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foreign [Music] foreign welcome to True Crime garage wherever you are whatever you are doing thanks
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for listening I'm your host Nick and with me as always is a man that is so scary that when he walks through the
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woods Bigfoot takes pictures of him he is the captain it's so scary he's so hairy but he's so cuddly thank you thank
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you thank you it's good to be seen and it's good to see you thanks for listening and thanks for telling a
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friend [Music] foreign today we reach for a classic we are drinking Genesee Beer garage grade
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three out of five bottle caps Genesee Beer is an American icon today every can bottle and pint glass delivers the same
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full taste and quality that made it famous in 1878. brewed with six row barley malt corn grits and hops Genesee
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is truly a great classic beer and this week's fridge is full thank you to these truly Great Garage guys and girls first
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up we have Erica and Walter in Tracy California a big shout out to Laura from Chelsea Michigan we like your gym and
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next up sometimes these things are hard to read but I think this one says awesome and she is from Bowling Green
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Ohio and another beer donation from Pam in Omaha Nebraska next we give a Super Bowl victory cheers to Evan and Philly
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and last but certainly not least we have Casey April and Amanda in Johnson City Tennessee so thanks everybody for
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filling up the fridge for this week's show if if you want to help us out with next week's shows go to truecrime
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garage.com and click on the Donate button and everybody that donated we like Yoji and speaking of jibs Captain
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the nice jib tank tops are now available backed by popular demand on our store Page at truecrime garage.com and they
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are going fast my friend so get them while you can all right let's gather around grab a chair grab a beer let's
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talk some true crime [Music] thank you foreign [Music] [Music] people on the outside do not know what
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evil is a quote by serial killer Arthur J shawcross FBI criminal ologist and former Army
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criminal investigator Colonel Robert K Ressler coined the term serial killer this term was used to separate them from
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spree killers and mass murders as defined by the FBI a serial killer murders two or more victims at separate
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times murder is one of the most complicated and difficult crimes to solve often there are only two witnesses
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present when a murder is committed and usually neither witness is talking because one is the offender and the
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other is dead according to a study conducted in the 1990s 62 percent of the time the victim of a
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serial murderer is a complete stranger and as we know stranger on Stranger murders are extremely difficult to solve
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at one time Arthur J shawcross was reported to be the most studied serial killer of his day
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interviewed extensively by local law enforcement the FBI and dozens of psychologists
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yet no one could say for certain why shawcross had committed the atrocities we know him to be guilty of
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some wonder if shawcross himself knew the reasons why there is little doubt that he was truly
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evil this week we take an in-depth look into the life of one man and those around him and examine how one
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little baby boy grows up to become known as the monster of the rivers the Rochester Strangler and perhaps the
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most notorious of all the Genesee River Killer thank you Arthur John shawcross was born in
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Kittery Maine on Wednesday June 6 1945. this coincidentally on the one-year anniversary of D-Day
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his parents are Arthur Roy shawcross and Elizabeth better known as Bessie or Betty shawcross his father was 21 at the
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time and Betty was just 18 at the time of Arthur shawcross's birth he would be the oldest of four children
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the story about his parents courtship and marriage is a simple one and it goes like this his father was in the Marines
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and had returned to the U.S in early 1944. he and Betty were childhood sweethearts both now adults and later
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that same year they got married the name shawcross is derived from the old English which Loosely translates as
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belief in the cross and the colonel in Old English is translated into drunken bloke Arthur was born two months
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premature but outside of that there were no complications he was a healthy little
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boy he spoke his first words earlier than average but walked later than normal at four years old Arthur says
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this is when he started getting punished by his father using either a broom handle or a belt when he would get into
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trouble I want to bring something up right here before we really get into Shaw cross's History something I want
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all of you to put in your detective handbag and to keep in mind as we discuss this guy throughout this
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timeline there will be accusations from Arthur about sexual encounters and abusive Behavior by multiple family
