Killer Stories with Harvey Guillén - “The Jacksonville Cannibal” - Ottis Toole

Episode Date: October 22, 2018

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Meet your match on ZipRecruiter. This episode is brought to you by Prime. Obsession is in session. And this summer, Prime originals have everything you want. Steamy romances, irresistible love stories, and the book to screen favorites you've already read twice. Off campus, L. Every year after, The Love Hypothesis, Sterling Point, and more. Slow burns, second chances, chemistry you can feel through the screen.

Your next obsession is waiting. Watch only on Prime. Due to the graphic nature of this killer's crimes, listener discretion is advised. This episode includes discussions of murder and assault that some people may find offensive. We advise extreme caution for children under 13. Fire. Modern humanity has taken fire and turned it into a tool. But we often forget that fire can be one of the most destructive forces on planet Earth. A single stray match can light a grill or burn a house down.

A single ember can turn into a wildfire and tear through the countryside. burning through a forest, incinerating everything that lives within. Those flames can manifest themselves in humans. Wrath, anger, power, violence, lust. Sometimes people will start fires just to watch them burn. One man went from burning wood to burning people. That man's name was Otis Thule, and the flames in his mind would later become the flames that consumed his

victims. Hi, I'm Greg Paulson, and this is serial killers. Today we're going to take a deep dive into the life of Otis Tool, sometimes referred to as the Cannibal Kid. I'm here with my co-host, Vanessa Richardson. Hi, everyone. Many of you have been asking us how you can support the podcast. If you enjoy the show, one of the best ways to help us is to leave a five-star review wherever you listen to podcasts. While you're there, you can listen to previous episodes of serial killers, as well as Parcast's other podcasts. A new episode comes out every Monday. You can also find us on Facebook and Instagram at Parcast and on Twitter at Parcast Network

or on our website, parcast.com. Otis Tool killed his first victim in 1961 and continued killing until his capture in 1983. He was convicted of six separate murders, but he confessed to over 100. It's clear that most of his confessions were lies, but the exact number of people he killed is still unknown to this day. Toul was a drifter, and he committed many crimes throughout the country, mostly focusing in the southern states. His most notorious crimes happened in his hometown of Jacksonville, Florida. He claimed to have killed in almost every way imaginable, including in satanic rituals, although his first convicted murder was committed through arson.

became most known for his companionship with fellow serial killer Henry Lee Lucas and his confession in the abduction and murder of six-year-old Adam Walsh. Otis Elwood Toole was born in Jacksonville, Florida on March 5, 1947 to William, Bill, Henry Tool, and Sarah Lorene Harley. When you look at how Otis' parents treated him, it's easy to see how his mind could get so twisted. Bill Toole was an abusive alcoholic, uncaring and unconcerned with his son's health. When Otis was only five years old, innocent, naive, and playing with toys,

one of his father's friends arrived at his childhood home. His father and his father's friend exchanged words and exchanged cash. Bill Toole told Otis to go with his friend into the other room. Otis's fragile young psyche was not prepared for what would happen in that room. Tool, Otis's own father, sold Otis's five-year-old body to his friend. At least one of Otis's father's friends raped him, but Otis believes he was sold to several. Vanessa is going to take over the psychology here and throughout the episode. Please note, Vanessa is not a licensed psychologist or psychiatrist, but she has done a lot of

research for the show. Thanks, Greg. According to the psychological study, impact of child sexual abuse, a review of the research, Sexual abuse can have many long-term negative effects on a child's psyche, including disturbed sexual functioning as an adult. Those effects worsen when the abuse involves a father figure, occurs frequently or over a long period of time, involves penetration, or involves the use or threat of force.

In Otis's case, all of these things factored into his situation. Bill later abandoned his family, but the horrors of Otis' childhood, would continue. Otis's mother, Sarah Harley, was a cruel woman and a religious extremist. She would abuse her son in a variety of ways, and Otis distinctly remembered her dressing him in girls' clothing and calling him Susan mockingly. Sarah Harley is not the only woman to force her son to wear girls' clothing, and each individual woman seems to have her own reasons for doing it. Some force their sons to wear

