Selects: The Great Finger in the Wendy’s Chili Caper

In 2005 a woman named Anna Alaya discovered a length of human finger – nail and all – in her Wendy’s chili. Her cries of disgust would set off a media firestorm, a criminal investigation and a prison sentence for her and her husband. Listen to Josh and Chuck go through the whole mess in this classic episode. See omnystudio.com/listener https://omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  This is an iHeart Podcast. Guaranteed Human.

• 0:04Josh Clark?

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• 1:34Speaker 03

  Hey, everybody. Happy Saturday morning, or whenever this finds you. Chuck here, introducing this week's Selects episode. And we're gonna replay the great finger in the Wendy's Chili caper episode from January 10th, 2019. There was a finger found in Wendy's Chili, and this is that story. Enough said.

• 2:03Speaker 04

  Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of iHeart Radio.

• 2:13Speaker 03

  Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, and there's Charles W. Chuck Bryant.

• 2:17Josh Clark?

  And there's Jerry, and this is the Stuff You Should Know Chili Caper Edition. Corporate Investigations, Las Vegas, San Jose, Chili.

• 2:29Speaker 03

  Yeah, and that means we get to use our special investigator nicknames. Seattle Clark, Portland Bryant, and San Francisco Jerry Roland.

• 2:37Josh Clark?

  That's not bad. I would have chosen Tony Kotein for me.

• 2:42Speaker 03

  Yeah, that was a very ham-fisted way to set up an in-show mention of our three shows next week.

• 2:49Josh Clark?

  Oh, oh, yeah. That was actually lost on me, Chuck.

• 2:53Speaker 03

  Next Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, it's apparently lost on the Pacific Northwest because no one's coming.

• 2:58Josh Clark?

  Right.

• 2:59Speaker 03

  Next Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, we'll be in Seattle, Portland, and San Francisco.

• 3:03Josh Clark?

  Yeah.

• 3:03Speaker 03

  On January 15th, 16th, and 17th at the Moore Theater, Revolution Hall, and the Castro for Sketch Fest. And you have an End of the World Live Friday night in San Francisco.

• 3:14Josh Clark?

  Mm-hmm.

• 3:14Speaker 03

  And I have a Movie Crush Live on Saturday afternoon in San Francisco.

• 3:19Josh Clark?

  I also have a Brooklyn End of the World one, too, on the 24th, just FYI.

• 3:23Speaker 03

  Hey, let's not get carried away here.

• 3:25Josh Clark?

  Okay, all right.

• 3:26Speaker 03

  But those are the shows we have coming up, everyone, so come on out. There are still great tickets left at all three of these venues.

• 3:33Josh Clark?

  Mm-hmm.

• 3:34Speaker 03

  And all five, probably. I'm not sold out for Movie Crush.

• 3:37Josh Clark?

  No, I'm not either. No.

• 3:39Speaker 03

  So, and especially those End of the World and Movie Crush shows are your best chance to hang out and talk to us personally because they're more intimate venues.

• 3:47Josh Clark?

  Like, I wear a negligee.

• 3:49Speaker 03

  Well, Busy Phillips is there, so I'm gonna have on my dinner jacket.

• 3:53Josh Clark?

  Oh, very nice.

• 3:54Speaker 03

  Trying to impress her with my tuxedo look, which is not impressive.

• 3:58Josh Clark?

  Tuxedo and jeans is a, it's a, it's a look.

• 4:02Speaker 03

  So, get all the information at sysklive.com. Or for the Sketch Fest shows, just go to the SF Sketch Fest site. And come out and support us, everyone, and shake our hand, pat us on the back, or spit on our shoes.

• 4:17Josh Clark?

  Don't do that.

• 4:18Speaker 03

  Don't do that.

• 4:19Josh Clark?

  Spit between our shoes. Just make it close, you know?

• 4:22Speaker 03

  Yeah, if you really hate us, spit between our shoes.

• 4:25Josh Clark?

  There you go. Yeah, that's gonna end up on a t-shirt, I have a feeling.

• 4:29Speaker 03

  All right, let's talk about Chili Fingers.

• 4:30Josh Clark?

  All right, so, back in 2005, actually, let's get in the Wayback Machine, go watch this thing go down.

• 4:38Speaker 03

  Wayback Machine, just for this short distance?

• 4:41Josh Clark?

  Yeah. I mean, it's not like you can walk to 2005.

• 4:50Speaker 03

  This is actually kinda great, though, cuz when you're 48, almost, to go back 13 years.

• 4:57Josh Clark?

  I wanna go back and do it all over.

• 5:02Speaker 03

  So, all of a sudden, I'm 35, which I thought was old.

• 5:05Josh Clark?

  Yeah.

• 5:06Speaker 03

  But, man, I'd love to be 35 right now.

• 5:08Josh Clark?

  I'm pretty happy with 42, I've gotta say. I'm not quite, I'm not quite happy with the kinda catcher's mitt that my face is turning into, but everything else, I'm pretty glad about.

• 5:20Speaker 03

  Yeah, just wait, just wait.

• 5:22Josh Clark?

  Okay.

• 5:22Speaker 03

  Just wait till 48 happens.

• 5:24Josh Clark?

  Oh, no.

• 5:24Speaker 03

  You're staring down the barrel of 50, and you're going, geez, I only got like 15 more good years left.

• 5:30Josh Clark?

  That is so not true. Don't you know 50 is the new 35? Is it? You know what's funny is all the people in this Wendy's in San Jose we just showed up at are looking at us like, what are these guys talking about?

• 5:43Speaker 03

  I know. They're like, get your super bar order underway.

• 5:46Josh Clark?

  Yeah, they're like, why don't you guys just be quiet and listen to Chumbawamba? Like, everybody else is right now.

• 5:51Speaker 03

  I don't think they had super bar in 2005. That was more like the 80s and 90s, but still.

• 5:55Josh Clark?

  What was it, super bar?

• 5:57Speaker 03

  Yeah, you don't remember that?

• 5:58Josh Clark?

  No.

• 5:59Speaker 03

  Wendy's in the 80s.

• 6:00Josh Clark?

  Oh, yeah.

• 6:01Speaker 03

  Had the super bar, which was this weird combination of tacos and pasta and salad.

• 6:07Josh Clark?

  And baked potatoes.

