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0:01
This is exactly right. Case.
0:06
Files and award winning podcast presents
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unforgettable true crime stories. Presented
0:11
by an anonymous host, Case
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File delves deeper into the
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experience. Follow. Case File wherever
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Kate Winkler Dawson of a journalist
0:45
who spent the last twenty five
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years writing about true crime. And
0:49
I'm Paul Holes retired cold case the best
0:52
to get or whose work some of America's
0:54
most complicated cases and solve them. Each
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week I present Paul with one
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of history's most compelling, true. Crimes
1:00
And I were you using modern
1:02
forensic techniques to bring new insights
1:04
to old mysteries. Together, using
1:07
our individual expertise, we're examining
1:09
historical true crime cases through
1:11
a twenty first century lens.
1:14
Summer solved and summer cold.
1:16
Very cold. This is
1:18
buried bones. Ache
1:41
eight, Are you? Hey. Paul I'm doing
1:44
well. How about you? Know you're making and in
1:46
there. So what's been going on with your. Well,
1:48
I'm very excited because the trailer for
1:50
Season twelve of Tenfold more Wicked drops
1:52
in a little more than a week.
1:54
I know that you're in disbelief that
1:57
I actually do a show, that doesn't
1:59
It. all views.
2:01
But that was the
2:03
original. That was my OG show, 10
2:05
Fold More Wicked. This is an exciting
2:08
season for me. It's different than
2:10
what folks are used to. They
2:12
are used to the seasons like
2:14
the ones that we're doing right
2:16
now, which is about one family and
2:18
a tragedy. This is
2:21
actually a carryover from
2:23
season 11. It's the same family,
2:25
a very dramatic family
2:27
line that includes Lizzie Borden,
2:30
which is a huge deal. And
2:32
it involves this cursed family, if
2:35
you want to believe in curses,
2:37
and not only that, but Fall
2:39
River, Massachusetts, which is where Lizzie
2:42
Borden was. And there is a
2:44
two or three block long section
2:46
that has over 150 years seen
2:49
some of the most unbelievable tragedy,
2:52
including the Lizzie Borden case where
2:54
she was acquitted for murdering her
2:56
stepmother and her father. So it's
2:58
sort of, do you believe in cursed families and
3:00
do you believe in cursed towns?
3:03
And we go through all of these cases that
3:06
happen just in this little area with
3:08
this kind of one family. Well,
3:11
I will say over the course
3:13
of my career that yes, I
3:15
have seen families that have
3:17
bad things happen to them over and
3:19
over again, as well
3:22
as locations. In fact, in my old
3:24
jurisdiction, there's a neighborhood in which I
3:26
had over the course of a decade,
3:28
multiple serial killers committing
3:31
crimes in this one
3:33
little neighborhood. And
3:35
it's like, how do you explain that? Why there? I
3:38
don't know about this mystical curse
3:41
aspect, but I'm open
3:43
minded. Maybe there's a curse.
3:45
Okay. Listen, what I want to make clear is
3:47
that I actually really like Fall River. I don't
3:49
think there's anything wrong with being a cursed city.
3:52
Actually, I think it's kind of cool. This
3:55
season really covers A
3:57
lot of different time periods, but it really is this
3:59
like... Two to three block radius
4:01
that has seen a lot of things happen
4:03
and I'm not sure everybody who visits the
4:06
Lizzie Borden Health knows that. So I I've
4:08
always been interested in the Lizzie Borden
4:10
case. I don't actually want to know if
4:12
she really did it or not. I like
4:15
the mystery. like a Jack the Ripper
4:17
type thing. I know that is not something
4:19
you want everything solved. I think. right?
4:21
Are ideally you know for sure you know
4:24
that's that's the whole point of what I've
4:26
been a while I got into what I
4:28
do Both you know it's your would you
4:31
start talking about these the store crimes. Obviously
4:33
it's more of okay what can we learn
4:35
from them? What were you notice as you
4:37
know we talk about here in Barry Bodes
4:40
you know so well the time periods different.
4:42
It's interesting to learn about that the cultural
4:44
and societal differences. But then we also see
4:47
as we always talk about while the reason
4:49
these crimes are committed. As for. The. Same
4:51
reasons today as they were
4:53
back then. Well, this season
4:55
of tenfold is unique. And I'm
4:57
really excited. Speaking of tenfold, the
4:59
story that we are about to
5:01
talk about number one is Huge.
5:03
so it's a two parter, and
5:05
number two, it is connected to
5:08
a tenfold season that I did
5:10
a couple of years ago, which
5:12
was a series of murders that
5:14
happened in Austin, Texas in the
5:16
late eighteen hundreds. we're going to
5:18
be talking about and my opinion,
5:20
the most well known. Serial killer you've
5:22
never heard of which is the servant
5:24
girl. Annihilate. Or it was. You know, a
5:26
series of crimes happened to him in in
5:28
of eighteen late eighteen hundreds in Austin when
5:31
it was a growing city and you and
5:33
I have never talked about it. I have
5:35
talked about it and ten fold because it
5:37
was related to a different story. But
5:39
you and I have never unraveled this sort
5:41
of unsolved. Crime before. It's very, very
5:43
old. Okay, so this is
5:45
in many ways this upcoming a case
5:48
is a spinoff from Tenfold More Wicked
5:50
then. Yes, Is an odd way
5:52
it is and I'm gonna have to throw a
5:54
syria you that I explore and tenfold more wicked
5:56
and to see if the how it sticks let's
5:58
see if the spaghetti stick. To the first
6:00
approach of at it is a that how
6:02
you to determine if your spaghetti noodles are
6:04
down as you throw him out the refrigerator.
6:07
That's what my grandma told me. Not years,
6:09
I guess not her. I guess I will
6:11
have to try said. Okay,
6:14
let's go back to Austin, Texas
6:16
and eighteen Eighty Five and what
6:19
set the scene. First
6:21
off, I like to give trigger warnings.
6:23
This does have some discussion of a
6:25
lot of brutality and I will say
6:28
this: Paul I've never told you this
6:30
before but when I watch. Shows when
6:32
I do stories, when I write books.
6:34
Knives and sharp objects really freaked
6:37
me out. It's really hard for
6:39
me to. Watch a movie. Even pure
6:41
description of a real crime involving a
6:43
nice. It just scares the daylights out
6:45
of me. and there's a lot and
6:48
nice stuff happening in the story. Okay,
6:50
yeah, you know obviously have worked a
6:52
lot of cases in which the weapon
6:55
with was a nice and there's good
6:57
reason to be scared by knives. You
6:59
know that that the type of injuries
7:02
that they inflict are brutal, but I
7:04
am. Well versed if you
7:06
will in terms of the wounds
7:08
that nice can produce, and so
7:10
I'm very interested to hear the
7:12
facts of this case. So
7:14
two things for listeners. One is
7:16
the descriptions of the wounds of
7:18
somebody like Jack the Ripper victims.
