# The Girlfriends: Spotlight, E12: Lois Captures Criminals

An episode of [The Girlfriends: Flight or Fight](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1695875823), 3 Nov 2025, 37 min.

Audio: https://podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/traffic.omny.fm/d/clips/e73c998e-6e60-432f-8610-ae210140c5b1/c2c81cb2-988e-4194-8382-b02e011bf37a/d7946700-18f7-4248-95b7-b3800109eec7/audio.mp3?utm_source=Podcast&in_playlist=289822ba-519c-4151-be1f-b02e011e1914

Lois Gibson has a rare gift: A gift for accurately drawing people she’s never seen before, from fragmented descriptions from traumatised witnesses. And that gift is incredibly useful to the Houston Police Department. Lois is the world’s most successful forensic artist. Over 40 years, on more than 5089 cases, she’s worked with victims and witnesses to painstakingly piece together a likeness of a suspect. And in more than 1313 cases, her drawings have nailed it with a conviction - case closed. This is the story of how she found this talent in one of the very darkest moments of her own life. The Girlfriends: Spotlight is produced by Novel for iHeartPodcasts. For more from Novel visit Novel.Audio See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

## Transcript

[0:00] Speaker 1: Hey, girlfriends, I just wanted to give you a heads
[0:02] Speaker 1: up that this episode includes conversations about rape, murder, and
[0:07] Speaker 1: graphic violence. But if you do listen, you'll hear some
[0:11] Speaker 1: crime fighting with an easel and don't come for me
[0:14] Speaker 1: if we swear this is a safe space for that
[0:16] Speaker 1: kind of thing. Lois is at home after work one evening,
[0:22] Speaker 1: getting ready to pit the kids to bed when her
[0:24] Speaker 1: phone rings.
[0:26] Speaker 2: The detective on the homicide called me and he said,
[0:30] Speaker 2: you did it, girl. You gotta come down here. So
[0:33] Speaker 2: I took the kids to the citar and went down.
[0:36] Speaker 1: When she gets to Houston Police station, the detective has news.
[0:39] Speaker 2: For her, so he tells me, we wouldn't have saw
[0:43] Speaker 2: the keys without that dry.
[0:50] Speaker 1: Lois has just done her first piece of forensic art.
[0:54] Speaker 2: I'm talking about a witness remembering a face they saw,
[0:58] Speaker 2: the face that represents the person that did the horrible
[1:01] Speaker 2: thing they saw.
[1:02] Speaker 1: She's just sketched the perpetrator of a dreadful murder based
[1:06] Speaker 1: on the fragmented memories of a hysterical bystander. It's her
[1:11] Speaker 1: first assignment for the Houston Police Department, and it caught
[1:15] Speaker 1: the killer. Overwhelmed, she has to decompress in her car.
[1:21] Speaker 2: It was too such a burden and knew I would
[1:24] Speaker 2: do whatever it took to help somebody get justice.
[1:28] Speaker 1: You see, Lois has a special connection to this case.
[1:33] Speaker 2: This guy was murdered the same way I was nearly murdered.
[1:40] Speaker 1: Lois uses the trauma of her near death experience to
[1:44] Speaker 1: find a new purpose. She's on her way to become
[1:47] Speaker 1: the world's most successful forensic artist. She'll help thousands of
[1:52] Speaker 1: people to find justice, one face at a time, and
[1:56] Speaker 1: in doing that, Lois will also find justice for herself.
[2:04] Speaker 1: I'm Annasinfield and from the teams at Novel and iHeart Podcasts.
[2:09] Speaker 1: This is the Girlfriend's Spotlight, where we tell stories of
[2:13] Speaker 1: women women Today, Lois captures criminals.
[2:35] Speaker 2: You hi Anna, how are you doing? Girl? Hi?
[2:43] Speaker 1: Lois?
[2:44] Speaker 2: What I do is guests.
[2:45] Speaker 1: Your sign sign usn't star sign Capricorn cancer. You know
[2:49] Speaker 1: the drill.
[2:50] Speaker 2: But I'm going to wait till we talk a while.
[2:51] Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, you get a flavor of who I am.
[2:54] Speaker 2: Oh, I have to push you around and see if
[2:56] Speaker 2: you get mean. I'm kidding, kidding, just kidding, I'm not me.
[3:00] Speaker 1: Hey, I'm game for you trying well.
[3:01] Speaker 2: This will be the best interview you ever had Anna.
[3:07] Speaker 1: Already the best interview ever. The thing about low Skipson
[3:10] Speaker 1: is that you never quite know whether she's being serious.
[3:13] Speaker 1: But I do know that she's always been into drawing.
[3:17] Speaker 2: My first drawing in kindergarten. The kindergarten teacher noticed, and
[3:20] Speaker 2: she freaked and drug me away from the easel, and
[3:22] Speaker 2: they called the lady at the museum in Kansas City, Missouri,
[3:26] Speaker 2: and they came out and framed it and put in
[3:28] Speaker 2: the museum. I guess. So I drew since I was young,
[3:32] Speaker 2: and I drew in high school and everything, and I
[3:34] Speaker 2: always wanted to draw people. So I waited tables for
[3:39] Speaker 2: nine years to get through college, and all I wanted
[3:43] Speaker 2: to do was draw faces.
[3:45] Speaker 1: Why did you want to draw faces in the first place?
[3:47] Speaker 1: What drew you to people's faces in your art?
[3:51] Speaker 2: The reason I wanted to draw faces in the beginning
[3:54] Speaker 2: is the same reason other artists who were like me.
[3:56] Speaker 2: I was just drawing, Like when I was only five,
[3:58] Speaker 2: I wanted to do a face. That's all I wanted
[4:01] Speaker 2: to do. And like poor Michael Angelo's same birthday as him,
[4:04] Speaker 2: only five hundred and ten years later, I love people
[4:08] Speaker 2: and I loved it raw.
