Tag Archives: Serial Killer

IS A SERIAL KILLER LOOSE ON THE HIGHWAY OF TEARS?

There’s a lonely road stretch in remote northwestern British Columbia, Canada having a huge number of unsolved missing and murdered women cases. It spans 450 miles between the small cities of Prince George in the province’s interior and Prince Rupert on the Pacific coast. Over the past 40 years, more than 40 women mysteriously disappeared or died from foul play in that area. Most of their circumstances remain unknown. The road’s geographically known as #16 or the Yellowhead Route but—for good reason—locals call it the Highway of Tears.

The Highway of Tears murders and the women’s suspicious disappearances began in 1969. They continue today with the last case of modus operandi (MO) similarities happening in December 2018. Although police officially remain cautious about confirming links, many in-the-know suspect there may be many more crimes with victims fitting the mold.

In 2005, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) formed a task force called E-Pana to look at the area’s unsolved missing and murdered women cases. The RCMP is Canada’s federal force having jurisdiction across the nation and in the region. The task force initially identified 18 cases but soon expanded their investigation to include similar files eastward along Route 16 to Hinton, Alberta as well as south along Highway 97 to Kamloops, BC and along Highway 5 from Merritt to Clearwater.

Two significant independent government inquiries or investigations into the Highway of Tears and related matters also happened. One was a British Columbia Provincial Symposium held in 2006. The other—a recent, national commission called the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women Inquiry. It’s called that because many victims were of indigenous or First Nations ethnicity.

Despite the massive police and public effort, no one’s been caught for most of the crimes. As well, many of the victim’s bodies remain hidden and undiscovered. That leaves people wondering if there’s a serial killer loose on the Highway of Tears.

The Highway of Tears Victims

Without exception, every victim in the Highway of Tears (HOT) sphere is female. That includes confirmed murders as well as unsolved disappearances. Another harsh fact is many victims originated from aboriginal or First Nations backgrounds. It’s a reality that can’t be overlooked.

Project E-Pana (named so after the Inuit spirit that guides souls to the afterlife) used four criteria to qualify a murder or suspicious disappearance as a Highway of Tears or HOT case. These parameters were sound and valid, as many homicide and missing persons cases in the north have other circumstances that don’t suggest a commonality the HOT files have. Out of great precaution, HOT investigators are very careful about using the “SK-word”—Serial Killer. To be on the HOT list, the E-Pana victim profiles are:

  • Female
  • High-risk lifestyle
  • Known to hitchhike
  • Found or last seen near Highways 16, 97 & 5

Females who hitchhike and practice a high-risk lifestyle around this remote road network are easy prey. Many come from physical, sexual and substance abusive backgrounds. Many are sex workers and drug users as well as having alcoholic tendencies and serious mental/emotional disorders. And, many women victims are from indigenous communities with a host of social problems.

Police investigators feel most, if not all, Highway of Tears cases are stranger-to-stranger relationships. Police don’t like the serial killer term because of public ramifications, but it’s a classic serial killer pattern to pick up strangers and have their way. Most lone-operating killers leave little evidence behind at their crime scenes, take little with them, make sure there are no independent witnesses and they rarely confess. That combination makes these predators so hard to catch.

First Nations women are particularly vulnerable. Along the main Highway of Tears stretch from Prince Rupert to Prince George there are 23 different indigenous communities or reserves. Most of these little places have few facilities like medical services, educational outlets and recreational opportunities. As well, poverty is a gigantic problem in Canada’s First Peoples settlements. They simply can’t afford private transportation.

Combined with personal issues and the need to be mobile, many at-risk women are alone on side of the road with their thumb out. They’re perfect opportunities for men with deviant desire. Here is a list of who fell victim in the deadly web called the Highway of Tears and throughout the entire region.

