Criminology - The Canal Murders

Episode Date: April 4, 2020

In 1975, several young women and teenage girls were found dead in or around canals in Broward and Dade counties in Florida. These murders shared very similar traits but the police were not convinced they were all connected. It turns out that they were correct.  Join Mike and Morf as they discuss what many have dubbed "The Canal Murders". You may also see this series of murders listed as the "Flat Tire Murders". No matter what you choose to call them, this a baffling series of murders, and all but one remains unsolved. You can support the show at patreon.com/criminology An Emash Digital Production Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

If you love chilling mysteries, unsolved cases, and a touch of mom-style humor, moms and mysteries is the podcast you've been searching for. Hey guys, I'm Mandy. And I'm Melissa. Join us every Tuesday for moms and mysteries, your gateway to gripping, well-researched true crime stories. Each week, we deep dive into a variety of mind-boggling cases as we shed light on everything from heist to whodunit. We're your go-to podcast for Mysteries with a Motherly Touch.

Subscribe now to moms and mysteries wherever you get your podcast. Criminology is a true crime podcast that may contain discussion about violent or disturbing topics. Listener discretion is advised. Hello everyone and welcome to episode 106 of the criminology podcast. I'm Mike Ferguson. And this is Mike Morford. Morph, how are you today? How are you hanging in, buddy?

Well, that question every week gets a little bit more interesting, but I can't complain. I'm here. We're doing the show. Everybody's healthy in my household and hopefully in yours too. Yeah, they are healthy in my household. We're definitely quarantine, as I know you are. We're hunkered down. You know, you said something about, you know, it getting stranger from week to week. And man, I'm telling you, every time I look at the news, the numbers get scarier and scarier. They just keep going up and up, both in the number of cases confirmed and the number of deaths. It's a very scary thing. Yeah, I almost don't want to turn on the news anymore, but obviously we have to see what's going on. But it's a different atmosphere out there. And I hope for our listeners' sake, if there's anyone out there that's got a family member that's sick or has lost someone or thoughts are with you.

And I hope we can all get through this and come out the other side and hang in there together. Yep, I echo that as well. That's what we have to do. but for our part, Morph, we're trying to continue to put out podcasts week to week. We had some new Patreon support and we actually had some good Patreon support. I've got messages from people that said, hey, I know everybody's going through this. We weren't hit as hard financially or maybe at all as some other people have been. So we've listened to the show for years.

We want to help you guys through this. And I thought, you know, that was very nice. of people to do. And it makes a huge difference to you and I because given the current things that are happening with the economy, there's no doubt advertisers have scaled back. You know, it's going to be a rough patch for us as well. So we're all, you know, trying to get through it. And I think it's important to say that we want to keep doing these episodes, whether we have

pads are not because we want to be something that helps people break away for an hour and just step back from what's going on and sort of keep their same routine. Yeah, it's definitely important. So let's go ahead and give those shoutouts. New Patreon supporter shoutouts. We had Jennifer O'Connor, Emily Moka, our good friend Jamie Holmes, who's been with us for a very long time, been to crime con. She upped her pledge to the highest level. We had Alicia Older Sabrina Milata. And then Jason K. came out at well above the highest level and just said, hey, here you go.

We're trying to help. And we appreciate it more if we say it all the time. But I mean, I think now more than ever. Yeah, it's very generous. You know, I'm blown away by that and very thankful. And if there's anyone out there that is in the position to help, you can go to patreon.com slash criminology and sign up for Patreon. And don't forget about Stitcher Premium.

You know, our episodes older than six months are out there on Stitcher Premium, some great episodes, Zodiac, Golden State Killer. Go check them out. Yeah, I've heard from a lot of people that they're downloading that app and finding lots of great stuff on it in addition to our old episodes. But one person said that they listened to all the back episodes we had on there. So that app is something that works. and people are happy about it.

Well, I think that's the key. I don't say it a lot, but it's not like it's just our stuff out there. You know, even my other podcast Unsolved. All the old episodes are out there on there as well, ad free, but a ton of other content. All ad free, true crime, comedy, you name it. There is a bunch of stuff on there. All right. All of that out of the way, Morf.