• 6:08Speaker 03

  And baked potatoes, all, just like, whatever you want.

• 6:11Josh Clark?

  I forgot all about that, man. What a good idea.

• 6:14Speaker 03

  Yeah, the super bar was a weird, weird thing, but I ate it.

• 6:17Josh Clark?

  So, there is no super bar anymore, but there is, if you look over there, there's a woman named Anna or Anna Ayala. And she is sitting with her in-laws, her mother-in-law, her father-in-law, her brother-in-law, maybe a couple of other people. And she is about to bite down into a bite of Wendy's chili that she has just ordered at the San Jose Wendy's, downtown San Jose Wendy's, I believe, on March 22nd, 2005.

• 6:47Speaker 03

  Yeah, she's in her, her late 30s. It's cold in San Jose. She's from Las Vegas, so she's not used to this.

• 6:56Josh Clark?

  She's actually, so she's from San Jose originally, but she's moved to Vegas a couple of years ago.

• 7:00Speaker 03

  Well, sure, she has lived in Las Vegas lately and has been warming in the sun there.

• 7:04Josh Clark?

  Right.

• 7:05Speaker 03

  And is like, I don't like this cold. I'm gonna order some chili, cuz. That Wendy's chili is so, so good.

• 7:12Josh Clark?

  It's meaty and warm, as Ed puts it.

• 7:15Speaker 03

  That's right. And so she sits down, she's eating this thing, and then all of a sudden, look at her.

• 7:22Josh Clark?

  She's just.

• 7:22Speaker 03

  She's, she's upset, Josh.

• 7:24Josh Clark?

  She's gone berserk. Everybody at the table's got their hands up like, whoa, settle down. And she's like, just pointed at her chili, her chili cup, which she's reached the bottom of, and she's saying that there's a finger in her chili.

• 7:39Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 7:39Josh Clark?

  She just bit into a finger.

• 7:41Speaker 03

  Yeah, she looks like she's about to puke. I didn't see her vomit.

• 7:46Josh Clark?

  I didn't either.

• 7:47Speaker 03

  But in court later, she would say she did. So maybe we can be key witnesses.

• 7:52Josh Clark?

  Right. She's going up to the, the counter demanding, I think she just said to one of the cashiers, who did you kill to get this finger? Which is a weird thing to say.

• 8:01Speaker 03

  Yeah, she's yelling at everyone else in the restaurant with chili, saying, don't eat that.

• 8:05Josh Clark?

  Yep.

• 8:05Speaker 03

  There's fingers, that's finger chili.

• 8:07Josh Clark?

  That's right. Finger chili, no one wants. Cha, cha, cha. She's starting to try to start a chant, I believe.

• 8:13Speaker 03

  And there's only one guy that's still eating, and he said, yeah, I ordered the finger chili.

• 8:17Josh Clark?

  He said, I think you got mine. So she's freaking out. Things are starting to go down. There's a hubbub in the restaurant. Everyone's got, every, she has everyone's attention. She's saying that she just found a finger in her chili. The people at the counter are incredulous. They're kind of poking at it a little bit. They're saying, I think it's a vegetable or whatever.

• 8:35Speaker 03

  Yeah, it looks like a carrot to me, lady.

• 8:37Josh Clark?

  Right. A very pale carrot with a fingernail on it. And it's the fingernail, really, that does the trick. After this point, it becomes clear to everyone in the Wendy's that there is a finger that this woman just found in her chili. There's a fingernail on it. It's about an inch and a half of a finger from the tip to, well, about an inch and a half down. And she just bit down on it and she found it in her chili. So the Wendy's employees react swiftly. They dump out all the chili. They call, they call the police. The police come by and they say, well, this is a health department kind of thing, really, and the police leave. And the Wendy's employees call the owners of the franchise, J E M Management, and they say, don't do anything to that finger, put it in the freezer,

• 9:22Josh Clark?

  and we'll be there in the morning. And at this point, Anna Alaya leaves, or Anna Ayala, this is going to be very difficult, because I want to say Alea.

• 9:30Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 9:31Josh Clark?

  She leaves, her families are taking, her family members are taking pictures of the location, and a huge national story has just begun. By 10 o'clock that night, this happened about 7:00, by 10 o'clock on the local news, there's an unconfirmed report of a woman who found a finger in her chili at Wendy's.

• 9:51Speaker 03

  And Dave Thomas gets indigestion immediately.

• 9:54Josh Clark?

  Well, he'd been dead a few years, so that'd be phenomenal.

• 9:57Speaker 03

  I thought he was alive then.

• 9:58Josh Clark?

  He died in 2002.

• 10:00Speaker 03

  Okay, well, he's rolling over in his grave.

• 10:02Josh Clark?

  But by this time, you know, he'd really kind of made Wendy's like a really loved and respected, you know, restaurant, because everybody thought Dave Thomas was so great.

• 10:12Speaker 03

  Well, yeah, and as, are we out of the way, Beck Machine? Are we done play-acting?

• 10:17Josh Clark?

  I was serious, but yes, we are.

• 10:19Speaker 03

  Well, you were seriously play-acting. You were Laurence Olivier, maybe.

• 10:23Josh Clark?

  I was delusional. I thought we were in that Wendy's.

• 10:27Speaker 03

  So, uh, immedi-, almost immediately, word starts to spread on the news, obviously. And as you might well imagine, the Wendy's restaurant chain, especially in the, in the area, in the Bay Area, near San Jose, it really starts to take a business hit. As you would imagine, people are not like, oh, they found a finger in some Wendy's chili. That really reminds me how much I love Wendy's chili.

• 10:56Josh Clark?

  Right.

• 10:57Speaker 03

  Let's go out and get a hot cup.

• 10:59Josh Clark?

  Right.

• 10:59Speaker 03

  Uh, because they are sort of famous for their chili.

• 11:02Josh Clark?

  Oh, yeah, I mean, like, if you want chili at a fast food restaurant, you're going to Wendy's, because you're not going to find it anywhere else. They really planted their flag in the chili market.

• 11:10Speaker 03

  Yeah, the old A and W's had pretty good chili.

• 11:14Josh Clark?

  Oh, yeah, but you wanted that on a dog.

• 11:17Speaker 03

  Sure, and of course, the Midwest, still very famous for their skyline chili.

