BTK Killer | Dennis Rader - Part 2

Uh, essentially that happened, uh, prior to murder number nine, which is Vicky Weatherly. Now I'm sure you guys know Dennis Rader was BTK or sort of pronounced himself BTK, which is the acronym for bind, torture kill. He killed 10 people between 1974 and 1991. So current day where we left off, we were talking about Vicki Lynn Weatherly. And this was a murder that occurred on September 16th, 1986.

And Vicki when Julie was 28 years old, not only was she 28, like many of his victims, tragically, she was also a mother of two. And, um, it was. Her beauty and her attention to her kids that first caught Dennis his eye as he began to stalk her. Like he did most of his victims before attacking almost like I kept imagining in my head and it's a terrible imagination, but like a Viper sucking its victim before it lashes out at attacks. Sonia Meza-Leon: So he.

As emo has shown us so far on September 16th, he posed as a telephone repair man. Like we have seen many times before that was a very popular thing for the Boston strangler to do, go check out that episode and he cut the telephone wires. Like he had done many, many times. You want to take it from here on this tragic events, leading up to Vicky. Sonia Meza-Leon: Well, let's talk a little bit about his trolling as he called it.

And then he stocking that ensued when he plans on, on, on his, you know, essentially what he called his project, his projects and Vicky wedge, really in particularly he referred to her as the PJ project. Apparently, as you said, Vicky really caught Dennis Raiders. I. He said that he would walk by her house during the day to listen to her, play the piano in a weird way. That's kind of a sweet, creepy it's disturbing, but it's kind of Sonia Meza-Leon: sweet.

I would not be playing the piano in the day anymore. I mean, think about like, just sort of step out of that bat out of that for a second sort of step out of that for a second. C an innocent situation where you have people walking by your house, you know, maybe they hear you play music and maybe they're like, oh, that's lovely. But to think that there's a serial killer walking right outside of your house, listening to your music that you're playing and becoming infatuated before you, you are.

Yeah, no, no, of course that's terrible. He's a serial killer. But like, if it was just like a normal person that enjoyed listening to someone, like my neighbor plays the PM. Sometimes better than other times, but when he's playing it, well, I quite enjoy listening to it. It's Sonia Meza-Leon: nice respite. Yeah, no, I get it in the normal world. That would be lovely. But in my brain with, in serial killer world, what we feel about him.

Sonia Meza-Leon: Well, but doesn't, I mean, to me, this makes me question everyone, you know, unfortunately, because there are so many criminals out there in the world and we talk about them so frequently, you know, you start to get a little, you know, sort of curious about people who may or may not be around you all the time, who you think are. Incapable of crimes like these, that clearly are. So I guess that's what I was saying is the most disturbing part.

It's disturbing to think how close he was to her, how frequently he was close to her. And how, I mean, he obviously studied this for quite a while. So as you said, you know, he dressed up as a telephone repairman. He went to her door. He. He, he, he kind of like styled this situation. Like he was walking from one house to another checking on all of them. Um, and so that's what the impression was that he gave her was that he was checking everyone's lines.

So, you know, again, at gunpoint, he goes into the bedroom, he ties her up, um, you know, She guess fought with him, causing him scratches and cuts. You know, what's really interesting too, is I'd be wondering if Dennis Raiders kids ever wondered why he had scratches and cuts if this happened on occasion, because I think there was another occasion in one of these murders where someone had also scratched him naturally or maybe got him.

So he gets a rope, you know, and he starts choking her to death. Um, again, He starts, he took photos of her in the different positions, you know, sort of similar to what he had done. Yeah. Similar what he'd done before with the, the bondage positions, here's where it gets crappy. Or this woman has a husband and she's got a toddler in the other room. He toddlers too. So of course this is ours, you know, later I'm sure.

Um, but what's real, you know, Dennis Rader wynand it looks like Dennis Rader went into the house at 10:00 AM. Sounds like the husband was coming home hours later. Um, and this is what's crazy. Oh, go ahead. Go ahead. Well, it was, I actually don't think it was that much later because Dennis actually stole Vicki's car in her husband, saw the car driving in the opposite direction. Sonia Meza-Leon: Exactly.