I think we need to get into our case for this episode. It was in 1975 when several young women and teenage girls were found dead in or around canals in Broward in Dade counties in Florida. The murders were dubbed by the local media, the canal murders. And then after two of the victim's cars were found with flat tires, some referred to this series of murders as the flat tire murders. So you'll see it listed both ways. the canal murders, the flat tire murders, but no matter what moniker is used, women in that area began to be afraid there was a killer on the loose. And while all the murders shared similar traits, police were not convinced that there was one killer

responsible and in one case they were correct. And more if I think what intrigues a lot of people about this case, is the fact that all but one of the murders remain unsolved. So the question is out there. Was this a lone serial killer responsible for the remaining victims? Or were there multiple killers roaming these same streets at the same time? The first murder occurred in early 1975. Judith Ann Osterling left her Indiana home in the summer of 1974.

She never called or wrote home to her family. after December of that year. Judith, who was just 20 years old, lived in Broward County, Florida, and her only mode of transportation was hitchhiking. She was last seen alive at around 9 p.m. on Wednesday, February 1st, 1975, when she was returning to her home from her massage parlor job in Dade County. Two days later, her body was found floating in a canal just north of the Dade-Broward County line. She was wearing a blue halter top and blue jeans with a butterfly on one of the same. League. The cause of death was listed as drowning, but she had been severely beaten prior to her death. Local deputies believed her killer had picked her up while she was hitchhiking.

Just 11 days later, another woman vanished. Barbara Stevens was a pretty blonde, green-eyed woman who had just recently separated from her husband, Richard Stevens. She was the daughter of an electric company president and at only 23 years old, vanished on Wednesday, February 12th, 1975. She had left home around 7 p.m. to visit a friend in Coral Gables, but never arrived. Her silver 1973 Chevy Camero was found the next day in the parking lot of the Gold Triangle department store, located on North Kendall Drive near Dadeland. Barbara's keys were still in the ignition, and a trace of blood was found on the steering wheel.

Two rock and roll records were in the car. Barbara had purchased the records shortly before her disappearance, but the shopping bag they were in was missing. Police speculated her assailant might have used the bag to help clean up the scene. Also found in the car with some brush, leading police to surmise Barbara had been abducted, driven to a wooden area, and abandoned. Then the assailant drove her car to the parking lot and dropped it off there. Police began a search for Barbara and her parents made a very public appeal for help in finding their daughter.

Barbara's husband Richard had recently moved to Hollywood Hills, California, and he was questioned by police there. But Florida investigators were unable to figure out his whereabouts. At the time, his estranged wife vanished. Eight days after Barbara Stevens disappeared without a trait, a police cadet found her body at 10.45 a.m. on February 20th in a South Dade field. The field was located behind the Sunset West Shopping Plaza at Galloway Road and Sunset Drive. The body was found not too far from a Grand Union food store.

Barbara was lying on her back facing east. Her clothing was in disarray and her pants were partially pulled down. Homicide detectives thoroughly searched the area for evidence, and they found several things, including a white or cream-colored purse. But police didn't discuss any other items they found with the public. Investigators thought Barbara's case was an isolated crime until more bodies started showing up nearby. 17-year-old Arieta-Tinker was married and had one child. On April 12, 1975, two-months, after Barbara Stevens vanished, Arieta's body was found in the Snake Creek Canal, near Pembroke Pines, Florida. She was last seen by her husband, Ralph Tinker, around noon on April 9th,

when he dropped her off at the hippopotamus restaurant at Hollywood Beach. When she didn't return home by the next day, he reported his wife missing. Ralph told police the restaurant was a popular hangout for members of the Outlaw's motorcycle game, and Arenda knew a couple of the members. but police never commented on whether they were investigating that angle. Two months after Areietta's body was found, 19-year-old Nancy Lee Fox was found dead on June 15, 1975, in the same canal where Judith Ann Austerling had been found four months earlier. An autopsy indicated she died from several severe blows to the head. She was also strangled before she was tossed into.

to the canal. Additionally, there was some evidence of sexual contact that authorities believed happened shortly before she was murdered. The night before her body was found, Nancy had worked to shift at her waitress job at a Fort Lauderdale restaurant at 9 p.m. She was seen walking to her apartment, which was about six blocks away. Nancy lived at 332, Southwest 22nd Street, and police figured out that she was on her way to a laundromat in the Southland Shopping Center when she disappeared. Prior to living in Fort Lauderdale, Nancy had resided in West Palm Beach. There, she was in a love triangle involving her sister, herself, and a man named William Farrell-Mour Jr. Nancy's attempt to ending the relationship wasn't successful, according to police.

