As an adolescent my wife used to bike the roads of rural Minnesota whenever she had the chance. She felt free and independent and enjoyed the physical exertion of pushing her body to bike further and faster. When I studied Larry Hall and saw how he destroyed the lives of families of young women who were either walking or biking it breaks my heart. March 29, 1993, Tricia Lynn Reitler took a break from writing her term paper. She wanted to be a psychologist. She walked to Marsh’s Grocery Store to get a root beer and vanished, never to be seen or heard from again. Tricia told her roommate that a van was driving by her when she was biking or walking. Tricia felt she was being stalked. Tricia Reitler’s clothes were found under a tree with blood on them and an earring had been torn off her ear. From the evidence, it was clear Tricia had been abducted and a sexual assault had occurred. Suspect, 28-year-old Tony Searcy made a 911 call on the night of Tricia’s disappearance. Investigators feel Tony was trying to send police to another part of town. Tony is given a polygraph examination on Tricia’s disappearance and fails. Cadaver dogs walked around his vehicle and hit on the back of his truck. One of the problems is that cadaver dogs are trained to hit on the presence of copper and Tony is a copper thief. Searcy is arrested for the theft of copper. Evidence or coincidence. As I’ve said before I believe in coincidence. On September 20, 1993, at around 3:30 p.m, Jessica Roach, 15-years-old, had gone for a bicycle ride in rural Georgetown, Illinois. Jesse wanted to be a pilot and was described as “always smiling.” Her bicycle was found abandoned only a quarter of a mile away from her home on a road between two large corn fields. A farmer in Indiana running a combine through a cornfield discovered a body. Investigators initially thought it was Tricia Reitler, but the Medical Examiner discovered it was Jessica Roach. A witness, Monte Cox, gave a description of a man with dark lambchop sideburns coming out of the cornfield late at night and getting into a van. In May of 1994, in Georgetown, Illinois, two teenage girls Abbey Rummel and Kaylen Hoskins were out riding their bikes. They realize a van is following them. They turned and pedaled fast but he followed. They cut into an alley his van couldn’t fit through and headed home. They had just escaped a serial killer. One year after the day Tricia Reitler disappears, two teen girls report being stalked by a man in a van. Police pull the van over and find lighter fluid, rope and the Tricia Reitler missing poster. The van belonged to Larry Hall. Larry says he might have kidnapped Tricia or he might have just dreamed it. They call a detective in Larry Hall’s hometown, and the detective tells him Larry isn’t the guy. “He’s just an odd duck.” Investigator Gary Miller still suspected Larry Hall. If you had a civil war reenactment, Larry Hall would be there. Miller discovered a civil war reenactment took place close to where Jessica disappeared. Miller showed Larry Hall a picture of Jessica Roach. Hall flinched and didn’t want to look at it. Ten days later, Gary spoke to Hall again. Hall admitted, “I was on the road. “There was a girl and I wanted to talk to her. Since she wouldn’t get in my van, I had to grab her…” He acknowledged sexually assaulting her. “I just do things. I’m out of control. I have nightmares.” He reported burying most of his victims. Hall also confessed to the Tricia Reitler murder. He admitted Tricia fought him hard when she attempted to escape, but he had a hunting knife. After Larry confessed to multiple murders, he then recanted his statement. They had no forensic evidence. It was argued Hall’s personality was such that he would admit to anything under pressure. The conclusion was: Larry Hall had no remorse, or he didn’t do it. This gets confusing. Not only was the lead investigator named Gary, Larry also had a twin brother named Gary. Larry and Gary Hall were twins born in 1962. Both babies shared the same placenta. Larry was small and born blue because he wasn’t receiving the same nutrition Gary was receiving during the pregnancy. Gary and Larry Hall’s father, Robert, was a sexton (gravedigger) in a cemetery. The family lived next to the graveyard. At age 12, Larry began digging graves with Robert. Larry greatly feared his father. His parents were hoarders. People described their home as “living in a garage sale.” Their father often smelled like alcohol and the boys were smothered by their mother. (Today they would call the relationship enmeshed.) Larry shared that Gary would talk about his mother as if she was his girlfriend, into his adulthood. Gary and Larry loved to participate in confederate reenactments. They were extras in the Glory and Gettysburg movies. Larry was easy to talk to but would never initiate a conversation. Gary was the leader. Both showed a lack of respect for authority as they got older. The police described them as “hardened.” Larry set fire to several buildings. In 1984, their father, Robert Hall was fired for drinking alcohol and burying people in the wrong place. Gary went to live with his girlfriend, which was a traumatic event for Larry. He had lost