This episode may contain content of a graphic nature, including descriptions of physical and
sexual violence against adults, children, and animals. Listener discretion is advised.
Hi everyone, I'm Talia and I'm Tanya, and together we are Crimes and
Consequences, a true crime podcast. Hi Tanya, Hi Talia. Welcome back
everybody to this week's episode of Crimes and Consequences. If you haven't done so
already, we're gonna ask you very kindly to hit the subscribe slash follow whatever
button you got going on on your favorite app. And with that, as
you can probably tell, I have a very stuffed up nose, So I'm
gonna do my best to not like I've stopped up nose, but get through
this. Okay, Yeah, it's a good story. Have you ever heard
of William Devin Howell. No, well, he's the most one of the
most prolific serial killers in the state of Connecticut is a tiny little state.
It is lovely. Yes, he killed seven women. So I'm gonna give
you some background on how he became this monster that he is. William was
born on February eleventh, in nineteen seventy in Hampton, Virginia, to what
was described as a good family and a good home. Oh yeah, what
went wrong? I'm glad you asked. Let me tell you. His parents
were married until his mom died, and like I said, they didn't have
a broken home. He was the youngest of four children, so he had
two brothers, and two of his brothers were a lot older than him.
One brother was serving in Vietnam the time William was born, so I mean
he had to be like at least eighteen years older than him. Unfortunately,
with a matriarch or the family dying in early fifties from brass cancer, this
really hurt the family and William was only twelve at the time. His mother
was a one that provided that sense of stability. She kept him in line
like most mothers do, and she also protected him because he was the baby
of the family. Oh it sounds like he might have been the oops.
I mean, you got an eighteen year old. Can you imagine like eighteen
years go by? And I mean he's older than that, but still anyway,
the mom is the one that kept William in line, and unlike money
serial killers, he never experienced any sort of head trauma, molestation, anything
really traumatic except I mean, yes, and he didn't like kill animals or
anything like that. I mean, we always hear about killer starting out like
killing squirrels or something and then working in a way to humans. But none
of that happened with William. He seemed to have a relatively normal childhood,
and he grew up in the seventies. Every aspect of his early life seemed
to be completely normal. When William was fourteen years old, he stole his
father's car in the middle of the night. He drove to the red light
district. Oh, I didn't know there was one in Connecticut or Virginia.
Maybe he's still in Virginia either way, I didn't know. Purchase native,
I guess. And that's when he picked up his first sex worker. He's
fourteen, he's fourteen. Yeah, where do you get the money? I
don't know. I'd like to mow and lawns. I don't know. This
behavior would continue until he got caught by the police. William started drinking in
high school, and he would started drinking before school even started. He only
had his driver's license for a year and a half before he got a drunk
driving Oh shit. Yeah. Unfortunately for William, by the time he was
twenty, he was a habitual offender, and this is just horrible. He
had grape fantasies when he was twenty, before he was twenty and ascent years.
Oh my god. And he spoke about it a gross He told people
about it. Can you imagine? He said, quote tonight is the night
I made my fantasy come true. He crossed that line and said that he
was unable to control his urges anymore. It wasn't something driving him to do
these terrible things, but quote, I chose to do it. I chose
to do what I did and not to care. Oh damn. He was
like, I don't give a full yeah. Serious. He started messing up
his entire life while in Virginia, so he still is in Virginia. William
said, quote, I started screwing up my life through drinking. And I
served half of the nineties in jail or prison in Virginia. And it was
all for driving a car without a license and drunk driving. And it instilled
a lot of bitterness in me. I would became very angry and sad.
She should be angry with himself. Well he should, but now we're going
to be angry at because you're a dumbass. He decided to relocate from Virginia
to Connecticut. He needed that fresh start. He blended in with society while
in Connecticut, so apparently he could fake it, fake it, and he
started his own lawn care business. So I told you it was cutting grass
to go to the red hot district. The neighbors knew him as Devin or
just simply the guy next door. William was kind of heavy set and he
stood about five foot nine inches. He had long blonde hair with a goatee.
