors, David took up a pseudonym F
Kim O'Neill Dave dubro. Video guy doesn't have credibility, whereas
of a made up, you know, army veteran who's actually
seen a real zombie. You know, he does have credibility.
I mean, he's right. But there was another reason some
authors did this. Every once in a while, a few
(26:33):
people wrote books under pseudonyms just because they didn't want
to get in trouble. In the Paladin catalog, there are
lots of macho sounding pen names like Ragnar Benson, George
Hayduke Rex Ferrell. I mean, like it or not, somebody
who hasn't thought about this kind of stuff, right, You say,
hey man, you know, they say, so what do you do?
And I say, well, you know, I worked for Paladin Press.
(26:54):
You know we're a publisher. Oh yeah, what do you publish?
You know, books, videos on Marshall, it self defense, that
kind of thing. Oh yeah, what kind of titles Oh well,
you know, like put them down, take them out, My
fighting secrets of fulsome prison. Oh my gosh, what are
you guys doing. I'm like, that's awful, that sounds terrible,
that's wrong with you. There are a bunch of people
were just going to be turned off by that and say,
(27:15):
you're the writer of a book like that, you know,
maybe it doesn't quite grease the social skids the way
you would think. All of this reminds me of that
correspondence I found from Rex Ferrell, something we haven't talked
about since the first episode. Quote, by the way, an
answer to your question and that of Mr Lund. I
get my materials from books, television, movies, newspapers, police officers,
(27:39):
my karate instructor, and a good friend who is an attorney. No,
I am not a hit man. I don't even own
a gun. But don't tell anybody. But even though some
of Paladin's authors weren't experts at all, sometimes the consequences
of sharing their expertise we're very real. We'll take another
(28:00):
look at Paladin in part two. Stay with us. These
are how to guide on how to do nothing more
than create violence, chaos, anti government, bigoted violence. They teach
(28:23):
you how to build bombs, they teach you how to
build guns. They provide you know, motivation and encouragement. That's
Vincent Suffalu, a retired special agent for the Bureau of Alcohol,
Tobacco and Firearms and the author of a book called
Rats Snakes about his career as an undercover officer. He
worked mob cases, drug trafficking, and contract killing. That's why
(28:47):
we called Vince in the first place. He actually posed
as a hit man many times, so he has a
unique view into this world. The people who who I've
approached in an undercovered capacity have come from every walk
of life. We asked him, who tries to hire hitman?
For the most part, I'm usually a little bit baffled
(29:07):
that the middle income soccer mom, or the local football coach,
or your regular neighbors um would even consider taking an
act like that. But yes, it's amazing how many people
I've talked to about murdering a loved one. It's it's
a little disturbing, needless to say. So when he says
(29:31):
he's seen a lot of Paladin books, including Hitman in
the Wrong Hands, I'm going to believe him. I've come
across the book in the hands of all types of gangsters,
subversive groups, why supremacist groups, biker groups, drug dealers, you know,
anti government, protest type groups. It's not something we would
(29:54):
necessarily look for, but it's something we would recognize immediately
upon executing a search warrant or being Say, if I
walked into an undercover environment working some sort of case
and somebody had that book and or the Anarchist Cookbook,
I'm I'm already drawing conclusions about this person that their
(30:16):
level of seriousness is a little bit higher than maybe
just bluster or you know, running their pie hole. We've
been narrowly focused on Hitman throughout this podcast because of
its linked to the Horn Perry murders, but the influence
(30:39):
of Paladin books in general is much much wider. Reminds
me of something I've said before. This isn't just one story,
it's fifty. Well. I created the fictional company Hawkeye Enterprises
in a separate town from the university town where I
was at the time, believing that was the kind of
(30:59):
name that would seem right up the alley of people
at Paladin or Soldier of Fortune and others whose mailing
lists I might get on criminologist Dr Park Deats has
spent more than a decade studying Paladin, Soldier of Fortune
and other publishers putting out similar books. It seemed to
me that it was wise if I was going to
(31:20):
be digging around in an arguably dangerous network of people,
to shield my family and friends from what I was
up to there. And I got on every wacky mailing
list you can imagine. Some of it was legitimate, but
some of it was also unlawful solicitations. For example, one
(31:41):
particular person who was well known in those circles had
a publication in which he was offering to sell mail
order cyanide. And this is in the wake of the
Thailand All tamperings, which in two became the second most
publicized crime in his tree. The Chicago Thaile and All murders,
(32:03):
as they became known, were a series of deaths caused
by product tampering when someone laced taile in all capsules
with potassium cyanide. Among those killed a twelve year old
girl and three people from the same family. The crime
sparked a number of copycat incidents and deeds. Was hired
by the Food and Drug Administration and the pharmaceutical industry
(32:25):
to investigate, and I looked for where someone could learn
to do such a crime and found the only source
for such information at the time to be Paladin Press
publications and publications by a handful of other publishers of
similar materials. He's referring to publishers like Loompanics and Delta Press,
(32:49):
though Paladin has been described as the principal publisher of
this kind of content. According to Deeds, the poor Man's
James Bond, published by Paladin, gives recipes for assium cyanide
and sodium cyanide. He believed that book and a couple
other Paladin titles had inspired the title and all killings.
