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True Murder with your 30 00:01:33.560 --> 00:01:38.280 host journalist and author Dan Zupanski. 31 00:01:46.640 --> 00:01:50.359 Good Evening. Some said the killer couldn't be a local. 32 00:01:51.239 --> 00:01:54.000 Others claimed he was the wealthy son of a prominent 33 00:01:54.120 --> 00:01:59.719 Morgantown family. Whispers spread that Meret and Karen were sacrificed 34 00:01:59.719 --> 00:02:03.000 by satanic cult who had been victims of a madman 35 00:02:03.159 --> 00:02:07.840 poised to strike again. Then the handwritten letters began to arrive. 36 00:02:08.639 --> 00:02:11.000 You will locate the bodies of the girls covered over 37 00:02:11.080 --> 00:02:14.800 with brush. Look carefully, the animals are now on the move. 38 00:02:16.159 --> 00:02:20.639 Investigators didn't find too few suspects. They had far too many. 39 00:02:21.639 --> 00:02:24.800 There was the campus janitor where the fur fetish, the 40 00:02:24.879 --> 00:02:27.639 harmless delivery man who beat a woman nearly to death 41 00:02:28.199 --> 00:02:31.080 they're nursing home orderly with the bloody broomstick. And the 42 00:02:31.120 --> 00:02:34.039 bouncer with the girlish laugh who threatened to cut off 43 00:02:34.039 --> 00:02:39.360 people's heads. Local authors Jeffrey C. Fuller and S. James 44 00:02:39.400 --> 00:02:42.560 McLaughlin tell the complete story of the murders for the 45 00:02:42.599 --> 00:02:46.000 first time. The book they were featuring this evening is 46 00:02:46.080 --> 00:02:50.560 The w VU co Ed Murders Who killed Merret and Karen, 47 00:02:50.960 --> 00:02:55.840 with my special guest journalists Jeff Fuller and S. James McLoughlin. 48 00:02:56.759 --> 00:02:58.639 Welcome to the program, and thank you very much for 49 00:02:58.680 --> 00:03:03.319 this interview. Jeff Fuller and S. James McLaughlin. Hi, Dan, 50 00:03:05.120 --> 00:03:07.919 good evening. Thank you very much for agreen to this interview. 51 00:03:09.639 --> 00:03:12.599 Let me start off with you, Sarah. Let's I won't 52 00:03:12.639 --> 00:03:15.560 ask how you got became involved with this story because 53 00:03:15.560 --> 00:03:19.680 that is involved in our interview and occurs later in 54 00:03:19.719 --> 00:03:24.719 this story. But why don't I get you, Sarah to 55 00:03:24.800 --> 00:03:27.919 tell us a little bit of the background about married 56 00:03:28.159 --> 00:03:33.639 Ellen Maleric and Karen Ferrell and get this a little 57 00:03:33.680 --> 00:03:38.280 bit of the setting for where this incredible story occurs. 58 00:03:39.560 --> 00:03:44.240 Sure, Merret and Karen had met at WVU. They were 59 00:03:44.240 --> 00:03:48.319 both freshmen. Karen was from a little town called Quinnwood 60 00:03:48.400 --> 00:03:53.560 in West Virginia and married was from Smoke Rise, New Jersey, 61 00:03:53.639 --> 00:03:58.080 which was sort of an upper class area. And they 62 00:03:58.080 --> 00:04:02.599 became really fast friends. And it wasn't really their typical 63 00:04:03.400 --> 00:04:08.759 behavior to hitchhike, but with the way that the transportation 64 00:04:08.919 --> 00:04:13.680 was set up at WU West Virginia University, they lived 65 00:04:13.759 --> 00:04:17.120 really far out in a dorm called Beverly Manor. They 66 00:04:17.160 --> 00:04:20.279 lived in the Westchester Hall of Beverly Manor, and the 67 00:04:20.319 --> 00:04:24.839 buses would stop running at I think it was seven 68 00:04:24.920 --> 00:04:27.360 PM something like that on a Sunday, and they had 69 00:04:27.360 --> 00:04:30.000 gone to see a movie together and the movie didn't 70 00:04:30.079 --> 00:04:34.160 let out until after ten thirty at night, so they 71 00:04:34.199 --> 00:04:37.480 had the option to either walk back to their dorms. 