00:00:00
In 1932, one man opened a two- room business school above a nondescript storefront in downtown Manchester, New
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Hampshire. How did it become one of the largest universities in the country? Okay, this case isn't exactly a mystery.
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Southern New Hampshire University offers over 200 degrees you can earn from your
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couch. And with low online tuition, Southern New Hampshire University makes earning your degree affordable, too.
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Find your degree at snhu.edu/g. That's snhu.edu/g. [Music] [Applause] [Music] Welcome to True Crime Garage. Wherever
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you are, whatever you are doing, thanks for listening. I'm your host Nick and with me as always a man that loves fast
00:01:27
cars and guitars. He is the captain. Out of my way when you see me driving my Pinto. It's good to be seen and it's
00:01:34
good to see you. Thanks for listening. Thanks for telling a [Music] friend. Tonight we are drinking Demon
00:01:46
Dweller by Greenman Brewery. Garage grade 3 and 3/4 bottle caps out of five. Demon Dweller is an Imperial stout that
00:01:54
is dark, sweet, and chocolaty. It's cunningly smooth, Captain. It's yum. Don't be afraid of the dark. And this
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week's beer was brought to us by these smooth criminals. First up, we have Gabe B in Portland, Oregon. And we have Josie
00:02:08
in Denim Springs, Louisiana. Next up, we have Gavin from South Portland, donated
00:02:13
to the beer from Maine. Was close. Close enough. Here's a cheers to Rayan in Arvda, Colorado. And a big we like your
00:02:22
jib to Jackie in Houston, Texas. And let's give a double cheers to malls in Alex in Davenport, Iowa. And last but
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not least, we have Kirsten from South Jersey. So, cheers to everybody for filling up the fridge for this week's
00:02:36
show. If you want to help us out with next week's shows, go to trueimeg.com and click on the donate button. And a
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reminder, all of our episodes are now available from from the first episode to now is available for free on the
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Stitcher app. And join in the conversation at our blog at true crimegar.com. All right, gather around,
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grab a chair, grab a beer. Let's talk some true crime. The first contact from the BTK strangler
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was made in October 1974. Early in the morning on the 22nd, the phone rang at the Otto murder
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hotline that was set up by the two major newspapers. The caller didn't say much and he sounded angry. He told the
00:03:48
newsman, "Listen and listen good because I'm not going to repeat it." He said, "The man that had killed theos stuck a
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letter in a mechanical engineering textbook on the second floor of the Witchah Public Library. Then he hung up
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the phone. The police were notified. The letter was located. The letter was addressed to the Witchah Eagle and
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Beacon Secret Witness Program. Under the Secret Witness Program, persons with information concerning a crime could
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pass on information to the police through the newspaper without divulging their identity. The poorly typed and
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badly misspelled letter provided details on the four Otto slayings that the police said at the time could only have
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been known to someone who had been present at the scene. The letter read, "I write this letter to you for
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the sake of the taxpayer as well as your time." Those three dude you have in custody are just talking to get
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publicity for the Otto murders. They know nothing at all. I did it by myself and with no one's help. There has been
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no talk either. Let's put this straight. Joe position southwest bedroom feet tied
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to bed. Bondage, window, blind cord. Garat, blind cord, brown belt. Death, the old
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bag trick and strangled with clothesline rope. Clothes, white sweatshirt, gray pants. Comments: He threw up at one
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time. Had a rib injury from a wreck few week before. Julie position lying on her back
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on the bed. Bondage blind cord. Garat clothesline cord tied in a clove hitch. Death strangulation
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twice. Clothes. Blue house coat. Black slack. White sock. Comments. Blood on face from too
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much pressure on neck. Bed unmade. Josephine. Position. Hanging by the neck in the northwest position of
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the basement. dryer or freezer north of her body. Bondage, hand tie with blind cord. Feet and knees all with
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clothesline cord all one length. Garat rough hemp rope. Noose with four or five turns. Clothes dark bra cut in the
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middle sock. Death strangulation once hung. comments. Most of her clothes at the
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bottom of the stairs, her glasses in the southwest bedroom. Joseph position in east bedroom
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lying on his back. Bondage blind cord garage, three hoods, white t-shirt, white plastic bag, another t-shirt. Clos
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line cord with clove hitch. Death. Suffocation once. Strangulation. Suffocation with the old bag
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trick. Clothes. Brown pants. Yellow brown striped t-shirt. Comments. His radio is
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blaring. All victims had their hands tied behind their backs. Gags of pillowcase material. Purse contents
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south of the table. Spilled drink in that area. Also, kids making lunches. Otto's watch missing. I needed
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one, so I took it. Runs good. Car was dirty inside. Out of gas. I'm sorry this happened to
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society. They are the ones who suffer the most. It hard to control myself. You probably call me psychotic with
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sexual perversion hang-up. When this monster enter my brain, I will never know. But it here to
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stay. How does one cure himself? If you ask for help that you have killed four people, they will laugh or hit the panic
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button and call the cops. I can't stop it. So the monster goes on and hurt me as well as
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society. Society can be thankful that there are ways for people like me to relieve myself at time by daydreams of
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some victims being tortured and being mine. It a big complicated game my friend of the monster play putting
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victim's number down. Follow them. Checking up on them. Waiting in the dark. Waiting. Waiting. The pressure is great.
