In 2013, Christine Moody and her husband, Jeremy, drove to the home of Charles and Gretchen Parker in South Carolina, pretending to need help with car trouble. Once inside, they shot and killed both victims. The Moodys claimed they targeted Charles Parker because he was a registered sex offender, and investigators said the murders were motivated by the couple’s extremist beliefs and self-appointed sense of vigilante justice.

I find it creepy to think that we interact with murderers at some point in our lives. So many unsolved cases means killers on the run. Recently a woman was arrested for a murder in 2012 in Arlington, TX. There’s pictures of her being a real estate agent since and she her dna was taken from a fork that she left behind at a restaurant while eating with friends. It blows my mind that the whole time she knew exactly what she did and was capable of but pretended to be a normal member of society.

I came across the survival story of Desiree Staperfene on TikTok. In summary she was 17 when her ex boyfriend (Brian Douglas White) broke into her home, held her hostage, and used an axe to murder her mother and new boyfriend before taking his own life. This happened in Livonia, MI, in 2012.

There is a lot across social media covering the 911 calls and some local news coverage from the time, but I’m shocked that I can’t seem to find any true crime documentaries or podcasts that dive into this case.

Is anyone familiar with the story who could point me to additional resources or an episode where it’s covered somewhere?

For those who are not 100 years old like me, Pat Allanson is the psychopathic creature featured in Ann Rule’s 1993 book Everything She Ever Wanted. In the book, Pat records her phone calls with her jailed husband Tom and, among other manipulations, attempts to lure Tom into a “suicide pact” before he’s tried so that he can’t implicate her for facilitating the murder of his parents. It’s a complicated and fascinating tale, but I’m wondering if anyone has ever tracked down these tapes and posted them somewhere? Just curious, I’ve always wanted to listen to them.

Here is the 911 call made by James “Conor” Hanlon after finding his wife, Brooke Hanlon, stabbed to death inside their secluded Chester, New Jersey home.

Brooke Hanlon, a 35 year old psychotherapist and new mother, was found stabbed to death and unresponsive on June 6, and while the emergency was initially classified as a cardiac or respiratory arrest, the dispatch record was updated to “suspicious death” just 13 minutes after 911 called. Chester Police officially declared it a homicide after arriving.

Although Brooke was killed on June 6th, 2026, The Morris County Prosecutor's Office officially released her name on June 29, 2026, over three weeks after her death. The delay was initially implemented to “protect the integrity of the investigation.”

Conor has obtained an attorney and is currently residing at his parent’s house in the Boston suburb he grew up in. Brooke and Conor met in graduate school at Northeastern. Brooke grew up in Chester, NJ and her family still resides there. Brooke and Conors daughter, who is turning one this month, is in the care of Brooke’s family. Police have been very quiet about the investigation, I live near Chester and it’s insane how hush it’s been in the community.

Police haven’t released any statement confirming whether there is or is not an ongoing threat to the community, which I find interesting.

Whats everyone’s thoughts on this case and the 911 call?

D4vd’s preliminary hearing is scheduled for July 21.

The judge will decide whether prosecutors have presented enough evidence for the case to proceed toward trial.

That is not the same as deciding final guilt.

Source:

https://www.foxla.com/news/d4vd-celeste-rivas-hernandez-status-hearing-july-7-2026?utm

In late 2024, in a quiet suburb of Stockholm, a 14-year-old boy approached a man in his 80s who was using a walker. He stabbed the man three times in the back.

The video of the attack in Hässelby was streamed and spread quickly. It fed a global online ecosystem that actively encourages and glorifies acts of violence and degradation – the “gamification of harm”, as the researcher Marc-André Argentino puts it.

The boy allegedly had links to a network known as 764. Such groups are known to target young people in games including Roblox and Minecraft as well as communities struggling with mental health or sexual identity for online extortion, pressuring them into acts of violence and self-harm.

The 764 network, founded by a Texas teenager, Bradley Cadenhead, is just one part of an evolving online ecosystem, with perpetrators and victims in dozens of countries. Cadenhead is now serving an 80-year sentence in the US for possessing child sexual abuse material.

On the morning of June 10, 1986, Dominick Occhicone drove to the Pasco County, Florida home of his ex-girlfriend, Anita Gerrety, who lived there with her parents, Raymond and Martha Artzner, and her children. He knocked on her bedroom's sliding glass door. She refused to talk to him and threatened to call police, so he left.