7:20
If they upset you, this is
7:23
probably not the episode for you
7:25
because this is brutal. And number
7:27
two, I do have to talk
7:29
about two children who were murdered
7:31
in a story that tangential to
7:33
this one. so I will go
7:35
quickly through. that's so just some
7:37
warnings I'd try to remember to
7:40
to let people know about that
7:42
sounded. Paul that sounds good. Can.
7:45
You guess the longest someone has
7:47
gone without sleep. No, I don't
7:50
know. having him. If you don't get enough
7:52
sleep, you die. I would say five six
7:54
days. The. answer is a levin days
7:56
and twenty five minutes the record
7:58
was back in nineteen sixty at
8:00
a San Diego science fair. Randy
8:02
Gardner, then a high school student,
8:04
won first place and set the
8:06
world record which he still holds today.
8:09
That sounds absolutely miserable. I think Randy
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10:42
so, 1885, Austin, Texas, the very
10:44
best city in the entire world.
10:47
I think everybody knows that by
10:49
now because they're all moving here.
10:51
Well, I think you also have a
10:54
personal bias. No.
10:58
Listen, I'll tell you, Paul, I lived in London,
11:00
New York. I went to school in Boston. I
11:02
lived in LA. I lived in
11:04
San Francisco. And Austin is still the best place
11:06
for me. Yeah, you know, I've only,
11:08
as a kid, when I was
11:10
living in San Antonio with my parents, I think we
11:13
drove up through Austin once. But that's
11:15
really been my only experience. And I
11:17
don't remember it, of course. No. So
11:21
let's talk about this story. This story involves, and
11:23
I know most of this because of my buddy,
11:25
Skip Hollinsworth, who is one of the
11:28
best journalists on the planet. He's with
11:30
Texas Monthly. And he wrote
11:32
a book that was based on an article
11:34
that he wrote for Texas Monthly in the
11:36
year 2000, which I barely remember.
11:39
And the article was called Capital Murder.
11:42
And it was about the Midnight Assassin is what
11:45
the name of the book was. But it was
11:47
about the person who was known
11:49
as the servant girl annihilator, which
11:51
we'll talk about in a little bit, was
11:54
not exactly an accurate moniker for him to
11:56
have. But you know, Skip wrote
11:58
this amazing article, and then he got a deal
12:01
and The Midnight Assassin is a really good
12:03
book and there's so much historical context. I
12:05
need to go through a little bit of
12:07
it before we start really digging into the
12:10
story. But there's a lot of murder that
12:12
happens here. There's a lot of issues with
12:14
race, which isn't surprising at all. 1885, Austin
12:18
Texas. A lot of sort
12:20
of complications. So let's just get going with
12:22
where we are in time. So Austin is
12:25
growing big time by 1885. Two decades earlier
12:27
it was about
12:30
5,000 people and by the mid 1880s it was somewhere between
12:32
23,000 and 30,000
12:37
people, which is huge growth. You
12:39
have to picture downtown Austin as
12:42
like mule-drawn streetcars. There's this beautiful
12:44
opera house. There's ice
12:46
cream parlors in restaurants. It's really
12:48
growing. There's a Capitol building
12:50
that's under construction. And then what I
12:53
will say modestly is the best hotel
12:55
on the planet, which is the Driscoll
12:57
Hotel. It is haunted for
12:59
sure. I have stayed there
13:02
with my kid and watched The Shining,
13:05
which scared the crap out of both
13:07
of us. We stayed in the historical
13:09
wing. People have died
13:11
there. It is the most beautiful,
13:14
but in some ways the creepiest
13:16
hotel around. So that just sort of
13:18
paints a picture of where we are. Yeah, you're
13:20
really selling me on this hotel. It's gorgeous.
13:24
It's a wonderful
13:26
hotel. I was just there two weeks ago. I took my kid
13:28
over one of our little
13:31
breaks and it was it was great to
13:33
stay there. But yeah, haunted hotels are a
13:35
mixed bag for me sometimes. This
13:37
is on a national level. This is 12
13:39
years after the Civil War. So this
13:41
is sort of the beginning of reconstruction. So
13:44
one thing that's interesting that I
13:46
want to start out with is, you know, there
13:48
are a couple of researchers that I'll give an
13:50
on to. One is Skip Hollinsworth. One is a
13:52
guy named J.R. Galloway, who was at
13:54
the University of Texas. And basically he wrote a
13:57
book that it sounds to me like he was
13:59
able to have access to so many newspaper
14:01
articles from the 1800s, he was able to
14:03
get a really good sense for this story.
14:06
And Skip really nodded to Galloway as in this
14:08
is somebody who did a lot of research.
14:11
So let's start with my first
14:13
question for you. This person was
14:15
named the servant girl annihilator, even
14:18
though this case does not
14:20
exclusively involve black women who
14:22
are servants or I mean,
14:25
that's, you know, the older term
14:27
for it or assistants or helpers or
14:29
housekeepers. It expands to
14:31
two white women and to
14:33
a couple of men. So where
14:36
do we come up with the names of
14:38
serial killers? I know what happened with the
14:40
Golden State Killer and Michelle McNamara,
14:43
but generally, is this a media thing
14:45
where they come up with the Colonial
14:47
Parkway Killer and all of these different
14:49
names? Yes, in most
14:51
instances, the monikers given to
14:53
serial predators are media driven.
14:56
And oftentimes, the moniker is not
14:58
descriptive of the types of crimes
15:00
that the predator is doing,
15:02
whether they are, let's say, a
15:04
serial rapist or a serial killer.
15:06
So it's not surprising to me
15:08
that this servant girl annihilator moniker
15:10
is kind of missing
15:13
the mark to be inclusive
15:15
of all the victimology. Nor
15:17
is it surprising that you
15:19
have a single offender who
15:22
is killing black women, white
15:24
women, men. This is
15:27
what is called crossover offending. It
15:29
is a myth that
15:31
these predators choose a certain victim
15:34
type and only stick with that
15:36
victim type. And a lot of
15:38
that myth really kind of
15:40
comes out of the Ted Bundy
15:42
era in which everybody thought Ted
15:44
Bundy only killed brunette
15:47
females with hair parted down the
15:49
middle, which is not true. But
15:53
that's what the media propagated. And
15:55
so oftentimes, law
15:57
enforcement during Unsolved Series
16:00
has so much more details about
16:02
the cases than what the media
16:04
does. And so the media is
16:06
relying upon scant details to
16:09
kind of formal opinions that
16:11
oftentimes are wrong. Danielle Pletka Yes,
16:13
I hear you with the wrong opinions of media,
16:16
but they do come up with some
16:18
quippy little monikers for serial killers. And
16:20
this one was the servant girl
16:22
annihilator. Servant girl is not a
16:24
phrase I would normally use. So when I use
16:26
it, it's because this is how they were literally
16:28
described in 1885. The
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Thank you, Lo-Me. for
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sponsoring this episode. So
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let's start with it. We are in December of
18:07
1884, December
18:10
30th. So for you local Austinites, I'm
18:12
gonna say the name of the street
18:14
that it was and then I'll tell
18:16
you what it is because they got switched around
18:18
quite a bit. I thought this was interesting. The
18:20
first thing happened on December 30th of 1884 and the address is 901 West
18:23
Pecan Street. Pecan
18:28
Street is now 6th Street. So if
18:30
you've come to Austin and you want
18:32
to really see a lot of
18:34
partying and a lot of drinking, 6th Street is
18:36
definitely one of the places you would go. It's
18:38
where I grew up going, but back then
18:40
it was a residential area and the victim
18:42
is a black woman in her early 20s.