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members these have all been adamantly denied by all people involved except for some of the beatings from his father
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which have some school records to support those incidents I will include some of these stories
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throughout but not all as these are pretty much all unconfirmed accusations by shawcross his parents and siblings
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maintain that he had a normal childhood and state the described events were largely the product of Arthur
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shawcross's imagination but other than these school records it's his family members denying that he was beaten as a
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kid correct they are denying all of these allegations from Arthur shawcross as he recounts his childhood now most of
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the time I would just report all of the stories to you and let let you all and the captain decide what is the truth and
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what is not the truth however in this case I will just repeat a few because there are a lot of these stories and
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and I I want to kind of back up my reasoning behind that with this Arthur shawcross would change his stories at
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times at will regarding these accusations throughout his life and frankly I don't believe a lot of them to
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be true this first story is true however at five years old Arthur created two Imaginary Friends one was called Paul
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who was a boy of Arthur's age and the other was a friend who was slightly younger a blonde-haired girl with no
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name during the months that follow Arthur would often carry on Long conversations in baby talk with these
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imaginary friends which gave others the impression that he was talking to himself
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later he would tell psychologists and authors quote I had to have these friends because I wanted someone to play
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with no one else liked me now his childhood consisted of frequent nightmares bedwetting which he blamed on
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his little brother Jimmy um and he started to stand out as being quote odd to others and he was actually
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nicknamed by the other school children as Audi at six years on a fun nickname as a kid
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no and I imagine he was probably Arty at one time you know for Arthur and then they they changed that to Audi at six
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years old he started running away from home this is believed that he did this just to get attention as he would often
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return he would also kind of tell people in advance I'm running away it didn't seem to have any serious significance to
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his life at that time yeah he would say Mom and Dad I'm running away and they'd say okay see you at dinner
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at eight years old Shaw cross began bullying younger children when he was nine years old he receives
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the first head trauma incident of which there will be quite a few he was hit in the head with a stone for which he
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received stitches and claimed it caused numbness now also when he was at nine years old
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and I believe this could be one of the largest impactful moments in all of Shaw cross's life
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not just as a boy but forever okay so his grandmother on his mother's side she receives a letter from a lady named
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Thelma June who lives in Australia good day mate who is Thelma June well for those of you who like soap operas here
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is your true crime garage soap opera moment of the week shawcross's father remember we had said he served this
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great country as a marine well back in 1943 a year before little Arthur shawcross was born his father was
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actually married to this Thelma June a woman who had he had met in Australia while on leave
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they had a son together um and this was uh they named the son Hartley and after this after his time was up
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he in 1944 returned to the U.S he never mentions to anyone that he is technically already married and has a
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family uh when he gets back in and you know gets married here in the states and starts a new family a very honest guy
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so it's at this very pivotal point that little Arthur Shaw cross's mother discovers that his father has a wife and
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child in Australia this changes the family Dynamic incredibly and of course for the worse at 10 years old Arthur he
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continued his odd behavior which caused other children to bully him while he bullied weaker younger children
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he began shoplifting and committing other Petty thefts he continued to run away again this is
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behavior that's strongly believed that Arthur was running away simply for the attention he would receive from his
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family and others at this time he also began to get bad grades in fact he flunked the fourth
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grade and was forced to repeat the fourth grade at 11 years old he says his mother caught him masturbating and
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threatened him with a butcher knife and he also would later say that not only did she threaten him but she inserted a
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broom handle into his rectum moving on when shawcross was 13 years old the shaw cross family moved and a
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bunch of the extended family moves to Brownsville New York so three sets of relatives moved nearby and then this
