The I-70 KIller /// Part 2 /// 442 | Forensic Files

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[Music] 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's moving out to LA the land of the Champions here
is the captain heading out to California it's good to be seen and good to see you
thanks for listening thanks for telling a [Music] friend today we are sipping on a
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describe I70 Colorado logger as Zippy so we'll back that up and let's start off by giving some praise to those that got
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know when we send out a promo code to the website store and that is enough of the business all right everybody gather
around grab a chair grab a beer let's talk some true [Music] crime [Music] 24-year-old Nancy kitsmiller played
soccer throughout high school and at Oklahoma State University where she graduated with a degree in geography she
returned home after graduation and organized her old high school soccer buddies to play in an indoor soccer
league she loved her country and western music and was a line dancing fanatic she
had a big smile blue eyes and long curly brown hair now Nancy wanted to be a cartographer she applied for a job with
the defense mapping agency headquartered in St Louis for this job she needed top
secret security clearance this is going to take some time to get and she had been waiting for about a year where we
pick up our story in May of 1992 so Nancy's finished with school and she's going to work at a store called boot
Village in St Charles Missouri this is while she's waiting on that security clearance nany's parents say that Nancy
was expecting that clearance to come within 2 weeks of the time of her death the bogey Hills Plaza boot Village Store
in St Charles Missouri opened on Sunday May 3rd 1992 at noon that day Nancy was one of several managers that worked at
the store well this location is going to be similar to some of the other locations in this story where yes it's a
business but it's surrounded by other businesses but since it's a Sunday the other businesses aren't going to be open
yeah it's a busy area and some of these stores in this immediate area will be closed due to the Sunday this Western
Footwear store is located at 2079 zumel or zambile road and I'll spell that because I'm a [ __ ] in the
garage who can't say things it's Z M be Road Nancy will be working the early shift by herself because business is
typically slow on a Sunday now sometime between unlocking the doors for business
that day again at noon and 2:30 p.m. that afternoon someone shot Nancy in the head and did take some
money from the cast register though there were reportedly plenty of people visiting other retail outlets in the
area no one comes forward saying that they heard a gunshot a passer by did say that they saw the killer though the last
customer that Nancy kitsmiller waited on according to this eye witness this person was a male of
medium height with dull red hair not terribly unlike the description we received from the man retrieving the
cumber bun right at the bridal shop today the address of 2079 zambo Road houses a St Louis Bread Company the
boot Village Store is no longer there this is very much much in every way a similar attack to the others a employee
working in a smaller business by themselves is attacked shot in the back of the head there is some money that is
stolen from the scene again the location though it's 2079 zambile Road St Charles
Missouri it's an 8-minute drive to Interstate 70 3 9 miles away wow and you had asked Captain off Mike if we knew
exactly how much money was taken or how much money was left the general description with all five of these
events that we are going to go through in the I70 killer timeline the description is all basically the same
that it is agreed upon by investigators that some money was taken from each location but also some money was left at
each Lo location this is where you have to wonder what is the hold back information here there has to be
something even if it's these quick attacks that are very succinct I mean we have what appears to be a guy walking in
to a store and killing an individual leaving very few Clues behind and also probably spending very little time at
the actual crime scene inside the store itself there does have to be some information that we don't know that the
public does not know that the police in these areas in these jurisdictions know how much money was left how much money
was believed to being taken the other thing that I'm curious about we know in one of these attacks that Mick his
wallet was taken It's Curious to me if there were personal items belonging to the victims
taken at all of the scenes or more than just that one scene yeah it's very difficult too because I think like you
were saying it's pretty easy to go well I think murder was the main motive because they're not taking much
money that might just be not much money to your eye or for us to go a couple hundred bucks I'm not going to kill
somebody over a couple hundred bucks but I wonder if that lowers the age of the suspect we're looking for
because obviously a couple hundred bucks to a 17 or 18y old kid would be huge well again here we have a potential
other witness and age has been a [ __ ] for the suspect in this case I've seen them put the age range as low as 20 to
30 years of age and as late as 30 to 45 years of age yeah I heard as early as a three-year-old well the thing here is if
we are to go off of May Rose's witness statement he was the manager at the paint store right keep in mind he says
some interesting things that immediately upon seeing this man if in fact that was
the killer I believed him to be a hitchhiker SL homeless person well typically people that are disheveled
unclean they can look older than they actually are and then to to take that a step further you and I keep honing in on
the fact that money was taken from the scene but money was also left at the scene we may be trying to rationalize
something that there is no rationalization for meaning if mayrose was correct in his assessment that this
individual was either on drugs or had mental problems or both there may be no Rhyme or Reason for why this
individual's leaving money at the scene this takes us to our next attack here Captain this is May 7th we're 4
days out from the last attack May 7th 1992 we have Sarah Lynn blessing working by herself her maid name is Hart and
she's recently married she's a newly wet as well uh 37 years old Sarah was a healthy conscious person very
knowledgeable about natural foods and such she went to empor State College halfway between Topeka and Witchita
