BTK /// Bind, Torture, Kill /// Part 3 | Forensic Files

[Music] Heat. Heat. Welcome to True Crime Garage. Wherever you are, whatever you are doing, thanks
for listening. I'm your host, Nick, and with me as always is a man that was not invited, but he's certainly glad he made
it. He is the captain. I just assume the invitation got lost in the mail. It's good to be seen and it's good to see
you. Thanks for listening. Thanks for telling a [Music] friend. Well, I too, Captain. I'm glad
that you made it because today we are drinking Dimwit by the River City Brewing Company garage three and a half
bottle caps out of five. Dimwit is a fantastic wit beer brewed in Witchah and delivering everything one would expect
from a great Wit beer. and Dim Wit is a fantastic co-host. It's citrusy, it's light, and it's warm. And today's beer
was brought to us by these witty guys and girls. First up, we have Ladonna up in Alberta, Canada. And a big we like
your jib to Sarah in Stockton, New Jersey. And Captain, everybody knows you don't mess with Texas. And down there,
we got Adrian and Denton. And we also have Catherine in Houston. Big shout out. You mess with the bull, you get the
horn. Next up, a cheers to Veronica and Matt in Charleston, South Carolina. Also, a cheers to Carrie listening in
the farmlands in Ledger, Montana. And last but not least, we have Brenda in Bloomington, Illinois. So, thanks to
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you there, Captain. Everybody, gather around, grab a chair, grab some beers. Let's talk some true crime.
[Music] February 10th, 1978, Friday evening in the Witchah, Kansas City Hall building.
The police chief made the following announcement. The purpose of this news conference is to advise the public of an
extremely serious matter involving a series of murders which occurred in our city. As you know, in January of
1974, four members of the Ouro family were murdered. In March of 1977, Shirley Vienn was killed. And in
December of 1977, Nancy Fox was also murdered. Earlier today, KV immediately brought me a letter where
the author took credit for the URO, the Fox, and the Vienn murders. In addition,
whoever wrote this letter has taken credit for a seventh victim. We are in no doubt and are convinced
that the person that killed the oturos, Miss Fox and Miss Vienn is the same person. I want to restate there is no
question in our minds that the person who wrote the letter killed these people. This person has consistently
identified himself with the initials BTK and wishes to be known as the BTK strangler. Because we are sure this man
is responsible for seven murders, we wish to enlist the assistance of each citizen of this
community. Our police department has already begun special efforts which is as follows. One, additional unformed
officers are already on the street. Two, a special detective task force involving
the major case squad has been established. Three, a special phone number for citizens to call has been established.
This phone will be staffed 24 hours a day. Four, we have solicited the assistance of the district attorney, the
sheriff, and professionals in the field of human behavior and would welcome the assistance from any person regardless of
their expertise. I know it is difficult to ask people to remain calm, but we are asking
exactly this. When a person of this type is at large in our community, it requires special
precautions and special awareness by [Music] everyone. When we left off last week, we
finished the week by announcing that the BTK killer had named himself, had sent a
letter to K Akev, and immediately that letter was sent to the police department. That same
evening, they held the press conference where we just discussed that announcement that they made. Now, as you
can imagine, the police announcing to the public and to the local media that a predatory sexual killer is on the loose
sent a wave of widespread panic, shock, and fear across the community. The announcement quickly became national
news. With the public aware that BTK was hunting people in Witchah, many rumors were swirling about who the killer was
and how and why he chose certain victims. One thing that was also mentioned during the public announcement
was that the killer had cut the phone line to the houses before he entered the home to attack and kill the
occupants. This information inspired a safety precaution that became a ritualistic habit of nearly all the
citizens of the greater Witchah area, especially something practiced by single women that lived alone. Because the
phone line was cut, people would upon arriving back at their homes, they would run to the phone in the house and pick
up the receiver and listen for a dial tone. Mhm. A lot of people would call their home from another location before
returning home to make sure that the phone would ring. Other precautions were taken by citizens as well. This included
the increased sales of peeppholes, dead bolts, other additional door locks, and of course, guns and dogs were in high
demand. But a pattern that we would see time and time again after this communication, BTK went dark and it was
14 months later when we have another incident. Yeah, this is going to be around 1000 p.m. on April 29th, 1979.
This is when Dennis Rder shattered the basement window of a 61-year-old woman who lived alone. Now, she lived just one
mile from one of his previous victims, Nancy Fox. Mhm. He climbed into the home and his victim, she was not home at this
time. He he would wait for her to return. There was a guest bed down in the basement. Beside it, he decided to
lay out some ropes and a broom handle. Then the woman returned to her house. She had spent the night out with several
friends. The friends had drove her home. She got out of the car and she approached the front door. Reaching into
her purse, she pulled out the keys to her house. She turned and smiled and waved at her friends. She looked down to
make sure that she had the right key. And then she heard her friend shout from the car, "Anna, wait. Why don't you come
over to our house for a cup of coffee?" Anna turned from the door, put her keys back in her purse, and walked back to
the car. Got in, and they drove away. Inside the house, BTK grew angry as he waited and waited for her to return.
Eventually, he ends up leaving the house. When Anna did return home, she found the broken window, the ropes, and
the broom handle. She picked up the phone to call the police and report a break-in, but the phone line was dead
and there was no dial tone. Right. She ran to her neighbor's home and called the police from there. When police
