Killer Stories with Harvey Guillén - Who Killed Jane Mixer?

Episode Date: August 21, 2023

In 1969, a 23-year-old law student at the University of Michigan was found murdered in a cemetery outside of Ann Arbor. Jane Mixer’s death was considered part of a string of violent killings known as the Michigan murders, thought to be the work of a serial killer. That changed when new evidence came to light. But more than 50 years later, doubt remains. Was the right person sent to prison? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I have to tell you, due to the nature of this case, listener discretion is advised. This episode includes discussions of murder and sexual assault. Consider this when deciding how and when you'll listen. On the morning of March 21st, police are called to a cemetery. Laid out on one of the graves is a young woman's body. She's been shot twice in the head. A stocking is wrapped around her neck. Her dress is pulled up and her nylons are yanked down.

She's covered with a raincoat, a wool jacket, and some clothes. There are a few items arranged between her legs. A blood-soaked towel, her shoes and purse. And beside her, a suitcase and a book. Catch-22. It's Jane Mixer. I'm Vanessa Richardson, and this is Serial Killers, a Spotify podcast. Episodes release every Monday.

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Your next obsession is waiting. Watch only on Prime. March 1969. Jane Mixer is a grad student at the University of Michigan's law school in Ann Arbor, one of just 37 women in a class of 420. She's about to head home to Muskegon, Michigan for spring break, and she has some big news for her parents. She's engaged to fellow grad student Phil Whiteman.

Phil plans to join Jane in Muskegon soon, but he wants to give her parents time to adjust to the idea first. they've never met. All Jane needs to do to get home is find a ride. She leaves a request at the campus ride board, which helps students coordinate carpools. Maybe someone will give her a lift. Sure enough, Jane's note gets a response.

A student named David Johnson is headed to Michigan and agrees to drop her in Muskegon on March 20th. Remember that name, David Johnson. Before she leaves, Jane calls her sister Barbara and tells you the plan. Barbara tries to talk her out of carpooling. She thinks Jane should just drive home with Phil and introduce him to their parents right away.

But Jane insists she knows what she's doing. Her last words to Barbara are, Trust me. March 20th arrives. Jane and her ride leave by 6 p.m. The drive is around three hours, so she should be home around 9.30. She's already let her dad know she's hitching a ride.

Back in Muskegan, the mixers wait for their daughter's arrival. 9.30 comes and goes. So does 10, then 11. Eventually they call the police. Jane's dad, Dan, gets in his car and drives around for hours, thinking maybe Jane got in an accident. But Jane isn't in Muskegon.

In a matter of hours, her body is found in a cemetery outside Ann Arbor. Jane's parents confirm it's her. And as the mixers go home to process their shock and grief, investigators get to work. It's determined Jane was shot to death. The way her killer staged her body is misleading. The stocking wrapped around her neck was only put there after she died. And despite the suggestive state they left her in,

with her dress pulled up and nylon's yanked down, there are no signs of a sexual assault. During a search of the campus, authorities find a few things of interest. One is in Jane's dorm room, a phone book with a mark next to a student's name. David Johnson. The name of the person Jane said was giving her a ride home. She mentioned him to her parents and her fiancé Phil. Detectives pay David Johnson a visit.

But it turns out he has an alibi. He was performing in a play at the time of Jane's murder. Not only that, he claims he doesn't know who Jane is. Authorities interview other locals with the same name, but it doesn't lead them anywhere. Shortly after, investigators find another phone book in the law school library. Strangely, it has the words mixer and Muskegon sketched on the cover. It feels significant.

But before authorities can run down that clue, they get distracted, because four days later, the body of another young woman, Marilyn Skelton, is found in Ann Arbor. Okay, so Jane and Marilyn's deaths are alarmed. on their own, but what's really worrying authorities is they may be part of a larger pattern. Two other young women were stabbed to death near local college campuses in the recent past, one in 1967, the other in 1968. All four victims were young, and they were each murdered within the same 15-mile radius. To detectives, it looks like there could be a serial killer on the loose.

And soon, more murders fan the flames of that theory. That summer, three more victims are found in quick succession. Don Basem, who was strangled and stabbed, Alice Colum, who was stabbed and shot, and Karen Sue Bynumann, beaten and strangled. Collectively, their cases become known as the Michigan murders. Karen's death leads authorities to their first promising lead since David Johnson. Karen was spotted with a man the night she went missing,

an Eastern Michigan University student named John Norman Collins. If that name sounds familiar, it's because we covered John Collins on this show in May of 2019. When investigators dig into Collins' past, they find Karen's blood and hair in the basement of his uncle's home, along with one of Collins' fingerprints. It's enough to make an arrest. The news comes as a huge relief. After so much terror, it feels like the police. finally have their guy, and the public can breathe again.