dresses because they wanted a daughter and not a son. Sarah Khan, a British television personality, caused controversy in April 2018 when she forced her son to wear a dress to school so he knows it's okay to be different. According to Otis, Sarah Harley would dress him in girls' clothing as a form of punishment. She would call him Susan to humiliate and demean him for acting effeminently, and this treatment only served to further confuse him. Sarah Harley was not the only one of his family members who enjoyed seeing Audis wear a dress. Drusilla, his older sister, loved seeing him in a dress because she always

wanted a younger sister. She would play games with Otis, also calling him Susan. Then she would lead Otis to another room, and their games would turn sexual and incestuous. Children learn behavior through their surroundings and from the people who raise them. Given Otis's sexual abuse from a young age, it seems only logical that Drusilla and their four other brothers would suffer from that same sexual abuse. According to Albert Bandura's social learning theory of aggression, with a complete lack of healthy role models, Drusilla interacted with her younger brother in the same ways that the adults in her life interacted with her, abusively and incestuously. Otis claimed other extended family members would also rape and sexually abuse him,

and people from the neighborhood would stop by to join in the abuse, including his next-door neighbor. It would seem that even though his dad had left, his abusers kept knocking. Otis also claimed that his abuse only got worse when he came out as gay to his family, at the young age of 10. Otis described his childhood as a nightmare that he couldn't escape. He was confused and terrified. He didn't know what to do to break free, or if he could do anything at all to make his situation better.

He was in a living hell, and his only guides served to make his life worse. The only person who Otis remembered treating him kindly was his maternal grandmother. Even Otis's fondness for his grandmother was somewhat tragic, as his grandmother worshipped hell and its king, Satan himself. She called Otis the devil's child, and he claimed that she taught him various satanic rituals and practices. She taught him self-mutilation and took him on grave-robbing runs, often taking body parts off the corpses for use in rituals and to make morbid talent.

These satanic rituals taught Otis that human beings, human corpses, and human body parts were all tools to be used, means to an end. Cutting parts off a human was no different from cutting parts off an animal. If you had use for the body part, you could take it for yourself. Otis said that he continued these occult practices throughout his life, but that he didn't partake in rituals for religious reasons. Instead, he carried on his grandmother's traditions for the sheer pleasure of hurting another person or watching their blood drip from their body. In order to escape his abuse,

he ran away from home on multiple occasions in the 1950s, but he always returned home at one point or another. However, while he was alone on the streets of Jacksonville, he began burning down vacant houses, deriving sexual satisfaction from the flames. He said he chose his targets because, he hated to see them standing there. It might be tempting to call Toole's fire-setting behavior, pyromania, and to call Toole himself a pyromaniac. After all, he fits several of the necessary

criteria. According to the diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders, pyromaniacs purposefully set fires on more than one occasion. They feel tension or become aroused before setting fires. They're fascinated with fire. They derive pleasure from setting fires or witnessing them, and they do not set fires for any purpose beyond the enjoyment of fire itself. All of these were true for Otis Tool, even as a child. But Otis Tool was not actually a pyromaniac. That is correct. The diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders also states that if fire-setting behavior can be better explained by impaired judgment or the presence of other personality disorders, then the person can

cannot be diagnosed with pyromania. Audis was diagnosed with an IQ of 75, placing him in the range of mild mental disability. Intellectual disability can be considered an instance of impaired judgment. If a person's intellect is sufficiently impaired, they might be unable to understand why setting fires is dangerous, whereas a pyromaniac understands the consequences

of setting fires and decides to set them anyway. It sounds like tools lowered IQ, could have prevented him from fully understanding a lot of what was going on in his world. Otis would later be diagnosed with antisocial personality disorder, one of the personality disorders that disqualifies Otis Tool's behavior from being classified as pyromania. A more precise term for Otis Tool and his fire-setting behavior would be to call him a serial arsonist. He also suffered from epilepsy and would have grand mal seizures at regular intervals. These seizures combined with his low IQ and horrific home life made it incredibly difficult

for him to learn. He dropped out of school after the ninth grade. Confused, abused, and trapped in the hell that he called home, Otis began to pursue the only thing that he felt gave his life meaning, pleasure. A 14-year-old dropout, he began visiting gay bars and became obsessed with pornography. He wanted money and didn't know how to get any of the sort of work, so he became a sex worker. His primary source of income became the very acts that had started his early life of abuse. After all, if Otis's father could make money from selling Otis's body, why couldn't Otis make that money himself? However, his traumatic memories of being forced into sex work

made it initially difficult for him to willfully participate in transactional sex, even if he was in control. One of Otis's first tricks turned ugly when a traveling salesman picked him up and drove him into the woods. Otis claimed that he got nervous after having sex with a man, so he ran over the man with his own car. At the young age of 14 in 1961, Otis Toole had committed his first murder. Afterwards, Otis' mental state only grew more chaotic. The fire in his mind became more pervasive and confusing. It was the first time in his life he had taken action against a person who had hurt him.