  • Gloria Moody — 27, Murdered near Williams Lake, October 1969
  • Micheline Pare — 18, Murdered near Hudson’s Hope, July 1970
  • Helen Claire Frost — 15, Missing from Prince George, October 1970
  • Jean Virginia Sampare — 18, Missing from Hazelton, October 1971
  • Gayle Weys — 19, Murdered near Clearwater, October 1973
  • Pamela Darlington — 19, Murdered at Kamloops, November 1973
  • Coleen MacMillan — 16, Murdered near Lac La Hache, August 1974
  • Monica Ignas — 15, Murdered near Terrace, December 1974
  • Mary Jane Hill — 31, Murdered at Prince Rupert, March 1978
  • Monica Jack — 12, Murdered near Merritt, May 1978
  • Maureen Mosie — 33, Murdered near Salmon Arm, May 1981
  • Jean May Kovacs — 36, Murdered at Prince George, October 1981
  • Roswitha Fuchsbichler — 13, Murdered at Prince George, November 1981
  • Nina Marie Joseph — 15, Murdered at Prince George, August 1982
  • Shelley-Anne Bascu — 16, Missing from Hinton, May 1983
  • Alberta Gail Williams — 24, Murdered near Prince Rupert, August  1989
  • Cecilia Anne Nikal — 15, Missing from Smithers, October 1989
  • Delphine Anne Nikal — 15, Missing from Smithers, June 1990
  • Theresa Umphrey — 38, Murdered near Prince George, February 1993
  • Marnie Blanchard — 18, Murdered near Prince George, March 1993
  • Ramona Lisa Wilson — 16, Murdered near Smithers, June 1994
  • Roxanne Thiara — 15, Murdered near Burns Lake, November 1994
  • Alishia Leah Germaine — 15, Murdered at Prince George, November 1994
  • Lana Derrick — 19, Missing from Terrace, October 1995
  • Deena Braem — 16, Murdered near Quesnel, September 1999
  • Monica McKay — 18, Murdered at Prince Rupert, December 1999
  • Nicole Hoar — 24, Missing from Prince George, June 2002
  • Mary Madeline George — 25, Missing from Prince George, July 2005
  • Tamara Lynn Chipman — 22, Missing from Prince Rupert, September 2005
  • Aielah Saric Auger — 14, Murdered at Prince George, February 2006
  • Beverly Warbick — 20, Missing from Prince George, June 2007
  • Bonnie Marie Joseph — 32, Missing from Vanderhoof, September 2007
  • Jill Stacey Stuchenko — 35, Murdered near Prince George, October 2009
  • Emmalee Rose McLean — 16, Murdered at Prince Rupert, April 2010
  • Natasha Lynn Montgomery — 23, Murdered at Prince George, August 2010
  • Cynthia Frances Maas— 35, Murdered near Prince George, September 2010
  • Loren Dawn Leslie — 15, Murdered near Prince George, November 2010
  • Madison “Maddy” Scott — 20, Missing near Vanderhoof, May 2011
  • Immaculate “Mackie” Basil — 26, Missing near Fort St. James, June 2013
  • Anita Florence Thorne — 49, Missing from Prince George, November 2014
  • Roberta Marie Sims — 55, Missing from Prince George, May 2017
  • Frances Brown — 53, Missing near Smithers, October 2017
  • Chantelle Catherine Simpson — 34, Suspicious Death at Terrace, July 2018
  • Jessica Patrick — 18, Murdered near Smithers, September 2018
  • Cynthia Martin — 50, Missing near Hazelton, December 2018

The Case for a Highway of Tears Serial Killer

These 40+ known cases all have a similarity beyond the E-Pana parameters. That’s the peculiar pattern of how they met their fate. Investigators assume most victims did not know their assailant and unsuspectingly fell into a fatal trap. And that trap may have been set by a serial offender.

Before assuming that one or more serial killers have been on the loose in the E-Pana project and the entire cases associated to the general Highway of Tears area, it’s necessary to define what a serial killer is. According to the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), a serial killer is an offender who commits “a series of two or more murders, committed as separate events, usually, but not always, by one offender acting alone.” Serial murder is defined as “the unlawful killing of two or more victims by the same offender(s), in separate events.”

This is a fairly tight description for a multiple killer. It fits someone on a path or destiny rather than a mass-murderer who goes on one rampage and causes numerous deaths. Most people associate serial killers with notorious Americans like Ted Bundy, Gary Ridgway or Albert DeSalvo. They were particularly nasty people. But, British Columbia had its share of these vicious villains. Noteworthy BC serial killers were Clifford Olson who killed 10 or more children and Robert “Willie” Pickton who did-in 49 women and fed them to his pigs.

Most serial killers operate alone and have a distinctive pattern or modus operandi. Experienced police investigators know to look for crime patterns and identify similarities. One of the main indicators is victim profiling. In almost all of the cases brought under the Highway of Tears investigation umbrella, the victim’s background and vulnerability stand out. Other indicators are the time frame and location.

In missing persons cases, investigators naturally start with where and when the victim was last seen. They also look for abandoned items such as a vehicle, their purse and contents or their phone. Where bodies are found, investigators look for the mechanism or means of death. Most of the Highway of Tears and related victims were strangled—the exact strangulation method being held back as it’s known only to the police and the perpetrator.

In the Highway of Tears periphery—and it is a periphery because what started as an investigation along the Prince George to Prince Rupert road quickly branched off to a much bigger area where a mobile serial killer could have easily traveled within a day. What’s really notable in this overall murder and missing persons combined investigation are the time periods. There are nine distinct activity calendar groups:

  • 1969-1974
  • 1978
  • 1981-1983
  • 1989-1990
  • 1993-1995
  • 1999-2002
  • 2005-2007
  • 2009-2014
  • 2017-2018

This date grouping shows a burst of start-stop, start-stop and start-stop. There could be many reasons for this such as the perpetrator being repeatedly incarcerated, moving out of the geographical area or, in the case of Gary Ridgway—the Green River Killer from Seattle—he nearly got caught and thought he’d give it a rest for a while. But, it seems more likely there are multiple offenders in the overall Highway of Tears file. In fact, police have already caught, convicted or identified five different HOT-profile men.