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And sometime he run the game to his liking. Maybe you can stop him. I can't. He has already chosen his next
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victim or victims. I don't who they are yet. The next day after I read the paper, I will
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know. But it too late. Good luck hunting. Yours truly guiltily. P.S. Since sex criminals do not change
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their mo or by nature cannot do so, I will not change mine. The code words for me will be bind them, torture them, kill
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them, BT K. You see he added again they will be on the next [Music] victim. When Dennis Rder killed the OTO
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and their two children, he was unemployed and attending classes at Witchah State. In November of 1974,
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Dennis was hired at ADT Security, which at the time sold and installed commercialgrade
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alarms. It might have been this job that kept him busy. Maybe it was his home life. Regardless, something was
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happening. And thank God that it did because BTK was just too busy to go out and kill. In fact, there would be 3
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years before he would kill again. The killer claimed responsibility for the murders of the four Otero family members
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and gave himself a name, BTK. But one thing he had yet to disclose and one thing that police were yet to connect to
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the BTK strangler Mhm. is that he had committed another murder shortly after killing theos. And this is one that BTK
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called Project Lights Out. Katherine Dorene Bright was one of five children in her family. She was born on February
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24th, 1953. She loved singing in the church with her sister. She had graduated from
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high school in 1971. Now, in 1974, she was 21 years old. Katherine was a smart, popular, and funny college student, and
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she worked for the Coleman Company. Catherine and her sister shared a house that they rented together. Now, on the
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morning of April 4th, 1979, Dennis Rder, who had been watching the house and who had targeted his next
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victim, picked her because she was attractive and no men lived with her and she did not have a dog. You know, these
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were problems that he ran into during the crimes. Yeah. And on that morning, he's going to break into a kitchen
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window to gain access to the house. and he knew at this time that the house would be empty, which uh this was good
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for him because he needed time to prep the home for murder, but he didn't he didn't just want to kill Catherine
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Bright. He wanted to play with her first. And he brought with him plenty of ropes and cords to play with. While he
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waited for her to return, he laid out ropes and cords on her bed. He used a broom to carefully sweep up the broken
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glass. and he was wearing gloves and a green parka. He took a stocking cap and pulled it down to cover his face and he
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brought with him a gun, his 22. Now he was ready and all he needed was for his victim to return to her home and find
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him. At this moment he was no longer Dennis, no longer the ordinary man that led an ordinary unremarkable life. In
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this moment, he was the killer that haunted Witchita, the phantom that the whole city feared. He was BTK. Well, and
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when she returned, she's she's going to return home, but she's not going to be alone. Yeah. With her was her
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19-year-old brother, Kevin. When they walked in, they were very quickly greeted by a man in a mask with a gun.
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The man told them that he was a convict and he just needed something to make his
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way to California. If they cooperated, they would not be hurt. He just needed some money, some
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food, and the car keys. And he was going to need to tie them up to make sure that
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he had enough time to get away. He had Kevin tie up Catherine, and then BTK tied up Kevin. BTK took Catherine to her
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bedroom where he had prepped the room with his ropes and a chair. He tied Catherine to the chair. Then he returned
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to the room where he had left Kevin. He put a rope around his neck. Now Kevin realizes at this moment that the man had
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lied to them, that the man was going to kill him. Mhm. So he started twisting his hands and his arms until the
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bindings gave way. Kevin jumped to his feet and the mass man grabbed his gun and put it to Kevin's forehead and
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pulled the trigger. Kevin fell to the floor, but he was not dead. Amazingly enough, he was not dead. He had been
00:14:01
knocked out. And when he came too, he could hear his sister in the other room screaming. He got up and he charged into
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the other room. The man saw him coming and again reached for his gun. But before he could take aim, Kevin pried
00:14:15
the gun from the man's hand. Kevin took the gun and shoved the barrel into the man's chest and he pulled the trigger.
