We use cookies and other tracking technologies to enhance your browsing experience. If you continue to use our site, you agree to the use of such cookies. For more info, see our privacy policy.
Skip to main content

Hi. We love you. Be our Life Partner.

Support the show to get ad-free listening, bonus content, and our new Greatest Hits Archive.

Learn more
This American Life Partners logo
00:00
00:00
  • Transcript
  • Share
This American Life
  • Life Partners
  • How to Listen
  • Episodes
  • Recommended
  • About
    • Overview
    • Staff
    • Announcements
    • Fellowships
    • Jobs
    • Music
    • Make Radio
    • On The Road
    • FAQ
    • Submissions
    • Merch
    • Contact Us
    • Our Other Shows
  • Merch
  • Follow Us
  • Life Partners
Full episode
473: Loopholes
Act One

Death Takes a Policy

  • Subscribe on Spotify Subscribe in Apple Podcasts
  • Transcript

An estate attorney in Rhode Island discovers the investor's Holy Grail: a financial scheme that guarantees only reward and no risk. All upside with no downside. The only catch? You have to die in order to get the money. But there's a loophole! Alex Blumberg from Planet Money and Jake Bernstein from ProPublica tell the story of how the attorney, Joseph Caramadre, figured out how to get someone else to die instead.

For a more detailed version of this story plus graphics, documents, video excerpts of the depositions, and a way for you to weigh in on whether it's acceptable to profit from the death of strangers, visit ProPublica's website.

By

Alex Blumberg

Song:

“Sign It on the Dotted Line” by Caravan

More in Death

View all
808: The Rest of the Story
Aug. 18, 2023

Act Two: Oh Mother Where Art Thou?

Contributor Samuel James thought he knew what happened to his mother.
793: The Problem with Ghosts
Mar. 10, 2023

Act Three: Seance Fiction

In the 1920s, at the height of the Spiritualism movement, a friendship blossomed between two men with opposing views on the topic: Harry Houdini and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.
779: Ends of the Earth
Sept. 16, 2022

Act One: Exit Strategy

Amy Bloom tells the story of her husband, Brian, getting Alzheimer's and wanting assisted suicide.

More by Alex Blumberg

View all
714: Day at the Beach
Aug. 14, 2020

Act Two: Beach Doctor

Alex Blumberg talks to Shane Dubow about a time decades ago, when Shane went sea kayaking and camping with his friends on the beach in Baja California, Mexico.
605: Kid Logic
Dec. 16, 2016

Act Four: When Small Thoughts Meet Big Brains

Alex Blumberg investigates a little-studied phenomenon: Children who get a mistaken idea in their heads about how something works or what something means, and then don't figure out until well into adulthood that they were wrong.
527: 180 Degrees
June 13, 2014

Act One: Seeing the Forrest For the Little Trees

Alex Blumberg takes us to an American classroom where students are reading a classic, The Education of Little Tree, by Forrest Carter.
This American Life

This American Life is produced in collaboration with WBEZ Chicago and delivered to stations by PRX The Public Radio Exchange.

  • How to Listen
  • Episodes
  • Recommended
  • About
    • Overview
    • Staff
    • Announcements
    • Fellowships
    • Jobs
    • Music
    • Make Radio
    • On The Road
    • FAQ
    • Submissions
    • Merch
    • Contact Us
    • Our Other Shows
  • Merch
  • Contact
  • Life Partners
  • Serial
  • S-Town
© 1995 - 2025 This American Life Privacy Policy | Terms of Use

Share

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Email

Subscribe

  • on Spotify
  • in Apple Podcasts

Share

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Email