earning a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in interpersonal Communications with a minor in Psychology she was known to be
a pet lover now Sarah was born 6 weeks prematurely and had a younger sister and a younger brother but her mother Wilma
Hart recalled quote she was always a little thing but she was the big sister and she goes on to say that she read
constantly and got straight A's in school now Sarah and five of her friends rented a storefront in Raytown
Missouri each would set up in an area where they would display their items to sell these could be things like crystals
vitamins natural foods and such they called it the store of Many Colors they would take turns working at the store
the grand opening was 1992 in April late April the grand opening week of April 18th to April
26th so another bizarre situation here Captain because we are now on our second store where it has just recently opened
on May 7th this was a Thursday it was Sarah's turn to work she's working alone that is the day that
she was killed Sarah was in the store alone when a man wearing a gray sports coat slacks
and dress shoes strolled across the large parking lot toward the shop of Many Colors the store that we're talking
about now this guy is going to stand out to Witnesses because most people drove to the popular strip mall and of course
they're going to park right in front of the store that they are intending to go into so this guy he's not seen getting
out of a vehicle he's seen walking the distance of the parking lot and then selecting this store the store of Many
Colors Tim Hickman owned a video store that was next door to the gift shop where we have our young woman working
where he said that he heard loud bangs after hearing this he said that he saw a man walking up the hill behind the shop
and he believed heading in the direction of Interstate 70 he goes next door enters the shop and
discovers Sarah's body lying on the floor then we have a clerk at a nearby grocery store who was outside collecting
carts if you look at this location on a map what we have here Captain is we have
have let's picture um a square with three sides and one of the sides not fully complete but what what we have by
that pointing that out is we have shops that are facing one another with a large
parking lot in the center of all of these shops the location of this grocery store which is the largest shop in this
strip mall location is across the street or across the parking lot I should say from the gift shop what he is going to
see is a man exit the gift shop and then walk in the Direction behind the store behind the store there's a hill a street
and then if you go beyond that there's a neighborhood but this person this second
eyewitness says that he saw this man walking away walking North at 63rd and Woodson which is is just about 3 Mi
south of I70 the suspect was also reported to be walking East down 59th Street approximately 10 minutes later at that
time the stranger was about 3 miles south of I70 so about the same location speaking of
location the store is located at 11573 East 63rd Street in Raytown Missouri this drive driving by car would
be 9 Minutes travel time to Interstate 70 it's 4.6 M away which is another similarity in this case as the other
cases now obviously we're connecting them but this is after law enforcement or already did so years ago yeah and I
actually heard um just one podcast I think there were several podcasts on this case I listened
to a portion of one of them and I don't recall the name and I don't want throw anybody under the bus anyway but they
had said you know these all these crimes and they're the distance apart of course
you're not going to connect them and it's the early 90s so the jurisdictions weren't talking to one another so they
didn't connect them for years which in fact that's absolutely false that's not correct information what we have here is
within days of the final attack we have four of the investigating four of the five investigating departments are are
meeting to collaborate and to discuss potential similarities and see if the crimes are in fact linked and what we
have is an immediate warning that comes from these four investigating departments in May that says this is
issued a warning issued to stores near interstate highways throughout the entire country saying be careful try not
to leave a clerk alone on duty saying we are moving ahead but just because we had a meeting doesn't mean that we're
going to catch the guy tomorrow these things are going to take some time now we said four of the five investigating
departments that is because there was a bit of a squabble over whether or not the Witchita homicides were connected to
the others or not we have Indiana state police detective crook who said without elaborating on the details that there
were certain factors about the witch slayings that were different from the others yeah but you're going to have
that I mean not every serial killer or expert in crime commits the crime 100% the same way every time right and what's
so funny about this portion of the story to me anyway is that he goes on to say on the record this is one of those
moments where it's like it's like toothpaste once it's out of the tube you can't put it back in and I I bet you he
wishes that he had not said some of these words so he says uh the Witchita shootings appear to be too far off of
I70 Witchita meaning their Police Department is really hot on the idea that they are involved but we are not
that seems pretty clear-cut but the problem is then just two days later the witch killings were in fact linked to
the others and Rick Pilgrim spokesman for the Metro case Squad investigating said we've been able to come up with
common denominators in all of the cases we have physical evidence linking the crimes so
maybe hair sample fingerprint DNA something palm print I wish that that were the case I don't think that
they have that stuff okay what we do know that is left at all of the crime scenes is bullets unfortunately what I'm
saying is that they're going to be able to physically connect these through evidence to each other because of
primarily the bullets right so the bullets because of ballistics is basically like a fingerprint for the gun
and we mentioned that we have the warning that was issued by police to basically the entire nation of this guy
could hit any store seemingly at random please do not have your employees working alone especially if you're store
that's located near an interstate or a freeway they did offer up some theories immediately early in the get-go of this