But that all depends on if I'm when time bill, bill wedge, really, essentially the husband was driving home. So there was time between when he, she was there alone with a toddler, right. It sound like some time has passed because he walks into the house and he's like, you know, obviously, depending upon where she was, how long was she gone? And then how long this toddler been alone. So it was like, what the heck?

And it sounds like you took a little time to figure out where the, where the, where the toddler was as well. So pretty terrifying. Um, he what's really sad about the situation is, as you said, you know, he sees Dennis Rader who apparently looks like every other white dude drive by. And, um, he, I think that he sees Dennis driving his wife's car.

Yeah. That's what I mean, he saw, again, it's driving his wife's car going in the opposite direction, Sonia Meza-Leon: but don't you think that's kind of weird though that, uh, you know, like, wouldn't you be. I mean, who's that guy, you know, if you don't see the person driving, he might just be like, oh my wife's going out to get groceries, but then you get home and you see at the toddler and the wife's gone, then you know, something's up.

Sonia Meza-Leon: But he said, he saw Dennis sitting in the seat and driving. He said he saw it. He's the new he saw, oh, that's this? Oh, I didn't realize that Sonia Meza-Leon: part. That's terrible. I saw a tall man in that seat. And by the way, I'm going to correct myself because he says a tall man. And I guess, I don't know. I don't remember how tall Dennis Rader was, but he wasn't. I think the guy.

Sonia Meza-Leon: Well, he, he calls him a tall man, and, but he couldn't have been that tall because I always heard that he was between like five, eight and five. Maybe he was, he was described between five, eight and five 10. I think that I, I thought I heard at one point, someone described him as being six foot, but I mean, sure. If you see from a distance or something, you don't notice 5, 10, 6 foot, not a big Sonia Meza-Leon: difference. But difference between five, eight and six, six foot.

Definitely. Yeah. No. So perplexing, um, cause most people who were over sort of five, 10, you there's distinguishable because the average was much shorter than that, but yeah, essentially bill saw his wiping driven away by her murder and um, then later. He's accused of it because he can't, you know, I mean the tests for where he was during her murder, because it happened, you know, probably not so long.

What, what we don't know is how long Dennis spends with his people, with his murder, his victims, because he spent time with her taking photos of her. So if, if he went to her house at 10:00 AM, however long it took to murder her and then take all these photos. We don't know what was crazy about this situation is I feel like that this is when this is the murder where Dennis starts getting sloppy.

Um, maybe he's not planted out as much, even though we, we, it says clearly that he or he says he did. But maybe it's just a simply the arrogance, but he leaves to me at least too much to chance, you know, he wasn't, he totally, how would he, how does he not know that his, her, you know, the husband's coming home, like everybody knows everybody's schedule and I'm in, if I'm not mistaken, Vicky is telling you. You know, my husband is coming home.

My husband is coming home and he realizes he doesn't have much time, but he takes him that he has enough time to take photos of her in bondage positions, you know, just defiling her is awful. So yeah, that's ultimately the Vicky Wagerly situation and. Again, for a number of years, her poor husband not only had to deal with the death of her, but he was accused of her murder.

And I think it was almost 20 years later that they, that BTK finally wrote a letter to the police or to the newspaper telling them. And here's what they did. Here's what he did because he's such a Dick. He sent her for her driver's license, a copy of her driver's license and a picture of her drawn in the position that he had left her, which was of course me clearly that he was the person, the perpetrator, because no one else would have had that information, but that was 20 years.

Almost 20 years later, this poor guy would go under this terrible. I mean, that's that's yeah. Um, so no, I know, side note, a side note for that. Um, but yeah, that was, uh, Vicki Wagerly. She was 28 when she died and she was another victim that was strangled. So now we've got BTK back on the prowl, you know, he he's out there. He's previous murder, April 27th, 1985 Marine hedge. And now, you know what, almost Raleigh a year later, a little more than a year later.

Isn't it like six months or so later. It's not that long. I didn't think Sonia Meza-Leon: it's April 27th was a, for 85 was Marine hedge and he didn't kill again until September 16th. You're right. You're right. You're right. So it was like a year and a half year. I was thinking that Marine was later in the year. Yep. Sonia Meza-Leon: Yep. So, so that's our number nine victim individually, and Vicki is going to be a key watershed victim for BTK because at this point.