Authorities aren't able to link Collins to the other six victims, but that doesn't mean he's not considered the prime suspect. In cases like these, the priority is getting a conviction and getting Collins off the street as soon as possible, so prosecutors will often prioritize whatever case is the strongest and pursue other charges later if they can. After Collins is sent to jail, the murders stop, which is proof enough for most people, including the mixers, that Collins was responsible for all the murders, including Jane's.

But officials don't find more evidence, so Jane's case goes inactive. The mixers step back from the spotlight to grieve in silence. It's easier for them to stop talking about Jane, to not have to continually relive the grisly circumstances of their daughter's death. It's not perfect, but they accept the ending. they've been given until it all falls apart. Are you looking for support in your weight management journey? Zepbound terseptitide may be able to help. Zepbound is a prescription medicine used with a reduced calorie diet and increased physical activity

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While it was never proven, most everyone assumes the culprit is behind bars for another murder. Everyone that is, except for Detective Eric Schroeder. Detective Schroeder is a Michigan investigator. He didn't work the Michigan murders when they were active, but he knows them well, and he thinks about the case. A lot. Jane's death in particular has always haunted him. He doesn't think she fits in with the

others, mainly because she wasn't sexually assaulted and the others were. She was also shot, not stabbed, beaten, or strangled. And the way the coats were laid over, Jane, suggested some sort of compassion or care from her killer. No one else received that treatment. When Schroeder's bosses assign them to recatalogue old cold case files, he gets a chance to examine the and Jane's. And he sends a few pieces of evidence from her crime scene back in 1969 to a lab. His hope is new DNA technology will either confirm Collins was the killer or point the case in a new direction. The evidence takes a year to process. But the results turn Jane's case on its head. The Michigan lab was able to collect a number of DNA samples from Jane's crime scene,

the pantyhose, the book, and blood on her left hand that wasn't hers. And to everyone's shock, the profiles don't belong to one person. They belong to three different men, none of whom were John Norman Collins. So who were they? The DNA on the book and sweater belonged to Phil, Jane's fiancé, which is easy enough to explain. The book was his and he was with Jane right before she left for her. home. But the other two profiles from the blood and the nylons are unknown. So Detective Schroeder turns to DNA databases that can cross-reference local, state, and national records. It takes months,

but they eventually get a hit. The blood belongs to a man named John Rulis. Rulis has a history of violence. Schroeder learns he's currently in prison, serving a sentence for killing his mother, who he'd abused for years leading up to the murder. But there's one big problem. Rulis is only 37 years old, which means he was only four years old in 1969. Investigators are baffled. How did his blood get on Jane?

Maybe Rulis was with the killer at the time, or at the graveyard after? But it's impossible to say. His parents, who were theoretically his character, at the time are dead. And when investigators interview Rulis, it doesn't amount to much. He doesn't say much, and it's not like police can trust his memory anyway. What do you remember for when you were four? Schroeder crosses Rulis off his list of suspects, and he's right back to square one, hoping another lead will turn up soon. Eight months later, one does.

There's another DNA hit, this time on the DNA from the nylons. It's a match for for a man named Gary Lighterman, a retired nurse and father of two. Officials submitted his DNA to the state after he illegally wrote himself a prescription for painkillers in 2001. But it's Gary's more distant past that interests Schroeder. He was 26 in 1969 and lived just 20 miles from Ann Arbor. Schroeder and his team spend the next three months

pouring over Gary's background, trying to learn everything they can. But they're not the only ones wrapped up in the case. Halfway across the country in New York City, 31-year-old Maggie Nelson is also researching Jane's murder, but she's less focused on solving the case and more interested in learning who Jane was. So Maggie is Jane's niece. When she was 13 years old,

she found out what happened to her aunt from a book about the Michigan murders, and she's been trying to learn more about her for years. Her mom, Jane's sister Barbara, still won't talk about Jane. Neither will her grandfather, Jane's father. It's too painful, easier to avoid the subject completely. Over the years, Maggie's had to rely on her own research, whatever she could find in library archives and old newspaper articles.