72 00:04:37.920 --> 00:04:43.240 This was January, January eighteenth, nineteen seventy. It was freezing cold, 73 00:04:43.639 --> 00:04:46.839 it was snowing, there was probably ice, and a lot 74 00:04:46.879 --> 00:04:49.360 of their trips, because this is West Virginia, a lot 75 00:04:49.399 --> 00:04:51.319 of that was going to be uphill on the way back, 76 00:04:52.399 --> 00:04:56.399 So they opted to hitchhike, and they were last seen 77 00:04:56.560 --> 00:05:04.680 getting into a cream collared car and they disappeared. The 78 00:05:06.600 --> 00:05:10.560 local police considered them runaways and didn't really look into 79 00:05:10.600 --> 00:05:15.120 the case very much until the state police set in, 80 00:05:15.959 --> 00:05:20.079 and then that's when it became an actual missing person's case. 81 00:05:20.759 --> 00:05:25.959 And I can go further if you want. That's that's 82 00:05:26.000 --> 00:05:29.680 sort of how they are part of this story, how 83 00:05:29.680 --> 00:05:34.120 they met and why they were important to this story. 84 00:05:34.800 --> 00:05:39.240 You talked about Morgantown police being involved till the state 85 00:05:39.279 --> 00:05:45.519 police intervened. Here, Jeff tell us about the what Morgantown 86 00:05:45.560 --> 00:05:51.000 police do? What information did they find? These women are disappeared, 87 00:05:51.319 --> 00:05:53.480 have disappeared, So how do they proceed? 88 00:05:55.319 --> 00:06:00.600 Well, they issued the contact the safely the FBI, a 89 00:06:01.040 --> 00:06:07.639 kind of standard procedure and said that they're missing. They 90 00:06:07.439 --> 00:06:11.759 they had over some time the subsequent a couple of 91 00:06:11.800 --> 00:06:15.439 weeks after they disappeared, they got they had tips coming 92 00:06:15.480 --> 00:06:19.120 in from different places, and uh, you know, they would 93 00:06:19.120 --> 00:06:22.959 follow up on these specific tips. But our biggest problem, 94 00:06:23.040 --> 00:06:26.199 serious and my problem in writing a book is was 95 00:06:26.959 --> 00:06:30.240 the records from the Morgantime police are all are long gone, 96 00:06:30.759 --> 00:06:34.199 So we only had news accounts and interviews and things 97 00:06:34.240 --> 00:06:36.279 like that, which you know, gave us a picture of 98 00:06:36.279 --> 00:06:42.000 what was happening, but not uh, definitive, definitive picture. And 99 00:06:42.079 --> 00:06:48.279 so it appears that they largely decided that, as Sarah said, 100 00:06:48.319 --> 00:06:53.399 the girls ran away and they didn't know where to look. 101 00:06:54.839 --> 00:06:57.800 So they didn't actually do that much apparently, other than 102 00:06:57.839 --> 00:06:59.680 follow up on tips that came in. 103 00:07:01.920 --> 00:07:05.600 Now, tell us about the state police. When when did 104 00:07:05.600 --> 00:07:10.040 they get involved, and who from the state police gets involved? 105 00:07:13.800 --> 00:07:17.279 Well, they they they were already in town because there 106 00:07:17.439 --> 00:07:22.120 was the county prosecutor had gotten in his car on 107 00:07:22.279 --> 00:07:25.839 January second, and the car had exploded when he turned 108 00:07:25.839 --> 00:07:30.759 the ignission key. So there were state police and some 109 00:07:31.040 --> 00:07:35.480 probably some FBI people, and there's the brand new ATS 110 00:07:35.959 --> 00:07:40.560 was also in town. But they were, you know, looking 111 00:07:40.600 --> 00:07:44.600 into how did that crime happen, what happened, you know, 112 00:07:44.639 --> 00:07:47.639 who may have been responsible. And in the process they 113 00:07:47.800 --> 00:07:55.199 begin to hear rumors of a connection between the disappearance 114 00:07:55.560 --> 00:08:00.240 and the bombing, and those rumors probably they weren't, as 115 00:08:00.279 --> 00:08:03.480 it turned out, really based on anything, but they probably 116 00:08:03.839 --> 00:08:08.040 arose because West Virginia at the time, especially, it was 117 00:08:08.120 --> 00:08:11.600 fairly you know, we were appeared to be at least 118 00:08:11.600 --> 00:08:14.160 fairly local. I mean, Karen and I found out later 119 00:08:14.519 --> 00:08:16.879 we weren't as low crime and safe as we thought. 