They had been placed roughly 10 yards from Ocean Parkway, the main east-west thoroughfare that traverses a barrier island off the South Shore. DNA technology helped investigators identify a serial killer responsible for the murders of three Eugene women in the late 1980s. It was later discovered that the I-5 Killer was Randall Woodfield, a gifted athlete and well-liked former student at Portland State University. John Charles Bolsinger, who died shortly after the final murder, has been identified as the man who killed a string of women in Oregon in the 1980s years after he was convicted of a first murder. Soonafter, he returned to the Eugene-Springfield area andenrolled in Lane Community College for the winter term. He was convicted and served five years in prison before being paroled on March 7, 1986, to Springfield, Oregon. Investigators found the suspects house in the area where they had begun creating their polygon. In a press release, authorities state, The Eugene Police Department and the Oregon State Police are pleased to finally bring closure to the family members of Gladys, Janice, and Geraldine, as well as our community. The driver was just as distinctive: hulking, in his 40s, with bushy dark hair and 1970s-style eyeglasses. Carlee Russell:Alabama woman admits disappearance, 'missing child' reported on highway, a hoax, police say. He holds dual bachelor's degrees from Pace University and a master's degree from New York University. Thats also where the phone of one victim, Megan Waterman, was last logged at 3:11 a.m. on June 6, 2010, shortly before she disappeared, according to court papers. The technology let detectives narrow down a profile for the suspect, giving a sense of their face shape, hair, skin and eye color, and ancestry,Parabon's Ellen Greytak said at a news conference alongside Curry where they released the new sketchin January 2018. Woodfield was arrested after investigators discovered phone records placing him in the area of multiple murders that took place on I-5. The Avalanche lead, said Mr. Tierney, the district attorney, had been known pretty much from the beginning. Mr. Tierney, who took office in 2022, said he did not know why investigators had not pursued it. Tell us your thoughts in the comments. Her alleged killer, John Charles Bolsinger, killed himself days after the sketch was made public. Michael Lee. Mr. Tierney had grown increasingly worried that more victims would drop on his watch. Bolsinger had a history of violence long before he encountered his alleged victims in Eugene. EUGENE, Ore. A convicted murderer who died by suicide in 1988 has been identified through genetic genealogy as an Oregon serial killer who killed at least three women in the two years before his death. Investigators learned that several of the murders had occurred when Mr. Heuermanns wife and children were out of town, according to prosecutors. Get more stories delivered right to your email. The investigative method exploded in popularity after California authorities used it in 2018 to identify the notorious Golden State Killer. 10 to Midnight; 555 (1988 film) A. Amsterdamned; Angst (1983 film) Anguish (1987 film) Antropophagus; Apology (film) L'assassino ancora tra noi; B. Both agencies remain committed to constantly evaluating unsolved cases and utilizing emerging technologies to bring closure to other families of crime victims.. Detectives with the Eugene Police Department restarted the investigation in 2016, following the release of new technology fromParabon Nano Labs that could inferphysical characteristics of people based on DNA. You will receive your first email soon. After her body was found the next day, detectives noted that the phone lines had been cut, the newspaper reported. He said that Mr. Heuermann had been visiting massage parlors and contacting women working as escorts. According to police, She saw the window slide open and then the suspect reached inside and removed a brace in the slider. He drove a vehicle with a distinctive look: SUV in the front, pickup in the back. "We obviously didn't just use DNA in this case, there was footwear analysis,fingerprint analysis," Curry said. When her sister arrived to take Geraldine Toohey to church the morning of Feb. 28, 1988, peered into a window after a knock on the door went unanswered. And Mr. Sini had invested in a system that allowed investigators to take the relevant areas, as he told Newsday, and shrink them to extremely manageable spaces.. After reading about John Charles Bolsinger, learn about the victim of serial killer Robert Hansen who was identified via DNA. According to police, Bolsinger was arrested for an unrelated murder in Salt Lake City in 1980. He had then panicked and fled. It wasn't until January that McCord said the investigators finally started to get some traction