arrived, they had found that the phone line had been cut. And they also discovered that some jewelry and several
articles of clothing along with $35 in cash were missing from the home. Initially, this incident was not linked
to BTK. But that changed when on June 15th, an envelope addressed with block letters arrived at Anna's home. Inside
was an article of clothing and jewelry that had been stolen from Anna's home. These items were accompanied by a letter
and a drawing. Now, the drawing was of a bound and nude woman. The letter was a poem and it was titled, "Oh Anna, why
didn't you appear?" And it read, "Twerfect plan of deviant pleasure so bold on that spring night. My inner
felling hot with propension of new awakening season worn wet with inner fear and rapture. My pleasure of
entanglement like new vines at night. Oh Anna, why didn't you appear? Drop of fear, fresh spring rain roll down from
your nakedness to scent to lofty fever that burns within. In that small world of longing, fear, rapture and
desperation, the game we play fall on devil ears. Fantasy spring forth mounts to storm fury. Then winter clam at end.
Oh Anna, why didn't you appear alone now in another time span? I lay with sweet and raptured garments across most
private thought. Bed of spring moist grass clean before the sun, enslaved with control, warm wind scenting the
air, sunlight sparkle, tears in eyes so deep and clear. Alone again I trod in past memory of mirrors and ponder why
for number eight was not. Oh, Anna, why didn't you appear? 2 days later, the newspapers are going to report that BTK
Strangler tried to get his eighth victim, but he failed when she didn't return home. So, the wouldbe victim was
Anna Williams. Now, she actually moved out of town shortly after the incident because even though the police didn't
connect the breakin with the actions of BTK uh until the letter was received, Anna's
instincts told her that it was the serial killer and she feared that he would return to claim her at another
time. Right. And actually, in fact, when the letter was sent to her home, she had
already moved out by that time. she had sent someone to collect the mail until the home could be sold or whatever they
intended to do with it. So, the letter was actually received by somebody else. But one thing that I think that this
shows here and I think there's there's a lot of evidence of this in the actions of the BTK strangler here, right? is
that after so after the announcement of the BTK strangler just like the son of Sam
who commit you know communicated with law enforcement and with the public and I also suspect this to be the case with
the Zodiac as well though we may never know Dennis Raider became well he became like addicted to the news coverage about
him and about the case right and he loved being the city's so-called boogeyman let's say
right or whatever Everybody's fearing. Right. Right. He Right. He loved the fear of the city's people. Uh he loved
that he knew the answer to the biggest question around town. Who was BTK? Yeah. Or who was POS? Well, and I tell you
what though, he he loved the secrets that he was keeping. And I would suspect and well later we would we would learn
that this was fact actually that he collected the newspaper articles about him. And like we learned from Gary
Ridgeway, the Green River killer, we learned from his wife after he was finally caught that Gary seemed to be
obsessive about not missing the evening or nighttime newscast. This probably would have been the case with Raider as
well. Right now, regarding the newspaper articles and collecting them, well, we also know that BTK has a wife and two
kids. So, he would have to hide his collection. He wouldn't want for his family or others to know that he had an
unhealthy fascination with the case. Yeah. And they're probably watching for two reasons. One, if they sent a letter,
what is the reaction? And also just is there any updates from the police so they can monitor, you know, is law
enforcement closer to catching me? Yeah. Yeah. It's kind of double duty, I guess,
right? Two birds. Yeah. You get to monitor the investigation or what what the public can see of the investigation
as well as see the reaction and and it's filling your ego at the same time. Yeah.
So scary. While we while we were talking about his family, um, you know, we talked about people checking the phone
lines, one thing that I found very interesting about this case was his wife, Dennis Rder's wife, was afraid of
the BTK. Um, to the point she was one of the people that would check the phone line in her house and she was vocal to
friends and family about being afraid of the BTK strangler. Well, and Dennis probably got off on that. Well, he he
may have, but I know there was one time that he did not like it at all because remember last week we spoke about the
phone call when Dennis Rder made that very short phone call announcing a homicide to the dispatcher and of course
they show up to the address that he gives and sure enough there's a victim there. Well, remember they played that
on the newscast. They played that. As bad as that audio was, they played that on the newscast hoping somebody would
recognize the voice. The strange thing here though is the two of them, Mr. and Mrs. Raider, were watching the news
together that night, and after they played it multiple times, she looked over at him and almost kind of like
jokingly, very casually says to him, "That sounds like you." Or, "BTK talks like you do." And let's let's reenact
that. Okay. So, I'll be Dennis Rider. Okay. And then you be his wife. Okay. Play. They just played my voice. Go
ahead. That sounds like you. Honey, a lot of people sound like me. Couldn't be me. Yeah. I think I I
don't know what was actually said, but uh according to Dennis Rder, he got he got very agitated and and pretty
defensive when that had happened. Oh, so I played it completely wrong. I I figured he'd just, you know, laugh it
off. Oh, yeah, that sounds like me, honey. I'm the BTK. I'm going to stab you. Uh the wife told Dennis that the
the phone call sounded like him. But but we also have to keep in mind that they've been together for quite some
time by this point. She she never actually thought that her husband was the killer, right? But so he pulled the
old, you know, she's just trying to make a joke. Hey honey, that kind of sounds like you. And he pulled the old What the
hell are you talking about? I I don't know what went down. He just said he his only comment on it would be that he was
