00:00:08
well on a very basic level people who are from Detroit simply don't like to get pushed around I guess and and I got
00:00:17
tired of listening to the rhetoric surrounding the the investigation or the legend but alleged investigation into
00:00:25
the Oakland County child killings um there there are two possible reasons this case was never officially closed
00:00:33
and I I don't believe in the first one which which is that the incompetence of the investigation uh led to it remaining
00:00:42
open for for over four decades now the other the other reason this case was never officially closed was that it was
00:00:50
not meant to be closed and and I could tell from from very early on listening to the news stories about this case and
00:00:58
doing some initial reading there were certain people in in positions of power who didn't want this thing shut because
00:01:05
to shut the case means you have to come up with a conclusion and but on a very personal level this case anchored in me
00:01:14
very early on because when I was a kid somebody tried to snatch me while I was walking home from the Century Drugs that
00:01:22
that used to be at Evergreen Plaza they called it over at 11 Mile and Evergreen in Southfield which is outside of
00:01:29
Detroit nothing happened somebody I thought was a security guard had followed me out of the store gotten into
00:01:37
his car followed me for three blocks and and then later tried to get me into that
00:01:42
car I ran away I never told anybody and as an adult I started thinking of the time period in which this attempted
00:01:53
snatch of me happened and and it was the same time period in which the uh Oakland
00:01:59
County child killings were occurring 76 77 and the same MMO people thought uh snatching kids from outside little strip
00:02:10
malls they speculated that it was somebody acting as in a position of power like a security guard or police
00:02:19
officer [Music] thank you [Applause] thank you [Music] welcome to True Crime garage wherever
00:03:01
you are whatever you are doing thanks for listening I'm your host Nick and I'm very lucky to have this guy with me
00:03:06
because lately he's not been sleeping in the garage he's been at a week-long RV party hosted by Baker Mayfield ladies
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and gentlemen the captain the Browns are so desperate they offered me a contract
00:03:19
thank you thank you thank you it's good to be seen it's good to see you thanks for listening thanks for telling a
00:03:25
friend tonight we are drinking Scotty karate Scotch ale by the brilliant team of
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Brewers up at Dark Horse Brewing in Marshall Michigan a garage grade four out of five bottle caps this is a big
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anything you can think of all at truecrime garage.com that is enough of the business everybody gather round grab
00:04:47
a chair grab a beer let's talk some true crime [Music] people from Michigan often describe
00:05:09
their state as a mitten they hold up their right hand and point to where they live on their Palm
00:05:15
in regards to this week's case they would show you the location of Oakland County by pointing to the base of their
00:05:22
thumb sounds odd but ask anyone from Michigan and the Hand will come up Oakland county is near Detroit
00:05:31
in the 1970s it was a county that had very high paid Executives as well as many middle class blue-collar workers
00:05:39
this combination provided both great schools and a safe environment but Oakland county is not famous for the
00:05:47
schools or the industry it is Infamous for the serial killer who found his prey there
00:05:55
[Music] this week we are talking about the case of the Oakland County child killer it is
00:06:08
a 40 year old unsolved mystery where in 1976 and 77 children were abducted and held for days then they were murdered
00:06:17
and staged the killer stole these kids off the streets before holding them captive
00:06:24
fed them and took care of their physical needs while at the same time torturing them
00:06:30
the bodies were not tossed out or dumped like garbage the killer cleaned them and placed them
00:06:36
in public places the bodies were easy to find but the killer was not what happened to him
00:06:43
some have speculated that the killer committed suicide taking his secrets to the Grave
00:06:50
some believe that just like the boogeyman he terrified us and vanished back into the Shadows
00:06:57
years later people began to wonder was this the work of something bigger something even more Sinister than a lone
00:07:05
killer [Music] [Music] Mark Stebbins lived in Ferndale Michigan one of the many hamlets inside Oakland
00:07:32
County Ferndale is primarily residential with a smaller commercial and Industrial
00:07:38
sector in the southeast part of the city ferndale's business district is anchored
00:07:44
by the intersection of Woodward Avenue and Nine Mile Road where privately owned storefronts dance clubs bars and
00:07:51
numerous restaurants are featured in the 1970s the Ferndale suburb Community emerged as a place for families to raise
00:08:00
children during the baby boom era with its elementary schools a Downtown City Parks active churches and Civic groups
00:08:08
it was a small town just like the other towns where these victims lived peacefully up until the day that they
00:08:15
were taken Mark was born September 13 1963. now in 1976 Mark was a seventh grader at Lincoln Junior High he lived
00:08:27
with his mother after his parents split up when he was just five years old besides his mother Mark lived with his
00:08:34
older brother Michael Mark was an average 12 year old boy in just about every way he was four foot eight inches
00:08:41
tall and weighed about a hundred pounds but life was about to change for everyone in Oakland County yeah this is
00:08:47
going to be Sunday February 15 1976. this would turn out to be a rainy day but it was quite warm for the season
00:08:55
