Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - BTK Killer Dennis Rader speaks: A demon made him murder

Episode Date: September 12, 2018

“BTK Killer” Dennis Rader claims in a just-released interview that a “demon” inside of him caused him to kill 10 people over a 17-year period in Wichita, Kansas. Nancy Grace explores that t...he 73-year-old serial killer says in the Oxygen documentary “Snapped: Notorious BTK Serial Killer.” Grace's experts include medical examiner Dr. William Morrone, Southern California prosecutor Wendy Patrick, Los Angeles psycho analyst Dr. Bethany Marshall, Los Angeles lawyer Troy Slaten, Cold Case Research Institute director Sheryl McCollum, and Crime Stories report er John Lemley. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Starting point is 00:00:00 This is an iHeart Podcast. If you have heard about the murder of Jessica Chambers, you do not want to miss the new docuseries on oxygen. The true story of a teen girl, a Mississippi cheerleader, burned alive, and the story of the man accused of this horrific crime. Is the right man on trial? Who is he? And who was Jessica Chambers? How does such a horrific crime even happen? More questions than answers. A case that has captured American headlines, takes over social media, and leaves a small town divided. A must-see TV event.
Starting point is 00:00:44 Unspeakable crime. The Killing of Jessica Chambers airs Saturday, September 15, 7, 6 Central on Oxygen, the new network for crime. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. I would get these feelings of being woozy. It was really unusual. And I was going to the doctor to find out what was wrong. They sent me to all kinds of specialists. It was after Dennis was arrested and probably about two weeks later,
Starting point is 00:01:23 it finally occurred to me you know what i'm not having any symptoms anymore and then it occurred to me that dennis and i were the only two people at the city who had access to a locked file cabinet for tranquilizer for animals. And I truly believe that Dennis was putting very tiny drops into my diapopsy. I personally believe, and I have no way of being able to prove this, I was a guinea pig for his ability to use tranquilizer on other victims. You are hearing Mary Capps, who worked with a serial killer for seven years, only knowing him as a bad-tempered boss, but she came to realize she was lucky to be alive. We are talking about BTK, bind, torture, and kill,
Starting point is 00:02:23 serial killer Dennis Rader, who has just spoken from behind jailhouse walls. I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories. Thank you for being with us. BTK Bind, Torture and Kill Dennis Rader. I knew something was up when I first found out he was a dog catcher. Who wants to catch dogs to haul them off to be euthanized? I mean, is that some kind of a freaky calling? But other than that career choice, he seemed to be normal. To John Limley, investigative reporter, who is BTK Dennis Rader and the guy who terrorized Wichita, Kansas for 17 years. We know of 10 brutal torture and murder victims.
Starting point is 00:03:17 Dennis Rader, the oldest of four sons, though born in Pittsburgh, Kansas. He grew up in Wichita. He went into the Air Force. He worked as an assembler for the Coleman Company, that outdoor supply company. He began to show signs that things were just not quite right as he was growing up. His parents recalled seeing him spending a lot of time alone. He was really obsessed with death and, as so often is the case, the death of small animals. Okay, right there.
Starting point is 00:03:55 It's a red bell of alarm. Joining me, John Limley, CrimeOnline.com investigative reporter. You can find this and all other breaking crime and justice news at crime online dot com dr william maroney esteemed medical examiner joining us author of a brand new book on amazon american narcan veteran trial lawyer out of la troy slayton he'll come up with the defense even for btk dr bethany marshall psychoanalyst joining joining us from L.A., Cheryl McCollum, director of the Cold Case Investigative Research Institute, and Wendy Patrick, California prosecutor. When you say tortured small animals, Dr. Bethany Marshall, all sorts of alarms go off in my head. Explain. Absolutely.