[4:09] Speaker 1: Much the same you and Michaelangelo. And like Michaelangelo, who
[4:13] Speaker 1: I imagine would go on many long, tortured walks around Florence,
[4:17] Speaker 1: Lois would visit the River Walk in her college town
[4:20] Speaker 1: of San Antonio, Texas to contemplate what to do with
[4:24] Speaker 1: her life.
[4:25] Speaker 2: In its beautiful waterway with cafes on the edge, with
[4:28] Speaker 2: colored umbrellas on each side reflected in the water in
[4:32] Speaker 2: a Japanese half moon bridge. I'm like, okay, chachin cha ching,
[4:37] Speaker 2: I want to make money down here. I should do portraits.
[4:40] Speaker 1: She was studying dentistry, but she was a little distracted.
[4:45] Speaker 2: Dinnell's school students have the best parties, unbelievable.
[4:48] Speaker 1: So on the side she decided to paint portraits for
[4:51] Speaker 1: tourists keen to remember that time in beautiful San Antonio.
[4:55] Speaker 2: I sat there and it was hot, and the tourists
[4:58] Speaker 2: were wiggly and moving and star sometimes drunk, and I
[5:02] Speaker 2: had to draw fast. The more faster I went, the
[5:05] Speaker 2: more money I made. And during the portrait I would
[5:08] Speaker 2: just be engulfed in their personality, completely immersed. And I
[5:13] Speaker 2: did a stint at six Flags over Texas doing watercolor
[5:16] Speaker 2: portraits live. So if you're an artist out there, you go,
[5:20] Speaker 2: that's impossible. Yeah, it's really hard. But I did live
[5:23] Speaker 2: portraits of tourists in watercolor.
[5:27] Speaker 1: Lowe's got an art degree from the University of Texas.
[5:31] Speaker 1: She was good.
[5:32] Speaker 2: All these people that do landscapes, I love them, I
[5:35] Speaker 2: love La love. However, you gotta be brave to do
[5:38] Speaker 2: faces because inside that faces a human being. And nobody
[5:41] Speaker 2: likes their own photographs, so they're gonna look at your
[5:43] Speaker 2: drawing and go ooh, and it could be terrific, so
[5:45] Speaker 2: you're gonna get emotional rejection. I did about three thousand portraits,
[5:50] Speaker 2: and one.
[5:50] Speaker 1: Of those was a portrait that will change her life.
[5:53] Speaker 2: I drew a portrait of a guy and fell in
[5:55] Speaker 2: love with him and moved to Houston.
[5:57] Speaker 1: Oh wow. Houston, Texas, the fourth most popular city in
[6:02] Speaker 1: the United States, was a long way from the quaint
[6:05] Speaker 1: college town Lois came from. It's a place where the
[6:08] Speaker 1: hot air from the Gulf Coast and the cool air
[6:10] Speaker 1: from the rocky mountains collide to form many a thunderstorm,
[6:15] Speaker 1: which is the case today when Lois and I are talking.
[6:19] Speaker 1: Oh my god, the weather.
[6:21] Speaker 2: Yes, ma'am totally one hundred percent Mother Nature.
[6:25] Speaker 1: No a little scary, hey, it wasn't just the storms
[6:28] Speaker 1: Lewis had to get used to. When she first moved
[6:30] Speaker 1: to Houston in nineteen eighty one.
[6:33] Speaker 2: The place was a bloodbath. They hid seven hundred and
[6:35] Speaker 2: one murder set year that I moved.
[6:38] Speaker 1: One day, Lewis and her friend Diana hanging out the
[6:41] Speaker 1: TV's on in the background.
[6:43] Speaker 2: They talk about a dancers structor who was raped in
[6:46] Speaker 2: front of her, a little eleven and twelve year old
[6:49] Speaker 2: little student, and in a split second, I said, oh
[6:53] Speaker 2: my god, Diane, I could draw a picture of that guy.
[6:56] Speaker 1: After developing her portrait skills on the riverbank in San Antonio,
[7:00] Speaker 1: Lois had started to believe that she could draw just
[7:03] Speaker 1: about anyone, even if she's never seen them before. She
[7:09] Speaker 1: recruits Diane to help her put it to the test.
[7:12] Speaker 2: You go to the gas station and there's gonna be
[7:14] Speaker 2: a male homo sapien a man working there. Right. Look
[7:17] Speaker 2: at the man, Diane, I'll take care of you. To
[7:19] Speaker 2: your daughter. So she goes to the gas station, looks
[7:22] Speaker 2: at the guy. She comes back and I tried to
[7:25] Speaker 2: draw the guy.
[7:26] Speaker 1: Lois gets Diane to describe this gas station employee who
[7:30] Speaker 1: she's only seen for a few seconds. Remembering as many
[7:33] Speaker 1: details as she can about his face, his hair, his skin.
[7:38] Speaker 2: And I got down to below the nose. I got
[7:41] Speaker 2: all that. She goes pretty good. She goes, oh, You're
[7:43] Speaker 2: not going to be able to draw this. He shows
[7:45] Speaker 2: both upper and lower teeth like Satchmo. Louis armstrong, upper
[7:49] Speaker 2: and lower teeth all the time, even when he's not smiling.
[7:53] Speaker 2: And I went oh, I said, yeah, that would be hard,
[7:56] Speaker 2: except for I went to dinner school. So I drew
[7:59] Speaker 2: the teeth real good. We drove to the gas station
[8:03] Speaker 2: and the guy came out and it looked exactly like him,
[8:07] Speaker 2: and so I hung under the gas pump and I
[8:10] Speaker 2: started weeping uncontrollably.
[8:12] Speaker 1: The portrait is a success, but Lois's reaction is unexpected.