There was no previous to this. I should say there was no collection of DNA. No one knew what it was for any of his previous victims. In 1986, it's started to come out and he certainly left DNA. It could not be traced to him or anyone else. And in fact, over 1300 samples of DNA were taken to try and Pintu. Uh, Vicky Weatherly, but none would be positive until almost 20 years later. Sonia Meza-Leon: So Britney, who was our last victim?

Victim number 10, 19 91. Again, a gap of, uh, coming up on five years, uh, between murders, Dolores Davis. Uh, Dolores is 62 years old. So again, uh, he is attacking older women at this time. Uh, Dennis is 45, 46 years old. Uh, Vicky was younger, but we saw Marine was, uh, 53. Now Delores is 62 and he particularly targeted Dolores because she, uh, lived alone. She was a little bit older and. If I'm not mistaken, she was a critical neighbor.

Sonia Meza-Leon: Yeah. She lived a mile and a half away. Yeah. So, uh, it was, he found it to be a pretty easy target. Sonia Meza-Leon: I feel like he's getting lazy. Yeah. I kind of agree. I mean, he's like, ah, you know, I think by this time, because this is 1991, by this time, I think, I feel like he really wants to get caught or he's frustrated with the police because nobody's paying attention to him. This is when he starts throwing down the gauntlet with information to.

Is heavily communicating with the police and the newspapers and the news. Like this is me, this is me. I mean, he sends photographs of himself, you know, in, in hanging, you know, and these autoerotic positions, you know, cross dressing. I mean, One way out of his way to get attention. So it's so crazy that they can't wrap their heads around this. And remember, you know, now I think we're, we're into DNA old, right? If I'm not mistaken, BTK was one of the very first DNA test that they ever did.

Let's listen to mean like in 1986, when he was, he was not tested. Uh, but Vicky Wagerly, the DNA that was left was tested. That was one of the earliest ones. So the. Database look for a DNA at the time would have been very, very small because you're right. This was one of the earliest cases that tried to use DNA.

Sonia Meza-Leon: So back to Dolores, you know, here's a poor woman again, um, he, uh, going, you know, with the boy Scouts or the Cub Scouts, um, he skipped, you know, slipped away again. He drove his car. Yeah, he does car to his parents' house. Four minutes hit close. I mean, this guy, he's such a douche bag. He's like, really he's really playing this part. Like he's so freaking cool. He's not whole, he's not cool. All you know, and I think that he thought he was not cool at all.

He's like, but he's also not evolving anything. It's just the same routine. Like you said, he's getting Sonia Meza-Leon: it doesn't have to evolve. He just is like, I'm just going to do well. He's proven over and over again, and they're not going to catch him. You know, my God, he went in with Dolores, same situation. He needed money blah-blah-blah he tied her up in the bedroom and then he strangled her, you know, this poor 62 year old, a woman living by herself.

He takes the car, you know, the body and puts it in the trunk. He. It's so crazy. He, it sounds to me like he drives the body, drops it off somewhere, um, goes back to her house and wipes it all down and then goes to the church. Yeah. But then I think he loses his gun. So he has to go back there and research for his gun. And then he goes, oh, I don't remember that part. He's like, oh shit. You know, and he drops his gun and then he goes back. So he goes back, he goes back to the church.

Um, and then he went back to where the body was. He put it back in the trunk and he went and dropped it off at her under a bridge, like, oh my God, how many times guys move in these bodies? And nobody seems to notice, well, he's leaving evidence everywhere. I don't recall if you left any DNA evidence with Dolores. Um, but I think by this time he was like scattered and freaking out and. You know. Oh, and here's, what's interesting Rader.

Then I am reading this directly from Wikipedia Rader, then went somewhere to change back and do a scout uniform and returned back to camp. The following evening, he went back to where he left the body and took photographs of it. So he goes back to where he drops it off and takes pictures. Like he, I mean, are you kidding me? Like, there's some dudes standing there taking pictures of a dead body and nobody notices what is happening here. And nobody notices, I don't believe it.