annoyed. No, he wasn't annoyed. He was scared when she said that to him that he was he was scared. So now, but I want to
I just point out here that this this letter, this letter that we just discussed or this communication, I
believe is proof of his addiction to his notoriety of his BTK persona because when the cops in the local media failed
to connect this break into BTK, it's about 15 months later and he wants to let the public know that he is still
around. So, you know, be afraid because I'm still out here. I haven't left. I'm still hunting people. We've spoke quite
a bit about Dennis Rder's personal life. So, he is this man living in Park City who had terrorized Witchah, killing
seven people, announcing to the public his name and presence, sending taunting letters, and threatening everyone to
kill more people. But he's he's a guy living this quiet and pretty reserved life in Park City, living in a a modest
home with his wife, son, and daughter, and working for the ADT company, rising through the ranks over the years. Yeah,
he is not killing during this time, but he has trophies. He has trophies from his kills. And unbeknownst to those
close to him and to those living with him, he is constantly fantasizing and reliving his sick, murderous fantasies
behind closed doors in his home. Raider also did what he called selfbondage. Um, and he did this in
wooded areas. He did this at his home. And he also did this, this is uncomfortable. Really, this whole
conversation is uncomfortable, but he also did this in his parents' basement was like one of his favorite places to
to go about this self-bondage thing that he liked to do. And what he would do is I guess his
parents um you know, they they lived not terribly far from where he was living and they traveled a decent amount, you
know, several times a year. And I think he would go check on their house, maybe collect the mail, things like that.
Right. His parents' basement was a place that was one of his favorite spots for what he called self-bondage. And this is
where he would take these long drawn out um sessions of of himself where he would
be, you know, he would he would wear mask, women's clothing. uh he was hanging himself, tying himself up, using
handcuffs on himself, and he would also take pictures of himself when he was doing this self-bondage uh let's say
hobby of his. Yeah. And and I believe that um a fetish. Well, yeah. And and I don't know how many you can find online,
but there are some of these these pictures have gone uh public uh of of his his crazy hobby. You know, he's also
doing normal things though at this time. He's raising his family, being a husband. He's he's listed as a regarded
as a hard worker at the ADT company. He is involved in his church. Uh by the early 80s, Dennis's son, Brian, is in
grade school and he joins the Cub Scouts. Now, Raider was in the Cub Scouts and Boy Scouts when he was a kid
and teenager. So, this is something that he he enjoyed himself, but he also passed it on to his son. And Dennis was
involved uh he was a volunteer there. He helped out quite a bit with the Boy Scouts and with his son's cub scouts.
And I have seen several websites that state that Dennis was a very officially appointed Boy Scout leader. I think this
is just more folklore. I think he just helped out there, but he was involved. But for Dennis Rder, uh for BTK, the Boy
Scouts would later become an important thing to his crimes and to his murders. Now, we had recently mentioned pictures
um you know, taking the Polaroids of himself. One theory early on in the BT case was that the killer was not only
taking some trophies from the houses, but he was probably taking photos of the victims and of the crime scenes as well.
This is a very strong theory and a smart one with a lot of thought to back it up.
Now remember, he killed four members of the Otoro family and then many years later in a communication to the police,
he recalls very specific details about each one of the victims and about what he did using which items and specifics
about the crime scene. Yeah. To prove it was him, right? And there was FBI that stated, you know what, either this guy's
taking photographs of the crime and that's how he's able to give us such a great detailed account of what had
happened a few years later or he has a photographic memory. Now, the FBI didn't think that photog photographic memory
was likely with this character. Mhm. Now, the early8s in Witchah was there was the birth of something that would
later be called the Ghostbuster Squad. By this time though, there had not been a murder or communication from
BTK in years. Now, what was the Ghostbuster Squad? Well, this was comprised of eight officers, and it was
you had all kinds of different ranking officers in this Ghostbuster squad. Did they have a cool car? Uh, I I don't
think that they actually had a vehicle at all. I think these were these were men that spent a lot of time in closed
door meetings trying to come up with new clues. They were reviewing the old cases, uh, trying to find something
within those case files that might lead them to BTK and coming up with a strategy for tracking this guy down.
Now, some of these officers, like I said, different ranking officers. Some of them would be experienced homicide
detectives, some that had originally worked the oturo murders and the other two murder cases as well. And then you
have you have officers that were just gone, you know, I believe one of them was even on like desk duty because he
was injured in the line of duty and couldn't go out of the office. But one officer that was involved in this, a
young officer named Ken Landwear. He was a police officer at the time, and he he's somebody that we would see,
he's going to end up working this BT case for like 20 years, you know, so he's one of the early guys in on this
and one of the guys that worked this case and saw it through to the end. Now, the name the Ghostbuster Squad, that was
not an official name. You know, they weren't called that by the police department. It's really annoying when
people don't use official names. Well, I don't know that they had a name. They were probably just referred to as some
type of task force would be my guess. What it was kind of a nickname that the department gave the task force because
one day there was an officer talking to another officer and said, "Hey, all those officers and detectives, I see
them in there every day working on something, having meetings. What are they doing in there?" Mhm. And the other