[8:18] Speaker 1: Her friend Diane is confused, but Lois knows where her
[8:22] Speaker 1: tears are coming from.
[8:24] Speaker 2: But I didn't tell anybody. I've been attacked. I've been
[8:28] Speaker 2: nearly killed in a rape that I barely survived.
[8:33] Speaker 1: And the discovery that she could draw a person's face
[8:36] Speaker 1: from a verbal description by an unreliable eyewitness sparked something
[8:41] Speaker 1: in her.
[8:42] Speaker 2: All of a sudden, I thought I could catch somebody
[8:45] Speaker 2: like that, and the thought of being able to do
[8:47] Speaker 2: that drove me out of my mind with desire to
[8:50] Speaker 2: do that.
[8:51] Speaker 1: Eleven years before the gas station drawing, Lois Gibson was
[8:55] Speaker 1: out driving. It was the early seventies and Lois was
[8:59] Speaker 1: in her rally twenty.
[9:00] Speaker 2: I was driving home, trying to get out of traffic,
[9:03] Speaker 2: and literally something took my steering wheel. I went up
[9:07] Speaker 2: a hill. I didn't mean to go up this hill.
[9:09] Speaker 2: It was hills of Hollywood. You have to go back
[9:11] Speaker 2: and forth, no way to turn around. You're forced up
[9:14] Speaker 2: the hill, up the hill, and then when I got
[9:15] Speaker 2: to the top of the hill, there was a piece
[9:17] Speaker 2: of gravel that I could turn around on. I turned
[9:19] Speaker 2: onto the gravel, I looked up and there was his face,
[9:23] Speaker 2: the man that tried to kill me.
[9:26] Speaker 1: Six weeks Sagas had been at home when a stranger
[9:30] Speaker 1: broke into.
[9:30] Speaker 2: Her apartment and I was nearly strangled to death. So
[9:34] Speaker 2: it was a really brutal attack. I didn't admit to
[9:38] Speaker 2: myself that had happened till six years afterward, so you
[9:43] Speaker 2: never reported that. At the time, I never reported the attack.
[9:47] Speaker 2: And since I was a dancer and a model, I
[9:50] Speaker 2: thought they would think I was sexy. Whatever that means
[9:55] Speaker 2: and blame me. I couldn't report it.
[10:00] Speaker 1: Considering you didn't kind of admit to yourself that it
[10:03] Speaker 1: even really happened. You can't face reporting it to the police.
[10:08] Speaker 1: Were you seeking some kind of justice? Were you hoping
[10:11] Speaker 1: that there would be justice?
[10:13] Speaker 2: I knew I couldn't get justice.
[10:14] Speaker 1: I was so mad.
[10:15] Speaker 2: I wanted justice, but I was in Los Angeles. Are
[10:17] Speaker 2: you killing me?
[10:18] Speaker 1: I'm sure you've heard the stories of seventies La being
[10:21] Speaker 1: rife with dancers and models like Lois being abused and assaulted.
[10:26] Speaker 1: It became so normalized that she lost all faith in
[10:28] Speaker 1: any formal justice system. So she thought that was that. But,
[10:34] Speaker 1: as Lois tells it, the next thing she knows, she's
[10:37] Speaker 1: driving up into the Hollywood Hills without meaning to and
[10:41] Speaker 1: sees her attacker.
[10:43] Speaker 2: When I saw him, that was the miracle that I
[10:47] Speaker 2: had prayed for. And I froze, and there were guys
[10:51] Speaker 2: in front and behind him, and then I realized they
[10:54] Speaker 2: were lapd and then he was sideways and I realized
[10:58] Speaker 2: he was in handcuffs.
[10:59] Speaker 1: She told me he was being arrested for a drug
[11:01] Speaker 1: related crime.
[11:03] Speaker 2: And then they're at the top of the stairs and
[11:04] Speaker 2: they got to go down tall, wooden two story stairs
[11:08] Speaker 2: and he starts fighting them like an animal. At one point,
[11:12] Speaker 2: they hold his elbows up and he's running his legs
[11:15] Speaker 2: like a bicycle in mid air. So they had to
[11:19] Speaker 2: beat him to keep him from knocking them and himself
[11:22] Speaker 2: down the stairs and breaking some of these arms and legs.
[11:25] Speaker 2: So I got to see him get beaten and beaten
[11:29] Speaker 2: and beaten. It was so beautiful, and I drove down
[11:33] Speaker 2: to the bottom of the hill and I was like
[11:37] Speaker 2: a Volkswagen got pulled off my back. I got justice.
[11:41] Speaker 2: I got justice in spite of myself.
[11:45] Speaker 1: So that's the lowest that winds up hanging over a
[11:47] Speaker 1: pump at a Houston gas station, laughing and crying at
[11:51] Speaker 1: the same time, clearly not getting any gas, but elated
[11:56] Speaker 1: that she's been able to draw the guy who works
[11:58] Speaker 1: there without ever having seen him.
[12:01] Speaker 2: So I scared the gas guy and he sees the
[12:04] Speaker 2: picture of me and he goes, wow, you're really good.
[12:06] Speaker 2: You're such a good artist. I made him look cuting anyways,
[12:10] Speaker 2: I always do that.
[12:11] Speaker 1: Now Lois knows she has a talent that can help
[12:14] Speaker 1: get justice for fellow survivors.
[12:17] Speaker 2: When I realized I could draw faces from someone's memory.
[12:20] Speaker 2: I realized this was an insanely important tool that the
[12:25] Speaker 2: law enforcement could use.
[12:29] Speaker 1: After the break. Using that tool, got.
[12:48] Speaker 2: I've got your, gotcha, I've got you.