investigation once they've connected all of these crimes saying that he may be posing as a traveling salesman or the
killer May Force his way into a store with his gun he may case the area and strike at a time when a single clerk is
vulnerable but I think one of the most powerful things that is stated early on in this investigation comes from the
assistant police chief in terao Indiana this is Joseph Newport who says we were dealing with a serial killer he's not
really getting much money out of the shops we don't know why he's killing people I just think he wants to kill
people he's going into places that don't have money if he had gotten every dollar
in there it wouldn't have amounted to much but I think that's important in this in the profile of this individual
is is maybe even though the amount of money was so little it was still they still
needed the money right it's something it's almost like a signature if in fact it's a a side thought it's also somewhat
necessary to the crime itself if he is in fact going in there just for the purpose of killing well he's taking an
extra step that has heightened risk involved with it of taking money from the scene a lot of what you are
discussing is information that came out pretty a lot of what we're discussing is
information that came out pretty quickly after the crimes but this next bit is something that came out I believe 20
years afterwards yeah in 2012 the St Charles Police Department released what they believe to be the
exact model of the gun used in all of the slangs and we say all of the slangs we I think we really need to hone in on
something before we get into the details of this weapon here what the hell is going on we
have six victims in five events that all take place in a month a period of just one month right that is forgive me for
saying so a speedy and efficient killer we have the first attack that takes place on April 8th 1992 and then
the last known attack is May 7th 1992 in a one-month period six people killed it was the uh Indiana State
Police or or maybe it was the Indianapolis City police pardon me that came up with the moniker of the I70
killer but but we know from what they were saying in late May of '92 that all of these events all of these homicides
are connected and then we fast forward 20 years later to learn in 20 2012 that they believe that they may
know the exact gun to have been used so lab test confirmed that all five had been killed by the same gun this would
be a semi automatic 22 caliber pistol and based off of witness testimony police strongly believe that the murder
weapon may have been an Irma work and I'm going to spell that in case I'm saying it incorrectly
W ke and it was model uh a model et22 pistol now this is a unique looking Weapon It's a handgun with a very long
barrel and it also looks like um me being a lay person uh refer to as like a Nazi looking gun you know those little
the little handguns that you see in the Indiana Jones movies um the cartridges of the bullets were polished with
Jeweler's Rouge this is a very specific thing to these crimes okay this is somebody we're talking about expert
level of experience with Firearms why would anyone polish bullets with Jeweler's Rouge I would have no idea
about that I have no clue why anybody would do that until looking into this case what I've been told is that if you
were to do this that it's it would prevent the bullets from jamming that it would it would prevent the gun from
misfiring so you don't run into any issues when you're trying to operate your killing machine that you're
bringing to the scene of these crimes now we say that this weapon is unique well it was in fact unique only 6,000
were imported to the United States from Germany so detectives are hoping that someone would recognize this gun and
remember if they knew someone who had this rare gun back in the early 90s the ammunition was CCI brand 22 caliber long
rifle with copper clad lead bullets police asked all gun enthusiasts and gun dealers to notify them
if they see an Irma work model et22 or had one stolen from them in the early 90s the owner or presumably the
killer may have used corundum or red Rouge for fire lapping of the weapon or may have used corundum and Rouge in
grinding polishing or machine shop work there are many complaints that this gun would not cycle reliable
or eject and load a new round again that's why somebody with an expert level of experience would know to use this
Jeweler's Rouge to prevent that from happening well we have multiple crimes multiple crime scenes multiple law
enforcement departments working together what kind of profile if any do we have of this
individual that's what's unique think to this this we have a known serial killer
operating the problem is he's operating in multiple States across many many miles of land but what's unique to this
case amongst the others is I couldn't really find a profile what I could find is several statements by several
different departments that said at the time you know early 1992 saying we are working with the FBI
to provide them information and details of the crime so that they can put together a psychological profile of the
I70 killer well you look you wait you look again nothing what you find is a month or two later a different
department saying the same thing we are working with the FBI to provide them details of the crime so that they can
put together a psychological profile what we have years later Captain is we have the uh Indianapolis Police who say
that they were working with the FBI but it was it was yet to be determined years later yet to be
determined if the case is even profile I'm having trouble with this profil there you go thank you God bless
you Captain if the case is even profil mhm because again it's like this guy walks into the store boom commits the
homicide and then walks out it's almost like a mix between a serial killer and a
spree killer yes exactly and when it comes down to it as far as the investigation goes we have the uh
Indianapolis Police on record saying we literally went through and got Hotel registrations from every single hotel
across Interstate 70 up and down the interstates all over and looked into those they looked into toll booths they
checked license plates they checked traffic stops during the times of the attacks and they've come out and they've
been pretty clear and upfront with this is not a DNA case this killer did not do
anything to the victims or uh the the attacks were not such that they had DNA evidence Left Behind of the killer you
had referenced um fingerprints Palm prints hair fibers anything of that nature earlier I can't say with certainty that