18:45
Her name is Molly
18:47
Smith. So we're just going
18:49
to jump right into it and I hope I have enough
18:51
information for you. You know in the 1800s they were vague
18:53
and there was a lot
18:56
of propriety. I mean I struggled
18:58
with when corners or whatever
19:00
you want to call them back then,
19:03
pathologists, city physician in this case, wouldn't
19:05
even necessarily take the clothes off of
19:07
the victim out of propriety. So I
19:09
hope I have enough information for
19:12
you here. So Molly Smith
19:14
was sleeping in her bed apparently that
19:16
she shared with her boyfriend who was
19:18
a 30 year old named Walter Spencer, also
19:20
black. So she lived in
19:22
a cabin on the property of
19:25
her white employer who was a
19:27
man named Walter Hall. He was an insurance salesman.
19:29
Molly was a cook in
19:31
the Hall's home. She was sleeping
19:33
in her bed and had apparently been
19:36
attacked that night, dragged
19:39
out of her bed. Now
19:41
we're talking about snow, just this one
19:43
instance because I'm telling you it never snows
19:45
here. There was a little bit of a
19:48
snowiness on the backyard, dragged out onto the
19:50
snow in the backyard, laid
19:52
by an outhouse and
19:54
murdered. And I have details on
19:56
potential sexual assault and then I
19:58
have details of course on what
20:00
ended up happening with her. The boyfriend,
20:03
he was attacked too, but he survived, but
20:05
it sounds like he was attacked in the
20:07
bed and was never taken out of the
20:09
bed. Okay, so you have an
20:11
offender that is willing to go into a
20:13
house with a man and woman who are
20:15
in bed. He attacks these
20:17
two victims. I mean, he's taking
20:20
on a male, and this is sort
20:22
of like Golden State Killer. You know,
20:24
this is where Joseph DeAngelo is willing
20:26
to engage with a male present in
20:28
the house. This tells me that this
20:30
offender has a lot of self-confidence in
20:32
their physical ability and is willing to
20:34
take on this higher-risk crime. It's
20:37
interesting that now after attacking
20:39
the male, the offender is dragging
20:42
the female outside and there's snow on
20:44
the ground. It's cold, and this is
20:46
where he is now potentially sexually assaulting
20:49
and killing the victim. Were
20:51
there other people inside the house? Is there a
20:53
reason why the offender is taking her outside? It
20:56
sounds like it was just Molly and
20:58
her boyfriend Walter. Walter has a head
21:00
wound. It sounds like he
21:02
was likely attacked first. He had a head wound
21:05
by an axe and doesn't remember anything. He
21:07
survived, but he doesn't remember anything. She is
21:09
dragged out. Now, there is a main house
21:11
that's in front of the cabin in which,
21:14
you know, the insurance salesman and his family
21:16
presumably are, but it's just Walter and Molly
21:18
at this point in bed. Okay,
21:21
so the offender is hitting Walter
21:24
in the head with an axe. It
21:26
sounds like the offender is now
21:28
trying to remove Molly away, get
21:30
space between him and Molly
21:33
from Walter. This tells
21:35
me the offender doesn't have confidence that
21:38
he has completely incapacitated Walter. So he's
21:41
now trying to generate space so
21:43
he can spend time with his
21:45
intended victim, which is Molly. Walter
21:47
is just, he is
21:49
just trying to eliminate this
21:51
threat, but the intended victim
21:53
is Molly, and it sounds like this
21:56
is a sexually motivated crime. you
22:00
can tell me what you think. She was found on
22:02
her back almost completely naked,
22:04
which in the 1800s would
22:06
have been shocking for a city physician or investigators
22:09
to come. That's why
22:11
they think that she had been raped. My
22:13
very first book was set in the 1950s with serial
22:16
killer John Reginald Christie. And
22:18
I remember reading The Pathologist
22:20
being able in the 1950s
22:22
to specifically say Seaman was
22:24
present when I did an autopsy.
22:26
They are not going to say that here. They
22:29
say that because she was mostly
22:32
naked and that
22:34
her sexual organs were
22:37
exposed, it suggested to
22:39
some that there was a sexual assault.
22:42
But I would not say that any
22:44
autopsy or anything is going to be
22:46
definitive in that way. But stripping her
22:49
down and brutalizing her
22:51
sounds pretty clear to me, right? This
22:53
is a sexually motivated crime. Now
22:55
back then, they're probably not
22:58
looking for the physical evidence that
23:00
could prove rape. And
23:02
when I use the term rape, I
23:04
come out of the California statutes. Rape
23:07
per California is a penetration of the
23:09
vagina by the penis, no matter how
23:11
slight. You can have rape
23:14
and no semen present. There is
23:16
no ejaculation. There's all
23:18
these different sex acts that these offenders
23:20
do. It all depends on what the
23:23
offender wants to get out of the
23:25
crime, what the offender's fantasy is. So
23:28
in this instance, we don't know the
23:30
sex act that the offender did, but
23:33
we know because she is stripped
23:35
down, there is a sexual motivation
23:37
to this crime. And
23:39
he separated her, which I know is another big clue
23:41
for you, obviously. If he just wanted
23:44
to come in, so the bedroom is
23:46
definitely turned upside down. Somebody
23:48
is looking for something, I don't know
23:50
if it's a thick of value, but
23:53
to take the chance to drag her
23:55
into the public, even if it's in
23:57
the backyard, is motivating. You're right. It's got
23:59
to be. something that's sexually motivated. Well
24:02
I think you know the the undressing of the
24:04
body is what's telling me there's a sexual motivation.
24:07
The separation, you know pulling her
24:09
outside, I believe the reason for
24:11
that is because of Walter. And
24:13
this is where the offender is
24:15
not confident that he has dispatched
24:17
Walter to the point where now
24:19
he can take his time with
24:22
Molly inside the house or even
24:24
inside the very bedroom in which
24:26
Molly and Walter were sleeping together.