And I told you before his middle name was Devin, so he's going
by Devin and he has Devin tattooed on his bicep case he forgets he got
his name his name. By the time William was thirty three years old,
he was married to a really wonderful woman and they had two kids. So
he did I mean, he seemed to maybe maybe maybe he's probably doing fucking
weird shit when he was married too. Well, yeah, if you're doing
weird shit when you're fucking fourteen. There were reports of domestic abuse, so
the man and as he was still picking up sex workers of course secretly.
Yes, then he began living in his van. Really, yes, he's
got a van. Of course he's got a van, a creeper van.
So he's very cliche here now he's now he's become cliche. And that's when
his reign of terror started. Christ he had a very binary view on women.
There were two type of girls, good girls and bad girls. Good
girls were like the mother of his children. They didn't drink, they don't
do drugs, they're faithful, and they're really good moms. Those were the
good girls. Bad girls were the sex workers. It was as simple as
that with William in his mind. I mean, that's just you're either good
or you're bad. The Madonna horror thing, right, and what's that,
the Madonna horror syndrome. You're either like Madonna and I don't mean the rack
star. Oh, I was gonna say, I don't know if there's a
difference. No, like Mother Mary. Okay, there we go. Okay,
because I'm like Madonna the singer. No, No, because you know
she's got a little bit of a up history. She's living her life in
the Free Woman. So I get you, now, Yeah, I get
you. You're like you're like a saint. Yeah, exactly. William had
a girlfriend at the time the killings began her name was Dorothy Holham. In
fact, he bought the van off her parents for four hundred dollars. He
would later refer to this van as the murder mobile. Didn't we have another
case where they where they fucking named their van? It was those two guys.
I don't remember what they named it the toolbox? Were they the toolbox?
Just fucking assholes? This van was blue, was in nineteen eighty five
forward a count of line and it was registered under Dorothy's name. The van
had two broken windows that were boarded over with plywood. Are you kidding me?
No? And since he was a landscaper, the side of the van
read quote quality lawn Service called Devon phone number and shit, I like how
he's just like killing people sleeping in this van. He's got his number on
it, right, Like, who's gonna be call with boarded up Are you
going to call landscaper? They had boarded up windows. Yeah, I would
think twice. And just like you said, the van had his phone number.
Now, Dorothy had a daughter named Julianna Helcom. She was six years
old when William came into their lives. Juliana knew Devin as a kind hearted
giant he'd never heard a soul. Imagine the shock she felt after finding out
all the horrific crimes that you don't know about. That, Yeah, because
she really adored him. Oh this is really sad. In two thousand and
three, Melanie came Melanie. I think that's whw you say? It came
Melanie. That would be Williams's first victim. She was really addicted to opiates.
According to Melanie's family, she was really beautiful the inside as well as
on the out. When she was younger, she played piano, and she
was also the mother of two small children. But then she disappeared. I
mean, her addiction was just as an addiction. She tried really hard to
fight it, but she just she couldn't be Her family would come home and
see her almost passed out from prescription pills, and they would get mad at
her, but they always knew she was an addict, so they would you
know, we're always there trying to help her. She eventually became a sex
worker, and she hung out around the Berlin Turnpike of Waterbury, Connecticut,
because she knew there she could exchange sex for money. One time, William
was driving around in his van sexy blue van with the broken windows, and
he drove down the streets and he saw these sex workers. And I told
you he was struggling with these rape fantasies. And he knew he could take
advantage of these women because they're sex workers and they often don't report anything.
Williams saw Melanie and he invited her into his van. When he did,
he knew she would not come out alive. Oh god, but Melan,
and he didn't know that. After raping her for twelve hours, kidding me,
no Ah, william tried to kill her by bashing a hammer over her
head. Yeah, the blow to the head, it didn't even knock her
out. So he's doing like one blow and it doesn't knock her out.