Mark's mother Ruth wanted to attend a work party at the American Legion Hall so mark his brother Michael Ruth and her
00:09:04
boyfriend drove the three blocks to the hall when they arrived there was a pool tournament in progress but watching
00:09:11
adults drink and play pool only entertains a 12 year old boy for so long so Mark before the party was over asked
00:09:18
his mother if he could head home he wanted to go home and watch television his mom was hesitant but she did allow
00:09:26
Mark to leave alone Mark then asked her for a quarter so he could buy some ice cream at the store next door to the
00:09:34
American Legion his mom reminded him that he had just received his allowance and said no now his brother offered to
00:09:41
go along with him but Mark he was 12 and he said he would be fine by himself at 12 25 pm
00:09:49
Mark Stebbins walked out of the hall alone sometime in the 7 PM hour Ruth tried to call Mark at home but there was
00:09:57
no answer this did not raise any alarms and probably shouldn't have but she so she's not worried and she
00:10:04
continued to enjoy the party at nine o'clock she returned to an empty house now this put her on edge a bit but
00:10:12
she figured she would wait one more hour to see if Mark would come home he did not and at 10 o'clock Ruth called the
00:10:19
police and reported him as missing the police responded to the Stebbins house not expecting anything more than a
00:10:27
runaway or a kid who lost track of time the police informed her we haven't had any kidnappings in Ferndale in 10 years
00:10:35
but nonetheless the search for the 12 year old boy began they searched abandoned buildings and
00:10:41
other stops popular with the kids but nothing turned up and he never came back and then the hours turned to days the
00:10:50
walk from the American Legion to Mark's house was only three blocks what could he have encountered on such a short walk
00:10:58
home unfortunately four days later they're going to find his body yeah this is on Thursday February 19th at
00:11:04
approximately 11 40 a.m when a man is out picking up lunch from the Fairfax Plaza office building he spotted a body
00:11:13
lying on a pile of leaves near the building's dumpster the man found Mark Stebbins body curled on a snow bank in
00:11:20
the fetal position it appeared that the body was placed there gently the odd thing here Captain this is not a
00:11:27
secluded location it is and was an active office building with people coming and going all day long right so
00:11:34
the perpetrator could have been seen by anybody yeah this killer was bold enough
00:11:40
to remove mark from whatever kind of vehicle he was driving and place the body in a location where he the Killer
00:11:47
could have been easily spotted or at least his vehicle seen by somebody on the extra time that he's going to be
00:11:54
taking to place the body in a certain position this spot is only two and a half miles from Mark's house but even in
00:12:02
that short distance we have a different police jurisdiction so the victim Mark lived in Ferndale but his body was found
00:12:10
in Southfield this is another town in Oakland County and one has to wonder if this is done on purpose yeah would the
00:12:17
killer have been aware of this uh did he Place Mark there knowing that it would involve another Police Department
00:12:24
so the Southfield Police arrived to find Mark the scene was like no other upon the first review of Mark there were
00:12:33
several things that jumped out at the officers Mark appeared to be clean Mark was wearing the clothes he had on the
00:12:40
day he disappeared his jacket was zipped up and his hood was pulled over his head
00:12:46
the Southfield Police radioed in the information that they had found the boy's body this quickly got back to
00:12:53
Ferndale police and they realized that their missing persons case just became a murder investigation
00:13:01
the Ferndale police showed up at the office building and started to process the scene this is hard to believe
00:13:07
knowing today's practices but remember we have two different police departments working this one crime scene well and
00:13:14
remember it's the late 70s I mean doctors used to smoke in the hospital well and in this area too Captain
00:13:20
neither of these police jurisdictions neither of these departments had much experience in murder cases so rather
00:13:29
than process the scene believe it or not the Southfield Police removed Mark's Body this is just wrong of course but
00:13:36
they take the body to the police station not to the morgue to the police station
00:13:40
then they decide to remove Mark's clothes at the police station then after sending the body to the morgue they go
00:13:48
back and processed the scene back at the dump site they decide to involve a local
00:13:53
psychiatrist this is Bruce Danto he was brought to the scene to create a profile
00:13:59
of this killer but he had a a better idea or at least a better idea that he thought to him yes so he suggested that
00:14:08
they place a life-size child's mannequin wearing similar closes Mark in the same
00:14:13
spot so let's stop here and review shall we well first of all what the hell does
00:14:18
that have to do with profine the perpetrator well he's brought into profile and I think what he thought was
00:14:24
let's see if we can get the killer to return to the scene and we'll just arrest him on the spot and I we won't
00:14:32
need to come up with any profile so I know that this whole thing sounds like a very weird technique but it's not unique
00:14:40
it's not a unique technique so let me just see if I'm hearing you right okay so the idea from this doctor is that
00:14:48
we're going to take this mannequin and we're going to place him in similar clothes or the same clothes no similar
00:14:54
clothes similar clothes and we're going to put them in a similar position and it's kind of out in the open we know
00:14:59
that sometimes Killers will go back to where they dump victims to kind of see has the victim been found yet
00:15:09
so their idea is that the the suspect will come back and when he comes back we'll arrest him on the spot correct