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The asalent managed to wedge his thumb between the gun and the hammer, preventing it from firing. The man
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pulled the gun from Kevin and put it to Kevin's mouth and pulled the trigger. The gun fired and Kevin once again hit
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the floor. BTK once again turned his attention to Catherine. Kevin was still not dead. When the gun was fired into
00:14:44
Kevin's face, the bullet had actually ricocheted off of his teeth, leaving Kevin a bloody mess and knocked out, but
00:14:51
not dead. It probably only knocked him out for a few minutes. And when he came to, he decided this time instead of
00:14:58
trying to fight off the attacker, he was going to take his chances and run for help. Kevin flew out the front door of
00:15:05
the home, running full speed and yelling at the top of his lungs. A man driving by stopped and Kevin jumped in his car.
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The man drove him to the nearest phone and they called the police. The call, a robbery in progress at a home on East
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13th Street. The robber was trying to kill two people and was still in the home. A police officer is going to be on
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the scene within 15 minutes of Kevin leaving the home. When the officer arrived, the front door to the home was
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wide open and the officer went in. He found Catherine in the front room lying on her side in a puddle of blood. A
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phone was next to her. She had tried to call for help, but when the operator picked up, Catherine could not speak.
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Her linex had been crushed. She could only whisper at this time. She lifted her head, but all she could say
00:15:56
to the officer was, "Help me. Help me." The officer radioed for an ambulance, and he knelt beside Catherine with his
00:16:04
gun drawn as he waited for backup. His backup arrived about the same time as the ambulance. They quickly determined
00:16:12
the man who had broke in and attacked Catherine and Kevin had fled the house. Mhm. In the two bedrooms were obvious
00:16:20
signs of a struggle. Both rooms were left in shambles and blood was smeared on the floors. Catherine had been
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stabbed 11 times in her torso and back. Two of the stabs had punctured her lungs. Catherine died a short while
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later at the hospital. Now, Kevin was a living witness. He was in the same hospital where his sister had just
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passed. Now, he was being treated for those two gunshots. He would survive and he was
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able to tell the police about the killer. You know, he told them what the killer had told them about him going to
00:16:57
California. Yeah. And this giving them a possible lead. Kevin described the attacker as a dark-haired man about 25
00:17:05
years of age, Caucasian with a pot belly and about 5'10 in tall with a thick mustache. Now, there was some problems
00:17:15
with this description of the attacker. Now, you and I, Captain, would know years later that this description is
00:17:23
actually a pretty good one, right? I mean, it's a little vague, but it's a pretty good one. He got the height
00:17:30
approximately right. He got the size of the person right. The the uh you know, dark-haired man with a thick mustache.
00:17:37
Yeah, the mustache. The thing that he got wrong was he didn't tell him that he saw a giant piece of [ __ ] Well, because
00:17:44
of the injuries that Kevin sustained during the the attack. Mhm. A lot of the police officers in and investigators had
00:17:52
a problem with taking him at his word. They thought that it was too traumatic of an attack and that he was probably
00:17:59
had suffered multiple concussions. So, he's just lying. No, no, no, no, no. That he just doesn't he doesn't
00:18:06
remember. He's misremembering. Correct. Okay. They I mean you you have to keep in mind Okay, but why why Well, for the
00:18:12
reasons I just said that No, no, but I mean like so what do they think he looks like? Oh, they No, they have no They
00:18:18
have nothing to go off of, but they're just for whatever reason going, "Well, we don't really buy that." Okay, but you
00:18:24
you have to keep this in mind. Let's say, okay, let's say he suffered multiple concussions within a short
00:18:31
period of time during this attack. Now, nobody's doubting that he that he didn't
00:18:35
get a good look at this guy. Uh the guy did had he had to disguise himself a bit
00:18:41
by pulling that cap down over his face. Now, on top of that though, you have to worry that if if for some reason this
00:18:50
guy is just misremembering and he gives you a bad description of this dude, if you run with this, this could really
00:18:58
screw up your investigation. Yeah. So, so to air on the side of caution, one might think, well, let's just throw this
00:19:07
description out or keep it to ourselves, not releasing it to the public and not putting much weight to what we're That's
00:19:13