officer said to the guy, "Don't worry about that. They're just chasing ghost." Yeah. And so that became the kind of
nickname that they slapped onto this task [Music] [Music] force. All right. Cheers, mates. And uh
big shout out to all the beautiful people that we met at Crime Con this weekend. Marine Wallace Hedge was 53
years old, was a quiet, dependable second shift supervisor at a medical center coffee shop. Now, she was
originally from Arkansas, but she had moved to Kansas with her late husband. She was widowed. She was described as a
kind, petite, well-dressed woman with a charming southern voice. She was a devoted mother to her three daughters,
one son, and a devoted she was devoted to her grandchildren as well. Now, she enjoyed playing bingo, doing yard work,
and attending the Baptist church. She lived on the same block as Dennis Rider. Actually, she had lived there on the
same block as Dennis Rder for over 30 years. At some point, Dennis started to fantasize about Marine Hedges. Mhm. He
got a strong sexual charge thinking about what she would look like tied up, gagged, and with a rope tight around her
neck. Now, this could be a big big problem for Dennis because Factor X is telling him to kill her, but killing a
neighbor would be extremely risky. But once Factor X focused in on a victim, Dennis had to get to work trolling the
subject, checking up on them, as he would call it. Now during this process, Dennis learned that the woman had worked
at a coffee shop and he would call this Project Cookie. Sometimes at night, Dennis would take a bike ride and he
would sneak around her home watching her through the windows. Sometimes he would
stare at her as she lie in bed at night with the light on reading. Dennis didn't
care about the risk. It it the the urge that he got to kill her was so strong, he was willing to take the risk. he was
going to create some kind of plan so that he could kill her but also give himself an alibi as well. Okay. So on
the weekend of April 27th, 1985, Dennis Rder was attending a Boy Scout camp. This is just outside of
Witchah. He left the camp in the evening with the pretext of having a headache and needing to get to town to buy
something for his headache. In his vehicle, Dennis Rder had what he referred to as his hit kit. This would
be his kit of prepared items he thought he needed or intended to use during the course of one of his murders. You know,
we saw this type of thing with Bundy. You know, that you keep this thing in your vehicle or you keep it close at
hand and you have these materials or items that you think you're going to need to use, right? But this time,
Captain, he had actually stored these items in a pre-selected bag. He he put them in a different bag. This time he
was using a bowling bag. Mhm. So after he left the camp, he parked his car by a bowling alley inside the city and he
bought himself a beer at the bowling alley. He drank half the beer and deliberately spilled beer on his
clothing and on his hands. So he would have smelled like he had been there all night drinking a lot. Mhm. So, he calls
a cab and when the cab gets there, he pretends to be drunk and he tells the driver that he's far too drunk to drive
home and he needed a ride. But Dennis instructed the driver to take him to take him home. But he didn't give the
driver an actual address. He told the driver to take him to a park in Park City so that he could walk it off before
going home, saying he wanted to get some fresh air, was too drunk to see his wife, whatever. Right? So, this park, it
was near the backyard of Hedg's property. Raider shows up. He makes the walk to her property, and he's actually
disappointed to see Marine's car in the carport. So, he assumed when he saw the vehicle that she was at home. He didn't
want her to be home when he arrived at the house. He cuts the phone line and he quietly pried open a rear door using a
screwdriver. And it turned out that that no one was home to his surprise, even though that car was there, right? Nobody
was in the house. But soon a car pulled up and Raider decided to hide in a bedroom closet. Now, Marine Hedge and a
friend, this was Gerald Porter, entered the home. They stayed there talking for approximately 2 hours. The whole time
Dennis Rder is hiding in this closet listening to the two of them talk, waiting for the man to leave. Well,
Gerald left the house that night around 1:00 a.m. Now, Raider waited until Meereen went to bed and, you know, till
till he he thought that she had fallen asleep. At that time, he crept out of the closet. He turns on the the bathroom
light so he can see what he's he's doing. And then he pounces on Meereen who's still in the bed. He manually is
choking the this woman. Now I I said she's a petite woman. This woman weighed less than 100 pounds. Mhm. So Dennis
Rder would seem like a giant on top of her. He ends up killing her when he's he's choking her. He was really just
trying to get control of her and get control of the situation. But because he was so much larger than her, his hands
strong, he ended up strangling her to death. Now, this this fantasy driven outing was far from over, though. There
was other stuff that he wanted to do. Looks like he's going to have to make up for it now that he accidentally
killed her too fast for his liking. So, he decided to rummage through the house looking for trophies that he could keep.
And he decided to take her purse and everything in it. He was going to do something he had not done before. He was
going to remove the victim's body from the house and dump her somewhere else. He didn't want this to look like a BT
BTK killing. Remember, this is way too close to his home, right? So, he dragged the body with the bedding to her car and
put her in the trunk of her own car. Then Dennis Rder drove directly to his church where Okay. So he was so trusted
at his church that he had keys to the building. He could get into the building anytime he wanted to. So he dragged the
body underneath some trees. Well, I mean, let's be real. He could get into it whether he had keys or not. Yeah, I
guess that's true. You know, he could break into the place. He dragged the body underneath some trees and he
entered the building um down and went down to the basement and then he taped black plastic over the basement window
so no one could see inside. He had actually stashed the plastic there a few days, maybe a week before, knowing that
this was his intention, knowing that he was going to need it. He then dragged the body down to the basement and he
photographed it in various poses. When BTK is done living out these fantasies, he's going to return his victim to her
