Death Defying

RISK! - RISK!

In this episode of 'Risk!', titled 'Death Defying', comedian Dave Hill recounts his nerve-wracking trip to Saltillo, Mexico, where he visited his friend Bob Coogan—a Catholic priest serving as chaplain in

Key takeaways

• Facing personal fears through extreme experiences can be therapeutic despite high risks.

Main topics

• Personal risk-taking and mental health
• Life in a high-security Mexican prison

Notable quotes

"If anything happens, you won't care because you'll be dead." – Dave Hill's brother on his trip to Mexico.

Conclusion

Dave Hill's journey into one of Mexico's most dangerous prisons reveals how confronting fear head-on—through

Transcript preview

Speaker 7 (0:03) Welcome to the I Can't Sleep Podcast with Benjamin Boster. If you're tired of sleepless nights, you'll love the I Can't Sleep Podcast. I help quiet your mind by reading random articles from across the web to bore you to sleep with my soothing voice. Each episode provides enough interesting content to hold your attention, and then your mind lets you drift off. Speaker 7 (0:37) Find it wherever you get your podcasts. That's I Can't Sleep with Benjamin Boster. Did Speaker 8 (0:58) you ever wonder what it's like to live alone, hidden in the woods, not speaking to a single soul for 30 years? or wander the desert, uncover a hidden well, and dive to the bottom of the deepest waterhole for 2,000 miles. The Snap Judgment Podcast takes you there with amazing stories told by the people who live them with an original soundscape that drops you directly into their shoes. Snap Judgment. Listen and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. Speaker 8 (1:36) Fear is the virus is trending on TikTok. Vaccines are poison. Then your yoga teacher says that sex traffic children are being sacrificed by satanic liberals. But it's all okay. The great awakening is coming. What is happening? Every week on Conspirituality Podcast, we explore the fever dreams that suck friends, family, and wellness gurus down the right-wing cult spiral in a search for salvation. Speaker 7 (2:07) What happens when two people who grew up in a very strange corner of Los Angeles look back and realize just how bizarre their Speaker 1 (2:14) upbringings really were? They start a podcast, of course. I'm Ashley Johnson. And I'm Taliesin Jaffe. Before we became the internet people we are today, we spent our childhoods as working actors, appearing in shows like Growing Pains and films like Mr. Mom. In our podcast, Speaker 7 (2:30) Weird Kids, we're diving deep into our unique upbringings, our friendship with each other, and all the delightfully odd interests we still carry with us today. In Speaker 1 (2:39) each episode, we get to share stories of our youth, the things that bring us joy, the problems that we face, and occasionally, the friends we've collected along the way. If Speaker 7 (2:48) you're a misfit, an outcast, or just a weirdo who loves all things nostalgic and unconventional, come take a seat at our table. Speaker 1 (2:55) Each week, we'll be releasing previously members-only episodes on YouTube and all major podcast platforms. with new episodes dropping exclusively and ad-free on Beacon.tv. Speaker 6 (3:06) Hey guys, this is Kevin. On this episode, you'll hear Dave Hill. Speaker 5 (3:13) He's like, well, people drive along that highway and shoot people in front of the prison. Speaker 2 (3:18) And I was like, Bob, I was just in front of the prison for like 20 minutes. Now Speaker 6 (3:24) here's the show. Speaker 6 (3:28) Hey folks, this is Kevin in 2026 here to let you know that this episode you're about to hear was first released in May of 2014. Enjoy. Speaker 6 (3:52) Hello kids, this is Risk, the show where people tell true stories they never thought they'd dare to share. I'm Kevin Allison and this is Pottington Bear, behind me now, calling this week's episode Death Defying. And you know the stakes are high when we're using that kind of language up in here. In just a bit, we are going to hear from Risk fan Chelsea Hostetter, who contacted us with a story she wanted to share. But before that, a favorite of ours, Dave Hill from a recent Risk Live show in New York City. This is Dave Hill with a story we call Holiday in the Sun. Speaker 2 (4:52) Incredible. Speaker 5 (4:53) Thank you. Thank you. I guess, like a lot of performers and a lot of people in general, I have a lot of anxiety and neuroses and things like that. Speaker 1 (5:05) And Speaker 5 (5:05) over the last couple of years, I've figured out if I do things to like scare the shit out of myself, it's like really ends up being really helpful. And I don't mean like jumping out of an airplane or any of that bullshit. But like... like really scary stuff. Like I've started doing shows in prisons. Like I did a show, do you know Sing Sing Prison? It's Speaker 2 (5:27) a very prison Speaker 5 (5:28) -y prison. Speaker 2 (5:30) And so, I mean, I started doing comedy shows in there. Because, I mean, you can see, I've been out here for a couple of years, you can see how, oh, that might be not the best idea. So, but I, you know, in the Speaker 5 (5:42) anticipation, I would just be freaking out that I'd do it and I'd feel better afterwards. About a year ago, there was an article in the New York Times Magazine about a friend of mine, Bob Coogan, who I knew from, I went to Fordham in the Bronx, and he was on the staff there working in campus ministry, which is sort of, you know, they just kind of help out the students with whatever. And he was always really great to me, and we became friends, and I lost track of him since I got out of college. And it turned out... He had become a priest later in life. In his 40s, he became a priest, a Catholic priest. And, you know, in America, Catholic priests, it's like, oh, you go work at a university or, like, a suburban church or whatever. But he was in Mexico, but not like the fun in the sun, Margarita, Mexico, like northern Mexico, like... murdery, rapey, cut your head off with a machete in Mexico. So this article is talking about this and he got a job as the chaplain at a prison in Mexico. And this particular prison, the cartel guys, which is the gang, the bad, very negative group of people at the prison. They murdered the warden at the prison a couple years ago, and the Mexican government, always on top of things, they were just like, well, Speaker 2 (7:05) it sounds like you guys got this one covered. You guys run the prison. We'll just be out on the outside. If you need us, let us know. And so this is the prison, and he's like, I'm getting the fuck out of here. But the bishop was like, no, Bob, you should stay. And he's like, oh, thanks. So anyway, so my... And this story Speaker 5 (7:25) in the Times Magazine is all about my friend Bob and how he works in this crazy, crazy Mexican prison as the chaplain. And it's like people disappear in this prison. There's like extortion. It's very, as prisons go, it's not a nice prison anyway. You slice it. I hadn't talked to Bob in years, so I get a hold of him. He's on Facebook, even priests and Mexican prisons on Facebook. So Speaker 2 (7:50) I jog him a line, and we get to chatting, and I'm like, Bob, I'd kind of like to come down there and hang out in the Mexican prison with you, Speaker 5 (7:57) catch up or whatever. And, you know, what do you think? And he's like, well... you know, the climate's improved lately. We'll just say, like, it's become slightly less murdery. And he's like, I think you'll be okay. I don't want to say you'll definitely be fine, but you'll probably be fine. And so come on down. We'll have some fun. And so I'm like, I think I'm going to go down. I start telling friends about it, and a lot of my friends read this article, and they're like, you're fucking crazy. Don't go down there. And, like, I looked on the U.S. State Department, You know, you can like see like, should I go Speaker 2 (8:34) to Paris? Yes, or whatever. But this in northern Mexico, Saltillo, this town he's in, they're like, basically the subtext is like, fuck no, do not go there. Bad, don't go somewhere else for vacation. And so everyone's like, no, no. And Speaker 5 (8:52) I talked to my brother and my brother's like, I don't know, I think you should go. You have the time of your life. And if anything happens, you won't care because you'll be dead. Speaker 2 (9:00) So I was like... Speaker 2 (9:02) That seems reasonable. So I bought a plane ticket. And so I fly down there. And, you know, we had been riding on the way up. And a few weeks before I went down there, Bob was like, oh, just Speaker 5 (9:15) so you know, a bunch of prisoners got released. And so I have a few of them staying at the house. Because in Mexico, Speaker 2 (9:20) in Speaker 5 (9:22) America, like, you kind of have a heads up. Like, I'm getting out of prison in a year, two months, whatever the thing is. But in Mexico, they kind of tap you on the shoulder and Speaker 2 (9:30) are like... Get out there and start living. So that's what happened. You know, they let like 30 guys loose. So they don't loose. But anyway, so he had some of them stay in his house because they had nowhere to go. And then by the time I'm headed down there, I had Speaker 5 (9:47) a Speaker 2 (9:47) liver in Houston. Another thing they were like, Speaker 5 (9:49) don't. take a taxi from the airport because like they'll kidnap you and hold you for ransom and Speaker 2 (9:55) kill you or whatever. Even like legitimate cabs. It's not like here in New York. Don't take a fake cab. Like even the real cab drivers will do this in Mexico, northern Mexico apparently. Very negative. And so I was calling Bob to make sure he's picking me up at the airport. And he's like, yeah, I'll be there. And just have one guy at