The Police Catch or Identify Serial Killers in the Highway of Tears Investigation

To be fair, not all the murdered or missing women in the previous list are true Highway of Tears victims from BC Highways 16, 97 & 5. As the investigation grew, it expanded to include a wide net of confirmed or suspected murders across the mid-section of semi-rural British Columbia. That was a natural progression. It’s a logical and competent way of investigating a broad range of offense dates and locations.

Long before the E-Pana probe in 2005, which started as a look at the cases on Highway 16 between Prince George and Prince Rupert, the RCMP knew there was a pattern emerging. In 1981, they held a multi-jurisdictional meeting called The Highway Murders Conference to look at commonalities of historic unsolved murders and missing persons cases. Over 40 detectives from across BC and Alberta met in Kamloops and presented their case facts. This was the original start to a massive investigation that’s still highly-active today.

In the years following the Highway Murder Conference, the RCMP and other law enforcement agencies solved some of the “HOT” killings and disappearances. They were able to profile offenders under the FBI’s serial killer definition. Here are the five serial killers known to have committed murders on the overall HOT list.

1. Cody Alan Legebokoff  — He was convicted of the 2009/2010 Jill Stuchenko, Natasha Montgomery, Loren Leslie and Cynthia Maas murders near Prince George. Legebokoff is serving life in prison.

2. Brian Peter Arp — He was convicted of the 1989 near-Prince George murders of Theresa Umphrey and Marnie Blanchard. Arp is also serving a life sentence.

3. Edward Dennis Issac — He was convicted of the 1981/1892 murders of Nina Joseph, Jean Kovacs and Roswitha Fuchsbichler in Prince George. Issac is still serving out his life sentence

4, Gary Wayne Hanlin — He was convicted of the 1978 Monica Jack murder at Merritt and faces new charges for killing another pre-teen girl. Hanlin got a life sentence, as well.

5. Bobby Jack Fowler — This known serial killer died in an Oregon prison in 1986. Post-death DNA analysis linked Fowler to causing the 1973/1974 Kamloops area murders of Coleen McMillan, Gail Weys and Pamela Darlington. Given the time frame pattern and location, Fowler may also have killed Monica Ignas in Terrace.

Known Highway of Tears Serial Killer Bobby Jack Fowler – MacMillan, Weys & Darlington murders

The Highway of Tears Public Investigations and Inquiries

Over the years, the mass of unsolved murders and missing women’s cases have been front and center in British Columbia and Canadian spectrums. Local, national and international interest spread, and took on a scope much larger than the cases committed along the original roadway called the Highway of Tears. Hundreds of thousands of hours and millions of dollar have been exhausted trying to rectify what went wrong and how future tragedies could be prevented.

In 2006, the British Columbia probe called the Highway of Tears Symposium released a report with an objective look at the entire factors causing victim vulnerability. They made rational and constructive recommendations that, if correctly implemented, could drastically reduce the potential for other women to end up on the HOT list. The symposium divided their solution into these four categories:

  • Victim Prevention
  • Emergency Planning and Team Readiness
  • Victim Family Counselling and Support
  • Community Development and Support

The Highway of Tears Symposium offered 33 separate recommendations on how to reduce victim risk and how to organize a holistic crime prevention program throughout the at-risk region. Most of the recommendations were solid, common-sense steps that could be practically implemented. One of the primary actions was to increase public transit along Highway 16 so the women wouldn’t need to hitchhike.

Other smart points in the action plan were making the police and public officials more responsible for spotting women placing themselves at risk and intervening on the side of the road. The report recommended a network of safe houses and a community watch program be integrated across the area. Many more recommendations addressed education and economic support for vulnerable women.

It’s been 13 years since the Highway of Tears Symposium did its necessary and valuable work. Sadly, very few of their well-thought-out suggestions ever materialized. An example is that it took 11 years before a simple and reliably-scheduled public transit bus service hit the Yellowhead Highway. Some of the risk prevention literature has been well written and promoted, though.

The Canadian Federal Government’s cross-country consortium called the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls (IMMIWG) took public problem probing to a whole new level. What started as a Highway of Tears inquiry expanding the plight of First Nations women turned into a f-fest where three of the leading commissioners quit in frustration and disgust. It seemed everyone with a grievance to grind and an agenda to advance hijacked the focus and spun it around. By the time the $53.8 million off-track inquisition ended, the indigenous women core concern expanded to include every fringe interest lumped into a category called 2SLGBTQQIA. That’s an acronym for 2 Spirit, Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, Questioning, Intersex and Asexual.

On June 4, 2019, the Canadian Prime Minister championed the IMMIWG report release with this quote, “Earlier this morning, the national inquiry formally presented their report, in which they found that the tragic violence that Indigenous women and girls have experienced amounts to genocide”. The Prime Minister’s critics were quick to point out the United Nations definition of genocide:

“Any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: killing members of the group; causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life, calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; [and] forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.”

What started as a well-intentioned review of what happened to cause the Highway of Tears-related murders and suspicious disappearances totally missed the mark in the Canadian Federal Government’s sights. While the HOT Symposium operated with honorable intentions, the IMMIWG was a farce. It contributed little, if nothing, to the cause and likely did more harm than good. The IMMIWG failed to make positive recommendations for future harm prevention and investigation improvements. Ultimately, the IMMIWG blamed colonialism for oppressive behavior on margins of society. It seems the IMMIWG forgot many of the Highway of Tears victims were white heterosexual women born and raised in mainstream Canada.