00:15:18
okay and and like I said though it sounds weird but it's not a technique that was unique and I mean that for the
00:15:25
time period I don't know that they would do something like this today or I can't
00:15:31
find anything recent where they did something like this today but we know that in the Michigan murders in the case
00:15:38
it's often referred to as the Michigan murders they use this technique they've used it in the Green River Killer case
00:15:44
as well as the Atlanta child murders right now question would you sign up for this special Duty
00:15:51
because that's what they call it they'd have special Duty where police officers would have to wait in their vehicle
00:15:58
somewhere looking for the suspect to return of course of course so like in the you get the Donuts I'll get the
00:16:06
coffee but here's the reason why I think that he decided to do this or at least suggested it was because the Michigan
00:16:13
murders took place in 1967 through 1969 right and that was when Ann Arbor brought in a man named Peter hercos to
00:16:22
assist he had he had assisted in the Boston Strangler case so they brought this dude in and say look we got a
00:16:27
serial killer and we need to try some things to try to figure out who this guy is now I don't
00:16:34
recall for certain whose idea it was but it was likely hercos's idea that they employed this technique in the Michigan
00:16:41
murders the idea as you said that the killer would return to the bodies um I'm guessing my guess here captain and I
00:16:50
would be willing to wager a hundred dollar bill bill and six pack of beer the Danto the guy brought in on the
00:16:57
Oakland County case on Mark Stebbins murder had studied the Michigan murders case and was taking a tactic from that
00:17:04
and whether or not you think this is a genius idea or a dumbass idea what could it hurt really right well
00:17:13
other than destroying the crime scene it doesn't hurt much well but if you process the crime scene properly in
00:17:20
advance right but here's the problem with it with using this technique uh or tactic in this particular case so the
00:17:29
main there's two main reasons why the killer will return to the body the first being in in actually most of the time it
00:17:37
being sexual for sexual reasons the killer will return to the body there's also investigative where the
00:17:44
killer wants to see why nobody's found the body right the problem with this situation is this situation is unique in
00:17:52
that most of the times when the in fact the the investigations that we just discussed the Michigan murders the Green
00:17:58
River Killer the Atlanta child murders and there's more but the bodies that they were returning to
00:18:05
were secluded they were in the woods they were hidden this this body is left out in the open so returning to the body
00:18:12
for sexual reasons means you're going to have to bring the pick up the body and take it with you you know it seems
00:18:20
unlikely that a killer would dump the body in a very public open location not secluded and then choose to return to it
00:18:28
yeah and you got to be pretty Brazen to return to open area and then drop trial and it almost seems usually when a
00:18:36
killer will leave a body in a very public place like this that psychologically for some reason it's
00:18:43
almost a sign of of that maybe they want the body to be found sooner rather than
00:18:48
later for some some unknown reason yeah you'll wonder if that is um kind of a control thing like I'm letting you find
00:18:57
the body well we could go through our thoughts on the actual crime scene but the general report is simple they just
00:19:04
took a crime seen that they could have produced something and they destroyed it so Footprints fingerprints and fibers
00:19:11
were destroyed they had nothing and we will get back to this in a minute the medical examiner's findings were as
00:19:19
follows Mark had been alive well fed and cared for during the time he was missing
00:19:25
about four days presumably by his killer or someone involved we say cared for for
00:19:33
a lack of better term someone who is kidnapped and later killed is never really cared for by the perpetrator
00:19:40
the cause of death was strangulation this could have been any number of ways some suggest it could have been as
00:19:46
simple as covering Mark's nose and mouth with a hand or hands or a bag placed over his head they found a large wound
00:19:55
on the back of Mark's head they concluded this was from either from the car trunk slamming down on his head as
00:20:03
he was thrown into the trunk of the car right or it could have been from the killer striking Mark in the back of the
00:20:09
head with a shotgun this was violence that Mark had experienced in the first few hours of the abduction Mark was
00:20:17
sexually assaulted with an object what object we do not know but this would be important so police could find could
00:20:24
they could possibly look for this item as they investigate the case Mark was bound and likely for a good length of
00:20:32
time we know this because he had rope burns on his ankles and hands further digging we find that it was determined
00:20:39
that The Binding marks on on the wrist and ankles were believed to have been caused by an eighth or quarter inch Bell
00:20:45
Telephone type wire his body was bathed his nails were cleaned and trimmed and this leads to
00:20:52
several questions right Captain one did Mark struggle with his abductor scratching him leaving evidence under
00:21:00
Mark's fingernails and the killer then decided to clean and trim the nails was Mark bathe before or after he was killed
00:21:09
did this killer tell Mark he was safe and taking him home convincing Mark to bathe and put on his clean clothes to
00:21:17
meet his parents after this nightmarish four days these are all good questions that anyone
00:21:23
who has studied this case has likely pondered right you want the answers to these questions well here you go well if
00:21:31
