February 27: The "other" Baton Rouge killer strikes
Plus: capture of the "Austrian Ripper," cold case victims in Oregon, and more.
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1992: Capture of the "Austrian Ripper"
When U.S. Marshals finally tracked down and apprehended serial killer Johann “Jack” Unterweger in Miami, Florida, on February 27, 1992, it ended an international fugitive hunt that led authorities through Switzerland, France, and the United States.
The Austrian native had been released from prison less than two years earlier after he was convicted of strangling an 18-year-old woman with her own bra.
Upon his release, Unterweger soon returned to his old ways, killing one woman in Czechoslovakia and seven others in Austria. Many of his victims were sex workers, and all were strangled with their own bras.
In 1991, an Austrian publication sent Unterweger — a gifted writer — to Los Angeles to write about crime in the city. He interviewed members of the LAPD and even did a ride-along with police through the crime-ridden red-light districts of LA.
During the time that Unterweger was living in Los Angeles, three sex workers were found dead — all strangled with their own bras.
On May 27, 1992, Unterweger was extradited to Austria, where he was charged with murdering eleven women, including the victims in LA and Prague.
He was pronounced guilty of nine of the murders and sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole on June 29, 1994.
That evening, Unterweger hanged himself in his prison cell using his shoelaces, which he tied together. Investigators noted that he used the same knot to make his jail-cell noose that he used on his strangulation victims.
Dive Deeper
Short read: The Vienna strangler (The Guardian)
Long read: Entering Hades: The Double Life of a Serial Killer, John Leake
Watch: World's Most Evil Killers (Season 2, Episode 18)
Listen: Austria’s Most Notorious Serial Killer - The Case Of Jack Unterweger (Minds of Madness Podcast)
February 27, 2023: Constance Marten and Mark Gordon Clue Found
On February 27, 2023, an abandoned vehicle was found on fire near Bolton, a town not far from Manchester, England.
Authorities quickly learned that the car belonged to a British couple — 35-year-old Constance Marten and 48-year-old Mark Gordon — who had been missing since February 5.
While investigating the disappearance of the couple, police found evidence that Constance, whom newspapers called an "aristocrat," had given birth, perhaps just days before she and Gordon went missing.
After finding the car in Bolton, authorities conducted a massive search, with more than 200 officers combing a 90-square-mile area.
Their efforts paid off when Constance Marten and Mark Gordon were found in Brighton that same day. The baby, however, was not with them.
Marten and Gordon were arrested, but they refused to answer officers’ questions about the baby's location or condition.
On March 1, the infant’s body was found wrapped in a plastic bag in a shed not far from the spot where Marten and Gordon were taken into custody.
The couple was charged with concealing the birth of a child, child cruelty, manslaughter by gross negligence, and other crimes.
The trial of Constance Marten and Mark Gordon began on January 26, 2024, but was put on hold in early February. It's expected to continue in March 2024.
Dive Deeper
Short read: Constance Marten says Mark Gordon told her to say baby died of cot death (BBC)
Listen: The Trial (Daily Mail Podcast)
February 27, 1988: Murder of Geraldine Toohey
Geraldine Spencer Toohey, a 73-year-old woman, was chatting on the phone with her sister on February 27, 1988, when an intruder entered her Eugene, Oregon, home.
He cut the telephone line, then stabbed, raped, and strangled Toohey. Her sister found her body the following day.
Toohey’s murder and the murders of two other women in Eugene — Gladys Mae Hensley, who was killed on June 5, 1986, and Janice Marie Dickenson, who was killed on June 19, 1986 — were unsolved cold cases for many years.
In February 2022, the Eugene Police Department announced that they had used DNA analysis to re-investigate the three murders.
Not only did the DNA findings prove that the murders were committed by the same person — a theory that was unproven at the time of the slayings — but that they identified the killer.
The murderer was John Charles Bolsinger, a man who had previously served time for the murder of a woman in Utah in 1980.
Bolsinger would not stand trial for Toohey’s murder, however: he had committed suicide on March 23, 1988, just weeks after killing Geraldine Toohey.
Dive Deeper
Short read: Long-dead former convict identified through genetic genealogy as 1980s Oregon serial killer (WPXI)
Listen: John Bolsinger (Blood & Barrels Podcast)
February 27, 1996: Execution of Kenneth Granviel
After several stays of executions and more than 20 years on death row, convicted serial killer and rapist Kenneth Granviel was finally executed by lethal injection on February 27, 1996.
Granviel killed seven people in Fort Worth, Texas, between 1974 and 1975. Five of his victims were killed in a single incident on October 8, 1974, including three women and two children.
He attacked again on February 8, 1975, killing two women. Granviel then abducted a pastor and forced him to accompany the murderer to the Fort Worth police department, where he confessed his crimes.
When Granviel was found guilty and given the death penalty, he was the first person in Texas to be scheduled for execution by lethal injection.
"Granviel, 45, uttered a quick but emphatic 'No' when asked by Warden Morris Jones if he had any last words," reported the Kilgore News Herald on February 28, 1996.
Dive Deeper
Short read: Killer of 7 Executed After a 20-Year Stay On Texas Death Row (The New York Times)
Listen: Kenneth Granviel (Seasoned Crime)
February 27, 2004: Victim of the "Other Baton Rouge Killer"
The mutilated body of 43-year-old Donna Bennett Johnston was discovered in a drainage canal near Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, on February 27, 2004.
She had been raped and strangled. A tire mark left at the scene proved to be a valuable clue, leading to the arrest of Sean Vincent Gillis.
A DNA swab from Gillis not only linked him to Johnston’s murder, but also connected him to a series of other unsolved killings, for which he was arrested on April 29, 2004.
After his arrest, investigators found 45 disturbing photos of Johnston and other victims that had been taken after they were killed. The photos showed that the bodies had been mutilated.
Although Gillis confessed to killing eight women, he only faced charges for the murders of Donna Bennett Johnston, his final victim, and two others during his July 2008 trial. He was convicted and sentenced to life in prison.
He was later found guilty of another murder and today is serving his sentence at Louisiana State Penitentiary.
Dive Deeper
Short read: Where Is Sean Vincent Gillis Now? (A&E)
Long read: Dismembered, Susan D. Mustafa
Watch: World's Most Evil Killers (Season 6, Episode 13)
Listen: "The Other Baton Rouge Killer" Sean Vincent Gillis Pt. 1 (Serial Killers Podcast)
From the Headlines
Australian police find bodies of couple after officer who was an ex-boyfriend admits to killing them (Associated Press)
Campbellsville University student found dead in dorm died by manual strangulation (NBC News)
Convicted killer sentenced to death for a third time over child murders (The Independent)
Investigators Close In on Person Responsible for Sledgehammer Death of WWII Veteran (Oxygen)
Man Convicted in Transgender Woman’s Killing in First Federal Trial of Its Kind (The New York Times)
The Volga Maniac: Russian ‘serial killer who strangled 31 elderly women’ to be jailed for life (The Independent)
Mexico’s ‘Hugs, Not Bullets’ Crime Policy Spreads Grief, Murder and Extortion (WSJ)
An exonerated Idaho man finally had his freedom. What came next was 'incomprehensible.' (NBC News)
Media Roundup
10 Details Left Out Of Netflix's Lover, Stalker, Killer (CBR)
New true crime book 'Zenith Man' explores unusual case in 1990s Georgia (WABE)
Steven Todd Jenkins (True Crime All The Time Podcast)
New Podcast Three Revisits Brutal Murder of Teen by Friends: 'People Don't Expect Girls to Kill' (People)
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