[12:57] Speaker 1: Forensic art helps law enforcement identi I suspects, and solve
[13:01] Speaker 1: crimes using artistic skill. One of the most common types
[13:06] Speaker 1: is called a composite sketch, which is created by interviewing
[13:10] Speaker 1: witnesses and drawing a face based on their memories of
[13:13] Speaker 1: the person they saw committing a crime. You've probably seen
[13:17] Speaker 1: them on the news or on crime dramas. They sometimes
[13:20] Speaker 1: look a bit weird, but they're also often eerily similar
[13:24] Speaker 1: to the person who's eventually found to have done it.
[13:27] Speaker 2: I realized that me doing portraits on the river walk
[13:31] Speaker 2: in San Antonio was the perfect setup to be able
[13:36] Speaker 2: to do that. And now it was somebody I couldn't see. Yeah, okay,
[13:42] Speaker 2: flash forward. I knew I could solve murders.
[13:46] Speaker 1: Lois just needs to persuade the cops that they need her.
[13:50] Speaker 2: Sure Enough, I called twenty phone calls over a period
[13:55] Speaker 2: of weeks. Everybody just got rid of me. Every buddy
[14:00] Speaker 2: had excuses.
[14:02] Speaker 1: Houston police departments aren't used to artists blowing up their fines.
[14:06] Speaker 1: They have procedures for recruiting new stuff, but Lois won't
[14:11] Speaker 1: let something as boring as bureaucracy get in the way
[14:14] Speaker 1: of her plans.
[14:15] Speaker 2: So here's how I finally got through. I went insane
[14:19] Speaker 2: with what do you call it, courage, gonads whatever, too
[14:24] Speaker 2: much bravery, but I was going for broke.
[14:28] Speaker 1: So I call them up.
[14:28] Speaker 2: I go, look, here's my proposition. I'll bring my gear.
[14:32] Speaker 2: I'll go to your office in front of you. I'll
[14:35] Speaker 2: have you take some of your personnel someone to look
[14:38] Speaker 2: at someone in the jail who they'd never seen and
[14:40] Speaker 2: who I can't see. Bring them back down. I'll do
[14:44] Speaker 2: a sketch from just their description. If I can, wouldn't
[14:48] Speaker 2: that be a great trick. If I can't, you guys
[14:51] Speaker 2: are armed, I'll just leave. So I said that speech,
[14:56] Speaker 2: and they couldn't answer anything because I had him by
[15:00] Speaker 2: the gonads. So somebody talked to somebody, and the last
[15:04] Speaker 2: two I talked to said, you need to talk to
[15:07] Speaker 2: Lieutenant Don mac Williams. So when I got him, I
[15:10] Speaker 2: started the speech and before I got a few words
[15:12] Speaker 2: in and he goes, come on down, girl. I'm like,
[15:18] Speaker 2: so he's the one. He goes, yeah, that would be
[15:20] Speaker 2: a great trick. And they put me to a patrol
[15:23] Speaker 2: car like I was under arrest, but with my easel
[15:25] Speaker 2: and everything. And I set up and they said, well,
[15:27] Speaker 2: should we have a detective go to the jail. And
[15:29] Speaker 2: I was too brave. I go, no, get me a
[15:31] Speaker 2: dingy person.
[15:33] Speaker 1: She wants someone who's a few sound much as short
[15:35] Speaker 1: of a picnic, you know, like not a lot going
[15:37] Speaker 1: on upstairs.
[15:38] Speaker 2: And I'll be darned. They got the dingiest dang secretary
[15:42] Speaker 2: and she comes back and she freaked. She almost cried,
[15:46] Speaker 2: so I had to go, Oh, relax, I just rely
[15:48] Speaker 2: relax anyway. The first thing I do is the hair,
[15:52] Speaker 2: and she pointed to the top of her head and
[15:54] Speaker 2: said dark dark. I mean I found out right away
[15:56] Speaker 2: he was wearing a black hat. But then I got
[15:59] Speaker 2: the eyes out the nose, and then he has weird
[16:01] Speaker 2: teeth and it completely blew them away.
[16:06] Speaker 1: Wow. I mean, what did they say where They like,
[16:09] Speaker 1: you'll hire it, we need you.
[16:11] Speaker 2: Ah No, they were too big of a bureaucracy and
[16:14] Speaker 2: I didn't expect him to but they used me.
[16:17] Speaker 1: They start hiring her on a freelance basis, and Lois
[16:21] Speaker 1: Green and keen to impress says yes, yes, yes, even
[16:26] Speaker 1: though she's just had her first child eleven months ago.
[16:30] Speaker 2: When I had to start working forensic art with a
[16:32] Speaker 2: baby at home, it was really intense. I ha loved
[16:38] Speaker 2: to be in home with a baby. It was so good.
[16:40] Speaker 2: I loved it. And then I get a call from
[16:42] Speaker 2: the detective and I get to do something. And I
[16:44] Speaker 2: always had the gear to do the sketches in the
[16:46] Speaker 2: trunk of my car. I would bring all my gear, easel,
[16:50] Speaker 2: drawing boards, pastels, a paper purse, blah blah blah, drag
[16:57] Speaker 2: it in, set up in a room, do the case,
[17:00] Speaker 2: the worst thing that happened in the world that in
[17:02] Speaker 2: Houston that week, and then break it down and go
[17:06] Speaker 2: back to the trunk of my car. The first homicide
[17:09] Speaker 2: I worked, I solved it. I had a hysterical witness.
[17:14] Speaker 2: He saw a man stabbed to death in our Memorial
[17:17] Speaker 2: Park and he thought somebody was digging in the dirt,
[17:21] Speaker 2: and he walks up and looks beyond this log and
[17:23] Speaker 2: somebody's stabbing somebody in the back. Well. He was hysterical.
[17:27] Speaker 2: It was the most hysterical witness that I've ever had.