they have that or did not have that we have multiple crime scenes and again every one of the crime scenes is a for a
lack of better term is a public place you have many people that could be in and out of these stores and these shops
so they may have that stuff they also may have that stuff and not able to link it to any or aware that they actually
have it because you have a crime scene that contains so many fingerprints so many palm prints possible hair and fiber
what we do have the very little bit that we do have as far as a profile would go
we have the physical profile that we've already talked about and we'll talk about again but we do have law
enforcement on record saying that they believe that the suspect could be a military man a hitchhiker a traveling
salesman or a truck driver because the thought being that there's a possibility that the Killer is someone who has a
reason to travel Beyond just killing so again such as a Salesman or truck driver
and then along those lines detectives said that the killer might have dealings with military bases because several of
the slayings occurred near Military in installations such as Fort Benjamin Harrison in
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changer [Music] what is up chicken butt cheers mates and welcome back we got a lot more to dive into in
the I70 killer case for all of you dieh hard garage listeners out there we just put out another off the Record episode
on Stitcher premium yesterday so make sure you check that out so in this case it's not clear but
it seems like there's no one source of profile but we do have a composite for this
individual yes we do and the general consensus seems to be that police describ the suspect as a white male in
his mid 20s to mid 30s um with the remark of but more likely in his mid3 eyewitnesses have described this
man as uh 5' 7 in to 5T all the way up to 5' 9 in tall about 150 lbs with reddish
colored or light colored hair and a stubble beard or faint beard and I might be wrong but it seems like from the
furthest distance from Indianapolis to I believe it's witch it's a 10hour radius
that we have so multiple places that this killer could be residing do we have any evidence or any clues to pinpoint
that down yeah so I want to talk a little bit about some Gang Busters work that is done being done by a guy going
by quester um I didn't write down his full name here but it's aters site.com he has worked on just as a
armchair detective has worked on several of these older cases particularly high-profile cases and he did several
post about the I70 killer one thing that the that he points out as far as a pattern goes because I'm looking at this
thing and I'm like what what's the pattern here because we don't have attacks that are taking place in order
of you know on down the road 1 2 3 four five we have five events six victims but
what quester points out and this is I think this is pretty brilliant here that he refers to this as
um polling which is so such a great word for uh everything going on right now in
our country but has nothing to do with that what he's saying is if you take if you take the CRI crimes and put them on
a a straight line what you have is the first crime takes place at the very furthest part of the one line which
would be roughly Indianapolis Indiana the next crime the second one goes all the way to the other side of that line
the furthest point on that other line and then the third crime is back again to the east back in
Indiana the fourth crime is in the middle and then the fifth is in Raytown so it's almost like he went to
the the furthest away that he could be which if you go by that rationale if you're going to use that as maybe your
your area it would it would seem that the Killer is probably more in the middle of these crimes rather than all
the way in Indianapolis or all the way out in Witchita that if he started and wanted to kill and felt that he could
kill comfortably furthest from where he resides to further the crimes from him as much as possible that he went to the
trouble of going as far as as he could East and then the next crime he went as far as he wanted West and then he felt a
little bit more comfortable because he had gotten away with some uh and then went a little closer to home so maybe
he's in the Raytown area maybe he's in the Missouri area or like you said he's a big traveler and he's not
even anywhere close to where he lives he could live all the way on the East Coast
or the west coast and what we have here too Captain is the biggest question that
seems to be Past who was the I70 killer yeah that's the biggest one always seems
to be where did he go because we have five events in just a one month time period
and we have six homicides inside those five five events and then he seemingly disappears isn't it uh kind of weird to
you that there's not even a hint of what he was driving I think that is something
that's very smart that you point out because what I think he was doing is I don't think this guy was hitching a ride
I don't think that he thought do make a lot of sense no it doesn't make any sense at all somebody would have came
forward and said you know what I I picked up this individual or this individual would been if again if the
the motive was just murder why wouldn't they just murder the person that drove them you know at some point um right so
there there seems to be some reason for him carrying out a mission it's almost like in a video game where you're given
a list of of objectives that you have to achieve on some kind of mission and it's
like all right get to this location one thing that I find interesting is all the
stores are very similar when you think about it other than the Payless none of these seem to be much of a in the way of
a chain of stores right and so he's picking small businesses that with the exception of the one case are not
terribly far from I70 itself but all of these locations are similar in the sense
that you could park behind the store or behind another store or maybe even in the neighborhood or the streets we said
that most of if not all of these businesses are backing up to streets and neighborhoods so if you have a general
idea of where you're going to attack and you do not want your car to be seen because we've talked about this time and
time again here in the garage right vehicles are 100 times easier to locate than a description of a person give me a
description of a vehicle we can find it easier than a description of a person especially when you tell me it's a white
guy and his mid to late you know mid 20s to mid-30s all white people 5'7 to 5'9 so I think he's parking his vehicle