trunk and he's going to then take off. Yeah. He's going to be looking for a place to ditch this body. So, he's
looking for a dumping ground. And he finds a place that he likes. Uh this is in a ditch along a dirt road several
miles outside of Park City. When he gets there, he takes her out of the trunk. He
places her on the ground and then he covers her with leaves and branches. Now, he also left a knotted pair of
panty hose near the body. Then, Dennis Rder dropped her car off about 6 miles away at a shopping center parking lot.
He left the car there after wiping it down for fingerprints. By now, it was getting it was almost light out by this
time. Raider had made his way back to where he had left his vehicle and then he drove and returned to the scout camp
that he had deserted earlier. Right. Then he went into his tent and pretended like he had been in there sleeping all
night long and he emerged a short time later giving the impression that he had just woke up for the day. He spent that
morning scrambling eggs for the scouts for whatever reason. And I think it was because she had died so quickly so early
on in the attack. He would later say that this kill that this was not a very satisfying kill for him. Next, BTK and
Factor X are going to focus in on Vicky Wagggerly. Vicki is a 28-year-old wife and mother. She was uh calm, quiet, kind
person. She loved children. And when she became pregnant with her child, she began providing child care from her
home. Vicki attended two churches. She attended the Lutheran church because it was her faith, but she also attended the
Methodist church because it was the neighborhood church. She volunteered to watch children in the church nurseries.
Now, Raider started stalking her in 1986. He he would walk by her house and Vicki would be inside playing the piano
many times. So, he started calling Vicki Project piano. Okay. In preparation for
this project, Dennis made up a fake repairman hard hat. He had glued a Southwestern Bell logo onto the hard
hat. On his shirt, he placed a fake name tag that he had fashioned out of someone's Southwestern Bell business
card that he had found. He brought along with him a briefcase to look, you know,
official. Inside the briefcase was the BTK hit kit, right? He's always finding ways to disguise this hit kit that he's
going to bring along with him. on September 16th. This is sometime after 10:00 am. He parked his car a few blocks
away from her home. And then he first went to Vickiy's neighbor's house and he's dressed as this telephone repair
man. He knocks on the door and then he goes through his spiel with the elderly woman who answered the door, you know,
saying, "I need to check your phone. We're checking phones in the neighborhood." Blah blah blah. You know,
this was kind of a smart move on his part. And he said that the reason why he knocked on the neighbor's door first was
if Vicki happened to be looking out the window. He didn't want to just walk from
far away and she see him knock on her her door first. He was determined to he was determined to attack and kill
somebody that day. Almost to the point that when the elderly woman had answered the door, it crossed his mind maybe I
just attack her instead of going next door. After he talks to the neighbor lady, he's going to end up at Vicky's
front door. And somehow Dennis Rder managed to talk himself inside the home, claiming that he needed to check the
phone line from inside. Once inside, he he goes over and he kind of like fiddles
with the phone for a little bit. He even brought with him some kind of fake testing gadget that he threw in his
briefcase. And then he turns on her and he informs her that he is going to need to tie her up. I wonder if he, you know,
she was married, so I wonder if the intent of let me get into the house under the the guise of checking this
phone just to make sure that she's alone, being in there for enough time to make sure she's alone, right? I imagine
using a gun he forced her into a bedroom and then he attempted to tie her up but
she she fought him pretty bad and uh she gave a fierce battle. She scratched him
several times in the process. Raider ended up winning the physical fight though and he would
secure her with ropes and then he proceeded to strangle her to death using panty hose as a legature. He
photographed the body in several poses and then he left in Wager Lee's vehicle. Yeah. And during this attack, she's, you
know, claiming that her husband's going to come home, too, cuz she's trying to scare him off. Yeah. She wants to scare
BTK out of the house, but the weird thing is, and I don't know if this was routine or not, Captain, but her
husband, Bill Waggerly, and did come home. He did come home soon after the attack. He came home so much soon after
the attack that he actually saw Vicky's car driving in the opposite direction from their home. Now, when the car was
kind of far away, he thought that it was Vicki. You know, he spots the vehicle. He's like, "Oh, there's there's our car.
She's probably going somewhere." Yeah. Vicki and actually assumed that it was not his vehicle that he was at that
time. When he gets home, something very strange had happened. Remember, we talked about how much Vicki loved
children and she even took care of other people's kids. But when he arrives home,
the home appears to be empty and his 2-year-old son, Brandon, is just sitting there in the living room unattended.
Mhm. Vicki Bill walked the home and he couldn't find Vicki. Well, he's there for quite some
time. I think he even like made his lunch. You know, he had returned home for lunch that day. And he comes home
and he starts to prepare his lunch. He's getting angry at his wife because why in
the hell is his son there, this little 2-year-old boy unattended in the home? And and furthermore, where does she go?
Right? He's home for about 45 minutes, maybe an hour, and he's kind of, you know, at first probably just walking
around kind of nonchalant, but as the time goes on, he's getting angrier and he's starting to look and look and look
around this house. Eventually, he discovers her lifeless body was placed between the bed and the wall. There's,
you know, how sometimes people put their bed near the wall and there's only a small space there. her body was either
pushed down in there or had fallen down in there and he hadn't he didn't see her. So, he calls the police and he
tells them what had happened. He calls and he says, "You know, I I'm pretty sure my wife is dead. I came home and my