[17:32] Speaker 2: And it took forever, and he cried uncontrollably a whole
[17:36] Speaker 2: bunch of times, and I comforted him. Anyway, I finished
[17:40] Speaker 2: the sketch and it looked horrible. You know, it's not
[17:42] Speaker 2: a fine work of art. None of them are right.
[17:45] Speaker 2: I gave it to him and I drove away from
[17:47] Speaker 2: the police station and I parked at this street in
[17:49] Speaker 2: a parking lot, and I said, I'm never doing that again.
[17:53] Speaker 2: It's would be so good if it could work, but
[17:56] Speaker 2: there's no way it's working. I'm going to go home.
[18:00] Speaker 2: I'm going to be a mont my eleven month old baby.
[18:04] Speaker 2: I went home the next morning. Douglas Osterberg, the detective
[18:09] Speaker 2: on the homicide, everybody called a big bird. So big
[18:13] Speaker 2: Bird called me and he said hello, and I went what.
[18:17] Speaker 1: The police had circulated Lois's sketch on the evening news.
[18:21] Speaker 2: And he said that the murderer's roommates called him in.
[18:24] Speaker 2: They saw the news that night, and they waited for
[18:27] Speaker 2: the rebroadcast at two thirty in the morning, and they
[18:29] Speaker 2: watched that.
[18:30] Speaker 1: You'd be pretty freaked out too, right, You're watching the
[18:33] Speaker 1: news and a drawing comes up if a man wanted
[18:36] Speaker 1: for a brutal murder, and the guy looks just like
[18:40] Speaker 1: your roommate.
[18:41] Speaker 2: He goes, oh my god, he called the detectives.
[18:43] Speaker 1: The roommate tells the cops that he knows the murderer.
[18:47] Speaker 2: It's the guy he lives with, and they go, can
[18:49] Speaker 2: we search your house? He goes, yeah, permission to search.
[18:52] Speaker 2: They found the weapon in the underwear with the blood
[18:55] Speaker 2: wiped off on it.
[18:56] Speaker 1: Oh my gosh, you must have felt amazing in that moment.
[19:00] Speaker 2: It was too such a burden when I found out
[19:03] Speaker 2: I was going to do that. I did better drugs
[19:06] Speaker 2: when I was eight years old. This sketch sucks, and
[19:09] Speaker 2: it stopped a murderer he was seventeen. If he was
[19:13] Speaker 2: seventeen and he was killing for fun, he was going
[19:16] Speaker 2: to kill again and again, my sketch stopped him.
[19:21] Speaker 1: HM, gosh, that's hard. I'd really like to know how
[19:26] Speaker 1: you do the sketches. Would you be able to walk
[19:29] Speaker 1: me through your process? Okay?
[19:31] Speaker 2: For a witness memory, I get the Samantha Steinberg Catalog
[19:34] Speaker 2: and I give it to the witness and they tell
[19:36] Speaker 2: me which features to draw.
[19:38] Speaker 1: The Samantha Steinberg Catalog is like a giant visual menu
[19:42] Speaker 1: that helps forensic artists draw faces. It has over one
[19:45] Speaker 1: thousand different eyes noses and hairstyles to help witnesses pick
[19:50] Speaker 1: out exactly what they remember, and.
[19:53] Speaker 2: I draw it where they're not looking. You always use
[19:57] Speaker 2: an easel. It's a five thousand year old piece of
[19:59] Speaker 2: a quip. You have to have a light source. It's
[20:02] Speaker 2: on your easel. You're drawing facing the drawing board. The
[20:05] Speaker 2: witness is sitting facing the back of the drawing board,
[20:10] Speaker 2: so they're private. It's like a barrier between you and
[20:13] Speaker 2: then they've been through the worst thing in their life.
[20:16] Speaker 2: So the way I draw is I start at the
[20:18] Speaker 2: top and go down like a printer, and then when
[20:21] Speaker 2: I get it composed, like just the good composition of
[20:26] Speaker 2: proportion for features that they give you all on a face.
[20:30] Speaker 2: Then you tell them I'm going to turn around and
[20:33] Speaker 2: show you and I will change anything you want any
[20:36] Speaker 2: way you want me to change it, and then do that.
[20:38] Speaker 2: You turn it around and whatever they say witness is
[20:42] Speaker 2: king they saw them, you didn't. You do exactly what
[20:44] Speaker 2: they say. And the way to know you're done is
[20:48] Speaker 2: the witness will say it's not perfect, but I can't
[20:52] Speaker 2: think of what else to change. That means you are done.
[20:56] Speaker 2: Take a picture first, and if you're old like me,
[20:58] Speaker 2: there weren't cell phones all I did halfway through my career.
[21:02] Speaker 2: But take a polaroid and then give it to the detective.
[21:06] Speaker 1: And do you interact much with the witness of the crime.
[21:11] Speaker 2: It depends on who you are. You know, if you're
[21:14] Speaker 2: a man and your son has just been shot to
[21:18] Speaker 2: death in a road rage as you drive out of
[21:21] Speaker 2: the Astros ballgame, and you're standing there and your arms
[21:25] Speaker 2: are crossed and you look like you want to punch me,
[21:27] Speaker 2: because you do want to punch somebody, and you're mad,
[21:30] Speaker 2: and you just donated the seventeen year old's organs, then
[21:34] Speaker 2: I'm really, really, really nice. You want to hear what
[21:38] Speaker 2: I said to that guy. Yeah, he wanted to be
[21:40] Speaker 2: strong and his arms were crossed. So I looked at
[21:44] Speaker 2: him and I went compared to all the people that
[21:46] Speaker 2: I've worked with, you're like almost the strongest and the
[21:51] Speaker 2: most composed, and you're emotionally, you know, stable considering what
[21:58] Speaker 2: you've been through. And his whole body relaxed because that's
[22:02] Speaker 2: what he wanted to be. And then I got him
[22:04] Speaker 2: to laugh. Anyway, I'm real funny. I can get people
[22:06] Speaker 2: to laugh in situations. But you got to tell me
[22:10] Speaker 2: the crime. No It's all customized to the crime how
[22:12] Speaker 2: I would talk to you.
