Barbara Blatnik /// Part 1 /// 316 | Forensic Files

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enough for the business. All right, everybody gather around, grab a chair, grab a beer, let's talk some
true crime. A 17-year-old girl goes out with friends to a party on a Saturday night.
Nearing what was believed to be the end of her night, she calls her parents. This is just a brief and simple call,
saying she plans to be home soon, but something happened. Something went wrong because she does not come home.
The next day, in the morning hours, her body is found on the side of a road, about 30 miles away.
She was strangled. For any town, this would be a horrific crime that would strike fear into the
residents' hearts. But for the Akron, Ohio region in 1987, this murder caused extreme terror,
panic, and outrage. There are three strongly supported theories in this unsolved murder case.
Each theory presenting its own level of disgust and outrage, but each also presenting a different
terror and threat level. The first theory is someone close to the victim attacked
and killed the girl. The second is maybe someone she only thought she knew. Or someone on the fringes of her social
circles is responsible. And thirdly, and certainly the most terrorizing theory, she was the victim of an undetected
serial killer. You see, there is evidence to suggest that this murder was not a one-off.
This murder could be just one in a string of murders of women in the area. Four women
were found murdered in Summit County in the final 18 weeks of 1987. All of those murders, to this day, are
still unsolved. This is True Crime Garage, and this is the case of Barbara Blatnik and the 1987
Summit County murders. Our featured case takes place in December of 1987. Barbara Ann Blatnik was a fairly typical
17-year-old girl. She lived in Garfield Heights, Ohio. This is on Band Drive with her mom, Teresa, her dad, John, and
her 19-year-old sister, Donna. Barbie, as she was called, had feathered 1980s style blond hair, and is described as
cute and bubbly. Her father described her as a free spirit who loved people, maybe too much.
She loved heavy metal music, makeup, dancing, babysitting, and hanging out with her friends, of which she had a
lot. Barbie's sister Donna, whom True Crime Garage spoke with at length in our research for the show, describes her
younger sister frankly as a girl who liked to party. She was known to drink, dabble in drugs, smoke, and basically
live the party lifestyle. Now, we said she loved loud heavy metal music. Captain, one thing we have in common
with Barbie, and anyone who listens to our other show Off the Record, knows this, one of her favorite bands was
AC/DC. Uh Barbie had a pack of girlfriends that was very tight, and they all hung out
with a bunch of neighborhood guys at a bike shop on Warner Road called Motorcycle Specialties,
where they would go to party. According to our sources, the bike shop owner liked pretty girls around and would
supply booze and pot. Now, Barbie had a boyfriend. His name was Jerry, and the two were dating on
and off for about a year. From what we understand, this wasn't a relationship that was likely to go down the
traditional route of dating, marriage, and kids. Donna says her sister liked boys and was
known to date around, never really being exclusive with anyone. Barbie had been in trouble a few times
and transferred high schools in January, leaving Garfield Heights High School and
switching to Erieview Catholic, where she was a junior. According to her family, although Barbie was a handful,
she had no enemies, and on the contrary, Barbie had lots of friends and was known
as a fun, scrappy, badass girl. Anyway, Barbie set out on the afternoon of December 19th, which was a Saturday,
with some friends to go to a party. She dressed in jeans, a sweater, jewelry, and she had her comb, money, and cigs in
her back pocket as usual. Newspaper reports at the time state that she left her home either around 4:00
p.m. or 6:30 p.m. Reports differ on this. Do we know why there's such a gap in time? We have one paper reporting
4:00 p.m. and one reporting 6:30 p.m. We don't know why there's a discrepancy in that time frame.
But what we do know is that she left with friends and they went to a party on Turney Road, which was about a mile and
a half away from Barbie's home. It's unclear whether this party was at someone's home or somewhere else.
We don't know who hosted this gathering. Well, and it's also hard sometimes to define what a actual {quote} {unquote}
party is. Party could be eight people sitting around a house or 100 people. Or a couple of teenage kids
in somebody's backyard or at a park. Right. Now, newspaper reports stated, and Donna confirmed this, that Barbie
called home sometime after 10:30 p.m. This just to say that she would be home soon.
Now, Barbie's sister, Donna, tells us that this was very unusual. Barbie did not usually check in. Typically, she
would go out with friends and she would come home or she would crash at someone's house.
It wasn't uncommon for her to stay out all night sleeping at a friend's. It was uncommon for her to call home.
Remember, this is 1987. So, this would also require her to find a landline to make that call. Who took the call? Her
parents answered that call. So, but can we definitively say that it's her? I mean
because I know with my parents, if I would have called, especially like on a uh on a school night or the weekend
night and said, "Hey, I'm going to" and it was a quick call, I might be able to confuse them by having a a friend call.