• 11:22Josh Clark?

  Mm hmm.

• 11:23Speaker 03

  Uh, which is delicious.

• 11:24Josh Clark?

  Is that, I guess that'd be fast food, huh?

• 11:26Speaker 03

  Yeah, I think they actually have skyline chili restaurants.

• 11:29Josh Clark?

  Yeah, yeah, which is good. It's quite good.

• 11:33Speaker 03

  It is.

• 11:34Josh Clark?

  Um, but if you're going to go just about anywhere in the US and you're a hankering for chili, you're gonna go to Wendy's. But like you said, sales started to plummet, and not just like chili sales, all Wendy's sales started to take a hit, especially in the Bay Area, like you said, especially in, in the western United States. Uh, people were just kind of grossed out by this whole idea. Um, but like I said, the, the, the cops had shown up and decided it was a health inspector's or a health department's jam. They didn't really have anything to do with it. So the next morning, uh, the owners of the franchise, the county health inspector, they showed up. I think they contacted Wendy's communications department and the gears

• 12:15Josh Clark?

  were starting to move. There was something that they had to deal with, and that was basically threefold. It was really twofold as far as Wendy's was concerned at first, but the third one crept in pretty quickly. Whose finger was this?

• 12:30Speaker 03

  Sure.

• 12:31Josh Clark?

  What, how did the finger get into the chili?

• 12:33Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 12:34Josh Clark?

  And then after that, who was this woman who, who found the finger in her chili? And the, so Wendy's really started to focus on the first two because, um, one thing that this whole, the way that this whole thing played out, the cops were very hands off at first. They felt this was a, a health department issue, a, a public health issue and not a police issue, and basically said, you need to go figure this out yourself, Wendy's. And so Wendy's had to do a lot of extra legwork that they probably wouldn't have had to do had the cops decided immediately that it was a criminal issue. But in the cops' defense, it didn't appear immediately to be a criminal issue. It appeared to be like a woman found a finger in her chili at Wendy's, and that's gross, so go figure it out, Wendy's.

• 13:20Speaker 03

  Yeah, uh, I also bet there was like one guy who literally ate, went to that specific Wendy's to get chili the next day.

• 13:26Josh Clark?

  Yeah.

• 13:27Speaker 03

  And was like, dude, that's the last place you're gonna find a finger in your chili now.

• 13:31Josh Clark?

  Right, yeah.

• 13:31Speaker 03

  Like, there's no way it would happen again. What are the chances?

• 13:34Josh Clark?

  Yeah, like flying on an airline right after they have a crash.

• 13:38Speaker 03

  He's like, you go to Burger King, you're gonna get a finger.

• 13:41Josh Clark?

  They're gonna purposely give you a finger, man. Don't be naive.

• 13:45Speaker 03

  All right. So did you introduce Police Chief Rob Davis yet?

• 13:49Josh Clark?

  Not yet.

• 13:49Speaker 03

  All right. So this is the guy, San Jose Police Chief, that would ultimately lead this investigation.

• 13:56Josh Clark?

  Later on, though, after Wendy's did a lot of the initial legwork for him.

• 14:00Speaker 03

  Yes, he would lead the investigation. And he, he basically was like, I gotta find out who this lady is. Because Wendy's, they're operating on the down low here. And this, this is a sort of a, and apparently this is, this case is taught in, in classes now about like how to handle a crisis as a corporation.

• 14:22Josh Clark?

  Yeah, I've seen, I've seen it criticized. I've also seen it held up as a, as an example of what to do, too.

• 14:28Speaker 03

  Well, I mean, here's what Wendy's can and can't do. What they can do is quietly throw a lot of money at this investigation on their own. And then publicly, what they can't do is, is start to go after this lady and be too sort of dismissive of this finger. Like, there's no way, lady. This lady's nuts. She's whatever. She's after money. Like, you can't do that as a public facing company. You have to be doing all your due diligence sort of quietly. And they really were.

• 14:58Josh Clark?

  They really were. So how, how about this, dude? Let's take a break and then we'll come back and we'll talk about the investigation that Wendy started. How about that?

• 15:05Speaker 03

  All right.

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• 17:00Josh Clark?

  All right, Chuck. So like you said, Wendy's can't just be like, that lady's a liar. There's no way that's our finger. They had to basically operate in the background. They couldn't appear like they were obstructing the police investigation. They couldn't appear like they were smearing Anna Ayala, especially because the early reports were very sympathetic to this woman, too. Everybody was very grossed out by this.

• 17:23Speaker 03

  Sure.

• 17:24Josh Clark?

  But at the same time, they had to deal with this issue and they had to get to the bottom of whose finger this was and where the finger came from.

• 17:31Speaker 03

  Yeah, and so the obvious first place to start is the restaurant itself. The employees there. The very obvious first place to start is to see if anyone was missing a finger.

• 17:42Josh Clark?

  Sure, and that's what they did. They said, "Show us your hands."

• 17:45Speaker 03

  Yeah, everyone looked at everyone's fingers. They were all there, and they went, "All right, so far, so good." They would eventually put everyone on staff through a polygraph test, which they all passed. They would, obviously, then they would go to up the supply chain.

• 18:01Josh Clark?

  Right.

• 18:01Speaker 03

  To see if this thing might have, because you know, these things happen.

• 18:06Josh Clark?

  Yeah, rarely they do, though.

• 18:07Speaker 03

  Well, I found five other cases of fingers in fast food.

• 18:11Josh Clark?

  That were legitimate?

• 18:12Speaker 03

  Oh, yeah.

• 18:13Josh Clark?

  Oh, wow.

• 18:13Speaker 03

  So it happens up the supply chain. You know, there can be an industrial accident that leaves a finger in a bag of lettuce greens or something. And that might eventually find its way to a Wendy's super bar.

• 18:26Josh Clark?

  Oh, my god.

• 18:27Speaker 03

  You know? Doesn't happen much. Like, I wouldn't be too freaked out.

• 18:32Josh Clark?

  I'm still freaked out.

• 18:33Speaker 03

  We'll go over those at the end.

• 18:36Speaker 03

  But they're going up the supply chain. They're really doing their due diligence. They can't find, they offer a reward at first of 50 grand, later 100 grand.

• 18:46Josh Clark?