when Bibb's potential brother's allowed for a DNA sample to be collected and tested. What other crimes have occurred in Oregon in your lifetime? First serial killer to be apprehended via usage of offender profiling: Melanson, Roy: 1974-1988 3 5+ Died in prison Your California Privacy Rights/Privacy Policy. Serial killings: Gladys Hensley, 62, was found slain June 5, 1986, in her ground floor unit at Parkview Terrace, pictured in 2021 in Eugene, Ore. Police announced Feb. 2, 2022, that DNA has identified John Charles Bolsinger as the killer of Hensley and two other women. He had beaten a suspect who had been arrested after stealing cigars and a bag containing pornography and sex toys from Mr. Burkes sport utility vehicle. Per-anders Pettersson/Getty Images. All the while, Mr. Heuermann was searching, too, asking Google the same question that so many of his neighbors had been asking each other for more than a decade: why hasnt the long island serial killer been caught?. Police officials said Hensley likely died in the early morning hours of June 4, 1986. Do you have any memories of these homicides? Toohey's 1988 murder was just two months after Bolsinger was released from prison. Ms. Gilberts corpse and other remains, including those that the authorities described as a man wearing womens clothing and a toddler, would be found along the same roadway over the following year. According to police, her killer had gained entry by cutting the screen of an unlocked window and climbing inside. Bolsinger, 30, took his own life in March 1988, weeks after his final alleged murder. Using DNA technology, the Eugene Police Department has pinpointed John Charles Bolsinger who died by suicide in 1988 at age 31 as the man who killedMay Hensley, 62, and Janice Marie Dickinson, 33, in 1986 as well as73-year-old Geraldine Spencer Toohey in 1988. Police in Dallas, Texas arrested 25-year-old Oscar Sanchez Garcia last week in connection with the death of three women believed to be sex workers. Though they're not using the term serial killer, a joint . Despite the reinvigorated investigation in the 1990s, no conclusions came and the case remained cold for more than two decades. Geradine Toohey, 73, was found slain Feb. 28, 1988, in her home, pictured in 2021, in Eugene, Ore. Police announced Feb. 2, 2022, that DNA has identified John Charles Bolsinger as the killer of Toohey and two other women. Over the years these high-profile crimes have ranged from the twisted acts of serial killers to racially-driven attacks to, just maybe, a "deep state" political assassination. The Most Dangerous Serial Killers Of The 1970s - Grunge Oregons most prolific serial killer had just been caught, and we were all horrified when we heard of his crimes. (Eugene Police Department). The going was slow, and though investigators expressed optimism they would find their man, they had little to show. More than a month after the Portland police spoke out against online speculation about a possible serial killer in the Pacific Northwest, investigators . There appears to have been some kind of struggle taking place there. 2023 Cox Media Group. Detectives made a timeline of Bolsinger's life going back to 1975, which showed he had interactions with law enforcement in Oregon and Utah, but was never connected to the murders in the 1980s or early 1990s. We found her where she died, Eugene police Detective Sgt. Bolsinger, 30, took his own life in March 1988, weeks after his final alleged murder. By Crystal Bonvillian, Cox Media Group National Content Desk March 01 . But the first four bodies all petite women in their 20s who had gone missing in the previous four years seemed linked. Lyda Southard (Lady Bluebeard) is often considered Idaho's (and the country's) first female serial killer. After 40 years, a teenage victim of the Midwest's 'interstate' serial killer is identified. He was sentenced to another five years in prison, but he was released just over a year later, on Dec. 8, 1987. Randall Woodfield, the I-5 killer, former Green Bay Packer However, the victim was still terrified about the . At the age of 15, Kinkel murdered his parents and then went on a shooting spree at Thurston High School in Springfield, killing two students and wounding at least 25 others. Shockingly, he was a draft pick for the Green Bay Packers. She had been stabbed, strangled and sexually assaulted, insimilar fashion to the other murdersat her home in the 5400 block of Franklin Boulevard. Though Oregon ranks number six in the nation for serial murders, we actually know very little about what drives these killers. She started screaming as the suspect tried to pull the phone from hand. The burglary investigation began Sept. 26, when officers arrived at a home on South 51st Place in Springfield to the sound of a woman screaming. Throughout his