# Case Notes: an unofficial Small Town Murder fan site

> Case Notes (https://stm.apj.co.uk) is an unofficial fan site for Small Town Murder, the comedy true-crime podcast hosted by James Pietragallo and Jimmie Whisman. It maps every main-feed episode to its town and records what the show says about each one: the town's history, its figures (population, crime, money, religion) and the online reviews read out, as told on the date the episode went out. It is not made by or connected to the show.

Key facts:
- 748 main-feed episodes, from 2017 to 2026, set in 741 towns across 50 US states and other countries.
- Every episode has its own page (https://stm.apj.co.uk/episode/<number>/), every town its own page (https://stm.apj.co.uk/town/<town-state>/), and each of the show's 38 recurring phrases its own page (https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/<slug>/).
- Endings (who was charged or convicted, verdicts, sentences) are covered by default on the site, behind a spoiler switch; this file and the page metadata leave them out.
- Accounts and figures are as told in each episode and may since have changed. Times are approximate.
- Fans can rate episodes and phrases from zero to five stars; zero stars is allowed on purpose.
- Corrections and takedown: https://stm.apj.co.uk/contact/. Why the site exists: https://stm.apj.co.uk/why/.

## Main pages
- [Map of every town](https://stm.apj.co.uk/): the home page, a map of all 741 towns
- [Episode catalogue](https://stm.apj.co.uk/episodes/): every episode by year, with filters
- [League tables](https://stm.apj.co.uk/league-tables/): fans' favourite episodes, and the town figures compared
- [Phrasebook](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrasebook/): the show's recurring phrases and catchphrases
- [Why this site exists](https://stm.apj.co.uk/why/)