  Well, they set up, yeah, a hotline for tips.

• 18:49Speaker 03

  But they're basically, as time is going on, becoming more and more confident that they did not have a finger in that chili.

• 18:57Josh Clark?

  Right.

• 18:57Speaker 03

  By their own fault.

• 18:59Josh Clark?

  They traced the chili ingredients to seven different suppliers, and they got documentation from all seven suppliers that nobody at their companies had suffered any kind of finger injury at any recent time. And also, like you said, no one at the store, no one at any of the nearby stores had suffered any finger injury, let alone an amputation. And so Wendy's was like, "This didn't come from us. This didn't come from inside our store." And they also, they kind of ran a simultaneous forensic investigation as well. They hired a woman named Dr. Lynn Bates, who's the CEO of a company called Alteca out of Manhattan, Kansas.

• 19:38Josh Clark?

  And if you are looking for evidence or study of a body part that was found in food, you go to Dr. Lynn S. Bates and Alteca, because they are, they engage in forensic. Food microscopy. That's what they do is their, that's their bread and butter is studying body parts found in food. And she'd been doing it since 1986. So Wendy's went to her and said, here is a piece of this finger. Was this finger cooked in this chili? Whose finger is it? She's like, I can't tell you whose finger it is, but I can tell you that there is no indication that this finger was cooked for three hours in chili at 170 degrees. It just wasn't.

• 20:21Josh Clark?

  So that was a, that combined with the Wendy's, no Wendy's employer or suppliers employers missing a finger, that told Wendy's everything they needed to know that they were being defrauded.

• 20:33Speaker 03

  Yeah, and you would think just grab a fingerprint police force. And they weren't able to. They weren't able to, they, they said if they had found a hand that they might, could literally look and compare fingerprints, but they, they didn't get a good enough print off it to, to do a legitimate database search.

• 20:52Josh Clark?

  Right, right. They just had to sit around and wait for that hand to show up.

• 20:56Speaker 03

  Cause that thing had been cooking in chili for three hours.

• 20:59Josh Clark?

  It had not been cooked in chili for three hours.

• 21:02Speaker 03

  That's right.

• 21:02Josh Clark?

  At any rate, so Wendy's knew what was going on. Now they had to go to the cops and say, we're being defrauded. Not only did they have the, the search for the missing finger investigation internally, and they hired Lynn Bates to, to do forensic work on the finger itself. They also hired a detective to start looking around at Anna Ayala. And the detective turned up some very interesting stuff about her.

• 21:31Speaker 03

  Yeah, he was like, wait a minute. This woman has filed at least 13 civil lawsuits, some against major corporations. And they, he probably could have stopped there. And Wendy's would have just been like, Dave Thomas from the grave would have said, see there?

• 21:48Speaker 03

  She's no good.

• 21:49Josh Clark?

  That's a good Dave Thomas impression. Although I think he would have said like, she should still get the benefit of the doubt.

• 21:55Speaker 03

  Oh, I don't know, man. When you've, when someone is this, has a pattern of litigious behaviors like this.

• 22:02Josh Clark?

  Well, maybe he finished with, prove me wrong.

• 22:06Speaker 03

  Uh, one, there were a couple of notable ones. Um, that it's, it's sort of frustratingly hard to find information. Um, she claimed that she won a $30,000 settlement from El Pollo Loco, from medical bills from her daughter getting sick from salmonella. El Pollo Loco has always been on record saying, never happened. We did not give that lady a dime.

• 22:28Josh Clark?

  Right.

• 22:29Speaker 03

  Uh, GM, she sued GM because the front wheel of her, her car came off and there was an accident. And, uh, that suit was dismissed with prejudice. Uh, when she fired her lawyer was a no show in court.

• 22:43Josh Clark?

  Oh, is that what that means?

• 22:44Speaker 03

  No, no, no. With prejudice means you can't bring it back.

• 22:48Josh Clark?

  Oh, okay.

• 22:49Speaker 03

  So you can't, she can't say, well, like, well, I didn't show up and my lawyer was bad, so let's do this again.

• 22:54Josh Clark?

  Okay, I got you, I got you.

• 22:55Speaker 03

  So basically it was dead in the water. So she sued a former employer for sexual harassment. I'm not even going to comment on that one because I have no idea. That could very well have been legitimate.

• 23:07Josh Clark?

  That one struck me as possibly legitimate, but she dropped it.

• 23:10Speaker 03

  Right. She lawyered up immediately with the Chili Finger and everything made, uh, Chief Rob Davis very suspicious. Uh, and then this, this guy that lived with, uh, her family named Ken Bono or Bono. What did you say, Bono?

• 23:29Josh Clark?

  I've been saying Bono. It hasn't even occurred to me. It could be Bono.

• 23:33Speaker 03

  Ken Bono?

• 23:33Josh Clark?

  Maybe it's related to Bono.

• 23:35Speaker 03

  Ken Bono, because the cops are starting to ask questions at this point. They do official investigations. They search her house. She claims that they held a gun to her head, ransacked her home and like abused her daughter.

• 23:49Speaker 03

  Which is quite a charge for a finger chili house investigation.

• 23:54Josh Clark?

  There's a picture of her and her daughter in the driveway, talking to a reporter and her daughter's got like her arm in a sling, but like the kind of sling you just go buy at the, at the drugstore.

• 24:04Speaker 03

  Yeah. So this was a guy who lived, Bono, lived with their family. And when he's being investigated by the cops, he said that this finger came from our aunt, our deceased aunt, it's her finger.

• 24:22Josh Clark?

  Right, which is a weird thing to say, especially because Anna Iola said, "All of my aunts are alive." I don't know what this guy's talking about, even though he lives in my house.

• 24:30Speaker 03

  Yeah, what was he, was he trying to get money?

• 24:33Josh Clark?

  I don't know.

• 24:34Speaker 03

  That's the part I can't figure out.

• 24:35Josh Clark?

  I couldn't find much on that guy. I don't know what the deal was. I also just saw references to a rumor that the media had been reporting on that it was her dead aunt's finger. So I didn't see how it came from him or what he was trying to do with that, but that's, that was a thing. But that was just kind of like a little side thread that I think also made the cops a little more suspicious too. Like, that's just a weird thing to say, even jokingly.