the point I was trying to get at, like, well, if if they're not sure, then what's the big deal? But, but like you
00:19:19
said, I mean, if you give this report out, then then this could affect the whole investigation. And you don't want
00:19:25
officers later going, "Well, I I arrested this guy and I thought maybe he had something to do with that attack,
00:19:32
but he didn't look anything like that description, so I let him go." Right? And then you're like, "Oh crap, that was
00:19:38
our dude." Um, so we have this murder and the strange thing about this murder is not only does BTK leave a
00:19:49
witness, but he also does not um he doesn't ever claim this murder. He never he never
00:19:58
outwardly says this is one that I did. And I want because it's botched. Yeah. And I wonder, well, not only that it's
00:20:04
botched, but this is the one time where we have a grown adult that might be able
00:20:11
to identify him, right? Therefore, we're going to see where he will claim, you know, by this point he's already told
00:20:18
the authorities and the police, I'm the one that did the OTO murders. But he never reaches out to them and talks to
00:20:25
him about this one. And this one occurred just three months afterward. Yeah. But again, you have eyewitness
00:20:32
that lived. Well, after the Katherine Bright's murder, other than his letter left at
00:20:39
the library, the killer went silent both in words and [Music] murder. Do you say data or data? However
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00:22:24
Captain. Well, it would be three years before BTK would resurface. And during this time, Dennis and his wife had had
00:22:31
their first child, a son that they named him Brian. Now, we talked about, we wondered why he could have gone silent.
00:22:42
what was going what else was going on in his world. We see the birth of his son,
00:22:47
but Dennis is also working very hard at the ADT company and he was actually earning promotions at this job during
00:22:55
the course of those three years. He got to the point where he was actually supervising a team of installers and
00:23:02
salespeople. Now, the country during this time celebrated its bsentennial. months came and went and the city that
00:23:08
had once feared the BTK began to forget about him. Mhm. The killer had vanished and a lot of people wondered if he had
00:23:17
maybe even left town a long time ago. And we now know why BTK took a break. But let's go through some of the
00:23:24
theories that law enforcement had at the time theorizing why he was on a break. Well, the two most popular, you know,
00:23:31
like we said that it seemed like the people of the city believed that maybe he had just fled the area, right, and
00:23:37
just left altogether. Now, the police theories, one of the more popular ones is that maybe he had died in a car
00:23:45
accident or that he was picked up on some unrelated charge and serving a prison sentence. Now, this is one that I
00:23:54
like. This was a theory of the FBI because the Otero murders were very it was a it was an infamous case. I
00:24:02
mean it the the investigation spanned months and years and they actually some of the investigators traveled
00:24:11
extensively in their investigation of the family murders. So they interviewed hundreds of people when it came to the
00:24:18
Otero murders. So, one FBI agent, he had theorized that maybe that the BTK was actually one of many people that were
00:24:28
interviewed in that in the course of that investigation. And just that experience alone was enough to scare him
00:24:36
away, you know, to stop him from moving forward with some of these crimes and some of these thoughts and desires of
00:24:42
his. And it's extra strange to me because he's made contact with the public and he's said, "Hey, I'm here.
00:24:49
I'm killing people and then it just kind of disappears. Yeah. And he also confesses to being a, you know, these
00:24:56
are crimes of a sexual nature is what he's told us in his own words. And you know, we somebody we talk about a lot on
00:25:04
this show, Captain John Douglas, you know, he says from his experience, serial sexual predators don't just wake
00:25:11
up one day and decide to turn over a new leaf and change their lives for the better. So that's why you have the FBI
00:25:18
and you have seasoned investigators believing that something must have happened. Something must have happened
00:25:24
to derail this killer who was going to prey on the city. But on March 17th, 1977, that's all going to change. Yeah.
00:25:32
And this is almost 3 years after the murder of Katherine Bright. So the killer is going to break his silence. On
00:25:40
that morning, in the morning hours, a little boy was returning home from an errand. He was stopped by a man he had
00:25:47
not seen before. Now the man had a bag with him and he also had a photograph and he showed the photograph to the boy
00:25:54
and asked him if he knew either of the people in the photograph. The boy said that he didn't know them. Now the man
00:26:01
then walked away and the boy was watching this man and he saw the man approach the home of his neighbor. Now,
00:26:08
the boy then returned to his house where his mother was in her room sick and his
00:26:14
brother and sister were still at home and they were watching TV. After about 10 minutes or so, there was a knock at
00:26:20
the door. The boy opened the door and on the front porch was the man who had asked him earlier about the photograph.
