00:00:07
11-year-old Ricky Stetson went for an
00:00:10
evening run on a jogging trail in
00:00:12
Portland, Maine.
00:00:16
Witnesses recalled seeing the boy and a
00:00:19
young man right behind him on a bicycle.
00:00:25
The next day,
00:00:27
Ricky Stetson's body was discovered in a
00:00:29
nearby ravine.
00:00:31
He had been murdered.
00:00:32
[Applause]
00:00:34
[Music]
00:00:36
The killer left very few clues, but he
00:00:39
left behind something he couldn't hide,
00:00:43
his signature.
00:00:46
[Music]
00:01:11
11-year-old Ricky Stetson and his family
00:01:14
lived in a working-class section of
00:01:15
Portland, Maine, a coastal city known
00:01:18
primarily as a summer vacation
00:01:20
destination.
00:01:23
Around 8:00 p.m. on August 23rd, 1983,
00:01:28
Ricky went for a short run along the
00:01:30
biking and jogging path called Black
00:01:32
Cove.
00:01:34
He never returned home.
00:01:37
His body was discovered the next day in
00:01:40
a grassy area just off the jogging path.
00:01:43
There was evidence, both externally and
00:01:45
internally as I recall, of asphyxiation,
00:01:48
that is of choking around the neck.
00:01:50
And it appeared to the medical examiner
00:01:52
as though he was he was choked manually
00:01:55
and probably by a ligature.
00:01:57
He had also been stabbed. The autopsy
00:01:59
revealed that the boy had not been
00:02:01
sexually assaulted, but there were bite
00:02:03
wounds on various parts of his body.
00:02:06
And the bite marks had been gouged with
00:02:09
a knife.
00:02:10
None of the forensic dentists
00:02:12
had seen a case before in which there
00:02:15
had been a bite mark with slashing and
00:02:18
cutting through it as if to hide the
00:02:20
bite mark.
00:02:22
Uh and so that's what the law calls a
00:02:25
signature crime. That is, it is done in
00:02:27
a way that is very unique, that is very
00:02:30
unusual,
00:02:31
that the culprit, the perpetrator, is
00:02:34
leaving, as it were, his signature
00:02:37
uh on the crime.
00:02:39
To Portland police, Ricky Stetson's
00:02:42
murder appeared similar to a series of
00:02:44
knifings that occurred 2 years earlier
00:02:46
in the Oakdale section of the city.
00:02:49
[Music]
00:02:51
Michael Witham was just 9 years old when
00:02:54
he had an encounter with the so-called
00:02:56
Oakdale Slasher. There's a wooded lot
00:02:59
between a couple of houses,
00:03:02
which have a couple of paths,
00:03:04
and
00:03:06
I was called into the wooded lot
00:03:09
by a guy who I didn't know at the time.
00:03:11
He had asked me a few questions, my age,
00:03:14
my name, where I lived. And after he had
00:03:17
asked his questions, he said I could
00:03:18
leave.
00:03:21
As I turned to leave,
00:03:23
he grabbed me and cut my throat.
00:03:25
Witham got away, but the injury was just
00:03:28
inches from being fatal and required 12
00:03:30
stitches to close.
00:03:33
All Witham could say was the attacker
00:03:35
was a white male in his late teens or
00:03:38
early 20s.
00:03:40
That description was similar to the one
00:03:43
of the man seen riding his bicycle
00:03:45
behind Ricky Stetson.
00:03:47
[Music]
00:03:49
For a full year, police searched for the
00:03:52
killer and eventually they identified a
00:03:54
suspect, 24-year-old Joseph Anderson. He
00:03:58
was also a suspect in the attempted
00:04:00
murder of a 9-year-old girl.
00:04:03
But there was a problem.
00:04:05
Police in Bellevue, Nebraska had a
00:04:08
similar murder.
00:04:09
A 13-year-old boy with stab wounds and
00:04:12
markings identical to Ricky Stetson's.
00:04:16
If the Nebraska murder was related to
00:04:18
the Stetson case in Maine,
00:04:21
Joseph Anderson wasn't the killer.
00:04:25
A serial murderer was on the loose on a
00:04:28
1,500-mile
00:04:30
killing spree.
00:04:36
In the fall of 1983,
00:04:38
police in Bellevue, Nebraska were
00:04:40
searching for a missing 13-year-old boy,
00:04:43
Danny Joe Eberle.