we have the shotgun attack on the back of the head and they think that happened early
00:21:38
and the abduction maybe is that how he got Mark into his car if he's posing as a security guard or a
00:21:47
police officer and he gets this young kid to turn around put your hands on the car crack him with your shotgun or a gun
00:21:56
and then put him in the vehicle well let's provide a few answers to some of those questions okay because this is
00:22:06
reported just wrong and it has been reported wrong for 40 years so why here's the truth
00:22:14
okay Mark was washed cleaned uh closed washed and cleaned no evidence or mess was found that has always been what was
00:22:24
reported because of a report prepared by Lauren Doan of Springfield p e the truth is and
00:22:32
this is taken from this week's recommended reading the kill jar that on February 20th 1976 evidence collected
00:22:39
from The Mark Stebbins scene was received by Charlotte day at the Michigan State Police crime lab and
00:22:45
reported on March 2nd 1976 as chronicled in that report on the body of Stebbins his blue parka with blood stains on the
00:22:57
hood blue jeans soiled with dirt and oil from the parking lot where he was found
00:23:02
Trace fibers of white wool red wool blue wool and yellow or gold carpeting one human hair whose Source was other than
00:23:12
Stebbins was found rodent hair and dog hair on all outerwear an unknown source of decorative blue paint on steben's
00:23:21
left rubber boot urine and fecal stains in his underpants soil and perspiration stains on his
00:23:28
T-shirt Stebbins red sweatshirt was stained with blood now that's a completely different report
00:23:35
than we found no evidence and the boy was washed and cleaned his clothes were washed and cleaned right just if you're
00:23:44
wondering you shouldn't find any of that stuff after you wash clothes right right
00:23:49
uh yeah so a completely different report why I think it has to do with several things here
00:23:57
likely won the mishandling of the body remember we said that the body was sent to the police department before it went
00:24:03
to the morgue right the clothes were removed from the body before it went to the morgue so I'm guessing here that
00:24:10
what you have is you have two different reports conducted by two different people at two different locations and
00:24:17
they each have different findings one finds a messy body with evidence on it all over it and the other finds a clean
00:24:24
body with no evidence well maybe one of them's processing the dummy well what has always made its way to the media and
00:24:32
to documentaries regarding this case this 40 year old unsolved mystery is the clean version that no evidence was found
00:24:41
that the body was cleaned so for the next 10 months Captain the south field in Ferndale police investigated they
00:24:48
called in The Usual Suspects the registration of sex offenders would not start for another 20 years but they
00:24:55
would round up the local sex perverts and they were checked out yeah you gotta round up the local flicky flickies but
00:25:02
uh the other thing here though is this if you're gonna if you're gonna profile this suspect
00:25:08
having a clean victim washed and bathed and closed clean and now a dirty victim with dirty
00:25:16
clothes you would profile this killer differently oh of course I think the thing to hone in on is the the four days
00:25:26
the 96 hours that someone held Mark captive so let's think about that how do you hold a child for that long from the
00:25:34
afternoon of Sunday then all of Monday Tuesday Wednesday and Thursday morning can you go to work during that time can
00:25:43
you do this by yourself or do you need someone's help and where do you live that you can bring
00:25:48
a child to your house without suspicion and hold them there for that many days [Music]
00:26:03
[Music] all right we're back cheers mates cheers captain on Wednesday December 22nd 1976
00:26:19
12 year old sixth grader Jill Robinson and her mom agreed on one thing that they had had enough of each other they
00:26:28
lived in Royal Oak another town like Southfield and Ferndale this is about 10 minutes from where Mark Stebbins body
00:26:36
was found Jill's dad Tom had divorced the mother a few years earlier now she had a long day already and now she was
00:26:44
rushing to get dinner on the table before going to church Jill's mom asked Jill to make biscuits for dinner and
00:26:52
Jill was known as being a smart and stubborn girl she was having a bad day too so Wednesdays are supposed to be the
00:27:00
days that Jill would spend with her father he would get her after school and they
00:27:06
would have the evening together well Tom failed to get Jill on this Wednesday no
00:27:10
surprise surprise and now she is stuck with her mom and sister for the night not exactly what she wanted
00:27:18
she was also not sleeping well lately because she was having this reoccurring nightmare this nightmare was so
00:27:27
concerning to Carol that Jill was seeing a psychiatrist to help uh help her through this problem what was the dream
00:27:35
about the nightmare that she was having I don't know exactly what the nightmare was but she's stating that it caused
00:27:44
Jill to have fear that someone was going to shoot her to death and she would be shot at some point in her life Jill
00:27:51
refused to help with the dinner and an argument started between the two Carol was at her breaking point and she looked
00:27:59
at her daughter and she shouted get out which was heard loud and clear Jill grabbed her denim backpack and she was
00:28:07
going to take off she filled she filled the backpack with her hairbrush a blue and green plaid blanket some makeup some
00:28:15
underwear and two books no so she's gonna go live out on her own not exactly the the first book is a first edition
00:28:23
Little House on the Prairie book this one had an inscription from a family member that gave it to her as a gift the
00:28:31
second book she checked out of the library which was a Nancy Drew mystery these books are very important Clues now