00:26:28
Now, the man was asking about a dog this time. He said that he had lost his dog and asked the boy if he had seen a dog
00:26:38
running loose around the neighborhood. The boy says, "No." And then the man asked, "Is your mother home? We should
00:26:45
ask her." The man then pushed the boy aside and walked inside the house right past the boy and he walks over to the TV
00:26:53
and he turns the TV off. Remember, the children are sitting there watching the TV, right? This startles the children
00:27:00
and they start screaming. The mother who was sick in her bedroom, she hears the commotion and she came out into the
00:27:07
room. At this point, the man had pulled out a gun. The woman yelled at him. She wanted to know who he was. Why was she
00:27:15
Why was he in her home? Why does he have a gun? Why does he have a gun? Yep. And
00:27:20
he he tells her to shut up and he pointed at the bedroom and he told her to get back in there. and she
00:27:26
says,"Well, what about my children?" And he told her to grab a blanket and some toys. Well, she complied. He took the
00:27:34
blanket and he lay it on the bathroom floor and then he spread the toys out on the blanket and he ordered the children,
00:27:40
all three of them, into the bathroom. Well, they complied. The bathroom has two doors. The man put together like a a
00:27:48
makeshift locking mechanism of some sorts. He he tied some rope from the door knob to the piping underneath the
00:27:56
sink in the bathroom. Mhm. And this prevented that door from being opened. Now the man went out the other door and
00:28:04
he pushed a bed to the outside of the door and this prevented this door from being open. So the three children are
00:28:11
trapped inside this small bathroom. The man then forced the mother to strip. Then he took some tape out of
00:28:19
his bag and he began to bind the mother. He taped her hands together behind her back and he laid her down on the bed
00:28:26
face down. He put a rope around her neck in a plastic bag over her head. Sometime
00:28:32
later, the children began to break free from their confinement in this bathroom.
00:28:38
One of the boys kicked through the bottom portion of one of the doors. This was the door that was tied to the pipes.
00:28:45
Yeah. When he busted free, he found his mother laying lifeless on her bed. The boy ran outside into the front porch of
00:28:55
a neighbor's house where he pounded on the front door. The neighbor answered and the boy screamed to the neighbor
00:29:02
that he needed help, telling him that his mommy was dead. So then the police were called. Well, paramedics arrived on
00:29:09
the scene first, and they actually went in and they cut the bindings around the woman's arms and legs, and it was a
00:29:18
smaller bedroom, so they carried her into the living room area, and they tried to revive the woman there. Now,
00:29:26
she had only been dead a very, very short period of time, so they thought they could bring her back. However, they
00:29:31
were unable to do so. Now, the police questioned the children. They wanted to know what had happened. What had they
00:29:39
seen? And the children told them that the killer was a dark-haired white man in his late 30s or 40s with a pot belly.
00:29:48
On March 17th, 1977, serial killer BTK killed Shirley Vianne in her home while her children
00:29:56
were locked in the bathroom. Now, many many years later, it was surmised that the man, the BTK that was walking around
00:30:05
the neighborhood, Mhm. that the photo that the man had shown the boy was actually a photograph of a neighbor
00:30:14
woman and her son. This was also the home that the man had approached after talking to the boy.
00:30:23
The intended target was the young mother who had regularly returned home from work during her lunch break, but not on
00:30:32
this day for whatever reason, right? And when she was not home, you know, he knocks on the door, no one answers the
00:30:39
door, nobody's home. He's too charged up. He's ready to murder. And the only way that this feeling was going to go
00:30:46
away for him was to kill somebody. Right. The factor X. Yes. So that's why when his target was not there, he
00:30:54
shifted gears and he went to he went to the home where he saw the little boy go inside because he knew somebody was home
00:31:00
there. Yeah. But you know, can you imagine what that kid's gone through with his life? I mean, one, he's stopped
00:31:07
by this killer. He doesn't know he's a killer, right? To ask a simple question about a dog. He answers. He goes back
00:31:15
home. Mhm. And his mom's sick in bed. The kids aren't sick. The mom's sick. but that's why they're not at school.
00:31:23
This guy knocks on the door. You answer. He says, "Well, let me talk to your mom." And he walks right in the house.