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area ends up being nicknamed shawcross corner now Arthur does not fit in at school at this point in fact he doesn't
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even fit in with his cousins and other family members according to them at 14 years old later in life this is
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the age when the sexual claims really start to escalate as an adult he would claim that at 14 he was having oral sex
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with his sister and cousin on a regular basis he also says when he was 14 he was
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tricked into getting into a car which later led him to have been raped by a male stranger
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shawcross also said that he was having sex with animals even killing a chicken during the ACT we won't get into that
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but chickens were not the only species he claims to have had sex with all of this extracurricular activity leads to
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failing the eighth grade and that's how Arthur shawcross ends up being 16 years old and still in the eighth grade as he
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has failed two grades at this point are you implying that all the sex with animals is what caused them to do bad in
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this he should have focused on school yeah stop having sex with chickens right leave the chickens alone Arty uh people
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around him refer to him as a loner with deep mood swings this is also where we see another case of him occurring a head
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trauma he was hit with a discus can you imagine that that's got to be super painful he was hit with a discus and
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spent four days in the hospital at 17 years old art is a freshman at General brown high school but he dropped
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out that same year so he would have been 20 years old when he would have finished
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school or actually he would have been on Pace to fail a grade once more so 21 possibly at the time of graduation
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Hattie graduated it'd be a drink he'd be bringing beer to school well then hey hey Arty where you been oh I've just
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been having sex with some chickens bringing new meaning Captain to the old Matthew McConaughey quote from Dazed and
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Confused I keep getting older and they stay the same age those chickens never get older after dropping out of high
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school he used all of that extra free time to burglarize Holmes and he started peeping in Windows he broke into stores
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stealing both merchandise and cash he however is either somewhat skilled at this or at least very lucky because he
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has never caught nor arrested for for these crimes he also took on a new persona
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people say that Shaw cross became extremely violent at this age when he would be crossed he was known to have
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fired his 22 rifle several times at different people threatening them he was feared in his neighborhood well and even
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though he was bullied he was bullying the weaker so I think this was his way of going if people aren't going to like
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me well then screw them I'm going to make them fear me yeah and it doesn't take a very tough man to threaten people
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with a firearm right now in 1963 shawcross was arrested for the first time this was for burglarizing a Sears
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department store he broke into the basement of the store and set off the alarm now
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he claimed he had he he claimed to have a good reason for this he told the judge
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that he was poor and that he was stealing Christmas gifts so this found favor with the judge so he was only
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sentenced to 18 months probation he received no prison or jail time for this uh burglarizing the department store in
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1964 Shaw cross found love when he met Sarah Lewis Chatterton when he was working at the family
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Bargain Center store the two got married in September of 64 at a Baptist Church he would have been let's see 19 at the
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time and Sarah was 20 years of age after marriage he held a job as a butcher and
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he claimed it was his favorite job his here's a quote from shawcross regarding his time spent as a butcher he says
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quote I used to eat a lot of raw meat in 64 and 65 when I worked as a butcher I used to butcher 19 cows a day and just
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like the taste of raw meat you know I just caught cut off a chunk and I could tell just by the taste of the blood
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whether we could turn it into steaks or hamburger but shawcross would not be able to stay
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out of trouble and after a probation violation for unlawful entry his wife Sarah files for divorce the marriage
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lasted less than two years don't judge Sarah would later go on record as saying Arthur was very immature and always
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faking illness or injury to miss out on work sex with him was lousy he just couldn't keep it up
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at 20 years old Shaw cross is arrested for beating a 13 year old boy this is after the youth threw a snowball at his
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car what shallcross called a sucked up Pontiac that's what he says suped up Pontiac
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souped up Pontiac I guess is what he's trying to say for this Shaw cross receives six months probation he is a so
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so he's in his car and then this teenager throws a snowball hits the car yeah I don't know if he he could have