But then, she stumbled on her aunt's old diaries and letters. They contain her aunt's dreams, insecurities, and fears, scrawled out in elegant handwriting and intimate detail. Through them, Maggie meets a version of her aunt that the world seemed to have forgotten. In most articles about her murder, Jane was described as shy, a bookish valedictorian, but the diaries reveal a much more complicated picture, a Jane who loved her sister deeply, but sometimes hated her just as much, a Jane that felt like an outsider, who desperately wanted to be happy and in love.

Maggie starts writing a book to capture this version of her aunt, a mix of poems and diary entries, a portrait of a woman who was so much more than a victim. She finishes it in 2004 and sends her mom an early copy. Barbara reads it and calls Maggie in tears. Barbara knew Jane, and it felt like her daughter managed to bring her back to life. What they don't know is,

Maggie's book is just the beginning of Jane's reintroduction to the world. A month later, Barbara's cell phone rings. The man on the other end introduces himself as Detective Eric Schroeder. He says Jane Mixer's case isn't over. They're about to arrest the man they think really killed her. Transport your senses with Saltisanado's limited edition perfume mist collection. At Sephora, spritz on lush notes of rainforest orchid and crisp sea breeze with

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need a confession at this point. His DNA is enough to arrest him on the spot. Sometime in the next two weeks, detectives search Gary's house. They don't find evidence exactly, but they do find cause for concern. Polaroid photos of a 16-year-old South Korean exchange student who lives with the lighterman's lying unconscious on Gary's bed. And notably, her clothing is pulled up, exposing her hips, similar to how Jane's body was arranged. In addition, authorities find drugs hidden in Gary's shaving kit. Jane wasn't drugged, but it's possible the exchange student was.

When she's interviewed, she says she doesn't remember the photos being taken. It's alarming, but unfortunately it's nothing that concretely connects Gary any further to Jane's case, and investigators were hoping to find something else because the DNA evidence connecting Gary to Jane's crime scene is complicated by John Rulis. How can they confidently place Gary there when they can't properly explain the four-year-old's blood? Officials move forward anyway. A preliminary hearing begins in January 2005. Maggie Nelson is there with her family. It's the first time she lays eyes on Gary Lighterman, a man she's heard so much about. And she's surprised by how unassuming he looks. He's a bald man in his 60s wearing some prescription glasses, like anyone's

grandpa or dad. It's also the first time she meets Detective Schroeder in person. Up until this point, they've only spoken on the phone. The hearing is a lot to process for Maggie's family. They've been avoiding this tragedy for decades, so they're all a little wary. especially since Jane's father, Dan, Maggie's grandfather, is the first witness. He's in his 90s, and Maggie's acutely aware of how old he looks on the stand as he recounts the day he identified his daughter's body in front of her possible killer. And things don't get any easier. There are vivid descriptions of Jane's autopsy photos.

Her murder is rehashed. Maggie can feel the emotional weight on her family. When the hearing ends, a trial date is set for that summer. Maggie's family has to go back to their lives and spend the next few months waiting. Maggie at least has a distraction. A few months after the hearing, the book of poems about her aunt comes out. She makes sure to send Schroeder a copy. According to Maggie, he goes over it with a highlighter.

He's on the prowl for details that are new to him, anything that could help the case. He gets in touch with Maggie here and there, asking her about certain parts. But after all the work Detective Schroeder is put into Jane's investigation, he's not able to see it through. Before the trial starts, he has a cancer scare and gets removed from the case entirely, which at the end of the day may not be such a bad thing. Schroeder confides in Maggie that during the investigation he drank too much and his marriage fell apart. The case was all-encompassing, and it got to the point he says where he would see Jane's ghost at night. I think Detective Schroeder was ready for a break.

Maggie and her family wish Schroeder well as they prepare to navigate the proceedings on their own. They're hoping to finally get some sort of closure. The trial begins in July 2005. What's working against Gary is, of course, that his DNA was found at Jane's crime scene, and he lived close to Ann Arbor at the time. But as the trial gets underway, more evidence comes to light. Gary's college roommate testifies that Gary owned a 22-caliber gun back in the day, the same kind that killed Jane.

