Morbid - Episode 672: The Death of Ken McElroy, The Town Bully

Episode Date: May 15, 2025

On July 10,1981, forty-seven-year-old Ken McElroy was sitting in his truck in Skidmore, Missouri with his wife, Trina, when the vehicle was struck by a hail of gunfire that seemed to come from all directions. Although there were nearly fifty witnesses to the shooting, they all claimed not to have seen the shooters, and none of them called an ambulance. Later, when asked why no one did anything to help McElroy or cooperate with investigators, the people of Skidmore all agreed, Ken McElroy got what he deserved.The story of Ken McElroy’s death captured the nation’s attention, primarily because it amounted to a modern-day lynching. However, while no one denies that McElroy’s death was murder, few people in and around Skidmore were interested in holding anyone accountable for the shooting. In fact, many seemed pleased to hear of McElroy’s death, which raised the question, how could someone become so hated by their neighbors that they’d be willing to overlook one of the most heinous crimes?Thank you to the Incredible Dave White of Bring Me the Axe Podcast for research and Writing support!ReferencesAssociated Press. 1981. "FBI enters Missouri shooting case." New York Times, July 18: 6.—. 1981. "Little chance of trial in 'town bully' shooting." St. Joseph News-Press, October 26: 1.Graham, O.E. 1968. "What is justice?" St. Joseph News-Press, July 19: 9.Hansen, Rose. 2018. Skidmore revisited. February 6. Accessed April 9, 2025. https://missourilife.com/skidmore-revisited-part-1-death-ken-mcelroy-2/.Loh, Jules. 1981. "Brute of Nordaway County: chilling rembeberances ." Kansas City Star, August 2: 1.MacLean, Harry. 1988. In Broad Daylight: A Murder in Skidmore, Missouri. New York, NY: Harper Collins.McGuire, Donna. 2001. "Two decades after bully's death, Skidmore still guards its secrets." Kansas City Star, July 10: 1.St. Joseph News-Press. 1968. "Dismissals to 2 more defendants in beating case." St. Joseph News-Press, July 11: 9.—. 1968. "Four now charged in beating of man, attack on woman." St. Joseph News-Press, June 14: 7.—. 1973. "Three charges against man." St. Joseph News-Press, September 22: 5.—. 1968. "Victim of assault testifies four men struck, kicked him." St. Joseph News-Press, July 4: 1.Stewart, Paul. 1981. "Grand jury disappoints lawyer." St. Joseph News-Press, September 26: 1.Stay in the know - wondery.fm/morbid-wondery.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Hey, weirdos, it's Ash here, ready to share a little secret. Have you heard of Wondery Plus? With ad-free episodes and one-week early access, it's like having an all-access pass to our lighthearted nightmare. So, come join us on the dark side and try Wondery Plus today. You can join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or in Apple Podcasts or Spotify. You're listening to a Morbid Network Podcast. Lamont Jones is shattered when his cousin dies just weeks after entering prison. Network podcast. County PA on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, weirdos. I'm Osh. And I'm Elena. And this is Morbid.

This is Morbid. This is morbid. We're fresh off of AK. Yeah, we had a little vacay. We hit Disney for a day. We hit Disney. I met a bunch of people. I only met, I think, two. Yeah, because you went one day.

Me and Drew rolled deep and we did... Five? Four days. We did four days and won at Universal. We did the one because, yeah, we... Well, you have like a lot of kids. And we wanted to, we wanted to redeem the Disney vacation and guys, I didn't have a bad time. She had no, she had a good time.

I did, because I ended up like, I never, I don't do rides. It's just like not, and it's not me being an asshole. It's just not me. I've never liked rides. I've just never been a ride girl, I didn't go to theme parks as a kid, it just wasn't a thing. And I don't like the feeling of your tummy flipping,

people love that feeling and I get it. Literally my favorite feeling. Yeah, it's just not a feeling I enjoy. Like if you're in a car and even then you dip down and it gives that like whoop, I don't like that. Oh, sometimes on those bumps I speed up for them. Yeah, see, I don't like that. And so I'm just that kind of person. So usually I will do like the very chill, chill, chill rides. And other than that, John is the ride guy. Ash is the ride person.

The ride TT. I know that like, you know, Ash and Drew and John are going to take the, take the reins. There's always an adult for each kid. Always. And I'll hold all the shit, you know, and take the pictures. Have to have that person. And I'm so good at that. You're great at that. You're great. You're great at holding shit.

But this time, my kids, now the new Tiana ride opened up. I can't even express to you how fucking good this ride is. Well, here's the thing. If you know anything about me, you know I fucking love Princess and the Frog. She rides hard. I love Tiana. She's my favorite princess. She's great. That's my girl right there. Yeah. Well, here's the thing, if you know anything about me, you know I fucking love Princess and the Frog. She rides hard. I love Tiana. She's my favorite princess.

She's great. That's my girl right there. Yeah. And when I heard there was going to be a Tiana ride, I said, oh fuck, I'm going to want to do that. And then I looked it up and I was like, I'm not going to do that. And then my kids said, mom, will you do that with us? And I said, yep, I'll do that with you.

So I literally went into this saying, fuck, I have to do this 50 foot drop and I don't know how to do it. The thing about the drops at Disney though is that they slow them down. This one was so fast that I don't remember it. I think I blacked out. This one is, I just showed her Velocicoaster and I was like, now that's a fucking roller coaster. I don't do, here's the thing, Tiana ride. If you haven't been able to do it,

if you go to Disney, do the fucking Tiana ride. Her Bayou adventure, so much fucking fun. It's incredible. A gorgeous ride. The end of that ride, one of the coolest things I've ever seen. The whole thing. Loved it. And it's long. It's long. But like in a good way.

Very fun. I enjoyed it. And it's long. It's long. But like in a good way. Very fun. I enjoyed it. I enjoyed the little drops. I was able to handle them and I was like, okay. And maybe even the little drops are good. They're pretty decent. I was impressed. You know, and but I think it was like my kids loved it so much and I was sitting next to one of them and it was fun. It was so cute. So that was a lot of fun. I highly recommend doing that. I always loved the Haunted Mansion. It's the best ride. That's a very fun one.

I had a good day. She wore ears. I did. She wore ears. I did for part of the day. They gave me a headache halfway through. I know. Sometimes they press on the back.

Yeah. It was fucking hot. It was blazing hot, which I don't love. I don't know how y'all live in Florida. But here's a little tip from me to you in case you're going. I prepared for this because I said, we're not having a disastrous Disney trip like we did last time. Never.

And I said, we're going to make this a fun day, which means I'm going to make everyone as comfortable as humanly possible, even though it's going to be a thousand zillion degrees. And it was. I highly recommend the cooling towels. You can get like anywhere. You can order them anywhere. Sometimes you can even get them at the park. Yeah. And you just, all you do is wet them and they stay wet and cold for a long time. So you can just race them over your neck or your shoulders. They work. I don't know what the science is behind those, but they're incredible. They're

very, and they're really easy to store in a backpack. So it's like, if you're looking for that, those little misting fans that you can get, highly recommend they are good for a little, you know, little zap of that. And I took it up a notch this time. What'd you do? I know my kids, I know they're going to want to see this fucking Main Street parade. That parade's pretty awesome. Oh my God. It was pretty great.

It is. I had a good day. See, that's all I needed. I just needed a good day. I don't, I still, I don't want to do it again anytime soon. But we're gonna. We will eventually. But like I'm not a theme park girl. It's just not my thing. You guys know that.