## Phrases
- [Shut up and give me murder](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/shut-up-and-give-me-murder/): The show's battle cry: a demand for the murder story, shouted by listeners and used by James to launch the case.
- [Yay, indeed Jimmie. Yay, indeed.](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/yay-indeed-jimmie/): The show's opening call-and-response, traded at the top of nearly every episode.
- [Let's go on a trip, shall we?](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/lets-go-on-a-trip/): James's cue to leave the opening chat and travel to the town where the murder happened.
- [You sir, may fuck off](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/you-sir-may-fuck-off/): James's judge voice for the moment sentence lands: the defendant is told, in so many words, that they may fuck off.
- [We're assholes, not scumbags](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/assholes-not-scumbags/): The show's disclaimer slogan: the hosts will make cruel jokes about small towns, police forces and murderers, but never about the victims or their families.
- [Clear the lungs, arms to the sky, let's all shout: Shut up and give me murder](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/clear-the-lungs-arms-to-the-sky/): The warm-up James runs through at the top of the show before the case: everyone takes a breath, clears their lungs, throws their arms up to the sky and shouts the battle cry, 'Shut up and give me murder'.
- [The Mount Rushmore of crime](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/mount-rushmore-of-crime/): James's name for the four violent crimes in the FBI figures: murder, rape, robbery and assault, which he also calls the big four.
- [As we all know, X is the Y of the north/south](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/the-x-of-the-north/): James's demographic running gag: when the town's religion figures are read out, the dominant faith is explained by swapping the region, so "Catholics are the baptists of the north" means the Catholic majority in the north mirrors the Baptist majority in the south, and vice versa.
- [Jimmie P is funny](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/jimmie-p-is-funny/): James's Twitter handle, read aloud as "I am at Jimmie P is funny" in the closing plugs; it sounds like a boast about Jimmie but is really the name of James's own account, spelled with a y to tell the two Jimmies apart.
- [All aboard the murder train](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/all-aboard-the-murder-train/): The opening catchphrase of Small Town Murder Express, the shorter Friday show: James usually calls everyone aboard an imaginary murder train and says it is pulling out of the station, after Jimmie's 'choo choo'.
- [A t-bowl for every b-hole](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/t-bowl-for-every-b-hole/): A line from James's house-listing riffs: a home with as many bathrooms as bedrooms has 'a t-bowl for every b-hole'.
- [No complaining later](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/no-complaining-later/): The warning at the end of the show's disclaimer: having explained that the podcast mixes true crime with comedy, the hosts tell anyone who does not fancy that to leave now and not complain once they have heard it.
- [We've convinced you to move here](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/weve-convinced-you/): James's mock sales pitch as he closes the town's housing figures: he pretends the show has persuaded listeners to move there, then launches into the real estate report.
- [The murder train is pulling away from the station](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/murder-train-pulling-away/): The second half of the show's railway-station opening: James announces that the murder train is now leaving the station, following Jimmie's or his own 'all aboard the murder train'.
- [Let's go back in time](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/lets-go-back-in-time/): James's segue from the present-day town into the case's backstory, usually followed straight away by a year and the time-machine sound effects.
- [The Homicide book](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/the-homicide-book/): James's shorthand for David Simon's Homicide: A Year on the Killing Streets, the non-fiction account of a year with Baltimore's homicide detectives.
- [Ten pounds of murder in a two-pound bag](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/ten-pounds-of-murder/): James's stock description of a Small Town Murder Express episode that holds far more crime than its running time can carry: ten pounds of murder crammed into a two-pound bag.
- [Small Town Murder Express](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/small-town-murder-express/): The train-themed name James gives the show, complete with a choo choo and an all aboard the murder train, most often in the opening of the shorter Friday episodes.
- [Hava Nagila, I don't know the words](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/hava-nagila/): The celebration James performs when a town's census comes back at least one per cent Jewish: he strikes up Hava Nagila, Jimmie harmonises, and the singing stops with the admission that he does not know the words.
- [No body, no crime](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/no-body-no-crime/): A play on Bob Marley's 'No Woman, No Cry', used whenever a killer disposes of the body: without a corpse there can be no murder charge.
- [Cheer up bitch](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/cheer-up-bitch/): James's mocking summary of how doctors and husbands were supposed to treat women's mental health in the 1950s and 60s: don't investigate, just tell her to cheer up.
- [Panhandle behaviour](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/panhandle-behaviour/): James's label for the stupid, reckless or trashy behaviour he associates with America's panhandles, the odd strips of states where he reckons the worst neighbours live.
- [Pocket Robin](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/pocket-robin/): Nickname for a man in the vampire pyramid scheme case, who who wandered his grandmother's house with a pyramid on his head, screaming about the robin in his pocket and eating it.
- [The Sahara Desert fart fact](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/sahara-desert-fart-fact/): James's name for the driest, most boring fact he can dig up about a town, delivered as "the Sahara Desert fart fact of the week".
- [We're all from somewhere that deserves to be made fun of. Who cares?](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/were-all-from-somewhere/): James's standing defence of the show's small-town mockery: everyone's home town is ridiculous, so nobody has the right to be offended on its behalf.
- [A bumbling police force that lets a murderer go free](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/bumbling-police-force/): James's stock description of small-town law enforcement, used in the show's regular disclaimer about who the comedy is aimed at: an incompetent police force that bungles the case and lets a killer walk free.
- [Ladies and gentlemen, my co-host, Andrew Jackson](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/cohost-andrew-jackson/): James's mock-formal introduction of Jimmie as Andrew Jackson, brought out whenever Jimmie makes an accidental racist slip.
- [That's grim, Karen](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/thats-grim-karen/): James's appalled reply when a woman called Karen says something especially bleak: "that's grim, Karen".
- [He's my kind of guy](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/hes-my-kind-of-guy/): James's deadpan compliment for a killer: whenever a murderer is described as charming, polite, well dressed or otherwise likeable, he tags him as his (or Jimmie's) kind of guy, and the horrific thing the man did lands as the punchline.
- [Not Small Town Murder approved](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/not-small-town-murder-approved/): James's all-purpose verdict on anything dumb, sleazy or dangerous in a case: behaviour the show would never sign off on, delivered as a mock official ruling.
- [Let's start out hot](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/lets-start-out-hot/): James's hand-off from the town talk into the case, announcing that he will open at the most dramatic moment, usually the discovery of the body or the crime itself, and then rewind to the background.
- [Murder Turkeys](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/murder-turkeys/): The name the hosts gave their listeners, taken from a man in that week's story who kept calling everyone turkeys.
- [Meth Falcon](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/meth-falcon/): James's imaginary drug-running bird of prey, a trained falcon that flies out, collects meth and brings it back to its owner.
- [107 dildos](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/107-dildos/): James's incredulous reaction to a Fremont, New Hampshire case in which a man was found with 107 dildos.
- [Salt to the earth](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/salt-to-the-earth/): James's mangled version of "salt of the earth", used approvingly of nice, decent, hard-working people, usually a rural or blue-collar family.
- [Trastic plash bags](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/trastic-plash-bags/): James's mangled way of saying "plastic trash bags": he cannot get the words out in the right order and they arrive as "trastic plash bags" or one of a dozen other spoonerisms.
- [The white trash defense](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/white-trash-defense/): James's name for the argument in the Phillips, Oklahoma case that a jury could not understand poor white trash culture.
- [Casey Anthony's hallway](https://stm.apj.co.uk/phrase/casey-anthonys-hallway/): A lie, or a way of living, with an obvious dead end that can't be talked past.

## Everything else
- [Every episode, town and phrase](https://stm.apj.co.uk/llms-full.txt)
- [Sitemap](https://stm.apj.co.uk/sitemap.xml)