Starting point is 00:04:41 I mean, you hear budding sociopaths. What we know about sociopathy is that there is a wish to relate to everybody on the basis of power rather than affection. Sociopathy is a disorder of detachment. do not attach to other people in a loving way. They only want to dominate them. They have a parasitic relationship with them. They want to take things from them. They want to cheat on others. And so the behavioral pattern we see in children and youth who are going to become sociopaths is that they begin to assert their dominance over animals, often to the point of cruelty, of killing and maiming animals and so this is really the canary in the coal mine basically
Starting point is 00:05:30 clinically when you want to look back and see if somebody a sociopath you look at their relationships with animals in their youth and childhood okay those were a lot of words dr bethany marshall i'm trying to process. Cheryl McCollum, break it down in regular people talk. It's straight out of the serial killer handbook. If you want to be a serial killer, you're going to start some fires. You're going to wet the bed past what we consider normal age, and you're going to torture small animals. We are talking about BTK, bind, torture, and kill.
Starting point is 00:06:03 Take a listen to Dr. Catherine Ramsland. But Rader's father worked long hours. He didn't see him a lot. He said his mother liked to read or watch TV, so she didn't pay a lot of attention to the kids. And she did let the grandparents take over some of the child rearing. I got along real well with Dad. But Mom always wasn't quite happy. I always loved her.
Starting point is 00:06:27 I still love her greatly. But I did have a little bit of grudge against mom. I'm Dr. Katherine Ramsland. I'm a professor of forensic psychology. I've had extensive correspondence with Dennis Rader, the BTK serial killer, because I wrote a book with Dennis Rader called Confession of a Serial Killer. When he was young, his mother's ring got caught on a couch spring, and she couldn't get her hand out. She apparently was terrified and told him to go get help. And he felt the first stirrings of arousal over this. It was exciting to him to see a woman helpless.
Starting point is 00:07:17 And it was the beginning of his ideas about women that what he wanted from them was to keep them trapped and helpless and looking to him in terror. That became imprinted in his mind keep them trapped and helpless and looking to him in terror, that became imprinted in his mind and became the image he was always after. That is a discussion. You're hearing the voice of Catherine Ramsland, Dr. Catherine Ramsland, who had dozens and dozens and dozens of conversations, correspondence with BTK, Rader insisting there is a, quote, dark side of him, the demons inside me. You know what? Cheryl McCollum, Wendy Patrick, Bethany Marshall, Troy Slayton, William Maroney. How many times do we have to see it? So often when we see
Starting point is 00:08:00 horrific evil acts like those of BTK, Dennis Rader, buying, torture, kill. They blame the devil. Oh, the devil made me do it. It's the demon in me. Cheryl McCollum, this guy is blaming the, quote, demon inside of him, the devil. You remember that old phrase, the devil made me do it? That's what the person chuckles about? Oh, yeah.
Starting point is 00:08:23 It's complete garbage. He doesn't want to admit that it's him. So, obviously, he's going to say, hey, it was the devil. Because what I did was so horrific and so horrible that when people hear about it, I've got to have an excuse ready. And the only excuse there is is the devil. Take a listen to what Jeffrey Davis, son of one of BTK's victims, has to say. Sitting here before us is a depraved predator, a rabid animal that has murdered people, poisoned countless lives, and terrorized this community for 30 years, all the
Starting point is 00:08:59 while relishing every minute of it. As such, there can be no justice harsh enough or revenge bitter enough, in this world at least, to cause the pain and suffering which a social malignancy like this has coming. Therefore, I have determined that for the sake of our innocent victims and their loving families and friends with us here today, for me, this will be a day of celebration, not retribution. If my focus were hatred, I would stare you down and call you a demon from hell who defiles this court at the very sight of its cancerous presence. If I embraced bitterness, I would remind you that you are nothing but a despicable, child-murdering being treated to the same despicable brutality, terror, and agony at the hands of your soon-to-be fellow inmates that you relished inflicting on your defenseless victims. If I were spiteful, I would remind you that it is only fitting that a twisted narcissistic psychopath obsessed with public attention will soon have his world reduced to an isolated solitary existence in an 80 square foot cell. He had gotten away with a lived a normal life and he decides to reappear?