near the crime scene and then going on foot to and from the actual crime scene and then fleeing in his vehicle once the
crime is committed we have eyewitness statements where they're saying I saw a guy who I believe was leaving the store
at or around the time of the believed homicide right he's heading in the Direction behind the building one person
saying I thought I saw him go behind the building and then up the hill where he would have just went down the hill and
he could have parked right on the other side of theill Hill what a great obstacle for hiding and concealing your
vehicle well like you were saying I mean we we or again we have evidence that he
was staking out these locations but almost like in a very genius sort of way like if you're in
these plazas where there's multiple stores and maybe the store you know yes the store he's going into isn't that
busy but the other stores they're probably not that busy either but there's people going in and out of those
parking lots all day long you know if I was driving up to a strip mall chances are I'm going to see a couple cars
coming in and a couple cars leaving so if somebody said oh did you see that man driving away no I I didn't
I saw multiple cars driving away so I think that would be a great way to the Clutter becomes your cover
well and one bizarre thing that is that I find fascinating that might just be pure happen stance beyond the idea of
targeting stores that may contain younger ladies working alone we mentioned several of the stores
had only been opened they were under you know there a new store and only open for
a month or two right and again that could just be happen stance maybe it's because a newer store has less customers
it's had less time to build up its clientele so he spots it and it's obviously not busy and goes in and it's
just he wouldn't have known that they were newer stores but again the question becomes that many attacks that many
homicides in such a short period of time and then he's gone why where did he go I
think the why to me is pretty obvious we had the police at the time that very quick
linked all of these crimes together and he knows I use the same gun at all of these crime scenes he knows what's
linking them he knows how police have linked them together so maybe he doesn't disappear maybe he doesn't go away
forever he's not this Phantom killer that just disappeared all he's got to do is change
guns and he can continue doing what he's doing especially if he's willing willing
to go to the distance of 10 hours away right so I think what happened here is I think that this guy probably
continued on I think what's interesting to me too is not just where did he go but also where did he come from one
thought that jumped out to me was we mentioned military man is this a guy that saw action that
went off to war we had the Gulf War ended in February of 199 91 Desert Shield followed by Desert Storm mhm did
this guy was he sent over there to serve his country and he got a taste for killing and then he brought it back here
and he couldn't turn it off you know so who knows where he came from who knows where where he went but
what was the trigger there was something that triggered this guy this guy while maybe not the most normal guy
in the world something happened to get this guy to start k killing in April of 1992 and then he stops in May of
1992 there are some theories about where this guy went or if he went on to other
crimes there Captain all right hit me with them well some investigators believe that the I70 killer may be
responsible for two murders in 1993 and an attempted murder in 1994 all of these crimes took place in
the state of Texas and it started in September of 1993 on September 25th when 51-year-old Maryanne Glascock was killed
in a Fort Worth uh in the city of Fort Worth at an Emporium antiques store continues on from there November 1st
1993 22-year-old Amy vest was shot to death in a dance apparel store in Arlington Texas and then we have the
January 15th 1994 attack on 35 year-old Vicky web she luckily survived this attack she was shot in in a Houston
store at a Alternatives gift shop she briefly spoke to the shooter so she has a description of the person that shot
her the man shot her and then she did not die and he attempted to shoot her again but his gun
misfired and then he left the scene there's great debate whether these crimes are connected and a big part of
that comes from the fact that the gun that was used in the I70 killer case and the six homicides that we've already
discussed was not the same gun used in these three Texas cases however these start up shortly after right the next
year after the I70 Killer goes vanishes and like I said he could have just got a new gun and then picked up
where he left off at some point the interesting thing is that what connects these is Interstate 35 and we mentioned
Interstate 35 before Interstate 35 does connect to I70 and it connects in the general area of where our I70 killer
left off with attacks number four and five which would be in the ray toown St Charles area that we discussed earlier
you can pick up I35 in and around the Kansas City area with I70 so maybe he just heads a little
further south continues doing what he's doing now with a new murder weapon yeah and I'm I'm sure some people listening
are going well maybe it's just a different guy but the description of this individual is very similar mhm and
that's why people believe he just got a new gun we have a surviving witness in the I35 attack who describes the killer
to look similar to that of the description given about the I70 killer and in the I35 killer and the final
attack the vague description that we get here is a white guy about 5' 8 maybe 5'9
in tall reddish hair 150 to 160 lbs faint beard brown jacket and dark pants so not unlike the other cases the I70
cases let's get get into some suspects here Captain before we wrap up some of these will be suspects that have been
named by law enforcement and some of it named by uh garage armchair detectives such as ourselves the first suspect that
we have to talk about is a man that died in July of 1996 and it is Herb bow Meister okay who
is BB bow Meister he is an Amer with a bad name he's an American suspected serial killer this was a very successful
man uh he resided in Westfield Indiana bow Meister was under investigation for murdering over a dozen men in the early
1990s most of whom were last seen at gay bars investigators found the remains of
11 persons eight which they identified three remain unidentified to this day on boow meister's property if in fact he
was the killer of these people uh he's dead so it's been tough to determine that it's believed he killed these