But I had a good day, which is exactly what I was looking for. And she's open to doing it again. I am. Absolutely. And my kids had so much fun. That's really all I'm looking for is like the last time everybody got sick. Yeah, it was just not good. I get to see their faces. had so much fun, that's really all I'm looking for is like the last time everybody got sick and I just wasn't, I didn't get to see their faces. Their faces during the parade. The parade was.

I said, I need to have eight children right now just to experience that, experiencing that as an aunt, incredible. I can't imagine how that made you feel as a mama. Oh yeah, seeing the little, the waving at the princesses. And just the, again, with Tiana, I think I meant to be Tiana's friend, I think. So when she went by, she pointed at one of my kids and did the little heart thing to her.

And my child beaming, I have not seen her that beaming in a minute, and she was like, Tiana just did a heart to me. Like it was, I was like, all right, this is very worth it. I was borderline about to cry. Yeah. It was the sweetest thing ever. But what I did for that was I got a parasol and they sell parasols at Disney, which I didn't even know that I just brought on my own. Get a parasol guy. If you don't like the heat and you're worried about that kind of stuff, I got one that like, maybe I can try to post a link to it. I'll find where I got it.

Cause it folded up really small. Even the little spokes of the umbrella itself bent upward to make it smaller. It was super compact so I could put it in a bag, easy peasy, and it like just crunched up. It was so worth it, because they used it several times. No, it was smart. And I was like low key making fun of you

like before we were going, I was like, you bought a fucking parasol. I saw so many people with parasols. It's worth it. You're with the trends. So let me tell you, if you're thinking about it, it really does work. And take this from somebody who's essentially translucent.

Yeah. And who has children who are also pretty translucent. I'm translucent too, and I didn't even burn this time. I was so good about my sunscreen. That's right. Oh. As you should be. A recommendation, another one.

There's an ELF, like ELF setting spray that has SPF 45. Ooh. That's all I use for face sunscreen because a lot of times when you do like the cream, it gets in your eyes and shit. This one, spray it on your face. Good. I spray it on my face probably like three, four times throughout the day. Not a hint of a sunburn.

I love that. So that's a good one even just for the summer. So there you go. These are summer recommendations. That's our summer recommendation. I thought of something when I was there and I said, I gotta tell the listeners. I gotta tell everybody.

I don't remember. I'll post some, I went real ham with like preparing for this trip. If I think of any like interesting hacks that I came up with, I'll be sure to post it for you guys just in case you have kids or are traveling or just traveling in general. You and Drew Capricorned so hard because, like, you have like a million kids,

so you had to get like 45 different things. It was just me and Drew going. Every day that I got home leading up to this vacation, he had a new thing for our trip, because we drove. So you have to be like prepared for that. He got... This is a little bit gross, but I don't care. He got these toilet seat covers. He got these toilet seat covers. He

got these toilet seat covers and you put them down and they like it he's to the toilet seat. It changes your going to the bathroom experience. I hate a public restroom to the point where like even in school, like in high school, I didn't like going to the bathroom. Incredible. But yeah, the I'll try to link the toilet seat covers. Because they were great. Yeah. Anything that works. I mean, I'm by no means a gatekeeper or like a professional when it comes to traveling or anything like that. But if it works with my kids and us, honey, I'll share it.

Disagree. I think you became a professional planner. I think you should start a TikTok page of trips, even though you go on one once a year. Yeah, I don't go on many at all. But, hey, when I do, I really prepare for it. So, yeah, I found a lot of good hacks. I'm just so happy that you had a good time. I'm glad we turned our Disney trip around. It was real rough that everybody got the stomach bug and John was super sick.

Everybody was sick and it was just such a lousy trip the first time. And it was weighing on us that that's the Disney trip that we had been planning forever. And so we were just determined. You needed new memories. I needed a good and it was- And you have them. We got this one picture of John and one of my kids in front of the castle. I saw that fireworks going and I was like, we're framing frame it.

That's a former. There's just it was it was a good day. I didn't want to say it during the time because I was like, don't say it. You'll jinx it. No, but they had a great time and that's all that matters during the fire where I cried the first time I saw the fireworks at Disney. I'm not Disney adult. When Tinkerbell came flying by sob full sob don't care cry every time You hate that do you hate no, I love it. I think it's adorable

That's what I was like. Oh, that's so cute I and I turned to one of my kids who is very like myself Oh, and I turned to her and I said, oh my god, it's Tinkerbell. What did she say? If your kids are listening right now, please, I'm going to say something that's going to ruin the magic. So like, skip forward. I just don't want to ruin other kids' magic. No.

But I was like, look at, oh my god, it's Tinkerbell. And she goes, yeah, I can see the wire. I was like, what? I was like, what? Wires? Like, what? I was like, what? Wires? Like what? What wires? You said, look at TT, she's crying.

She goes, she's ziplining. Okay. And I was like, yeah. And she was like, she's not flying. All right. Like she was literally like, she was looking at me like, mom, I'm sorry I'm ruining the magic for you, but she's not really flying. You know what though? As long as Tink is is zip lining, I thought you were going to say something

even worse. No, she was just like, fuck that, that's not Tinkerbell. Well, no, I think she essentially was like, that's a zip line. That's not really Tinkerbell flying across the thing. Whatever. Child. So I looked and I looked at her and I was like, please don't say anything in front of a younger one. And she was like, of course I won't. And she hasn't. No, because the younger

one brought it up and she was like, I know. Wasn't that crazy? Did you say don't tell TT either? Don't tell TT. She thinks that's Tinkerbell. But I was like, my such my logical child who's always looking to see how anything works. Well, she wants to be an engineer. Yeah, she immediately saw those wires and was like, oh, I get it. One thing I will say, and I say it every time I see the parade in between my tears, where are those projectors? How do they project those images on to, because like they, if you've ever seen the Castle show,

like it's fucking crazy. Yeah. I've never seen the projector. I haven't either. And there's only so many ways you can make Tink flyer, right? It's fucking beautiful. I think it's great. I think it's adorable. So there you go.

It's a much different take on what happened. There it is. Because a lot of... I displeased a lot of people who loved Disney that last time. You don't want to piss those people off. Yeah, and it wasn't me. It was just a bad trip. Coming from the Disney community. No, just kidding.

You're like, just kidding. No, seriously. But for real, shut up. But yeah, so that was good. We got some good stuff coming up that we can't tell you about yet. Like I said, but you will find out and it will be awesome. I think we say that every episode at this point. But it's coming.

Yeah, manifest it. And I think with that, we can probably, this has been a long intro. We don't do those all the time. So sometimes it happens. He lived. Hopefully. He lived. Hopefully.

Gosh. Geez. Pouring out if you didn't. Oh my goodness. But yeah. So, oh, quick little, little side, side quest. Are you going to talk about the Pope? Anyone else hyper fixated on the conclave coming up? The way I knew you were about to talk about the Pope.

I know. I'm sorry. Did you see me call that? I'm sorry. I said, are we about to talk about the, the conclave? I think it's wild that this happened like right after the new papa and ghost was announced. It's suspicious timing. It's crazy timing.

I'll give it to you. But also guys, and like this is no, I am not a religious person. You know this, I've, it's pretty clear by now. Honey, are you new here? If you're shocked by that, I don't know what to tell you. But I'm hyper fixated on it, because I feel like it's very Gothic the way it all happens. It's very metal.