Starting point is 00:10:10 His ego was everything to him and he was the master manipulator. Dennis Rader wanted to taunt the media and the police. He was mocking them. He started writing the most chilling letters to us. He thanked the news team for getting the word out. Many of us thought that he was contemplating another kill and it could be someone in our station. I didn't know whether I was the next victim. You are hearing right there local news reporters recalling strange events surrounding the BTK investigation and I find it it very, very odd to Wendy Patchett, California prosecutor, that he, the BTK killer, buying torture kill Dennis Rader, wanted to, quote, get the word out.
Starting point is 00:10:54 Most killers want to keep it a secret. Well, you know, we live in a day and age where, unfortunately, the notoriety associated with some of these despicable actions is arousing to some suspects and some defendants. We've seen that with shootings. We've seen that with other types of killings. This man apparently was at it for three decades. And so at some point, it's almost like he wanted credit for his work. It's unthinkable. It's inhumane. But it's in this mindset. And that's part of why Dr. Ramsland wrote this book with him. It's this mindset that we want to know in case we see red flags, which, which I, believably, nobody saw in this particular case. That's part of the reason he wanted the story out. To Cheryl McCollum, director of the Cold Case Research Institute, what exactly happened? Let me go on one thing real quick. When you have a killer like Son of Sam or Zodiac or BTK that gives themselves a nickname,
Starting point is 00:11:52 that's a window into that person's ego. Of course he wanted credit. There was no other person like this. When he first decided he was going to kill, he didn't choose one victim. He chose a family that he was going to strangle with his bare hands and then proceeded to tell us, you know what? I just didn't know it was going to take that much strength. Serious grief. That's what his issue was.
Starting point is 00:12:24 That he just needed to get in better shape so he could keep killing. He gave himself a nickname. he reached out to the media he wanted the credit that's how you become famous you know to troy slayton a veteran defense lawyer how are you going to defend this raider known as btk by torture kill actually once dressed up as one of his victims i'm looking at the photo now it's of him wearing that looks like to be kind of a dress and he's tied himself all up and he's wearing a blonde freaky wig and he looks like he's got on a doll mask with it's solid white with blackened out eyes and red blobs on the cheeks for rouge and interestingly he has tied a blue binding across his own mouth i'm looking at the picture right now, Troy Slayton. Defense.
Starting point is 00:13:28 This is clearly not somebody who is in control of all of their mental faculties, Nancy. But aside from that, in a case like this. Really? Because he held down a job as a dog catcher and was a leader in his local church, a former church leader who hid his killings from his wife and two children. What about that? What do you mean he's insane? The Constitution of the United States of America protects everybody. And so what I do in a case like this is— I know you're in trouble.
Starting point is 00:14:03 Wendy, they're in trouble when they start quoting the Constitution because there's nothing in the law that's going to protect this guy, Wendy. When the defense starts quoting the Constitution, I know they're in deep doo-doo. That's true. You only go there when you have nothing else. And, you know, it's a tough question for Troy because it's indefensible. It's one of those... It is indefensible, Ms. Patrick.
Starting point is 00:14:26 Here he comes with the Constitution again. Come at me, man. I'm ready. What the defense attorneys need to do here is try and save his life. And so what we are looking to do is to take the death penalty off the table. And so the entire purpose of the defense is to not try and have him be found not guilty, but it's to try and spare him from the death penalty. You know, it's amazing how some people would interpret this as God getting up in the middle of it again, because he was actually tracked.
Starting point is 00:15:10 He was ultimately brought down by a floppy disk that led police to trace it back to his church. OK, so he by by Sunday mornings is is this churchgoer, worshiping family man. The whole time he's out as a dog catcher, tracking, scoping out victims in various neighborhoods all over town. To John Limley, CrimeOnline.com investigative reporter, tell me about his crimes. Nancy, the really interesting thing is to go back to the very first of those crimes and to, for a moment, take this from the point of view of the survivors and the victims. Charlie Otero was a 15-year-old boy. He had had a great day on this January afternoon. He had aced a bunch. Okay, when you say something like that, John, I know something bad is about to happen. When you say something like, he had a great day,
Starting point is 00:16:19 or like, it was a sunny afternoon. That's how you always do it, John Limley. And it was sunny. Then was stab me. Go ahead. It was sunny. Okay, go ahead. So as Charlie Otero is crossing the street to his family's white bungalow, he sees that the garage door is open and his mother's car is missing. Right there, he knows something is not right because his mother is always there to greet him when he gets home from school. So he walks around back trying to figure out what's going on. The family dog then runs toward him across the snow. No one ever let this dog, a German shepherd mix, lucky out of the house, outside alone at least. Charlie walks into the kitchen,
Starting point is 00:17:07 notices a half-made peanut butter sandwich sitting on the table besides an empty lunch box. It seems that his 14-year-old brother and 13-year-old sister had returned home just minutes before him, and Carmen, the girl, comes running and says, come quick, Mom and Dad are playing a bad joke on us. It's anything but a joke. From the doorway of his parents' bedroom, Charlie sees his dad on the carpet by the bed.