I don't think anybody's disputing that it was Barbie on the phone. But despite that unusual call saying
that she would be home, she didn't come home. Her parents went to bed and didn't
worry. The next morning, they assumed that she was at a friend's. Barbie's mother and sister went out Christmas
shopping. Little did Teresa and Donna know that while they were shopping, two cops showed up at their house. John
Blatnik was asked to go to the morgue in Cuyahoga Falls. Barbie had been found dead.
We have been able to shed a little more light on the events of the last night of
Barbie's life. This, thanks to Donna and also from the Justice for Barbara Blatnik website, run by a local armchair
detective who wants to help bring closure to the Blatnik family. Here's what we found. Barbie met up with
her good friend Michelle that afternoon at a party at the bike shop on Warner Road. This is in addition to the party
on Turney Road that Barbie told her parents she was going to, if in fact that was true. All right, so she meets
up with her friend Michelle. Right. They're going to go to the bike shop. That's where they normally hang
out, have these little parties, little gatherings. Yeah, so when Michelle meets up with Barbie, it sounds like one of
them is already at the bike shop on Warner Road. All right. At this party. So, the first time that
Michelle sees Barbie, according to Michelle, is at this bike shop where they were known to hang out and party.
Okay, so then they're going to go to another party. No, that's why I think things are a
little confusing here. So, we have the statement that Barbie tells her parents that she's going to a party on Turney
Road, right? And then we have Michelle who's going to add some detail, fill in some blanks of the time that Barbie was
gone that night. And she's saying that the first time that she sees Barbie is at this party at the bike shop on Warner
Road. So, a different party. So, if in fact there was even a party on Turney Road
that Barbie was going to go to. She could have actually gone to that party and then went to the bike shop
afterwards. I think this is part of the reason why we have some different things
within the timeline regarding when she left the house that day. Yeah, and I think it's it's tricky, too, because
there are some people when you're friends with people when you're younger, they you know, you'd be hanging out at
your buddy's house and they'd just be saying, "Oh, we're going to go to such and such house and we're going to go to
somebody else's house." And it might be because they know that the parents know the parents better,
but you never end up going there. Does Does that make sense? Well, the other thing, too, that we got to keep in
mind is I don't know 100% when this uh Barbara Blatnik website was created by the local armchair detective,
Mhm. but Michelle is supplying the armchair detective with this statement of the timeline for that night of or
what she knows of the timeline for that night. And this could be 20 years later. All
right. So, we have a gathering at the bike shop. That's where Barbie runs into her friend, Michelle. Michelle was
Barbie's friend who had just had a baby and the two actually hadn't seen each other in a while. Now, Michelle also had
another girlfriend with her and they did eventually meet up with at least one other girl. Their names are Linda and
Sheila. The four of them partied at the bike shop along with a bunch of other local
teens. This bike shop had a basement and the owner, Jeff, was known to provide booze and marijuana to
to attract teens to hang out there during the winter months when they couldn't party outdoors.
The girls partied there for a while and then they left in Michelle's car to go to a pub that served minors. This is on
East 71st Street. Barbie and her friends were known to hang out at pubs like this, where
drinking rules weren't enforced and they were open late. Right. And some people are probably
listening right now going, "What? Bike shop owners are supplying drugs for kids to hang out? Um bars serve underage
people because that is cracked down on a lot more now. Back in the '80s, even in the '90s, there was
plenty of bars that you could go to cuz they had no customers, so they're they were fine with serving underage people.
Right. And they I really feel like it was in the early 2000s, at least in this area, which we are somewhat close to her
area, maybe hour and a half, 2-hour drive, let's say. Mhm. But in our area, it wasn't until the early 2000s where
they really cracked down on that. Everybody either themselves or knows somebody that had a bar that
they could go into and get a couple drinks. And be 18 years old, let's say, or 19 years old, right?
This is where things get a little tricky because now we know that they're at the
pub, okay? But at 10:30 when that call goes from Barbie to her parents, it's not known where that call was
placed. So, that gets to be a bit of a difficult thing. It could have been as something
as simple as calling from a payphone at that pub. But we don't have anybody else to tell
us that Barbie that they were present when she made that call. So, anyway, we have the girls, they sat
at a table in the pub chatting and drinking. They say that nothing seemed amiss. According to Michelle anyway,
there was no one who seemed strange or threatening at the pub. All right. So, we know that this call happened around
10:30, but based on Michelle's records, we don't know what time she left the bike shop, what time they got to the
pub, so we don't know if this call came from the bike shop or while they're at the pub or after the
pub. It would seem that it Well, we do know what time they left the the pub. So, it would seem that this call would
have had to have taken place, if we are going off of Michelle's events of that night, that the call would have had to
have taken place at the either the pub or at the bike shop. Right. Because Michelle goes on to say
that the girls, all of them including Barbie, stayed at the pub until closing time, which was 3:15 a.m.