120 00:08:16.959 --> 00:08:21.639 But anyway, the general perception was that there was no 121 00:08:21.759 --> 00:08:24.160 crime in that, you know, and then these two big 122 00:08:24.199 --> 00:08:26.399 crimes happened within a couple of weeks of each other, 123 00:08:26.439 --> 00:08:29.480 and everyone sort of or a lot of people started thinking, well, 124 00:08:29.519 --> 00:08:34.120 they must be connected. So the state police went to 125 00:08:37.399 --> 00:08:43.200 the Westchester Hall to interview anyone you know who lived 126 00:08:43.519 --> 00:08:45.480 on the fourth floor of Westchester Hall where married and 127 00:08:45.519 --> 00:08:49.399 Karen lived and see if they could find a connection 128 00:08:49.519 --> 00:08:53.039 between the two. They didn't. This was in late March. 129 00:08:53.080 --> 00:08:55.679 By this time, they didn't find the connection that they 130 00:08:56.240 --> 00:09:02.039 hoped to find, but they did get very drawn into 131 00:09:02.039 --> 00:09:04.720 the case because they didn't unders they didn't realize it 132 00:09:04.720 --> 00:09:07.480 had been so severe and that these two people have 133 00:09:07.519 --> 00:09:09.399 been missing without a trace for three months. 134 00:09:11.639 --> 00:09:17.440 So, as you say, Sarah, as Jeffa said, the emphasis 135 00:09:17.519 --> 00:09:22.200 was on the LaRita case with the sensational explosion and 136 00:09:22.320 --> 00:09:26.200 trying to kill this prosecutor potentially. But what it did 137 00:09:26.279 --> 00:09:28.600 have as an effect was is that the story of 138 00:09:28.919 --> 00:09:32.320 Merit and Karen now got a lot of traction in 139 00:09:32.360 --> 00:09:33.240 the media, didn't it. 140 00:09:34.480 --> 00:09:38.519 Yeah, this wasn't the only reason that their case got attention, 141 00:09:38.679 --> 00:09:41.159 but it's sad that it had to come from other places. 142 00:09:41.200 --> 00:09:43.720 So we have Larita's bombing and that's what brings in 143 00:09:43.799 --> 00:09:47.279 the state police, who are actually investigating it as a 144 00:09:47.320 --> 00:09:49.679 missing person and not a runaway. But then we have 145 00:09:49.759 --> 00:09:53.840 these mysterious letters that are postmarked from Cumberland, Maryland that 146 00:09:54.159 --> 00:09:58.480 are taunting the whereabouts of these young women, and so 147 00:09:58.600 --> 00:10:02.120 the state police are sort of galvanized at that point 148 00:10:02.159 --> 00:10:05.000 through the governor to try and find these women, because 149 00:10:05.279 --> 00:10:08.000 the assumption is at this point that whoever's writing these 150 00:10:08.080 --> 00:10:11.360 letters that are only signed with a triangle their suspect 151 00:10:11.480 --> 00:10:11.960 number one. 152 00:10:11.919 --> 00:10:14.039 At this point. 153 00:10:15.799 --> 00:10:18.919 So how do they proceed with the investigation of these 154 00:10:18.960 --> 00:10:21.200 triangle letters? What does it lead to? 155 00:10:23.679 --> 00:10:26.799 Well, in the second letter there is a crudely drawn 156 00:10:26.840 --> 00:10:31.759 map and it has directions that you go twenty five 157 00:10:31.840 --> 00:10:36.120 miles south from the most southern tip of Morgantown and 158 00:10:36.200 --> 00:10:40.840 then one mile into the woods. And the police took 159 00:10:40.879 --> 00:10:43.279 that seriously. They got in their cars and they drove 160 00:10:43.600 --> 00:10:45.639 and they went twenty five miles and then they want 161 00:10:45.720 --> 00:10:48.720 one more and they found themselves in downtown Grafton, and 162 00:10:48.759 --> 00:10:50.440 they were not in the middle of the woods. They 163 00:10:50.440 --> 00:10:54.519 were in the middle of a fairly large city. But 164 00:10:54.879 --> 00:10:57.279 it was around this time that there were also some 165 00:10:57.399 --> 00:11:00.159 items of the girls that were being collected in the 166 00:11:00.399 --> 00:11:03.960 searches from the National Guard, and so a lot of 167 00:11:04.000 --> 00:11:08.919 the roles that leads south