00:28:38
Jill before leaving is going to put on winter clothes it was below freezing outside and as she was leaving she told
00:28:45
her younger sister that she was going to their father's house she slammed the door behind her now
00:28:51
her father's home is approximately six miles away so she grabbed her bike she loved her bike it was a high-speed brand
00:28:59
20 inch frame purple with chrome fenders it had a white banana seat sounds like your bike she hopped on her bike and she
00:29:08
was gone Jill's mom waited an hour and went outside to look for her Carol thought that she would find Jill sitting
00:29:16
out front of their house ready to apologize but when she got out there there was no sign of Jill
00:29:22
so Carol called Tom Jill's father and when he told her that she wasn't there and he had not seen her Carol
00:29:31
called the police and reported her missing the police began searching they checked if she had stopped at any stores
00:29:38
and they interviewed a bunch of people Jill was seen by a family friend at about 7 30 PM near the Tiny Tim Hobby
00:29:47
Center they didn't find anyone who saw her after this nothing the police found nothing else until the next day
00:29:56
this is when the police found her bike in the 160 block of Washington Street it was leaning against a tree the police
00:30:06
started searching the neighborhood when a local teenager came up to them and informed them that they had found the
00:30:13
bike he and his friends somewhere else and they had been out joy riding it through the area before leaving it at
00:30:19
the tree so the police went to 1523 North Main Street this is where the boys said that they had originally found the
00:30:27
bike the address was for a building and a business area the bike was found at the rear of the building according to
00:30:34
the boys now this would be a concealed area behind the building about a three-quarters of a mile from Jill's
00:30:41
home it was in the direction that she would have traveled if she was in route to her
00:30:46
father's house I won't put too much emphasis on where the bike was found or where it could have been during the
00:30:54
course of that day because we now know all these years later that we have many reasons to believe that the bike was
00:31:00
moved several times throughout the course of this time period before it was found by the police well first of all
00:31:07
the police need to tell these kids look what you did you little jerk don't move a bike it's not yours that's stealing
00:31:15
long days passed as everyone searched for Jill now the day after Christmas Sunday December 26 1976 at 6 30 a.m four
00:31:26
days after her disappearance a motorist driving Northbound in Troy Michigan saw her body on the I-75 shoulder he got on
00:31:34
his CB Radio and contacted the police he reported this but was gone by the time that the police had arrived the police
00:31:42
arrived to find a girl who was shot in the face and killed it appeared she was shot Point Blank the police reported a
00:31:50
Halo of crimson around her head Jill's body was placed in the snow fully clothed with her backpack still on her
00:31:58
there was a light layer of snow on the body this location was not shielded in any way anyone driving down the road
00:32:07
could have witnessed this murder or The Dumping of the body in fact Jill's body was within Sight and Sound of the Troy
00:32:15
police station no one at the police station heard or saw a thing but there was a witness the
00:32:22
witness was driving his car on Highway I-75 at 3 30 in the morning when he spotted a 1971 Pontiac Le Mans idling on
00:32:34
the highway shoulder the witness slowed down and merged into the left lane as he
00:32:39
approached the Le Mans the Le Mans slowly pulled onto the road the witness was adamant to the police that it was in
00:32:48
fact in 1971 Le Mans because he had once owned the same vehicle similar vehicle the witness offered up specific details
00:32:58
regarding the vehicle there were primer spots on the left side and a broken left
00:33:04
tail light Jill's body was transported to the morgue and an autopsy was performed she
00:33:12
was fully clothed she still had her backpack on the two books were missing her body was bathed and her nails were
00:33:20
trimmed and clean Jill had been quote cared for and fed during the four days that she was missing Jill was also
00:33:27
placed where she was found not dumped or thrown I think it's fair to say we have the right to question the last
00:33:36
few items that we stated here you know we we saw in the mark Stebbins incident that one thing is reported and another
00:33:43
thing actually happened regarding the body yeah if there's urine and feces those clothes weren't washed the cause
00:33:50
of death was from a shotgun blast to her face while she was lying on her back so
00:33:56
she was killed where she was found she had died the same way that she had feared that she would or at least what
00:34:03
she had told her mom and the psychiatrist wait go back to that so you're you're claiming
00:34:09
that they're stating that she was killed where she was left yes but this eyewitness that saw the car leaving the
00:34:18
scene did not hear anything did not hear anything and there's also no other reports of hearing anything
00:34:25
right and like I said the Troy police department is within an earshot yeah shotgun blast you're going to there's
00:34:32
going to be somebody reporting that what what makes them believe this if nobody heard it then there's no one to report
00:34:39
it mm-hmm I'm just saying what other evidence did they have to make it them think that the the actual Death happen
00:34:49
where well where the victim was I had reported the Crim the Halo of crimson above her head so that would be the the
00:34:57
blood being blasted out of her I mean I can't put it there's no nice way to put it the
00:35:03
blood being blasted out of her head as she was shot in the in the in the face with the shotgun
00:35:08