At that time, Michelle drove Barbie to the intersection of Warner Road and Grand Division Avenue. This is right
near the bike shop. So, if you look at the area on a map, you can see that it's a residential neighborhood, but Warner
Road has commercial businesses like convenience stores, automotive repair shops, and so on.
Uh Barbie says that she was going to Jerry's house. Remember, Jerry is the boyfriend. Mhm.
Or the guy that she was seeing at the time. Jerry, Jerry, Dingleberry. So, this is fairly close to the place where
Michelle drops Barbie off. He lived with his older brother Bob and his parents in a house behind the AC
Delco auto parts store, which was another place where the kids would meet up to party in the yard and
the parking lot outside. This is mostly in the summertime when it was warmer outside. Right.
Michelle and the other friend dropped Barbie off there and then drove off and never saw or heard from her again.
The next morning, Sunday, December 20th, around 10:20 a.m., Barbara's nude and bruised body was
found in a wooded area just off O'Neil Road near the Blossom Music Center in Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio.
This is about 30 miles away from where Barbara was last seen. Yeah, it's kind of out in the middle of nowhere, if if I
remember correctly. Yeah, Cuyahoga Falls is a totally different area of Ohio and
is a suburb of Akron, whereas Barbara lived in Garfield Heights near Cleveland. Now, initial reports confused things
because they stated that Barbie was found on the grounds of the Blossom Music Center. This is an outdoor concert
venue, the kind of place where like 15,000 people can watch a concert. Yeah. It's a pretty popular It's popular
in that area, anyway. I saw Radiohead there. Ooh, fantastic. Uh Barbie and her friends had been there
in the past to see concerts, but she was nowhere near it on the night in question.
It turns out that she wasn't found on the grounds of Blossom. Detectives corrected this on December
22nd. She was found near a wooded area on the side of a nearby access road that would not have been heavily
trafficked on a Sunday morning in December. We don't know whether Blossom would have
been open in December, although it seems unlikely unless they had some kind of Christmas
holiday show. Some of these places have holiday light displays and we do know that Blossom in modern times has a
Halloween fright fest in October. Yeah, but a lot of these concerts, like we had
Germain Amphitheater here, which is similar to Blossom, but a lot of those concerts, don't you
remember them like closing down around midnight? Like they weren't it wasn't like a bar show where you'd
stay there till 2:00 in the morning. I remember some of them closing at 11:00 p.m. Yeah.
because of noise ordinances. I'm assuming that it was not open that night and probably not open during the
cold weeks of early winter. We have little details of how and by whom Barbie was spotted.
Newspaper reports stated that it was an employee of KST Oil and Gas who spotted Barbie's body
as he drove along the road. The Akron Beacon Journal and other papers reported that she was found about 10 ft north of
O'Neil Road. O'Neil Road has a strange orientation in that it runs north and south, then
curves sharply and runs east to west. Mhm. And then turns again into north and south.
Barbara was found on the northern side of the east-west portion, which falls between two other more
unused roads. O'Neil Road runs parallel to another road that abuts the Cuyahoga Valley
National Recreation Area. As for the person who found her, it doesn't seem bizarre that
an oil and gas company worker would be out and about on that desolate stretch of road if he was on duty, perhaps even
working nearby. What's horrifying is that Barbie's sister Donna tells us that when this person found
Barbie, who had been dumped naked on the roadside like a piece of garbage, she was still alive.
Barely, but alive. And sadly, that was not the case for long. I couldn't even imagine being at
work and coming across somebody that is losing their life. Yeah, well, we do have some of this
autopsy information because it was released to the newspapers at the time. So, the
Summit County Coroner, this is William A. Cox, performed the autopsy promptly after she was found. A preliminary
report was released on Monday. The Beacon Journal quoted Cox's statement in some broadcast interviews,
and what he said was very interesting. He said that Barbie was killed in an unidentified place, and her body was
taken to where it was found just a couple of hours before it was discovered. So, now we have to question how could he
come to this conclusion? One thought I had is possibly since she was still breathing when found, he may
have been estimating that she would not have survived long outside in the cold after such a brutal
attack. Mhm. Or, we have this, too, this possibility. Someone, perhaps even the same oil and
gas worker, or someone else the police talked to, had drove by this area on O'Neil Road
just a couple of hours before, Right. and he or she was certain that Barbie was not there at that time. Well, and
like you said, this worker could have been working in the area, so he could have been paying attention.