from Morgantown were being searched 168 00:11:09.039 --> 00:11:15.919 and they were finding their their licenses, broken compacts, They 169 00:11:15.960 --> 00:11:20.600 found prescription pills and prescription classes, things like that. So 170 00:11:20.840 --> 00:11:23.679 they finally got on the trail of where they had been, 171 00:11:23.879 --> 00:11:27.399 or at least where their killer had been. 172 00:11:30.840 --> 00:11:33.639 Now at the same well around this time as well, 173 00:11:33.679 --> 00:11:37.639 they find a couple of witnesses, this person named Itsy 174 00:11:37.919 --> 00:11:42.240 from the school and her boyfriend Skip. What did those 175 00:11:42.240 --> 00:11:47.000 two people tell state police? 176 00:11:47.279 --> 00:11:47.799 Do you want say that? 177 00:11:47.960 --> 00:11:53.519 Joe? Yeah? Okay, yeah. They actually assumed Skip it's She 178 00:11:53.720 --> 00:11:56.960 was also on the fourth floor at Westchester Hall and 179 00:11:57.480 --> 00:11:59.559 sort of heard the commotion. There were a lot of 180 00:11:59.559 --> 00:12:03.240 the people waiting up to see the night that they disappeared, 181 00:12:03.240 --> 00:12:05.679 waiting up to see if they would come back. And 182 00:12:06.000 --> 00:12:08.000 she came out of her dorm room and asked what 183 00:12:08.080 --> 00:12:10.159 was going on, and they said, oh, you haven't heard 184 00:12:10.159 --> 00:12:14.600 Merrick and Karen are missing, And she said, well, I 185 00:12:14.720 --> 00:12:17.559 just saw them at a movie. Skip and I were 186 00:12:17.720 --> 00:12:22.159 at a movie at downtown at the Metropolitan Seer and 187 00:12:22.279 --> 00:12:25.200 they Skipped and Itsy had decided to take the bus 188 00:12:25.279 --> 00:12:27.519 rather than a hitchhike, so they split off from the girls, 189 00:12:27.559 --> 00:12:32.000 and the girls started hitchhiking, and so Skip and Itsy 190 00:12:32.039 --> 00:12:37.440 had seen the two of them. A car stopped for them, 191 00:12:37.440 --> 00:12:41.799 a small white car, apparently a Cadillac or Chevy or 192 00:12:42.159 --> 00:12:47.080 they weren't sure. And they had got gotten into that 193 00:12:47.120 --> 00:12:51.879 car and the car had driven pats them and disappeared 194 00:12:51.879 --> 00:12:53.840 into the night. Now, when the car went past them, 195 00:12:54.600 --> 00:12:58.600 they married and Karen did not even acknowledge skipping itsy. Now, 196 00:12:58.639 --> 00:13:03.399 maybe they were talking and not paying attention, or maybe 197 00:13:03.759 --> 00:13:06.080 they weren't able to acknowledge because they had been told 198 00:13:06.399 --> 00:13:10.440 not to, so that's unclear, but they essentially were from 199 00:13:10.440 --> 00:13:16.799 that point looking for a white car, either Cadillac or Chevy, 200 00:13:17.279 --> 00:13:21.039 and Chevy was the leading contender, driven by a young man, 201 00:13:21.440 --> 00:13:28.159 dark hair, and the descriptions were variously kipping itty. The 202 00:13:28.159 --> 00:13:31.879 descriptions were variously between somewhere between twenty five and forty. 203 00:13:32.039 --> 00:13:34.000 They weren't sure the age of the man, but he 204 00:13:34.080 --> 00:13:40.200 was very clean cut and also didn't signal them or anything, 205 00:13:40.240 --> 00:13:41.600 didn't acknowledge them. 206 00:13:42.679 --> 00:13:46.000 And this car was like a white or cream colored 207 00:13:46.000 --> 00:13:47.600 car that it had sins on the back. 208 00:13:50.120 --> 00:13:53.399 Now, Sarah, there was another person that came forward, Donna 209 00:13:53.480 --> 00:13:58.480 de Young, And it's important regarding the petition that she 210 00:13:59.080 --> 00:14:02.720 initiates or wants to initiate tell us about Donna de 211 00:14:02.799 --> 00:14:06.559 Young what she says to a police. 212 00:14:07.440 --> 00:14:10.080 Donna had been friends with Married. They had gone to 213 00:14:10.120 --> 00:14:15.600 school in New Jersey, I think from grade school through graduation, 214 00:14:15.919 --> 00:14:20.399 and they were actually roommates in college. She was Married's roommate, 215 00:14:20.960 --> 00:14:24.679 and she was very, very concerned when they went missing. 