I just think it's so crazy. So this is the end of a BTK. Now remember everybody right around this time, you know, D D this is where BTK is escalating with all of his paperwork, his drawings, um, all his nonsense. You know, I, I I'm unaware of any specific incident that caused him to sort of reinvigorate something happened between 1986 and 1981 or 91 that, you know, caused him to sort of stop who knows?

Oh, You know, but at the end of the day, I think what we know to be true about how Dennis Rader slash BTK was caught was that he had been communicating with an investigator on the, at the police. And, uh, he, he apparently he thought he developed a lovely relationship with this guy and, uh, Ken, one of the detectives, any ask Ken, if he could send them a floppy disc, um, of some photos and things that he wanted to send him, if he would, if he would trace it.

And well, the police says, no, the police say no, uh, you know, of course good for them for lying. And then he, they get this floppy disk and. Fairly easy to see exactly who authored this file. And I guess BTK, wasn't aware of, you know, how forensic it forensics work, but he clearly didn't, didn't protect himself in that way. Okay. So let let's, let's back up a little bit though, and talk about the events that led up to this. So from 91 to 2004, BTK, Dennis, Laid dormant.

He didn't commit any other crimes to, you know, per se. Uh, he at least was not tied to any other confirmed victims, but coming up on the 30th anniversary of when the first murders happened, the Otero murders happened. An article was published from a biography about the BTK killer. And Dennis read this article in the newspaper. Wait, wait, this isn't accurate. He's not telling it right. And he's trying to take credit for my own story.

If anyone's going to get credit for telling my story, I'm going to tell my story. He was provoked again because he thought someone else was going to get credit for his work. Not necessarily, they're going to take credit for the, for, for the murders, but they're going to get the notoriety for writing about him. So that goes against his ego, his hubris that gets him caught. So. No, he starts sending letters again and pictures, uh, copies of pictures.

Cause like you said before, he never sent the originals. He always made copies of letters and pictures and sent the photocopies and he left like a box that showed that had a Barbie doll posed in, I think the way that. Violent way that Vicki Weatherly was found, I believe it's. Sonia Meza-Leon: And he did, he, he sent them more than one Barbie doll posed as one of his victims. And, um, he would send this to like big box stores or some store.

And, um, the, the second one, uh, well, I know there are at least two, the other one that I knew of was posed like Josephine hanging from, uh, Oh, see then, and that goes back to what I said in part one, listen to that. It's terrible. Uh, but Josephine is an 11 year old girl. And you just said it was found hanging from PVC pipe, which is just awful. He, he even posted pictures around town, behind street signs. His victims, he fancied himself an artist. He was a terrible artist.

Um, but I want to also quickly talk about that floppy disk like that, that you discussed, because the way that the investigators communicated with him was really clever. I don't know if you read about this. He was communicating with this detective and asked, as you said, can you trace a floppy disc back to its original owner and instead of a yes or no conversation communication, they actually agreed upon putting something in the crossword puzzle of the, uh, local newspaper.

And if there were like certain letters in there or numbers, or however it worked that was going to give him the answer. It was really, I thought Sonia Meza-Leon: it was very clever, but what was the, well, the answer was he going to get yes or no? Yes or no, but it wasn't going to say yes or no. It was going to be like, if it's these three letters in a row or, or the answer to this clue is such and such, that's already. Oh, Sonia Meza-Leon: this guy he's such a jerk.

So I here's where I want to step back too, because you know, we're down. We're, we're, we're at our 10 murder victims. We know that he's killed 10 people. I, I personally don't believe he was dormant and he actually has written a lot about all of the times that he tried to commit the same crime and he wasn't successful. I just think he got one. I think there got lazy. There was a person he had planned to murder and he, it didn't actually happen.

And then there was another woman, I think it was her name, Anne Williams, where he went over to her house and, you know, she didn't show up or something, but he said that happened quite a lot. That wasn't the first time I've been, it wouldn't be. He said he got bored waiting. So decided not to go through with it, like, come on. Are you like, wow, I be so you're right. When, when I say supposedly when dormant, we don't know for sure. Uh, Sonia Meza-Leon: yeah.

I think those, I think that those are his unsuccessful times, to be honest with you. I don't think he ever went dormant. He may say. And I think that part of that was the two. I do believe that he did. Well, here's what the, you know, a lot of people, oh, well, he, he didn't, you know, sort of confess to other murders. Were there other murders happening? Like how could they not tie him to them? You know, if it was the same situation and there was likely DNA, why couldn't they be tied?