But mentally she freaked out and she starts begging for her life and William hears
her begging, please don't kill me, Please don't kill me. But he
doesn't care. No, he strangles her. She's a bad girl. He
thought that would be the quickest way to get her to stop begging and make
her quiet. The hammer didn't work, It didn't you know. He tried
and it didn't work, so, oh my god. He ended up keeping
the ring that Melanie wore, which was just like not worth anything. It
was this tarnished ring with a stone in the middle. It was like a
souvenir. He kept it as a souvenir. Later he was asked about the
ring, and he said, I kept the ring to remember the night that
I stopped being a man and I became a monster symbolic. Yes, he
recalled also that Melanie's last words were, please don't kill me. I have
children. Oh man, hate him? Yes, what a piece of shit.
William later stayed, you know, I almost didn't kill her, but
probably because of her begging. But then I felt like I had no choice.
This part is he slapped beside Melanie's dead body for two weeks. Two
weeks? Are you what? Two weeks? He had her body in his
hand for two weeks and slept next to it. What the fun? I
know, what the fuck is that? And reports have stated, and I'm
not sure the accuracy, that he cut off her fingertips and pulled some of
her teeth out and hit them, so eventually, when you decided to dispose
of her body, she wouldn't be able to be identified. I mean,
to William, sex workers were just worthless objects. He had to view each
of these women this way in order for him to do what he about he
needed to do and live out those rape fantasies. Just despicable. He stated
he didn't get any pleasure in killing them because remember, his thing was rape.
After the rape and murder of Melanie, Melanie, the rest of the
victims were easier. Yeah, I mean, it gets easier, I guess.
I mean, I don't know. Yeah, I don't know for sure.
I don't know personal experience, but I heard yeah. After Melanie,
William decided to go back to Virginia for a few months. But he came
back to Connecticut in April two thousand and three and he's driving down the streets
of Waterbury, Connecticut. As he's driving, he comes across a sex worker
named Marylyn Gonzalez. She was a heavy drug user and a young mother.
He invited Marylyn into his van and she climbed in, hoping to earn some
easy money. William, like he did with Melanie, drove around with Maryland
for twelve hours while having her tied up and raped her. When he wasn't
raping her, she was tied to the back bench of his van and her
mouth was tape shut with duct tape. He would just drive around different locations,
and he even went through the McDonald's drive through. What yea with her
in the back? Yep? Wow, that's ballsy, right, didn't give
a fuck? No, he really didn't, he said later a quote.
I'd go through the Mickey D's drive through with a half naked, tied up
bitch in the back and told him if they made a sound, it would
be their last. And none of them ever did. Wow. William knew
what he was doing, he knew what he was doing was wrong, but
he didn't care. I mean, he's selfish, he doesn't care. Yeah.
He ended up strangling Marylyn and dumping her body into the specific place called
the garden. Oh. He would do the same routine with each of his
victims. He would rape, murder them, wrap their bodies in trash bags,
and then dump them behind a strip mall in New Britain, Connecticut.
What wow, I wonder it's what's behind that strip mall? I feel like
I've seen this on like a forensic file show or something. But I could
be wrong. I mean a high chance I'm wrong. Janice Roberts Now she
was formerly known as Danny Whistant was a transgender woman. She was William's third
victim. William would go to this one bar in particular on his off nights,
and it was called the Cadillac Ranch. Once inside, he'd sit at
the bar for hours hoping to pick up someone there, and when he had
no luck, he would go hit the streets in his van. On this
particular night, the bar close at two am, and William, surprised didn't
have any luck, and then he saw Janice Roberts on the streets. She
had long, thick black hair. She was wearing a short miniskirt and high
heels, and William didn't know that Janice was a transgender woman, so he
invites her into his van. She accepts the invitation. He asks her,
can you give me a blowjob for twenty dollars and she says yes. William
then places his hand on her head and when he goes to pull her hair,
he pulls off awake. Oh shit, and that pissed him off.