It is interesting. This whole conclave and the burning of the ballots and the black smoke and the white smoke and everybody waiting for that smoke to happen. Love it. Yeah. Love it. And if you, you want to bone up on, on the conclave,

all your Pope knowledge, Andy, hold on. I'm going to look it up because I'm going to give you somebody that you should follow. I love this creator to get all your, uh, the Pope games here. He also covers the Berenstein Bear books and it's great. The, he's a TikTok creator. He's on other platforms too though, but I mainly follow him on TikTok. Rob Anderson. So funny. He's doing a thing where he's calling it the Pope Games and he's treating it like a real Housewives kind of thing. But he's introducing all the would-be popes and telling you what they stand for and again. So it actually, he's giving you the information in like a very funny way.

It's fun. But I'm like, I would, this is very interesting. He also gives them a house lives tagline. Because again, I don't care at all about this stuff, but I'm weirdly hyper fixated on it from a purely curiosity level. It's interesting. Like it's a pure curious, just me being like, this is a wild situation.

It is. I didn't know really anything about it. Yeah. When was the last conclave? Francis has been a pope for a minute. I thought he wasn't the pope that long. I mean, a lot, some popes are popes for like 30 years and shit. That I know.

But I thought Francis was like kind of a short pope. He was only a few years, I think. That's what I think. Yeah. So it's only been a few years. That's also what I think. So that's, so only been a few years. That's also what I think. So that's, so they couldn't, it couldn't have been that long since the last conclave. I'm Googling.

Yeah. Google it. Find it out. Um, but again, uh, not none of like to each their own, the religious stuff doesn't really do anything for me with this, but it's, I'm just purely curious. 2013. So he's been there for a minute. I mean, that is a very long time ago, but in my brain, it's not.

Yeah, it's over 10 years ago. So there's that. Shudders. But yeah, so become hyper fixated on that with me because it's fun. It's wild. It's a wild thing. And follow Rob Anderson because he's really funny. All his other content.

Yeah, all his stuff is funny. And that I think is the end of our very long intro. Wait! No, I'm just kidding. Last year, law and crime brought you the trial that captivated the nation. She's accused of hitting her boyfriend, Boston police officer John O'Keefe with her car Karen Reid is arrested and charged with second-degree murder. The 6 week trial resulted in anything but resolution.

We continue to find ourselves at an impasse. I'm declaring a mistrial in this case. But now the case is back in the spotlight and one question still lingers did Karen Reid kill John O'Keefe? The evidence is overwhelming that Karen Reid is innocent. How does it feel to be a cop killer, Karen? I'm Kristin Thorn, investigative reporter with Law & Crime and host of the podcast Karen The Retrial. This isn't just a retrial. It's a second chance at the truth. I have nothing to hide.

My life is in the balance and it shouldn't be. I just want people to go back to who the victim is in this. It's not her. Listen to episodes of Karen, the retrial, exclusively and ad free on Wondery Plus. Hey, weirdos. If Ash and Olenus episode on Ken McElroy left you wondering how someone could become so cruel, manipulative and untouchable. You'll want to hear my psychological breakdown of this case on my podcast, Killer Psyche.

I examined the twisted mindset behind McElroy's reign of terror, how he exploited fear, used charm as a weapon, and turned an entire town into his victims. Understanding what made him tick is exactly the kind of insight I bring on killer psyche, where I use my experience profiling criminals for the FBI to uncover what drives people like Ken McElroy to become predators.

So if you're curious about the mind behind the mayhem, join me for an inside look at the psychology of a man who got away with everything until he didn't. Follow Killer Psyche on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. So, today, we're going to be discussing a very strange, it's brutal at parts, and then has a wild ending case. This is fun? Question mark?

This is, well, this is the death of Ken McElroy. Okay. But he was known as the town bully. Oh, okay. I don't want to tell you too much upfront about what happens. I would like to leave the ending for the moment it happens because you're just going to be like, what the fuck is going on? So I'm going to give you very little of what I'm not going to tell you how this ends.

Just know that he dies and that he was the town bully. So this did happen. The act itself happens on July 10th, 1981. Okay. When he, Ken McElroy was about 47 years old. This took place in Skidmore, Missouri. That's all I'm going to tell you about the end of it. Let's start at the beginning now. It's so funny that this is 1981 because when you said the town bully, for some reason that just read as like 1900s. Right? Didn't it? Like 1904. Yeah, that's how I thought too, but it was in the 80s.

Okay. A bully is a nice way to describe him, I would say. The town predator, the town monster, the town criminal, the town abuser, the town assaulter. Like he was pretty terrible. He was pretty terrible. So let's talk about him. Let's.

His name was Kenneth Rex McElroy and he was born June 16th, 1934. That's why he's so terrible. He's a Gemini. There you go. Gemini's are the most frightening. Yeah. I say that as Gemini. So it's okay. He was born in Overland Park, Kansas and he was one of 16 children. That's a lot. That's many children. One might say too many. One might say. Me, no, because I won't step in that, but he's... One might say it. I don't know who that one is, but not me. That's when I said one, I didn't say it.

His parents were Tony and Mabel McElroy. Mabel had married Tony when she was just 14 years old, and he was 20. Sounds illegal. Very much so. And it really sets the tone for how Ken is going to act later in life. I think I'm not going to like that. He married her because at 14, she was pregnant with Ken's oldest brother, Herschel.

Oh no. So the apple does not fall far from this tree. 14. Yeah. Born during the height of the Great Depression, Ken's early life was a bit of a struggle, for sure. The whole family was. Tony McElroy had always had a lot of difficulty finding and kind of like maintaining work,

but it was because of his attitude and explosive temper. Not just the depression. It wasn't because it wasn't available. Just before the depression started, he and Mabel had saved enough money to rent 14, or no, 400 acres of farmland in Southern Missouri. God damn. But just before the depression started, he and Mabel had saved enough money to rent 400 acres of farmland in southern Missouri. And they planted a very large corn crop there thinking this is their time.

Unfortunately, they had two rainless weeks in the summer of 1927, and it wiped out the entire crop. Just two weeks. Yeah. So he lost his entire investment. Oh. According to author Harry McLean, the complete loss broke Tony, and he eventually just had to go back to working really low paying construction and farming jobs in and around southern Missouri. In the years that followed that, they continued having children and struggling to get by on Tony's very meager wages, moving from one rented home to another

whenever things would become hard or unaffordable. When the four oldest McElroy boys became strong enough, they were put to work farming, clearing land. This allowed the family to finally settle down in a rented home in Skidmore, Missouri. Skidmore is a wild name. I don't know why. Skidmore is a wild name,

and I feel like it's been featured in like something that I saw lately. Really? Yeah. Skidmore? a wild name. Skidmore is a wild name and I feel like it's been featured in like something that I saw lately. Really? Yeah. Skidmore? I don't know. Hmm. Well, it's a small town of less than 100 residents.

Damn. And it's in Nodaway County in Northern Missouri. Okay. So less than 100 residents, very small town. According to McLean, Ken McElroy spent the first 13 years of his life as the child of a tenant farmer, living in someone else's house, subsisting at near poverty levels in a large family and the bitterness of those years just never left him. To make matters worse, with 14 kids in the house, Ken was definitely not ever his father's

favorite child and never even came close to being the favorite child. I mean, that's a lot of competition. That's a lot of competition. But also you're not allowed to have a favorite child and never even came close to being the favorite child. I mean, that's a lot of competition. That's a lot of competition. But also you're not allowed to have a favorite child. You're not, you have to love them all. Now with so much activity in the house though, both Tony and Mabel were working 12 or more hours a day. They were out of the house a lot.

So Ken and his siblings came and went as they pleased and were never really noticed by his parents. Like they just let it go. It was a very different time. But when Ken did get noticed, it was usually long enough for his father to yell at him for not doing what he was supposed to be doing.