It felt good to Otis, but it also felt terrifying. At the time, he thought his first murder might be his last, but that was far from the grisly truth. It's important to note here that many of Otis's murder confessions that came later in his life would be proven false. The only evidence we have for this murder is Otis Tool's own telling of the story. There's no police record of a murder like this. occurring at that time and place.

However, given Otis's many actual crimes and horrific upbringing, it's not hard to believe that this specific incident actually happened, or that Otis began his killings at such a young age. Otis's bad behavior continued, and he would first be arrested when he was 17 years old in August 1964. His first arrest was for the simple crime of loitering, though his rap sheet would eventually include several accounts of petty theft and lewd behavior. By 1966, he began drifting throughout the southwestern United States. We know that he supported himself through panhandling and sex work. He likely committed more thefts as well, but not much is actually known about Otis's life

between 1966 and 1973. Otis's mental impairment contributed to his inability to hold a job, and his persistent criminal behavior encouraged him to keep moving from place. place to place. By 1974, Otis was living in Lincoln, Nebraska. He was 27 years old, and 13 years after his first murder, he may have laid claim to his second victim. A 24-year-old woman named Patricia Webb. But first, time for a quick change of subject. Yamava Resort and Casino at San Manuel is California's number one entertainment destination for today's superstars. Catch the Jonas Brothers return to the Yamava Theater stage on a April 30th, the powerful vocals of Demi Lovato on May 17th, and the signature Southern

Country Rock of Eric Church on July 19th. Tickets on sale now at yamava Theater.com, only at Yamava Resort and Casino, celebrating its 40th anniversary. You in? Must be 21 to enter. Now let's get back to the story. In 1974, 27-year-old Otis Toul was living in the vicinity of Lincoln, Nebraska. He became one of the prime suspects in what might have been his second murder, when the body of a 24-year-old woman was found hidden under a haystack. This woman's name was Patricia Webb, and on April 18, 1974, she was found with tape over her mouth, six bullet wounds in her head, and four bullet wounds in her torso. She had been working her job at an adult bookstore when a robber took 51 bondage-themed porn magazines, a calculator,

$30, and her life. Audis Tool became a person. crime suspect in this case. The town knew him as a drifter and a near-do-well, and his participation in sex work made him a known criminal entity. He also visited the adult bookstore where Patricia Webb worked on multiple occasions. It was the only adult bookstore in town. The murderous drifter theory seemed entirely plausible to some police officers working the case. An Otis' tool fit their profile almost perfectly. However, the evidence linking Otis to the murder was not substantial

enough to pursue a case against him. The police investigators did not think the crime was sexually motivated as Patricia's body did not show any signs of rape. The complications of the case also made it difficult to pin the murder on just one man as the bullets in her

body came from two separate weapons. The autopsy showed that the ten bullets pulled from Patricia's body came from two separate guns, one a rifle and the other a pistol. When Otis was searched, they did not find a gun on his person. They did not find the stolen pornographic magazines, calculator, or cash on his person either. Although it should also be stated that they never found the weapons or the stolen goods at all. Additionally, an eyewitness stated that the last person they saw entered the adult bookstore where Patricia worked was a short black man, but Audis' tool was a

six-foot-two white man. We could not find the name of the suspect, but in articles about the case, according to the eyewitnesses, this short suspect was also a known criminal in the town. To make matters more interesting, Patricia Webb was also working as an undercover drug informant

for the Nebraska State Patrol. The police suspected that her work as an undercover cop may have made her a target, although they could not point to any individuals for whom this motive perfectly fit. At the time, the suspicion of two murderers made the case against Otis less compelling. But we now know that Otis was more