Her boyfriend merely commuted between West Palm Beach and Fort Lauderdale. It's unclear if he was ever considered a suspect or ruled out in any way. Shortly after Nancy was found dead, two 14-year-old girls were found slain, execution style along a roadside canal in the Everglades. This was along U.S. Highway 27, Barbara Barbie Schreiber, and Belinda Darlene Zetterauer, who went by Darlene, were high school friends. And they both attended Addict's middle school together. They were last seen leaving Barbie's home late on Wednesday, June 18th, 1975. They were headed to another friend's house, but they never made it.

Barbies and Darling's bodies were fully clothed, and each had been shot once, one in the head, the other in the chest. They hadn't been sexually assaulted. The site where their bodies were found was only 200 yards from a Nancy Lee Fox's body was found. However, there was no apparent connection between the murders that police could find at the time. So I get it, Morph, police are not able to establish a connection, but man, something's going on in that department, right? there have been a number of women found, and especially a number found in a specific area, in the area of this canal, they had to be thinking something was going on. There was some connection.

And there was a connection, but at the time, police just couldn't figure it out. A few days after Barbie and Darlene were killed, Howard County detectives were looking for a couple who had rented a 1974 beige Chevrolet Vega that they believed was connected to the girls' murders. The car was found abandoned at Airways Rent a car early Saturday, June 21st. Rental agency records showed the car was rented on June 18th, the day the girls vanished by a young woman from out of state who was accompanied by a young man. The car had only been rented for one day, but it was not returned. It turned up abandoned at the agency lot about 5.30 a.m. on Saturday the 21st.

Grass and weeds were caught in the undercarriage of the rented vehicle. That investigators said matched growth in the area where the bodies were found. The rental agency's employees called the couple's motel to discuss the balance due on the car, but were told by motel staff that no one using the woman's name had registered there. The rental car ended up being a rabbit hole for investigators. And I think throughout this episode, Morf, right, we have to keep in mind this is the 70s, much easier back then to walk into a rental car agency, get a car. You know, today it's tough.

They want 18 forms of ID. They want your insurance. they know who you are on top of a credit card. They won it all. But back then it was easier to get away with stuff like that. Yeah, and I think because of the lack of technology back then, they just had to do everything on a scaled down version and didn't have all those ways to dot the eyes and cross the T's.

About a month after the rented Chevy Vega was found abandoned. The body of 14-year-old Robin Leslie Loesch was found in a canal off U.S. 27 south of Andytown by a Fort Myers family who had stopped at a roadside park for lunch. Robin, who was from Fort Lauderdale, disappeared on July 8th, 1975 after she left home for summer classes at Stranahan High School. Her cause of death was listed as drowning, and the medical examiner estimated that her body had been in the canal, 24 to 36 hours. Robin was the fourth girl in four weeks found dead

along a 10-mile-long strip of U.S. 27 in West Broward County. But police said at the time that they saw no connection between her death and the other three. Police also hadn't connected the murders of Judith Ann Osterling and Barbara Stevens to the others. But regardless, they were taking notice of the young women turning up dead in this area, and they were troubled by it. It was turning out to be quite the busy summer for investigators. On Tuesday, July 22nd, 1975, 27-year-old Ronnie Gorland, an unemployed respiratory therapist,

disappeared from the 163rd Street Mall in North Miami. She had recently been staying with her parents in Hallandale while visiting from Pennsylvania. Prior to Ronnie taking this trip to Florida, she had recently been staying with her parents in Hallandale while visiting from Halendale. She had met the love of her life, 28-year-old Thomas Phillips, who was a manager of a candy factory, and the two were set to marry back in Pennsylvania in February of 1976. The day after Ronnie disappeared, her body, clad only in shoes, was found in a canal at northwest 138th Street and 105th Avenue. The cause of her death was found to be drowning. Investigators noticed the similarities between Ronnie's cancer.