uh the crown of her I was going to leave this out of the story but uh since pushed for an explanation the top of her
00:35:16
head was located there as well did they do an autopsy to find out if she if there was regulation
00:35:24
at all um look it's the report is the same as with Mark and what we will see with the other
00:35:32
two victims as well the public the public reports of these are not the actual findings not the actual police
00:35:41
findings right and all of these situations we're going to be told and at some point it became like almost like
00:35:48
lore like like local Legend right that this mystery of a killer who's who's so smart and so tactful that they decide
00:35:57
you know what I'm gonna I'm going to abduct children off of the streets um and these are middle class kids too
00:36:05
I'm going to take these kids and I'm going to keep them do whatever I want and I'm going to clean them scrub them
00:36:10
clean to the point where you can't find anything on me you know they want the there's this
00:36:16
portrayal of some kind of Genius child killer that was stalking the area right and really as we saw with the mark
00:36:25
Stebbins case that wasn't the case that's not how the body was found right but we see this a lot in the the 60s 70s
00:36:33
80s 90s 2000s and and it's really just starting to turn over now where this idea of these genius killers and these
00:36:44
genius serial killers like if this guy was such a damn genius then why is his tail light busted
00:36:52
you know I mean if in fact that was the car that dumped the body or right placed
00:36:57
her there and then shot her there right but again here's a here's folklore taking over going uh not this guy's an
00:37:04
evil genius and he grabs these victims and he cleans them up and you'll never catch him you brought up a great
00:37:10
question though was there any sign of possible strangulation I believe that there was and and I have
00:37:16
not much to base this off of at all but my here's what my suspicion is she was laid on her back and her backpack was
00:37:24
found on her I think that somebody one of two things possibly happened I think that this individual that was dumping
00:37:32
her body there on the side of the highway took the shotgun along with them for two
00:37:38
reasons one in case they needed it to use it on the victim and two if they needed it for protection of themselves
00:37:46
okay so picture this he's walking he or they are carrying the body of of a girl that they have already strangled
00:37:58
that they believe to have been dead right and they're going to put her in the snow place her off the side of the
00:38:05
highway and then get back in the car and drive on right now I think one of two things happened they lied her down they
00:38:12
laid her down on her back and they said that her backpack was found still on her
00:38:16
back so I think that either a she wasn't actually dead and when they placed her on the ground
00:38:24
she came to and took a breath and it scared them and they shot her there and then or
00:38:33
she was in fact dead they placed her down and because of the backpack it may have made the cause the body to move in
00:38:40
a way or even push out air from the lungs where they would have the same reaction they would think maybe she was
00:38:48
still alive and react the same way using the shotgun there and then okay you want
00:38:54
to know the fact what's that you wanna know the fact Jack but that came out a little hairier than I
00:39:02
thought it would here's the fact Jack this is what I believe I believe like you said
00:39:09
perfectly is that she was strangled before she was strangled at this suspect's house she
00:39:16
was dead she was in this person's possession for four days what was the biggest thing going on in
00:39:22
our life or one of the biggest things going on in her life she's seeing a therapist about these nightmares of
00:39:29
being shot and killed and I think she was dead and I think this killer went out of his way
00:39:36
to bring a gun to shoot her in the face as a sign to the parents as at like I got to know her
00:39:45
and that's what I believe right I think this person I think this killer knew about these dreams and and thought they
00:39:52
were clever in some way well I think that goes with the profiling as well we're we're not talking you know let's
00:40:00
stop calling these people Evil Geniuses but this person does have some intelligence and they do have some
00:40:06
thought process on what's Happening and what's interesting here is you have one body that's found in the fetal position
00:40:12
and one body that's found face up right with the book bag on and I wonder if that's some kind of clue that they're
00:40:20
trying to leave because they took their time to put these bodies and their wide open
00:40:27
spaces right but they're taking their time to almost place the body that's there's some thought process or possibly
00:40:35
again that could just be the way that it's reported what we learned with the first murder is you can't we can't trust
00:40:41
the reports on the mark Stebbins case so I don't know that we can trust all of the
00:40:46
you know it it almost looks to me more like Mark was just dumped not not really placed with a whole lot of thought and
00:40:55
it could be and it could just be reported that way oh well he was found kind of in the fetal position right and
00:41:01
I think I here's the one thing that we cannot uh dispute you know you got to look for actual
00:41:09
scientific fact in these things and so what we're going to go ahead and talk about here is we the the layer of snow
00:41:16
that was on Jill is going to tell us what time she was approximately killed because it it didn't start snowing until
00:41:25
about 3 A.M that night okay so they would they would determine that she was killed between three and six A.M
00:41:34
that helps us out a little bit scientific fact we know about what time it started to snow well we know
00:41:40
not killed possibly but we know when the body was left in that spot correct correct
00:41:47