than willing to commit heinous crimes like armed robbery, sexual assault, and murder alongside other accomplices based on his later crime spree with his lover. Patricia Webb was abducted from the store and killed at another location. It's entirely possible that Otis knew the other suspect through connections in the criminal underworld of Lincoln, Nebraska. The other suspect could have taken Patricia to a location where Otis was waiting, and they could have committed the murder together. However, no connection between the two was actually proven in a court of law, and that scenario does seem mildly far-fetched. We also know that Otis was no stranger to petty theft, was obsessed with pornography. Remember, 51 porn magazines were stolen, and that he would later

use guns to kill. So Otis was definitely capable of killing this young woman, although, although he would never confess to her murder. The police could not convict any individual suspects for this murder, and the case remains open to this day. However, after facing intense scrutiny, Otis Toole fled Nebraska and moved to Colorado. It's generally believed that he fled because he was scared that he would be found guilty of the slaying.

According to Toll, his next murder occurred six months later on September 19, 1974, at Susie's Oriental Massage Parlor and Colorado Springs, Colorado. Tuel entered the building late at night. The 36-year-old proprietor, Sunak cousin, and a 32-year-old masseuse, Yon Chah Lee, told him the store would be closing soon

and that if he wanted a massage, he should come back the next day. Instead of leaving, Toul pulled out a gun, aiming it at the women. He demanded they give him all the money in the register. Terrified, the women gave him all the money. the cash they had available, $60 total. They thought that would be enough, but Toole wasn't satisfied. If Toole's previous crimes were not enough evidence of his sadistic impulses, what he did to these two women would be a prime example of them. Tool pulled out a rope and demanded that the women stay silent as he tied them up and laid them

out across the floor. Terrified, they stayed absolutely still, not knowing what this man had in mind. Toul pulled out a knife and approached Jion Chaliy. He stabbed her multiple times, then finished by slitting her throat. Soon, Ak, cousin, watched in horror, knowing that she was next. She struggled against her ropes as Toul dragged her to a neighboring room. Here, Toul raped her, stabbed her multiple times, and finally shot her to death. Before Toul fled the scene, he set both women on fire and watched them burn.

This would be the first known instance of Toole's fire-setting behavior being used on people instead of things, but it would not be the last. Of course, Tools' psyche was not the only one in play here. The inherent desire to live cannot be understated. Amazingly, after being stabbed, having her throat slit, and having been set on fire, Yon Chali survived this horrific incident. Incredibly, Yon Chali was able to get a lot of. a description of her assailant to the police. She said he was six foot two, weighed 195 pounds, was clean-shaven, and drove a white pickup truck, a description that matched Otis Toole perfectly. However, Toole was a drifter, and he fled the scene and the town

before anyone knew he was there. Police grew desperate in their search for the killer. They had a clear eyewitness description for the most gruesome murder to happen in the town's recent history, and they needed to close the case to avoid looking incompetent. On October 30th, six weeks after the incident, police arrested a man named Park Estep for the murder instead of Otis Tool. Park Estep was white and had a fair amount of facial resemblance to Toole. As far as the police were concerned, he was their only suspect.

He matched the description, if you squinted, and if you really needed to catch a murderer. However, many aspects of his physique were directly contradictory to Yon Chalese statements. Park Estep was 5 foot 10 inches tall. The murderer was 6 foot 2 inches tall. Park Estep weighed 150 pounds. The murderer weighed 195 pounds. Park Estep had a full mustache, but the murderer was clean-shaven.

Park Estep drove a red pickup truck, but the murderer's pickup truck was white. Park Estep's wife also gave him an alibi, saying Park was at home that night, sick with a fever. He also had no criminal record, and in a lineup, Yon Chaliy did not name Park as her assailant until he was pointed out to her by the police. After police influence, Yon Chaliyanh Ali said her assailant was probably Park Estepe, but she continued to insist that her assailant had been clean-shaven. Some concerns have been raised in issues of police influence. on witnesses during lineups.

In fact, according to a study published in the Journal of Applied Psychology entitled, Effects of Administrator Witness Contact on Eyewitness Identification Accuracy, they found that an eyewitness was more likely to make claims in line with police expectations when police were heavily involved in the lineup process. It seems entirely likely that the police pushed Yon Chaliyy into identifying the wrong man, especially considering her own person, considering her insistence that her assailant was clean-shaven. Nevertheless, Park Estep was convicted and sentenced to life in prison for the murder of Sunak

cousin and the attempted murder of Yon Chaliy. Adda's tool would only become a suspect 10 years later when he confessed to the crime in gory detail. So why did Toole commit this heinous crime? The man himself gave two reasons. First, he said that once a person has started killing and finds that they enjoy it, killing becomes a habit, like smoking cigarettes or chewing gum. Killing became something that he did on impulse.