216 00:14:24.799 --> 00:14:27.480 She said that wasn't like merit at all, and she 217 00:14:27.600 --> 00:14:30.840 contributed quite a bit to try and help them find 218 00:14:30.919 --> 00:14:34.720 the girls. She and Married actually had matching purses, and 219 00:14:34.799 --> 00:14:37.200 so she sent her purse into the police so that 220 00:14:37.240 --> 00:14:40.720 they would know exactly what they were looking for. And 221 00:14:40.799 --> 00:14:44.720 she claimed that she got a strange phone call from 222 00:14:45.120 --> 00:14:49.559 a man with a strange accent, and he was telling 223 00:14:49.600 --> 00:14:51.759 her what she needed to get the police to do 224 00:14:51.840 --> 00:14:56.840 in order to find these girls. And we're not sure 225 00:14:56.919 --> 00:15:00.399 exactly if that was someone who had been in law 226 00:15:00.519 --> 00:15:03.600 enforcement or if this was someone that was just trying 227 00:15:03.639 --> 00:15:05.919 to help and thought this was the best way. But 228 00:15:07.080 --> 00:15:10.200 she tried to take this to the police. They weren't 229 00:15:10.240 --> 00:15:12.559 sure whether or not to take her seriously or not. 230 00:15:13.200 --> 00:15:16.080 And when she wasn't getting the answers that she wanted, 231 00:15:16.159 --> 00:15:18.960 or she wasn't getting the reaction that she wanted. She 232 00:15:19.080 --> 00:15:21.840 and a handful of other students that were concerned went 233 00:15:21.919 --> 00:15:26.000 to the university president and he helped get them an 234 00:15:26.080 --> 00:15:29.559 audience with a governor, and with that petition, they were 235 00:15:29.600 --> 00:15:32.600 able to talk to the governor and try to get 236 00:15:32.600 --> 00:15:35.159 a little more coverage on this case and get a 237 00:15:35.200 --> 00:15:36.600 little more manpower behind it. 238 00:15:39.559 --> 00:15:42.960 A little aside here, just so we keep referring to 239 00:15:43.039 --> 00:15:45.080 Merit and Karen as girls, and there was a couple 240 00:15:45.120 --> 00:15:47.240 of reasons for that. One isn't the age majority of 241 00:15:47.279 --> 00:15:52.200 the time was twenty one, so they technically were underage. 242 00:15:52.759 --> 00:15:57.799 And also that's how essentially how women were referred to, 243 00:15:58.320 --> 00:16:00.960 but women of that age were referred to at a time. 244 00:16:01.080 --> 00:16:05.080 So you know, we're not trying to be disrespectful or anything. 245 00:16:05.120 --> 00:16:07.960 Nowadays you'd said it was too young wound, but anyway, 246 00:16:07.960 --> 00:16:09.000 I just wanted to clarify that. 247 00:16:11.480 --> 00:16:15.240 So police are also there's an event on February seventeenth 248 00:16:15.360 --> 00:16:21.000 where a couple young women, Candy Bales and Cindy Smith. 249 00:16:22.039 --> 00:16:25.679 What happens with this and what do police believe might 250 00:16:25.720 --> 00:16:30.559 be this relation this crimes relation to Karen and Merritt. 251 00:16:33.440 --> 00:16:37.200 Candy and Cindy had also been hit hiking. They had 252 00:16:37.240 --> 00:16:40.679 been right across from the Mountain layer a little strip 253 00:16:40.720 --> 00:16:44.000 in between the lanes called Grumbne Island, and they were 254 00:16:44.039 --> 00:16:46.360 picked up by two young men and a red gto 255 00:16:48.039 --> 00:16:51.360 and they were being They were asking them to drop 256 00:16:51.399 --> 00:16:54.960 them off at their dorms, but then then kept going 257 00:16:55.799 --> 00:16:59.840 towards Star City and Osage, which was the opposite direction 258 00:17:00.039 --> 00:17:02.519 in which they needed to go, and they were driving 259 00:17:02.519 --> 00:17:05.960 really recklessly. They were driving fast, they were skipping red lights, 260 00:17:06.319 --> 00:17:09.400 and they were ignoring the girls. When they're saying, hey, 