Okay. So not great. That's shitty. One would think that in a family with so many people in it, that maybe there'd be some close bonds between most of them, perhaps. I don't know.

At least those close in age. But when it came to Ken, his brothers and sisters seem to not really pay a lot of attention to him, kind of like his parents didn't. So it was basically that because Ken spent a lot of his childhood by himself. In the winter, he skated on the pond and in the summer he would hunt and trap animals, usually by himself. And that's really sad.

Yeah. During the depression, it was common for a lot of like adolescents and teenage boys, and some girls to be not going to school absent from school a lot, because they would need to stay home and help the family earn money, essentially. In Ken's case, this was true, but even if they weren't growing up during the depression, he probably would have been absent anyways. He didn't like authority. He was not into education. And when he did show up for school, his appearance and hygiene were occasionally so bad that

the teachers would either have to take him to the washroom and show him how to clean himself, or they would just send him home because they said he smelled so bad that it was distracting to other kids. Oh, that's really awful. This lasted until Ken turned about 15 and he dropped out of school. Now when it came to friends, he was never super successful at forming bonds with other children in the area either. At best his teachers would find him kind of like surly and like sullen, like he just wasn't. But at worst he was mean, aggressive and unmanageable.

One of his former classmates said, when I came to Graham school in fourth grade, But at worst, he was mean, aggressive, and unmanageable. One of his former classmates said, when I came to Graham School in fourth grade, one of the first things the other kids told me was about Ken McElroy, the type of kid he was. I was told to stay away from him, that he pushed other kids around. Damn.

Yeah, fourth grade. You're like 10 in fourth grade. Yeah. It's wild. Another classmate said that on his first day riding the bus with Ken, Ken got into a fight with it, and this that on his first day riding the bus with Ken, Ken got into a fight with it.

And this was Ken's first day riding the bus. Ken got into a fight with another student and Ken and one of his brothers pulled knives out and threatened to cut the other boy. Holy shit. And they said after that, Ken had plenty of room on the bus. I would say so. So it turned out the aggressive behavior that he was demonstrating at school was something he was definitely learning from home.

Usually is. In one incident that McLean talks about in his book, Ken was caught stealing from a general store in town and the owner called his father, Tony, to tell him that Ken had stolen from him. Yeah. Rather than like reprimand his son for stealing and saying like, hey, that's not good, you can't do that.

Yeah, like we're not allowed to. Tony quote, burst into the store with a long curved hunting knife in his hand, slammed the owner up against the wall and held the knife to his throat and said, if you ever touch my boy again, I'll cut your heart out. I think that's super rational. I was like, whoa, here's the thing. The report that we saw was that he just called the father

and was like, he's stealing. He's saying like, you ever touch my boy again, I'll cut your heart out. I don't know what happened if the owner like did something to him. It's never good to threaten somebody with a knife. Don't do that. Yeah, we don't recommend it. I could understand the rage component there.

If somebody touched my kid, I would also want to cut their heart out. But like you don't threaten people with a knife, don't do that. Yeah, we don't recommend it. I could understand the rage component there. If somebody touched my kid, I would also want to cut their heart out, but like you don't threaten people with knives. It's illegal. But it also sounds, you know, this is a situation where you can both be angry at the owner if he touched your kid.

Absolutely. But again, this was a time period where this probably wouldn't have been looked at as crazy if an owner like slapped a kid for stealing. But also you have to reprimand your kid for stealing from someone. Yeah. You can't let that go. Because otherwise they're just going to keep stealing and think that you'll attack people

with hunting knives. Well, this incident sent a very clear message to Ken and to everyone else in town that no matter what he did, no one had the right to control him or tell him what to do. Or they'd have their heart cut out. And from then on, Ken operated accordingly. Because this just did send a message to him. I'd be fucking terrified. Like as a community member, I'd be fucking terrified.

Absolutely. And they were. They eventually really were. Now, as Ken grew older, his reputation got worse and worse and his behavior became more and more problematic. Former classmate Bruce Roberts said he was in trouble so many times. After dropping out of school, he found work at a local plant nursery, but he was fired within his first week when the owner caught Ken,

quote, fooling around with a young girl who also worked there. Oh no. Now, this began a trend of Ken finding work and then losing work a short time later because of his temper, his disinterest in authority, his disinterest in work, it would get the better of him. As far as Ken's former friend John saw it, he said he was always in the kind of self-sabotage mode. Sounds like it. He said Ken never got over the fact that he was poor and he resented people who had money.

He could never bring himself to do their shit work. Huh. It's like, but that's not never bring himself to do their shit work. Huh. And it's like, but that's not, like you can't treat people like shit. No. That's not gonna get you anywhere. Exactly, you'll never work your way to the top with that attitude.

In 1952, when Ken was 18 years old, he married Oleta Holland, which was a girl two years younger than him, so she was 16. This was the first time Ken left the McElroy farm and struck out on his own. He didn't go very far though. I was going to say, how'd that go?

Yeah. After the marriage, Ken and Oleta moved to Denver, Missouri, which was a small town about an hour away from Skidmore. And that's where one of Ken's sisters lived at the time. Oleta at the time was pregnant when they moved to Denver. Unfortunately, they did have a stillborn baby. Oh, that's awful. Which is really sad. The move to Denver wasn't just an opportunity to start his own life

with his new wife, though. It was also looked to be like he was trying to start somewhere fresh where no one knew him and knew his reputation for being a complete dickwad. Yeah, you're already like pissed off too many people to get work. Yeah, like you piss off a town of a hundred people. That's going to be tough. Word travels fast. That's going to be tough. Not long after they reloc Yeah, like you piss off a town of a hundred people, that's gonna be tough. Yeah, word travels fast. That's gonna be tough. Not long after they relocated, he found work on a construction crew.

And he was determined, he was like, I'm gonna keep my anger in check. Like he was telling Oletta, this is gonna be different, until an accident derailed his new found success. One day while he was working at the site, and he had been doing well up until here, a large piece of cribbing, which is a temporary support structure,

fell from one of the beams 30 feet above him and landed directly on his head. Holy shit. He was wearing a helmet. The blow split his construction helmet in half. Oh my God. And it cut him obviously in his head and compressed his spine as well.

Oh fuck. Which caused muscle and nerve damage in his neck that he would have forever. Yeah. Compressed his spine? So for Ken, who had never been one for an honest day's work, this was just a sign to him that the straight and narrow way of life was not for him. Okay. He took that as, I tried to be good, I tried to go in the straight and narrow and look

what happened. I got struck down. Not long after that, he and Aletta picked up their things and went back to Skidmore. Was workers comp a thing back then? Right. But when he figured in Skidmore, he could find less dangerous and less scrupulous ways of finding money. So throughout his early adolescent and teen years, Ken had engaged in all manner of illegal

activity, typically for no other reason than just enjoying doing illegal activity and hurting people. Like much of his other very undesirable behaviors and characteristics that he demonstrated in his youth, there was never any consequences for any of these illegal activities, which appears to have enforced his own little fucked up belief that regardless of whether it was right or wrong, no one was stopping him from doing it. Right. It was never going to be any consequences, so I'll just keep going.