individuals he was killing and burying people on their very large property unbeknownst to his wife and family that
lived in a house along with herb on that property after arrest warrant was issued
for him he fled to Canada and then he killed himself before he could be arrested and brought to trial he never
confessed to any of these crimes his suicide note made no mention of the murder allegations against him he was
though later linked to a series of murders of at least nine men along Interstate 70 which occurred in the
early to mid 1980s so this guy is suspected of possibly killing as many as two dozen men that number certainly
unconfirmed but I think it's his ties to the general area of Interstate 70 and the state of
Indiana together that put him on the list of suspects here as you very obviously know Captain this m Mo if her
bro Meister killed all of these people is it could not be further from the M Mo of the I70 killer yeah or the profile
victims correct so this seems like it's it's one of those situations where he is
a known active serial killer he gets tossed on on this list just because of that fact he's also nickname I believe
one of the nicknames given to him was the I70 Strangler so it doesn't help when your nickname is so much so close
to the nickname of the killer that they're seeking MH I don't think her bow Meister had anything to do with these
killings the next suspect that we come to is an individual that was listed and stated in the papers at the time as a
possible suspect his name is Donald Waterhouse and he's a suspect because on the night of February 29th
1992 this is just more than a month before the I70 killings started happening Waterhouse reportedly shot and
killed his mother and stepfather inside their home in Dyersburg Tennessee now like the I70 victims these
two were shot in the head with a 22 caliber weapon Waterhouse he vanished eventually his truck was found abandoned
in East St Louis right off of I70 he evaded police until October so the thought here he's eventually caught in
Oklahoma but the thought here being that he's killing while on the run for having
killed his parents he fit the physical description somewhat of the I70 killer however I think what we have here is a
situation where you have because these killings are taking place on S such far stretches across this country and they
seem to be motiveless murders right this is really to me reminds me of like a zodiac type killer who's not
communicating who would choose not to communicate with police or the media someone who is trying to terrorize
that's what a that's what a terrorist is someone who terrorizes the public with with threats this being the threat of
any anyone working in any store within a series of States could be killed at any
time any random time of the day yeah but again the key victim is female right under 30 and what I think we have here
Captain with uh Waterhouse as far as he is concerned I think that the police were under a lot of pressure at the time
to throw out a name to make it seem like hey we we got we got a trail on somebody
what we would learn 20 years later is that they were bombarded with tips once they started putting out the composite
sketch of the suspect they said that they believed that over 60,000 tips were followed up on and a lot of them
obviously false you know some of them were were blatant false tips where somebody was angry at somebody else
right and threw them under the bus and said oh they look like the suspect or he should be your suspect for x y and z and
it turns out they baseless speculation there right but a lot of these composite sketches they kind of look cartoonish
this one this this draing has a little bit of soul to it and it and it's very uh disturbing this guy would would freak
A lot of people out yeah and this Waterhouse guy while on the Run um I don't know what it is it I have not
seen an exact statement but once they located Waterhouse and once they were going to
take him to trial for the killings of his parents authorities very quickly said that you know now that we've caught
him he's not a very high priority suspect in the I70 killings and then in fact we have just in June of uh 1992
where the St Charles Missouri police chief David King announced that Waterhouse was no longer a top suspect
in the I70 killings that brings us to Donald Blom AKA Donald Prince born 1949 he is an American who was sentenced to
life in prison for the killing of Kathleen Katie prior in 1999 he's a registered sex offender involved in five
cases of kidnapping and sexual assault prior to Katie's murder he is suspected to be a serial killer by
case investigators Blom is serving his prison sentence at a medium security facility in
Minnesota this assumption though doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me I'm not really certain how he ends up
on this list of potential suspects well he killed somebody there you go his killings and his attacks look this guy
at the end of the day he's a rapist and murderer none of the I70 killings were sexual nature that none of that took
place so the police seem again here possibly desperate to get names out in the press and this may be one that was
just thrown out there but was it the start of something was this how I'm going to do it fantasize about it that
will turn into something else later where he was once a hands-off killer and then became a Hands-On killer right next
up on our list we have Ralph Leon Jackson also known as Ralph men old Ralph men he's a real prick Monger Ralph
men or Ralph Jackson he is convicted of shooting two people on the Blue Ridge Parkway in
2010 and unfortunately he killed one of those victims and if it wasn't for the the courageous efforts of the
other victim he he he thought he killed her as well so what we have here Captain is a
situation where this guy it seems that he killed these people at random and I think that it's the random nature and
given his age he was 57 years old when he was convicted of the 2010 crimes and that would put him in
the general age range for R I70 killer and his we're going to go back and back to this but we need to put a red flag
and a marker on it right here where we say he his physical description is not unlike that of the I70 killer but right
you've seen the picture it's it's kind of a vague description of the I70 killer right yeah so he looks somewhat like the
description he's about the same age but really I think it here is the randomness
of the crime this crime that he committed it almost looks like like he went out to the Blue Ridge Parkway that
night hoping to see someone or someone's and was determined to gun them down from