Starting point is 00:17:33 He has been strangled with a belt. He's a handsome guy, but his features were grotesquely swollen. His mother lay on the mattress. Some clothesline clenched and cinched around her neck. Both of them had been bound with thin cord at the wrists and ankles. And at this point, they think that another brother and sister are still at school, but they'll find out differently, unfortunately. When you say that, it just breaks my heart because it makes me think of my own children coming in to find such a horrible thing. mouth, Dennis Rader, describing very unemotionally the
Starting point is 00:18:28 Otero family, his first victims. They talked to me about giving the car and whatever money. I guess they didn't have very much money. There I realized that
Starting point is 00:18:43 I was already, I didn't have a mask on or anything. They already could ID me and made a decision to go ahead and put them down, I guess, or strangle them. I had never strangled anyone before, so I really didn't know how much pressure you had to put on a person or how long it would take. I strangled Mrs. Oteroo and she went out or passed out. I thought she was dead. She passed out. Then I strangled Josephine. She passed out. I thought she was dead. Then I went over and put a bag on Junior's head.
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Starting point is 00:21:38 They talked to me about giving the car and whatever money. I guess they didn't have very much money. And there I realized that, you know, I was already, I didn't have a mask on or anything. They already could ID me and made a decision to go ahead and shut them down, I guess, or strangle them. I had never strangled anyone before, so I really didn't know how much pressure you had to put on a person or how long it would take. I strangled Mrs. Otero, and she went out or passed out. I thought she was dead.
Starting point is 00:22:17 She passed out. Then I strangled Josephine. She passed out. I thought she was dead. And then I went over and put a bag on Junior's head. You are hearing BTK, Bind, Torture, Kill, serial killer Dennis Rader, the dog catcher, describing with very little emotion how he, quote, put him down. How he killed the Otero family. But that's just the tip of the iceberg.
Starting point is 00:22:49 Listen to what he says next. Josephine had woke back up, and I took her to the basement and eventually hung her. I had some sexual fantasies, but that was after she was hung. Went through the house, kind of cleaned it up. It's called the right-hand rule. You go from room to room. Picked everything up. I think I took Mr. Otero's watch.
Starting point is 00:23:14 I guess I took a radio. I'd forgot about that, but apparently I took a radio. Did you hear what he just said? He's talking about killing Mr. and Mrs. Otero, but then he goes on to talk about killing, very dispassionately, Josephine Otero. Josephine. He hung Josephine. She was just 11 years old. He hung her in the basement. Josephine Otero. To John Limley, CrimeOnline.com investigative reporter. I'm looking at photos right now as they haul out on a gurney a little body covered with a blanket and just like the brother says there's snow outside
Starting point is 00:24:08 it's just you know a suburban home they're walking up the path a body is being removed from the scene of BTK's first known murders Joseph, Julie Josephine
Starting point is 00:24:22 and Joseph II. All four of them found dead in their home. I'm looking at them, and I'm looking at the little boy, Joseph Otero II, and little Josephine. How was Josephine found, John Limley? Joey had been asphyxiated with a plastic bag in his bedroom. Josie's partially clad body was hanging from a pipe in the basement. Dr. Bethany Marshall, psychoanalyst, joining me from LA, he said he had a sexual fantasy. He's lying. He lived out that sexual fantasy on that little girl. He lived it out. That little girl hanging in the basement, Nancy.