• 25:00Speaker 03

  Yeah, but they did actually get, while it didn't lead to the, uh, whose finger it was, that tip line did yield some stuff at first, right?

• 25:07Josh Clark?

  So, yeah, so like you said, Wendy set up a tip line, a hotline that you could call in. And what they were looking for specifically, ostensibly was whose finger it was. That's what they wanted information, the owner of the finger. But they were taking any and all tips that people called in. And they started offering 50 grand, like you said, they later upped it to 100 grand. And it started to yield some tips, like pretty, pretty much off the bat. I think the San Jose Police, and Wendy's is funneling this information to the cops as it comes in, like as good tips come in. But two very early on came in, from what the San Jose Police said, there were two different people who supposedly did not know each other,

• 25:49Josh Clark?

  who told very similar stories about how Anna Iola had told them that she was fleecing Wendy's, that all of this was just a fraud for money, to extort money from Wendy's in a lawsuit. So that...

• 26:03Josh Clark?

  That combined with all the evidence that Wendy's had gathered that it, the finger had not come from inside their store. All of Anna Iola's background, all of that put together, really turned the tide, not just on the police investigation, but also on the media against Anna Iola. And she had started this, she had created a huge media circus around this issue. Like, she went on Good Morning America, and I could not find it. I think Good Morning America just took the video down.

• 26:36Speaker 03

  Probably just burned it.

• 26:38Josh Clark?

  Because she just went on and lied, lied, lied, through her teeth about what had happened, and just pointed at Wendy's and said, like, "These guys screwed up, and this is the most disgusting thing that could happen to somebody, and I'm torn up inside about it, and they should pay." On, on national news about a week after the incident.

• 27:03Speaker 03

  Yeah, so, like you said, this is all playing out pretty quickly. It's all over the news, it's all over late night talk show comedy. Just bad joke after bad joke coming out of Jay Leno's mouth. I won't even repeat the one that Ed included.

• 27:16Josh Clark?

  I liked the Letterman one. Did you see Letterman's?

• 27:19Speaker 03

  What was his?

• 27:20Josh Clark?

  Said that she'd been spotted going back at Wendy's and ordering chili again because she was going back to collect all five.

• 27:27Speaker 03

  That's good.

• 27:28Josh Clark?

  Yeah, you gotta give it up for Letterman.

• 27:30Speaker 03

  What, what was Leno's? Something about him...

• 27:32Josh Clark?

  They, they don't, the chili now comes with fingernail clippers. The side of fingernail clippers.

• 27:38Speaker 03

  And that really just encapsulate, encapsulates the difference between those two men.

• 27:42Josh Clark?

  It does.

• 27:43Speaker 03

  Although they have their joke writers, but still.

• 27:45Josh Clark?

  The love of cars, I think, is also a big differentiator.

• 27:48Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 27:49Josh Clark?

  I don't think Letterman really cares about cars.

• 27:51Speaker 03

  Shout out to Brian Kylie and Rob Cutner.

• 27:54Josh Clark?

  Shout out to the midnight... 90s Letterman book of top 10 lists that helped shape me as a human being.

• 28:00Speaker 03

  Brian and Rob are Conan O'Brien's monologue joke writers and have been for many, many years.

• 28:05Josh Clark?

  Did I tell you, Yumi and I went to see Conan O'Brien live with Ron Funches and a couple of other people.

• 28:12Speaker 03

  Yeah, was that good?

• 28:13Josh Clark?

  Do some stand. It was so good. And we actually, it turned out, we were sitting next to a member of the S Y S K Army throughout the show.

• 28:20Speaker 03

  Oh, no way.

• 28:21Josh Clark?

  Yeah. He was like, are you Josh and Yumi? We were like, yeah. He was a good guy, good kid.

• 28:26Speaker 03

  Yumi was like, I'm Yumi, but that's not Josh.

• 28:28Josh Clark?

  Right.

• 28:29Speaker 03

  He's like, well, that's weird.

• 28:30Josh Clark?

  I'm suspicious now.

• 28:32Speaker 03

  All right. Where were we? All right. It's all over the news. This is all playing out very fast, but the, the dragnet is sort of closing in. Thanks to Wendy's investigations, thanks to the cops getting involved, and Ms. Ayala is starting to feel the heat. And like anyone who, and I think the cat's out of the bag now, right?

• 28:55Josh Clark?

  I think it was.

• 28:55Speaker 03

  She put the finger in the chili.

• 28:57Josh Clark?

  Yeah.

• 28:57Speaker 03

  Anytime someone does something like that, it seems like two things happen. They brag to their friends.

• 29:02Josh Clark?

  Yep.

• 29:02Speaker 03

  Cause they're dummies to begin with. And then that net starts to close and it all starts to fall apart.

• 29:08Josh Clark?

  Right. So her response, and this is a pretty human response. She basically said, once the media spotlight went from sympathetic to her to, wait a minute, who are you again? And how do you explain this thing and that thing and all this? She, she was like,

• 29:24Speaker 03

  Never mind.

• 29:24Josh Clark?

  Yeah. It's basically what she said. She said, you know, I can't handle this media spotlight or anything anymore. So I'm just going to drop my lawsuit against Wendy's and we'll just forget all about this.

• 29:34Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 29:34Josh Clark?

  And Wendy said, no, we're not going to just forget all about this.

• 29:39Speaker 03

  No, of course not.

• 29:40Josh Clark?

  Let's take a break, shall we?

• 29:41Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 29:42Josh Clark?

  We're going to take a break.

• 29:58Josh Clark?

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• 31:39Josh Clark?

  So I can't, surely when Ana Ayala was like, okay, I'm just going to drop the lawsuit and this will go away. There had to only have been maybe one and a quarter percent of her brain that thought that that was actually going to work, that it was actually going to go away. She seems like streetwise and savvy enough to me that, that she knew it probably wasn't just going to go away, that that was nothing but hope, right?

• 32:05Speaker 03

  I guess.

• 32:06Josh Clark?

  I'm curious about that.

• 32:09Speaker 03

  Yeah, I don't know, man. But like, the more that they poke into her private life, then you learn that she and her husband, James Placencia, had, there was a, and this was hard to get information on too. From what I can tell is, they sold a trailer. A trailer park trailer that did not belong to them.