Yeah. He always got himself out of shit, and he did that for his whole life. Now... A slippery sloop. It is. It does not work out for him. Now once he and Aletta had settled back in a farm in Skidmore, he started out his criminal career pretty small. According to Harry McLean, Ken, quote,

"...rigged a toggle switch to shut off the running lights in his Ford and shored up the plywood lining in the back so that he could bear more of a substantial load in the back. With his truck now altered, he would drive the back roads of Skidmore and the surrounding areas, looking at the properties of local farmers and looking for calves or hogs that looked ready to be slaughtered and brought to market. Once he would find one that he deemed suitable, he would make note of the

closest entrance and return in the middle of the night, sneak on the property, and steal the animal. He was stealing people's farm animals? Stealing people's farm animals. That's messed up. Most of the times he would just go a short distance to another farm and sell the stolen animal to that farmer who didn't ask where it came from. He's like just putting cows in the back of his truck. Yeah.

Now throughout Skidmore and the surrounding towns, most adults knew how Ken made his money. But they looked the other way because they didn't want to get on his bad side because he was a scary motherfucker. It sounds like it. And on schoolyards across Nottoway County, there were other stories about Ken. According to McLean, people whispered, quote, that he had raped a 14 year old quitman girl who became pregnant and died delivering twins at home because she couldn't afford to go to the hospital. Oh my God.

Yeah. About a year later, McLean went on to say Ken, quote, returned and raped her older sister who ended up marrying one of his best hunting buddies. What the fuck? Yeah. Oh, that's a fucking monster. He's a fucking monster and it gets worse. The extent, these are rumors.

These are all like things that are hard to verify. But they are things that people were talking about and believed and they are reports of it. The extent of these, like how much is fact and how much is exaggerated as fiction for those specific rumors that I just talked about. But what is true is that around 1960 or so, Ken started hanging out with a lot of young people. And he's a full blown adult.

So much younger than himself. During this period of his life, when Ken was about 21 or 22 years old, his best friend was reported to be a boy named Larry, who was at least a decade younger than him. That's not normal. Yeah. Now this, that relationship is strange just as a friendship, but it was his relationships with younger women and girls that people around town were really concerned with. Well, I'm sure he used Larry to meet girls.

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with Larry and using him to find girls, Ken also met a young woman in her late teens named Barbara, who soon became his go-to drinking buddy. Oh, God. A teenage girl. It's so sad because when you're that age, like as a teenager and somebody older wants to hang out with you, it's so exciting and it's so fun and you don't think anything's wrong. And then you become an adult and you're like, why the fuck did that adult want to hang out with me when I was that age? No adult wants to hang out with teenagers like this

for anything but nefarious reasons. It's so hard to tell teenagers that like I was a teenager who hung out with older people. And I remember you being like, no adult should want to hang out with you like that. And I was like, fuck you. You're like, fuck that. I'm so wrong. I'm a great time. I was like, fuck you. You're like, fuck that. I was like, you're so wrong. I'm mature. I had a great time. And now I realize it was fucking weird.

That's nefarious as fuck. But it's so, like, how do you tell kids, how do you teach kids that? I know it's like, cause you have to like shatter completely their illusion of the world. Yeah, and their sense of self too. Yeah, like you really have to, you have to be a little, you have to be a little.

You have to play them this podcast episode. Honest with them and you have to be like, not everybody is a good person. I've already had to tell my kids that. Not everybody's a good person. There are adults who are really bad people and they wanna do bad things to kids. And you have to be on the lookout for that.

Now, according to McLean, this type of behavior was quite common for Ken, who always seemed to have young women hanging around him. He wrote, he would laugh and tell them they didn't have to worry about him. And this is, this is gross. He would say, you're too old to me for me. I like my women young and tender.

I like that young meat. Ew. When Dave sent, like, did, I like helped me with this research, he sent me a note on one of these that said, I'm so sorry for this. When he sent that, cause he was like, I'm sorry, you have to read this. Yeah, that's fucking heinous.

In fact, it was known around Skidmore that although he was married to Aletta at the time, Ken would often carry on sexual relationships with girls as young as 12 or 13 years old. Oh, my God. Meaning, not sexual relationships. Rape. Rape. He was raping 12 or 13 year olds,

and he was claiming, like, these are relationships. And poor Oletta, too, because I remember she was 14 when he got her. One of those girls who is referred to as Donna G. That's not her real name, would frequently sneak out of her house at night to meet him. She was probably excited. To be assaulted by him. About a year later, according to McLean, Donna gave birth to Ken's first child, a son.

Of all the crimes and awful behavior that the people of Skidmore were tolerating from Ken, the hardest for most of them to tolerate was his predatory behavior with young girls. Of course, I can't imagine. And also his violence against women in general, because like just giving you a heads up, like he is a violent, abusive man. And I'm going to mention a couple of instances and it will be difficult to hear. Not surprising. Not long after moving back to Skidmore from Denver, Ken started an affair with a 15 year old local girl named Sharon.

One evening in either 1959 or 1960, Ken and Sharon were arguing in his car when he pulled out a shotgun and held it to her face and said, if she didn't shut up, he was going to blow her head off. Now, nobody knows if it was intentional or not, but the gun discharged. And it tore open the underside of Sharon's chin. Oh my God. And it seriously injured her in the chin and neck.

It's incredible that she even lived. For the first time, the police were called and charges were filed, finally against this fucking asshole. But as always, he found a way to avoid any consequences. How the fuck and explain. So he explained things to Oleta, his wife, and Ken insisted he had to divorce her and marry Sharon in order to avoid being convicted for the shooting. Because you can shoot your wife? What? Aletta agreed and the two were soon divorced and Ken took up with the teenager, Sharon.

Well, that's a, Aletta probably saw that as her ticket out. Yeah. Who soon gave birth to a son. And she named Jerome. Yep. Jerome would eventually be taken in and raised by Ken's sister, Helen. Luckily. The fact that this woman had to marry a man who shot her in the face and then birth his child and then have that child taken away from her.

That's so fucked. Yeah, I feel for Sharon. Big time. Now throughout the 1950s and 60s, McElroy and his various criminal associates continued their theft, their illegal sales schemes, the assaults, batteries, break-ins. They were literally tormenting this town. This town lived in fear of this man.

And he would just avoid arrest or consequences through intimidation tactics or just threats of violence. He was literally running it. And he shot a girl in the face. That those tactics actually worked is a testament to his reputation for how violent he was. And Ken's capacity for violence was on full display in the summer of 1968 when Ken and three of his associates,

Larry Combs, Raymond Hayward and Glenn Hayward, were arrested for a brutal assault on 52 year old Glenn Graham, a farmer in Skidmore. Now according to Graham, the farmer, he and his daughter went out to the pasture, their pasture that evening, on June 13th to check on their horses when they were the victims of a completely unprovoked attack. And it was by four men who were armed with brass knuckles and clubs. Oh, fuck. Graham's daughter, Anita Foster, told police she heard her father call out for help. And when she ran to see what was happening, she saw the men had her father on the ground

and were kicking and punching him all over his body. This gets gnarly. kicking and punching him all over his body. This gets gnarly. The sheriff's report stated one of his eyes was kicked out of his head. Oh my God. Yes. Holy shit. The actual report states one of his eyes was kicked out of his head. How does that even happen?

That is brutal on a level I can't even describe. Oh my god, I just keep closing my eyes. When Anita, the daughter, ran to help her father, quote, one of the four men assaulted her, held her down against the hood of a car, choked her, hit her in the stomach, and threatened her with death. A neighbor, Jim Swope, called the police

when he heard the assault. And when he ran to help, one of the men, the men tacked him as well. Because all four men were known to Graham and his daughter, they were quickly rounded up and charged with assaults and intent to do great grievous bodily harm. However the severity and completely unprovoked nature of the beating, a judge agreed to release the men on as little as $2,500 for bond. Even Blanche was just like, what the fuck was that? I was just going to say that. What? Most of them were out of jail within a couple of days. They kicked a man's eye out. Yeah. And were literally beat his daughter brutally. And threatened to kill her.