Starting point is 00:25:16 You know, we know that certain animals are born with a predatory instinct. Like, say, a lion on the savannah might eat a springbok and not think twice about it. It's lunch. It's bad for the springbok, but lion doesn't think much about it. That's what we call cold-blooded. And this is very rare amongst humans, but some human beings are born with a very strong predatory instinct. And killing is just like an animal that's trying to get its lunch. It's that inconsequential to them. And when I hear the BTK killer in court and in these interviews say, yeah, I had to apply a little more pressure. Oh, you know what? He tore the bag that was over his head. So I put another bag over his head just to make sure he was dead. I hear
Starting point is 00:26:06 something called alexithymia. And alexithymia is when a person uses the same words you and I might use, but the meanings are very thin. Like put a bag over his head, hang her in the basement, apply more pressure. These would be horrifying things for us to say, but they have absolutely no meaning to the BTK killer. And then you put that sexual overlay on it that for a human being who cannot feel, there are no emotions about anything. This kind of sociopath is going to have a very difficult time with sexual arousal because he's not going to be able to feel sexual arousal in normal ways with a same age sex partner. So what he's going to do is inflict cruelty on his victims in order to enhance his sexual arousal. And this is the distinction in the literature between sociopaths and psychopaths. Sociopaths are just mean, heartless, they commit
Starting point is 00:27:03 crimes. With the psychopath psychopath you have the additional the addition of cruelty and the commission of the crimes to dr william maroney medical examiner joining us an author of a new book on amazon american narcan dr maroney he speaks dennis raider btk speaks so dispassionately so unemotionally in court. It's like he's reading a medical document about how he murdered his victims, including hanging the nine-year-old little girl before having a sex fantasy on her. Dr. Maroney, what does the victim live through
Starting point is 00:27:38 when they are strangled dead? Strangulation is part of a much larger comorbid condition called asphyxia. I try to simplify that down. Asphyxia is the lack of oxygen to the brain. Blood brings oxygen to the brain. Asphyxia is caused by obviously strangulation, carbon monoxide, drowning, drug overdose, any other kind of gas that replaces the environment, respiratory disease, sleep apnea. But here, strangulation is the cause of asphyxia. So you slowly kind of wander off into the fog, and then you never wake up. But in a strangulation, there is the violent struggle. You are physically being assaulted to shut down the blood to your brain by the assailant. And while he's dispassionately talking about this in court, it's a very active, full contact, negative experience.
Starting point is 00:28:52 But we should never really forget this man tortured animals as he was growing up. Torturing humans was just the next logical step in some sick pathway. So he's BTK. T stands for torturing. Strangulation is torturing. He tortured animals as a child. This is why we tell our kids, leave the cat alone. leave the dog. Don't, you know, ignore that. Don't, don't pour gasoline on the anthill and burn the ant. We, we try to preserve the message of life around our children and create more positive things so that we don't lead them to the path of strangling families. But he tortured animals growing up and he had a fetish about women's underwear his whole life mixing those two things it's it's not surprising that he strangled people and he had sexual fetishes there's a lot of negative things here but suffocating people asphyxiating people they they fall away unless it's strangling it's violent and it's a very
Starting point is 00:30:08 full contact experience isn't it true dr maroney that when you recover a strangulation victim's body sometimes their neck is like um three or four wide. Their whole neck has been contorted and constricted so much. It stays that way. Well, there's a big part of the neck that compresses. Your blood vessels are full of blood. Ordinarily, they're pumping, and you shut them down. You close them. So all the blood that's in the head that has no oxygen is stuck there.
Starting point is 00:30:48 And all the fresh blood below the belt or the rope or the grasp, the hand. So it is basically plumbing. And you're shutting off the oxygen that's carried by the blood and if you strangle somebody hard enough you squeeze them down to the bones of their throat and their spine listen to beverly platt whose sister nancy was murdered by dennis raider i lost a friend a confant. My children will never have an aunt, and I'll never have another sister. Nancy's death is like a deep wound that will never, ever heal. As far as I'm concerned, Dennis Rader does not deserve to live. I want him to suffer as much as he made his victims suffer.