case and that of Barbara Stevens in February. Both victims were young, light-haired women who were making quick stops at large shopping centers before they disappeared. Through their investigation, detectives were able to trace Ronnie's last movements. She left the Children's Asmatic Foundation at 1.30 p.m. on July 22nd. She told people there that she intended on visiting her mother at 2 p.m. who was hospitalized at Parkway General Hospital. Ronnie's 1975 Olds Moble. Cutlass was found with a flat tire in the Burdine's parking lot at the shopping center. The car had been blocking traffic and was towed on Wednesday morning the day after she vanished. When her family learned of Ronnie's death, of course, more if they were heartbroken,

as any family would be, eventually because of Ronnie's love for children, her fiance Thomas and her father established the Ronnie Gorman, trust fund for the children's asthmatic foundation. A week after Ronnie Gorland vanished, another body of a female was found on July 31st, in a canal northwest of Miami, and less than a mile from where Ronnie Gorland's body was found. That body was later identified as Elise Rapp, who was 21 years old. The only thing Elise was wearing was a necklace with the Hebrew symbol for life. Elise was originally from flushing New York, but had moved to Hallandale floor.

in late June 1975. Elise was described by a relative as very kind and gentle. She was an only child and suffered from severe acne in high school, which left her self-conscious and distant. She was an introvert and stayed home most of the time in an apartment that she shared with her cat. After Elise landed in Florida, she rented a car and found some secretarial work through Kelly staffing services. on Wednesday, July 30th, 1975.

Elise went to the beach during the day. She returned home and then left her apartment at 8 p.m. After that point, she was never seen a lot. Her landlady grew concerned when Elise did not return home the next morning, and she called the police. In the suburbs of D.C. A woman fails to show up for work and is found brutally murdered. I wonder which emergency.

We just walked in the door, blood in the foyer. For the next two decades, the case remained unsolved until new technology allowed investigators to do what had once been impossible. A new series from ABC Audio in 2020, blood and water. Listen now, wherever you get your podcasts. And she also called Elisa's parents. Elisa's rented yellow Chevy Vega was found in the parking lot of the Hollywood Mall

at 1130 p.m. on Thursday, July 31st. And just like Ronnie's car, it too had a flat tire. The other thing that police took notice of was the fact that both cars had the letter E on their license plates indicating that they were rentals. The Shaw Festival presents the most beloved musical of all time, My Fair Lady. This is the story of Eliza Doolittle, the Cockney Flower Girl who, Professor Henry Higgins bets, he can turn into a lady. Don't miss, My Fair Lady, a wonderfully lavish and lovelry production. This year, at the Shaw. For best seats at best prices, go to Shawfest.com.

Police were convinced that Ronnie's and Elise's cases were connected. Both women were attractive in their 20s. with the same general physical description. Both were Jewish and last seen alone in shopping centers. They were most likely abducted by their killer who offered to help them after disabling their vehicles. Ronnie and Elise had both been living in Hallandale only a short period of time. Initial reports that came out on Ronnie's and Elise's murders mentioned nothing about their bodies being mutilated by the killer. But by the end of August 1975, it was revealed.

that both girls had been severely mutilated and they had both been raped. Elise had been more brutally mutilated than Ronnie. Dade County Medical Examiner Dr. Donald Wright told the media the savagery indicated that a quote, Jack the Ripper type of psychopathic killer was on the loose. And a police spokesman came out and agreed with his statement. Wright also went on to say that as many as 12 young women murdered in South Florida could have been victims of the same killer. He believed the killer was most likely a white male in his 20s, who was relatively attractive. Right also said that this person probably dressed well.

This would be the type of person that a woman would not be afraid of in a shopping center. He said that this was going to be a guy that looked like the all-American type of individual. He also said there was a good chance the killer was married. After Ronnie's and Alisa's murders, the Miami News offered a $1,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the person who, quote, sexually ravaged and brutally murdered the two women. The line in the paper was meant to shock people in the coming forward. with information, but no one did. Detectives then announced that

Barbara Stevens' murder was connected to Ronnie and Elieces. Additionally, law enforcement officials theorize the killer may have murdered in five other states. Similar murders were happening in California, Idaho, Oregon, Utah, and Washington.