2-year-old son is by himself." Well, he's also going to tell them that he thinks he saw Well, now he thinks he saw
his vehicle driving away from the house. Yeah. And when the paramedics arrive, they are desperately trying to revive
her. Keep in mind, she would have only been dead if in fact she was dead when BTK left the home for a short period of
time. But unfortunately, it she was pronounced dead a short time later before they could get to the hospital.
Now, BTK, meanwhile, had been driving around the city and he is disposing of evidence as he's driving. Mhm.
Eventually, he returned to the area near Vickiy's house, and he parked WGly's car
just a couple blocks from their home. In fact, he exited the vehicle in the area
on foot. Um, and he returned to his own car that he had left nearby. Changing his clothes, uh, he escaped all
detection for this crime and was actually for the longest time never suspected of this murder at all. You
think somebody would uh reported his car being, you know, a suspicious car within
within a few blocks of a crime taking place and nobody knows whose car that is. Correct. Yes. And but one thing that
might help him with this is that this is an attack during the middle of the day in a neighborhood. There's a good
chance, you know, a lot of people off at work. People are less likely to see some
things, right? This story right here, you know, all of these stories are extremely tragic. This one is a little
has a little more added tragedy to it because not only is a young mother killed here and a young wife killed
here, but this is a real tough one because a lot of the police and detectives thought for sure that the
husband actually had killed his wife. You know, he's the one that finds her dead. Um, they couldn't believe that the
son was there, right? They could not believe that he was home for 45 minutes to maybe an hour before discovering her
body. And so yeah, that that sounds a little fishy. Exactly. So you can see you can
see that side of the fence. Now on the other side of the fence, we have other detectives that had issue with this
thought and and one reason was the knots that were found at the scene. Some of them thought they resembled some knots
that they had seen at BTK crime scenes. Mhm. And now number two, they thought that, you know, this
this would take some time in their investigation, but once they found the vehicle, and I know that it wasn't
terribly far from her home, but but the the problem they had with that was while
logistically it was possible for this man to move her vehicle a few blocks from the home and return. Nobody had
seen him, just like you said about BTK's suspicious car. Nobody saw that either,
I guess. But the thought was they thought somebody would have seen him walking back to his home. They couldn't
find anybody that had said that. And then three, and this is probably the most important, was the little boy. Like
you said, their son is still at home. Well, when police talk to the little boy, mind you, he's only two, so he's
limited on words and stuff like that. Yeah. But the nightmares that kid is going to
have. Well, the the only thing that he was able to tell the investigators was was a single sentence that was man hurt
mommy. Man hurt mommy. Well, a lot of the detectives found it strange that the boy would say, "Man hurt mommy." That if
if he had seen his father kill his mother, Yeah. he would say daddy or whatever he called him. Now, January
31st, 1987, upon returning home to Witchah, Kansas, after visiting family for a few
days, Mary Fagger was understandably shocked to discover her husband Melvin dead on the floor. This is directly in
front of the door to their home. Her husband had been shot twice in the back. Now, their two daughters, this is
Sherry, she's 9 years old, and Kelly, who's 16 years old, they were found in the basement. They had been left in a
covered hot tub with the hot with the water running. I think it was at like 90 degrees in this hot tub. Sherry had been
bound with electrical tape and placed in the water after having been strangled. Kelly had been drowned. Now,
there were no signs of forced entry to the home, implying that maybe the killer was known to the family or at least good
enough to talk his way or their way into the house. The husband and father, like
I said, was found by the front door still wearing his coat. So, there was one police theory about this crime is
that the man may have been shot upon entering into the home that he had un, you know, unknowingly returned home
during some portion of a crime being committed and startled the killer or killers. One big clue in this case was
the family car was missing. Now, along with a local handyman, um there was a guy by the name of William Butterworth
who had been employed by the family for some work around the house. I like their
syrup. It was initially feared by the investigators that Butterworth was either another victim or he had, you
know, possibly been taken by force or that per perhaps he was party to whatever had happened in the house. Now,
his own van was found several days later. This was just blocks away from the house. A search of the van came up
empty. They found no evidence in this van whatsoever. On January 3rd, 1988, so almost a year later, Butterworth is
arrested in Florida. He had called his wife and a family member reported this to the police. And in fact, he was still
on the phone when he was arrested. They had been looking for this guy ever since
this murder went down. They find him in Florida because he decides to call his wife. Now, when he's arrested, the car
keys, the keys to the Fagger family vehicle Mhm. they were found in his pocket and the stolen car was found
nearby. He was unarmed and he did not resist when he was arrested. Now, while being questioned by the police, he told
the officers that he had entered the home, discovered the body of Melvin, that's the father, heard some noises in
the house, got scared, and ran away. He had no obvious reason to flee to Florida. The police couldn't figure out
if Look, if you're not guilty, why did you flee the area? He didn't have a police record. He
was not a match for the There was seaman found in the hot tub. He was not a match
for that that seaman. He was also not a match for strange fingerprints that were
found inside the home. He was described as a guy who would always go out of his way to do a favor for someone. Nice guy.
He had three children, a three-year-old, a six-month-old six-month old twins, I'm
sorry. And he had been having some financial issues at the time, just weeks before these murders. Mhm. under