24:28
This may inform me that the
24:30
offender is a novice
24:32
when it comes to killing. Okay and
24:34
that's gonna be interesting for later on,
24:36
a novice. Okay and we'll see what
24:38
progresses as we have many other victims
24:40
coming up. Two things,
24:42
one I said this place was
24:45
in disarray. It could have been that he
24:47
was looking for something but also there was
24:49
clearly it sounds like Walter put up a
24:51
fight. The furniture was in disarray, there was
24:53
glass broken, they found a bloody
24:55
axe on the floor. So
24:58
they did not identify whether or not this
25:00
was from the people
25:02
who lived there or from Molly
25:04
and Walter. Everybody had axes back
25:06
then of course but the
25:08
bloody axe is on the floor. So he drags
25:10
her out and it sounds like he has another
25:12
weapon. There's a city physician is what they were
25:14
called in the 1800s named William
25:17
Jefferson Burt who comes to the scene. And
25:19
if you've heard that season I told
25:21
you about of tenfold more wicked you'll recognize
25:23
his name because he becomes important. So
25:26
the city physician, one guy, would show
25:28
up to all of these different murders
25:30
and assess what happened, help solve the
25:32
case you know and he says Molly
25:35
had been stabbed in the chest,
25:37
the abdomen, the arms and the
25:40
legs and had a deep wound
25:42
in the side of her head. That to me
25:44
sounds like a knife also because
25:46
the axe was left inside. Yeah
25:48
you know depending on description of
25:50
the wounds to Molly, I'm
25:53
going to assume it's a knife versus a screwdriver
25:55
or an ice pick or something like that. You
25:57
know it is interesting he goes into into
26:00
the house with an axe. After
26:04
using the axe on the male, he discards
26:06
the axe or drops it. I'm assuming he's
26:08
not picking up a knife from inside the
26:10
house, but he's brought a knife to the
26:12
scene. So, he's bringing two
26:14
weapons. It's almost as
26:16
if he knew that the male,
26:18
Walter, was inside the house and
26:21
made a predetermined choice that he was
26:23
going to utilize the axe while Walter
26:25
was asleep to dispatch Walter.
26:27
But what he wants to do
26:29
with Molly, in addition to the sexual
26:31
assault, as part of his
26:33
fantasy, is the knife play on her
26:35
body. He's not using the axe on
26:38
her. He is purposefully choosing
26:40
to use the knife. Well,
26:42
this next one's tough. I thought Molly
26:44
was hard, but this next one was
26:46
very difficult for me. So, just another
26:48
warning to listeners, this is pretty graphic.
26:51
A few months later, May, so we are now
26:53
in late spring, 1885. Something
26:56
happens similar to this between
26:58
December 31st and May 6th,
27:00
but on May 6th, something
27:03
very similar plays out. So
27:06
with this story, I'm hoping you can
27:08
help me say, yes, these all seem
27:10
to be related because they have always
27:13
been packaged together as the work of
27:15
one killer, and two, who
27:17
this person might have been, because there
27:19
are some suspects. So, here's your second
27:21
case to see what the similarities are.
27:25
This is another black victim, a woman.
27:27
She was a cook. Her name was
27:29
Eliza Shelley. She was in her 30s. She
27:33
was the mom of three young boys, and
27:35
she worked for a family, the Johnson family.
27:37
And the patriarch of the family was a doctor.
27:41
She and the kids, these three young boys,
27:43
lived in a tiny back cabin on
27:45
the property of what is now Third
27:47
Street. So, these are in close proximity.
27:49
So, we went from Sixth Street down
27:51
to Third Street, downtown Austin. She
27:54
stays in the bedroom. She's found
27:56
dead on the bedroom floor wrapped
27:58
in bloody shit. See her bloody
28:01
seats as if she and the
28:03
betting had been dragged off the
28:05
bed together. And they think Paul
28:08
multiple weapons here. Okay, so here's
28:10
the graphic stuff for brains were
28:12
reportedly oozing out of her head
28:14
wound. She appeared to have an
28:17
axe wounds in her skull and
28:19
a deep hole drilled between her
28:21
eyes and above one of her
28:24
ears. As. Well as deep
28:26
slashes all over her body. There.
28:28
Is one witness one of the boys
28:30
who was under ten years old. He
28:33
said he wasn't sure whether the attacker
28:35
was a black man or a white
28:37
man, but he thought he was white.
28:39
but either way the intruder had covered
28:41
his face with this white rag. The.
28:43
Boy and Return said that the
28:46
man had woken him up. Demanded.
28:48
To know where the mother had kept all
28:51
of her money and then told the boy
28:53
to put his head under a pillow and
28:55
keep it there until he left. So I'm
28:57
presuming the mom was dead at this point.
28:59
So what do you think of that. You
29:01
know, I don't know if I would
29:03
presume as a mom is dead at
29:06
that point. The offender, possibly a pair
29:08
of is lacking familiarity inside the house
29:10
and first runs into this boy and
29:12
now is knowing that he's got his
29:14
face covered, is now interacting with the
29:16
boy. I'm trying to get direction as
29:18
to where the intended victim is. if
29:20
he's asking the boys, where's mom kisses,
29:23
where's money wears moms money for his
29:25
mom's my, but he's He's also he's
29:27
He's aware that there's an adult woman
29:29
inside this house and this is tiny.
29:31
Paul They said a tiny cabin so I
29:33
don't know how much room there actually is
29:35
to move in here. It's interesting
29:38
to me is also using an axe
29:40
in this case. We don't have an
29:42
adult male present like we did with
29:45
Walter have been Molly's carries so it
29:47
sounds like this is how he is
29:49
equipping himself. Or and the similarities between
29:51
these cases is enough. For. Me
29:54
to say yes, the sounds like it
29:56
is the same offender us but it
29:58
is important that he's also. Like
30:00
you've got a knife with them.
30:02
Feel that he flashes and again
30:04
this is something that I believe.
30:06
a score to his fantasy that
30:08
is Often times offenders like to
30:10
use a knife first is something
30:13
a little less impersonal. Days like
30:15
date utilize something that they can
30:17
nail penetrate into the women's body.
30:19
The holes being drilled me. I
30:21
don't know what to make of
30:23
that if that's a sign. A
30:25
Skepticals you know it's not like
30:27
they had a portable drill, battery
30:29
power drill. My it out. It's
30:32
like, well, how would this be done
30:34
You know you're sitting there with a
30:36
hand cranked drill, you know. So I
30:38
would tend to think that maybe this
30:40
was more likely a puncture wound was
30:43
something like may be a screwdriver, Something
30:45
similar that would indicate yes, you have
30:47
some sort of bet that is boring
30:49
through the bone. Well. They have very
30:52
little evidence to work was here. they
30:54
have a witness is very young who
30:56
can identify whether this person was black
30:58
or white. Of course we're talking about
31:01
not even candlelight. He striking and night
31:03
when people are in bed, there's no
31:05
lights anywhere and he's covering his face.
31:07
It sounds like they find one saying
31:10
that will become important later on. A
31:12
bear footprint in dirt near the cabin.