It turned out that those murders were actually committed by Ted Bundy, which no one knew at the time. Well, more of you and I know full well. How many murders Ted Bundy committed. So, you know, if law enforcement was thinking all of these were tied in, that's a lot of murders that would have been committed by a single individual. Prior to his 1989 execution, Broward and Dade County officials asked Ted Bundy if he had killed the women in the canal murders, but he never took credit for any of the murders. But police

verified that Bundy was not in Florida at the time of the canal killings and he was apprehended in Utah in August of 1975. But I think Morph, you can make the connection here. Not between Bundy and these murders, but between the person, if it was one person that committed all these murders, there are some Bundy-like qualities here in the way that this killer was choosing victims in the way that, you know, he was luring his victims. There are some connections that can be made. Yeah, it certainly seems like he was able to gain their trust and not be frightening to them. Well, and the one thing that stood out to me was that we know, Bundy had a very definite type, right? He looked for women that had a certain look. And it seems as though this

killer did as well. After Elise Raps murder, things quieted down for. about three months. There were no murders during this brief period. The reward money increased to $4,000. Metro Police showed 15 different composite sketches to victims of sexual assault and other young women in the North Dade area. Police were desperate to catch the killer that they had dubbed a Jack the Ripper-type killer, responsible for the string of canal murders. One of the sketches depicted a man in his 20s, blonde and blue-eyed, who was considered handsome by some who were shown the sketch. At the 163rd shopping center where Ronnie Gourland's car was found.

That description resembled Dr. Wright's theory on what he thought the killer looked like. It was soon after these sketches were used by police that another young woman vanished. Marlene Annabelli was 27 years old and originally from Reading, Pennsylvania. Marlene and her husband Dave Anabelli had been separated for about a year. They had signed up for a vacation package, which included a week's stay at the Lauderdale Beach Club at 903 Breakers Avenue. But because they separated, Marlene decided to take this trip alone. She flew to Fort Lauderdale and connected with some friends that she knew in nearby Sunrise, Florida. The friends drove Marlene to the beach club and helped her check in on Wednesday, October 15th, 19th.

Around 9.30 a.m. on Wednesday, October 22nd, a week after she checked in, a maid saw Marlene leaving the room, carrying a purse and wearing what the maid said was a bluish-looking dress. The maid then went in and cleaned Marlene's room. And the maid would later tell authorities that she cleaned Marlene's room every day, even though the bed, was never slept in. Since her arrival in Florida, Marlene had been phoning her sunrise friends daily, but she didn't call them on the 22nd, 23rd, 24th, or 25th. The friends called the hotel looking for Marlene, and the hotel staff notified the police that one of their guests was missing on Saturday, October 25th.

The next day, on Sunday afternoon, a man named Luther Hill decided to take his young grandson and another child for a motorcycle ride. in West Broward County. Luther lived at 16670 Sterling Road. Near his home, there was a long desolate road that led to a dumping ground where people would occasionally go to fire weapons at tin cans and other targets. That Sunday, Luther decided to take a motorcycle ride down the road. As he neared the end, he smelled the horrific odor of rotting flesh. At first he thought it was a dead animal. and he told the kids to stay on the road while he went to check it out.

But what he found was not a dead animal. He saw two human feet sticking out from beneath some sheets of plywood. So Luther hopped back on his motorcycle with the kids and he rode off to tell police what he had found. When police officers arrived, they found the body of a woman in her 20s, clad in a purple blue dress with red trim at the bottom. She was shoeless and didn't have a purse with her, but she was wearing several pieces of costume jewelry. The officer suspected the victim was Marlene Annabelli. Her husband flew down to help with identification, but he didn't recognize the jewelry,

and the body was too badly decomposed for him to say for sure whether it was his wife. Detectives took fingerprints from the body and compared them the prints found on Marlene's personal papers in her hotel room, and they got a match. A few days later, a Redding Pennsylvania dentist told police a dental chart of the corpse matched Marlene Anabelle's as well. Marlene had been severely beaten around the abdomen, but there was no evidence of rape. The official cause of death was strangulation. Though the investigation into all of the murders seemed to be going nowhere, police finally got a break in one case. In mid-October 1975, a 22-year-old woman named Sour.

Sue Jane, Tiger Sue Walter, confessed to the murder of Judith and Austerling in early February. Walter told police she and her late boyfriend, 28-year-old Clarence Deacon Carnival, drove Judith to the C9 canal near the county line on January 25th. And it was there that the couple beat her with their fists as well as a rock. They tied her hands and feet and then tossed her into the canal when she resisted their sexual advances. Walter was booked and charged with first-degree murder. Judith Austerling had been employed as a masseuse at the Tigris Health Studio in Miami, which was operated by Walter and Carnival at the time of her murder. Carnival, a reputed Miami drug dealer, was later shot to death in the backyard of a Miami residence on June 13.