He instantly got enraged like he was being treated like a fool by this man,
and he begins shoving Janice against the wall of his van and then punches
her twice with his fists until she's knocked out. He didn't write Janice because
Janice was transgender. He just strangled her right away. William's fourth victim was
thirty three year old Nilsa Urs Mendy, okay, era's mendy. I'm sorry,
I can't. Everybody knows I can't pronounce names. Neither can I.
You're no help, no help. Interestingly enough, William never planned on raping
and killing Nilsa, so he says he always planned his crimes around his work
schedule. So apparently that's maybe this is off his normal killing schedule. If
he had Lons caught the following day, he would take the night off from
raping or killing a woman. Gott to get a good night's sleep, right,
know what is that? On the day Nilsa was picked up, Nilsa
asked William for ride to Hartford so she could pick up some drugs. He
said that he would give her a ride in exchange for sex. She gets
in the van and she refuses to have sex with him, so he rapes
and he murders her. He originally thought that with Nilsa it would be strictly
some sort of trance. His actual action, like he was going to take
her where she wanted to go and then yeah, yeah, but that didn't
work out, and he thought he would let her free of the murder mobile.
Buddy, he didn't since he didn't plan this attack. He kept Nilsa's
body wrapped in a tarp while he finished his work. Oh no, the
next day, yeah, and then he disposed of her body. Unfortunately for
William, Nilsa would be the downfall of his reign of terror in Connecticut.
But there's still more victims. But we're gonna take a quick break before I
do as I said. William wasn't done with his reign of terror, though
it would soon end. On July thirty, first of two thousand and three,
Brenda trus went to the Weathersfield Police Department because she hadn't heard from her
sister, Nielsa in over a week. And Nilsa was always really good about
keeping in touch with her family, and she didn't have custody of her four
children, but she visited them all the time. She lived in a local
motel with her boyfriend, Angel Sanchez, and the police knew that she was
a haremine user and a sex worker. Her boyfriend was a drug dealer,
so he was immediately the first person they suspected killed her. He was brought
in for questioning and agreed to take a polygraph, which he passed with flying
colors. Rather than being behind his girlfriend's disappearance, he would end up becoming
a key factor and bringing down William Howell. Angel told police that he and
Nilsa invited William Howell into the remote room and he was going to stay overnight
in the three them were going to smoke crack together. Probably I'm assuming William
would be the one maybe paying for it, I don't know. Angel told
police that the last timey son Nilsa was at two thirty am on July twenty
fifth, two thousand and three. She was last seen getting into William's blue
van, But despite having all of this information, it would take them over
six months to arrest William. On November twenty eighth of two thousand and three,
William was driving through North Carolina when he was pulled over by a patrol
cop for a driving violation. When the Weathersfield Police found out, they were
really worried that they would like somehow lose William, he would get released,
so they asked the North Carolina Police to hold them until they could travel the
eight hundred miles to sort them and arrest warrant for violating parole. North Carolina's
police they obliged, and they held Welliam. After William was picked up,
they went back to Connecticut and it wasn't long drive. William mass the police.
Why would you come all this way on a misdemeanor warrant? And I'm
not sure what the warrant was for, but it was a misdemeanor. One
of the detectives showed William a picture of Nilsa. The detective said quote.
William appeared shocked and immediately stated, I don't want to speak to you without
my attorney president. I want to exercise my right to remain silent. The
detective was like, surprise, bitch, right. Yeah. While they had
William and custody, investigators got a search warrant for his van. Oh boy,
yeah, and the forensic team along with investigators, began searching the blue
van and they noticed a blood soaked cushion. Of course it didn't clean off
because you know, he's nasty shit, and the blood had soaked all the
way through into the foam. There's a lot of blood. Yeah, that
is a lot of blood and they noticed that one of the backseat cushions had
been replaced with three couch cushions. Can you want me agine what this fucking
van looked like. It's like a garbage dump. Yeah, and shit,
yeah, there's bloodstains and god knows what else. I boarded up windows and
oh man. The blood was tested and it was found to be similar genetically,
though I think at the time they didn't come across one hundred percent.