And said, "Well, when I entered my route, I didn't see anybody there." Whatever the case may be, the coroner
will stick with this timeline and stick to that statement. As he stated, the coroner didn't believe that the O'Neil
Road site was the murder scene. Whether he could have concluded this because of lack of blood, signs of a struggle, drag
marks, or disturbed foliage, we don't know. And we have no idea if Barbie was carried or dragged to the dump site or
just dumped out of a vehicle. Now, Coroner Cox also stated that Barbie was intoxicated when she died. This does go
along with what we hear from Michelle, her friend. He did not indicate a time of death, but
we know that she was still alive when found at 10:20. As for when the attack occurred, we can
narrow that down ourselves. If we assume her friend Michelle is accurate about the timeline she
provided. Mhm. Then Barbie was still alive and well at around 3:30 a.m. when the girls
were dropped off near Jerry's house. And she was found at 10:20 a.m. So, sometime between the hours of 3:30 a.m.
and 10:20 a.m. someone raped and strangled Barbie. And they beat her so badly that her neck had to be covered by a
scarf at her funeral service to disguise the bruising. Barbara was found wearing only her
contact lenses and a class ring that displayed her school and her first name inside of it.
Her clothes and other jewelry that she was wearing that night have never been found. Now, this is a little-known fact
that was never released to the papers, but we learned this from Donna, from Barbie's sister.
It was the '80s, and Barbie was wearing at least four or five earrings, and wearing uh, you know, tons of stacked
bracelets, Mhm. at least two necklaces, and possibly other jewelry that night. Kind of like the Madonna style. Yeah, or
uh, Mr. T. Yeah. Uh, none of these were were found at the scene. The class ring,
we have to wonder, did the killer, if he took and removed all these other items,
why not take the class ring? It was it something as simple as he didn't see it, or was it too hard to get off? He
couldn't take it off of her finger? But you said that the earrings were in or they were taken?
No earrings. The only thing she had on her was her contact lenses and class ring.
Yeah, I I I would assume it was something just didn't see it or maybe he couldn't get
it off. Yeah, he would have had no way of knowing that her name was inside of this ring. Well,
which is actually That's if you're assuming that the person that attacked her didn't know who
she was. No, I mean the the her name was inside of the ring. So, you would have to
remove the ring to see her name Right, right. there. So, if the ring never came off, he would not have known that and we
can't we can't really go down the road too much of whether he wanted her to remain
unidentified for a period of time or if he cared at all. Uh but regarding this ring, I want to
point that out because this is actually how they were able to identify her. So, they have her school
class ring and then they have her name inside of it. That's what led them to realize that
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All right, we're back. Cheers, mates. Everybody keeps asking us where they can find old episodes, download the Stitcher
app. They're free on the Stitcher app. Also, check out our show on Stitcher Premium called Off the Record. Let's get
into this investigation some more. So, Barbie's case was assigned to the Cuyahoga Falls PD. She was found in
Summit County, not her native Cuyahoga County. Keep in mind, Barbie had no ties to
Cuyahoga Falls that police could find, and no one could think of a reason why she would be in that area.
All anyone knew was that Barbie and her friends were very familiar with the Blossom Music Center.
So, Barbie's case was investigated based on the jurisdiction of the body, not the
jurisdiction where she had attended a party and been out and about just hours before her death.
This is standard procedure. But, if the murder took place in or near Garfield Heights by a person or persons who knew
her, perhaps this is why her case remains unsolved. And perhaps dumping her in Summit County
may have been quite deliberate. After the autopsy, Coroner Cox made some statements to the media that are
interesting. Barbie was strangled to death. We don't know whether manual or with an
implement. And she was raped. What's intriguing here, and these are some uncomfortable details to cover in
the case, but they're important to the case. So, bear with me here for a minute.
The main thing that's intriguing about what Cox went out of his way to clarify regarding Barbara being raped. He says,
quote, "by more than one person." End quote. This statement was made to the media on Tuesday, December 22nd. So,
only 2 days after Barbie was found dead. The question becomes, how could the coroner know this detail? This is 1987
and very, very early in the DNA testing era. And what is the likelihood that a small
town in Ohio had access to the highest level of DNA testing available at the time or could complete that testing
within just 48 hours. My guess is slim to none. One thing that is possible is that
perhaps the coroner found two different samples of semen on different parts of Barbie's body.
And he did blood type testing which showed two different types. What seems more likely is that Cox may
have just jumped to this conclusion based on what he determined in the autopsy. That Barbie had been raped
repeatedly. He said, "Quote, it was repetitious. I believe that we are dealing with more
than one person." Whether or not this is correct is really anyone's guess. In any
event, Coroner Cox said that Barbie was raped by more than one perpetrator. It's interesting to hear Cox describe
the state of DNA testing back in late 1987. The following appeared in a Beacon Journal article about Barbie's case on
December 23rd, 1987, where it says, "Quote, sperm taken from the girl's body has been sent to a New York firm for
analysis of genetic content because molecular genetic material DNA is different for everyone except identical
twins. A print of this material would be equivalent to a fingerprint for positive
identification," Cox said. The question is, "Is there enough to cultivate?" If anything ever came of this DNA
analysis, police have not revealed that. An article in the Beacon Journal in February of 1988 stated that although
Coroner Cox used the DNA test on Barbie, he said nothing had been produced to help identify a suspect. I want to
wonder, did they have enough to identify a suspect? Right, And that's the question that he
first posed when they were going to send it off for analysis. Mhm. Now, we don't know if that means they didn't
get a match to anyone or whether they weren't able to extract a profile at all, as you're saying. Mhm. For what
it's worth, we did ask the sergeant currently in charge of the Cuyahoga Falls detective unit whether there was
any testable DNA in Barbie's case, and he told us that, quote, "We've done everything we can do with regard to
DNA," end quote, and he would not comment on whether any samples remain intact for future testing.