appeals process, Dayton Leroy Rogers has been sentenced to death four times. According to the City of Eugene, renewed investigations by the Eugene Police Department (EPD) and Oregon State Police have finally identified the womens murderer as John Charles Bolsinger. Seattle/Minneapolis Suspected in dozens of sex-slayings spanning four decades and several Western states and provinces, Carignan is thought to have killed at least two women in Washington. His orgy of. In the investigations early days, at least five hairs were discovered on the victims or stuck to the burlap or duct tape that enveloped them. For more true crime tales from the Beaver State, check out our previous article: 6 Disturbing Unsolved Mysteries In Oregon That Will Leave You Baffled. Ashley Pond (age 12) and Miranda Gaddis (age 13) were both students at Gardiner Middle School. When Rogers finally pulled into his own driveway, the witness was able to get his address, which led to Rogers' arrest. The body of Janice Dickinson was found June 19, 1986, in a grassy area behind a car dealership. While Oregon is generally considered to be a safe place to live, theres no denying that we have had more than our fair share of infamous crimes. You can find out more about our use, change your default settings, and withdraw your consent at any time with effect for the future by visiting Cookies Settings, which can also be found in the footer of the site. James Lee Calhoun, 38, was arrested on June 6 for a parole violation, and he has not yet been charged with any of the deaths . Investigators concluded that most of the hairs found on the victims were likely to have come from Mr. Heuermanns wife. It found enough markers in common to conclude that while 99.96 percent of the population could be excluded as a match, Mr. Heuermann could not, the authorities said. The list of Pacific Northwest serial killers you've been dying for In the late 1980s, a string of seemingly connected murders left police in Eugene, Oregon baffled. A man pretending to be the outraged boyfriend rushed in, part of a ruse to steal the money, according to the court papers. Once the service pinpointed Bolsinger as the likely killer and authorities were able to confirm the DNA match, they were able to fill in some of the blanks in the serial killer investigation. But his billing records showed the general location of the phone when calls were made, the court papers said, putting it in New York City around the same time in 2010 that the cruel and taunting calls were made on Ms. Barthelemys cellphone. The more investigators learned about Mr. Heuermann, the more convinced they were. In 1988, Mulgeta Seraw, a 27-year-old Ethiopian student, was beaten to death with a baseball bat by Kenneth Mieske, Kyle Brewster, and Steven Strasser. In the 1980s, the town of Molalla was much smaller . The suspect fled through the kitchen window. A decade before, 11 bodies had been found in the underbrush around Gilgo Beach, a remote stretch of sand five miles away on the South Shore. He read the report again and again perhaps dozens of times, as if trying to convince his brain of what his eyes were seeing. In court, Bolsinger claimed that he and Sorensen had been engaging in a consensual sexual act that accidentally led to her death. Because Bibbs' DNA was "highly degraded," the case languished for more than two years in the labs as volunteer genealogists worked to create a DNA profile that could be uploaded to the databases used for forensic cases, Lauritzen said. But the investigation also raised an unsettling question: Could the authorities have solved the case years earlier? A surveillance team retrieved the remnants of the suspects pizza from a trash can in New York. (Google). There are links between four cases: Kristin Smith, Charity Perry, Bridget Webster and Ashley Real. Antti/Flickr. It allows for a cross-referencingof genetic analysis andtraditional historical and genealogical research, such as census records, obituaries and newspapers. served a five-year prison sentence before being paroled to Springfield, Oregon in 1986. Eugene Police Department, Using DNA technology, the Eugene Police Department, John Charles Bolsinger who died by suicide in 1988 at age 31 as the man who killed, May Hensley, 62, and Janice Marie Dickinson, 33, in 1986 as well as. Bolsinger was sentenced to five years in prison but was released on Dec. 8, 1987. Contact him at [email protected], and follow him on Twitter@LouisKraussNews. In the meantime, a customer hopped into his vehicle and followed Rogers on a high-speed chase. Here are the most notorious serial killers and murder locations in Idaho. Two weeks later, on June 19, the nude body of 33-year-old Janice Marie Dickinson was found behind a Eugene car dealership. In 2016, the department tried Snapshot Phenotyping, which uses