Starting point is 00:31:49 But then, when I think about that in his sick, perverted way, he'd probably find that as some kind of pleasure or reward. This man needs to be thrown in a deep, dark hole and left to rot. He should never, ever see the light of day. And I have some afterlife scenarios for him on the day he dies. Nancy and all of his victims will be waiting with God and watching him as he burns in hell. Her execution by that monster was, you know, he's got to go on and live his life,
Starting point is 00:32:28 31 years now with raising a family and children and career and everything. And, you know, he snuffed out 10 people's lives. Right now he's not any remorse, no remorse, no compassion, no mercy. And I think that's what he ought to receive. And I just pray that he'll get the toughest sentence possible. I just, it's like Charlie was saying, he's being judged here now, but eternity, when he stands before the Lord for eternity, for his judgment, if he's still in his sins that he's committed here, he will spend it by himself in darkness.
Starting point is 00:33:14 And, you know, that's what I love to tell him. You're hearing Kevin Bright, who survived the attack that killed his sister Catherine. You know what? I wish what he said were true, that he would live out the rest of his days before his death in remorse. But I don't think he feels remorseful about it if you listen to him in court. I mean, take a listen to Dennis Rader, who dubbed himself buying, torture, kill, as he describes how he selected his victims i had many what i call them projects there were different people in the town that i followed watched uh captain bright was one of the next targets i guess as i would indicate uh just driving by one day and i saw her go in the house with somebody else and and I thought that's a possibility.
Starting point is 00:34:05 There was many, many places in the area, College Hill. They're all over Wichita. But anyway, it just was basically a selection process, work toward it. If it didn't work, I'd just move on to something else. But in my kind of person, it's stalking and strolling. You go through the trolling stage and then the stalking stage. She was in the stalking stage when this go through the trolling stage and then a stocking stage she was in the stocking stage when this happened that's a possibility to dr bethany marshall psychoanalyst
Starting point is 00:34:32 out of la he saw the woman just walking in that and he's talking about katherine bright you just heard her brother kevin speaking and he looked at her and goes well, well, that's a possibility. I mean, it's just like they have a total different mind than we have. That, yes, that is a possibility. Nancy, I used to have a cat who would bring me all kinds of little trophies and treasures. I'd come home, there'd be a mouse on the front doorstep or there'd be a lizard and invariably the cat would want to toss it around proudly. That cat looked so proud whenever it caught, killed something and brought it to me. And I think about this Dennis Rader as an animal, one of these rare people whose predatory instinct is on overdrive. And he's sitting in the court like a cat with tossing a little mouse around saying, oh, I did this and then I did that.
Starting point is 00:35:27 And he is happy about it. And you have the overlay of the fact that he's a human. He's not a cat. He's not a tiger. This is a human being. And what do you get in a human being? You get something that we call grandiosity, which is a core feature of sociopathy. He's grandiose. He's having his day in court.
Starting point is 00:35:55 Now he thinks he's actually like the venerated professor who's teaching everybody what it means to be a serial killer. Well, step one, ladies and gentlemen, you drive down the street. Step two, you identify your victim. Step three, and maybe not this one. I think I'll go look for another one. Can you hear how he feels he's teaching the people in the court? This is like a very thick, twisted version of grandiosity. And we've seen this in every sociopath we've covered on your show. Wendy Pashuk with me, veteran California prosecutor that has handled many, many homicide prosecutions. Wendy, how did BTK, Dennis Rader, actually implement, execute his crimes? You know, the short answer is easily because he was somebody that wasn't a suspect. I mean, he had some status in his community. He had a job. He was a church
Starting point is 00:36:45 goer. He had a family, Nancy. Think about that. So when you have somebody like this that seems relatively unassuming and unsuspicious, it is easy for him to go out and find victims, in his own words, troll them, then stalk them, attack them, then kill them in a number of different ways, as we've seen over the years. So he was apparently able to move about freely without drawing suspicion. And that makes him one of the scariest and one of the most dangerous serial killers. But I hate to say it, Nancy, it follows the pattern of other killers just like him that lead apparently normal lives on the outside. I don't really understand the phenomenon of him writing letters to taunt the public through the local news media. And Troy Slayton, his methodical way
Starting point is 00:37:33 of picking his victims and executing these crimes, sneaking into their house under different pretenses, like being a repairman or somebody to check the gas meter or whatever his pretext was, showed a lot of forethought. And he has so many victims. How do you even fashion a defense for that? Well, it's certainly not easy. And I think that the defense team here had certainly a tough job. And so it was focused, like I've mentioned before, on purely trying to convince prosecutors that the pain of going through a protracted litigation
Starting point is 00:38:20 would just cause more damage to the victims, that it would be better for the victims to be able to give their impact statements to the court, which they did, and for the state of Kansas to not seek to execute. And that's not going to bring any of the tragic victims back to life. Is that how you justify it, Troy, that a death penalty won't bring the victims back? I mean, I've only known so far of one person brought back from the dead. I mean, unless you count Lazarus.