31:14
A footprint. I mean that. not shoe
31:16
print. So as we go forward he
31:18
does not wear shoes. It sounds. Like.
31:21
Did. The a boy was he able
31:23
to describe the closing of the offender
31:26
was wearing outside of the white mask.
31:28
It doesn't sell my at. The only thing he
31:30
was focused. On as at Scary White Mask and
31:32
the guy telling him now he's not hurting
31:35
the child who was a witness. So that's
31:37
another question. What does that mean? He has
31:39
a soft spot for kids or does that
31:41
mean he doesn't think that this. Kid's gonna
31:43
be able to be helpful to investigators
31:46
and all. It's so hard to exactly
31:48
say why doesn't harm the kid yet
31:50
out but but I would probably say
31:53
the the primary reason is that the
31:55
kid is not meet his victim type
31:57
yet so he's not going to do
32:00
that. Whether she has a saw spot
32:02
for kids who knows you know the
32:04
that the barefoot bread to there is
32:07
a practical aspect and that practical aspect
32:09
is is that you can walk much
32:11
quieter inside the house than if you
32:14
have a hard soul to odds know
32:16
I'm an So. this would be something
32:18
that you see cat burglars employ. Cap
32:21
Burgers are offenders at break into houses.
32:23
Wow, There are people inside typically asleep
32:25
and they are silent as he moved
32:28
to the house. They're like a cat
32:30
you know and they will do this
32:32
type of thing only be a half
32:35
socks on in order to be able
32:37
to walk quieter as a move to
32:39
the house. So right now there's the
32:41
not having any shoes on. My guess
32:44
initially is ceased doing that in order
32:46
to be able to move silently through
32:48
the house or as quietly as he
32:51
can. Let's assume that
32:53
he did this for the first
32:55
murder from Mali. It's in the
32:58
snow. Maybe he didn't that it's
33:00
in the snow in covered up?
33:02
Would you then have reconsidered where
33:05
he said about him being an
33:07
inexperienced killer? Would that have added
33:09
any sort of validity? This some
33:12
being somebody. Who's more experienced if
33:14
he did this on the first go
33:16
round? Know because these killers evolve over
33:18
time if he let's say, and the
33:20
first one with the reason I'm saying
33:23
that I believe you might be a
33:25
novice killer is because he separating Molly
33:27
from Walter and in my opinion the
33:30
only real reason to do that take
33:32
her outside into the Cold War now
33:34
he's exposed vs being in the privacy
33:36
of the house is because he's unsure
33:39
about whether or not Walter. good
33:41
reanimated become a threat to
33:43
him while he was spend
33:46
time with molly's however prior
33:48
to that homicide chances are
33:50
he's already gained comfort and
33:52
experience breaking into houses probably
33:55
with occupants inside and so
33:57
he has learned okay i
33:59
need to do this, this, and
34:01
this in order to be able to move
34:03
throughout the house without alerting the victims. And
34:05
part of that learning process may have been,
34:07
I need to ditch the boots or ditch
34:10
the shoes and go barefoot.
34:12
And so he is just employing
34:14
what he learned as
34:16
a cat burglar before
34:18
escalating to homicide. Okay. And
34:20
we actually don't know from the kid if
34:22
he ended up finding the money. We would
34:25
assume maybe he took it if he
34:27
found it. But we know from what
34:29
you're saying, likely the primary motivation is
34:31
sexual. I don't have any details on
34:33
whether Eliza was assaulted or not. It
34:36
sounds like she was partially clothed, but
34:38
does it matter at this point if
34:40
the first one was sexually motivated? Are
34:42
they all going to be after that?
34:44
Well, in all likelihood, you know, you
34:46
have female victims. We know with Molly,
34:49
there's no question that it's a sexually
34:51
motivated crime. We don't have enough descriptors
34:53
in terms of what happened to Eliza,
34:55
in terms of what disruption to her
34:57
clothing, what positioning of her body, any
34:59
types of specific injuries or sexually
35:02
related observations. I
35:04
do want to address the
35:06
searching, the house for financial
35:08
gain. And
35:10
this is often seen
35:12
with serial predators
35:15
is sometimes they are seeking
35:17
financial gain. They take advantage
35:19
of the opportunity, even though
35:22
the primary motive is
35:24
the sexual assault and or
35:26
the homicide. Or you have
35:28
predators that want
35:30
to display a
35:33
potential financial motive to
35:36
kind of in a way minimize
35:38
the fact that they really
35:40
are there for the sexual assault
35:42
and or homicide. In some ways,
35:45
it's their justification. I was really
35:47
just breaking into the house because
35:49
I needed food and money. And
35:52
she was there. And I just happened to
35:54
take advantage of it. They're trying to minimize
35:57
you know what their true primary motive is.
36:00
Well, after Eliza Shelley, the
36:02
police start looking sort of
36:04
in earnest for someone. There's
36:06
a lot of contradictory information out there.
36:09
People who I have spoken with have said
36:11
in their research that the police
36:13
could give a fig about this because it turned
36:16
out to be a litany of black women
36:18
until we get to the two white women at
36:20
the very end, which I believe.
36:23
I had a quote from someone who said that the police
36:25
mounted their horses and made it all the way to Shoal
36:27
Creek, which is not very far, and
36:30
stopped because it was primarily black
36:32
women and a few black men. But
36:35
other sources say they're kind of on the hunt for
36:38
someone. In Eliza's case, they start
36:40
looking at her inner circle. They
36:42
arrest one man who just doesn't
36:44
seem to have any kind of
36:46
connection. I think he was a narrative
36:48
well, 30-year-old, and then they let him
36:50
go. And then they talk
36:52
to a neighbor who says, well, Eliza
36:54
had a boyfriend and they argued about
36:56
money. They overheard someone asking
36:58
for money. And
37:01
they talked to a boyfriend, and
37:03
it turned into nothing. So there's
37:05
not enough evidence for anybody at
37:08
this point. In the city's
37:10
black community is on edge. I don't think
37:12
the white community really was, is the
37:14
impression I got. But it's the black community that's
37:17
concerned at this point because now you've got two
37:19
women who are dead. And yes, they're five months
37:21
or so apart. They
37:24
are brutalized in this way. This is
37:26
a warming people. Yeah,
37:28
and as it should, because it's obvious
37:30
to me, just with these two cases,
37:32
that this is a serial predator that
37:34
is at work. These are related cases
37:36
for sure. I don't need DNA in
37:38
order to draw that conclusion. Kind of
37:40
going back to Eliza, one of the
37:43
details that you mentioned is that even
37:45
though she wasn't taken out of the
37:47
house, she was removed from the bed
37:49
but found wrapped in sheets. Do
37:52
you have a description? Is she completely cocooned
37:54
in these sheets? Are the sheets just covering
37:56
her? Investigators are describing
37:59
it as... Covered. So
38:01
he attacked her in bed and
38:03
yanked her along with the sheets.