his vehicle so that puts him on the list of potential suspects for the I70 killer
as well as he's his name comes up in the Colonial Parkway murders as well yeah I
just don't like that many of these these suspects well I think it's because there's no really good Clues here in any
of these cases that we have what I would consider great suspects well I also think it's because the mo is so strange
it definitely seems like he was targeting a certain type of victim but it doesn't seem like it was sexual
nature like I said could have led to that later maybe it was just a fantasy and he wasn't willing to uh take the
risk to take the time to live out those fantasies but also the strange just to steal a little
bit of money it's just it's very strange MMO well here's a name that you'll recognize and some of our listeners will
recognize as well the longtime listeners anyway the next suspect that we're going
to discuss is Neil Falls who is Neil Falls well that name may sound familiar to you because he was mentioned in our
Vanishing women case that is the case of six missing women and several that were
killed in the southern Ohio area why did he come up on that uh in those episodes
well that was because he is a man that was killed during what was believed to be the attempted killing of a woman um
maybe rape would be involved I don't know he at least threatened her with both where he met a woman on the
internet shows up at the door and things turned bad real quick and according to our victim who survived
and killed Neil Falls she says that Neil Falls told him told her look I'm going to prison for a long time for this it
could be for rape or for murder you're the one that's going to decide it well she decided it and it was for neither he
wasn't going to make it to prison he did because of her luckily now when police start looking through this Neil Falls
guy and looking through his vehicle very disturbing stuff they find Firearms handcuffs shovels a pickaxe several
bladed weapons including a hatchet and several knives and he had a bulletproof vest on him now he was a good distance
from where he lived yeah and so the thought here is not just that this guy is willing to travel to
kill but some people did some very interesting work because remember we have our I70 killer who who would have
been in his early 20s to maybe mid to late 30s that again being the big window for the age description of our potential
killer here this I found this on Reddit and web SLU where several people had found an an
interesting little thing here in Neil falls's background in early 1992 we don't have an exact date Neil falls
moves to his father house in Kansas well the I70 murders began in April on April 8th of 1992 and then 3
days later in April we have the murders in Witchita Kansas MH so the home that he was living at Greensburg Kansas is
about an hour and a half west of wital so this guy and he does look you know at the time of his death this is a guy that
moved around he lived in many different states and when this woman killed him the FBI and police immediately came out
and said we want to know one where this guy was we want to put together a complete timeline of him but we have him
getting uh driving violations speeding tickets and such in multiple States over the years so not only did he live and
move around but when he was living at certain places he was traveling to other states as well and this is is a guy that
they thought he might be driving or flying and going elsewhere and killing people and then returning to his home
the interesting thing here is we've put him within an hour and a half of the killings in Witchita back in 1992 now
the picture of him at the time of his death is kind of a fat version of the description given of the I70 killer and
if you go on to web SLO or Reddit and you'll look up this Neil Falls I70 killer angle you'll see that what they
did here was they put a picture from his I believe this is his senior year high school yearbook a picture of of his
senior year in high school followed by the sketches of the I70 killer along with the fat version that I pointed out
of the the the chubby cheeks version of Neo falls from the time that he roughly around the time that he was killed and
that's BS f a l LS not balls I know you're thinking it's Neil balls but it's no it's Falls well and the other thing
here too Captain that's interesting about Falls is uh Texas 1993 and the 1994 killings the I35
killer again some believe these could be related could be linked could be the same killer as the I70 killer FSE father
who he was living with at the time passes away in 1995 and he moved back to Oregon and of course there's no more I70
kill killings or I35 killings believed after that 90 1994 attempted killing yeah but so possible reason for why it
stopped in that area would be that Neil Falls moved out of the area well again I
think uh his age is something that I like because I feel like these killings these I70 killings it's like a step
towards a direction it's almost like a precursor to something else that is going to happen and again the money
taking not huge amounts of money but taking the time to take that money seems like
something somebody with not much of a future would do but also something that maybe you know a teenager early
20-year-old would do you're working under the theory that this guy might be earlier or toward the the younger end of
the spectrum right that what we're talking about as far as our eyewitnesses go now you're exactly right because with
Neil Falls he would have been 22 years old back in '92 when these homicides first started up right and a couple
hundred bucks to me when I was well heck now but I mean even back then it was a lot of money like 200 bucks or 300 bucks
oh that's a lot of money I actually think if in fact that this guy is a cold calculated killer that if he's all there
that if he's not on drugs not mental problems are both like one of the witnesses stated that I think that the
robbery or the The Taking of the money is really just to throw the police off I guess I don't
know what they're he's throwing them off of um because everything the murder still took place but he's an interesting
one because he would have been 22 at the time when they started and then again that window of time he is there roughly
in that General vicinity of that area when the killings start and then when they stop after the I35 killings stop
he's gone in 95 he moves to Oregon so I think that's one of the more interesting
ones one uh one more name here captain and this is one that I would be shocked if our listeners don't know because
we've covered a case that he is potentially linked to as well so many times is Thomas Bruce and if you