physical characteristics of individuals based on DNA information to find a suspect. Each, shortly before she disappeared, had been in contact with a different disposable cellphone. Ill tell you right now: No suspect vehicle was on our radar when I was still there, he added. It ended with Bolsinger being convicted and sentenced to five years in an Oregon prison. "She started striking the suspect with the phone and a flashlight. Pennsylvania:Former pastor charged in 1975 murder of Gretchen Harrington, 8, who was walking to church. A staff writer for All Thats Interesting, Marco Margaritoff has also published work at outlets including People, VICE, and Complex, covering everything from film to finance to technology. The image alleges that 19 female bodies have been found near the Springwater Corridor, a popular pedestrian trail in the greater Portland area, and that "a lot of the bodies matched missing persons."Text in the image also suggests that the information is being withheld from the public because Oregon Gov. The description of the vehicle in the driveway, a dark, first-generation Chevrolet Avalanche, ended up tucked away in the case file, the authorities said. This technology uses a database of genetic material to locate potential family members connected to unidentified DNA. The Oregon City community was rocked in 2002 after two young girls went missing. FACT CHECK: Were 19 Female Bodies Discovered Near The Springwater Suspected Portland serial killer had tried to choke police K-9, was One laboratory compared the DNA profile from the fifth hair to the genetic material found on Mr. Heuermanns pizza. I just happened to see her up there, mechanic John Nelson told the newspaper. 1. Again, less than three months after his release, he killed 73-year-old Geraldine Spencer Toohey in her home on Feb. 28, 1988. The Rajneeshees (continued) In 1984, roughly 700 people got sick after ingesting food from salad bars in The Dalles intentionally laced with salmonella by the Rajneeshees. According to the Register-Guard, a mechanic from the business found Dickinson lying face-up under a cottonwood tree about 20 feet from the dealerships parking lot. Eugene Police spokesman JohnHankemeier wrote that the department is"pleased to finally bring closure to the family members of Gladys, Janice and Geraldine, as well as our community.". Henry Lee Lucas and Ottis Toole, the Confession Killers. He was charged with three of the murders, to which he has pleaded not guilty, and was named as the prime suspect in the fourth. In the Gilgo Beach investigation, the critical clue had fallen through the cracks. Additional evidence, including Bolsingers history and criminal profile, clarified him as the culprit. We'll take a look at the crimes of: Gary Ridgway. Althoughpolice said he was given a five-year Oregonprison sentence for the burglary, Bolsinger was transferred to Utah State Prison on Aug. 4, 1987, before being released early on Dec. 8, 1987. agents in 2012 had already identified the area where coverage from four cell towers overlapped in Massapequa Park. By mid-2016, Mr. Sini had secured a court order for tower dumps information on every phone that connected to particular towers in a given window of time. Do you think youll ever speak to her again? the person had asked in a bland, calm voice. They were deemed unsuitable for detailed DNA analysis. She heard her dog making strange noises in the kitchen, so she went to investigate, the news release stated. How fears about Devil worship shaped Oregon in the 1980s Two weeks later, a murder happenedin a public setting on a grassy hillside behind a car dealership on Coburg Road just north of the Ferry Street Bridge. "She saw the window slide open and then the suspect reached inside and removed a brace in the slider. Want to keep up with the latest crime coverage? 1980s Serial Killer Who Murdered Women in Oregon Identified as Convicted Criminal John Charles Bolsinger Bolsinger killed himself in 1988 before he was linked to the slayings By Christine. Known as the "Highway Killer," Eyler was suspected of killing more than 20 people, most of whom were discovered near interstates in several Midwest states. However, he was shortly let go by the team. The killer often has no personal connection to the victims. About three months later, the other murders began. Category:1980s serial killer films - Wikipedia A search for one missing woman on a South Shore beach yielded the remains of four others. Piecing Together the Story of an Oregon Serial Killer There are piles of evidence, he said. 6 Most Notorious, Dangerous Idaho Serial Killers - Only In Your State David Berkowitz, known as Son of Sam and perhaps the state's most notorious serial killer, was arrested in the 1970s after the police found that he owned an illegally parked Ford Galaxie that .