He would get the itch, and then he would scratch it. This was very similar to how Otis described setting fires. He would have the impulse to destroy, and then he would act on it. In this particular murder, all of his sadistic impulses were cobbled together into one horrific incident. Torture, rape, murder, and arson. Here he got to do it all. It was this behavior and motivation that would allow psychiatrists to diagnose Otis Tool with antisocial personality disorder. According to the diagnostic and statistical manual, fifth edition, a person can be diagnosed with antisocial personality disorder when they meet several criteria. First, their identity is egocentric,

or they derive their self-esteem from personal gain, power, or pleasure. They set their goals based entirely on personal gratification, ignoring any social, cultural, or legal norms for ethical behavior. Otis' childhood gave him very little means to acquire self-worth, and nobody in his life showed concern for morality or following the law. The DSM-5 also states that people with antisocial personality disorder, or APD, for short, lack empathy and do not have the capacity for true intimacy with other people. Otis said on multiple occasions that killing a human was the same as killing a hog.

This demonstrates a clear lack of empathy, and given the fact there was nobody in his life that he could truly trust, it makes sense that he would not be able to have true intimacy with other people. People with APD demonstrate antagonism in the form of manipulativeness. deceitfulness, callousness, and hostility. Otis Thule would later become known for his lies and tall tales, and we've already seen plenty of evidence for his callousness and hostility toward other human beings. And finally, people with APD are characterized by disinhibition, which means they're irresponsible and impulsive,

and they often take risks, typically to alleviate boredom. All of these descriptions match Otis Tool to a It's important to note here that APD and psychopathy are often confused with each other. According to an entry in the encyclopedia of clinical psychology, APD and psychopathy share many similarities, but they are in fact different things. In order for an individual to be diagnosed with APD, they have to have demonstrated their disordered behavior while they were still children

in the form of conduct disorder. A psychopath does not necessarily have to be. to demonstrate his or her poor behavior as a child to be considered a psychopath. So Otis Tool's frequent arson, grave robbing, and other criminal behaviors during his childhood allowed psychiatrists to retroactively diagnose him as having conduct disorder, meaning he could also be diagnosed as having a PD. Now remember, Otis Tool gave two reasons for why he attacked Yon Chali and Sunok cousin. The first was that he simply enjoyed it, allowing him to be.

diagnosed with antisocial personality disorder. The second reason was a little more surprising. Otis Tool claimed that he committed this murder, along with many others, as part of his membership to a nationwide satanic murder cult called the Hands of Death. He told many more grand tales about this cult, but because these stories were only told after his capture, we'll get more in depth about those at a later time. For now, we'll return our focus to Otis Tool's time in Colorado during September and October of 1974. Otis Tool killed on impulse, and it seems that his impulse to kill

was not fully sated with the blood of Sunok cousin. Less than one month after the September 19th murder in Colorado Springs, a 31-year-old woman named Ellen Holman was taken from her home on October 14, 1974. Some sources say she lived in Boulder, Colorado. Others say she lived in Pueblo, Colorado. But all sources agree that she was shot in the head three times, and her body was found dumped at the Colorado, Oklahoma border.

The case remains open to this day. The police lacked enough evidence to pursue a case against any suspect. But when Otis later began confessing to many different crimes, Otis became the prime suspect in the murder of Ellen Holman. At the time, Otis did face some largely baseless accusations within the community, But Otis feared the repercussions of these accusations, and he fled the state, indicating that there may have been some truth to those accusations after all. After fleeing Colorado, Otis continued to drift across the American South.

For eight years, from 1966 until 1974, Otis had moved across the country, never staying in one place. His behavior and criminal activities made it difficult for him to stay in one place for too long. But looking for some return to stability, Otis found his way back home to Jacksonville, Florida, in early 1975. When Otis Tool got back home, his destructive behavior would only get more dangerous and more out of control. He would soon meet a partner who enjoyed murder and mayhem just as much as he did,

and the bodies would start to pile up. Let's break for a moment. We've got something we think you'll find interesting. Now, back to the story. After Audis Tool's eight-year journey across the U.S., he returned to Jacksonville, Florida in early 1975. He moved in with his mother, Sarah, his stepfather, Robert, his nephew, Frank Powell, Jr., and his 11-year-old niece, Frida Powell.