00:04:45
Danny Joe had been delivering newspapers
00:04:47
early one Sunday morning when he
00:04:49
mysteriously disappeared. He's partially
00:04:52
through his paper route
00:04:54
and now he's disappeared.
00:04:56
And uh he wasn't with any of his
00:04:58
playmates, any of his relatives, uh
00:05:00
wasn't in any of the neighborhoods,
00:05:02
and we knew something was terribly wrong
00:05:06
right then.
00:05:07
Danny Joe's bicycle was found in front
00:05:09
of a home he delivered newspapers to,
00:05:12
but there was no sign of a struggle and
00:05:14
no sign of the boy. Danny's bicycle,
00:05:18
his brother and sister and his mother
00:05:19
and dad said his whole life was that
00:05:21
bicycle. He That's why he delivered
00:05:23
newspapers to buy accessories and to
00:05:25
keep the bicycle shining. He was really
00:05:27
proud of it.
00:05:29
Police searched for Danny Joe Eberle
00:05:31
across the state of Nebraska.
00:05:37
His picture was seen on nightly
00:05:39
television programs and in the
00:05:41
newspapers.
00:05:43
Three days later, investigators'
00:05:46
worst fears were realized.
00:05:49
Danny Joe Eberle's body was found on a
00:05:52
desolate stretch of road 4 miles from
00:05:55
his bicycle.
00:05:56
He had been stabbed to death.
00:06:00
The town's mayor, Joe Baldwin,
00:06:02
personally delivered the news to the
00:06:04
boy's mother. We broke the news to her
00:06:07
and we were all crying, including the
00:06:09
FBI guy. He was crying. He was crying
00:06:12
and I was crying. The chief was crying.
00:06:14
A very traumatic type thing to tell some
00:06:18
woman your son is found and he's dead.
00:06:21
It's the most traumatic thing I think
00:06:22
I've ever done.
00:06:24
Danny Joe Eberle's hands and feet were
00:06:26
tied with rope and a star-shaped pattern
00:06:29
had been cut into his chest, but there
00:06:32
was no sign of sexual assault.
00:06:35
Police turned to FBI behavioral analyst
00:06:38
Robert Ressler for a psychological
00:06:41
profile of the killer.
00:06:43
We had a biter, an individual was
00:06:45
compelled to bite his victims and then
00:06:47
cutting the flesh away to deny that
00:06:48
evidence to the police.
00:06:51
Since the body was found so close to the
00:06:53
road, Ressler suspected the killer was
00:06:56
slightly built and not strong enough to
00:06:58
carry the body very far. The location
00:07:02
also told Ressler that the killer was
00:07:04
inexperienced. And it was right off the
00:07:07
side of the road, really uh would
00:07:09
indicate to me that the killer was in in
00:07:11
a little state of panic, uh wanted to
00:07:13
get rid of the body, didn't want to be
00:07:14
found with the body in the car, but but
00:07:16
wasn't sophisticated or knowledgeable
00:07:18
enough about the area to do it
00:07:20
effectively. And uh it would indicate to
00:07:22
me possibly that this may have been the
00:07:25
uh first time that he had killed in this
00:07:27
particular area.
00:07:29
The rope used to bind Danny Joe Eberle
00:07:32
was of particular interest to
00:07:34
investigators and was sent to FBI
00:07:36
headquarters in Washington, D.C.
00:07:39
Special Agent Wayne Oaks conducted the
00:07:42
analysis. I had never seen anyone like
00:07:44
this, none of the other examiners in the
00:07:46
laboratory who deal with ropes on a
00:07:48
daily basis over a number of years had
00:07:50
ever seen a rope like this.
00:07:52
The outside of the rope was common white
00:07:55
nylon, but the inner core was extremely
00:07:58
unusual.
00:08:00
There were 24 different types of fibers
00:08:03
and 106 different colored yarns.
00:08:06
There were polyesters, nylons, rayons,
00:08:09
acrylics, polyethylenes, wools, and
00:08:11
cottons, which is what made the rope
00:08:14
unique.
00:08:15
Oaks took the rope to the National
00:08:17
Cordage Institute, a trade association
00:08:20
of all rope manufacturers in the United
00:08:22
States. Their technical experts had
00:08:25
never seen a rope like this, either.
00:08:29
Back in Bellevue, Nebraska, police were
00:08:32
desperate to find the killer of Danny
00:08:34
Joe Eberle and parents were warned to
00:08:37
keep a close eye on their children.
