Mike Burton Murder Case: Richard Diamond, Private Detective (July 5, 1950)

“Mike Burton Murder Case” is an episode of Richard Diamond, Private Detective, the old-time radio show, first broadcast July 5, 1950. Listen free on Stupid Potato.

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What happens

When a wrestler named Tobias Briggs hires private detective Richard Diamond to investigate the death of his friend Mike Burton—a truck driver killed in a supposed hit-and-run accident—Diamond discovers a connection to the Cross-State Trucking Company. His investigation uncovers a smuggling operation using hollowed-out baseball bats to transport stolen jewels, run by the company's owner Harry Fenner and driver Roy Cooley, who feared Mike would expose their scheme.

A city with a trucking company warehouse, gym, police precinct, and Fenner's Long Island colonial house

Characters: Richard Diamond, Tobias Briggs, Mike Burton, Roy Cooley, Harry Fenner, Patty Dablonsky, Tim Lasko, Lieutenant Walt Levinson

Listen for: The clever use of hollowed baseball bats as smuggling containers, Richard Diamond's witty interior monologue, the physical confrontation between Toby and the criminals, and the resolution revealing Mike's involvement with the smuggling operation

Written from the episode itself; it never gives away the ending. Every recording is remastered for the stream: cleaned of rumble, hiss and mains hum (and the old TV whine where we found it), then levelled in two passes to steady broadcast loudness, so one show is never quieter than the next.