Is a Serial Killer Loose on the Highway of Tears?

The answer is yes and no. There isn’t , and never has been, one lone serial killer continually at work on the Highway of Tears or in the surrounding geographical area. The right answer is there are many serial killers out there who’ve traveled those remote highways for years. Without a doubt, at least five separate serial killers contributed to some of the forty-year carnage. It’s highly-likely a large number of the yet-unsolved cases are the work of still-to-be-caught perpetrators. And, it’s also highly-likely some murders and abductions are one-offs.

Will all the Highway of Tears related murders eventually be solved? It’s highly-unlikely that’ll happen given the time gone by and the limited evidence available. However, there’s good reason to be optimistic some old and cold cases will be cleared. Back in the 70s, no one saw how powerful forensic DNA typing would be. We’re only now starting to tap the new familial database mines. Back in the 70s, no one saw how effective the Mister Big undercover sting would work on serial killers. And, back in the 70s, information sharing was nothing like what’s happening today.

So, no one knows what’s to come. Thanks to high-tech science combining with cool cop creative minds, we’re in for an interesting crime-solving drive down the Highway of Tears.

WAS ALBERT DESALVO REALLY THE BOSTON STRANGLER?

The Boston Strangler was America’s first modern serial killer case. From June 1962 until January 1964, someone terrorized the Greater Boston area of Massachusetts with thirteen sexually-motivated murders. Single women of all ages were raped, sexually brutalized and killed inside their apartments. Apparently, they voluntarily let their killer in.

The slaying string suddenly stopped. No one was apprehended, charged or convicted. Today, the Boston Strangler serial murders remain officially unsolved. The files—whatever left of them—sat shelved with other cold cases. Day-by-day, the trail got icier. That’s until modern forensic science revisited the evidence.

Authorities long debated whether Albert DeSalvo was the Boston Strangler. He was a serial sexual predator and certainly capable of strangling women while raping them. In fact, Albert DeSalvo admitted being the Strangler and claimed responsibility for the thirteen cases, plus other homicides. But, DeSalvo also recanted his confession, blamed others and many pieces implicating him didn’t fit.

Boston area detectives didn’t have Albert DeSalvo on their radar during the early investigation. It wasn’t until late 1965 that DeSalvo surfaced after making a jail-house confession to a cellmate who happened to be represented by high-profile lawyer F. Lee Bailey. Bailey took on DeSalvo’s case and tried to broker a deal with Boston Police and the D.A. It was having Albert DeSalvo ruled criminally insane so he could move from the harsh penitentiary to a comfortable hospital.

The police were very cautious about credibility in DeSalvo’s confession. There was absolutely no physical evidence—at the time—to connect Albert DeSalvo to any of the Strangler scenes. DeSalvo was well known for exaggerating and fabricating stories. Further, DeSalvo seemed wrong about some Strangler scene key facts such as times, mechanisms of death and various evidence points. It seemed to investigators that DeSalvo could have got his information from the news, made some up, or possibly heard it in jail from the real killer.

Albert DeSalvo was written off as a braggart and a pathological attention seeker. He was never charged for the Boston Strangler murders and died in prison in 1973 after being shanked by fellow inmates. The Strangler case sat dormant until 2013 when the Boston PD got special cold case funding from the National Justice Institute. With it, they assembled a team and applied DNA analysis from questioned male biological evidence retrieved at one Strangler death scene and compared it with known DNA extracted from DeSalvo’s exhumed body. The results finally settled the question, “Was Albert DeSalvo really the Boston Strangler?”

Boston Strangler Case History

The killings associated with the Boston Strangler serial murder case happened over a 19 month period from the summer of 1962 until the winter of 1964. All victims were females alone in apartments who were killed by manual or ligature strangulation. Some were also stabbed. All were sexually violated in some manner, and most had their nylon stockings cinched around their necks. However, there were marked differences in modus operandi (MO) between the killings. There was also a huge age range. The youngest Strangler-attributed victim was 19. The oldest was 85.

Initially, the Strangler case was called the “Silk Stocking Murders”. This label changed when the Boston Sunday Herald ran the July 8, 1962 headline “Mad Strangler Kills Four Women in Boston” after the fourth victim was found. Then, a panic surge swept Boston causing women to arm themselves, buy guard dogs and rig alarms in their homes.

The print, radio and TV media industry didn’t help calm peoples’ fears. They sensationalized the Boston Strangler case as Boston’s crime of the century. Interest intensified as the Strangler’s body count grew. Through good investigative journalism and helpful leaks from police officers, much of the Strangler key-fact evidence got published.

Normally, this critical information—only known to the true killer and the principal investigators—would be held back in strictest confidence. Not so with many of the individual Strangler murders. Descriptions of exact ligatures, body posings in lurid sexual positions and notes allegedly left by the killer appeared in newspapers and on the air.