1975. Walter pleaded no contest in Judas' murder in early January 1976 and was later found guilty and sentenced to 15 years in prison. So no doubt, she was involved in the murder of Judith Austerling. What's unclear is whether or not she was ever a suspect in Clarence's murder. With Walter's confession, Judith Ann Austerling's murder was no longer considered connected to the other murders by police. In December 1975, the bodies of two young women were found, one on December 13th and the other one on December 23rd. The first woman was found in a wooded area of West Broward, and the second was found in a canal near Davy by a woman who was at horseback riding near the canal. Both women were never identified as far as we can tell from research, and there was no official mention of these murders being connected to the others. But they're worth mentioning since they

seem to fit the pattern in many ways. On New Year's Day, 1976, a couple of snake hunters found skeletal remains in a deserted field in South Dade. The body was later identified as 15-year-old Mary Coppola of Homestead, Florida, during the autopsy. No physical evidence of foul play was found. They didn't find a gunshot. There were no knife wounds. Police were quick to not call her death a murder. All they would say is that it was an unclassified death. Mary was a 10th grader at South Dade High School, and she had been missing since September 2nd. On that day, her mother drove her to Genesis Outreach, a South Dade Counseling Center for Use with drug problems. Mary's counselor said she was troubled over typical teenage concerns like pure pressure, family matters, and drugs.

Mary had run away from home before. The first time was in August 1975. Her mother found her several days later at a Burger King. But when Mary hadn't returned home from her counseling appointment, her family thought she had run away again. I think the difference here is that unlike the previous time, Mary didn't take any personal belongings with her. Some of Mary's friends told a local newspaper that she had been seeing an older guy in his 20s. Sometimes he would pick her up at the bus stop and take her to school. And apparently Mary was a very straight-laced girl until she met this older boy. He influenced her to take drugs like he did. Now, this guy's name has never been made public.

But all of this going on, this was the reason why Mary's family had sensed a problem with Mary, and they sent her to counseling. And I think while Mary's case does seem different than the other murders, there is a possibility that it could have been connected. It was in the same time frame. Mary was a pretty young girl with long hair. I think the problem morph is that there just was no information about the man that she was seeing before her murder and no information on, you know, did police check into this guy?

We just don't know. Not long after Mary Coppola's body was discovered, investigators were called out about a body that was found. 17-year-old Michelle Winters had been missing since. December 30th, 1975. On Saturday, January 10th, 1976, her body was found in the Snake Creek Canal

in Pembroke Pines. The same canal area to tinker was founded. Michelle had been strangled to death with the strap of her purse, which had been wrapped around her neck 12 times. At the time of her disappearance, Michelle was described as being a very depressed

teenage girl. She had talked about joining the Navy before she died. In the last month of her life, Michelle had been living in a small cottage on the beach that she shared with her older sister, Joanne. Michelle was known to have been a homebody. She only had a handful of friends, and she enjoyed spending time with her pet cat. One of her friends saw Michelle just before her disappearance. The friend went to her home, and Michelle was depressed as usual. She did say that she was trying to get a job with a family in Miami as a nanny. The friend tried talking

Michelle and coming to live with her and her family, and Michelle said she would think it over. The friend never saw Michelle again. This friend said Michelle frequented a cocktail lounge close to her home and occasionally hitchhike around town during the day. It's possible her killer picked Michelle up while she was hitchhiking. And more if I would say it's very possible. We know how big hitchhiking was in the 70s. We also know from doing as many cases as we've done that a lot of killers picked up their victims that way because they were hitchhiking and they needed to arrive. And I think today younger people just don't understand that that term, that philosophy of hitchhiking. But I think for older people,

not that we're really old, but you and I, when we were younger, we remember seeing people with their thumbs out on the side of the road. And I remember my parents saying, don't you ever do that because they knew what might happen? Well, we live in a much different time, right? Back then, there was no Uber, there was no lift, there was no easy way to get from point A to point B if you didn't have a car and you didn't have a friend that was willing to take you. I just think options were much more limited back then. Now, they still had public transportation. you could take the bus.

But a lot of people just thought, hey, this is a free and easy way to get where I need to go. I think a lot of these people that decided to hitchhike felt they could size up whoever picked them up and make a decision to get in that car or not. And unfortunately, a lot of these killers are, they don't look like Otis Tool.

When you pull up and open the door and you see Otis Tool, he just shut the door and wait for the next ride. And unfortunately, that's not the way real life is. some of these killers blended in and they were able to gain these victims trust. No, I think you're absolutely right. You know, I think back in the day, there probably were a lot of people that thought, okay, if somebody pulls up and I don't like the look of them, I think they're scary.