questioning. You know, he's questioned multiple times. Captain, he did not change his story. His story did not
change. He stuck to it. He said that he entered the house, saw the body, heard something, ran away. He also said that
that being terrified in this situation, he thought he was going to die. Yeah. And being terrified in this situation,
he didn't recall what he was doing or his whereabouts for several days after that went down. He said when he came to
he it was like four or five days later and he was in Florida and he was afraid to return. Right. So Butterworth's
defense attorney, he's going to be he's going to be charged with this. However, his defense attorney has him undergo 20
hypnosis sessions over the course of four months. They're trying to get a full story or to see if possibly he's
lying. Right. Under hypnosis, Butterworth gave a similar but much more detailed story of what had happened that
day. He said that he had been building the family a sun room, which was true. He took a break for lunch. When he
returned, he said that Kelly, this is the oldest daughter, and someone that he assumed was possibly her boyfriend were
in the hot tub. He he did not see um anyone in the sun room, but he said that he heard movement or saw some type of
movement. So, he decided that he was going to leave the home and he would come back later. You know, keep in mind,
he assumes that he saw the oldest daughter with probably her boyfriend. Maybe he felt awkward at walking in on
this situation. Decides to leave. Happens. So during this time he goes out and he goes shopping cuz he's just
trying to kill some time. While he's out he bumps into a retired police captain.
This is William Dots. Now later William Dots would verify having seen and spoke with Butterworth that day at that
approximate time. Dots went on to say that Butterworth did not seem to be shaken or to be nervous or acting
strange when he met with him that day. Then Butterworth returned to the house at approximately 4:30. At this time, he
said that the lights were off. He entered the salarium and he found Sherry face down in the hot tub. Then he saw
Melvin dead in the hallway. He heard a noise and he realized that the murderer was still in the house. So frightened,
he bolted. Now, for some reason, Captain, and I apologize because I do not know why, but apparently this man in
the confusion ended up with the wrong set of keys somehow. I'm not sure how this happened, but when he was trying to
get the heck out of there, right? He had accidentally tried to use Fagger's keys
to start his van. When he realized that he had the wrong set of keys, he was in he was afraid. He didn't want to enter
the home again. He grabbed his stuff out of his van and then took off in Fagger's
car. Yeah, but could you imagine you have a psycho killer that you believe is still in the house, you're running for
your life, and then you get into a vehicle, you go to start it, and you have the wrong damn keys, and you have a
victim's set of keys in your hand, and you're going to end up taking their vehicle because you don't want to go
back into the house at that point. Right now, remember, he says that he kind of he's uncertain of his whereabouts or
what he was doing for approximately the next 4 days. He says when he came to the
next thing he remembers he's in Florida that he he magically wakes up in Florida. Once he comes to he said that
he felt shame and cowardice for running. He was also afraid that he would be picked out to be the suspect or to have
murdered these people. And that made him not want to return. And that's why he waited so long before he contacted
anybody after he had already been out. He was charged with these three murders, but it was on June 7th. Well, that's
because his story never changed. What we've learned from shows like Serial is if you change your story over and over
that they normally put you on the prosecutor's team. Yeah. And that's a good way to get your conviction
overturned years later, possibly at least. On June 7th, 1988, Butterworth was acquitted of all of the charges.
Now, most people to this day believe that this is not an open case. They they don't believe that the, you know, that
the they believe that the police have closed this case because the police firmly believe in the public's eye that
Butterworth was the killer of these three individuals. But then you have to wonder, we have this guy BTK who's
active at the time killing people inside their homes and we have two female victims there. And remember, Dennis Rder
was not opposed to attacking and killing children. And what we do know is this, Captain, on January in January of 1988,
Dennis Rder sent a letter to the mother who had discovered the bodies of her husband and children. And this letter
simply said, "I did not kill your family, but I admire the work." So, an interesting, still unsolved to this very
day, triple homicide. So, maybe maybe Butterworth did it. Maybe Butterworth has a partner, you know, maybe that
would explain some of it because some of the evidence doesn't match up with him 100%. Right? Or maybe BTK did it but
isn't claiming responsibility for it for some reason. Then you have the other possibility which is the killer is an
unknown suspect. At the time that this letter was sent from Dennis Raider to Mary
Fagger, it was actually believed to be a hoax, simply someone pretending to be the BTK. But after his arrest, it was
confirmed that the letter was in fact from Dennis Rder. Because like most of his communications, Raider would make a
photocopy of his letters and to further elude detection, Dennis Rder would mail the photo copy, not the original, to
either the police or to the media. Right. After his arrest, police found the original amongst raiders BTK
memorabilia. Right. But I I'm just going to assume that BTK didn't do this because one, he wanted credit for these
crimes and he wanted to be in the spotlight and he he wanted people talking about him that he wanted people
fearing him, you know, so he wrote a letter so he could get into the spotlight, but he also said, "Hey, I
admire your work, but I didn't do this." And I think you're exactly right. I think him sending that letter is simply
just a reminder to the general public. I'm still out there. Now there's another crazy person out there too, right? I'm
still out here and I'm watching and I'm [Music] waiting. Thanks for listening and stick
around for the finale of BTK tomorrow. Until then, be good, be kind, and don't litter. Heat. Heat.
[Music] [Applause] [Music]