Right. So, we can't assume either way, but if they have it, we've like we know now we're in the golden age,
and this could get solved. Donna, this her sister does not know whether any DNA from
Barbie's attacker remains, either. She does know, though, that her sister was a fighter
and would almost certainly have harvested perpetrator DNA under her fingernails as she fought for her life. I know that
they did a toxicology report, and they said that she had been drinking, but I wonder if they went any further, because
let's say there wasn't DNA underneath her fingernails. I mean, do we know that? No, we don't know that. That's just
speculation by her family. And with her sister saying, "Look, my sister was a fighter," this also makes
you wonder, was Barbie, you know, in a state where she could even fight back, or was she so heavily intoxicated or
or drugged by something where she couldn't fight back? Right. And really the the simplest thing
with all of these words that the coroner is saying, really all that's providing to us, the
general public, is that they have or had some form of DNA. They know that she was raped
and they've they believe that she was dumped there within just a couple of hours of being
found. So, another intriguing tidbit that the coroner mentioned to the media, this involved something found on
Barbie's body. So, the coroner found that she had something written on her hand, two lines
of text written in pen. So, during the autopsy, this is what Cox says, "We noticed that
there was some kind of writing in the palm of her left hand. Some of it was legible and some was not." He stated
that the first line contained numbers and the second line was words. Possibly, Cox guessed it was an address.
So, what did the authorities in Summit County do to try to interpret the writing?
Which the press immediately seized upon as a possible clue left by Barbie as to her killer's identity or identities.
Without her family's consent or even their knowledge, they amputated her left hand and sent it
to the FBI lab in Washington for analysis. Cox said that the lab had sophisticated
laser and infrared technologies that might enable them to decipher the wording on Barbie's palm.
And that he should have the results in a few weeks. And that's the last the public heard of this writing on her
palm. Whether or not it was an actual clue, well, we don't know. Well, it's weird be because okay, we do
know that she went to a bike shop that she went to often. Why would you write down that address?
Right. This other party that she told her parents about, if she left the address when she called,
I would then assume that that would be the address that you might find on her hand.
But, we can also assume that maybe she knew where that party was, too. And then she gets dropped off at her
boyfriend's house or her I mean, we're calling it her boyfriend, right? But she was kind of not one to have serious
relationships. Mhm. You would assume that she knew that address. Of course she does. Yeah. Right. So, why
would you write that down on your hand? So, if if it's not a phone number, which
that would make sense to me as well. You're out at some parties, you run into some
friends or old friends. Hey, here's my number. But but the coroner is saying, I think it's
a address. Numbers, words underneath. To me, you'd only write that down if you're going to a place that you didn't
know. Mhm. And so, it's like Is this a sign? Okay, we don't have any We don't have any information back.
They They sever her hand. They send it to the FBI. Why the family hasn't got some answers on this
is absolutely ridiculous. Well, even more so that they weren't asked for permission
to do so. Or or at least even told about it. Yes. Right. Right. I Maybe not asking for
permission. Um But saying, "Hey, this is what we're doing because this is how we think we
can solve this and this is what we discovered." That's appalling, really. Um that's like
you know, that's just very disrespectful to Barbie and her family. Well, they likely they likely didn't get
the information from it even during this testing that they were hoping to to get.
Right. But let's just Let's that Cox is correct, right? That it was some kind of address.
Then it almost implies that she knew she was going somewhere or possibly going to go somewhere after
she gets dropped off at her boyfriend's house. Mhm. Yeah. Or it I mean it could have been for any
type of future use. We don't know that it had to have been for that night. And when I first read this statement, my
mind jumped to a phone number. You know, I could see we've all done it, whether it be a piece
of paper or on your hand, where you write down someone's name and a phone number. But the way that he says it,
when he says that there were numbers on top and some type of words on the bottom, that to me, I'm I'm going with
Cox on this one because that's how I would typically write down an address, you know, the the the
numeric and then the street name. So, the other thing too is we've not actually seen this and not many people
have, apparently, the including the family. So, it's very likely that whether you're
able to make it out or not, what what was written, there's a chance that he could have
looked at this and said, "Well, there's only four or five numbers on top, not enough for an actual phone number."
Again, this type of laser technology back then, we have discussed this on some of the other cases that we
covered that were around this same time frame. It wasn't uncommon for them to bring in
these this laser technology from the FBI to try to find fingerprints on a body or on
certain items. So, this is really just to try to paint a a better picture and fill in
some of the blanks. Because if there weren't blanks, they wouldn't have had to send it off to be tested.