In his testimony given during the preliminary hearing a month later, Graham, the victim, the farmer, told the judge when they arrived in the pasture, Ken McElroy, quote, came from the direction of a nearby house and accused Graham of calling him names. That's what this is over. Graham tried to tell McElroy that he didn't know him and certainly hadn't called him any names, but McElroy only punched him in the face and then the three other men joined in after that. Among the injuries he sustained during this attack were several broken bones in his face. His jaw was broken in two places.

He had damage to his left eye which had to be stitched back into its socket. Because remember it was kicked out of his fucking head. Before fleeing the area, Ken McElroy told Graham, quote, we're going to do the same thing to your daughter if you report this. And he repeated it twice as he ran out of the scene. What the fuck is wrong with this guy? He's a demon. He's a demon. A few days later, the charges against McElroy and Glenn Hayward

were dropped. Don't even fucking say it. But this proves you right here that polygraph exams are fucking bullshit. No. They were dropped after both men passed polygraph examinations testing whether they were involved in the beating, which they denied. What a joke. But Glenn Graham and Anita Foster were also given polygraph examinations, the two victims during

which they insisted McElroy and Hayward were the assailants and they also passed. It's also like guys in this town of 100 people, there's one man who's been terrorizing all of you for twenty fucking years. Like come on. And the prosecutor told a reporter, it's the first time I've been faced with defendants and prosecuting witnesses telling the truth and being of opposite beliefs. What? It's like they were like literally like, this is the first time that the polygraph exam has said they're telling the truth and they are also telling the truth, but they have

opposite stories. At that point, they should have thrown it out the window. Yeah, like that's bullshit. Yeah. Hot dog in a trench coat. Hot dog in a trench coat. Like, truly. Yup.

So the dismissal of charges against McElroy and Haywood caused outrage among the locals. This was the moment when everybody was like, fuck this shit. The fact that he's going to get out of this. You can't kick a man's eye out and not expect public outrage. One resident wrote to a letter to the local paper and said, are these people released to go out and conduct other crimes and maybe kill next time? Should I and other men take the law in our hands to protect the ones we love? Yes.

Which is like, I mean, I don't know. If the law enforcement in your town is going to let that shit happen. So the letter writer was right to assume that they would go on to commit other crimes. In fact, in the months that followed, Ken and these associates only seemed to increase their criminal activities in and around Skidmore. Of course they did. They were emboldened. They were emboldened.

In the winter of 69, a farmer's co-op warehouse was robbed twice of several cases of fertilizer and pesticides, totaling in the thousands. Expecting that these thieves were going to return a third time, the co-op hired an elderly night watchman to guard the place and armed him with a shotgun. A few weeks later, when the guard heard the sound of somebody trying to break back into the building, he called out and the thieves ran away, but the guard aimed the shotgun in the direction that they were running away and fired several warning shots just to scare them. The night watchman said he never saw the faces of the men trying to break in and he couldn't identify them. But according to

Harry McLean, quote, the night of the third burglary, a man had some shotgun pellets removed from his rear end in a small town not far from St. Joseph. The man was Ken McElroy. I love that the elderly night watchman shot his ass. He shot his ass. Literally. Now, Ken McElroy's violent and very unpredictable temper in his growing criminal enterprise at this point were a constant threat to the town and the locals.

Yeah. But equally problematic and much more disgusting to the locals was his constant predation on teenage girls. In 1961, he was 26 years old and he met and began an affair with Alice Wood, who was a 15 year old girl who worked at a local pharmacy. And did he, he ended up marrying another 15 year old girl like a few years earlier. Oh yeah. Yep.

Okay. In 1964, he had left his previous wife and now moved in with Alice and in 1968 they were married. Who is allowing this? That's what it's, this time period is wild. But even at that time, like this is like the seventies. You could, if your parents allow it, then a lot of these, the parents would end up having to,

they would be like bullied into it. Gonna keep my mouth shut. Yeah. Like all the other women in his life, Alice suffered constant physical and verbal abuse from Ken that went unreported for the most part. In one instance, early in the marriage, and this is very upsetting just so you know.

This is like- Domestic assault, just so you're aware, Ken returned home to find Alice packing clothes in a box and immediately exploded into a violent rage because he assumed that she was leaving him. Before she could explain that she was just putting the clothes into storage for the season, Oh my God. He had quote, grabbed her by the hair

and swung her into a wall. Oh my God. He had quote, grabbed her by the hair and swung her into a wall. Oh my God. Yeah. And this apparently was a very typical experience that women or young girls who got involved with Ken McElroy would deal with on a regular basis. Swung them by the hair into a wall. Yeah. He was very physically abusive, sexually abusive, physically abusive, verbally abusive, emotionally abusive. Nearly all of Ken's relationships were frowned upon by the townspeople, but no one seemed like they were going to do anything about this behavior. Like they were like being bullied into submission almost.

The worst and most egregious of his relationships, which would also prove to be his last, and I think the tipping point that ended his reign of terror, began sometime in 1969. He met 12-year-old Trina McNeely. Twelve? You have to remember that right now, he is 27 years old, and she is 12. Twelve. Twelve. He was 15 and she is 12. 12. 12.

He was 15 when she was born. Yep. He's 27 years old and she is 12. He is a fucking monster. I don't even want to know. Yep. So although he couldn't prove it at the time, Trina's uncle, Sheriff's Deputy Russ Johnson, suspected Ken of preying on schoolgirls when he stopped by a school dance one night and

found Ken hanging around the middle school girls. Middle school? Like what the fuck, dude? Later, Johnson learned that Ken had intimidated Trina's date into picking her up and bringing her to him at the school, then bringing her home after. What the fuck? So like delivering Trina to him, essentially. Ew.

From that point on, it became common knowledge among the kids on the schoolyard that Ken had been arranging to meet Trina before or after school, often picking her up at the end of the school day. Sometimes Trina would get other students to sign her mother's name on absentee notes. And instead of going to class, Ken would meet her at the bus stop and take her to Skidmore for the day. And again, she's probably excited that an older man is expressing interest in her because she doesn't know better.

Exactly. And also, he was keeping her cat, like he was threatening her. Yeah, of course he was. This was a captive situation. And she was just doing whatever she could to survive it. Cause one former friend said, in the beginning she was more or less a captive. And then they said, and sooner or later, when everybody abandoned her,

she just gave up and went along with it. Cause that's what they do, they isolate you. Of course, that's exactly what he did. And she's fucking 12 years old. Oh my God. Throughout the years that he'd known Trina, Ken had abused her in nearly every way possible, including stalking, sexual assault,

setting fire to her parents' home, What? And shooting her dog. No. He has literally stalked, abused, raped, committed arson to her parents' house and shot her dog. Like, I just don't understand why they're not putting him behind bars. That's what I'm saying.

That's how you stop people from doing crazy shit. Well, in 1971, when Trina was 14 years old, she became pregnant with Ken's child and dropped out of school to move in with him and Alice, who she is still living with. Alice later denied that they lived together at any point, like all in the house together, but he was fearing that he might be facing statutory rape charges, which, uh, yeah, you absolutely should. Why all of a sudden is he fearing that though? So he bullied her parents into letting him marry her and then divorced Alice and they married in 1974. Like he like threatened that he would like kill her, threatened he would kill them. Like they were totally put into a horrible, like the whole thing is just beyond anybody's

comprehension. Yeah, it's certainly beyond my comprehension. I can't comprehend allowing that to happen. I just can't. But you have to think about if they did allow that to happen, what was going on here? You know what I mean? Like how bad it was. And when you find out what happens to Ken and how many people are complicit in it happening, he was really bad for it to go this way. Everything you've said, he's raped a 12 year old. He's raped like multiple 12 year olds.