• 32:31Josh Clark?

  Yes, for $11,000, she did specifically. I don't know that he was involved. He may have even owned the trailer. But regardless, she did not own the trailer, sold it to a woman for $11,000. And later on, the woman and her children were evicted from the trailer that they thought they owned that they didn't own.

• 32:52Speaker 03

  Yes, they also learned that her husband, I guess from a previous marriage, owed a lot of money in child support. And so things are starting to fall into place to where they're like, this lady is always making up stories and suing companies. She's always looking for that get rich angle. Her husband owes a ton of money.

• 33:12Josh Clark?

  400K.

• 33:13Speaker 03

  And so this is all sorting, they're starting to finger her, if you will, for this crime.

• 33:22Speaker 03

  It's the worst pun ever.

• 33:23Josh Clark?

  We all, I thought we were gonna make it through this, but no. I've even been saying tip line about the finger and just ignoring it. I know you did. But okay, all right, it's done. It's out there.

• 33:34Speaker 03

  So they finally, like you said, even though she was like, oh, let's just forget about it. They're like, no, no, no, we can't do that. And then there enters a lady that just kind of, and it didn't end up having the hugest impact on the case itself. But it is worth mentioning, this woman named Sandy Allman. This is a little strange. So this is a woman who owned exotic cats.

• 33:58Josh Clark?

  Big cats.

• 33:59Speaker 03

  Leopards, Jaguars, Tigers, I think.

• 34:03Josh Clark?

  Is that how we're saying Jaguars now?

• 34:05Speaker 03

  Jaguar?

• 34:06Josh Clark?

  Yeah. Wow.

• 34:08Speaker 03

  It's how the Brit says it on the commercial.

• 34:10Josh Clark?

  Is it a year end sales event up in here?

• 34:12Speaker 03

  Yeah, the Jaguar X12.

• 34:16Speaker 03

  So this lady owns these big cats.

• 34:19Speaker 03

  This is not too far from Vegas where she lives in Paramore, Nevada, I guess. Or is it California, on the California side, do you know?

• 34:26Josh Clark?

  I think it's Nevada.

• 34:27Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 34:28Josh Clark?

  I don't know, actually, now that you mention it.

• 34:29Speaker 03

  And she eventually, I guess, has to get rid of these cats and calls in a rescue group that does things like this. They're like, we're a wild animal orphanage and you're a dumb dumb who bought all these animals you shouldn't have had. So now we will deal with it. And during this transfer of animals, she's attacked by a spotted leopard. And it bites off her finger.

• 34:49Josh Clark?

  Yes.

• 34:50Speaker 03

  And she says, she comes forward and says, I think that is my finger.

• 34:53Josh Clark?

  No, no, I think actually a person who was at the wildlife rescue at the time was the one who called the tip line with that one.

• 35:01Speaker 03

  Oh, I thought, because she wanted to take a DNA test and everything.

• 35:04Josh Clark?

  Oh, I didn't see that. Okay, all right, cool. So she's the one who called and said, that's my finger?

• 35:09Speaker 03

  Well, she wanted, I don't know if she literally picked up the phone and called. But she got involved such that she wanted to take a DNA test to find out if that was her finger.

• 35:18Josh Clark?

  Gotcha. Okay, cool, cool. Well, yeah, because she had said that the last time she'd seen it, it was on ice in the emergency room. So I guess she wasn't the sentimental type who's like, I want my finger back.

• 35:29Speaker 03

  Would you?

• 35:30Josh Clark?

  Oh, yeah.

• 35:31Speaker 03

  Float it in formaldehyde?

• 35:32Josh Clark?

  Yumi would probably have that thing gilded and wear it around her neck.

• 35:36Speaker 03

  Oh.

• 35:37Josh Clark?

  Yeah, I'd be like, that's my finger on Yumi's neck, check it out.

• 35:42Josh Clark?

  But so the whole thing was just a red herring, though, a blind alley, right? Like, it went nowhere.

• 35:48Speaker 03

  No, it was not her finger.

• 35:49Josh Clark?

  No. There were some other tips that came in about the finger. The Mexican authorities, I guess, just over the border got involved because it was rumored that an incident with a ranch hand, losing a finger in Mexico, had been the source of the finger.

• 36:09Josh Clark?

  Even as Anna Ayala, who, by the way, that whole tip about the trailer sale, the trailer scam, that came in from Wendy's hotline as well.

• 36:19Speaker 03

  Oh, really?

• 36:19Josh Clark?

  Mm-hmm. By this time, I believe it was day 22? No, I'm sorry, it was day... Thirty, thirty-two, I believe, about a month after the incident originally happened. Anna Ayala and Jamie Palencia, Plensencia, her husband, were both arrested in Las Vegas. Him for the child support payments, failure to pay child support, her for that trailer scam. And so while they're on ice in Las Vegas, Wendy's is still conducting this investigation. San Jose are still conducting this investigation. And they've got them. They have them on this other stuff, but I guess they just kind of kept them from running,

• 37:01Josh Clark?

  and that's why they arrested them, knowing that they were eventually going to build the case. I'm not sure, but that's exactly what happened because I think about fifty-two days after she walked into that Wendy's and put the finger in the chili and took that bite, they charged them for grand theft, for basically defrauding Wendy's.

• 37:20Speaker 03

  Yeah, and at this point, as far as the police were concerned, they're like, we don't even need to know whose finger this is at this point.

• 37:28Josh Clark?

  Right.

• 37:28Speaker 03

  Like, that's really immaterial. But Wendy's, they still have a public relations crisis going on. And they're like, we really would like to find out where this finger came from, just so like, as many facts out there as possible will really help us restore our good name.

• 37:46Josh Clark?

  Right.

• 37:46Speaker 03

  If we can actually pinpoint whose finger this is and exactly how this happened and let everybody know what went on.

• 37:53Josh Clark?

  Yeah, so they actually, that's when they up the reward from fifty thousand to a hundred thousand, right?

• 38:00Speaker 03

  That's right.

• 38:00Josh Clark?

  And that's when they hit the jackpot, which is ironically, they got two callers on the hundred thousand dollar line.

• 38:08Speaker 03

  Go ahead, caller, you're on the one hundred thousand dollar chili finger line.

• 38:13Josh Clark?