About an hour later he came back armed with a handgun. He cut the home's phone lines and roused the household. When Raymond Artzner came outside, reportedly carrying a broomstick to confront him, Occhicone shot him. As Anita and her daughter fled to a neighbor's house, Occhicone broke through a locked door to get inside, where he shot Martha Artzner four times, killing her. A deputy later found Raymond still alive; before he died of his injuries, he reportedly identified "Dom" as the shooter. A police dog tracked Occhicone's scent to nearby railroad tracks, where he was arrested.

At trial, his defense argued voluntary intoxication, that his drinking that night and his documented alcohol problem meant he couldn't have formed premeditated intent. A witness testified that weeks before the murders, Occhicone had said he felt like killing Gerrety's parents and making her watch. A jailhouse informant also testified that Occhicone later told him his only mistake was not killing Gerrety too.

In September 1987, a jury found him guilty on both counts of first-degree murder and recommended death for both, by a 7-5 vote. The trial judge, however, imposed a split sentence: life without parole eligibility for 25 years for killing Raymond, and death for killing Martha. In support of the death sentence, the judge cited three aggravating factors: a prior conviction for a violent felony (resisting arrest with violence), that the murder was committed during a burglary, and that it was cold, calculated and premeditated. The only mitigating factor found was that he acted under extreme emotional disturbance.

Occhicone, now 80, has spent nearly four decades on death row. If his execution goes ahead July 28, he'll become the oldest person ever executed in Florida, and the second-oldest in modern U.S. history. His attorneys are arguing he's now too old and ill to be executed, he reportedly needs help getting in and out of the shower, but Florida courts have consistently held that advanced age alone isn't a constitutional bar to execution.

Sources:

https://www.tampabay.com/news/crime/2026/07/15/dominick-occhicone-execution-pasco-holiday-murders-desantis-death-penalty/

https://www.pasconewsonline.com/news/gov-desantis-signs-death-warrant-for-man-convicted-in-1986-pasco-double-murder/article_d8ea4480-7841-4597-80f4-576d1f71765f.html

https://caselaw.findlaw.com/court/fl-supreme-court/1391028.html

https://law.justia.com/cases/florida/supreme-court/1990/71505-0.html

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/florida-to-execute-3-of-its-oldest-death-row-inmates-by-the-end-of-the-month

Has anyone watched this? It was posted on 16 & 17 July 2026. There’s an article that summarizes the shows here.

It focuses on evidence that was either hidden or not introduced, ostensibly because the prosecution “had their man” and wanted to convict him. The case is 24 years old. It certainly appears that Scott was absolutely guilty. He was the spouse, he was having an affair, he was trying to escape to Mexico. But there are some inconsistencies. Without reviewing the whole case and timeline, has anyone thought about this case recently?

Jermaine Adrian Bennett and Savonne Morrison randomly murdered Jeffrey Chapman who was out riding his bicycle at 12.30am in Clearwater Beach Fla.

Investigators claim the two proclaimed themselves “legends” for performing the horrifying murders and beating an elderly man in St. Petersburg hours before the murder.

According to authorities, the two suspects implicated beat an elderly man in St. Petersburg and vandalized automobiles nearby about an hour before the savage murder of a Clearwater man in a beach neighborhood.

Investigators claimed that one texted the other saying, “We did it,” the morning following the crime spree. Police announced on Thursday that they had detained Savonne Morrison, 18, in connection with the murder in Clearwater. Jeffrey Chapman, 49, was slain on October 21. Jermaine Adrian Bennett was detained shortly after.

Deputy Chief Michael Walek stated, “We are certain [these] two individuals are accountable for this murder,” noting that Morrison was on probation for an armed carjacking.

A timeline of Morrison and Bennett’s activities was provided by the investigators. We about to become ghetto, Bennett texted Morrison at 8:07 p.m. on October 20.

Morrison was picked up by Bennett in Pasco. A timeline of Morrison and Bennett’s activities was provided by the investigators. We about to become ghetto, Bennett texted Morrison at 8:07 p.m. on October 20.

At 8:29 p.m., Bennett picked up Morrison in Pasco County. They traveled to St. Petersburg, where they made a film of themselves using a tire iron to smash the windows of automobiles and trucks.

Detectives are currently sifting through thousands of videos on Bennett’s phone, according to Walek. They approached a senior citizen in St. Pete at about 11:35 p.m. along 22nd Avenue North, close to Bob’s Carpet Mart.

Kovacsev claimed that they beat the man with the same tire iron. The man had ribs and shattered bones, so he was hospitalized. He was later discharged from the hospital.

The time of this was between 11:09 pm. and 11:31 p.m. Both suspects were in Clearwater Beach at 12:37 in the morning when they saw Chapman riding a bicycle, according to the police.

According to Walek, Bennett beat Chapman after Morrison shoved the victim off of his bike. They both left the area.