Well, this is also kind of the problem with having where she was found, not where we think
the actual crime took place, but where she was found, investigate this crime. Because again, maybe you
have some smeared letters or numbers or whatever, but maybe detectives within her home
town would know what those meant. You know I mean, like they have a better chance of
You know, it doesn't make any sense. I I mean, I know what you're getting at, but
I don't I don't know. I do think that there is confusion in this case because they did follow protocol and and
the investigative agency was where the body was found. Right, right. But I understand is protocol, but again, it's
to me the protocol should be not only are we going to have where she was found investigate, but
where she came from. We're going to have them involved. Because again, a name or a number might
ring a bell to a local detective where it might mean nothing to somebody from Cuyahoga Falls, you know. So, when we
covered the Tony Muncy case that took place in the '80s as well and in Ohio as well,
there was a bit of a struggle for jurisdiction regarding that case. I don't know that there was necessarily a
struggle for jurisdiction here, but just to give some people an example of such.
In Tony Muncy's case, he lived in Columbus, Ohio. He was found in Delaware County.
And found within What was it? 24 hours or so after he was last seen? Yeah, now a lot of people, just to clear this up,
a lot of people are going, "Tony Muncy? I don't know if I heard that episode." It's one of our uh bonus episodes. We
only have two. Uh Tony Muncy and the Brick of Family Murders. You can find those on iTunes or on our website. Yeah,
and during that time Columbus PD said, "We want to take this case on because we believe he was he was
killed likely in Columbus or by somebody that that was in Columbus." Okay? Right.
And Delaware County was like, "No, we're going to take it because we found the body in Delaware County." What what
transpired there, in my opinion, I don't mean to criticize, but the leads that Delaware County was following, they
weren't they weren't equipped to handle that type of case back then. They are nowadays, but not back then. I think it
would have been a different outcome had Columbus Police Department been the one to lead the investigation.
Or I mean, well, I shouldn't say lead because they weren't really allowed to be involved very much at all.
Right. So, what you're saying is not to offend, but hey, you guys are just little pieces of [ __ ]
Well, I don't know the way that it went down in Barbie's cli- in Barbie's case. I don't know that they were that there
was a struggle for jurisdiction. What I'm getting at here is But see, what I'm saying my the new protocol, not
to cut you off, sorry, but New protocol is everybody works together. That's the new protocol.
Right. I mean, they The somebody may still have the lead on a case, but often times we see Yeah, often at least here
in Ohio, what we've seen with our own eyes and a lot of times with the cases that we've covered elsewhere, what we
see is when we're reporting this stuff, it's like we mention two or three or four agencies when we're talking about
some of these cases. So, I don't know how much involvement Garfield Heights actually had in this
situation. Because we know that it was Summit County that had the case, and we know still to this day the The remains
unsolved, and Summit County still has the case. Where I will give criticism goes back to the removal of the hand.
Because this is the way that this whole thing went down. And it's a bit shameful to me.
The family discovered that Barbie's hand was severed and sent away, effectively mutilating the corpse, when
a reporter called the Blattneck home. And the person that answered the phone was 19-year-old Donna, her sister.
And she was simply asked by the reporter, "Why was your sister's hand Why had it been cut off?"
What I'm getting at is I'm not suggesting that they would have had to ask for permission, but I do think there
are better ways to handle this situation when you have loved ones that are mourning the loss of
their sister and their daughter. Where you don't have to show any of your cards, per se.
You could simply say, "Look, this is one thing that we think will be extremely helpful to the investigation
of the murder of your daughter. The hand contains We believe that it could contain some evidence that could
lead us to the perpetrator." Right. And in order for us to do the best job we can as investigators, we're going to
actually turn over this to the FBI. Right. You don't have to tell them what you found. You don't have
to doing so, we have to remove her hand. Right. And you know, because it'd be a very difficult thing for a
parent, cuz part of you would just be going, "Can't they just come here? Yeah. Can't they just come here? Do we
have to you know, put her through more than she's already been through?" Right. And and I understand that she's passed
away at this point, but that's what it feel like that you're putting her through.
More torture than is necessary. So, what is known about the investigation is besides what we've already talked about.
By Tuesday, December 23rd, Cuyahoga Falls police had interviewed 15 or 20 people in connection with Barbie's
death, including a number of her friends. But, they said publicly that they had come up with nothing concrete
and had no definite suspects in mind. What if any police uncovered in their investigation remains a mystery even to
this day. When we inquired of the Cuyahoga Falls sergeant about certain aspects of the
case such as whether police ever found her clothes or jewelry or whether they could tell us what the message was on
her hand, we received basically a no comment, which is which is fine. That's good.