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been driving or could have just been parked he witnessed the boy throwing a snowball at his car but he the I don't
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know how aggressive he was with the 13 year old but according to the record it states that he was arrested for beating
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a 13 year old boy now during this time he he received six months probation he's also evaluated by
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a psychologist who labels him as a an emotional an emotionally unstable personality
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you think right guys have sex with chickens and beating up 13 year olds because they threw
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snowballs at him when he is 21 on April 7th 1967 Arthur shawcross is drafted into
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the U.S army he is private number 529-67041 and started his training at Fort Lee Virginia he then completed his
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basic training at Fort Benning in Georgia and was designated a supply and parts specialist he meets Linda Ruth
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Neri while on a 30-day leave also while in the military he fell off of a ladder hitting his head and concussing himself
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so another head trauma yeah he marries Linda Neary in October of 1967. they both have stated that they thought that
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there was a good chance that he would die in Vietnam so they got married in advance
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after getting hitched shawcross was stationed in South Vietnam where he served a 12-month Tour of Duty with the
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supply and Transport company of the fourth infantry division Arthur shawcross says that he was based in the
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central Highlands and was a Rambo type one-man First Strike weapon fighting In the Heat of the action and one of his
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letters he wrote I shot a woman who was hiding some ammo in a tree she didn't die right off I tied her up gagged her
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then searched the area found the Hut with another girl inside of the age of about 16. knocked her out
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with the butt of the gun and carried her to where the other girl was there was a
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lot of rice ammo and other stuff in the hut I tied the young girl to a tree still
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gagged tied her legs too they didn't say anything to me at all I had a machete that was very sharp I cut the girl's
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throat then took off her head and placed it on a pole in front of that Hut that girl at the tree peed then fainted I
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stripped her then first I gave her oral sex she couldn't understand what I was doing but her body did I untied her then
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re-tied her to another small tree She fainted several times I cut her slightly from the neck to crotch she screamed and
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[ __ ] herself I took my M16 pulled on a nipple then put the gun to her forehead and pulled the trigger cut
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off her head and placed it on a pool where they got water another time I went on patrol and shot a
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kid chained up into a tree he killed one GI with an M1 our own weapon that made three
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again on patrol I killed two women in a river after they killed two GIS they had a map of base camp plus AK-47
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rifles and ammo food and two hundred and eighty thousand dollars in money belts I split the money with some guys smashed
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the AKs and ammo took everything else back to camp we let the bodies drift Downstream
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he also claimed a combat kill total of 39 which when investigated later was also discounted as a fabrication
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authorities claim he killed no one on his Tour of Duty and saw no action saw Crossing interviews will talk about his
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time in Vietnam and it seems like the story changed from the way I heard him tell it to the way you're telling it and
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it's like then if he tells it again it changes a little bit I mean the stories are roughly the same it's just the
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details kind of switch yeah and I think there's several things that make that difficult
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one the most likely thing is that he's lying and totally making up these stories and he can't keep his lies
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straight two he tells different accounts to different people this this account is taken from a
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letter that he wrote right now he also claims a combat kill total of 39. so often when he's talking about these
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different let's call murders that he did while on tour um he he just simply refers to these
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victims as the girl or the older woman or the boy that was tied up to the tree he doesn't give any names or a lot of
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times not even specific locations to kind of give you an idea of who he's referring to in that long quote-unquote
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combat kill total of 39 that he claims to have had well and he was no John Rambo right but that doesn't mean that
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he wasn't going off on his own and killing people that he wasn't supposed to be killing and just murdering in
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Vietnam yes I mean we can't account for every waking minute that he had while on
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tour on that tour of Duty for 12 months in October of 1968 John said John Rambo John Rambo well on that
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note it looks like I need a quick beer break [Music] [Music] all right cheers mates back to the case