Bennett allegedly posted the following on Instagram at 1:50 a.m.: “I committed two murders tonight.”

Bragging Murderer ....

:(

Emilie Morris, a promising teenager, faced a devastating turn when her 29-year-old track coach, Wilder, sexually abused her. This abuse shattered her future.

Years later, Emilie battled debilitating illnesses, addictions, and lost her family and jobs.

At 33, driven by a desire for justice, Emilie pressed charges against Wilder. They recorded an incriminating conversation.

Wilder was charged with statutory sodomy. Emily and her family prepared for a trial, hoping for closure.

Tragically, Emily was found dead at 35, weeks before the case. The cause of death was accidental asphyxiation.

The legal case against Wilder was dropped due to his inability to face her. Despite his innocence, the family remains devastated.

Towards the end of the video, the narrator says, “Nobody knows for sure.”

Nobody knows for sure? Except the (original prosecutor) The running coach (just noticed she's still in braces in her track suit!) and anyone who heard his (recorded with a warrant) confession.

This whole thing stinks like the proverbial rotting fish. Of *course* there was chicanery afoot! I knew as soon as I heard there was a *two year* delay before trial, which means he doesn't have to register as a sex offender or lose his job because *nothing is proven*?

And OF COURSE, all charges were dropped, because OF COURSE they were. But 'Nobody knows for sure. Kind of dropped the ball on this one, True-ish crime news.

Shinya Matsuoka was four years old when he vanished on March 7, 1989. He was left-handed and had an older sister and a younger brother.

After Shinya’s maternal grandmother passed away, his family traveled from Ushiku in Ibaraki Prefecture to Komatsushima City in Tokushima Prefecture for her funeral.

Afterward, they stayed overnight at the home of one of his mother Keiko’s relatives in Sadamitsu, about an hour from Komatsushima City.

The next morning, on March 7, Shinya’s father, Masanobu, took him and several of the other children, including some relatives and nephews, on a short walk around the neighborhood. Since breakfast was waiting, they were only gone for about ten minutes.

According to Masanobu, a flight of stone steps about 10 meters long led from the road up to the relative’s front door. He clearly remembered Shinya walking closely behind him and making it all the way to the entrance.

According to Masanobu, Shinya wanted to keep walking, so Masanobu quickly stepped inside, handed his younger son to Keiko, and immediately went back outside. But Shinya, who should have still been standing near the front door, was gone.

It took Masanobu only about 20 seconds to hand his younger son to his wife and step back outside. He looked around, but Shinya was nowhere to be seen.

The entire family immediately began searching the area, but Shinya was nowhere to be found. After one of the relatives called for help, members of the local volunteer fire department joined the search. Despite their efforts, there was no sign of him.

At around 10:00 a.m., the family reported Shinya missing to the police.

Authorities first believed he had wandered into the nearby mountains and become lost. Around 100 police officers, firefighters, and civilian volunteers searched the area, but they still found nothing.

The following day, the search party grew to around 200 people. Searches continued for three months, but not a single confirmed trace of Shinya was ever found.

The relative’s home stood at the end of a quiet road that was rarely used by outsiders. Shinya had been out of Masanobu’s sight for less than a minute. Police could not understand how anyone could have taken him in such a short amount of time.

There was also a field about 100 meters from the house. Local residents working there told police they had not seen any unfamiliar vehicles in the area.

Shinya and his family had only arrived the day before. The locals apparently did not even know they were staying there until the day he disappeared, making a planned abduction seem even less likely.

Authorities also considered the possibility that a driver had accidentally hit Shinya and then taken him away or hidden his body. However, police found no evidence that a traffic accident had occurred.

Shinya’s family remained at their relative’s home in Tokushima, hoping for news. On March 16, the day before they planned to leave, the house received a mysterious phone call from an unknown person.

The caller claimed to be the mother of Mariko Nakahara, a child at Seikei Kindergarten in Ibaraki Prefecture, which Shinya and his older sister also attended.

She explained that the parents of children in the kindergarten’s Dalnim class had collected money for the family after Shinya disappeared. She then asked, “When will you be returning home?”

Keiko told her, “We plan to return tomorrow,” and the call ended.

After ten days had passed without a single sign of Shinya, the family returned home to Ibaraki on March 17.

But several days after the family returned home, nothing arrived. There was no money, no message, and no further contact from the woman. Growing suspicious, the family called Seikei Kindergarten directly.

The kindergarten told them that no collection had ever been organized and that no child named Mariko Nakahara was enrolled there.

Masanobu later recalled that the woman spoke with the distinctive rising tone of the Tokushima dialect, suggesting she may have been local.