I hope what that means Well, it's fine. That's good. And I say that because I hope that this is a case
that they're revisiting from time to time and they don't want to show any of those cards that we just talked about.
Right, but you could say something like that. Yeah, we're currently working on this.
Uh we don't want to compromise what we have. Um but the fact that there's out there's people
out there like you said armchair detectives, you got people in our family that are still pushing this forward.
Now, we're trying to push this forward. Sometimes these cops need to get off. Uh stop sitting on their hands and put
out more information. Uh even if cuz that's going to be my argument constantly. You see it like
with the Amy Mihaljevic case, coming out with new evidence and having press conferences 20 years after the fact.
You know, some of that stuff just doesn't make any sense. And And they have DNA, they need to be testing it.
Well, according to Barbie's family, the clothes and the jewelry were never found.
And the police captain at the time back in 1988 told the Beacon Journal that quote, "We have probably interviewed
over 200 people about Barbie's last hours, her whereabouts, and the timeline." 10 years later, reflecting on
the unsolved case in 1997, the lead Cuyahoga Falls detective on the case, Larry Wagner, theorized that it hadn't
been solved because the crime was probably committed 30 miles away in Garfield Heights.
And police didn't have an easy time tracking down witnesses. Wagner said quote, "She was a fairly
popular young lady, so she had a lot of friends and a lot of people we had to look into. I'll bet we interviewed at
least 100 people. But he said they had very few solid leads to go on, even chalking her murder up to a possible
transient." And that's about it for public knowledge of the official investigation.
Now, thanks to the Facebook page and Barbie's sister Donna, again, we have a little more insight
into some of the players whom police might have spoke to or looked at in this case.
According to Michelle, Barbie did not hook up with Jerry, her boyfriend, that night, at least
initially, right? We know that. Jerry wasn't around. She asked to be dropped off
on Warner Road and that she was going to head to his house nearby. By local reports, Jerry wasn't home. He
was out with his friends that night. We have no idea whether Barbie knocked on the door or just went away when no one
answered. Right. What the situation could have been. Or here's a possibility. Or if Bob, Jerry's brother or anyone
else answered the door if Barbie did approach the door and knock. Right. Well, cuz we have to put it out there
that it's a possibility that she tells her friends hey, drop me off by my boyfriend's house.
And that could have been a meeting spot for her to meet somebody else. So, we don't even know if she made it to
her boyfriend's house. Right, exactly. I mean, there could be any number of reasons for her to change her mind and
go elsewhere. Right. We do know that Jerry was looked at hard by police, but it's unknown whether they ever tested
his DNA. So, he's not home that we know of. And Well, we we know according to statements that he was out with friends
that night. Right, so he has an alibi. He's not at home and he has an alibi. It seems like Jerry was looked at pretty
good by police, but it is unknown whether they ever tested his DNA. Mhm. We have been told that several of the
guys in the neighborhood eager to exclude themselves from the suspect pool agreed to be tested. But we don't know
for certain if Jerry was one of them. According to Donna, there were a few who refused. But police seem to have
satisfied themselves that Jerry was not involved. We're basing this off of the fact that he was never named a suspect
or arrested. Uh he has since passed away. Yeah, so you got all these local creepos. Think about the shitty things
that you had to do with your life where you somebody comes up missing, somebody's
dead body is found and you're very eager to get yourself excluded from the investigation. Well, I
don't know that that necessarily means that they're creeps or that they've done anything wrong.
Not all of them, but I'm saying out of one of them in that group is super duper creepo, right? And so he's going,
"Please test me cuz I've made a lot of bad decisions and I don't want people to think that I did this."
Well, I I don't know but I'm just saying there there's at least one and I'm just
saying that guy made a lot of bad decisions. It's a possibility, but when they're talking to these individuals
look, if they believe that they have a blood type or or anything regarding DNA or that type of evidence that can
either clear somebody or connect them they're not going to make their jobs any harder than it has to be. They're going
to ask you where you were that night. Do you know Barbara Blatnik? How long have
you known her? Do you know any of her friends? Okay, who of them do you know? Would you be willing to submit your DNA
or your blood type or any of that evidence to us and we can either include you or exclude you?
But I'm saying there might be somebody in the audience going with their hand raised, "Please test me." Hey, we're not
even talking to you. No, I know you're not talking to me, but please test me. I want to be excluded from this
investigation. I think what's more interesting is the alibis that some of these teenagers and young adults may or may
not have had for that night. Mhm. We have a lot of kids and young adults that are
Look, I'm not going to accuse them of of anything that we don't already know. These are people that are drinking
underage smoking some pot, hanging out, partying. Not a big deal, right? That's pretty
That's a fairly common activities for people of that age. So, no big deal there. No harm, no foul.
However I think where a lot of the the trouble that this investigation has got into
is going off of the word of these young adults and teenagers that are breaking some very small rules and laws. Right.