Mall can never be one hundred percent. But it was Nilsa's, I mean
it was. There were also more bloodstains found that were unidentified to the specialists
at the time. The police automatically thought there's got to be some more women
because we have this other blood. Well and besides the fact you've got this
creepy van, right, besides the bloodstains. Six videotapes were seized by investigators,
and the video showed a darkly lit scene of how William was having what
was quoted as bizarre sex with women. He videoed it too, Yeah,
bizarre sex, none of the disgusting, none of the women's faces were visible
in the tapes. Now. While William was detained, he mentioned that he
wanted a speedy trial. He told us to a man whose name was Thomas
Rodriguez, and this man eventually told the police or whatever, Hey, he
wants a speedy trial, okay. And he also told this guy how he
beat the fuck out of nil Saw in the back of the van. He
broke her nose and threw out of the van. He said he had to
hurry up and rushed the case because it's all circumstantial right now, and he
doesn't want there to be a body found. Oh shit, that's why he
wanted a speedy trial. I don't so I don't think he wanted a speedy
trial so I could hurry up in the service time. But wouldn't it be
new evidence, Like let's say he does. Go on, let's say he
does. Oh, maybe you're right, right, it's new evidence that didn't
exist when he would have been convicted or acquitted, So double jeopardy doesn't apply,
right, that's a true. Yeah, it's new I mean, hello,
a body that didn't it wasn't an evidence. Remember that one case we
did with mal Ignato where they found the photos of yeah, her being tortured
and murdered, and he only did time for perjury. But that was a
long time ago. Yeah, and you and I do family law criminal law,
so we don't really know. Don't trust us. This is not giving
you legal advice right now. He also mentioned he hated fucking prostitutes. Oh,
like that's not a given. He took a plea deal because there was
no body, and he played guilty to first degree manslaughter on January thirtieth of
two thousand and seven and was sentenced to fifteen years. So this is for
Nilsa. Yes, okay, fifteen years. Yeah. Mary Jane Yard,
age forty at the time, would end up becoming what was known as the
fifth victim of William. She had disappeared on October fourth, or two thousand
and three, from Seymour, Connecticut. She was just out buying a pack
of cigarettes when William spotted her. Mary Jean's daughter, her name was Tiffany,
said that she'd talked her mom gouldbye that day and would have never thought
that that was the last time she would see her mom. Mary Jane was
picked up and taken to McDonald's parking lot once again. He drove around with
her for twelve hours at least, and he raped her over and over again
before strangling her. There's something odd about this particular McDonald's parking lot. The
corner of it is really secluded. It's about fifty feet away from where any
other cars would go, and that was always where William would park his van
and near where he'd dumped the bodies. Now I'm just saying, so most
people are by the I guess close to McDonald's. Yeah, he parked very
far away. If I see this van parked in the corner like hanging out
there, really, what is this McDonald's butt up against. So it's the
busiest in the area. He would pull up next to the guardrail and there
was at that strip mall I was telling you was by it. And then
he would roll out the body of his victims from his van and then put
them over the guardrail, wrapped in trash bags. Parked the van in the
corner of the McDonald's parking lot, get out with his shovel, what walked
down to where the body was, and then drag the bodies a few more
hundred yards or so deeper into this woods. I swear to God, I've
seen this start deeper into these woods. And then he would bury them in
his garden. Oh, this is where his gardens behind the goddamn McDonald's.
Yeah, I'm by a strip mall. I'm like freaking out. I need
to see where this is. I mean to google this ship. And nobody
at McDonald's ever saw anything. No one ever heard anything, or maybe they
did, ye knows. Tiffany Menard side of her mother's disappearance, I thought
she may have gotten into some trouble. But now that we've found her remains,
now I think in my head she was probably brutally killed. Oh she
was. Mary Jane's family placed flowers behind the new Burton strip mall with balloons
at red Love you mom, and a nova said thinking of you always.