What made the call even more disturbing was that the woman seemed to know two things she should not have known.

If she was calling from Ibaraki, how did she get the phone number of Keiko’s relative’s home in Tokushima? But if she was from Tokushima, how did she know the name of Shinya’s kindergarten back in Ibaraki?

One possibility is that the caller never mentioned the kindergarten or class by name. She may have simply said that money had been collected, prompting Keiko to ask whether she meant Seikei Kindergarten and the Moon Class.

Another possibility is that the caller was involved in Shinya’s disappearance. If he had been abducted, she could have learned the name of his kindergarten and class simply by asking him.

According to this theory, the real purpose of the call was to find out when the family planned to leave Tokushima. She may have made up the collection and the child named Mariko Nakahara just to get that answer.

If that was the only information she wanted, the elaborate lie suggests that the family’s departure mattered to her for some reason.

It also seems unlikely that someone from Ibaraki had followed the family to Tokushima, since targeting Shinya near his own home would have been far easier.

Whoever made the call likely knew at least some personal details about the family. However, the call ultimately led nowhere and brought investigators no closer to finding Shinya.

Another theory is that a large bird of prey, such as a golden eagle, carried Shinya away while the adults were distracted. This is considered extremely unlikely, since an eagle could not realistically lift a four-year-old child and fly away with him within seconds.

After Shinya disappeared, his family appeared on television and traveled across Japan searching for him. The broadcasts led to many reported sightings, but very few were considered credible.

One of the most credible sightings came about a month later. A woman reported seeing a boy who closely resembled Shinya near the coast of Hiwasa in Tokushima Prefecture.

The child was with a man in his late thirties, but something about them seemed off. The man never spoke to the boy, and they did not seem to behave like a parent and child.

The witness, who had grown up in Tokushima and knew about Shinya’s disappearance, moved closer to get a better look at the boy’s face. The man immediately seemed uneasy, blocked the child from view, and hurried him into a nearby white car before driving away.

Because North Korean abductions were a major concern in the 1980s, some believed the man may have been an agent. However, no evidence has ever confirmed this theory.

Most confirmed victims were adults or teenagers who were used to teach agents Japanese language and culture or help them assume Japanese identities. At only four years old, Shinya would have been far too young for that purpose.

Shinya vanished during an especially grim period in Japan. In 1989, the country was already shaken by a series of child abductions and murders, the death of Emperor Shōwa, and the horrifying details of Junko Furuta’s murder, which became public that March.

Against that dark backdrop, Shinya disappeared on March 7, 1989, becoming yet another haunting mystery in an already terrible year for Japan.

His mother, Keiko Matsuoka, spent the rest of her life searching for answers. She died in October 2020 without ever finding out what happened to her son.

As of 2026, 37 years later, Shinya’s case remains unsolved and is considered one of Japan’s three major unsolved child disappearance cases. If he is still alive today, he would be around 41 years old.

In 2006, William Dickerson's girlfriend and another man allegedly engaged in a filmed sexual encounter. According to the prosecutorial narrative, Dickerson believed the affair partner to be his childhood friend, 29 year old Gerard Roper. At gunpoint, Dickerson confronted and demanded money from Roper at another friend’s residence and then pistol whipped and abducted him.

Reportedly over the course of 36 hours, Dickerson and two accomplices ripped teeth out of Roper’s mouth, sodomized him with a broomstick and gun, burned his scrotum, beat him with a vase and mirror, repeatedly slashed and cut his skin, and strangled him. According to court documents, Roper slowly succumbed to a combination of 200 external lacerations and dozens of internal blunt trauma injuries to his head, legs, hands, and rectum. Dickerson and his accomplices then abandoned Roper’s body in a vacant townhouse, and it was discovered hours later by a woman surveying the property.

During the torture, Dickerson called his girlfriend, and she recorded him and Roper discussing the details of the sexual assaults to her. Other acquaintances reported that Dickerson confessed to Roper’s murder to them. One of the accomplices also testified that Dickerson forced his involvement by threatening to cut out his unborn child from his pregnant partner’s womb.

After three years of proceedings, Dickerson was sentenced to death by the state of South Carolina. Per South Carolina Department of Corrections' records, Dickerson currently remains on death row.