I wonder how well we can trust the alibis and statements provided to detectives regarding what was going on
that night, with whom and where. Right. So, hypothetically speaking, you got a group of teenagers that were hanging out
at the Captain's Pub. And the Captain's Pub was serving minors alcohol that night.
Mai Tais and margaritas. Mhm. Yeah. Loads of Mai Tais and and we got a special drink called the douche
canoe. It's very long and it's filled with booze and it's kind of like a fishbowl. But anyways,
there's a So, here's what I'm hearing you say. It's a teen a teenage group might tell the
cops, "We were at Tommy's house." Or we were just driving around. And not to give the location of the place that
they might have been drinking or partying at. Mhm. And so, that makes Did they do anything wrong? No. Are they
involved in the crime? No. But, it's making a lot of these stories unclear. Yes. And
and I base that off of this. So, let's I'm going to create four different compartments real quick here regarding
these teens and young adults. And especially the young adults that are still living at home with mom and dad.
Okay. So, we have the A group that may not give a [ __ ] about anything and they're just willing to tell the cops
whatever because they don't care. They don't fear the cops, they don't fear their parents, they don't fear the law.
Then we have another group who might be terrified of getting in trouble with the
law, may not understand the law and think, "Oh, I sold some pot to these people. I'm going to go away forever."
Okay? And then you have another group, group C, that might just be terrified of mom and dad. I don't want to get in
trouble with mom and dad, or I don't want to disappoint my parents. Right. Then we got group D,
who is going to go, "You know what? Maybe I'm a little afraid of the law. Maybe I'm a little afraid of
disappointing my parents, but in the sake of doing what's right, I'm going to accept what I've done, and I'm going to
tell the truth to the police anyway." Right. But what I'm getting at is you still
have two groups within that that large pool of people. We know that she was a popular kid. She had a lot of friends.
Nobody There's nobody out there saying differently. So you have a large group of people, all
of them young adults and teenagers, and you have if we're going to break that up
into just four different groups, we got two of those four groups that probably would bend the truth. Well, right.
Or leave out details, or, you know, The other group is the people that don't want to get the establishment that
they're at in trouble. Right. So you So no And then on top of that, no it also can affect your personal life going
forward. Right. And your activities. Maybe you love going to the bike shop in December and
January and getting all boozed up with your buddies. But guess what? After I tell the truth about what I was doing
that night when Barbara went missing and then was found dead, Mhm. guess what? I can no longer say, "Hey,
Mom, Dad, I'm going off to the bike shop. See you in a few hours." That ain't going to fly anymore. Well, yeah.
And all those rats that ratted out the Captain's Pub, no douche canoe for you. No douche canoe
for you. Well, in episode two of this case, Captain, I really want to take a deep dive into what are some other
possibilities for that night, for Barbara's last night. And I also want to explore if her murder could be connected
to other murders in the area. A lot more to dive into. If you have thoughts on this, go to
truecrimegarage.com and leave your comments on the blog. Yep, join us back here for part two.
Until then, be good, be kind, and don't litter.

Source: https://www.podbean.com/eau/pb-ihrur-b754c8

Barbara Blatnik /// Part 1 /// 316 Part 1 of 2 www.TrueCrimeGarage.com Join us in the Garage as we discuss an Ohio Cold Case. Barbara was just 17 when she didn’t come home one night. Her body was found the next day. There was fear at the time that an undetected serial killer was operating in the area. We will discuss some possible leads for this unsolved case and ask you for your help. Beer of the Week - Focal Banger by The Alchemist Garage Grade - 4 out of 5 bottle caps Cheers to this week’s sponsors! Save some ca$h with our codes! www.Stamps.com - click on the microphone and type in GARAGE and get a special offer that includes a 4 week trial plus FREE postage and a digital scale www.ThirdLove.com/Garage - find your perfect fitting bra at Third Love and get 15% off your first purchase www.ZipRecruiter.com/Garage - Try Zip Recruiter for FREE!

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Brief Summary

Barbara Blatnik, 17, was murdered in 1987; her case remains unsolved with theories of a serial killer involved.

Key points

The Disappearance of Barbara Blatnik. A 17-year-old girl goes missing after a party, leading to a tragic discovery.
Theories of Terror. Three theories emerge regarding the unsolved murder of Barbara Blatnik, each more chilling than the last.
The Discovery of the Body. Barbie's body is found in a wooded area, sparking fear in the community.
Barbie's Last Moments. Barbie was alive at 3:30 a.m. and found dead at 10:20 a.m. after a brutal attack.
The Mystery of the Class Ring. Despite the killer removing other jewelry, Barbie's class ring remained. Why?
Intriguing Autopsy Findings. Coroner Cox revealed Barbie was raped by more than one person, raising questions about the investigation.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

She was strangled.

The shocking revelation of the girl's cause of death.

3:13WatchJul 9, 2019

Tension

75/ 100High tension

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