Like, how are people unaware of other murders happening around them? No, totally. Uh, so the, the floppy disc, they were able to track the metadata from Microsoft word, which is really easy to check. If anyone knows how to. Basic things about Microsoft word. And so they didn't find that it was him specifically, but they found that it was a guy named Dennis and that the Microsoft word was registered to the church that Dennis Rader attended.

So now they narrowed it down to anyone named Dennis at this particular church. And keep in mind they had his DNA from 1986, but they didn't have any current DNA to match it. So they got really clever. The detectives knew his daughter attended Kansas state university. So went to the campus university health center and collected DNA, which I think is really crazy from a pap smear that she had. I have to say, when I heard this, I thought, what about HIPAA laws?

I don't understand how they could do that and get away with it, but it actually worked out for the best because they were able to compare her DNA to the DNA, found at the crime scene of Vicki Wagerly and they were able to tie of course, to Dennis rater. Sonia Meza-Leon: Yeah. And what's interesting is I watched a, um, uh, some video on YouTube. I can't remember the name of it. Sorry guys. But. Interviewed and she describes the situation herself.

She says that exact thing that they got the DNA from. They got that. What she said was they felt they got they, what did they say? She is? So they associated my father's DNA with DNA, from my pap smear. And I was just like in a really connected it, you know, because here's a woman sitting there saying that this is my father and they use me to prove it really, really crazy. I mean, and I think that. Uh, uh, there were, uh, there were other, there were other murders.

I don't think that they had tied to him until also, you know, when his daughter was being interviewed, she told them, I think that they didn't tie the Marine, their neighbor nor Dolores to Dennis Rader until, um, I think maybe his daughter had mentioned it because she knew them. Yeah, they were neighbors. There were. Yeah. Uh, he, um, so after the confirmed the DNA. Yeah, it was academic from there. He was pulled over for a routine stop. He was arrested.

He knew exactly why he was being arrested. He had been waiting 30 years to get caught and he finally got the notoriety that he had been hoping for and he openly confessed to all of his crimes. So that way it, his name would become famous. Sonia Meza-Leon: So here's some other crazy things about Dennis Rader. I just wanted to sort of wrap it up with this because obviously he confessed no death penalty in Kansas at the time. So he got 10 consecutive life terms.

He knows he's not getting out by the way, he's in solitary confinement. He doesn't get to be around any of the other inmates. So just so that. And I feel like it also lets them off the hook. Also, it sounds like people are pretty pissed off the victims in particular, because he can buy stuff with the money he makes or earns or gets in jail and he has a TV and other stuff, so he can sit in his little solitary confinement and, you know, whatever, but it's really discussing. It's frustrating.

I don't think that's fair. Um, you know, but the other thing I want to mention is, you know, he, oh, Dennis. When he's being interviewed, he's still like kind of disconnected from what he did. He's talking to these guys like they're his buddies and he, when the police, he asked the police where he talks to police about the floppy, he gets offended that they. Uh, you know, he asked them, you know, yeah. He, they lied to him and that, that was how, why would you lie to me?

I mean, that's so crazy, but, um, other than things that he said during the interview that I thought was really weird, was that how yeah. They asked, he asked how long he was going to be there. Um, you know, because he had other things to do and you know, he's like, am I going to be here for like, yeah, you'll probably be here for a while.

The other thing that he said right after that, that I thought was so flipping gross was he asked if he could write BTK on his coffee mug in the, you know, when he was being interviewed. So it wouldn't get mixed up with anybody else's oh my God. That's the Sherri. That's the cherry on the top for me right there that tells me that this guy doesn't never, he's never cared. He doesn't care.

He never will care about what he did to be so flippant and to be so obsessed with taking responsibility for these horrendous crimes and to say something so freaking stupid. Oh, I think also when he was being arrested, he asked for them to tell his wife that he's going to be late for lunch or something. I mean, just. Stupid. Like, are you kidding me? Um, but you know, I, I didn't find too many conversations like videos with that interviewed dinner's Raider directly.