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of John Rambo on October of 1968 Arthur shawcross was reassigned to Fort Sill Oklahoma as a specialist fourth class
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repairing weapons he was honorably discharged in the spring of 1969 and moved with his wife to Clayton New York
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which is located along the Saint Lawrence River he put in a disability claim for war
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injuries although Veterans Administration examiner found no substance to Arthur's claim
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the former soldiers constant badgering though won him a 73 dollar a month Disability Pension
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shortly after being discharged from the Army Shaw cross had nightmares and flashbacks this led him to heavy
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drinking he started beating his wife around this time on one occasion the beating caused
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her to miscarry as she was four months pregnant this had locked him up for murder that son of a [ __ ] Linda then
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files for a divorce this is in the fall of 1969 but it does not get finalized until 1971.
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so seven months after leaving the army shawcross found employment with the Knowlton Brothers paper mill this is the
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city's largest employer in April of 1969 He Set Fire to the place causing twenty
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eight thousand dollars worth of damage three months later a hay barn mysteriously caught fire and it was
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Arthur shawcross who had reported the fire three days later he set fire to Crowley's Cheese Company this was the
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city's second largest employer and Arthur J shawcross also called the fire department to report this fire
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shortly after the cheese company fire shawcross attempted to rob a gas station the proprietor of the business he knew
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Shaw Cross by sight and called the sheriff and Arthur was arrested during questioning he ends up confessing to all
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of his crimes which included the arson attacks a Jefferson County Judge sentenced shawcross to five years in
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Attica prison while in prison he claims to have been raped by three other inmates he also
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claims he later extracted Revenge by beating and raping each of his attackers in separate incidents
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he wrote his own version of the incident years later titled the Miss begotten son quoting
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Shah cross quote got raped in Attica prison by three black guys I was lost threatened and in pain I got all three
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my way their way I hurt them like they hurt me but I used a sock with soap as a blackjack knocked them out and screwed
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them and then smashed them once in the nuts I was never bothered after that shawcross was later transferred to
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Auburn prison right so these three black men wanted to rape them well he claims the three of them
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attacked him um the three of them teamed up on him attacked him and raped him and then
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later he decides to get revenge on them attacking them individually one at a time and raping them correct I think we
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should keep in mind though here captain that with this incident a lot like the incidents that he talks about from his
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childhood there's no one to cooperate any of these stories you know this is just Arthur shawcross saying this is I
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was a victim and then I individually I was Stronger than these people and I attacked them I was more brutal than
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they were to me and I was never attacked after that well you won the boner War John Rambo he was later transferred to
00:29:08
Auburn prison now listen to this story this is a an interesting one on November 4th 1970 troopers were sent to Auburn
00:29:18
prison when rebelling inmates refused to return to their cells failed to report to assign workshops and prevented other
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inmates from doing so as well by 11 45 am seven guards had been clubbed by inmates inmates armed with boards and
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pipes seized 30 guards as hostages prisoners had taken control of the entire prison with the except version of
00:29:43
the administration building 322 troopers were mobilized with an additional force of 300 guards and
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sheriff's deputies placed in a support role Corrections officials refused to discuss grievances until all of the
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hostages were released the show of overwhelming Force quickly ended the rioter's desire to continue
00:30:07
the attack at 3 30 PM the first hostage was freed and inmates started returning to their
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cells without further incident approximately 450 inmates were actually involved in this Rebellion
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this incident would lead to the October 18 1971 parole of one Arthur J shawcross
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that's right after only 22 months of a 60-month sentence Shaw cross was given an early release when he served when he
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saved the life of a prison guard who had been clubbed during the prison riot how
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did he save his life I couldn't find the the specifics the detailed report of of
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what he did during that to save this officer's life but that's why he was Grant granted leniency on his sentence
00:31:01
before his parole hearing he was examined by the prison's supervising psychiatrist in his report Dr William
00:31:10
Tucker wrote inmate is an immature adolescent with schizoid personality who decompensated an ego functioning under
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the influence of stress and rejection by his wife he should be viewed as a schizoid
00:31:25