the house so it's not going to be Speaker 5 (10:14) too crowded. Just me and be you. And then this other guy, who was a murderer. and a rapist. See you in a couple Speaker 2 (10:22) hours. And so I'm like, what was that? Speaker 5 (10:25) And I get to the airport. Saltillo Airport's this tiny little, it's like a bus station practically. And Bob's waiting for me. I hadn't seen him in years. And he's got the murderer, a rapist with him who seemed delightful, all things considered. And we go. to dinner and I don't speak any Spanish. I can order a beer or something which is entertaining at first or whatever and then the more you do it, you're like, this guy's got a problem. So basically I can't have a conversation and the murder rapist guy, he can't speak English so we're mostly just smiling and nodding and things. Bob goes to the bathroom and just murder rapist and I're like, Speaker 2 (11:10) hey, how's Speaker 5 (11:10) it Speaker 2 (11:10) going? And then Bob comes back and the murder rapist goes to the bathroom and I'm like, Bob, he seems great. But how does a murder rapist get out of prison at all? And he's like, Speaker 5 (11:25) I'm just kidding. He's a thief. But he's really a thief. So if anything's missing, you know, the house, tell me because he definitely took it. So I'm like, all right, thanks for that. Speaker 2 (11:40) And so, you know, we go home, we go to sleep. And, you know, I wake up and the next day I'm like shoving my stuff, like hiding my stuff all over his house. Speaker 5 (11:50) So then Bob and I go out and we kind of run his errands for the day. He's like checking on like recent, at least inmates. But the big fun errand of the day is he had to get pizzas because it was a guy's birthday in prison. and they were gonna have a pizza party for Speaker 2 (12:05) him. And you know, you never, Mexican prison pizza party, four words you don't expect together. But, you know, as best I can tell, I'm like, I don't know what I've heard. Sometimes it's good times all the time in a Mexican prison. So we go to the prison, and we get there, and Bob's like, Speaker 5 (12:23) I don't know if I have permission for you to come in tomorrow, but you can't come in today, so no pizza par for you. And so he's like, you've got to wait out front while I go inside with the pizzas. I'm like, all right. And it's just like a wasteland out front, and there's like wild dogs running around, and there's guards, and like the guards don't even have uniforms. You just know like, you know, that's Jose. He's the guard. Like that's Juan. He's an arsonist or whatever. Whatever the thing is. Speaker 5 (12:52) So I'm just waiting and there's this highway about like 30, 40, 50 yards in front of me. Just cars whizzing past and like state police come by like, you know, with guys in the back with like machine guns. It's like a war zone and I'm waiting and the whole time I'm sitting there. And there's these guards circling, passing me, and they have bulletproof vests on. And I'm like, that's kind of weird. And Bob finally comes out, and he's like, let's go. And so we're walking back to his car, and I'm like, Bob, why do the guards on the outside of the prison have bulletproof vests on? And he's like, you see that highway over there? I'm like, yeah. He's like, well, people drive along that highway and shoot people Speaker 2 (13:32) in front of the prison. And I was like, Bob, I was just in front of the prison. for like 20 minutes. Like, what? Why'd you do that to me? And he's like, well, that, you know, it's kind of how it is down here. Like, everything's fine until it is. And I was trying to tell you. And, uh... And he's like, you can't, you know, worry about that sort of thing. I'm kind of worried about it. And then I was like, Bob, aren't you afraid you're going to get murdered down here? Because, like, a Catholic priest has been murdered, like, a million Speaker 5 (14:04) times down there. And he's like, well, Dave, do you worry when you wake up in the morning that it's going to rain later? And I'm like, not really. Speaker 2 (14:12) He's like, well, that's kind of how I am about murder. So, all right, let's get lunch. You know, I don't know. I wasn't raised to listen to whatever the priest says. So I'm like, okay. But yeah, he was just kind of like, you can't sit and worry about being murdered down here. You know, otherwise it's all you think Speaker 5 (14:34) about. So anyway, we go have, you know, we have dinner again at a Mexican restaurant. This is where I was always confused. Like, is Speaker 2 (14:42) it a Mexican restaurant still if it's Speaker 5 (14:44) in Speaker 2 (14:44) Mexico? Anyway, not important to the story. I said so many negative things about this place, but the Mexican food in Mexico, the food there was delightful. It was great. Anyway, so we have another great dinner. Speaker 1 (14:58) Next Speaker 2 (14:59) day we wake up