He got a job at a paint factory, and he began visiting the local soup kitchen for food and flirtation. His family grew used to Otis bringing home men for sex over the next year. This meant it was not out of the ordinary when Otis brought home a man who would prove to be a disastrous companion for the people around him. In 1976, Otis Tool met Henry Lee Lucas at the soup kitchen. Henry Lee Lucas was a fellow drifter with a childhood similar to Otis's. By this point, Henry was a convicted murderer. On January 11, 1960, Henry Lee Lucas killed his own mother after an argument about whether or not he should take care of her in her old age.

Henry was sentenced to 20 to 40 years in prison for second-degree murder, but he was released in June 1970 after serving only 10 years due to prison overcrowding. Henry was put back in prison one year later after attempting to kidnap three young school girls. Henry was released again in 1975, and he began drifting across the country from one relative to the next, constantly burning bridges wherever he went by pocketing his relatives' cash and molesting his girlfriend's children. Finally, he ended up in Jacksonville, in 1976, where he met Otis Tool. They immediately made a connection, discussing their shared interests in rape and murder. Otis brought Henry home for a night of drinking and sex.

Everybody needs human connection, and serial killers are no different. Otis and Henry felt like they had met their sadistic soulmates. Both had abusive parents and had been abused in similar ways. Both were drifters who had spent some time in prison. Both enjoyed the act of killing. It was a terrible trick of fate that brought these two together. Henry, having nowhere else to go and feeling right at home with Otis, moved in to the Tool household.

Otis helped Henry get a job at the paint factory where he worked, and they worked together off and on for months. When they weren't working, they began driving across the nation's highways, robbing convenience stores, and according to their confessions, murdering any person they came across who seemed like an easy target. Their crimes followed a pattern of escalation similar to many other serial killers and criminal duos,

as they grew more comfortable with each other, Their actions became more daring and brutal. While most robberies are committed for material gain, they committed these crimes to enjoy terrorizing those people unlucky enough to run into them. As they held clerks and workers at gunpoint, if the clerk showed any sort of resistance, the duo would gun them down.

Henry Lee Lucas told the Georgia Bureau of Investigation about one robbery they committed in Western Georgia. Henry seemed to enjoy telling stories about his killings more than the killings themselves. So it's no surprise that he would tell the police this story in as much detail as he did. Lucas approached the counter of a small convenience store and placed a 22-caliber handgun

against the forehead of the young woman working at the store. He forced her to stay still as he bound her with ropes. An otta's tool took the money from the register. Fearing for her life, the young woman started screaming and struggling against the ropes. Lucas approached the girl and told her, quote, If you don't keep quiet, I'm going to have to shoot you, end quote. The woman obeyed.

Otis and Henry began counting their money. As they split the takings, Henry Lee Lucas noticed the woman quietly trying to break free from her ropes. Without another word, Lucas walked over to her and shot her in the head. As Lucas loaded beer into the car and the woman's blood pulled on the ground, Otis Toole stripped her of her clothes and raped her corpse. Otis Toole was clearly a very disturbed individual, and even his partner Henry Lee Lucas felt Otis was the more deranged of the two. About this incident, Lucas told the police, quote,

Now see, that's the difference between me and Otis. He just kills him when he feels like it. At least I warn him first, end quote. Their distorted desires fed into each other, and they grew more brutal as each killing took place. The duo enjoyed driving on the I-35 interstate through Texas. One night, they came across a teenage couple whose car had run out of gas. They were walking toward the nearest gas station,

but Toul and Lucas cut the couples' walk short. Otis stopped the car, pulled his gun, and shot the teenage boy nine times, firing bullets into the boy's head and chest. He rolled the boy's body into a day. while Henry Lee Lucas grabbed the girl and forced her into the car. As Otis drove the car, he watched Henry rape the screaming girl in the backseat. They traveled miles, torturing the poor girl, Henry Lee Lucas raping her multiple times. Otis said that eventually he grew jealous of the girl.