Multiple, multiple children. Throughout the 1970s, Ken McElroy continued to terrorize the people of Skidmore with violence, theft, being a sexual predator, all the fun things. In 1973, he was facing charges of forcible rape, assault with a dangerous and deadly weapon, and arson. But he was released on bond and managed to get the charges dropped. That's good. That makes sense.

A few years later in 1976, Ken shot his neighbor, Romaine Henry, in the stomach after a minor argument and was quickly arrested for the shooting because like you shot your neighbor. Why do they even bother arresting him though? This one's wild. Before the trial had even begun, Ken burned the judge's barn to the ground and stalked several members of the jury and got himself acquitted. Oh, okay. He burned the judge's barn down and stalked the jury until he was acquitted. That's just a Tuesday for Ken.

There is no stopping him. No, there is though. The pattern continued four years later when McElroy shot 72 year old grocer, Ernest Bowen Camp in the neck. Ken was indicted for the shooting, but when the trial came in summer of 1981, the charge had been reduced and McElroy was convicted of a simple assault charge and he was released on bond pending an appeal date, which was scheduled for early July. That's good.

Bowencamp's wife, Lois, said same old story. Police arrest him, courts let him go. So like she told a report of that. She's like, when is this going to stop? Yeah. Like, are we really just going to keep this going? And the town said, yeah. A few days later, one of the locals spotted Ken in Skidmore waving a gun around,

which was in direct violation of the terms of his bond. The witness signed an affidavit and agreed to testify at the bond hearing. Which was brave as fuck. When the hearing date arrived, the townspeople learned that the bond hearing had been pushed back to an undecided date in the future. Fantastic. To everyone in Skidmore, it seemed like Ken McElroy had managed to find a way to avoid facing every single consequence in his entire life.

That must have been maddening. The result they were fearing was that Ken would only become angrier, more vengeful, more powerful, and eventually he would take it out on the entire fucking town. Had he not already? Like they were like, something even bigger is going to happen here. Like he's not going to stop. We're all going to be dead at the end of this. Yeah. On the afternoon of July 10th, a large group of Skidmore locals met at a Legion hall meeting at a Legion hall, a little town

meeting at the Legion hall to discuss the situation that they found themselves in. For decades, Ken McElroy had preyed on the people of Skidmore. He had terrorized them, he had kept them hostage in their own homes. I mean, they were terrified. He had victimized them all in one way or another. And it seemed like even law enforcement was too afraid of him to do anything about it. By that point, he'd shot more than a handful of people and like, and was liable to go on doing so until he finally killed people.

Like he had already- Killed everybody in the town. Yeah. They all agreed something needed to be done about the situation. And if the law wasn't gonna do anything about it, maybe they would have to do something about it. Girl. As the group was talking,

as they're talking in the Legion, this is a true, like, take a sip of your drink. I'm getting ready. Like bitch. I'm getting a little comfier. As the group was talking, Ken entered the DNG Tavern, which was just like a bar. He had been in a few days earlier after the conviction for assault. Oh yeah.

And the bartender remembered him saying, I've been fighting prosecutors since I was 13 years old and I'm damn near 50. This is the first time I've lost. Oh my God. Imagine that man being in your town for nearly 50 years doing the shit he was doing. Yeah. The conviction or more likely the loss had made Ken angry. And on that day, he was in one of his shittier moods, which almost always meant to the people

of Skidmore, something bad is going to happen. He's going to hurt someone. As Ken sat quietly at the bar muttering about the conviction, pissing and moaning and angrier and angrier, one of the patrons slipped out of the bar and ran over to the Legion hall and told everybody, hey everybody, Ken's over there and he is fucking spitting mad.

So like something bad's going to happen. And the fact that they all knew like this bitch is mad and bitching about something, somebody's going gonna get hurt. Yeah, that's bad That's scary scary now ordinarily this news would have cleared the room and sent everyone scrambling back to their homes Just to wait locking their doors closing their she they would like wait things out like until he had chilled out the group of men though all Left the Legion Hall and walked over to D&G Tavern where they found Ken finishing his drink.

And the group of men just stared at him silently, wordlessly until he got up from his bar stool and then he walked out the door. And they just wordlessly, no one said a fucking word. They all just walked out after him. And again, no one's talking. And he goes outside and he gets in his truck where Trina, his 12-year-old bride who is now, you know, she's a few years older now, but that's that Trina, was waiting for him in the truck.

The men all watched as Ken put the keys in the ignition. And then before turning and starting the engine, they watched him light a cigarette. And then out of nowhere, nobody could figure out where. Gunshots rang out. Stop it. One after the other, after the other, from different vantage points, different guns, just pow pow pow pow pow. All, whoa, what happened?

A barrage. By the time the shooting had stopped, the car had been riddled with bullets. Was Trina okay? Trina's okay. Okay. The car had been riddled with bullets of various calibers from various guns. Strange. The first shot, a slug from a 30, 30, 30 rifle, I think it's called.

Couldn't tell you. I don't know anything about guns. I apologize. Like, please don't get mad at me. It's a rifle. It shattered the back window of the truck and it struck Ken in the base of his skull. Oh, fuck. Tearing through his tongue and teeth before exiting through his cheek. That's like low-key poetic because remember that time when he shot a child in the face? Exactly. It would eventually be found a few yards away in the wall of a small hut down the street

from the cavern. Nobody was hurt. Don't worry. That's good. Except for Ken. The second shot that hit McElroy came from a.22 caliber rifle and was fired from farther down the street. The bullet hit him in the upper skull and into his brain before exiting the other side of his head. According to McLean, there was also quote, substantial evidence that a shotgun was also fired at the truck, which would have accounted for the smaller

pellet wounds found in McElroy's neck and face. How terrible. When the shooting stopped, someone pulled Trina out of the car while this was happening as well. Iconic. Like literally dragged her to safety. Wow. This is a movie.

And they kept her there until it was all over. When it was clear there would be no more shooting, someone called the sheriff's department to report the death of Ken McElroy. I said, that's crazy. He just killed over. Of course, the sheriff was already in town. In fact, he had been at the Legion Hall with everyone. Not long before the shooting. Wait, no way. He was getting a drink at that same time. He was at the Legion Hall where the meeting occurred. Oh, under the circumstances, it wouldn't really be appropriate for him to investigate the case. Feels like a little bit of a conflict. He said, you know, I have something going on right now. You know,

how about the deputy, the deputy, maybe get the deputy on this one. So the case was handed over to the Northwest Missouri Investigative Squad or NOMAS. NOMAS. A task force of law enforcement officers from the surrounding counties who occasionally called it were called upon to investigate unusual crimes. No, don't bother the task force with this. He just, it was a bad time. He died. We're not even done.

What? Because the news of Ken McElroy's murder spread quickly and soon journalists from around the country flocked to Skidmore to interview the town that from all appearances had taken the law into their own hands. Unfortunately for those people, no one in Skidmore would talk to anybody. Well they didn't know. Literally anybody and they never would. What?