I'm just not going to accept the ride. But when Ted Bundy pulls up and looks like the All-American guy, people are going to jump in. They're not scared of Ted Bundy. Now, they should have been because we know what. he was capable of, but I think he was able to use his looks and the fact that he didn't look scary to his advantage. During the investigation into the canal murders, all kinds of different people came out and tried to help police, whether the police asked for their help or not. In April 1976, a Dutch psychic named Peter Herkos announced he was going to solve South Florida's

Canal murders. Hercos put together pictures of some of the victims, Nancy Lee Fox, Ronnie Gorlin, Judith Osterling, Barbara Schreiber, and Belinda Zetterauer. He sat with police and he told them that the victims in the photos had known one another and that all of their murders were connected. But Herco's claims were flawed because Sue Walter had already confessed to Judith Osterling's murder, but it didn't matter because Herkos quickly recovered. He threw Judith's picture aside and said, okay, this one had nothing to do with the others.

According to Peter Herkos, the killer lured victims with drugs, which he bought from an older man who had his pilots license. Herko said the killer was a crazed druggie himself, who got a sexual thrill from his murders. But really, Morf, that was the extent of his prediction or his insights. And none of it was really useful to the police.

It wasn't like this guy was able to provide them with this golden piece of information that was going to break the case wide open, it just didn't happen. The investigation into the canal murders lasted into the fall of 1976 before it dwindled down. Detective Charles Major was quoted as saying at the time, we have tough new cases coming in all the time that need to be followed up fast. So even if we had a possible fresh lead on the canal mirrors, I don't have to tell you which one takes priority.

He also said it was possible that killer killers had left the area. And I always think that's a possibility. You know, does a killer at some point morph think, okay, there's too much heat. I don't have any ties. Let's say the killer doesn't. I can easily pull up stakes and move to another state, continue to do what I'm doing, and nobody knows who I am, and they probably won't connect my murders in another state with these, especially in the 1970s.

Michelle Winner's murder appeared to be the last of the canal murders, but was it? A decade after the canal murder started, 17-year-old Kerry Welgin was found dead in a Davy Canal in March 1985. Carrie had gone out for pizza with friends in West Broward on the evening of Friday, March 15th, 1985. Her parents, Leo and Loretta Welgin, were not concerned when she hadn't returned home that night because she often stayed the night with friends. Carrie was scheduled to work Saturday the 16th at the McDonald's restaurant located on State Road 84 at Southwest 130th Avenue. When she failed to show up for a shift, a coworker called her home to check on her. Loretta told the employee to call back again if Carrie didn't show up. When the co-worker never called

back, Loretta assumed her daughter had finally shown up for work. By Sunday, when Carrie still wasn't home, Loretta called Carrie's friends, but no one had seen her. Then on Sunday night, Loretta received the phone call saying Carrie was being held at the Pompano Beach Detention Center, an adult facility. Leo and Loretta drove to the facility only to find out that no one by the name of Carrie Welgin had been detained there. The Weljans reported their daughter missing on Tuesday, March 19th. A police officer went to their home to take fingerprint. from Carrie's bedroom. The next day, the police confirmed that the body found in the canal was Carrie Welgin.

Carrie died from multiple stab wounds and had been dead somewhere between 24 and 48 hours when her body was found on Monday, March 18. Her murder has never been solved. Almost a year later, 29-year-old Linda Callerton was found dead in the Coral Springs Canal. Linda, a married mother of two sons, didn't have a driver's license, so she used a bicycle as her mode of transportation. Linda worked at a Mexican restaurant four miles from her home. At around 10.30 p.m. on Thursday, February 20, 1986, Linda left work, got on her bike, and headed home. When she failed to pick up her kids at the babysitter's home, her babysitter let the children stay the night.