38:05
Off. The bed, like trying to get her
38:07
on the ground in the seat kind of came
38:10
with her is the impression I get of. I'm
38:12
not sure this was like addressing. I think it
38:14
was like a frenetic moment and then maybe. The
38:16
boy walks and before he's able to
38:18
sexual assault her, but she's dead pretty
38:20
quick. The. Are you a good
38:23
cause? If if the offenders taking
38:25
the time would say to cover
38:27
his victim was seats are wrapping
38:29
her and seats you know a
38:31
purposeful act that a significant behaviorally
38:33
and often times that indicates that
38:35
the offender either has some sort
38:37
of connection to the victim or
38:39
and as expressing remorse does of
38:42
want to see what he has
38:44
done to the victim or there's
38:46
a practical aspect sometimes offenders will
38:48
cover the bodies to delay discovery
38:50
It also it's a matter. Of
38:52
this is where you're crime scene photos
38:54
would be huge in terms of try
38:56
to me a really figure out okay
38:58
to deceased just come off with the
39:00
body ordered the offender actually purposely cover
39:02
her up and if the offender did
39:04
and yeah that would be something out
39:06
be king and on. That's not the
39:08
impression I get but that's really good
39:10
information. I do think that there's going
39:12
to be probably posing. Coming up here,
39:15
let's talk about the timeline a little
39:17
bit, because now I'm not confused, but
39:19
I'm interested in his bed. So we
39:21
go from December thirtieth two about five
39:23
months later at the beginning of May.
39:26
And that's the gap five month gap
39:28
between Molly Analyzer. Now we're to a
39:30
woman. Named I Ring Cross. This
39:33
is less than three weeks
39:35
after a wiser is ramping
39:37
up. Or. What's Happening. It's
39:40
a very similar. Attack you are.
39:42
We have to few data
39:44
points to determine if there
39:46
is a temporal pattern to
39:48
this offender, but that typically
39:50
isn't something. That. is consistent
39:53
in a series you know i saw it
39:55
a little bit and golden state killer that
39:57
wants to as will start a killer g
39:59
initial went biannual. He would kill twice a
40:01
year. And it was almost
40:04
like he experienced, you know, it was almost like
40:06
the sexual gratification from these
40:08
homicides and then went into this
40:10
refractory period for about six months
40:12
and then offended again. But oftentimes,
40:15
when the offender offends, commits the
40:17
crime, is often driven by when
40:19
the offender has the opportunity in
40:21
their personal life to commit the
40:24
crime. And so sometimes
40:26
we'll see a long period in between
40:28
attacks because now the offender is
40:30
gainfully employed, you know, can't
40:32
get out and do the prowling or whatever
40:35
else is needed to commit the crime. Like
40:37
in one instance, I can think of like
40:39
with Green River Killer Gary Ridgway, when he
40:41
stopped offending, when he was
40:43
being interviewed, he says, well, I
40:45
got married. You know, these offenders
40:47
have real things that happen in
40:49
their personal lives that can impact
40:51
their ability to offend. Now,
40:54
there's also behavioral things, you know,
40:56
in terms of, okay, in this
40:58
instance, we have just a three-week
41:00
gap between Eliza's case
41:02
and Irene's case. Is this a
41:04
time in this offender's life in
41:06
which there's stressors that is now
41:09
driving him to want to go
41:11
out and offend in a
41:13
quicker period than what he had done between
41:15
Molly and Eliza's case? Who knows at this
41:17
point, there's so many variables. Let me tell
41:19
you about what happens next. So this is
41:21
May 22nd. So we're jumping from May
41:24
6 to May 22nd. This
41:26
happens at 302 East
41:28
Linden Street, anyone who's local, there is
41:31
a Linden Street in Austin, but this
41:33
is a different one. This is now
41:35
called 17th Street. So we've gone from
41:37
6th Street to 3rd Street to 17th
41:40
Street. So we're all downtown at this
41:42
point. This is a woman named Irene
41:44
Cross. She was a
41:46
black domestic worker, and
41:49
she was heard screaming in
41:51
the night on the lawn of
41:53
her employer, who was a woman named Sophia
41:55
Whitman. And just like the previous victims, Irene
41:57
lived on the property of the property of the property of the
41:59
property. property in a small cabin in
42:02
the back. By
42:04
the time the helper arrived, so
42:06
she was conscious and screaming, he
42:08
was gone. She is clinging to life, but
42:11
the prognosis is not good and they're trying
42:13
to get information from her and nothing. Okay,
42:15
so let me tell you the wounds. A
42:18
six-inch gash above her right
42:20
eye, multiple reports are that
42:22
he tried to scalp her,
42:25
so part of her head
42:27
is open. Her right arm
42:30
had been so severely and
42:32
deeply cut that it was cut
42:34
almost in two pieces. And she survives this
42:36
for a little while and then dies. I
42:39
mean, just brutal. If the woman
42:42
is found naked and they're saying this looks
42:44
like certainly like a sexual assault, I'll tell
42:46
you, but Eliza was a no and
42:49
Irene is a no, meaning they're
42:51
closed. So this
42:54
right arm wound, did
42:57
the wound penetrate through her
42:59
bone or is are
43:02
they just describing a very
43:04
large incisive wound? They
43:06
just say so deeply severed it
43:08
was nearly cut in half. Okay.
43:11
And she's screaming through this. Well,
43:14
and I think that that is
43:16
a huge factor. You know, she's making
43:18
noise. The offender is aware she's making
43:21
noise and possibly alerting other people in
43:23
the surrounding area. So now the time
43:25
that the offender has with Irene is
43:28
sped up in his mind and that
43:30
may be why we don't see more
43:32
overt signs of sexual assault, like her
43:35
clothing being disrupted or removed from her
43:37
body. This wound to her arm, unless
43:39
he's again armed with an axe, you
43:41
know, and swings the axe and
43:44
in an offensive posture, you know,
43:46
the axe actually goes through bone,
43:48
you know, and
43:50
that's a possibility. You know, I've got a case
43:52
in which a woman is killed With
43:55
a machete and her forearm is literally just
43:57
hanging on by a piece of skin. It
44:00
sounds like that's likely a defensive
44:02
wound, whether be done by an
44:04
axe or it's done by a
44:06
knife and is just the. It
44:08
also is significant incisive injury probably
44:10
two or form as he's trying
44:12
to ward off the nice a
44:15
napkin look like it's severing the
44:17
arm, but it doesn't necessarily go
44:19
through the bone with the attempt
44:21
at scalping is interesting. I'm aware
44:23
of one instance in one case
44:25
in which they california d O
44:27
J profiler talks about an offender
44:29
who. Had read about another offender
44:31
scalping his victims and wanted to
44:34
try it. I personally don't have
44:36
a case in which somebody was
44:38
purposely scalped, but also you're dealing
44:40
with Texas back in the late
44:43
eighteen eighties. Mid eighteen eighties scalping
44:45
would. I imagine would be
44:47
something that people were much more
44:49
aware of just because of the
44:52
indigenous aspects you know. Is this
44:54
an attempt at staging? You know
44:56
where Now the offender is trying
44:59
to make authorities believe that you
45:01
have an indigenous person that is
45:03
committing the crime. Or is this
45:06
part of a way to denigrate
45:08
the female? Maybe she has beautiful,
45:10
had a hair, and now he's
45:13
wanting to collect souvenirs or trying
45:15
to. Go after something that
45:17
he takes pride in. The house
45:19
are so many different potential behavioral
45:21
aspects to what's going on with
45:23
this with the scalping, but I
45:25
do believe that in all likelihood
45:28
with the limited amount of injuries
45:30
to Irene and the fact that
45:32
she's outside screaming that he probably
45:34
got scared off in this instance.