00:08:39
People are reluctant to let their
00:08:41
children out to go sledding or skating
00:08:44
or any of the normal activities.
00:08:47
Children are
00:08:49
watched over at shopping centers. The
00:08:51
parents are keeping a very tight rein on
00:08:54
their children for their safety.
00:08:57
Despite the precautions, the unthinkable
00:09:00
happened again.
00:09:03
Another young boy, 12-year-old
00:09:06
Christopher Walden, was abducted as he
00:09:09
walked to school. It was about eight
00:09:11
blocks from his house,
00:09:12
uh again in Bellevue,
00:09:14
and uh he was at a four-way stop when uh
00:09:18
a young man came up and forced him into
00:09:20
the car and drove off with him.
00:09:24
In the subzero temperatures,
00:09:27
police searched for Christopher Walden.
00:09:30
Three days later, a group of pheasant
00:09:32
hunters stumbled upon a snow-covered
00:09:35
figure.
00:09:36
Christopher Walden's frozen body was
00:09:39
found in the same area as Danny Joe
00:09:42
Eberle's.
00:09:44
Like Danny Joe, Walden had been stabbed
00:09:47
to death
00:09:48
and he had the same star-shaped pattern
00:09:51
etched on his body.
00:09:58
Two sets of footprints led into the
00:10:00
woods where Christopher Walden's body
00:10:02
was discovered, but only one set of
00:10:04
footprints left the scene, an indication
00:10:06
the killer did not have an accomplice.
00:10:09
The star-shaped pattern told
00:10:11
investigators that this was the same
00:10:13
individual who killed Danny Joe Eberle 3
00:10:16
months earlier.
00:10:18
Witnesses saw Christopher Walden with a
00:10:20
young white male in his early 20s on the
00:10:22
walkway near the school. From those
00:10:25
descriptions, police created a composite
00:10:27
drawing which was distributed to
00:10:29
newspapers and local television
00:10:31
stations.
00:10:32
Robert Ressler refined his profile of
00:10:34
the killer with information gathered
00:10:36
from the second murder.
00:10:38
I felt that the individual because of
00:10:40
this need to be close to young males and
00:10:42
having attraction for them that he would
00:10:44
be involved in some sort of activities
00:10:46
with youth. Uh soccer coach, baseball
00:10:49
coach, uh Boy Scouts. Since the killer
00:10:52
was using a knife to obscure the bite
00:10:54
wounds, Ressler suspected that the
00:10:56
killer read police and detective
00:10:58
magazines because matching bite wounds
00:11:01
to a dental impression is often
00:11:03
discussed in these types of
00:11:04
publications.
00:11:07
Police talked to a woman who was walking
00:11:09
her dog near the intersection at the
00:11:12
time Christopher Walden was abducted.
00:11:15
She thought she saw the abduction, but
00:11:18
she wasn't entirely sure. So, police
00:11:21
asked her to undergo hypnosis.
00:11:25
Hypnosis can sometimes help a witness to
00:11:28
recall details of an event they can't
00:11:30
otherwise remember, but hypnotically
00:11:33
enhanced recollections are usually not
00:11:36
admissible in court. She underwent
00:11:38
hypnosis.
00:11:39
And something came out in the session
00:11:41
and it was just driving her crazy.
00:11:43
And it all came back to her. And that's
00:11:45
when she realized that she had seen uh
00:11:48
Christopher Walden being kidnapped.
00:11:51
She said that Christopher Walden was
00:11:54
with a man who was approximately the
00:11:56
same height.
00:11:59
[Music]
00:12:04
The car leaving the scene was brown. The
00:12:07
license number started with the letter R
00:12:09
followed by a series of numbers.
00:12:13
Sheriff Patrick Thomas issued a
00:12:15
challenge to the killer during a news
00:12:17
conference. And I think that the
00:12:19
individual who's responsible for these
00:12:22
acts
00:12:23
is very sick,
00:12:27
spineless,
00:12:29
a coward,
00:12:31
and uh I would urge him to call a
00:12:33
minister
00:12:35
or a priest
00:12:36
or me.
00:12:40
There was a lot of uh Monday morning
00:12:42
quarterbacking from then on that uh
00:12:45
maybe this shouldn't have been done or
00:12:46
maybe uh
00:12:48
whatever.
