Heinous Hometown Crimes

There's something especially creepy about those sleepy-little-town crimes.

Back in the early 70's, my wife's father was a circuit judge in our home county, and although we didn't have a crime problem, we did have our share of doozies. One of them was called "The Camper Murders." A midwestern family was touring the countryside in their Winnebago-style camper back then, and they stopped near our town to pick up three young hitchhikers. The hitchhikers (two boys and a girl, and all of them long-haired, drugged-out hippie-freak types), decided that their new friends were rich, and they should kill them. They slaughtered the kid and the wife in the back of the camper, and the husband in the driver's seat. The girl used a pair of scissors to slash the throat of the wife.

They ransacked the camper, and not finding any money at all, abandoned it. The murders took place in our little county, which is where they left the blood-soaked camper and slaughtered bodies. The three kids were quickly caught, and the girl flipped on her accomplices. My wife's father was the presiding judge in the case, and my wife has the actual case file in her file drawer. The two boys were sentenced to life in prison without parole (they're still there), and the girl was given a reduced sentence of 50 years. She apparently got time off for good behavior, because several years ago my wife was informed that the "girl" was out of prison. She's never vowed to take revenge, or anything like that, but it is weird to think that the 60-year old woman we bump into in the grocery store might be a former teenaged murderess. We had even heard that she was getting her degree in cosmetology - think about that the next time someone stands behind you at the hair salon with a pair of scissors...

Does your area have any old, heinous crimes to report?

 

I grew up in the big city. I don't even know where to start.

I suppose with one that is a bit closer to home. When I was a kid, probably about 10 or 11, I was at my friend's place on the 14th floor. To get to my home on the 3rd floor, I would usually run down the stairwell -- full tilt of course. It was about 20 minutes after I got home and was in bed that the flashing lights started. Multiple cop cars were out front of our building.

It turns out that a fight had broken out in an apartment on the 9th floor. Some guy shot another guy, killing him. He then ran into the stairwell and shot himself. It was the same stairwell that I had just run down not 20 minutes earlier. Had I been a little bit late getting home, I might have come on the body or worse.

Interestingly, the friend I was visiting that day, years later would be involved in a murder suicide himself.

Life in the city.

 

As a child my friends and I used to play in a playpark on the hill just below my house, the playpark being on a small street lined with maybe six or seven houses. An old lady in her 70s lived in one of the houses and would sometimes come out to talk to us. She seemed lonely and she kept a couple of cats, which she would take out for walks armed with a golf club for chasing away dogs. She was known by the kids in the area as the "crazy cat lady" and it's true she was a little eccentric but she was completely harmless so the nickname was a little unfair. We weren't afraid of her at all.

One evening while 14 years old I attended a house party nearby to hang out with my friends. They (all older than me) were drinking but there was no way I could get away with that so I stayed sober. One of the people in my circle of friends was a strange, slightly socially inept guy who had lived in the house next door to me for a few years. I am told in the years since he moved away that he was subject to abuse at the hands of his mother while living there but I was unaware at the time, e.g. he had been forced sometimes to sleep in their garden shed, and was apparently regularly beaten. This guy was not well liked at school and frequently got into fist fights with the other boys. He wasn't all that popular in our crowd either, but we had known him for years and he hadn't done anything that would have warranted falling out with him, at least not until the night of that party.

At some point during the evening this guy left the party, and later reappeared.

During his absence, this guy went to where this old woman lived, which was only about 250 yards away around a couple of corners, and entered her house. Using the woman's own golf club, he beat her repeatedly as well as punching and kicking her. One of her ears was severed during the attack and her jaw was broken on both sides. Her blood was splattered around the ceiling and walls. She lay for two days undiscovered until a neighbour became concerned. Fortunately (?!) she lived through this attack but I think she died perhaps 18 months later, unrelated to her injuries. I was told by someone who visited her in hospital that her face was so disfigured her eyes were no longer aligned with each other. It was extremely brutal.

The guy had left a bloody handprint somewhere in this woman's house so after a couple of weeks he was eventually rumbled by the police. Seemingly after his attack, he went home covered in this woman's blood and had admitted to his mother what he had done, and she washed his bloodstained clothes and simply kept it all to herself (I have no idea if it is normal to protect your 16 year old kid to this extent).

He pleaded guilty to attempted murder and was sentenced to seven years in prison. He served about four. I saw him maybe two or three times in my town (on one occasion he was darting around looking rather paranoid as though trying not to be seen) but needless to say he moved away after his release from prison. I understand he lives a normal life now, with a job and a girlfriend with whom he has a kid. His mother still lives next door to my mother.

I'm sure there must have been worse crimes in my town (c 5000 people) but this is the one I'm most familiar with.

 

Pee Wee Herman's arrest was about 12 miles from my parents' house, where I grew up. That's all I'm aware of.

 

1.

I remember learning of this crime vividly in January of my freshman year of high school. My hometown was a quiet, affluent, suburban community and stuff like this just didn't happen.

2.

I learned about this crime in my adopted hometown after watching the episode of Unsolved Mysteries that covered it, in which the crime's reenactment was filmed in a storefront property now owned by a good friend of mine (the actual crime took place elsewhere in the city). To this date (to my knowledge), they still have no suspects.

3.
My current area of residence is rich in Civil War history but has apparently also seen its fair share of axe murders. A friend and member of a local cycling club known for his interest in and penchant for being an amateur historian has hosted an annual "Axe Murderer Ride" around Halloween that visits various sites associated with axe murders from the early twentieth century. I haven't made it to one of these yet; if it's going on this year, I will be there for it.

 

Anchorage has had a few serial killers but its most famous was the Butcher Baker killer Robert Hansen who owned a bakery here in town during the boom days of the pipeline.
He would pick up women, fly them out to his cabin in the bush and then hunt them.
Hansen is known to have raped and assaulted over 30 Alaskan women, and to have murdered at least 17, ranging in age from 16 to 41.
He was convicted of only killing four.
Hansen died in prison.
I knew a girl who worked in his bakery as a cashier on weekends.
She didn't have a clue.
They made a movie On Frozen Ground about it, starring Nicolas Cage, John Cusack.
They really did go to a lot of trouble to make Anchorage look right for the time.