Another challenge was the multi-jurisdictional overlap in the Greater Boston police departments. Strangler victims surfaced in Cambridge, Salem, Lynn and Lawrence as well as central Boston. This was the sixties and way before modern communication links in law enforcement. The media had better information channels than the cops and were making case links that seasoned detectives doubted.

The sixties weren’t sophisticated times as forensics and informatics go. But, the Boston detectives were no strangers to murders and were well-equipped with gut sense. The wide gap in victim ages, race, social class, crime scene modus operandi and event spacing puzzled the initial investigators. There were so many different patterns that it was hard to believe that, behaviorally, the crimes were committed by one person.

Many officers still believe that today. They feel that more than one killer was at work in the Boston area during that period and to seasoned officers, that makes sense. However, there was one obvious common denominator in all thirteen murders. Not a single scene had any sign of forced entry. Somehow, the killer had to have been let in.

The Boston Strangler Victims

Initially, the Boston Strangler victim list held fifteen names. After a time, two cases were solved and found to be independent perpetrators. The police also proved these assailants were not connected to the unsolved cases they cautiously suspected were the Strangler’s work. Here is the list of victims historically associated with the Boston Strangler.

1. Anna Slesers – age 56. Found: June 14, 1962 at 77 Gainsborough St., Back Bay, Boston MA. MO: Sexually assaulted with unspecified foreign object. Non-fatally strangled with a belt then fatally strangled with bathrobe cord tied in a bow around neck.

2. Mary Mullen – age 85. Found: June 28, 1962 at 1435 Commonwealth Ave., Boston MA. MO: Sexual assault in progress but died of heart attack during strangulation attempt.

3. Nina Nichols – age 68. Found: June 30, 1962 at 1940 Commonwealth Ave., Boston MA. MO: Sexually assaulted with a wine bottle. Fatal ligature strangulation with one nylon stocking. Two more postmortem nylon stockings tied around neck in a bow.

4. Helen Blake – age 65. Found: June 30, 1962 at 73 Newhall St., Lynn MA. MO: Raped and fatally strangled with nylon stockings. Another nylon and bra tied around neck postmortem.

5. Ida Irga – age 75. Found: August 19, 1962 at 7 Grove St., Beacon Hill, Boston MA. MO: Raped and manually strangled. Pillowcase around neck postmortem.

6. Jane Sullivan – age 67. Found: August 21, 1962 at 435 Columbia Rd., Dorchester, South Boston, MA. MO: Raped and fatally strangled with nylon stockings.

7. Sophie Clark – age 20. Found: December 5, 1962 at 315 Huntington Ave., Back Bay, Boston MA. MO: Raped and fatally strangled with nylon stockings. Petticoat wrapped around neck postmortem.

8. Patricia Bissette – age 23. Found: December 31, 1962 at 515 Park Drive, Back Bay, Boston MA. MO: Raped and fatally strangled with interwoven nylon stockings. Blouse also tied around neck postmortem.

9. Mary Brown – age 69. Found: March 6, 1963 at 319 Park Ave., Lawrence MA. MO: Raped, bludgeoned with a pipe, stabbed in breasts with fork and manually strangled. No ligature involved.

10. Beverly Samans – age 23. Found: May 6, 1963 at 4 University Rd., Cambridge MA. MO: Raped, stabbed four times in neck, twenty-two times in torso. Two scarves and one nylon stocking tied around neck postmortem.

11. Evelyn Corben – age 58. Found: September 6, 1963 at 224 Lafayette St., Salem MA. MO: Raped, forced to perform oral sex and fatally strangled with two nylon stockings.

12. Joann Graff – age 23. Found: 23 November, 1963 at 54 Essex St., Lawrence MA. MO: Raped, beaten and fatally strangled with nylon stockings. Black leotard wrapped around neck postmortem.

13. Mary Sullivan – age 19. Found January 4, 1964 at 44-A Charles St., Boston MA. MO: Sexually assaulted with broom handle, forced to perform oral sex, fatally strangled with nylon stocking. Two scarves tied around neck postmortem. Posed on bed with back against wall, legs spread and hand-written sign placed at feet reading “Happy New Year”.

How Albert DeSalvo Surfaced

Hindsight is a marvelous thing. Many police and forensic investigators wish they were issued it when they started their careers. Hindsight may be 20/20, but that’s not the real world in active, fluid police and forensic worlds.

Analyzing modus operandi, or method of operation, is also a marvelous thing. In hindsight, the Boston Strangler’s MOs appear glaringly obvious. But, it’s just not that clear for field investigators on the ground. These professionals had to do the best with what they had at the time. Usually that’s a name and they didn’t have Albert DeSalvo’s as a murder suspect.

Looking back, Albert DeSalvo was proficiently active across the crime spectrum. DeSalvo was a con-man duping people on scams. He boosted cars and broke into businesses. DeSalvo dealt drugs and fenced goods. But what Albert DeSalvo was really good at was scamming innocent people into letting him enter their homes.