00:31:29
And look, when you're a kid, if an adult would have walked in the house, you you
00:31:34
probably just would have froze. Yeah, I don't know this person. What are they doing? And you know, they turn it off,
00:31:41
turn off the TV, and then your mom comes out and now you're stuck in the bathroom
00:31:47
and you're trying to get out. You got to get through that rope and then you have
00:31:50
to kick through the door and then you run to go get help and then paramed paramedics almost are able to uh save
00:31:58
your mother and you would have to contemplate for a long time that well not saying that you'd have to
00:32:06
but you would you would think maybe I could have done something to save her or maybe I could have got through there
00:32:12
faster you know. Well, and it's depressingly strange how some small events that seem so meaningless in their
00:32:20
moment, how they shift the gears of our lives and the others around us. I mean, you talk about had had the mother not
00:32:28
decided to keep the children home from school that day. Yeah. You know, she didn't send them off to school because
00:32:33
she was too sick to get them ready for the day and take them to school. These were small children. It's the butterfly
00:32:39
effect. Yeah. And so had her little boy not been walking the neighborhood, he would have never been approached by that
00:32:46
man, by BTK. And maybe BTK would have been forced to go to another street or to call it off
00:32:53
completely if he had no alternative victim, let's say. So it's it's depressingly strange
00:33:00
how these tiny little moments shift the gears of everything. The other thought too here, Captain, is
00:33:08
the scary thought that there was another targeted victim that that he that there
00:33:13
was somebody else that he was watching and he was so worked up by this point that he couldn't stop himself. He had to
00:33:20
kill somebody. This was the moment for him and he was going to make that happen even though his target was not
00:33:26
available. And and then you also wonder how long he was stalking this person. Yeah. And I get the feeling, well, I
00:33:33
don't get the feeling. I I know for a fact. I just don't know who these other potential victims would have been. Um
00:33:40
I'm sure law enforcement knows this and I'm sure FBI might know this because BTK
00:33:46
kept extensive notes. Okay. And he called each one of these little things. He called a project. It had a project
00:33:53
and a nickname. And usually in the notes he would refer to it as PJ something. So, like for we talked about uh
00:34:01
Katherine Brightit's murder, right? Well, she was project lights out and the next project that he had because he
00:34:10
fancied himself some kind of like he was conducting these secret missions. He's spying on these people. He's taking
00:34:18
notes about their activities and their lifestyle, their comingings and goings. And his secret mission is to break into
00:34:24
their home and terrorize them and kill them. Yeah. And so the next project that he had, he referred to this as Project
00:34:32
Foxy. And this would be Nancy Joe Fox. She was 25 years old. She was a smart, hardworking woman. She had a good sense
00:34:40
of humor. She worked days full-time as a secretary for a construction business. And at nights, she worked at a jewelry
00:34:48
store. So this was a busy, young, professional woman. A neighbor described Fox as a loner who seldom entertained
00:34:57
friends. On December 9th, a call came in. So busy working. Well, working two jobs. Yeah. On December 9th, a call came
00:35:05
in from a pay phone. The caller told the dispatcher, "You will find a homicide at
00:35:11
843 South Persing. Nancy Fox." Now, I'm sorry, sir, said the dispatcher. I can't
00:35:19
understand you. What is the address? At that point, another dispatcher who had been monitoring the call interrupted and
00:35:26
said, "I believe he said 8:43 South Persian." "That is correct," the man said, and then he hung up the phone. At
00:35:35
8:30 a.m., police arrived at the address given by the unknown caller. They discovered a back window to the home had
00:35:44
been shattered. The phone line to the house had been cut. The front door was unlocked. They entered the home. In the
00:35:51
master bedroom, the police found the half- naked dead body of 25-year-old Nancy Fox. She was lying on the bed. A
00:35:58
nylon stocking was used to tie her wrist behind her back. Her panties were pulled
00:36:04
down to her knees. A night gown had been tied around her ankles, and she had been
00:36:09
dead for quite some time, probably hours. Now, some portions of her body had turned black by the time she was
00:36:16
found. She had been gagged with panty hose. Blood was dried around her nose and mouth. Panty hose had been tied
00:36:24
around her neck. The killer had dumped NY's purse on the coffee table in the living room and her driver's license was
00:36:32
missing. Seaman was found on a blue night gown that was found on the floor near the foot of her bed. The victim had
00:36:41
not been raped. There were they were able to find partial fingerprints and a partial palm print on her body. However,
00:36:49
these would not be sufficient enough to find a match. Police theorized the killer had broke into the home through
00:36:57
the broken window, perhaps before Nancy had returned home the previous evening. He turned up the heat to make to make up
00:37:06
for the cold air that was coming through the broken window. He threatened her, bound her, killed her, masturbated near
00:37:14
her body, then posed the body, possibly taking photos of her. He then dumped out
00:37:20
her purse, keeping her driver's license as a souvenir. He rummaged through her dresser drawers, probably taking some of
00:37:27
her undergarments with him. He then left the home and at around 8:00 a.m. the next morning, he drove to a pay phone
00:37:35
and called in the homicide. Now, the phone call only lasted 7 seconds. The phone call was recorded and it was
00:37:43
played over and over on the local news channels during their broadcast. The police were hoping someone, anyone,
00:37:52
would recognize the voice. Someone had to know who this killer was. This audio clip is very distorted, but keep in mind
00:38:00
it is from 1977. Roger. Yes. You will find a home side at 843 South Ving. I'm sorry, sir. I can't understand you.