Starting point is 00:38:58 But I'm not expecting a miracle. Of course, we can't bring the victims back that's the whole point troy slayton nancy yes the defense attorney's job here was to prevent another killing blah the defendant himself okay and and they succeeded instead, he will spend his life in prison. You know what? You speak of it like you're analyzing a problem in an algebra book. Listen to Rader. Actually, on that one, she was completely random.
Starting point is 00:39:39 There was actually someone across from Dillon's was a potential target. It was called Project Green, I think. I had project numbers assigned to it. And that particular day, I drove to Dillon's, parked in the parking lot, watched this particular residence, and then got out of the car and walked over to, it's probably the police report, the address, I don't remember the address now, knocked, nobody answered it. So I was all teed up, so I just started going through the neighborhood. I'd been through the neighborhood before.
Starting point is 00:40:09 I kind of knew a little of the layout of the neighborhood. I've been through the back alleys, knew where some certain people lived. You know, to you, Cheryl McCollum, director of the Cold Case Research Institute, he kept writing the TV station KAKE in Wichita, claiming responsibility for all the murders and suggesting names for himself, including BTK, demanding media attention until they finally announced publicly that Wichita had a serial killer.
Starting point is 00:40:42 He even made a poem which was stealing the lyrics to an old folk song, and he called it O Death to Nancy. Again, his ego played such a role in these crimes. It, again, reminds me of Son of Sam. You know, he wrote poetry. Zodiac. He contacts when the letters don't do it, he calls. And you remember how sinister he tried to be?
Starting point is 00:41:06 This is Zodiac. You know what I mean? They've given themselves nicknames. They're not just playing out these fantasies. Nancy, they're living it. Dr. Maroney, weigh in. I want you to know that I feel a cold chill down my spine because I was a resident of Johnson County, Kansas. I lived in Olathe, Kansas,
Starting point is 00:41:29 southwest of Kansas City during these crimes. And when I went to go take my medical board exams, I went to Wichita. I was here. I walked these streets. Now, ordinarily, you know, people don't turn out to be this cold and just drive around looking for people to kill. And people could say, you know, Kansas could be kind of a boring place. There's not a lot going on. But I walked these streets and I just have a very cold, almost like somebody opened the door and it's February and the curtains are blowing. I almost feel a need somewhere. We don't talk about this anymore. This guy needs an exorcist.
Starting point is 00:42:18 Okay, because ordinarily people in Kansas are hardworking, good people, but he grew up the wrong way. This is evil again. I mean, we have to bring Father Malachi Martin back from New York. To exorcise him. You know, Dr. William Maroney, I don't always expect a dispassionate medical examiner to talk about exorcism of the devil, but thank you for throwing that bone in there. Let me just say these names out loud. Joseph Otero, 38.
Starting point is 00:42:51 Julie Otero, 33. Joseph Otero, Jr., age 9. Josephine Otero, 11. Catherine Bright, 21. Shirley Vann, 24. Nancy Fox, 25. And I think somewhere out there in the universe, all of them agree with me. Dennis Rader, rot in hell. Nancy Grace, Crime Stories, signing off.
Starting point is 00:43:30 Goodbye, friend. This is an iHeart Podcast.

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