Before the Boston Strangler case started, Boston police were baffled by sexual predators called the “Measuring Man” and the “Green Man”. They appeared to be two different entities because of two different MOs. Both behaviors were far from how the Boston Strangler operated.

The Measuring Man started his Boston business in 1960. He was a clean, well-dressed and cheery man who randomly appeared at single ladies apartment doors, confidently portraying himself as a modeling agency rep. The ruse was the lady had been recommended by her anonymous friend to be a model. The Measuring Man was asked in, took critical bust, waist and hip sizes and was never seen again.

The Green Man was more aggressive. He appeared at single women’s apartments dressed in green work clothes. His ruse was repairs, and he was let in to do his job. That turned out to be raping women, but leaving them alive. Most gave a very good description and one victim later led the police to Albert DeSalvo.

Boston police arrested Albert DeSalvo for the Green Man rapes on October 27, 1964. This was eight months after the last Boston Strangler murder. Based on DeSalvos description and distinct Green Man MO, they charged him with multiple counts of rape and related sexual assaults. DeSalvo was held in custody and remanded for a psychiatric assessment. It was the same place and time holding George Nassar.

Albert DeSalvo Meets George Nassar

George Nassar was a violent Boston area criminal. Nassar was also in psychiatric remand for cold-bloodedly killing a gas station attendant during a robbery. He was already convicted of a previous murder. They wrote the penal code for guys like George Nassar, and he’d already checked off most of the boxes.

Somehow, Albert DeSalvo and George Nassar were cell mates. No one except Nassar knows how the conversation started. He’s still alive, but not talking. However, back then, the increasingly high-profile American defense attorney F. Lee Bailey represented George Nassar. Though Nassar and Bailey—Albert DeSalvo confessed to being the Boston Strangler.

This toxic mix of masterful manipulators gave Boston police investigators the willies. Nassar was known as a cruel murderer with sexual deviancy. Bailey was an up-and-coming publicity hound. And Albert DeSalvo had absolutely no priors for anything indicating murder.

F. Lee Bailey (later famous for clients like Sam Sheppard, Patty Hearst and OJ Simpson) recorded 50 hours of interviews with DeSalvo producing 20,000 transcript pages. Bailey remained the middle man and the police never talked to DeSalvo directly.

Boston and other PD detectives carefully analyzed Albert DeSalvo’s statements. They concluded that DeSalvo got may details wrong about the crime scenes, particularly times of death that contradicted autopsy evidence. They also concluded details DeSalvo got right—certain key fact information—could well have come from another capable criminal like George Nassar.

DeSalvo suddenly recanted his confession. Police suspected a ruse between Nassar and DeSalvo to split a reward and prefer facilities. DeSalvo was already facing life imprisonment and Nassar had an appeal shot. Police also mistrusted F. Lee Baily and for a good reason, given Bailey’s track record. Eventually, Bailey goes home. DeSalvo dies. Nassar does life. And the Boston Strangler serial killings go unsolved.

Mary Sullivan and Albert DeSalvo’s Families Join Forces

This might sound like an unlikely joint venture, but the families of Mary Sullivan—13th on the Strangler list—and Albert DeSalvo joined forces to exonerate him. Both families had agendas. DeSalvo’s family wanted his name cleared as the Boston Strangler and Sullivan’s family long suspected a copycat—an associate of Mary Sullivan’s roommate.

The Sullivans and DeSalvos did a private investigation in 2000. The Boston police and other law enforcement agencies weren’t involved. Because both families had next-of-kin and executor powers, they convinced the medical examiner to exhume Mary Sullivan and Albert DeSalvo’s bodies for DNA examination.

Their goal was to isolate the killer’s DNA profile on Mary Sullivan’s remains and a known DNA profile from DeSalvo’s remains. Theoretically, this would link or exonerate the two. This was despite Mary Sullivan decomposing for 36 years and Albert DeSalvo rotting for 27.

They exhumed Mary Sullivan on October 13/14, 2000 from her grave in Hyannis MA. The forensic report of her disinterment and forensic examination is fascinating for the forensically inclined. Foreign DNA signatures developed on what was left of Sullivan’s underwear, pubic hair and head hair. They produced two separate donor profiles through degraded mitochondrial DNA profiling. The question was, “Were they contributed by Albert DeSalvo?”

The DeSalvo family authorized the Medical Examiner to exhume Albert’s body. The private team isolated suitable material and developed a unique DNA profile for Albert DeSalvo. When compared, the foreign DNA on Mary Sullivan clearly wasn’t contributed by Albert DeSalvo. Albert DeSalvo seemed innocent.

For the next 13 years, both families and many others were convinced Albert DeSalvo didn’t murder Mary Sullivan. That wasn’t so with the Boston police who still held the original semen swabs and slides from Mary Sullivan’s autopsy. They were waiting for forensic science to catch up so degraded DNA could be positively processed.

Boston Police Examine Strangler DNA in 2013

Boston and other police departments had no involvement in the 2000 private exhumations and DNA analysis. Neither did the Medical Examiner’s office or District Attorney. They let a privately-funded—and expensive—venture play out and let the private conclusions stand for what they were worth.