Now there's actually another victim. What Yeah, damn. Her name is Diane
Kustack, and she would end up being the sixth victim of Williams. Diane
had been a strained from her family for years because she was addicted to drugs,
but she was never reported missing. Oh that's really sad. That always
makes me really sad too. The last time anyone saw Diane was in late
September. They're not even sure, I'm time in the fall of two thousand
and three. The only reason that her family found out about Her death was
due to a clay bust created after the forensic team reconstructed it from a skull
found in the garden. In the garden Wow. Photos of the boss were
publicized and the local news stations asking the public, you know, does anybody
recognize her? And Diane was originally a Jane Doe until her brother and then
his wife called in the tipline and gave them a DNA sample. That's how
they got to hit a match that it was Diane. It was seven years
after she'd been killed before she was identified. Oh really, that's just really
fucking sad. I'm gonna tell you about another one. Ah, man,
this dude is crazy. Twenty four year old Joveline Martinez disappeared from East Hartford,
Connecticut, and was last seen on Hillside Avenue. This is where she
was picked by William joy Vleen was really beautiful and she had a lot of
life left to live, just like the other women, but William decided his
needs were more important than her life. And this is around the time that
he was living in his van and William's wife actually filed for full custody of
the children, so he was like in a really pissed off mood. I
guess her school was found on the dumping grounds and a clay bus was also
put together and released to the public at the same time that Diane's was,
so she was the second Jane Doe to be identified. The remains of three
victims were spotted in August of two thousand and seven by a hunter trying to
find a spot behind the New Britain Strip Mall. This area was far away
from the public, as I already told you, and the hunter called the
police to let him know what he'd stumbled upon. But those were the bodies
of Di and Jovelin and Mary Jane I mean, or that's how they were
found, Oh geez, by a hunter. They were able to identify some
of those bloodstains I was telling you about in his van. I know that
some of them matched Joveline place knew there are other victims out there. I
told you about some of the bodies they found, And keep in mind they
still haven't found Nilsa. But something interesting happened in the prison system. They
have cards that they'll give prisoners. They're cold case cards. Oh really,
yeah, And these cards are used by the prosecution and detectives to get conversations
going between inmates in the hopes that someone would confess that this is wild I
know, right, yeah, and then once that person confessed, maybe the
other inmate could get a reduced sentence. William was playing cards with his summate.
His name was Jonathan Mills, and that's when the face of Joveline was
on one of the playing cards. William shows the card to Jonathan and says,
quote, I'm the one that murdered this young woman. And then he
proceeds to give details. Oh, he started referring to himself as the quote
unquote sick ripper. Oh so he named himself. Yes, he's the sick
ripper. And he talks to Jonathan. He says, you know, not
only did I kill Joveline, I murdered seven people and then put all their
bodies behind the strip mall in New Britain, Connecticut. So here here you
go. Yeah, but don't tell anybody. Yeah right, I guess Apparently
he never heard of a jail house snitch, right, and he even ended
up drawing a detailed map over the bodies were buried in the garden for his
for this guy in jail. Oh, hey, here, I'm gonna draw
you a map to look right dumped everybody took it out and he labels the
bodies one through seven. There's that I didn't know this either. There's a
hotline number that inmates can use if they want to be like jail house snitches.
Really and a lot of inmates, as we know, take advantage of
this process. William also told Jonathan he was going to kill himself, so
that's why he was all right confessing all this. Spoiler alert, He's probably
still alive. William basically told Jonathan all this with the point of killing himself,
and he told him and did that map because in trade, Jonathan said
he'd give him a bunch of pills that William could use to kill himself.
And William did take the pills, but he fucking lived through it, Like
you just said, to kill people other people, but he couldn't kill himself.
The police they end up talking to William about this and at first he
he doesn't he doesn't cooperate. They go back to the dumping ground the garden
with cadaver dogs and they excavate the site behind that new Briton Strip mall.
It was in twenty fourteen that the police were able to identify the other four
missing women that they believed were murdered at the hands of William. They found
their bodies for their remains and were able to identify him. One of the
bodies was Melanie Melanie, it was on her birthday that she was identified.