Linda failed to pick up her children the next morning. So Linda's husband, Steve Cali, called police at 8.15 a.m. The search for Linda began on the morning of Saturday, February 22nd. And just the very next day, at 6.42 a.m., fishermen found Linda's body in the canal. Police speculated that her killer had grabbed Linda off her bicycle as she was riding home. Linda and Steve had separated about three weeks before her murder. They had been married for roughly five. years, Steve and Linda were originally from Auburn, New York, but moved to Broward County

about six years before Linda's death. As far as we can tell, Steve was never considered a suspect in his wife's murder. In fact, when he found out Linda had been murdered, he had to be sedated and hospitalized due to the shock and grief of losing his wife. The similarities between Carrie and Linda's murders, and the canal murders are hard to ignore, despite the 10-year gap. Like the victims of 1975 and 1976, Carrie and Linda were young attractive females with long hair, who were found dead in canals in Broward County. Carrie sometimes hitchhiked to work, another similar aspect to some of the canal victims. While Linda was older at 29 years old, a couple of the 1975 victims were in their 20s as well. We have two victims killed, one in 1985, and

and one in 1986, a decade before we had victims killed in 1975 and 1976. While police haven't been able to connect the mid-1980s murders to the mid-1970s murders, we felt the possible connection was worth mentioning. And more if we do know that some killers take a break. Now, 10 years is a long time, but you can look at somebody like BTK, right? it's possible that for whatever reason, you could have somebody that got locked up for 10 years, got out,

and decided they wanted to continue to do what they had done before, or there's a whole bunch of reasons why a person might stop. Yeah, there could be a whole host of different reasons for that. So Morp, as we're wrapping up this case, the canal murders, also known as the flat tire murders, are still unsolved today. police believed back then and I think they still believed to this day that there was more than one killer. In addition to the woman that confessed to the murder of Judith Osterling, Detective Major once said that

dumping bodies in Florida canals was the most convenient place in that area to dispose of bodies. He said it was like dumping bodies in a desert out west. Now it's possible that it could be a coincidence that all of the bodies were found in canals. I think what's strange is that there's no information on these murders after 1977, except for a few paragraphs in a 1990 newspaper. I mean, Morph, if you type in any of these victims' names in the Unsolved Murder's database on the website of the Florida Department. of law enforcement, you get nothing. None of these women's cases are in there. It's almost as if they've been erased or forgotten. And if that's the case, that seems like a huge injustice to these women who were victims who lost their lives. One thing you mentioned was that maybe it was a coincidence that all

these bodies were found in a canal. And I think in a lot of cases we discuss bodies are found in rivers or creeks sometimes thrown in there because they hope evidence will be washed away or they just won't be found in one way or another. And in Florida, you have alligators and stuff like that. So that might be even more of a way to hope that the remains aren't found. Well, and I think that's why there have been historically a lot of victims' bodies disposed in canals in Florida because of alligators. I mean, if I'm in here in Ohio, we don't have alligators. So if I was a killer, which I am not, but if I was a killer, I can't walk down to the local creek or river or canal or whatever body of water and dump a body in knowing that there is a high probability

that a gator is going to come along and essentially get rid of. And essentially get rid of of the evidence, get rid of the body. But in Florida, you have that. So I think it's a very valid point that you bring up. One other thing that you touched on was the fact that these victims, their names aren't in that database. And there's a possibility they've somehow been missed as far as unsolved cases that need to be solved. So hopefully there's someone out there that hasn't forgotten these these women and they're working on it and hopefully can give them justice someday. Yeah, my thought morph and my hope, I guess I should say it that way, is that these are cold cases, but somebody still has them, right? There's a folder. There's there's something.

There's a file. Okay, they may not be in the database, but they're, they're in somebody's department and that information is there. It's not been lost. Now, it's cold. And, you know, unless they get some major tip on these murders, I don't know how they're going to be solved. And as a family member, the last thing you want is your loved one's case file sitting up on a shelf someplace collecting dust forgotten about. I would think the last thing the family would want is for there to be no case file at all. Like it is literally gone. No one knows about it. The information no longer exists. So it's, it's as though it's been completely erased. I'm just hoping that's not the case. Thanks goes out to Debbie Buck at truecrime diva.com for research and

writing assistance in this episode. If you haven't done so yet and you love the show, take a minute. Go out, give us a five-star rating. You can leave a review if you want. Keep telling your friends about criminology. All of that goes a long way towards helping new people find the show. If you want to find us on social media, we're on Twitter with the handle at Criminology Pod. You can also find us on Facebook by searching for Criminology Podcast or by joining our Facebook Discussion Group, which is Criminology Podcast Discussion and Fans. All right, Morf, that is it for another episode of Criminology. But you and I will be back next Saturday night with everyone bringing a brand new episode.

So until then, for Mike. And Morf. We'll talk to you next week. Take care, everyone.