Gary apparently even set up a firing range in their basement. The roommate also says that Gary used to save newspaper articles about the Michigan murder cases. And remember that second phone book? The one police found in the school library with the word, Mixer and Muskegon sketched on the cover. A handwriting expert compares the words to a sample of Gary's writing and determines it's a highly probable match. All this, on top of all the damning evidence against Gary's character,

the photos of the exchange student, the drugs found in his home, the illegal prescriptions make for a pretty compelling case. But the defense works hard to poke holes in the prosecution's case. Gary's 22-caliber gun, for example. There's no way to prove it was the weapon that killed Jane. As far as firearms go, it's a relatively common caliber. And even though Gary's DNA was found at the crime scene, his fingerprints weren't. Of all the prints lifted by police back in 1969, none belonged to Gary.

So then, how did DNA evidence place him at the scene? How is that possible? Well, the defense suggests it's a huge, mistake, caused by cross-contamination at the lab. Turns out the lab that processed Jane Mixer's evidence in 2001 was also processing materials for other cases around the same time, including the murder of John Rulis' mother. Cross-contamination could explain what the police haven't been able to, how John's blood somehow appeared at a murder scene miles away from his home at a time when he was only

four years old. As for Gary, after he was charged for forging prescriptions in 2001, he had to provide a DNA swab to police, and his saliva was being processed in the same lab at the same time. So the defense argues that all the DNA evidence should basically be tossed out. But at trial, representatives from the Michigan lab assure the court that they followed all federal standards and practices. Multiple technicians testified that there was no contamination, and at the end of the day, the jury sides with the prosecution. Gary Lighterman is convicted of murder in the first degree and sentenced to life in prison. His appeals are rejected, and about a decade later, Gary passes away.

But once again, there's a lingering question. Did the court get it right? In 2018, a study in psychonomic bullet. and review singles out Gary's case. With a better understanding of DNA technology, they re-examine the evidence that put him behind bars and conclude, its highly likely cross-contamination impacted the case.

They make all the same points we've mentioned and discuss another strange anomaly. The amount of Gary's DNA on Jane's Nylons. It was a lot. In fact, there was more of Gary's than Jane's, which is odd considering she, was wearing them. It's possible Gary's DNA was so prevalent because it was more recent and hadn't degraded as much as Jane's, as in it might have been transferred onto the nylons in the lab in 2002.

But there's no proof. The lab maintains their tests were accurate and reliable, but doubt has grown over the years. The mixers find themselves in the same spot they were years ago, fairly confident Jane's murderer was caught, but wondering if they'll ever know for certain. If nothing else, Maggie says that through revisiting her aunt's case, they've been able to remember how much they loved her. So who killed Jane Mixer? Was it Gary Lighterman? Or was it Karen Byneman's murderer, John Norman Collins, the suspected serial killer who everyone originally thought? What if I told you that according to Luteman,

Penaed Earl James, who investigated Jane's murder back in 1969, Collins used to live in a college frat house with a bunch of young men, and one was named David Johnson. Thanks again for tuning in to serial killers, a Spotify podcast. We'll be back Monday with another episode. As you might have noticed, we've made some changes to bring a fresh perspective to the show, and more will be coming. I want to take a moment to acknowledge my longtime co-time co-examines.

host Greg Poulson, who will no longer be joining me. I'm truly grateful for his invaluable contributions over the years. Together, we built an extensive library of episodes for you to enjoy anytime, anywhere. Finally, you may not know this, but serial killers is a collaborative effort with a dedicated team of researchers and writers who tirelessly craft compelling stories for you every week. Moving forward, you can expect to hear from our talented staff as they move from behind the scenes and join the show. I hope you're as excited as we are for this thrilling new chapter. Stay tuned for more updates and thank you for your continued support. For more information on Jane Mixer, amongst the many sources we used, we found The Red Parts by

Maggie Nelson and CBS News 48 hours special, The Deadly Ride, extremely helpful to our research. Stay safe out there. Serial Killers is a Spotify podcast. podcast. This episode was written by Kate Murdoch, edited by Sarah Batchelor and Andrew Kelleher, researched by Mickey Taylor and Chelsea Wood, fact-checked by Haley Milliken, and sound design by Alex Button. Our head of programming is Julian Borrow. Our head of production is Nick Johnson, and Spencer Howard is our post-production supervisor. I'm your host, 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. Monsters among us. is a weekly podcast featuring true stories of the paranormal.

One of the boys started to exhibit demonic possession. Stories straight from the witness's mouths themselves. Something very snakelight lifted its head out of the water. Hosted by me, your guide, Derek Hayes. Somehow I lost eight whole hours. Listen now on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.