Another body was Nilsa, which she's serving. Of course that fifteen years in
prison. Four William still wouldn't cooperate with the police, but the investigators they
didn't stop. They wanted to bring peace to the family, and they ended
up charging him with six counts of capital murder. In the end, he
pled guilty to all six counts. He did. He did, He said,
quote, I didn't want to put the families through it, meaning the
trial. Why put the families through it? Why put the taxpayers through it?
I would have been found guilty anyway. At least he was realistic.
He stated it had he not been caught, he would have definitely killed more
people. And yeah, right right. And Anne Kay Howard's book it's called
His Garden, A Conversation with a Serial Killer. He says he never wanted
to kill anybody, He only ended up killing them. One said he was
afraid he would be caught for rape like for raping them. He said,
basically, I killed them to cover up my crime. My fantasy wasn't about
killing, it was about rape. When as if he felt remorse, he
said, quote, the killings tore me apart. I have no excuse.
What can I say? I was selfish. If I could take it all
back, I would. I'd give my own life to bring theirs back.
I would, Oh fuck off. Yeah, I didn't want to do it
up. Here's some more snippets from Anne Howard's book. These are quotes from
William Why did you kill them? Bill? He answered his quote, it
wasn't about killing them, and it was about raping. The prosecutors didn't know
this, But I didn't just rape three of them. They based that on
what Jonathan Mills, that's his former sallmate, had told them. How would
they know that I raped just three. The bodies were nothing but bones when
they dug them up. I raped all of them except Danny, whistn't so.
I think they only only could maybe charge him with three Okay, she
says, because he was a man. He says, yeah. I picked
him up and knew Britain. After leaving the Cattillac ranch in Southington. He
was wearing a short miniskirt and already described it. And she asked, how
did you kill him? I punched him a couple of times, and then
I strangled him. She asked, did you strangle Melanie Camilanie too? Yeah.
I first tried to kill Camilanie by hitting her in the head with a
hammer. She didn't see it coming. There's another thing that Mills got wrong
when he talked to the cops speaking about Jonathan. He said, I tried
to strangle Melanie, but she wouldn't die, so I beat her in the
half with a hammer. That's backwards. I hit her with a hammer first,
pretty hard, but it didn't even knock her out. She begged,
please don't kill me. Don't hit me with a hammer again. And I
just didn't have the heart to hit her again. If that makes sense,
No, it doesn't, it doesn't make sense. No. Instead, I'm
going to strangle her because that's so much better. Ann asked, when you
slice off Melanie Melanie's fingertips? Was that so the cops couldn't identify her body?
And he says, yep, and John send some shit about me dismantling
her jaw that's not true. I just pulled out a few teeth after she
was dead, that's all. When I asked what he did with the teeth
and fingertips, he said, I put them in a grocery bag and I
threw him into the trash outside the Family Dollar store. Jeez, it's gruesome.
In a follow up letter to Anne, William admits that he did lie
to her about something. Oh oh, he says, quote, There's one
thing I've been dishonest with you about, and that is that I did remove
Melanie's lower jaw and an attempt to hide her identity. Oh. I lied
to you about this because I was embarrassed by the sheer gruesomeness of it.
That embarrassed him. Even as I was doing it, I couldn't believe I
was doing it. Put her fingertips and her jaw on a plastic grocery bag
and just threw them in the dumpster beside the store. And she's the one
he kept for two weeks, isn't it. Yeah? The body? Yeah?
Oh no. Leon will remain in prison for at least three hundred and
sixty years. And that's the end of our story. Oh so this winner
is still alive. And wells sitting in prison, riding away. We're in
Connecticut where he belongs. Yeah, it's gross. Well, thanks to Leah
for that one. I had never heard of him. I may have,
Yeah, I don't recall. And it's hard when there's you know, it
gets difficult to tell some of these cases when there's so many and there's different
timelines and stuff. So if it was a bit confusing, it was a
bit confusing for me to try to figure out when the bodies were found and
identified. But at least he did pay the price. Yeah, he did.
Well, thank you for that. Yeah, you're so welcome. We
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