00:38:13
What is the address? South is correct. That is correct. It's like he's trying to be a
00:38:21
robot or something. Maybe he was doing some kind of weird cadence cuz if you notice like every everything he is
00:38:28
saying is kind of like this. Mhm. So maybe he's doing that on purpose, but I don't think this clip generated any
00:38:35
leads, right? And and the audio quality may be so bad that it's just it sounds distorted anyway. U but like you said,
00:38:44
this was played on the news and it didn't really generate any leads of any value. If they did get any calls
00:38:50
regarding this, you know, these could be crackpot calls of people calling in saying, "This sounds like my evil
00:38:55
stepfather." You know, things like that of that nature. But it was on the last day of January 1978 that the killer sent
00:39:03
a Valentine to the local newspaper. This would be almost two months after the murder. And that but that's not going to
00:39:10
be made public. No. And because of that reason, on February 10th of 1978, a letter was sent as well to
00:39:18
K TV network with a handdrawn picture of a woman tied up, gagged, and lying face
00:39:25
down on a bed. The letter would later become known as the Fox letter. Right. So, we have the Fox phone call and now
00:39:33
we have the Fox letter. But these are I mean he his writing is as bad as my speaking. Well, it could be or it could
00:39:41
be done on purpose. Right. So there's some thought that if you okay if you break up your words and if you break up
00:39:50
your sentences that that they are able to tell the experts are able to tell less about you. There are some people
00:39:58
that are of the belief that by using certain words and choosing certain words and the way that you arrange them in
00:40:05
sentences that they might be able to judge and tell things about your personality. So, one thing that people
00:40:11
have always taken a guess at here when it comes to BTK, was he just stupid? Like the way that his words sound on
00:40:19
paper? No, you stupid you stupid. Or was he smart enough that he did this on purpose so that he wasn't showing his
00:40:27
full hand, so to speak? The typed photocopied letter that they received, known as the Fox letter, reads as
00:40:33
follows. I find the newspaper not writing about the poem on vain unamusing. A little paragraph would have
00:40:44
enough. I know it not the media fault. The police chief, he keeps things quiet and doesn't let the public know. They're
00:40:53
a psycho running around loose, strangling mostly women. There are seven in the ground.
00:41:01
Who will be next? How many do I have to kill before I get a name in the paper or some national
00:41:09
attention? Do the cop think that all those deaths are not related? Golly G. Yes, the MMO is
00:41:18
different in each, but look, a pattern is developing. The victims are tie up. Most
00:41:25
have been women. Phone cut. Bring some bondage. Sadist matter tendencies. No struggle outside the death spot. No
00:41:36
witnesses except the veins kids. They were very lucky. A phone call saved them. I was going to tape the boys and
00:41:46
put plastic bag over their head like I did Joseph and Shirley and then hang the girl. God,
00:41:55
what a beautiful sexual release that would been. Josephine, when I hung her, that really
00:42:02
turned me on. Her plead for mercy. Then the rope took hold. She helpless. Staring at me with wide,
00:42:10
terrorfilled eyes. The rope getting tighter, tighter. You don't understand these
00:42:19
things because you are not under the influence of factor X. The same thing that made Son of Sam,
00:42:27
Jack the Ripper, Harvey Glatman, Boston Strangler, Dr. HH Holmes, Pantyho Strangler of Florida, Hillside
00:42:39
Strangler, Ted of the West Coast, and many more infamous character kill, which seems senseless, but we
00:42:50
cannot help it. There is no help, no cure except death or being caught and put away. It a terrible nightmare. But you
00:43:01
see, I don't lose any sleep over it. After a thing like Fox, I go home and I go about life like anyone else. And I
00:43:12
will be like that until the urge hit me again. It not continuous. And I don't have a lot of time. It take time to set
00:43:23
a kill. And one mistake it all over since I about blew it on the phone. Handwriting is out. Letter guide is too