When I tell you no one talked, no one saw nothing. No one, no one person in this town said, let me tell you what I saw. That's brotherhood. And his statement to no misinvestigators and eventually to Missouri FBI agents, Sheriff Dan Estes, the sheriff that was like, whoops, can't be there. He admitted that he had met with a group of 35 or 40 men at the Legion Hall that afternoon to discuss their concerns about the Bowen camp case. And like the guy who, the 70 year old grocer who was shot in the neck and of McElroy in general, they were just discussing their concerns

that he's a problem. That's all. But he adamantly denies having anything to do with the shooting. In fact, when the man from the tavern came into the hall to tell them McElroy was in town, Estes distinctly recalls telling them all, we're not going to go down there and do anything. Right, boys?

Then he left, assuming everyone would simply go home. That's what he said. And they did. He said, I told him, we're not. That's what he said. And they did. He said, I told him we're not going down there and doing anything. He did his job. As far as I'm concerned, that sheriff did his job. He said, we're not going to do anything, are we? And they said, nope.

And he said, I'll believe you. He said, wink, wink. Based on the evidence collected at the scene and from McElroy's body, there had been at least four shooters, all firing from different positions along the street. That's crazy. One was directly behind the truck. One was off to the driver's side.

Another was down the hill a few yards. Another was about half a block away by the post office. Damn. Despite the fact that there were about 40 people in town that day, investigators found it nearly impossible to find anything who would admit they saw anything. Anyone. Anyone. Anything.

Nothing. Anywhere. Anywhere. Anytime. Anyplace. One elderly man, one elderly guy told investigators he'd seen at least three men with guns just before the shooting started. Couldn't tell you who they were.

Just that they were guys with guns. But a short time later, his attorney withdrew the statement citing his client's health problems. He never said that. And he didn't mean it either. And those who would talk, would talk mostly to reporters. Lois Bowencamp, who had everything- She said, I have something to say. She told reporters justice had finally been served.

She said, you know how awful it was living in a town with Ken McElroy? She said, my neighbor and I took turns sleeping at night. It was frightening. That's how scary it was to live in that town with him. That tells you something. Yeah. A few weeks later on August 2nd, a grand jury was assembled to review the evidence and determine whether it was sufficient to warrant an indictment for murder. On who? The problem was, investigators had no suspect to indict. Trina said in her statement, it seemed so strange. There were vehicles lining the street, but no people anywhere. A man in the crowd told me to stay in the truck, that they wanted to shoot me too, but

someone else pulled me out. In the end, the grand jury determined there wasn't enough evidence to indict anyone, and the district attorney declined to press charges against any of the people who were there the day McElroy was shot. The coroner's determination was that Ken was killed by a person or persons unknown, and Trina's lawyer Richard McFadden said we are disappointed but not surprised. Now we can only hope for the Justice Department to complete its report soon. If Trina and her lawyer were hoping that something would come out of the Justice Department's

report, they were probably disappointed by the outcome. When he was asked about the potential for an arrest or indictment, District Attorney David Baird told reporters, any hope of making a case against McElroy's killer or killers faded when the county grand jury disbanded to September 28th without issuing any indictments. They said, we just don't know. A short time later, the Missouri FBI wound down their investigation too, finding little

evidence that would lead them to a suspect and virtually no one who would even admit to being in town that day. Damn. Trina and a few members of the McElroy family tried to speak out against the injustice that they saw, but eventually that died down too. You feel for his family? For sure. For sure. That's tough.

After spending years researching the case for his book, Harry McLean isn't convinced that there are many people left in Skidmore who really know what happened. He said, I don't think the guys on the street that day went home and told their wives and kids. I think they went back home, got on their tractors, and shut up. Former Sheriff's Deputy Dick Luzier more or less agrees with that assumption. He told a reporter in 2001, they were so relieved that Ken McElroy was gone that it didn't matter to them whether the shooting was right or wrong. In the four decades since his murder, no one has ever been charged with or even suspected

of McElroy's murder. No suspects. Damn. Mayor Tracy Shuey said, just because those bad things happen doesn't mean the whole town and the whole community is bad. For newcomers, it does come up. But what we say is, that's not all that we're about. We've had a couple of things that have been not so pleasant, but to us, that doesn't define the town.

Please see past that. If you can't, you've got to move on. She said, if you can't, get the fuck out of Skidmore. Tracy's saying, fuck out of here. We don't talk about it anymore. It is what it is. She said, shut your mouth. And that is the wild death of Ken McElroy, known as the town bully, which is a nice name, I would say for him. It's a good anecdote to learn from.

Yeah, you can't spend your life terrorizing your community. Don't do that. Don't do it. Sad. The ending of that case had my jaw on the fucking ground. Well, I didn't really see that coming. I'm very glad that Trina was not hurt. I'm so glad.

And that somebody pulled her out of the situation. And I'm sorry for his family that they didn't have. Of course. Because it's like, you know, it's a person. It's a person that. Yeah. And then, you know, I'm sure they had different feelings for him. Of course they did. Like, yeah. There are monsters in every family that, you know, it's a person, it's a person that... Yeah, and then, you know, I'm sure they had different feelings for him. Of course they did. Like, yeah.

There are monsters in every family that, you know, you just... That their family loves. So it's like, you know, that's just the way it is. But obviously vigilante justice is a very slippery slope and a very... A lot. It's a complex and very nuanced thing. There's, it's, you know... This is a situation where you go... Case by case. Wow. and very nuanced thing. There's, it's, you know, this is a situation where you go, wow.

But I'm more, I'm mostly interested in the fact that you rarely see people come together and just keep a secret like that or keep just no one saw nothing. But I think they're right. I think this is a, this was a community of like farmers and you know, blue collar workers and they're all you know, like they're working hard during a hard time. And they're getting their shit rocked every day. And they're getting their shit rocked every day by this guy. Most of them are scared to go to sleep.

And like the fact that she said the children aren't safe. The children aren't safe. Like he's going to schoolyards. Like he's going to school dances. Like there's nowhere that anywhere is safe. Well, if you didn't know like any other detail other than the fact that one woman said her and her neighbor took shifts sleeping, that alone tells you what kind of fear he had them living under. Can you like genuinely sit here right now and imagine you call up your neighbor to wake them up because it's their turn to watch for the town bully. Yeah.

Like that's crazy. And that was not even that long ago. And they were just, they were tired of living under complete tyranny and just like, you know. Well, and if the law is not going to do anything in a case like that. It's a wild case. I'm not saying what's right and what's wrong. I'm just saying like, this is a wild case.

It's a wild case of you can't treat people like shit for your whole life and expect anything good to come out of it. It's hard to say too much. Exactly. Like, because again, I'm not condoning shooting people by any stretch of the imagination. Never ever. It's a horrifying sight to think about. Yeah, it actually, it's more or less just me saying you got to think about how you treat

people. Yes, because absolutely people be people in an every different way. So you don't know what you're doing. I've never heard another story quite like that. Me neither. It's shocked. That's the thing. It's just a shocking, shocking story. Dave found that one. Dave found that one. Dave, Dave, Dave is the craziest shit. Dave finds the crazy like the some of the most fascinating stories and most interesting ones I've heard. Everyone came out of the mine to Dave. For real. Damn. Wow. Well, we hope you keep listening. And after that, we're pretty sure you will. Hell yeah. And we hope you keep it. Weird. But not so weird that you terrorize a town to the point where there's quite literally no return. Yes. Don't,

just don't do that. They'll meet at the Legion Hall. They will or the VFW. That's all I could picture. That's basically it. Bye. So If you like Morbid, you can listen early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple podcasts. Prime members can listen ad-free on Amazon Music. Before you go, tell us about yourself by filling out a short survey at Wondery.com slash survey.