Um, but they most certainly sure that. Well, I, I, well, I'm sure that all the detectives and officers do, I don't want to see, I don't want to see interviews with him. I don't want him to have notoriety he's D he was the, the talk of 2005 for sure. And years later, it's 15 years later. Now his name has. Fallen out of the headlines, his family has dropped all communication. His, his wife filed for an emergency divorce and it was granted right after he confessed.

His kids do not communicate with him. Uh, and his kids feel really bad and guilty because they feel like. I should've seen this. I should've seen the, the, the patterns and the evidence. He left clues that they're recognized. They thought, never thought it could be possible because it's their dad and who wouldn't think that, but now they live with this guilt and say, had they put two and two together. They absolutely would have turned him in.

They, they do not feel any closeness or Alliance with them. And they agree with the rest of the world that he is a disgusting, horrible human being who deserves to rut in. Sonia Meza-Leon: Yep. Um, a couple of other things to note, um, you know, I just want to talk a little bit about all of the. The, uh, things that the BTK killer had, Dennis Rader inspired and, uh, co uh, many, many things in the media.

I mentioned that he had written his, a book confession of a serial killer, um, with Catherine Ramzan, I guess she's a forensic psychic. This was a guided autobiography. She says, and it sounds like that the proceeds of that went to the victims, but that was certainly to, you know, stroke Raider's ego. He wasn't doing it for them. You know, he might not get the money for it, but who cares now? Also mentioned that his daughter was, um, you know, writing a book about surviving demonstrator.

So you know, that talking about, you know, how they found out and things like that, I'm on the fence about that. I don't know. I would kind of just let it go in my opinion. I don't know how, you know what I mean, like yeah. Uh, I don't, I don't want to be still want to seem opportunistic in a moment like that. Right. Cause I, I mean her kids, his kids definitely see themselves as victim number 11. They totally, that, that they've said that, you know? Yeah. And, and I agree.

The other things that you'll see in the media that was there or inspired by BTK was a, I guess, a novella written by Stephen King called a good marriage. And then a film. I did not see the film, but I love seeing me king I'm also on Amazon prime, but I Sonia Meza-Leon: didn't have time. I'm gonna watch it. Yeah, it sounds well, I don't know. Sometimes Stephen King movies. Aren't so good. I'm just saying, that's why I Sonia Meza-Leon: decided to know. I'm not sure.

Well, so sidebar, what Stephen King movie would you say would be a good movie? I mean, there's only one I could think of maybe two shining and be the shining Salem's lot. It was a great, I haven't seen, um, I think the, Sonia Meza-Leon: I liked pet cemetery, but it was kinda cheesy. I, um, I really like the remake of it. I haven't seen part two, but part one or chapter one, I think is. Surprised the heck out of me, how much, how good I thought that. Sonia Meza-Leon: Yeah, it's good.

It's just not like, I mean, to me, the book and the movies are completely different. It's crazy. But I love seeing the king is one of my favorite writers. I started reading him when he was, when I was 10. Um, the other things that have inspired by Raider are, which I did not know was that Thomas Harris who wrote red dragon. And then of course the lambs, right.

He said that he based Francis dollar hides character on him in red dragon, which I was like, Hmm, I guess I did not even really associate that. Then there was the hunt for watching that. Yeah, no, totally a hunt for the BTK killer, which is what I watched it was. And I got a lot of my information from it was really interesting. Um, I also listened to generation Y and their podcast episode about, uh, dentist. And it was interesting as well, as well as serial killers. I listened to serial class.

That was really good. It was, I liked their take on stuff. Last, but not least. I would like to remind all of us that the BTK killer was featured in mine, hunter, uh, seasons one and two, which I'm hopeful that there'll be coming back. But, um, I would love to see their portrayal of Dennis Rader, um, you know, completed and to see his, um, you know, his crimes come to fruition. So that's a lot out there. I mean, I, I, like I said, I hate this guy.

I mean, I can't think of a better, any other way, like a slow, painful death. Somebody really knows what they're doing. Like, I would say Dexter's perfect for this guy. Like, let somebody kill him, who would keep him alive and let him be a pain, like tear him apart, limb from limb, throw him in an ant bed, whatever. I mean, I don't know. There's not enough to, to. I mean, he just did such terrible things and he just appears to not give a shit about it. He doesn't care about anybody else.