(33:10):
The culprit was never found. Lund had a memorable response
to Dietza's findings that in the wrong hands, Paladin books
could be dangerous. He told author Eric Larson, quote, I
really can't be bothered by him. If you take two
(33:31):
hundred thousand people, you're gonna find two or three who
don't wear underwear, four or five who cultivate Bonsai trees,
six or eight who have shaved their heads. There's no
statistical validity to the man's conclusions. It's as if you
went to a party last night and met five people
who were divorced and decided the divorce rate had gone
up catastrophically. Here's Lund in a rare appearance he made
(33:54):
on sixty Minutes with Mike Wallace. Why do you publish
these things? It's market driven? My absolutely again, terrorism expert
Neil Livingstone, he had this very warped view that he
wasn't doing anything morally questionable. It was just business and
(34:19):
it was great that he can have such a business
in the United States. He wasn't there to decide who
could and could not buy his books. What you're saying is,
no matter what pain has caused, I'm a defender of
the First Amendment and my right to make money from
these books. I'm saying that ideas and knowledge don't kill people.
(34:41):
People kill people. We've been talking about how the content
in these books could have and have had consequences. But
what if this content wasn't allowed? What about those consequences.
We're talking about censorship and maybe your but Paladin, it's
(35:01):
such a fringe example. Well, the Freedom Forums National First
Amendment ombudsman Paul McMasters once said, that's where you fight
the First Amendment battles. You fight them on the fringes,
or you fight them on the frontiers, or the next
thing you know, you're fighting them on your front porch.
(35:25):
So for the most part, Paladin Press was safe. But
Livingstone also goes on to say this evidence of intent.
Later on, if someone carried out a crime. Is it
true that Timothy McVeigh ordered one of their books? I
think I read that somewhere. Yeah, he did, but he
would have found it totally useless. That's Tom Kelly, a
(35:46):
press lawyer who represented Paladin. Timothy McVeigh, the domestic terrorists
who murdered one d sixty eight people in Oklahoma City bombing,
was found to have owned several Paladin books, including one
called Homemade C four A Recipe for Survival. Now it's
worth noting that C four was not the explosive that
(36:08):
McVeigh used. He built a truck bomb using nitrogen fertilizer,
but the book was used in his trial as evidence
that he had the knowledge to build explosives. In fact,
Paladin's own finance director Dana Rodgers, had to read the
catalog description from the witness stand quote. Serious survivors knew
the day may come when they need something more powerful
(36:30):
than commercial dynamite or common improvised explosives for blowing bridges,
shattering steel, and derailing tanks. They need C four. Oh wait,
here's another one. Remember the fifty one day standoff between
federal agents and the members of the Branch Davidians, a
religious cult back in. This siege ended with a massive
(36:53):
fire that took over the Waco, Texas compound, killing seventy people.
This raid was made possible by a search warrant, which
was secured in part because agents heard the head of
this cult was trying to get his hands on the
anarchist cookbook, the most notorious how to book on making
explosives and weapons, among other things, and it was distributed
and advertised by Paladin Press. I actually found a list
(37:19):
of quote crimes involving Paladin Press publications and some court documents.