  And then for the next thirty seconds, like, hello, am I on? Can you hear me?

• 38:17Speaker 03

  Yes, you're on, you're on.

• 38:18Josh Clark?

  Am I on?

• 38:19Speaker 03

  Go ahead, caller.

• 38:20Josh Clark?

  Am I live right now? So they call, the two people called, one to this day, as far as I can tell, has remained anonymous. The other one was a guy named Mike Casey. And Mike Casey owned a company called Lamb Asphalt out of Las Vegas, Nevada. And he happened to be the employer of Jamie Plensencia.

• 38:41Speaker 03

  That's right.

• 38:42Josh Clark?

  And he said, it's weird because you arrested one of my employees, one of my longtime employees, for this scam. And I also have another employee named Brian Rossiter, who lost- Lost a finger not too long ago, and I think they might be connected. I think that might be Brian Rossiter's finger.

• 39:00Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 39:01Josh Clark?

  And that's how the whole thing finally came crashing down because they got a hold of Brian Rossiter. They got a, they gave him a DNA test. They matched it to the DNA taken from the finger. And they said, it's Brian Rossiter's finger. Brian Rossiter worked with Jamie Pl- Placencia. Jamie Placencia was married to Anna Ayala. Anna Ayala found a finger in her chili. Ipsos facto, something's rotten in Denmark and that's how it stands.

• 39:28Speaker 03

  Yeah, and it's even a little weirder when you find out the details. So Brian is at work. Someone slams the tailgate of the truck on his hand, cuts an inch and a half off of his finger.

• 39:39Josh Clark?

  Can you imagine?

• 39:41Speaker 03

  No, dude. No. Cuts off his finger and it's funny too, because Ed points out, instead of like driving to the hospital, which is what any normal person would have done, he had owed Placencia some money. Placencia, and this is a man, a husband of a woman who, and it seems like they're both always looking to scam somebody.

• 40:05Josh Clark?

  They're looking for the angle.

• 40:06Speaker 03

  He sees this finger and he goes, hey, you owe me money. Some people say it was 50 bucks. We don't know for sure.

• 40:13Josh Clark?

  I saw a hundred almost everywhere.

• 40:14Speaker 03

  Okay, so let's say it's a hundred.

• 40:16Josh Clark?

  Okay.

• 40:16Speaker 03

  He's like, you give me that, that finger and we'll just call it square. And not only that, my friend, but if you ever hear about this finger in the news, keep it quiet and I will give you a quarter of a million dollars at some point in the future.

• 40:33Josh Clark?

  Yep. That's what they call the carrot and the other carrot.

• 40:37Speaker 03

  Yeah. So he said, just drip some blood on this roof shingle and that will be our contract.

• 40:44Josh Clark?

  Right. Right. Right. It's a sign X with your stub, your bloody stub.

• 40:48Speaker 03

  This old used roof shingle.

• 40:49Josh Clark?

  I saw, actually I saw that he did go to the hospital and Came back to the work site with his amputated finger and that's when Jamie Plazensio was like, hey, hey.

• 40:57Speaker 03

  I'm sure he did.

• 40:58Josh Clark?

  What are you gonna do with that?

• 40:59Speaker 03

  Any sense at all?

• 41:00Josh Clark?

  Yeah.

• 41:01Speaker 03

  That he would just be like, wait a minute.

• 41:02Josh Clark?

  So they, so, so Brian Rossiter gives him his finger and that's where the whole thing began. Just a couple of months before, right?

• 41:11Speaker 03

  Yeah, and I think didn't, didn't Rossiter himself also call the tip line?

• 41:15Josh Clark?

  I didn't see that anywhere.

• 41:17Speaker 03

  Okay, I heard he called the tip line himself because he knew at this point he was getting no money out of the scam, so he thought, let me try and get this hundred grand at least.

• 41:27Josh Clark?

  Right.

• 41:27Speaker 03

  And Wendy's never would cop to whether or not he got any tip line money.

• 41:31Josh Clark?

  Right, and so Mike Casey, the guy who from all, from everything, it seems he was innocent of this. He just happened to put two and two together because he knew the guys. He said originally, hey, you know, my asphalt company maintains the lots of a few Wendy's around here and they've always been good to me, so I wanted to help out. That was an article in May. An article in September is Mike Casey saying, you know, Wendy's never paid me that money for the hotline. So I don't know if he ever got it, but from what I saw, he was gonna have to split it with the one other anonymous caller. I don't know if that was Brian Rossiter or not, maybe Brian Rossiter was scared that Jamie Plazensio might do something if he found out that he had been, he had tipped him off or what.

• 42:15Josh Clark?

  But supposedly Mike Casey and this anonymous caller were going to split that hundred grand. So whether Wendy's actually paid that money or not, that remains to be seen. I don't know, I didn't see that anywhere.

• 42:27Speaker 03

  Well, in the end, Ayala and her husband, she got sentenced to nine years. He got sentenced to 12, because I think they piled on him for the, probably child support, right? Or was it the trailer scam?

• 42:40Josh Clark?

  Yeah, he, no, he got three and a third years for the, the, the child support thing.

• 42:47Speaker 03

  Okay. I don't know how long he actually served, I think she only served about four of that nine. She later revealed some more details, including that she did cook the finger. So apparently was not a, it wasn't a raw finger, nor though was it cooked in 170 degree chili for three hours.

• 43:10Josh Clark?

  Right.

• 43:10Speaker 03

  But it was cooked a little bit. I think she just literally probably put it in a pan and was thinking like, oh, wait a minute. I bet, I bet they didn't think I would think of this.

• 43:20Josh Clark?

  Right.

• 43:22Speaker 03

  And cooked up the finger a little bit.

• 43:23Josh Clark?

  One thing that she didn't think of though Chuck was she didn't bite the finger. And they found out pretty quickly through forensic investigation that there was no bite in the finger.

• 43:33Speaker 03

  Nor did she throw up in the restaurant like she said she did because there were people in the restaurant that were like, no. She didn't vomit that I saw and employees were like, no, she didn't throw up that I saw.

• 43:44Josh Clark?

  Her father-in-law and mother-in-law both said that they saw her throw up. But yeah, there was no evidence of vomit anywhere in the bathroom or around her table or anything.