BTK /// Bind, Torture, Kill /// Part 3

Released: 5-1-2018

Part 3 of 4

www.TrueCrimeGarage.com

January 1974 - Wichita, Kansas - After years of fantasizing a killer emerges from the shadows and announces himself to the world. A dark haired man slipped into the home of the Otero's one morning as the children prepared for school. He murdered all four people inside the home. Later that same year he would attack and kill again before vanishing into hibernation. After many requests we have decided to take an in depth look into the dark, disturbing life and mind of Dennis Rader. Driven by what he called Factor X, Dennis was better known as the BTK. Beer of the Week - Demon Dweller by Green Man BreweryGarage Grade - 3 and 3 quarter bottle caps out of 5

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Brief Summary

The episode details the BTK killer's murders, psychological profile, and the impact on victims' families in Wichita, Kansas.

Key points

The BTK Strangler's Announcement. A police chief reveals the chilling details of the BTK murders and seeks public help.
Anna's Close Call. Anna Williams narrowly escapes becoming a victim of the BTK killer, leading to a chilling letter.
The Ghostbuster Squad. A nickname for a police task force that wasn't officially recognized.
Dennis Rader's Dark Fantasies. Rader's disturbing thoughts about his neighbor lead to a chilling crime.
Vicky Waggerly's Tragic Fate. A young mother is brutally murdered, leaving her husband and child behind.
The Arrest of William Butterworth. William Butterworth, a handyman, was arrested in Florida almost a year after the murders.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

You mess with the bull, you get the horn.

A playful saying about Texas.

1:39WatchApr 30, 2025

Tension

75/ 100High tension

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