00:43:33
long and typewriter can be traced too. My short poem of death and maybe a drawing later on. Maybe a real picture
00:43:44
and a tape of the sound will come your way. How will you know me? Before a murder or murders, you will
00:43:53
receive a copy of the initials BTK. You keep that copy. The original will show up someday on Guess Who. May
00:44:03
you not be the unlucky one. P.S. How about some name for me? It's time. Seven down and many more to go. I like the
00:44:14
following. How about you? The BTK strangler, Witchita Strangler, poetic strangler, the bondage strangler or
00:44:27
psycho, the Witchita hangman, the Witchita executioner, the Garat Phantom, the esphyxiator. Number five, you guess
00:44:39
motive and victim. Number six. You found one Shirley vein laying belly down on unmade bed in northeast bedroom. Hand
00:44:49
tied behind back with black tape and cord. Feet and ankles with black tape and legs. Ankles tied to west head of the
00:44:59
bed with a small off-white cord wrapped around legs, arms, and neck. many times a plastic bag over her
00:45:09
head with a pink nighty on barefooted. She was sick. Use a glass of water and smoke one or two cigarette. House a
00:45:20
total mess. Kids took some toys with them to the bathroom. Bed against east bathroom door. Chose at random with some
00:45:30
pre-planning. Motive factor X. Number seven, one. Nancy Fox lying belly down on maid bed in southwest bedroom. Hands
00:45:43
tied behind back with red panty hose. Feet together with yellow nighty. Semi-nude with pink sweater and bra.
00:45:52
Panties below butt. She had a smoke and went to the bathroom before the final act. Very neat
00:46:00
housekeeper and dresser. Rifled purse in kitchen. Empty paper bag. White coat in living room. Heat up
00:46:09
to about 90°. Christmas tree lights on. Hosery on bed. Driver's license gone. Seinal stain
00:46:20
on or in blue women underwear. Chose at random with little pre-planning. Motive factor
00:46:28
X. Number eight. Next victim maybe. You will find hanging with a wire noose. Hands behind back with black taper cord.
00:46:40
Gagged then cord around the body to the neck. Hooded maybe will be chosen at random with some pre-planning. Motive
00:46:49
factor X. Enclosed was a poem titled Oh Death to Nancy. Oh, what is this that I can see? Cold,
00:47:01
icy hands taking hold of me. For death has come, you can see. Hell has opened its gate to trick me. Oh, death. Oh,
00:47:11
death, can't you spare me? Over for another year. I'll stuff your jaws until you
00:47:18
can't talk. I'll bind your legs till you can't walk. I'll tie your hands till you
00:47:23
can't make a stand. And finally, I close your eyes so you can't see. I'll bring sexual death unto you for me.
00:47:40
[Music] All right, Captain. Before we leave, before we take off for Crime Con. Yeah.
00:47:51
I'm leaving Crime Con on. I'm leaving tonight. I'm going I'm traveling by way of hot air balloons, so it will take me
00:47:57
a little longer. Want to drop you a little recommended reading before we go. I'm traveling by foot. Here you go. This
00:48:04
week, we are recommending Love and Death in the Sunshine State, the story of a crime by Cutter Wood. And this story
00:48:10
starts off when a stolen car is recovered on the GF coast of Florida. And it sets off a search for a missing
00:48:17
woman. Now, there are three men that are named as persons of interest. And this is her husband, her boyfriend, and the
00:48:25
man who stole the car. This is this is a mystery that's going to keep you guessing. I highly recommend Love and
00:48:32
Death in the Sunshine State. And you don't have to write that title down now because you can go to true
00:48:37
crimegar.com, click on the recommended page, and you will find that title amongst others there. Also on
00:48:44
trueg.com, you can check out our store page. We have the pre-orders going on right now for the team Nick tanks, the
00:48:51
team captain tanks, the skull logo tanks, the douche canoe tanks, and the nice jib tanks. So, it's a tank top
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sale. And don't forget to check out our sponsor. Support the people that support
00:49:02
the garage. All right, see you guys after Crime Con. And until then, be good, be kind, and don't
00:49:11
litter. Heat. Heat. [Music] [Applause] [Music]