261 00:17:09.440 --> 00:17:11.480 I need to get back. I told my boyfriend I 262 00:17:11.480 --> 00:17:14.240 would be there. The girls are really scared because they're 263 00:17:14.279 --> 00:17:17.319 being ignored. They're not sure where they're being taken. And 264 00:17:17.680 --> 00:17:21.599 they noticed there's a crate of soda bottles glass Toto 265 00:17:21.599 --> 00:17:25.640 bottles in the backseat, so Candy grabs one and hides 266 00:17:25.680 --> 00:17:29.000 it in her jacket, and when the two men finally 267 00:17:29.079 --> 00:17:34.799 stop and get out, she grabs Cindy and pulls her 268 00:17:34.839 --> 00:17:36.960 out of the car and they try to make a 269 00:17:37.039 --> 00:17:38.799 run for it, and one of the men tries to 270 00:17:38.839 --> 00:17:41.279 grab her, and he grabs Candy by the throat, and 271 00:17:41.319 --> 00:17:43.079 so she hits them in the head with his bottle 272 00:17:43.920 --> 00:17:46.279 and she breaks the bottle on him, and he finally 273 00:17:46.400 --> 00:17:48.279 lets her go and they're able to kind of hide 274 00:17:48.279 --> 00:17:51.559 from them and walk down along the street. They're in 275 00:17:51.599 --> 00:17:53.359 no stage at this point, and they're able to hide 276 00:17:53.400 --> 00:17:56.240 behind some cars along the road until they feel that 277 00:17:56.319 --> 00:17:59.200 it's safe, and then they hitchhike again to get back 278 00:17:59.279 --> 00:18:03.960 into more Town. And they didn't really want to tell 279 00:18:04.000 --> 00:18:06.319 any one because Candy was afraid that she would go 280 00:18:06.359 --> 00:18:10.039 to jail for assault, and the other girls in her 281 00:18:10.119 --> 00:18:12.720 dorm were like, Hey, if you don't tell the police 282 00:18:12.720 --> 00:18:16.000 about this, this could happen to someone else. And so 283 00:18:16.279 --> 00:18:20.440 that's when she decides that she is going to figure 284 00:18:20.480 --> 00:18:23.640 out who this man is, and she does a lot 285 00:18:23.680 --> 00:18:26.119 of legwork. She does some detective work to find out 286 00:18:26.200 --> 00:18:28.720 who this person is because when she calls the police, 287 00:18:29.319 --> 00:18:31.640 they don't give her much of a reaction. So she 288 00:18:31.759 --> 00:18:35.519 knew that she has his name, she can bring forth 289 00:18:35.799 --> 00:18:40.279 a stronger case. And she remembered seeing his name, I 290 00:18:40.279 --> 00:18:43.799 think on his shirt, like his first name, and she 291 00:18:43.920 --> 00:18:46.640 knew that the bottles in the back were from RCI Cola, 292 00:18:47.079 --> 00:18:50.359 and so she took a chance that he worked at 293 00:18:50.440 --> 00:18:54.839 that warehouse, and she called all of the numbers that 294 00:18:54.880 --> 00:18:56.599 she could find and then the number that she got 295 00:18:56.599 --> 00:18:58.440 from the warehouse when she called and asked for his 296 00:18:58.480 --> 00:19:00.960 first name until she finally found and then she took 297 00:19:01.039 --> 00:19:04.119 that information to the police, but not until after she 298 00:19:04.200 --> 00:19:06.400 stocked him so she could see his face and make 299 00:19:06.440 --> 00:19:08.400 sure that it was him, and she said he saw 300 00:19:08.440 --> 00:19:09.960 her and he was quite shook. 301 00:19:11.799 --> 00:19:12.039 Yeah. 302 00:19:12.279 --> 00:19:17.000 Yeah, another little scene setting thing here. We're talking about 303 00:19:17.079 --> 00:19:19.119 hitchhiking a lot, and that seemed very strange to a 304 00:19:19.160 --> 00:19:22.839 lot of people nowadays. But at time West Virginia had 305 00:19:22.839 --> 00:19:25.839 a split campus. Well it still does now, but transportation 306 00:19:25.920 --> 00:19:28.920 is better. They had a split campus which about a 307 00:19:28.960 --> 00:19:31.519 mile apart, and what that meant was that a lot 308 00:19:31.559 --> 00:19:35.839 of students hitchhiked constantly. So down on Grumbine's Island, right 309 00:19:35.839 --> 00:19:38.440 in front of the student union, there would be dozens 310 00:19:38.440 --> 00:19:42.400 and dozens of people hitchhiking. So hitchhiking was not sort 311 00:19:42.400 --> 00:19:45.759 of two individuals or four individuals taking a chance. It 312 00:19:45.799 --> 00:19:49.839 was a common method of transportation at the time. And 313 00:19:49.880 --> 00:19:52.839 the car a car would stop and as many students 314 00:19:53.039 --> 00:19:54.839 as could fit would pile into the car and that 315 00:19:54.880 --> 00:19:57.359 would drive away. So that was very common. 