arsonist who requires supervision emotional support and immediate referral to a mental health clinic upon parole
00:31:33
Leighton projected homicidal intent of at least two of his arsons should not be underestimated he is a
00:31:42
fair parole risk and will require psychiatric treatment Plus close supervision upon his release Arthur went
00:31:50
to go live with his parents and he got a job the parole officials insisted that he undergo outpatient Psychotherapy at a
00:31:58
VA hospital this was scheduled but shawcross regularly missed appointments and no action was taken by the
00:32:06
overworked parole officers after release from prison at 26 years old he returned
00:32:12
to Watertown he started seeing Penny shabino they knew each other from high school
00:32:18
just after Christmas the Watertown public works department hired him under the federal emergency employment program
00:32:25
a supervisor assigned him to a far corner of the 60-acre landfill at the end of Water Street
00:32:34
Arthur shawcross and Penny got married April 22nd 1972. so this is his third wife this would be his third wife that's
00:32:43
correct Penny already had two children when they got married plus she was pregnant with Arthur's baby at the time
00:32:50
however this baby was miscarried they moved into an apartment at 233 Cloverdale Street Arthur claims that the
00:33:00
marriage came under threat when Penny's father accused him of sexually assaulting Penny's younger sister we
00:33:06
need to introduce the Blake family at this time the Blakes were a rough family but they loved their children they had
00:33:13
nine children in total and they lived just about a mile from the far corner of the 60 acre landfill where Arthur
00:33:21
shawcross worked Jack Owen Blake was the seventh of nine children and he had once saved his sister from
00:33:30
drowning in the Black River he was 11 years old and in the fifth grade he was an impressionable boy and he
00:33:39
liked to go fishing he and his brother Peter who was only nine years old they would sometimes go to go fishing with a
00:33:46
guy that their mother Mary Blake had said was sort of a weird guy Audi and she would she had warned her son not to
00:33:56
associate with the man named Arthur shawcross and she didn't like Arthur because she states that this guy was
00:34:03
always boasting about his service in Vietnam and he was also showing the boy photographs of naked women
00:34:10
he rode around on a white woman's bicycle but the boys ignored their mother's warning they they like to go fishing and
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they and they liked playing around the water so sometimes they would lie to their mother right and tell her that
00:34:25
they were going elsewhere but then they would often go down by the water now shawcross many times went fishing by
00:34:33
himself when he caught something he would bring it home fillet it and cook it up cook the fish for dinner sometimes
00:34:40
when Shaw cross was down by the water with a line in the water he would see some children down there playing many
00:34:47
times he saw the Blake boys come down there they even started talking to Shaw cross at some point asking him about
00:34:54
fishing so after a while shawcross was he was out walking heading down toward one of his favorite fishing spots and he
00:35:04
sees the kids and asked them if they wanted to go fishing this became a regular thing shawcross was very much he
00:35:12
very much preferred to be alone so fishing is a great hobby for somebody like him but he didn't mind the company
00:35:19
when he would be fishing and it seemed like he preferred the company of young children compared to that of adults
00:35:27
on Sunday May 7 1972 on that day the two Blake brothers Jack and Peter they went
00:35:33
fishing with Shaw cross at the Black River afterward Jack headed to a friend's house at the old Cloverdale Apartments
00:35:41
just a few blocks away Peter went home and that was the last time that Peter saw his brother Jack
00:35:47
when Jack didn't return home later that night Mary reported to the police that her son was missing explaining that Jack
00:35:56
had wanted to go fishing with shawcross and despite her warning he had probably gone against her wishes suspicion
00:36:03
therefore fell upon shawcross from the outset police talked with shawcross going to
00:36:09
his Cloverdale apartment knocking on the door he spoke with them he told them yes
00:36:15
he had seen the Blake boys down by the river several times he had even spoke to the boys on a few occasions but he
00:36:22
denied being with Jack that day the Blakes as we said were a rough family this was well known in their
00:36:29
community and they were known to be strong disciplinarians police began to think that Jack was a runaway they were
00:36:37
able to convince some of Jack's family that the boy had run away as well but at the urging of a desperate and
00:36:45
depressed mother who hounded the police time and time again to talk with shawcross because quote he's weird and
00:36:53
he knows something the police did follow through with her request but with no other evidence to to suggest otherwise
00:37:01
Shaw cross was released following two interviews with police and once again the thought was that Jack had run away
00:37:08
from home yeah so we have the family in this situation that they believe that their son is not just missing but he was
00:37:15
murdered he was murdered by Shaw cross because he's a weird dude right and this weird guy Adi
00:37:22
their kid was known to fish with him and this was you know pretty common knowledge to the brother and to the
00:37:31
parents now on Friday May 26th Arthur shawcross was again questioned by police this time it was when he was
00:37:39
caught stuffing grass cuttings down the shirt and shorts of a six-year-old boy and spanking him uh this for this
00:37:48
offense he received a ten dollar fine and was reprimanded by the court Wednesday September 2nd 1972. Karen Ann
00:37:58
Hill age eight was last seen playing by the river she was not from Watertown and
00:38:04
was there that day only because her mother was staying with a friend now let's go through the police
00:38:10
investigation yeah it's going to start off with the eyewitness reports from children claiming that they saw a man
00:38:16
that looked like Arthur walking Karen across the bridge yes this is the Pearl Street bridge over the Black River which
00:38:24
would just be a short downhill walk from where Karen had been staying although the children didn't know the man by name
00:38:30
they and specifically a teenage girl recognized his distinctive white bicycle with its Brown mud guards and basket
00:38:39
which he had leaned against a wall styling and profiling from a distance the Curious children watched as the man
00:38:47
lifted Karen over the railings and gingerly led her down the bank to show her the fish
00:38:55
when the alarm was raised that Karen was missing the children came forward to tell the cops what they had seen at 10