The authorities are no fools. They analyzed the private process flaws and waited till technology advanced. By 2013, forensic DNA analysis had three decades under its belt and was far more precise on old, degraded serology swabs and slides like those still retained from Mary Sullivan’s autopsy in 1964.

Two forensic labs worked tandemly to profile mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) from the foreign, or questioned, semen samples taken at Sullivan’s postmortem. They produced a clear biolgical picture of her killer. Now, the forensic team needed a known sample from suspects.

For years, Albert DeSalvo was the leading Boston Strangler suspect. Certainly, individual investigators had their personal opinions. But, the preponderance of evidence pointed to DeSalvo and the overall modus operandi pointed to all thirteen murders being related.

Now the Boston police and the forensic team needed a known sample from their prime suspect—Albert DeSalvo. The problem was, DeSalvo was dead. Unlike the NOK/family loop that allowed exhumation, the cops had to convince a judge to issue a search warrant.

Again, the authorities are no fools. They needed a live link to the dead for an indicative DNA donor. That lay in a living male relative of Albert DeSalvo and, by now, the cooperative ones had dropped off. The closest living DeSalvo was a nephew. He wasn’t cooperating.

So, the Boston PD did a sting where they surveilled the nephew till he discarded a plastic water bottle. From that, the forensics team developed a Y-Chromosome DNA profile that showed that someone from the DeSalvo male lineage was 99.9% likely to be Sullivan’s foreign sperm donor. This powerful biological indicator provided grounds for a second Albert DeSalvo exhumation, authorized by a court warrant. Direct nuclear DNA from Albert DeSalvo was crucial to precisely proving or disproving the connection.

On July 10, 2013 Boston police and their forensic team once again dug up Albert DeSalvo and extracted DNA from his femur and three teeth. Nine days later, the Boston PD chief, the local DA and the Massachusetts Attorney General jointly announced that Albert DeSalvo’s DNA matched Mary Sullivan’s sperm donor with odds of one in 220 billion.

It follows that if Albert DeSalvo’s semen DNA match conclusively links him as Sulivan’s killer, then the intricate MO—the nylon stocking nexus—connects DeSalvo to all thirteen killings. That evidence combination is the holy grail in a serial killer investigation and there is no doubt—no reasonable doubt—that Albert DeSalvo really was the Boston Strangler.

GILBERT PAUL JORDAN—THE “BOOZING BARBER” SERIAL KILLER

A5The term “serial killer” makes us think of hi-profile monsters like Ted Bundy, who beat and strangled his victims, or the Zodiac Killer, who shot most with a gun. There’s Clifford Olson who used a hammer. Jack The Ripper who liked his knife. And Willie Pickton who drugged his ladies, cut them apart with an electric Sawzall, then fed their pieces to his pigs.

By nature, serial killers follow a specific Modus Operandi—an M.O. peculiar to their wares. Some strangle, some shoot, some smash, and some slash. But the most unique and unsuspecting method of serial killing I’ve heard of came from Gilbert Paul Jordan, aka the “Boozing Barber”, who got his victims comatose drunk then finished them off by pouring straight vodka down their throats. He intentionally alcohol-poisoned at least nine women—possibly dozens more.

A1

Gilbert Jordan was a monster from the 1980’s operating in the Down Town East Side of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. Today, the skid row DTES of Vancouver is still one of the most dangerous, crime and drug-ridden inner cities of the world. In the DTES, the most popular drug of choice is still alcohol—ethanol as it’s known in the coroner and toxicologist world.

A6Jordan was born in 1931 and started a crime career in his twenties by kidnapping and raping a five-year-old aboriginal girl. He beat the charges and went on to commit more sexual assaults including abducting a woman from a mental institute and raping her, too. Jordan bounced in and out of jail. He continued to prey on the helpless and downtrodden, especially alcoholic women from the First Nations culture. Gilbert Jordan, himself, became a raging alcoholic and consumed over fifty ounces of vodka per day.

Jordan learned barbering skills while in prison. Between jail sentences, he set up a barber shop on East Hastings Street in the heart of Vancouver’s DTES, being a regular fixture in the seedy bar scene. He blended easily and was not at all intimidating—short, stocky, balding, with thick glasses.

Jordan was a well-known mark for buying vulnerable aboriginal women drinks and he’d take them from the bars to his barber shop or a room which he kept in a derelict hotel. Here they’d party till they passed out. It’s estimated that hundreds of women binge drank with Jordan during his spree from 1980 to 1987.

Overdose deaths in the DTES were common.

A7The majority were intravenous drug users, many having a lethal toxin level amplified with mixed use of ethanol. It’s still that way today. But overdose deaths from ethanol consumption alone are rare. Usually, heavy drinkers reach a blood-ethanol limit where they pass out—long before ethanol effects shut down their central nervous system. The few deaths from ethanol alone are almost always caused by an unconscious victim aspirating on vomit—not from reaching a lethal blood-ethanol-content. A BEC of 0.35% (35mg of ethanol per 100 milliliters of blood) is considered the start of the lethal range. Note that 0.08% is the standard for drunk driving.