• 43:54Speaker 03

  Yeah, and they did a pretty bad job.

• 43:57Josh Clark?

  Yeah, they did. I was gonna use a nasty word to characterize it, but I, it's the family show. So.

• 44:04Speaker 03

  Well, these are the worst kind of people, man. These litigious, like, just like work for your money, man. Going around suing corporations.

• 44:15Josh Clark?

  I know, so.

• 44:16Speaker 03

  So mad.

• 44:16Josh Clark?

  Wendy supposedly lost 2.5 million dollars in verifiable lost money. They had to cut people's hours. This is another thing that kind of gets left off a lot. They had to cut the hours of the employees in the Bay Area in particular because there was such little foot traffic coming through their stores. So when they were convicted and sentenced, Jamie Placencia and Anna Ayala were sentenced to pay back 170,000 plus dollars in lost wages to the Wendy's employees. Oh, and they were also ordered to pay 500,000 to J E M management who owned the Wendy's.

• 44:57Josh Clark?

  And then like another, another substantial amount to Wendy's if they ever profited from the crime.

• 45:02Speaker 03

  Man, bad people. She was banned from Wendy's, which I don't know how you enforce that.

• 45:08Josh Clark?

  Yeah, I was wondering that myself, actually. It seems. Like, I don't know if there's, every Wendy's has a picture of her or something like that?

• 45:16Speaker 03

  I know at sports stadiums, they do that when people are banned. And that is a little more enforceable, because like, you can literally just have everyone be aware of that person that's like checking tickets and things, but you can't, how can you keep someone from coming into any Wendy's anywhere?

• 45:30Josh Clark?

  I don't know. They can try, at least. They can send a message by saying, "You can't come here any longer."

• 45:38Speaker 03

  Arby's, two fingers, 2004, 2012?

• 45:42Josh Clark?

  No.

• 45:43Speaker 03

  Kohl's Frozen Custard in Wilmington, North Carolina, finger, 2005.

• 45:47Josh Clark?

  Oh, man.

• 45:48Speaker 03

  TGI Friday's hamburger had a finger in 2006.

• 45:52Josh Clark?

  Wow.

• 45:53Speaker 03

  And those are all verified, and they found, you know, like, it was in the supply chain, like, someone lost a finger and it got mixed in, and it's very, just very unfortunate. I'm sure there was quiet settlements on those.

• 46:05Josh Clark?

  I'm sure, too. It's bizarre. I had no idea that that happened. I thought it was almost always either a case of mistaken identity, or a hoax. I didn't realize that actually really happened, you know?

• 46:16Speaker 03

  Oh, yeah.

• 46:18Josh Clark?

  Well, that's the Wendy's Chili Finger caper. If you ever wanted to know about it, now you do. And we're glad that you do. We're glad we're the ones that told you. If you want to know more about it, go read contemporary articles at the time. It's awesome just to see something like that unfold. It's so cool. And since I said that, it's time for the listener mail.

• 46:40Speaker 03

  And hey, shout out to Wendy's. I'm sure, I don't know if they like people still talking about this or not, but they did not put a finger in anyone's chili.

• 46:48Josh Clark?

  Yeah, good point.

• 46:49Speaker 03

  Just wanted to make that clear.

• 46:50Josh Clark?

  Good point.

• 46:52Speaker 03

  All right, I'm gonna call this Adidas Puma. "Hey, guys, just finished listening to the feud between Adi and Rudy Dasler. Wanted to say I really enjoyed it. My dad is actually from Herzoginnerach. We were an Adidas family."

• 47:07Speaker 03

  Through and through, and my godmother, Aunt Helga, worked for Adidas as an administrative assistant for years. In addition to this, I almost jumped out of my seat when you mentioned the mayor of Herzog. You spoke of Dr. Germain Hocker and how he refereed a soccer match wearing one Adidas shoe and one Puma. My Uncle Hans was the mayor right before Hocker was.

• 47:25Josh Clark?

  Oh, cool.

• 47:26Speaker 03

  Yeah, I knew you wouldn't be referring to him because he wouldn't have been caught dead in even one Puma because of my aunt's work at the opposing shop. I didn't wear Puma gear myself until I was grown and could buy it myself, and my entire German family called me a traitor. And this was in the early 2000s, so the tension is still real.

• 47:45Josh Clark?

  Wow.

• 47:46Speaker 03

  I'm sure it was lighthearted, at least I hope it was.

• 47:48Josh Clark?

  Okay.

• 47:48Speaker 03

  In any case, I just want to let you know your research was spot on. Really love hearing about something I knew a little bit about. By the way, I also use your show in my classroom, teaching 12th grade government and civics, and the kids love it.

• 48:00Josh Clark?

  Nice.

• 48:00Speaker 03

  So shout out to Jennifer Westner Gajo at Thompson Stations, Tennessee, and your senior government class.

• 48:11Josh Clark?

  Well, thank you, Ms. Gajo and class.

• 48:14Speaker 03

  That's probably not pronounced right.

• 48:16Josh Clark?

  Gajo?

• 48:17Speaker 03

  I have no idea.

• 48:18Josh Clark?

  Gauchogenev?

• 48:20Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 48:21Josh Clark?

  Gancho Ginev, that's what it is. If you want to get in touch with us to say hi about an old episode or for whatever reason, you can go on to stuffyoushouldknow.com, check out our social media links, and you can also send us an email to [email protected].

• 48:42Speaker 04

  Stuff You Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.

• 48:58Josh Clark?

  Buy smart, drive for less, and trade for more. That's Toyota affordability, and it starts with a great deal on an off-road-ready Tacoma or half-ton Tundra, two of Toyota's longest-lasting trucks, combining power for work, tech for adventures, and style in between. And they're built on a reputation for quality and reliability, which is why Toyota trucks are known for holding their value, which could mean big savings when it's time for your next Toyota. So get a great deal today and a great value tomorrow. Shop toyota.com for more. Toyota, let's go places.

• 49:30Speaker 05

  In military families, service is more than a job. It's a legacy. At American Military University, that legacy can help open new doors through education. If someone in your family served in the military, you could be eligible for reduced tuition. Take the next step with flexible online programs built for real life. Learn more at amu.apus.edu/military.

• 49:53Speaker 00

  This is an iHeart Podcast. Guaranteed Human.