00:39:02
pm search officers equipped with flashlights discovered a crumpled body it was covered by a slab of concrete and
00:39:10
lying face down crammed into a sewage outfall pipe on the South Bank of the bridge police dogs were called for they
00:39:19
tracked a scent up Pearl Street to Starbuck Avenue and eagerly tugged their handlers left into Clover Street
00:39:28
straight to the stoop of Arthur shawcross's front door Karen Ann Hill was found dead under a
00:39:35
bridge near the Black River she had been raped mutilated and strangled when a police investigation revealed that hill
00:39:43
and shawcross had been seen together earlier that same day and they received another report that shawcross was seen
00:39:50
eating an ice cream at the bridge near where the body was found after the dog sniffed out this piece of [ __ ] they're
00:39:56
gonna take him in for questioning well you have a combination of things happening here so the girl the poor
00:40:04
little girl is reported missing and hours later they find her body you have the dogs which you just
00:40:10
mentioned they they walk the officers from the crime scene to the where the body was found to Arthur Shaw cross's
00:40:18
front door right and as if that wasn't enough they start getting reports from these
00:40:25
children that are coming forward and saying look we saw a guy that kind of looked like him
00:40:30
with somebody that kind of looked like Karen earlier today plus one thing that I think is very telling here is Arthur
00:40:38
has a very distinct bike it doesn't look like the other bikes in town you know this isn't a bike that is made for an
00:40:46
adult it's white it has a basket on it it was made for a woman and it's a man riding it so that's also sticks out well
00:40:54
I don't know if this is that he had a long time ago it probably is at the autopsy the medical examiner
00:41:01
discovered that the girl had died because of Suffocation and her killer had stuffed weeds and debris into the
00:41:08
child's nose mouth vagina and rectum now as the captain pointed out shawcross was picked up and he was questioned for
00:41:17
this murder it took some time but he would eventually confess to killing Karen Hill
00:41:24
he also told investigators where they could find Jack Blake's body on Tuesday October 17 1972 after much
00:41:34
negotiation Arthur shawcross pled guilty to the Lesser charge of first-degree manslaughter and after proceedings which
00:41:43
lasted only 20 minutes he was sentenced to a maximum term of 2 to 25 years for the murder of Karen hill by a disgusted
00:41:53
judge who had the misfortune of actually having seen Shaw cross in front of him before this was the same judge who had
00:42:01
sentenced him to five years for the arsons in the robbery this manslaughter sentence was light but it was agreed to
00:42:11
in part to clear the Jack Blake case however he was never charged with the murder of Jack Blake right I think it
00:42:20
came down to the police didn't know what happened they assumed that it was shot cross
00:42:26
but that the family wanted to know too and they wanted to know some details and so I think that's why they made this uh
00:42:33
horrible agreement yeah they needed to recover the the boy's body right and without Shaw cross that wasn't going to
00:42:40
happen and I think leading up to this point I think the police thought that it was a
00:42:45
little far-fetched that somebody had killed the boy until they find this girl dead now all of a sudden it doesn't seem
00:42:52
so so big of a leap right that we we may have a child killer killer in our area so now we have his second set of prison
00:43:03
years um which started in 1973 he was once again sent to Attica prison during this time period he states that
00:43:12
he was threatened by other inmates because of his crimes against children uh he filed for divorce from his wife
00:43:19
Penny because she refused to visit him while he was in prison all right well sorry I'm not visiting a piece of [ __ ]
00:43:27
that kills children he earned his high school equivalency certificate and qualified in carpentry he was
00:43:35
transferred to Greenhaven correctional facility at Stormville New York this prison houses many of the state's most
00:43:43
evil criminals where 742 prisoners this is 33 percent of the population at that time were rapists and murderers
00:43:54
prison psychiatrist diagnosed him as a dangerous schizophrenic pedophile suffering from an intermittent explosive
00:44:02
personality and it was noted that he heard voices when he was depressed shawcross was a Troublesome inmate and
00:44:10
he continually faked illness or psychiatric problems to gain attention I've seen this before fake The Runaway
00:44:19
get attention a fake you know when he was married I think to his second wife when he had fake illness so he didn't go
00:44:25
to work he soon learned that the key to an early parole lie in the hands of the people around him so what he decided to
00:44:35
do was he started playing the game and he started sucking up to the the officers in the prison sucking up to the
00:44:43
prison psychiatrist and the church that was offered there and he started to behave himself he
00:44:50
became a model prisoner he gained a pen pal named Rosemarie Wally now while well into his sentence
00:45:00
Arthur was found exhibiting all the behavioral traits of a reformed man he figured that it was better to accept
00:45:09
responsibility for the murder of Karen Hill he worked his way into a counselor's job
00:45:16
in the prison's mental health unit while there he learned the language of Psychiatry and psychology and in doing
00:45:24
so he eventually conned the support of three of the three-man state parole panel who granted him his freedom
00:45:33
he was granted parole on his ninth attempt his he was denied the first eight attempts
00:45:40
on Tuesday April 28 1987 the gates of hell were opened and out walked Arthur J shawcross a man who spent just 15 years
00:45:50
in prison for in all reality what was the rape and murder of two children yeah it should have been two life sentences
00:45:57
or like the death penalty but uh because they didn't have the body they had to make that agreement and there was a
00:46:04
parole officer this is Robert Kent who objected and made a statement of quote at the risk of sounding dramatic this
00:46:12
man could be possibly the most dangerous individual to have been released to this
00:46:17
community in years he was in fact released on parole and Arthur shawcross had difficulty settling
00:46:25
down in the communities as the neighbors would protest his presence and employers
00:46:31
would fire him yeah he first moved to Binghamton New York and then relocated to Delhi New York this with his
00:46:38
girlfriend Rose remember she was once his pen pal while he was in prison when Delhi residents became aware of
00:46:45
Charlotte cross's presence the couple were forced to move to nearby fleischmann's New York only to be met
00:46:52