During Jordan’s run, there were increasingly suspicious amounts of aboriginal women deaths from shockingly high BEC. They included:

  1. Ivy Rose — 0.51
  2. Mary Johnson — 0.44
  3. Barbara Paul — 0.47
  4. Mary Johns — 0.76
  5. Patricia Thomas — 0.51
  6. Patricia Andrew — 0.79
  7. Vera Harry — 0.49
  8. Vanessa Buckner — 0.50
  9. Edna Slade — 0.55

A8When Edna Slade was found dead in Gilbert Jordan’s hotel room, and it became apparent Jordan was the common denominator in many similar deaths, Vancouver Police put Jordan under surveillance. From October 12th to November 26th, 1987, VPD observed Jordan “search out native Indian women in the skid row area of Vancouver and take them back to his hotel room for binge-drinking”.

VPD officers listened from outside Jordan’s door and recorded him saying phrases like “Have a drink. Down the hatch, baby. Twenty bucks if you drink it right down. See if you’re a real woman. Finish that drink. Down the hatch, hurry, right down. You need another drink. I’ll give you fifty bucks if you can take it right down. I’ll give you ten, twenty, fifty dollars. Whatever you want. Come on, I want to see you get it all down. Get it right down.”

On four occasions during the surveillance, police intervened and remove the comatose victims to the hospital.

A9Gilbert Jordan was convicted of manslaughter in the death of Vanessa Buckner. The prosecution used similar fact evidence from the other eight identified deaths. He was sentenced to fifteen years imprisonment. This was reduced to nine years on appeal and he served only six. When Jordan was paroled in 1994, he went right back to the business of stalking alcoholic aboriginal women. He was being watched by VPD and immediately sent back to prison for parole violation and an additional sexual assault. He served out his sentenced but was released in 2000, again returning to a life of chronic alcoholism and serial predation.

Gilbert Jordan, the Boozing Barber, died of the disease called alcoholism in 2006.

*   *   *

Ethanol, or ethyl alcohol, has been used by humans for thousands of years for its relaxation effect of euphoria and lowering social inhibitions. Drinking ethanol is widely accepted around the western world and is an enormous economic force.

A12Ethanol abuse is a contributing factor in untold tragedies.

Despite ethanol’s popularity as a social interactor, the medical pathophysiology considers any amount of BEC to be clinically poisonous. Ethanol is metabolized by the liver at a rate of about 50 ml (1.7 fluid ounce) per 90 minutes. That’s like two beers or one 9-ounce glass of wine every hour and a half. Drink more than you can absorb and you’ll get drunk. Wake up still drunk and you’re hung-over.

A13The acute effects of an ethanol overdose vary according to many factors. The body mass and tolerance to the drug are primary as is the rate of consumption. Ultimately, acute ethanol poisoning depresses the body’s central nervous system, causing the respiratory system to shut down and the victim asphyxiates.

These are the average symptomatic presentations of ethanol poisoning in relation to BEC:

  • 02 – 0.07% — Intoxication and euphoria
  • 08 – 0.19% — Ataxia (loss of body control ), poor judgment, labile mood
  • 20 – 0.29% — Advanced ataxia, extremely poor judgment, nausea
  • 30 – 0.35% — Stage 1 anesthesia, memory collapse
  • 35 – 0.39% — Comatose
  • 40 +             — Respiratory failure, sudden death

A14In my time as a police officer—then as a coroner—I attended lots of deaths where ethanol was a contributing factor. Very few were acute ethanol poisoning deaths, though. Many were mixed drug overdoses, especially mixing booze with prescription pills. Then there were suffocating on puke cases, suicides while pissed, fatal motor vehicle crashes driven by drunks, and violent homicides done during ethanol-fueled anger and inebriation.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not slamming the social use of ethanol. I’ve been around the booze scene my whole life and still enjoy decent wine and good scotch, although I’ve never had a taste for beer.

A15I grew up in a socio-economic environment where rampant alcoholism was common. It was accepted. Grant Robertson—I worked with Grant in my teens—Grant was proud of his breathalyzer certificate proving he was caught behind the wheel at a 0.44% BEC. True story. I saw the paper. Grant was a die-hard—a chronic alcoholic with forty years of practice. I don’t think Grant ever went below two-five.

As a young cop, I brought an old guy in for a blow. I couldn’t tell if he was drunk but he’d caused a minor car accident and slightly smelled of liquor. Legally, I had to demand a breathalyzer test. He pushed the needle to a 0.36% and I’ll never forget the breathalyzer operator’s remark “You’re no stranger to alcohol, are you?”

People have different tolerances to ethanol. And different physiological responses.

A16I’ve worked with cops who were drunk on duty, seen judges half-cut on the bench, had my pilot pass out before time to depart, and I’ve woken in places unknown. I’ve had countless laughs, spent way too much money on time pissed away, and have stories from nights in the bars.

But I still can’t get clipped in my buddy Dave’s chair without thinking of Gilbert Paul Jordan, the “Boozing Barber” Serial Killer of the Down Town East Side of Vancouver.