um there was no sign of sexual abuse found with Jill um some so the cause of death
00:41:54
uh lack of sexual assault different gender different victim gender and the location was enough to keep these two
00:42:03
murders unrelated as far as police are concerned at least for the moment so now Captain what we
00:42:10
have is we have police from four different agencies working these cases Troy police Royal Oak police they are
00:42:19
working the Jill Robinson case right while Ferndale and Southfield are working the mark Stebbins case now again
00:42:25
gut your gut feeling here is does this person know does the suspect know does the killer know that they're leaving
00:42:32
them in different areas under different jurisdictions it's possible it's very possible it could
00:42:40
also be possible that the victims were victims of opportunity for the killer uh that they went out trolling around
00:42:48
looking for somebody walking alone and that's who they took and presumably did the same thing when it
00:42:55
came time to dump the body I'll drive around and look for a spot where nobody is and if it happens to be out in the
00:43:01
open then boom I gotta park my car and get this thing on the side of the road very quickly well there's another two
00:43:07
victims so I think that's gonna lead us down more of a funnel a week after Jill's body was found Christine
00:43:14
mihelik vanished she was a 10 year old fifth grader who lived in Berkeley Michigan another Detroit suburb on the
00:43:22
day of her disappearance Christine was helping her mom around the house she already had run an errand for her mom
00:43:28
that required her to cross 12 mile this is considered to be a busy street to most So Christine asked her mom if
00:43:37
she could run to the 7-Eleven across 12 mile she'd love to paper her walls with the pictures from the hottest teen
00:43:45
magazines the new Teen Superstar magazine had just come out and she wanted to pick up this issue who you
00:43:53
think was on the cover uh this was Donnie and Marie Osmond that was going to be my guess her mom had trouble
00:44:00
saying no to Christine she didn't really want her to go but she had already sent
00:44:05
her off on an errand for herself across this busy road and so now it's going to be tough to say no to her so
00:44:12
she lets her go to go pick up this magazine she even gave her two dollars so that she could pay for it now it was
00:44:19
around 27 degrees that day so she put on her baby Blue ski jacket over a white blouse and gray jeans it's about a five
00:44:28
minute walk for her when Christine was not back in hour her mom started to panic she contacted the police and
00:44:36
Christine's father the police checked with the clerk at the 7-Eleven and found out that Christine made it to the
00:44:44
7-Eleven store and in fact had purchased the magazine this would be around 3 P.M
00:44:50
so the search for her began immediately after finding out that she had made it to the store but not returned home
00:44:57
it was a full-on search the parents hit the streets looking for her her father he was he was out on the streets with
00:45:07
his gun and his belt looking for his daughter we had two missing children that showed up dead the police were
00:45:13
stopping cars and investigating every possible lead the neighbors of the mihalix started collecting money in case
00:45:19
of a ransom demand the the total was up to seventeen thousand dollars in just a couple of days the parents and
00:45:27
grandparents went on TV begging to whoever to allow Christine to come home the search in the media attention stayed
00:45:34
strong for 19 days for the 19 days that Christine was missing let's emphasize that one more time 19 days over two
00:45:45
weeks almost three weeks Jerry wozny a an 11 year old veteran of the postal service was following the same route
00:45:52
that he did every day when he saw tracks leading about six feet off of Bruce Lane
00:45:58
there he spotted what he thought was just a blue blanket as he approached this and got closer he noticed that a
00:46:06
hand and knees were sticking out from it terrified he jumped in his mail truck and he went to the closest police
00:46:13
station wozni told the police that the body was snow covered except for a hand in her knees sticking out Christine's
00:46:21
father received a call at work from a reporter nice that that's how you get notified
00:46:27
about your daughter's body being found her father drove through a blizzard to the state police station in Pontiac
00:46:35
Michigan he arrived in time to see his little girl's frozen body lying on the metal autopsy table and then did he
00:46:42
punch somebody in there freaking face for not letting him know he did not after defrosting the coroner
00:46:51
was able to perform the autopsy she was dressed in the clothes that she was kidnapped in they had been cleaned and
00:46:58
pressed like the other two victims She was recently bathed and her fingernails had been cleaned and trimmed the cause
00:47:05
of death was Suffocation there were no signs of sexual assault or blunt force trauma they ruled that she had been
00:47:12
killed within 24 hours of the discovery that means that she was alive for at least 18 of the 19 days that she was
00:47:21
missing there was one thing noticed about Christine's clothing that the parents of
00:47:26
the other children did not mention Christine's mom was adamant that Christine did not dress herself the way
00:47:34
that her body was found she cites two reasons one her pants were tucked into her boots and two her blouse was tied in
00:47:42
front instead of in back or may have been put on backwards right these are two signs that might at least in this
00:47:50
case show that the killer dressed the victim after death there was evidence left at this scene tire and Footprints
00:47:57
were found in the snow with the discovery of Christine's body a task force was formed authorities
00:48:04
announced that they believed that children were murdered by the same person the task force will investigate
00:48:09
the three murders and the possibility of a serial killer the task force was made