It's hard to imagine anyone being jealous of a rape victim, but for Otis' tool and his disturbed sense of sexuality, watching his lover, quote, have repeated sex with someone else was enough to anger him, regardless of the horrendous context. Enraged, Otis stopped the car in the middle of the road. He dragged the girl onto the pavement and opened fire, shooting her six times total. They left her body lying on the road and drove back to Jacksonville. If we are to believe these men, according to Otis, everybody they came in contact with was a potential victim. When the duo met, it was like steel-striking Flint.

Their collective anger at the world, their lust, their frustration, and their lack of moral inhibitions grew to dangerous proportions when they finally met each other. They didn't care what damage they caused so long as they had fun while doing it. They tended to keep to rural locations where witnesses were less likely to find them committing their crimes. Their favorite victims were fellow drifters, hitchhikers. or even women whose cars had broken down on the side of the road. If their own car broke down, they'd claim they would steal themselves a new one, sometimes killing the driver and then dump the stolen car and the next date over.

On January 14, 1977, at 29 years old, Otis surprised everyone in his household when he married a woman 25 years his senior. We don't know how they met, but given that the soup kitchen was Otis' usual meetup spot for romance, they likely met each other there. Her name was Novella, and she was a lonely woman who married Otis only a few days after meeting him. But she soon learned that she couldn't hold a candle to Henry when it came to Otis's sexual interest. Otis would later claim that this marriage was intended as a cover to disguise his true sexual orientation. Given that Otis was gay in the 70s when homosexuality was widely frowned upon,

and given the fact that Otis claims his childhood abuse, abuse worsened when he came out to his family as gay, it might make some sense as to why he would want to hide his identity. Of course, Otis had been openly gay since the age of 10. It's possible that moving back in with his family further confused his sense of self, much like it did back when he was a child. His mother was also extremely religious, so while she was likely used to Otis bringing men over, she very likely didn't approve, even though she allowed Henry to move in. But why did he think a false marriage would work? It seems odd that Otis thought marrying a woman could somehow change his family's perception of him.

But perhaps he did it as an act to appease his mother, a sort of peace offering to show that he was making some progress towards living in a way that she would approve of. It's possible that he wasn't only trying to lie to his family, but that he was also trying to lie to himself. Only it didn't work. Novela moved out of the house after quickly realized, realizing that Otis was gay and in a relationship with Henry Lee Lucas.

Despite this bump in their marriage, court documents indicate that they never actually got divorced. Novella stayed married to him because he provided the level of companionship that she wanted without her having to reenter the dating world. She said Otis could not get it up with her alone. But if he had just been with a man, he could sometimes keep it up long enough to do the deed, and she felt that was enough for her. It is possible that Novella may have also had her own issues with self-esteem. Otis's mother, Sarah, bought the family a new house, and the entire family moved, including Henry Lee Lucas.

Henry quit his job at the paint factory and began selling scrap metal from home. While Otis was at work, Henry began molesting Otis's niece, Frida, whom Henry called Becky. They called her Becky to disguise her identity while traveling, sometimes pretending that she was Henry's daughter or pretend. that she was Henry's wife. Frida grew to like the name better than her own. Given Otis's previous account of jealousy, it's reasonable to assume that Henry Lee Lucas kept his growing attraction to Frida a secret from Otis.

In 1979, Otis and Henry got jobs at a roofing company called Southeast Colorcoat. The pair worked for this company for two years. Eileen Knight, their office manager, said that during that time, the duo would vanish regularly, sometimes missing for weeks at a time. Despite Otis's frequent disappearances, Eileen said the roofing company would always hire Otis whenever he came back,

because he was a good worker. While Otis's employers didn't mind his erratic behavior, other people in his life did grow suspicious of some of his actions. Betty Goodyear, Toole's landlord, said about Otis and Henry, quote, They went out of town, always disappearing. All Tool cared about was that old car. I think they were using it for robbing people

because they always seemed to have a lot of money, end quote. Despite the suspicion, their cross-country crime spree would continue uninterrupted until May 1981 when Otis's mother, Sarah Harley, died. After having surgery, Sarah's body gave into complications. Otis was crushed. In spite of Sarah's poor treatment of Otis, he still felt her loss.