00:12:49
But I felt that uh
00:12:51
that I would see what he's made of
00:12:53
because I knew that he was watching the
00:12:55
press, he was watching TV. He was
00:12:58
monitoring us as much as they do.
00:13:01
That's part of their profile, that's
00:13:02
part of their MO.
00:13:03
And I figured that uh maybe he would
00:13:06
make a mistake. And it worked.
00:13:11
A local woman, Barbara Weaver, told
00:13:13
friends that she had been praying for
00:13:16
the capture of the serial murderer, and
00:13:18
she did something else.
00:13:21
In her prayers, she offered herself in
00:13:25
any way possible to help find the
00:13:28
killer.
00:13:33
[Music]
00:13:35
Barbara Weaver worked in a daycare
00:13:37
center, and she usually arrived at work
00:13:39
early to get her classroom ready.
00:13:44
When she looked outside, she noticed a
00:13:46
strange car in the parking lot.
00:13:50
The driver was wearing a ski cap and
00:13:53
looked similar to the composite drawings
00:13:55
of the killer she saw on television.
00:14:03
As she was writing down the license
00:14:05
plate number, the man entered the
00:14:07
classroom.
00:14:08
Step back. He threatened the killer and
00:14:10
pulled a knife.
00:14:12
Mrs. Weaver ran past him and fled to the
00:14:15
house next door, which belonged to the
00:14:17
pastor of the church. From there, she
00:14:19
called police.
00:14:27
She writes down his license tag. That's
00:14:29
first thing she did, sharp woman.
00:14:32
And she went The fact of it is, you got
00:14:33
to say, she went She saw the car, she
00:14:35
said, "That looks like the car of this
00:14:36
killer."
00:14:37
Remember, this is all that's on
00:14:38
everyone's mind. This is the biggest
00:14:40
case they've ever had in Nebraska.
00:14:42
Police tracked the license plate number
00:14:45
to a 19-year-old enlisted man stationed
00:14:47
at Offutt Air Force Base. His name was
00:14:51
John Joubert.
00:14:53
Joubert was a maintenance mechanic in
00:14:55
the radar unit. He was also an Eagle
00:14:58
Scout and was an assistant scout leader
00:15:01
for a local troop.
00:15:03
Joubert denied having anything to do
00:15:05
with the two murders, but there was an
00:15:07
interesting coincidence.
00:15:09
Joubert had been living in Portland,
00:15:12
Maine the year before at the time of
00:15:15
Ricky Stetson's murder.
00:15:21
When John Joubert was questioned about
00:15:23
the murders of Danny Joe Eberle and
00:15:25
Christopher Walden, he had little to say
00:15:27
to investigators.
00:15:30
But he fit the FBI's profile of the
00:15:32
killer. He was 19 years old, slightly
00:15:34
built, and an Eagle Scout who
00:15:36
volunteered his time as an assistant
00:15:38
scout leader of a local troop.
00:15:41
Joubert read softcore pornography and
00:15:43
detective magazines, which were found in
00:15:46
his footlocker at the Air Force Base.
00:15:49
But what police found in his automobile
00:15:53
was of particular interest.
00:15:55
On the right floorboard was a brown
00:15:57
Caucasian head hair, which was sent to
00:16:00
the FBI for analysis.
00:16:02
Microscopic examination of the question
00:16:05
hairs found from the vacuum sweepings in
00:16:07
the vehicle with the known standards
00:16:09
from the victim, they were the same
00:16:11
microscopically. And I indicated in my
00:16:14
report that the hairs in the vehicle
00:16:16
were consistent head hairs from the
00:16:18
victim, Danny Joe Eberle.
00:16:20
Police also found a knife and a roll of
00:16:23
tape.
00:16:24
And in Joubert's automobile was a piece
00:16:27
of rope.
00:16:29
At first, it appeared to be common nylon
00:16:32
rope similar to the type sold in
00:16:34
thousands of retail outlets throughout
00:16:36
the United States, but inside the rope
00:16:39
was a surprise. The core of the rope was
00:16:42
so unique with 106 different fibers in
00:16:45
there. Every single one of those fibers
00:16:47
was mounted on a glass microscope, and
00:16:49
the generic class of fiber was
00:16:51
identified to make sure they they were
00:16:52
same color, composition, diameter, and
00:16:55
cross-sectional shape. And to make sure
00:16:58
that the acetates matched the acetates
00:17:00
and the polyethylenes matched the
00:17:01
polyethylenes. I found that they were
00:17:03
identical in all respects
00:17:05
microscopically, instrumentally,
00:17:07
chemical tests, there were no
00:17:08
differences between the two ropes.