He doesn't care about his own family. It's just so crazy. And to see pictures of him and his family, um, you know, I really feel for them, but, and of course, certainly we all we feel for the victims to cause the things that they've gone through as the guy who survived. Holy crap. I mean, that's just, Ugh. And then the guy, the guy who had to watch his mom be murdered, I mean, it was a path of devastation and it's, it's, we're glad that it's over, but.

I have to say, I'm sad that it took them so long to figure that out. And that's the part that is, is really tragic because they had their opportunities. We've seen this before. We've read about other cases. We've watched other examples. It's just really sad because he had, he wanted to be caught because he wanted that fame and notoriety and he was begging for it. And it wasn't until. He kind of was like, screw it. I'm done. I'm he practically just gave himself. Sonia Meza-Leon: Kind of, yeah.

I want to go back for a minute and talk a little bit about all the jobs that he had, because to me I'm like the trail of, you know, the jobs really sort of spoke to me. He worked, uh, like you said, he was in the air force. Um, apparently he was a butcher at one point in some, some market, he worked at an outdoor supply company, fancy that cords ropes, things like that. And that's how he also knew how to, he knew how to. Actually, uh, create a lot of different kinds of knots.

Cause he was a Cub scout boy scout guy. Um, he also was the ADT security systems representative, which is holy racy. He was a census field operations person. So he got to go to every single person's house that asked them who lived there, how old they were and what they did. So talk about invasive. The sky was taken, uh, making his list, you know, I'm sure he figured out people that he wanted to target doing. And then he was a dog catcher and a compliance officer.

And here's what threw me over the edge. Again. I was like, are you freaking kidding me? He, as a compliance officer gets to go visit the field office where they've got their BTK, you know, sort of task force underway. He gets to walk in there and see all of this work happening, searching for him. Like I'm sure. I floated his boat. And I think this is around the time where, you know, people were getting frustrated with him and he people that aren't really, he wasn't a nice guy.

You know, he like had a dog euthanized. He was really horrible to people. Um, from the compliance standpoint, when he wasn't, he was a total asshole, everyone hates. Yeah. And I mean, she filed a restraining order on him. So they had a restraining order situation on this guy too. He said some terrible things to people. He told one woman that he was stopped bothering her. If she got rid of her boy, I mean, it's crazy.

So, you know, again, we're to the end of the story, I think at the end of every story, we always have this conversation about how we're so surprised that nobody could figure it out sooner. Um, this one, you know, I just, I I'm like you, I feel like he just kind of gave it up himself at the very end. He wanted to get. Yeah, he totally did.

I in a, he wanted to get it caught much earlier something I forgot to mention, but wanted to, you know, we talked about how Dolores was a neighbor that he knew. He actually comforted, comforted her family during the Memorial and the days after her death. So that was just a little something I meant to mention earlier and I forgot about, and it was very reminiscent to me as well as the way that he was caught and confessed of aerial cat.

Sonia Meza-Leon: I know I was just gonna say that totally because Ariel Castro's like, he's, you know, sort of creating this connection between these people, a false connection, because it's something that can sort of instigated, but he's now working his way in horrendous Dennis Rader. For me, he's my number one, you know, hate, hate, hated serial killer. I. 'cause he just, I can't believe.

I mean, I'm sure more people have killed or people have killed more people than he has Def, but the way that he did it and starting with the children, that was the nurse. And what else was weird about it? To me, this case, I think the worst murders happened at the beginning and he deescalated, I agree. That's. Sonia Meza-Leon: Yeah. That's not common though for serial killer.

So there were a lot of things that were Plex perplexing about him, but, um, he's still alive and well sitting, watching cable and El Dorado correctional facility. So if you wanted to send him a note, you probably could. I guess he got in trouble, like right. For like some kind of male thing. Um, some, some kind of male issues he got, he's been a, he's been a great whatever.

You know what, whatever you are when you're in jail, a prisoner, um, he hasn't except for some kind of jail, a mail thing, because he's either sent something or he got something that he wasn't supposed to get. I don't think those guys should get any mail by the way, screw them, but I'm sure he's often married to somebody else. All right. Uh, so Sonia, you mentioned a lot of your sources. I want to give credit to biography. Uh, Wikipedia naturally.