316 00:19:59.480 --> 00:20:05.319 Tell Us AB troopers Gooden and Mitchell and also their 317 00:20:05.480 --> 00:20:11.440 sergeant Heiss, and just the character of Gooden and some 318 00:20:11.480 --> 00:20:15.920 of the ideas he had regarding this murder. For these murders. 319 00:20:18.039 --> 00:20:23.799 Yeah, well, Preston Gooden was one of the troopers who 320 00:20:23.920 --> 00:20:28.799 had a lot of experience coming into the Saint Police 321 00:20:29.039 --> 00:20:32.000 and he had been and he'd taken whats of courses, 322 00:20:32.000 --> 00:20:36.359 he had trained with various police institutions and one of 323 00:20:36.400 --> 00:20:39.720 the things he was especially good at was investigation. That's 324 00:20:39.759 --> 00:20:45.319 what he had. His background was in Mitchell. Mitchell was 325 00:20:45.359 --> 00:20:47.680 a sergeant. He was kind of in charge, but actually 326 00:20:47.759 --> 00:20:53.359 much of the investigation. Harold Ama named Larry. Harold was 327 00:20:53.400 --> 00:20:57.440 also a trooper and Preston Gooden were together and Preston 328 00:20:57.480 --> 00:21:02.119 Gooden was very careful, did things by the book, and 329 00:21:03.519 --> 00:21:08.799 he became very concerned about what not only what might 330 00:21:08.880 --> 00:21:12.559 have happened to the two girls married and Karen, but 331 00:21:12.759 --> 00:21:18.359 also at the frequency with which similar things happen were happening, 332 00:21:18.440 --> 00:21:22.160 like with Cindy and Candy. That kind of thing seemed 333 00:21:22.160 --> 00:21:23.839 to happen a lot. And we've got some of that 334 00:21:23.880 --> 00:21:27.440 in the book of their interviews with people in Westchester. 335 00:21:27.480 --> 00:21:29.920 And they kept going back and back to Westchester. They 336 00:21:29.960 --> 00:21:35.119 would scour the streets looking for a similar car they would, 337 00:21:35.440 --> 00:21:38.160 you know, they just they did a lot of that 338 00:21:38.279 --> 00:21:41.359 kind of thing, trying to follow up everything, and they 339 00:21:41.359 --> 00:21:46.720 spent long hours at that until at one point on 340 00:21:47.000 --> 00:21:51.720 April sixteenth, about eleven in the morning, they started hearing 341 00:21:51.759 --> 00:21:56.160 some of the radio traffic and realized the girls had 342 00:21:56.200 --> 00:21:59.559 been found about ten miles south of Moregontown. 343 00:22:01.599 --> 00:22:05.319 Tell us the state that the police find the bodies 344 00:22:05.480 --> 00:22:10.039 of Merit and Karen, and what do they derive evidence wise? 345 00:22:10.359 --> 00:22:15.880 As a result, the bodies were found under a really 346 00:22:16.319 --> 00:22:21.079 crudely constructed tomb, that's what the media called it. It 347 00:22:21.119 --> 00:22:26.599 wasn't necessarily a tomb. It was very large rocks and 348 00:22:26.240 --> 00:22:30.319 a forked tree and branches, lots of brush that were 349 00:22:30.319 --> 00:22:34.720 covering them. And as they were dissecting this and pulling 350 00:22:34.799 --> 00:22:39.559 everything off, they realized that the girls were missing. Karen 351 00:22:39.680 --> 00:22:43.680 was missing her one of her shoes, Marrit was missing 352 00:22:43.720 --> 00:22:46.319 both of her boots, and Karen was missing a colt. 353 00:22:46.519 --> 00:22:49.799 But both of them did not have their heads and 354 00:22:49.880 --> 00:22:54.119 those were not found on any of the lands. It 355 00:22:54.240 --> 00:22:56.319 wasn't found ever to this day. 356 00:22:58.240 --> 00:23:02.119 Yeah, we have a lot of mines, and so they 357 00:23:02.119 --> 00:23:04.279 were searching minds and so forth. They looked all over 358 00:23:04.319 --> 00:23:07.119 the place, drained ponds and couldn't find anything. 