He was seen wandering around in the graveyard and laying across her grave, quote, feeling the ground move beneath him. His actions in the graveyard were a physical manifestation of his grief, but he took that grief and funneled it right back into killing, this time bringing children along for the ride. Shortly following Sarah's death in May 1981, Otis Thule and Henry Lee Lucas took Frank and Frida Powell. Otis's niece and nephew on a road trip to California.

Frida was only 12 at the time, but Otis and Henry continued their habit of depraved murder. They'd often have the children wait in the car while they broke into their victim's houses. Otis later said the motive for having Frank and Frida along on their travels was to keep people from getting overly suspicious of him and Henry. The children acted as an innocent cover

for two deeply malevolent human beings. One example of a crime like this happened in Bonifay, Florida. Otis Toole confessed to the murder of an 18-year-old woman named Geraldine Peoples. Toulin Lucas broke into her home while she was at the grocery store. They waited inside for their victim, sending Frank and Frida to hide in the street. They didn't know or care who their victim would be, but when Jerylyn returned home, hands full of groceries, Toul and Lucas shot her in the living room.

The men left the house, and without any leads, the police were left with a murder mystery that would only be solved years later. It's natural to wonder what psychological effects these crimes would have on Frank and Frida. Not much information is available on Frank Powell, so any statement on his psychological health would be pure speculation. However, we do know a little bit more about Frida. Similar to Otis Tool, she was also developmentally disabled. It's entirely likely that she didn't know what her uncle and his lover were doing on her. the road or if she did know she probably didn't understand much about the moral

implications or the depth of depravity of their actions while traveling with Frank and Frida in 1981 Toul and Lucas managed to get as far west as Arizona the children got homesick and the pair of murderers decided to cut their trip short they sold their rundown car for some extra cash and took the more adventurous route of riding freight trains and hitchhiking to get back to Jackson They stayed in Jacksonville for a month, but quickly grew tired of it. They had intended to leave Jacksonville for good. Because they sold their car in Arizona, Toul and Lucas stole a truck from one of of Otis's cousins. They convinced Frank and Frida it would be more fun to see new places,

and that they would enjoy meeting some of Henry's relatives up in Maryland. So they headed north. While in Delaware, the truck broke down, and they abandoned it on the side of the highway. They hitchhiked for a few miles before Otis grew sick with an unknown illness, and he was hospitalized. Henry didn't want to get stuck paying for any hospital bills, and the kids got bored at the hospital, so he took the children and continued north to one of his relatives' houses in Maryland. Otis was too sick to stop them. The police caught up to Henry, and he was arrested for stealing Otis' cousin's truck. Henry had no legal claim to custody for Frank and Frida, so the two children were.

were taken by the authorities and returned to the custody of their mother, Otis's sister, Drusilla Carr. Separated from his family and his lover, barely recovered from disease, Otis made his way back to Florida. But before he made it back to Jacksonville, he stopped off in Hollywood, Florida. Here he would commit his most famous crime. The abduction and murder of six-year-old Adam Walsh. Next week will cover his six other murder convictions. and his wild claims to Satanism, cannibalism, and widespread terror that garnered more media attention than most of his actual proven crimes. And we'll tell you about how one of the longest-running and most popular TV shows in recent history would carry his legacy across the country, terrifying the public for decades after his capture.

Thanks again for tuning in to serial killers. You can find more episodes of Serial Killers as well as all of Parcasts, other podcasts, on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Google Play, CastBox, Tune-in, or your favorite podcast directory. Many of you have asked how to help the show, and if you enjoy the show, the best way to help is to leave a five-star review. We'll see you next time. Have a Killer Week. Serial Killers was created by Max Cutler, is a production of Cutler Media and is part of the Parcast Network. work. It is produced by Max and Ron Cutler, sound design by Carrie Murphy, with production

assistance by Ron Shapiro and Paul Mahler. Additional production assistance by Carly Madden and Maggie Admeyer. Serial Killers is written by Giles Hofseth and stars Greg Paulson and Vanessa Richardson. A beloved 75-year-old man washing up getting ready for bed is brutally beaten and killed. Despite an exhaustive investigation, the killer avoids arrest and then strikes again. I'm Global News crime reporter Nancy Hicks. You might listen to a lot of true crime podcasts this year, but they're not crime beat. Search for and follow the award-winning podcast Crime Beat on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, and wherever you find your favorite podcasts. Do you want to hear something spooky? Some monster, it reminded me of Bigfoot.

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