00:48:14
up of law enforcement from 13 communities and led by the Michigan State Police the Detroit News offered up
00:48:22
of one thousand I'm sorry Captain a 100 000 reward for the Killer's apprehension
00:48:28
and local stations aggressively covered the case the Michigan State Police and the police
00:48:34
departments where the children were last seen or the bodies were found received a
00:48:40
Federal grant to help pursue the investigation Oakland County was on high alert police were giving classes at
00:48:47
schools on how to stay away from strangers and how to escape if someone tries to grab them yeah old stranger
00:48:54
danger parents were not allowing their kids to walk by themselves there was a safe house program established where
00:49:02
participants would be screened and then allowed to put a safe house placard in their front window if a child felt that
00:49:10
they were in danger they would be able to run to one of these houses for help fathers sat down with their children and
00:49:18
told them to be careful and steer clear of stranger dangers lurking in the nearby areas this is what Barry King did
00:49:26
with his son Timothy on Wednesday March 16 1977 Tim King a straight A student he's
00:49:35
a sixth grader Adams Elementary School went out to play around on his skateboard it was chilly but not
00:49:42
freezing Tim was small for his age at four foot three inches and only 63 pounds Tim and his family lived in
00:49:51
Birmingham Michigan this was a it's a little bit nicer than the other towns that we've already discussed but not
00:49:57
rich by any means Tim's father Barry was a lawyer and on this night he had to meet with a client since he needed a
00:50:06
witness he convinced Tim's mom to come with him Tim has always been the responsible type
00:50:13
he even recently took on a paper route but his parents were worried about him being out on his route
00:50:19
so Tim was spending the night at home with his brothers and his sister throughout the evening they each got
00:50:26
called away his sister Kathy was getting ready to to leave when Tim asked to borrow 30 cents so he could buy some
00:50:34
candy at the local pharmacy she lent him the change and left to meet her friends Tim ended up alone for the
00:50:42
night at about 8 15 p.m wearing a red nylon shirt dark green Levi corduroy pants and white sneakers Tim headed out
00:50:52
and he arrived at the pharmacy on Maple Road at about 8 30. Tim left the pharmacy through the rear door that led
00:51:00
to the parking lot which is where he would typically ride his skateboard Tim's parents were eating at the diner
00:51:06
across the street this is at Peabody's restaurant after dinner Tim's parents went home arriving around 9pm they
00:51:14
immediately contacted the police once they realized Tim was not home police suspected this to be the act of the
00:51:21
serial killer that they were looking for and they wasted no time searching for the boy and spreading his story an
00:51:28
intensive search was executed that covered the entire Detroit metropolitan area and there was widespread media
00:51:36
coverage and an emotional television appeal Timothy's father Barry King begged the abductor to release his son
00:51:44
unharmed in a letter printed in the Detroit News Tim's mother wrote that she hoped Timothy would come home soon so
00:51:52
she could serve him his favorite meal Kentucky Fried Chicken a tip came in from a woman claiming she
00:51:59
had seen a boy with a skateboard talking to a man in the parking lot of the drugstore that Tim had been to the woman
00:52:06
described the man as white with a dark complexion and around 25 to 35 years of age he had shaggy hair and sideburns and
00:52:16
had been driving a blue AMC Gremlin with a white stripe on its sides so we got two two cars now this Gremlin was seen
00:52:26
during the evening Tim went missing by his brother a composite sketch of the man was
00:52:32
released all over the area authorities questioned everybody in Oakland County who owned a gremlin
00:52:39
this is a good move right here Captain they they got a county-wide search warrant so officers could randomly pull
00:52:48
over vehicles to search for Tim King a lot of effort was made here but sadly in the late evening hours of March 22nd
00:52:57
1977 two teenagers spotted Tim's body in a shallow ditch alongside Gill Road in Livonia this is across the county line
00:53:08
in Wayne County his skateboard was placed next to his body again it has been reported that Tim
00:53:15
was found like the others his clothing neatly pressed and washed he had been tied up sexually assaulted with an
00:53:23
object and suffocated the post-mortem showed that Timothy had fried chicken before he was killed and that he was
00:53:30
suffocated approximately six hours before his body was found the Oakland County child killer task force
00:53:37
reportedly investigated over 18 000 tips but when the Federal grant money ran out
00:53:43
in December of 1978 the task force was formally disbanded as of 2012 reports the case File has
00:53:52
accrued 20 000 tips 500 000 pages of documentation thousands of interviews and hundreds of pieces of evidence yet
00:54:02
to this day no one has been convicted of the murders of Mark Stebbins Jill Robinson Christine mihelik and Timothy
00:54:11
King however the investigations continued the victims families have refused to let these Child Murders be
00:54:18
forgotten they have formed their own task force conducted their own investigations and from that came
00:54:24
theories the theories put together in the last 15 years are far more plausible than the theories worked by
00:54:31
investigators in the late 70s we believe that now we are closer than ever to solving these murders and
00:54:39
tomorrow we will explore the mother of all theories in the continued search for the Oakland County child killer
00:54:47
[Music] I want to thank you guys so much for listening thanks so much for sharing on
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00:55:30
[Music] [Applause] [Music]