[22:14] Speaker 1: The witness that relaxes the most is the witness that
[22:17] Speaker 1: remembers the most.
[22:18] Speaker 2: Every witness tells you in the beginning they can't do
[22:21] Speaker 2: this sketch. They scream it, they yell it, they say
[22:24] Speaker 2: it in different languages. But don't listen. Here's what you
[22:29] Speaker 2: need to know. I'm absolutely positive one hundred percent of
[22:34] Speaker 2: the time when you do a sketch from a witness
[22:38] Speaker 2: who is not lying, your drawing will look like the
[22:42] Speaker 2: person described one hundred percent. You don't believe it. I
[22:45] Speaker 2: know you don't believe it, and the law enforcement, hey,
[22:48] Speaker 2: they don't believe it. But I'm right. And if you
[22:51] Speaker 2: doubt me, you're wrong.
[22:56] Speaker 1: What qualities do you have that make you so good
[22:59] Speaker 1: at it?
[23:00] Speaker 2: I have that makes me so good as I'm empathetic.
[23:03] Speaker 2: You got to feel what the other person feels, and
[23:07] Speaker 2: that can be so horrific if you think about what
[23:10] Speaker 2: you're going to go through, because it's the worst thing
[23:13] Speaker 2: on the news. But I do it because I'm strong,
[23:17] Speaker 2: because I've been attacked, and then that informs you what
[23:21] Speaker 2: you should say to that person.
[23:24] Speaker 1: Empathy a powerful tool, probably the most important one to
[23:28] Speaker 1: have in law enforcement. I wanted to ask you, how
[23:33] Speaker 1: would you draw me? Oh, you'd be easy.
[23:35] Speaker 2: I do it real quick. Okay, Yeah, your hair is Rassianna,
[23:39] Speaker 2: you know nobody and yellow ochre and there's a little
[23:41] Speaker 2: raw umber.
[23:42] Speaker 1: Yeah. In the UK, just get called ginger. With her
[23:49] Speaker 1: easel and color palette in hand, Loes wants to take
[23:52] Speaker 1: her career to the next level. After the break Justice,
[24:22] Speaker 1: Lois becomes the go to freelance forensic artist for the
[24:26] Speaker 1: Houston Police Department. I mean she's on a roll fighting
[24:30] Speaker 1: crime left and right.
[24:32] Speaker 2: One of the most wonderful cases I was able to
[24:37] Speaker 2: do was we had an officer named Paul Deeson and
[24:41] Speaker 2: he stopped somebody, not realizing it was an escape convict,
[24:44] Speaker 2: and the man got out and shot him in the head,
[24:46] Speaker 2: shot him in the back, and then on purpose, the
[24:49] Speaker 2: shooter got in his car and ran over and drug
[24:51] Speaker 2: Paul under the car for about sixty five feet. So
[24:56] Speaker 2: Paul walked back and called in his assist and he survived.
[25:02] Speaker 2: So I heard about it on a Friday night. Now
[25:06] Speaker 2: I'm a sleepwalker and I can't explain, but I ended
[25:10] Speaker 2: up sitting down on a fork. The fork went clear
[25:13] Speaker 2: to the bone. It punctured my back of my leg,
[25:15] Speaker 2: right under my booty, and my husband threw hydrogen peroxide
[25:19] Speaker 2: on it.
[25:20] Speaker 1: Lois ends up in hospital where she's pumped full of
[25:23] Speaker 1: antibiotics and promises the doctor that she'll rest fully for
[25:27] Speaker 1: two days, but of course she's barely out of the
[25:31] Speaker 1: hospital when she gets a call. Paul Is conscious and
[25:35] Speaker 1: ready to do a sketch.
[25:37] Speaker 2: I sat in my car. I had to for the guys.
[25:40] Speaker 2: I had to. I ignored my leg, it was kind
[25:44] Speaker 2: of hurting, and I sat sideways. Drove to the hospital.
[25:46] Speaker 2: It's really an ordeal. You have to walk about a
[25:48] Speaker 2: quarter mile with the easel. And I got to him
[25:51] Speaker 2: and he was wrapped in gauz, completely covered in gaze
[25:54] Speaker 2: like the mummy, but just slids for the ears, the
[25:57] Speaker 2: eyes and nose. And then I just whispered in his ear,
[26:02] Speaker 2: and he said, I never saw his face. I only
[26:04] Speaker 2: saw the flash of the gun. Anyway, I make him laugh,
[26:08] Speaker 2: I make everybody laugh. I was whispering. He's laughing anyway,
[26:11] Speaker 2: and then he says, I only saw the flash of
[26:13] Speaker 2: the gun. And so I have a trick. You say,
[26:17] Speaker 2: what kind of expression did he have? You know? You
[26:20] Speaker 2: talk about something else. You don't argue yes, you did
[26:22] Speaker 2: see the face. You go, oh, what kind of expression
[26:25] Speaker 2: did he have, Paul? And if they answer that, you're
[26:29] Speaker 2: going to get a sketch. So I held my breath
[26:31] Speaker 2: and Paul says he didn't have any expression. He looked
[26:37] Speaker 2: like a shark, like he didn't care about anything at all.
[26:41] Speaker 2: So in my mind, I'm screaming yes, yeah, yeah, I
[26:46] Speaker 2: got done. And then I got the sketch done, but
[26:52] Speaker 2: it was so hard. He was coming in and out
[26:54] Speaker 2: of consciousness. I wasn't sure I had anything. I gave
[26:58] Speaker 2: it to the detective, wanting to say gets any good,
[27:00] Speaker 2: because he wouldn't even tell me at the end if
[27:02] Speaker 2: it was any good. So I went home and they
[27:05] Speaker 2: put the sketch out. Two guys were at the jail
[27:09] Speaker 2: and they thought the sketch looked like a guy they
[27:10] Speaker 2: had just arrested for shoplifting a chainsaw from a store.