with hostility there as well finally in late June of 1987 Shaw cross's parole officer moved him to the a transient
00:47:03
hotel in Rochester New York in mid-october shawcross and his girlfriend Rose found a more permanent
00:47:11
lodging this was at 241 Alexander Street in Rochester now Rochester is a city that is much larger than his previous
00:47:20
days and it was believed and encouraged by his parole officer that the larger population would allow shawcross to kind
00:47:29
of sink into the community and back into civilian life or be a cover well Rose once they were
00:47:37
there Rose enrolled as a nurse at the local hospital and Arthur shawcross found work with a vegetable and fruit
00:47:44
wholesaler based in the public market which was to the south of the city he would cycle an hour each way on a
00:47:53
lady-style blue Schwinn Suburban bike okay maybe it was a different bike before well I don't know ladies bikes
00:48:00
but that's what I think you're hitting on here Captain I don't know if the other because it was two white bikes or
00:48:06
maybe the same white bike but it seems like he's maybe painted the old white bike blue it seems like he's always
00:48:12
having a a woman's well this again is another city so I don't know that he's bringing the bike with him hey you never
00:48:18
know after a long prison sentence to the uh new city of Rochester but again a lady
00:48:26
style bike for some reason I don't know maybe he prefers the uh what is that the
00:48:30
crossbar that's the low there yeah anyway this bike was quite distinct in itself it was a blue Schwinn Suburban
00:48:38
bike which had a shallow basket and had a Stars and Stripes flag on the handlebars with two deep baskets
00:48:46
straddling the rear wheel in which he would keep his fishing gear so he's a creature of habit of course Captain we
00:48:54
see this guy that in his free time he's going to Bicycle around town and he's gonna go fishing his weekday working
00:49:02
hours were between 7 A.M and 3 30 p.m which left him the evenings to pursue his Hobbies let's say well do we know what
00:49:13
shift his wife is working I believe she worked the evening shift so he'd be by himself quite a bit yeah
00:49:21
yeah and he was actually having an affair at this time as well with a woman named Clara Neal she was 40 she was 58
00:49:31
years old and she had a lot of kids a lot of grandkids but the two of them were having an affair while his
00:49:37
girlfriend was at work [Music] he would borrow cars from both his girlfriend that he lived with and the
00:49:47
woman that he was having an affair with now one of the vehicles was a small metallic blue Dodge Omni and the other
00:49:54
was a some sort of Gray Chevrolet I used to drive a Dodge Omni yeah and he well he would use these to do you know run
00:50:02
errands to go out on the evenings or to go fishing now shawcross married Rose after two
00:50:11
years of living together this took place in August of 1989 right and the count of
00:50:16
wives for Arthur is up to number four yeah just putting that out there well and it was sometime after his wedding
00:50:25
captain that his employer found out and discovered that he was a former convict and so at that point they released him
00:50:34
or fired him from their employment his next job that he had was selling hot dogs on Main Street before he landed a
00:50:43
permanent job as a salad maker for the gng Food Services which provided catering services to hospitals and
00:50:50
schools now at that time Arthur did work the night shift he worked nights and he
00:50:55
was getting paid six dollars and 25 cents an hour uh which this was back in 1987. so actually approximately if you
00:51:05
convert that to today's it would approximately been making about like 13 to 14 dollars an hour which is
00:51:12
pretty good money for somebody that's been forced to move around because they're a convict that nobody wants to
00:51:18
hire right also during this time shortly before his marriage he started visiting
00:51:24
sex workers and having sex with them uh female or male uh females well and started in
00:51:31
1988 Rochester is going to find a problem on their hands because they're going to find a series of murdered
00:51:40
victims female victims well in the first believed victim in this series that you
00:51:47
had mentioned Captain is thought to be Dorothy who went by the name of Dotsy Dorothy Blackburn she was 27 years old
00:51:55
she was a mother of a six-month-old boy and two older children she was a small boned woman with a slender figure uh
00:52:05
brown eyes and long brown hair petite and dainty she was StreetWise with two convictions for loitering in 1985. she
00:52:15
was last seen alive on Tuesday this is March 15 1988 after having lunch with her sister and she was seen on a a place
00:52:25
that's going to become familiar throughout this case and it's called Lyle Avenue
00:52:31
during an interview many years later shawcross claimed that he had been driving Claire Neal's Omni around and he
00:52:39
admitted that he had killed Dotsy at the Northampton park because she had bitten
00:52:45
his penis during fellatio he said that she was laughing at him because he couldn't get his what he
00:52:52
refers to as he couldn't get his pecker up and when she started laughing at him and
00:52:57
making fun of him he said that he slapped her around and when he did that she bit him and he got madder and hell
00:53:04
and that's when he decided to kill her old what he had the old wet noodle he says that he dumped her clothes in a
00:53:12
trash can he cleaned the blood from the seat of the car and then he drove home now dotsy's body was found by hunters
00:53:21
during the morning of Tuesday March 24th floating face down in Salmon Creek a stream that meanders through Farmland in
00:53:30
woods on Rochester's Eastern Fringe a crew of laborers clearing debris and garbage that had clogged a culvert they
00:53:40
soon realized however that what they were looking at was a woman's frozen body her face had a distinctive heavy
00:53:47
eyebrows full lips slightly irregular teeth and her left eye was shut she had long dark hair and wore jeans a hooded
00:53:57
sweatshirt and a single white soda pops brand sneaker at the autopsy the medical examiner
00:54:04
determined that she had died as a result of manual strangulation and noted that she had been bitten several times around
00:54:11
the vagina which is probably retaliation for her biting his penis so I'm the I'm
00:54:18
guessing those bites around the vagina well or yes or or as he claims he's uh well yeah who knows what to believe
00:54:28
with Arthur [Music] a lot more to get to on this case in part two if you'd like to support the
00:54:43
garage go to truecrime garage.com click on the store Page and check out the nice
00:54:48
jib tank tops thank you to everybody for joining us here in the garage tonight we
00:54:52
will see you back here tomorrow until then be good be kind and don't litter [Applause]
00:55:17
thank you [Applause]