45:37
And there's a witness. Another young
45:39
witness. Now this one's twelve. and
45:41
I think my. Twelve year old kids
45:44
would have been able them to give some pretty
45:46
good details. they would have been traumatized
45:48
but this is probably a more reliable
45:50
witness than that kid who was under
45:52
ten in the last and since this
45:54
is a twelve year old nephew of
45:56
irene see says that he saw the
45:59
intruder it was big chunky, he
46:01
says, big chunky black man.
46:03
He was barefooted and his
46:05
pants were rolled up. He also
46:07
said the man had a pocket knife,
46:09
wore a brown hat, and
46:12
told him to shut up, essentially. What do you
46:14
think about this, a pocket knife? He must have
46:16
had something bigger than that. You
46:18
know, in terms of evaluating the pocket knife,
46:20
it would go towards this wound
46:22
on her arm. You know,
46:24
would this pocket knife have been able to create
46:26
that wound? I'm skeptical
46:29
that the people who are describing this wound
46:31
really know what they're looking at. So maybe
46:34
he is just armed with a pocket knife. Most
46:36
certainly a pocket knife can be used to attempt
46:38
to scalp somebody. However,
46:40
the consistency, pants rolled up.
46:42
Now that is consistent with
46:44
the bare footprint that was
46:46
found in Eliza's case. So
46:49
this appears to be, you
46:51
know, really strongly tying Irene's
46:53
case to the previous two.
46:55
Yeah, and I will tell
46:58
you the black community is terrified at
47:00
this point because we go into the
47:02
summer, which is always Hardin Hill in
47:05
Texas, we go into the summer with
47:07
three women dead and everyone is alarmed
47:09
at this point. Nothing happens over the
47:11
summer. The media jokes it's because it
47:14
was too hot, which I mean,
47:16
who knows? August 30th rolls around
47:19
1885. And
47:21
now we have our next victim, two
47:23
victims. This is a little complicated.
47:25
So let me unravel this a little bit. It
47:27
involves a 50 year old woman,
47:29
black domestic worker named Rebecca Ramey.
47:31
She was sleeping in the kitchen
47:34
with her 11 year old daughter
47:36
because she was so scared of
47:38
this, what they presumed to be
47:40
a multiple murderer is what they
47:42
would have called it in the
47:45
1800s. She was so scared of
47:47
this multiple murderer that she and her daughter
47:50
wanted to be safe. And
47:52
she and Mary were sleeping in the kitchen of this
47:54
house where they were. So this is
47:57
a little different. And it's different
47:59
because this young girl, this
48:01
11-year-old girl Mary and her mom
48:03
Rebecca are sleeping in
48:05
the kitchen of their employer. They are
48:07
not in a back cabin. They are
48:09
in the family's kitchen
48:12
to stay safe. They
48:14
are in the home of a family called
48:16
the Weed family. They made a lot of
48:18
money in downtown stables, at least everything from
48:20
horses to carriages, so they had a lot
48:22
of money. They are on what is what
48:25
was then 300 East Cedar Street.
48:27
Now it's 4th Street, so we've gone,
48:30
boy can I remember, 6th Street to
48:32
3rd Street to 17th Street, back
48:34
to 4th Street, and
48:36
they are very very
48:38
close to Eliza's house.
48:41
Very close. So the
48:43
Weed house is obviously
48:46
not very secure. They are in
48:48
the kitchen. The man comes in,
48:50
hits Rebecca over the head
48:53
with what my friend Skip Hollinsworth
48:55
describes as a club about a
48:57
foot long containing several
48:59
ounces of lead packed in
49:01
sand that are all wrapped
49:03
in buckskin. That's called
49:05
sandbagging, and the person
49:07
used this and knocked out Rebecca
49:10
Cold. I'm assuming they found this. That's
49:12
how they know that. Rebecca is completely
49:14
knocked out. So the
49:16
sandbagging sounds heavy, but it
49:18
sounds effective if you want
49:20
to disable someone who's a potential
49:23
victim. Yeah, you know, and
49:25
it's it's somewhat of a, sounds like
49:27
somewhat of a padded type of weapon,
49:29
which is an interesting choice. It's
49:32
not a hammer. It's
49:34
not a bat. You
49:36
know, something that an offender would use
49:39
to bludgeon somebody to death. So
49:42
it sounds like this
49:44
was purposefully chosen to
49:46
incapacitate versus kill. So now
49:48
I'm gonna want to know from you when you hear this next,
49:51
if this is
49:53
a situation where he is specifically
49:55
casing things out for specific
49:57
victims because he does not have a weapon.
50:00
take the 50-year-old Rebecca Ramey,
50:02
he takes her daughter, Mary.
50:04
So what happens is he
50:07
takes Mary, he drags her
50:09
to the weeds the family's
50:11
shed in the back,
50:13
and he, I mean, just
50:15
brutalizes her. And I
50:18
can tell you what the injuries are
50:20
in a minute, but can you respond
50:22
to that, that he didn't seem like
50:24
he had designs on Rebecca, the older
50:26
woman, that he was really focused on
50:28
the young girl? No, exactly.
50:30
If you could, could you tell
50:32
me the ages of Molly, Eliza,
50:35
and Irene? Yeah, well, you know how
50:37
this goes. People who are disenfranchised in the 1800s,
50:39
I'll give you the best estimate. So Molly, between
50:41
23 and 25, Eliza, early 30s, 31-30
50:43
is what they're saying. Irene, Skip thinks
50:45
she's 33,
50:52
some people say 23, but all, you
50:54
know, 20s and 30s. And then Rebecca
50:56
Ramey is 50, and her
50:59
daughter is 11. Yeah, so in
51:01
this offender's mind, I
51:03
would say that Rebecca is
51:05
not fitting within the characteristics,
51:08
which is her age range. We don't
51:10
know about physical appearance requirements that this
51:12
offender has, but what
51:14
we do know is that Rebecca is
51:17
significantly older than the three prior victims.