359 00:23:09.319 --> 00:23:13.119 What was there? Was there any indication of sexual assault 360 00:23:14.079 --> 00:23:17.079 or any kind of sexual contact, There. 361 00:23:17.000 --> 00:23:19.480 Wasn't really a good way to test it. They had 362 00:23:19.519 --> 00:23:21.920 been in the in the weather for eighty eight days. 363 00:23:22.440 --> 00:23:24.920 Karen was sort of on the top, and she had 364 00:23:24.960 --> 00:23:28.400 taken the most damage from the elements and from animals, 365 00:23:28.880 --> 00:23:32.960 so they weren't able to ascertain whether that was or 366 00:23:33.119 --> 00:23:36.759 was not. Just there wasn't enough to testifind any evidence 367 00:23:36.799 --> 00:23:41.119 either way. But the way that they were found fully closed. 368 00:23:41.799 --> 00:23:45.319 Merrit was still wearing her stockings and she had a 369 00:23:45.359 --> 00:23:47.799 cigarette pack that she had tucked in the waist van 370 00:23:48.319 --> 00:23:51.920 with one cigarette, So it seemed really unlikely that they 371 00:23:51.960 --> 00:23:55.680 had been assaulted and then dressed themselves back so carefully. 372 00:23:59.200 --> 00:24:04.599 So what happened in terms of suspects emerging. 373 00:24:09.240 --> 00:24:16.359 Well, the first suspect they had was a man named 374 00:24:16.400 --> 00:24:20.400 Thrasher who lived nearby. They had they had been canvassing 375 00:24:20.400 --> 00:24:23.680 the neighborhood. They being Harold and Gooden, had been came 376 00:24:23.920 --> 00:24:28.359 canassing the neighborhood and they stopped by Lloyd and Thomas 377 00:24:28.559 --> 00:24:35.039 uh a Vilma's place and a farm, and they found 378 00:24:35.079 --> 00:24:38.880 out that there was a young man who named Eddie 379 00:24:39.119 --> 00:24:42.279 or you know, Charles Edward, but he was they called 380 00:24:42.319 --> 00:24:46.200 him Eddie, and he was had been a janitor at 381 00:24:46.279 --> 00:24:52.920 Westchester Hall, and he became the first person they looked 382 00:24:52.960 --> 00:25:01.680 into as a suspect. Now, subsequently there were many suspects. 383 00:25:01.799 --> 00:25:05.640 We have the whole section of the book that deals 384 00:25:05.680 --> 00:25:09.759 with the various people who are doing different kinds of 385 00:25:10.000 --> 00:25:14.160 bad things or had drawn the attention of authorities for 386 00:25:14.240 --> 00:25:18.240 various reasons that they thought might have been married in Karen, 387 00:25:18.599 --> 00:25:21.960 or might have been the killers of married Careen Well. 388 00:25:22.000 --> 00:25:24.920 And we also still had the letter writers at this point. 389 00:25:25.599 --> 00:25:29.960 Yeah, yeah. And one of the things the police did 390 00:25:30.079 --> 00:25:34.519 was the same police did was take handwriting samples of 391 00:25:34.599 --> 00:25:37.880 everybody they talked to, whether they were suspects or not. 392 00:25:37.960 --> 00:25:43.599 But they wanted to compare those handwriting samples to the letters. 393 00:25:44.000 --> 00:25:50.119 Exactly a lot go ahead. Sorry. 394 00:25:51.559 --> 00:25:54.400 There was actually a good better police work that went 395 00:25:54.400 --> 00:25:57.960 into tracking down the letter writer. I mean thousands and 396 00:25:58.079 --> 00:26:03.960 thousands of handwriting samples taken checked from voter registration and 397 00:26:04.000 --> 00:26:07.160 they were actually able to track the letter writers to 398 00:26:07.759 --> 00:26:14.400 a psychic science church in both summerset pa and Cumberland, 399 00:26:14.400 --> 00:26:19.839 Maryland with several members. They were able to track them 400 00:26:19.880 --> 00:26:21.640 down and they found out that the person that was 401 00:26:21.680 --> 00:26:25.680