remember correctly he is a deli suspect he is a known killer and I think it's people have linked him to the I70 killer
simply because Indiana's part of the the story for the I70 killer two of the known events linked to the I70 killer
took place in the state of Indiana and his crimes he was in St Louis when he got picked up just a year
or so ago because what did he do remember he went into that Catholic supply store right and he took several
he took a I believe it was a customer and a couple employees back to the back where there were some sexual assaults
that took place and homicide that took place and he was on the run for a very short
period of time before they tracked him down and found him uh his age would put him at about the right age again I I
think that the age range for the I70 killer is is vast yeah I mean it's just big it so it gets difficult to to Really
pinpoint down and say oh the age is right when we're talking about a span of 15 years maybe for our potential uh
I70 killer but Bruce is an interesting one simply because he he does this attack he's locked up he's been quiet
ever since some people are trying to link him to Deli some people are trying to link him to other cases and because
of the nature of the known attack that he did the known homicide that he did do that there's no question about it's
similar in ways to that of the I70 killer yeah one of my issues though is I I feel like some of these actions of
this crime show again either maybe somebody that's just not mentally stable then they're probably locked up
for something else or this these actions are a little immature which doesn't really go with the the sketch in my mind
CU to me the sketch seems older so it's it's a very difficult case it's very difficult because again it it
goes to why did this even start in the first place and then where did this killer go he he's not apprehended for
these homicides at least he may be as you said locked up for something else uh at this point if he was older he may
have even passed away this is an interesting case because it's one that that unlike many other
cases it would seem that there would be very few clues for law enforcement to work with to finding this guy and really
to be honest with you Captain the only hope that I have that the I70 killer is ever
identified I mean you're talking 26 27 28 years later very little Clues to go on back in
1992 well again the investigators said at the time on the one homicide this case was cold by the end of the week
right there's so little go on we don't even have a profile of the suspect right and that's the homework
for our garage Army if somebody can find a psychological profile of the I70 killer please send it to us and we'll
review it on off the Record because like I said it was stated multiple times in the paper that these different
departments were going to work with the FBI to see if they could put together a psychological profile of the I70 killer
what we do have is months later where somebody says we don't even know if we have enough to put together a profile of
this guy and this guy's had five different events six different homicides in the course of a
month it also wouldn't shock me if we have a situation where if drugs or mental health W and both especially if
both were involved that this individual once they linked the crimes may have discarded the weapon or committed
suicide or both at the time and it's not been linked for whatever reason again if he's
willing to go 10 hours travel time between two of the different homicides who knows how far he went for for any of
them to begin with I think the key here Captain I the only hope hope I really hold in identifying this killer is that
gun you know the police believe that they've narrowed it down to the makeing model of the gun used in all of the
attack and it's it's a unique weapon and I think that if they could find someone
with that weapon if he's not discarded that weapon there's a chance that this is a prize possession of his
yeah you find the gun you find the [Music] one thank you so much for hanging out
with us in the garage again and again and again for all these great stories Colonel do we have any recommended
reading this week we are recommending killer on the road violence and the American Interstate by Ginger strand
killer on the road tells the entwined stories of America's highways and its Highway Killers you can find that great
title and many more at true Crim garage.com and make sure when you're at the website you sign up on the mailing
list and until next week be good be kind and don't [Music] litter [Music] you can live out your Master Chef dreams
when you find a professional on Angie to tackle your dream kitchen remodel connect with skilled
professionals to get all your home projects done well visit angie.com you can do this when you Angie that

The I-70 KIller /// Part 2 /// 442

Part 2 of 2 www.TrueCrimeGarage.com (http://www.truecrimegarage.com/)

Interstate 70 is a major East - West Interstate Highway in the United States that runs from Maryland to Utah. On April 8th, 1992 a serial killer made his first known attack. Killing a young woman working alone in a store near the highway. In the course of one month there were a total of five events resulting in six homicides. The murders are unsolved and many wonder what happened to the killer? Why did he stop and where did he go? Join us in the Garage as we discuss the crimes, the suspects and the possibilities.

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Brief Summary

The episode details the I70 killer's murders and ongoing investigation, focusing on Nancy Kitsmiller and Sarah Lynn Blessing's cases.

Key points

Police Issue Nationwide Warning. Authorities warn stores near interstates to avoid leaving clerks alone after a string of murders.
The I70 Killer Emerges. In May 1992, a series of murders linked to the I70 killer begin, shocking communities.
The I70 Killer's Profile. Investigators struggle to create a psychological profile of the I70 killer, who operates across multiple states.
Possible Connections to Other Murders. The I70 killer may be linked to murders in Texas, raising questions about his whereabouts after 1992.
The I70 Strangler. A known active serial killer with a chilling nickname that haunts the investigation.
Donald Waterhouse's Crimes. A suspect linked to the I70 killings due to his violent past.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

It's good to be seen and good to see you.

Host greeting listeners

1:58WatchNov 16, 2023

Tension

65/ 100Some tension

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