[27:15] Speaker 2: They held a video lineup in Paul Deese's room and
[27:19] Speaker 2: he picked him out, and then they went to the
[27:21] Speaker 2: place where the shoplifting happened, and they found a car
[27:24] Speaker 2: with pieces of Paul's skin and uniform hanging from the undercarriage,
[27:28] Speaker 2: so they know that that's the man who did it.
[27:31] Speaker 2: And it looks like this sketch.
[27:34] Speaker 1: No spots Paul in court looking different now without the
[27:38] Speaker 1: gauze on his face.
[27:40] Speaker 2: She goes up to him and he looked Romani, crossed
[27:43] Speaker 2: his arms and he said, can I help you, ma'am?
[27:45] Speaker 2: I said, oh, Paul, I'm the artist that did the sketch,
[27:49] Speaker 2: and then he told me I don't remember doing the
[27:51] Speaker 2: sketch with you, Lois, I do not remember doing that
[27:55] Speaker 2: with you. Wow. I only remember the end.
[27:58] Speaker 1: Wow. And there are many memorable cases, each one worthy
[28:04] Speaker 1: of a podcast in itself.
[28:06] Speaker 2: If this is the only case I ever did, this
[28:08] Speaker 2: would make my life absolutely worthwhile. They called me late
[28:14] Speaker 2: in the day and said a baby's being kidnapped from
[28:16] Speaker 2: a hospital. Everybody drops everything looking at the mom and
[28:20] Speaker 2: she's going, where's my baby. I can't even explain. The
[28:24] Speaker 2: personnel at the scene of the hospital, we're so upset.
[28:27] Speaker 2: I've never seen dozens of officers upset. So I get
[28:32] Speaker 2: to the hospital and the security guard. You could feel
[28:36] Speaker 2: a feeling in the building, A ten hour old baby
[28:39] Speaker 2: of being kidnapped. This woman comes in. She's acting like
[28:43] Speaker 2: she's a nurse and she's convincing, and she tells the
[28:46] Speaker 2: woman she's with this nursing program helping moms with newborn babies. Fine,
[28:51] Speaker 2: she's there for several hours. Then the mom goes to
[28:53] Speaker 2: the bathroom to take a tinkle, and the kidnapper takes
[28:57] Speaker 2: the baby, puts it in a really large per she
[29:00] Speaker 2: had brought with her, and she just walks down the
[29:04] Speaker 2: stairwhealel and exited with the baby. So I got up
[29:07] Speaker 2: and the mom I won't even describe. She turned her
[29:10] Speaker 2: bible into paper machede and then the detective, the female
[29:15] Speaker 2: officer that was left to keep her company, said do
[29:18] Speaker 2: you need me? I go No, I like doing alone.
[29:20] Speaker 2: She tried to not act like she was running out
[29:22] Speaker 2: of the room. She could hardly wait to get out
[29:24] Speaker 2: because the feeling when there's a kidnapping, it grabs you
[29:29] Speaker 2: at the base of your throat and it makes you
[29:31] Speaker 2: want it's hard to breathe. It's so hard to explain.
[29:34] Speaker 2: So I did my best, and it looks like she
[29:38] Speaker 2: posed for the kidnapper. Oh my god, And they put
[29:42] Speaker 2: it out. I didn't know at the time. I was
[29:45] Speaker 2: sure it would be kind of close. I knew I
[29:46] Speaker 2: had the air right. But I was exhausted, and so
[29:50] Speaker 2: I went home and I sat down and I went, oh,
[29:54] Speaker 2: I can't go to bed and go to sleep if
[29:58] Speaker 2: there's a baby still out there. So I turned on
[30:00] Speaker 2: the news, and within fifteen minutes they showed the nurse
[30:05] Speaker 2: that was at the hospital crying, holding the baby, kissing.
[30:08] Speaker 2: They said they got the baby back, They got the
[30:11] Speaker 2: baby back, and I watched, didn't even hear them after that.
[30:16] Speaker 2: I just watched the people at the hospital kissing the baby.
[30:19] Speaker 2: If that is the only thing I did in my life,
[30:23] Speaker 2: I'm done. I'm fine. I'll just go make sour dough bread.
[30:28] Speaker 1: I mean, it's an awful lot for you to be
[30:29] Speaker 1: taking on these stories. You know you're right there in
[30:33] Speaker 1: that crisis point.
[30:35] Speaker 2: Well, I have gotten a lot of strength by literally
[30:39] Speaker 2: being almost killed. That'll give you the little bumper sticker
[30:45] Speaker 2: quote like what doesn't break us makes it stronger. And
[30:48] Speaker 2: if you go down as far as I have, then
[30:51] Speaker 2: you come back real strong. And all the detectives they
[30:55] Speaker 2: talk like you anna, They go, how do you keep
[30:57] Speaker 2: a sound mind? You're out of your mind? How can
[30:59] Speaker 2: you do all this? Because they do murders and they
[31:02] Speaker 2: work child sex crimes and they work rapes, but they
[31:05] Speaker 2: nobody does it all, but I do it all. And God,
[31:09] Speaker 2: literally through the Holy Ghost, gives me a sound mind.
[31:13] Speaker 2: I'm positive it's from Heavenly Father, because I'll be feeling
[31:16] Speaker 2: just normal and goofy. And I get a call at
[31:18] Speaker 2: three thirty in the morning to talk to a girl
[31:20] Speaker 2: that's seen her mom killed and then she's been raped,
[31:23] Speaker 2: So come on down, and I get this feeling in
[31:26] Speaker 2: my chest of power and love and I feel healthy
[31:31] Speaker 2: in my mind, and then I feel really healthy if
[31:33] Speaker 2: I get to solve the crime.