his best friend. Larry got work as a janitor at the bank. IN 1987, Gary married. Larry started going to civil war reenactments by himself. Gary reported that Larry was always very jealous of him and threatened to kill him numerous times during their childhood. The Macdonald Triad theory was developed in 1961 by John Macdonald. The Triad suggests that serial killers are more likely to have a history of three elements: enuresis (bedwetting), fire setting, and animal cruelty. Larry Hall met all 3. He was embarrassed about wetting the bed in adolescence. Larry had started a number of buildings on fire. Larry also killed approximately 300 rabbits on the family rabbit farm. Michelle Dewey was a young mother in her 20’s who was strangled to death close to Larry’s hometown. Her son was clearly the most important thing in her life. On July 1, 1991 Michelle Dewey was sunbathing in the backyard of her Irvington home on South Downey Avenue. "Michelle was sitting in the lawn chair and Willie was playing in the little wading pool," recalls Michelle's aunt Jane Bray. Gary Hall visited his brother in prison in 2009, in an effort to give Michelle’s family some closure. Gary stated, "Larry confessed that he was in the Irvington area of Indianapolis on July 1, 1991," Larry had driven to Irvington to check out a blue Dodge van listed in a Trader newspaper. "He drove by Michelle Dewey. She was laying out." Hall says his brother stalked her and later barged in the door of the home, strangled Michelle Dewey and left when her child began to scream and cry. Larry admitted to an investigator that he had taken a record from Michelle’s home, a detail that hadn’t been public. Gary Hall said his brother confessed to 15 murders that took place in California, Colorado, Illinois, Missouri and Wyoming. "I don't believe he's making any of this up. He's got too many specific details," says Gary Hall. "He was attracted to young, long dark-haired women, 5-foot-3 to 5-foot-5 inches in height, with a slender, athletic build," says Gary Hall. (The dimensions of Gary’s wife.) All of the convicted victims looked like Larry’s twin brother’s first wife. Gary Hall’s wife had dark curly hair and was small in stature like the victims. On August 19, 1992, a co-worker walked Laurie Jean Depies to her vehicle after work at the Fox River Mall in Appleton, Wisconsin. Her vehicle was heard coming into the parking lot of her boyfriend’s apartment complex, located at 310 West Wilson Avenue in Appleton, Wisconsin; however, Depies never entered the apartment. Depies’ boyfriend’s sister and her friend searched for Depies in the parking lot to no avail. They found her vehicle locked, with a Styrofoam cup of soda on top of it. Larry Hall admitted killing her in an interrogation. Larry remembered she’d placed a soda cup on top of her car. Prosecution portrayed Larry Hall as a stalker. The defense presented Larry as a mild mannered, shy man who was easily manipulated into a confession. Larry was convicted of murder; however, he won an appeal for a new trial. It was determined that the confession was coerced. Larry was convicted again at the new trial. The case was appealed again. The prosecutor wanted to help the Reitler family find Tricia’s body. They placed convict Jimmy Keene in Larry’s cell in an effort to get Larry to reveal the location of Tricia’s body. Larry loved watching America’s Most Wanted. When they were watching the show in a general area another prisoner changed the channel. Jimmy changed it back to Larry’s favorite show and a fight ensued. Jimmy earned Larry’s trust by standing up for him. Larry created a map and placed a hand carved falcon at the location of every body. Larry spoke of the victims as if they were his girlfriends. Larry admits Tricia Reitler put up a tough fight. Larry admitted he had the murder kit in his van including shackles and a tarp. He drove Tricia’s body into the woods and buried her there. Jimmy made a call to the FBI and told them he now had all the information they needed. Jimmy then made the mistake of going back to the cell and confronting Larry and calling him “a demented killer.” Jimmy’s FBI handler didn’t get the new information in a timely manner, which gave Larry time to destroy the map. (This is featured in the Netflix series Blackbird.) An investigator interviewed Larry Hall in prison regarding an unidentified victim, called “Grace Doe,” who was strangled and sexually assaulted. Larry denied murdering “Grace Doe” but did admit to murdering the Springfield three. Larry told the investigator how he enjoyed strangling and spoke specifically about the murder of Jessica Roach. Larry stopped during the interview and apologized for eating in front of her, and then went on to give the details of murder. Larry claimed his brother Gary Hall was involved, but there is no evidence to support this. The Springfield Three: On June 7, 1992, 47-year-old Sherill Levitt, her daughter 19-year-old Suzanne Streeter and Streeter's friend, 18-year-old Stacy McCall, disappeared from Levitt and Streeter's Springfield, Missouri, home. They haven't been seen or heard from since. Authorities believe the women were abducted sometime between 2:15 a.m. and 7:30 a.m. on June 7. The suspects in the Springfield 3 disappearance:
In 1996, reporter Dennis Graves went to a Texas prison to interview Cox about the Springfield 3. “I know that they are dead," Cox told Graves. "I’ll say that. And I know that.” Cox refused to provide further details. Robert Cox is currently serving a life sentence in Texas for robbery and will be eligible for parole in 2025. Despite heavy suspicion, he was never charged in connection with the disappearance of the Springfield Three. 2. Bartt Streeter was Sherrill Levitt’s son and Suzanne’s brother. Bartt had a history of intoxication and trouble, and Sherrill had disinherited him. Despite his volatile relationship with Sherrill, investigators didn’t feel it was him. In 2019, Bartt Streeter was arrested for public intoxication, disorderly conduct, and attempted false imprisonment. Surveillance video showed Streeter grabbed a customer's hand—at a nail shop in Las Vegas. The owner said Streeter pointed to a 15-year-old girl customer, claiming he was her grandfather and saying he was there to take her home when she was finished. The girl had never seen him before. 3. A 3rd suspect in the murder of the Springfield 3 is Dustin Recia. Recia was a former boyfriend of Suzie Streeter. He broke into a Springfield mausoleum a few months before the women vanished and stole $30 worth of gold fillings from a skull. Streeter had given investigators a statement about the mausoleum break-in and was scheduled to testify as a witness against Recla in court. Recla and two friends that helped in the mausoleum robbery were known to be together and in the area the night the women went missing. 4. Larry Hall. Serial killer Larry Hall claimed he killed them. At the time of their disappearances, Sherill Levitt is described by the police department as 5 feet tall and 110 lbs. with brown eyes and short bleached-blonde, curly hair. Suzanne Streeter was 102 lbs. with brown eyes, straight, shoulder-length, bleached blonde with a scar on top of her right forearm and a small tumor in the left corner of her mouth. Stacy McCall was 120 lbs. with blue eyes, dark blonde, medium-length hair with freckles and a dimple in the middle of her chin. Larry Hall was never convicted of Tricia Reitler’s murder. Larry told his brother in 2009 he murdered 19 women. In 1994, Larry confessed to murdering 22 women. He later changed the number to 39. People now believe Larry is a murderer and not a “false confessor.” The number of murders is unknown. Larry Hall is incarcerated at the all-male Federal Correctional Institution Butner Medium II in North Carolina, where he’s expected to remain for the rest of his natural life. Additional Alleged victims of Larry Hall: On June 28, 1982, 19-year-old Naomi Lee Kidder left Buffalo, Wyoming with several friends en route to Rawlins, Wyoming. They stayed at the Travelodge Hotel until June 29, 1982, when Kidder left to go hitchhiking. This was the last time she was seen alive. Kidder's nude remains were found in Natrona County, Wyoming on September 10, 1982, in what appeared to be a partially-dug grave. She was identified on March 10, 1993, through dental records. Her cause of death was ligature strangulation. Larry Hall is considered a viable suspect because after his arrest he was found in possession of a document bearing Kidder's name. On September 6, 1986, the body of a young woman was found nude, strangled, and sexually mutilated a day after her death in a cornfield near Summerfield, Illinois by a farmer. The unidentified woman was referred to by detectives as the "Summerfield Jane Doe," and was buried in the Mount Hope Cemetery under a gravestone that said "Jane Doe: Known Only to God". In 2007, the unidentified woman's body was identified as being 26-year-old Eulalia Mylia "Lolly" Chavez after fingerprints from an arrest record matched. Lolly was believed to have been hitchhiking on the day she disappeared. After confessing to Chavez's murder to a St. Louis television reporter via letter, Larry Hall became a suspect. DNA evidence at the crime scene proved to be inconclusive. Linda Lynn "Little Linda" Weldy, 10, disappeared on February 24, 1987, after she was dropped off by her school bus near her home on McClung Road in La Porte, Indiana at about 3:30 pm. Linda was last walking to her rural home, 200 yards from the bus stop. Linda’s body was found three weeks later on March 17, along an abandoned railroad track nine miles away from where she was last seen on County Road 500 South near Kingsbury, Indiana. She had been manually strangled. According to investigators, Larry Hall was in the area at that time.
To the victims, I wish you peace... Thanks for listening, Frank
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AuthorFrank F. Weber is a forensic psychologist specializing in homicide and sexual and physical assault cases. He uses his unique understanding of how predator’s think, knowledge of victim trauma, actual court cases, and passion for writing true crime thrillers. His Award Winning books include "Murder Book" (2017) "The I-94 Murders" (2018) "Last Call" (2019) and "Lying Close" (September 2020). Archives
April 2024
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