51:19
Now, Mary is significantly younger,
51:23
yet evaluating that
51:25
can be problematic. You
51:28
know, in this day and age, we know
51:30
that we have younger girls
51:32
that hit puberty earlier
51:35
than in past generations. You
51:38
know, so an offender from
51:40
afar may choose a
51:43
victim based on her physical appearance,
51:45
but has no clue what her
51:47
actual age is. She just meets
51:49
a certain physical characteristic or requirement
51:52
that the offender needs to satisfy
51:54
a fantasy. This can often be
51:56
confused, you know, with like with
51:59
an 11. Oh, this
52:01
must be a pedophile not
52:03
necessarily, you know depends on
52:05
did the disoffender purposely choose
52:07
Mary because she was so
52:10
young maybe looked prepubescent
52:12
or did
52:14
he see her from afar or see
52:16
her in the moment in the kitchen
52:19
and See a 11
52:21
year old girl that maybe looked more
52:23
physically mature Than other 11 year
52:25
old girls at that time and decided she
52:28
met his niece We don't know what's going
52:30
on inside the offenders mind But
52:32
I am fairly confident that in
52:35
all likelihood Rebecca did not meet
52:37
this offenders needs as a victim
52:40
Likely because of her age. Well
52:42
the evidence is is that Mary the 11
52:44
year old had been sexually assaulted The
52:47
injuries are pretty awful and the sexual
52:49
assault, you know Again, the reason they
52:51
say they believe it happened is because
52:54
she was virtually naked and
52:56
her organs were exposed When
52:58
they find her the next morning, she
53:00
is still alive and Her
53:04
mom survives this Rebecca
53:07
Ramey. So this is
53:09
the injury. I mean They
53:11
described her as dazed Mary
53:14
She had a whole now. This is where
53:16
the vernacular comes into play drilled. We talked
53:19
about this whole drill She had a whole
53:21
drilled through her left ear but
53:25
The next note is they think it
53:27
was made by an iron rod or
53:30
a pen So it's a
53:32
puncture right penetrated her brain her
53:34
skull was also fractured They
53:36
found her she was alive but
53:38
not for very long when she ended up
53:40
dying I think it's informative,
53:42
you know, they they use the term
53:44
whole drilled left ear, but then
53:46
they think it's an iron rod So
53:49
this tells me this was
53:51
a tool or weapon that produced a
53:53
puncture wound that could penetrate the skull
53:56
And Then that goes back to Eliza, you
53:59
know, we're working. We had a debate
54:01
as to whether a drill was
54:03
used or was puncture wound. In
54:05
all likelihood, what happened to Eliza
54:07
was also something akin to an
54:09
iron rod or pin that punctured
54:11
allies skull vs. something that was
54:14
drilled. Why would you do that? Is.
54:16
Is experimentation. She was alive when
54:18
he did this. Marry has no
54:20
incisive injuries, so it's not like he's
54:23
using a knife on her is he
54:25
is only using this this puncturing weapon.
54:27
I do know that these offenders do
54:29
experiment and they will experiment in in
54:31
many different ways, including the type of
54:33
weapon they use from case to case
54:35
to case and that may be what's
54:37
going on here. Does he bring this
54:40
weapon with them or does he just
54:42
you know, find something on the property
54:44
that he uses? We don't know at
54:46
this point, but he's not using a
54:48
nice and so that. To me as
54:50
the most significant thing, I was
54:52
kind of postulating that this offender
54:55
really wants to use a knife
54:57
on his victims were Rebecca and
54:59
Mary more opportunistic. He. And
55:01
also, he wasn't fully equipped with
55:03
his kill. Kit if you
55:05
will. the acts that knife or Chino
55:07
the puncturing weapon the only has a
55:09
weapon in his the something that he
55:11
had used previously of same type of
55:14
weapon or just something that he found
55:16
laying on the ground on the property.
55:18
Just don't know right now. And
55:20
ten, let me give you
55:22
a little bit more information.
55:24
Another bear footprints in the
55:26
dirt. This one is unusual
55:28
shape they say. Now you
55:30
tell me what you think
55:32
about this. It appears that
55:34
whomever made this footprint. Was.
55:37
Missing a little toe, can
55:40
you really tell that from dirt
55:42
i would need to see the
55:44
print you know like would say
55:47
you have a foot impression and
55:49
it's a good foot impression without
55:51
distortion and so when i say
55:53
an impression let's say this was
55:56
a shallow muddy area and you
55:58
have a clean impress which
56:01
I would have confidence replicates the
56:03
foot. That would give me greater
56:05
confidence that if there was a
56:07
missing toe present that the offender
56:09
was lacking a toe. If it
56:11
looked like that that little toe
56:13
should have also been part of
56:15
the impression the way that that
56:17
went into the mud. If
56:20
this is just a footprint
56:22
in dirt, I
56:26
think my confidence is less
56:28
because you can step
56:30
in certain ways and that's not going
56:32
to fully replicate all the features of
56:34
the foot. Okay, well
56:37
the police now understand why the
56:39
black community in Austin is alarmed
56:41
and I'm sure the white community
56:43
does not want killers roaming around
56:45
their house which is what happened
56:47
in this last instance. So
56:50
they go searching, they arrest several
56:52
people including one man that they
56:54
really felt like was trying to
56:56
evade them by you know putting
56:58
on a chemical on his leg so
57:01
the bloodhounds wouldn't find him. None of
57:03
it sticks. They do not have enough
57:05
evidence in order to
57:07
keep somebody longer than just a few
57:09
days. So as we end this
57:11
episode we are left with four
57:14
very violent murders, potentially all
57:17
sexual assaults. We don't know
57:19
for sure. One
57:21
mother who has lost her daughter
57:24
and I'm assuming has probably permanent
57:26
brain damage from being whacked on
57:28
the head with that sandbagging thing
57:31
and zero suspects and a
57:33
lot more ahead Paul. So I'm just gonna have
57:35
to stop there. We have a lot to talk
57:37
about next week. Oh I'm fully engaged
57:39
on this case. This is my wheelhouse
57:41
so I'm looking forward to getting more
57:44
details. Great. See you soon. Sounds
57:46
good. Our
58:00
producer is Alexis Amorosi. Research
58:02
by Maren McClashan, Ali Elkin,
58:04
and Kate Winkler-Dawson. Our mixing
58:07
engineer is Ben Taladei. Our
58:09
theme song is by Tom Breifogel.
58:11
Our artwork is by Vanessa Lilac.
58:14
Executive produced by Karen Kilgariff, Georgia
58:16
Hardstark, and Danielle Kramer. You
58:18
can follow Buried Bones on Instagram
58:20
and Facebook at Buried Bones Pod.
58:23
Kate's most recent book, All That is Wicked, A
58:25
Gilded Age Story of Murder and the Race to
58:27
Decode the Criminal Mind, is available now. And Paul's
58:30
best-selling memoir, Unmasked, My Life
58:32
Solving America's Cold Cases, is
58:34
also available now.
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