[31:37] Speaker 1: According to the Oracle Guinness World Records, Lois has become
[31:40] Speaker 1: the world's most successful forensicicotist.
[31:44] Speaker 2: I worked five eighty nine cases over forty years, and
[31:49] Speaker 2: I've helped solve over oney three hundred and thirteen cases
[31:53] Speaker 2: as some of the worst felons to walk the face
[31:54] Speaker 2: of the earth. Every third sketch I would do is
[31:57] Speaker 2: solve a case. It took seven in a quarter years
[32:01] Speaker 2: to give me a full time job.
[32:03] Speaker 1: After all these years. Do you feel that young Lewis
[32:06] Speaker 1: has received some justice for what she went.
[32:09] Speaker 2: Through after all these years? Yeah, I got justice for
[32:15] Speaker 2: what I went through. That stupid guy got me going
[32:20] Speaker 2: after every kind of guy like him. It was therapy,
[32:26] Speaker 2: talking to the witnesses and talking to the girls that
[32:29] Speaker 2: had been attacked. It was so good because I knew
[32:31] Speaker 2: how to make him feel better. And then if the
[32:34] Speaker 2: sketch caught the guy, then that really made him feel better.
[32:39] Speaker 2: And so oh, I just I got the most fulfilling life.
[32:45] Speaker 2: I want to help other artists start their careers. I mean,
[32:49] Speaker 2: it's too wonderful. I got to spread it before I
[32:51] Speaker 2: go to the big drawing board in the sky.
[32:55] Speaker 1: And now it's time for the most important assessment of
[32:58] Speaker 1: this podcast.
[33:00] Speaker 2: So are you a Scorpiel?
[33:02] Speaker 1: No, I'm not, but I'm Gemini apparently.
[33:06] Speaker 2: Oh yay, that's the opposite. Okay, Jumini is just supposed
[33:10] Speaker 2: to be real funny. You should do radio interviews. See no,
[33:13] Speaker 2: but no, here we are.
[33:21] Speaker 1: Even though Lewis can't get my star sign right, I
[33:24] Speaker 1: get the effect she has on people. She's disarming constantly observing,
[33:30] Speaker 1: two great skills for a forensic artist and a podcaster.
[33:34] Speaker 1: To be fair, some of her stories are wild, but
[33:39] Speaker 1: I get the feeling that's all part of the charm.
[33:41] Speaker 1: She needs to lull people into the sort of headspace
[33:44] Speaker 1: where they can describe a man they only saw for
[33:46] Speaker 1: a split second right before he shot them in the head,
[33:50] Speaker 1: and the numbers speak for themselves. Forensic Heart clearly has
[33:54] Speaker 1: a place in law enforcement, but during our conversation she
[33:58] Speaker 1: told me it's a dying trade, barely used outside of
[34:01] Speaker 1: the States and hardly use there either. Now she's headed
[34:06] Speaker 1: towards retirement, Lois wants to turn her focus onto helping
[34:10] Speaker 1: train up a new generation of artists and campaign for
[34:13] Speaker 1: their work to be recognized by police departments worldwide. So
[34:18] Speaker 1: if you want to see if you've got the skills
[34:20] Speaker 1: to do this job, you can head over to her
[34:22] Speaker 1: Facebook page Lois Gibson's Institute of Forensic Art. She's got
[34:27] Speaker 1: a bunch of exercises for you and she'll review your
[34:29] Speaker 1: work and let you know if you've got that secret
[34:32] Speaker 1: crime stop in source. Good luck, and yes, best interview ever.
[34:44] Speaker 1: If you've enjoyed this conversation, you can find loads more
[34:47] Speaker 1: incredible women on our feed. Do check them out, and
[34:51] Speaker 1: please do spread the word and tell your friends about us.
[34:53] Speaker 1: We want as many people as possible to be part
[34:56] Speaker 1: of the Girlfriend's Gang this season. Reporting the charity Womankind Worldwide.
[35:02] Speaker 1: They do amazing work to help women's rights organizations and
[35:06] Speaker 1: movements to strengthen and grow. If you'd like to find
[35:09] Speaker 1: out more or donate to help them secure equal rights
[35:12] Speaker 1: for women and girls across the globe, you can go
[35:15] Speaker 1: to womankind dot org dot UK. The Girlfriend's Spotlight is
[35:28] Speaker 1: produced by Novel for iHeart Podcasts. For more from Novel,
[35:32] Speaker 1: visit novel dot audio. The show is hosted by me
[35:35] Speaker 1: Anna Sinfield. This episode was written and produced by Malia Sortland.
[35:40] Speaker 1: Additional production by al Shabarney. Our assistant producer is Lucy Kahr.
[35:45] Speaker 1: Our researcher is Seyana Yusuf. The editor is Hannah Marshall.
[35:49] Speaker 1: Max O'Brien and Craig Strachan are executive producers. Production management
[35:54] Speaker 1: from Joe Savage, Sharie Houston and Charlotte Wolf. Sound design,
[35:59] Speaker 1: mixing and score who ring by Nicholas Alexander and Daniel Kempson.
[36:03] Speaker 1: Music supervision by Jako Taievich, Nicholas Alexander and Annasonfield. Original
[36:08] Speaker 1: music composed by Louisa Gerstein and Jemma Freeman. The series
[36:13] Speaker 1: artwork was designed by Christina lemcol. Willard Foxton is creative
[36:18] Speaker 1: director of Development Special Thanks to Katrina Norvel, Carrie Lieberman,
[36:22] Speaker 1: and Will Pearson at iHeart Podcasts, as well as Carl
[36:26] Speaker 1: Frankel and the whole team at wm

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