Uh, I actually read an original news article from the, uh, from, uh, uh, the Wichita Eagle where, uh, that BTK sent letters to, and it was an article about, uh, one of the letters where he claimed to kill seven, uh, then, uh, Murderpedia. All that's interesting.com and you just turned me on to surviving BTK, which was a really fascinating website. And I'm glad you turned that on to me because there's a ton of good information here.

Sonia Meza-Leon: Yeah. Yeah. They really did their research and they've got a lot of good videos. So that's a really great website. Check it out. You guys surviving btk.weebly.com. And they've got a lot of really good information and we, you know, we count on all of these different sources. For our information and we're happy to give them credit, you know, where credit is due because they've done so much legwork of new information from us. We're not discovering anything new.

Sonia Meza-Leon: Yeah, definitely. But I think we're compiling in, in a way that hopefully is interesting for people. Um, you know, I mean that, that's our, that's our mission is to give you guys some entertainment while we're giving you details about true crime. So that is up and let us know how we're doing and vote for. Yay. Yeah. So, uh, check us out for the 2020 podcast awards in the people's choice and, uh, society, podcasts, society, and culture podcast section.

Um, we were shocked and surprised and happy to be nominated. So please check us out and vote. Um, we're, we're thrilled and drop us a line on all of our social media channels on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook. I think those are all the big ones. Sonia Meza-Leon: Yep. And follow us at our, you can also subscribe to us on Patrion, which we love.

We have a couple of patriotic folks these days, and we're going to be doing some giveaways for our Patrion peeps to show them some recognition because we sure do appreciate their subscriptions.

Also, when I give a shout out to a couple of fellow podcasters out there, We've got music city, nine 11 coming out of Nashville with Brandon Hall and folks, they do a great job over there and you'll hear their premiere at the end of the episode, as well as meanwhile, at the studio, which is a little studio in winter Haven, Florida, my hometown. That's trying to try to make it to the big time and I want to support them. So I'll be sharing their promo as well. All right.

It's Carlitos love haven't you listened to us. Like share, subscribe, follow, enjoy. Well, any final word, Sonia? Sonia Meza-Leon: Nope. Hit us up. Let us know how we're doing. Let us know if you have any suggestions for episodes or we're all yours. Stick around for few promos. After the show, we are the ladies of Scarlet. Keep Sonia Meza-Leon: killing it. Now check out a couple other podcasters that support us, and we Sonia Meza-Leon: want to give them some support.

Hey, fellow Scarlet, true crime listeners. I'm CC the host of a new true crime podcast, sooner state, true crime as a born and bred Oki I'll cover cases based in my wonderful home state of Oklahoma, the term sooner actually refers to tutors in the land. My state's very first true crime. New episodes are released twice a month and apple podcasts and most podcasts apps or visit our website, anchor.fm/crime state to listen now.

So come away with me to my crime state on the sooner state true crime podcast. And please stay sooner safe out there. Y'all. Hi everyone. I'm Ariel Cooksey, host of malice. When violent acts occur, we tend to think the predators are monsters. Surely no human could do such things, but if we're honest, only humans commit malicious crime. And if you're like me, you want to know why to find out. Join me at malice, wherever you listen to podcasts by.

Hey, y'all I'm Brandon Hall. I'm one of the hosts of music city, nine 11, a podcast about the good, the bad, and the dark side of nine 11. Dispatching me and my co-hosts are 9 1 1 dispatchers. With over 60 years of experience. Join us as we play 9 1 1 calls and discuss them. Oh, did I mention that we get. 9 1 1. What's your emergency? And they stopped my daughter-in-law You can find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram at music city nine 11, and we're downloadable on every podcast platform.

We want to give a shout out to the pod all the time podcast network that we Scarlet TCP are proud members of Sonia Meza-Leon: other members of the pod. All the time podcast network, our creative intuitive, another digital citizen history of a haunting round and round the podcast. Real AKA truth podcast, ruck up podcast, random unnamed podcast bourbon. Three PS in the podcast, Ross sex podcast. I think we're doing it podcast.

So if you like what you're hearing from Scarlet TCP, check out these other shows that members of the pod all the time podcast network.