00:17:10
Joubert had no idea the rope was so
00:17:13
rare. He said he had been given the rope
00:17:15
years earlier in the Boy Scouts.
00:17:17
When confronted with the evidence,
00:17:20
Joubert confessed.
00:17:22
He said, "Let me tell you about the
00:17:24
second boy first because it's fresher in
00:17:27
my mind."
00:17:28
And uh we started questioning him and he
00:17:32
told us and provided us with facts
00:17:34
concerning uh the uh
00:17:37
killings and the abduction of both boys
00:17:40
that would only be known to the
00:17:42
individual that had uh committed the
00:17:44
crimes.
00:17:46
Joubert also admitted that he was the
00:17:49
Oak Dell Slasher and his attacks on
00:17:51
people like Michael with them were
00:17:53
practice for his subsequent killing
00:17:56
spree.
00:17:57
He also revealed that after killing
00:17:59
Danny Joe Eberle, he walked into a
00:18:01
McDonald's restaurant, washed the blood
00:18:04
from his hands in the men's room, and
00:18:06
ordered some breakfast.
00:18:08
After the Christopher Walden murder,
00:18:11
Joubert said he attended a Boy Scout
00:18:13
meeting where he was an assistant troop
00:18:15
leader. At that meeting, the troop
00:18:18
discussed the abductions.
00:18:20
>> Yeah, well, guys, you know, as long as
00:18:21
you look out for each other, you have
00:18:23
nothing to worry about.
00:18:24
Okay?
00:18:26
After 116 days in one of the most
00:18:30
intensive manhunts in Nebraska history,
00:18:34
police finally had their killer.
00:18:37
And Portland, Maine had theirs as well.
00:18:41
In Maine,
00:18:43
Joubert was sentenced to life in prison
00:18:45
for the murder of Ricky Stetson.
00:18:48
In Nebraska, for the murders of Danny
00:18:51
Joe Eberle and Christopher Walden,
00:18:54
Joubert was convicted and sentenced to
00:18:57
death.
00:18:58
I specifically asked him if he disliked
00:19:01
the boys, and his statement was, "How
00:19:03
could I dislike him? I didn't even know
00:19:04
him."
00:19:07
No one knows what drove John Joubert to
00:19:10
kill.
00:19:12
And I remember one day I said uh John,
00:19:15
"If I let you out of jail today
00:19:17
and just uh let you walk away from here,
00:19:21
uh do you think you've learned now that
00:19:23
you would never do that again?"
00:19:25
And he says He thought for quite some
00:19:27
time, and he says, "No.
00:19:29
No," he says, "I don't think I could
00:19:31
help myself."
00:19:33
I says, "Do you mean you would go kill
00:19:34
another little boy?"
00:19:36
"Yeah, probably," he said.
00:19:38
"Yeah, probably would."
00:19:41
On July 17th, 1996,
00:19:45
John Joubert was put to death in the
00:19:47
electric chair.
00:19:50
Joubert's presence is still felt to this
00:19:53
day in the small town of Bell View.
00:19:57
Former mayor Joe Baldwin regularly
00:20:00
visits the victims' graves and remembers
00:20:04
the 116
00:20:05
days when a serial killer stalked his
00:20:09
community.
00:20:11
Most horrible thing that ever happened
00:20:12
in this city, you know, for to have
00:20:15
young a young person like that, two
00:20:17
young persons, and even three when he
00:20:19
died
00:20:20
to have their life taken away by a
00:20:22
person like that. I think that is
00:20:23
terrible. It it's you can't believe how
00:20:26
traumatic it is when it happens.
00:20:29
Just the other day in the grocery store,
00:20:30
a lady said that she's just fearful of
00:20:33
her little boy
00:20:36
playing after dark.
00:20:37
Uh that uh she remembers Joubert and
00:20:41
she says, "I don't know how to instill
00:20:42
in him that it may happen again."
00:20:45
And uh I told her to hope and pray it
00:20:47
never would happen again, but make sure
00:20:49
she keeps an eye on her little boy.
00:20:55
You just have to be careful. Children
00:20:57
have to be very careful.
00:20:59
There are people out there that prey on
00:21:03
[Music]
00:21:26
[Applause]
00:21:27
[Music]