I'm just going to read them to you. Here goes
the murders committed by America's first female serial killer, Sylvia
Secrist Kip Kinkle of Springfield, Oregon, who killed his parents
before engaging in a shooting rampage. The murder of talk
show host Alan Burg by the Order in Colorado attempted
(37:42):
spousal homicide by William Chancellor in Texas, murder of a
grocery store manager by Stephen Red in California, spousal homicide
by Michelle Williams in Ohio. Extortion and loan sharking by
Lawrence Tubiolo of Arizona, Attempted bombing by Robert A. Strickland
in Florida, Solicitation of murder by Robert G. Lees of Washington,
the manufacturer of fifty illegal silencers by Carl Genova of
(38:05):
New York, Triple homicide by Dana Yule of California, Murder
and attempted murder by package bomb by Dominic Perry in Australia,
Triple homicide by Tony Dwong in California, robberies by Terry
Adams and Matthew Taylor, and Tennessee letter bombs by Raymond
neil Best in Alberta, Canada, Attempted bombing of police chief
by Terence Rolls in Alberta, Canada. For murders by Lester
(38:28):
Leroy Bauer Jr. Of Texas, and triple homicide at the
Mildred Horn residents in Maryland. Multiple murders, bombings, robberies, extortion
and Paladin Press was protected under the First Amendment in
(38:49):
every single one of these cases, that is, until the
murders of Million Trevor Horn and Janice Saunders. That's the
case that changed legal history. Peter himself, you know, he uh,
it was funny. He kind of went through a change
over time from an adventurer himself. You know, he was
(39:09):
a former Special Forces, a team leader in Vietnam. He
was a man who was used to violence and had
actually seen it, you know. I mean, there's a difference
between somebody who has to put sights on somebody and
pull the trigger versus somebody who doesn't. And it's not
necessarily a good thing or a bad thing, it's just
a thing. And that's something that Peter had to do.
And not only that, the cultural shift over time, I
(39:29):
think he got kind of disillusioned with He was very
much a man of the seventies and eighties and not
so much that the two thousand's people moving away from
can do more towards what can you do for me?
Um I think helped him shift away from that. I
first started looking into this story back in two thousand fifteen,
(39:51):
when Palette and Press was still very much in business.
That's when I made my first call to their offices
and Boulder and the very mention of the book. Hitman
ended that versation quickly. But I'd always imagined someday I'd
be able to interview Peter Lund for this podcast. I
was going to keep trying, and then in June two
thousand seventeen, he died suddenly on vacation in Finland. Apparently
(40:14):
he was on his way to Russia. He was seventy
five years old. I was shocked. The official Paladin statement said,
quote Petar was always a doer, and we at Paladin
take comfort in the fact that he died doing what
he loved most. A lot of Lund's life is a mystery,
and his death is going to remain one. Two. A
Soldier of Fortune social media post said that he had
(40:36):
been found unconscious in his hotel room and could not
be revived. He lost sight in one eye a few
years back, they said, but otherwise had no serious health issues.
A post on guns dot Com said he was quote
killed while on vacation. It's a weird word choice. Killed.
Less than six months later, word went out that Paladin
(40:57):
Press was shutting down. They put out a another statement
saying thanks for the trust you placed in us for
the past forty seven years. It has been quite a ride.
We reached out to LUN's wife, who also helped him
run Paladin. She was in charge of the business after
he died and ultimately made the decision to close the doors.
(41:18):
She declined an interview. You know, he could have just
been on a nice, leisurely trip with his wife. But
the myth of Peter Lund, of the man who kept
a handgun on his desk, who almost invaded Cuba, who
fought for the First Amendment for information to stay free
no matter the cost, The myth of the most dangerous
publisher in America. It's never gonna die. The editor of
(41:43):
AMMO Land News wrote, quote, who knows what Peter was
up to in Finland on his last trip, but I
am comforted to know he remained dangerous right to the
sudden end. Next, on hit Man, I represent a woman
(42:11):
named Bobby who was the survivor of an attempt to
murder attack by a would be hitman who had bought
a book about how to do that. The other time
hit Man was used horrifying scene in Sue in which
this young would be killer man had a cerreted type
wire that was used to slip throats, and he went
after with that in the battle to get it off
the shelves. Forever. This ship cannot be protected by the
(42:33):
First Amendment. That was the legal principle that we follow. Literally,
this ship can't be protected. That's a slippery slogan because
there will be always someone who is discussing, astounded and
agreed by the content of someone's speech. Hit Man is
(42:57):
a production of I Heart Radio and Hit Home Media.
It's produced and reported by me Jasmine Morris. This episode
was reported by Michelle Lands. Marc Lotto is our story consultant.
Executive producers are main gesh Hatiki Door and Me. Mixing
by Michelle Lands and Jacobo Penzo. Our fact checkers are
Austin Thompson and not Sumi Ajisaka Special thanks to Lucas Riley.
(43:19):
Our theme song by Alice McCoy and additional music written
and produced by the students at DIME powered by the
Detroit Institute of Music Education.
Hit Man News
Host
Jasmyn Morris
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