Sources:

1.https://caselaw.findlaw.com/court/sc-supreme-court/1581793.html

2.https://www.live5news.com/story/10322671/jury-hands-down-death-sentence-in-dickerson-trial/

3.https://www.wistv.com/story/5326005/prosecutor-says-he-will-seek-death-penalty-in-charleston-county-slaying/

4.https://deathsentences.wp.drake.edu/death-sentences/2009-2/south-carolina-2009/

5.https://www.live5news.com/story/15602559/jury-hands-down-death-sentence-in-dickerson-trial/

This case is literally keeping me up at night! I can't stop thinking about it. There are so many strange details, and a lot of things just don't make sense. The more I research this case, the more confused I become.

Here's my entire breakdown, research, and analysis of the case.

_________________

Disappearance Timeline

Madalina Cojocari was 11 years old when she disappeared sometime between November 21 and November 23, 2022.

Both of her parents, Diana Cojocari (mother) and Christopher Palmiter (stepfather), failed to report her missing for 22 days.

Madalina was last seen on November 21, 2022, when the school bus's onboard surveillance camera captured her getting off at her regular bus stop outside her home at approximately 4:59 PM in Cornelius, North Carolina. This is the last independently confirmed sighting of her by anyone outside her immediate family.

_________________

The School's Role

Madalina Cojocari officially stopped attending school on November 22, 2022, the Tuesday right before the Thanksgiving holiday break.

When classes resumed on November 28, 2022, so that's 6 days later, her unexcused absences mounted, triggering automatic truancy warnings and prompting school officials from Bailey Middle School to repeatedly reach out to the family.

When school staff first made contact with the mother, Diana, following the Thanksgiving break, she kept telling them over the phone that Madalina was "sick."

As the weeks dragged on, the school guidance counselor and the school resource officer realized the medical excuse was stretching far beyond realistic limits.

On December 12, 2022 (14 days after she disappeared), school staff made an unannounced home visit to drop off an official truancy warning packet. (Basically warning the parents that if the child did not return immediately, the school would file criminal charges against the parents or contact Child Protective Services.)

The counselor knocked on the front door, but no one answered, so they left the formal truancy warning packet directly at the front door.

Because of that warning that was left at the front door, Diana knew things were escalating and that law enforcement was likely going to become involved. She called the school guidance counselor back on December 14, just a day or two after the packet was left, and desperately tried to buy more time.

The counselor adamantly demanded to see Madalina.

Diana lied and promised she would physically bring her daughter to school the next morning.

When she showed up on December 15, 2022, the next morning, alone without Madalina, and sat down with the counselor, she finally confessed that she had no idea where her daughter was, stating she hadn't seen Madalina since the night of November 23.

This led the school to contact law enforcement.

Detectives arrived at the school, took the mother into official custody for interrogation, and formally opened the missing child investigation.

_________________

Diana Cojocari (Madalina Mothers)

The mother's role in this case is so suspicious and strange that it's hard not to think she was responsible for her daughter's disappearance.

1. Her explanation for not reporting her daughter missing for 22 days

The mother, Diana Cojocari, claimed that November 23, 2022, was the last night she saw Madalina. She told investigators that she and Christopher Palmiter, the stepfather, had a severe argument after they went to bed that evening. Diana claimed that hours later, around 11:30 AM on Thanksgiving morning (November 24), she went into Madalina's room and found her gone.

She told detectives she didn't report Madalina's disappearance sooner because she feared it would cause severe "conflict" with Christopher Palmiter. She painted a picture of a volatile household and claimed she was deeply afraid of how he would react if law enforcement swarmed the house and that it would spark an even greater, more volatile conflict or argument with her husband right after he got back from his trip.

She later said that she believed Palmiter was actively putting the entire family in danger.

She claimed that she had a plan and was secretly using that 22-day window to secure cash and arrange a network to "smuggle" herself and Madalina away from the home forever.

Furthermore, she claimed that she was trapped in a "bad relationship," wanted a divorce, and believed that involving the police while she was still living under Palmiter's roof would ruin her ability to escape with her daughter undetected.

**Personal Thought:**

This makes no logical sense at all. If Madalina truly disappeared on November 23 or 24, how could the mother actively discuss a plot to smuggle her away on December 2?

2. Her reaction as a mother

As a mother, she claimed she checked on her 11-year-old daughter the next morning and discovered she was gone. Yet she didn't immediately search for her, call the police, or tell anyone that her daughter was missing. Instead, she kept it hidden for 22 days and continued giving false explanations about Madalina's absence.

From my perspective, this is one of the hardest parts of the case to understand. If your 11-year-old child suddenly vanished, you would expect a parent to be desperately searching everywhere, calling family and friends, contacting the police immediately, and doing everything possible to find their child. That reaction is what makes her behavior so difficult for me to understand.

3. Burning Madalina's belongings (The Backyard Fire Pit)

Investigators discovered that in the days immediately following Madalina's disappearance, her mother burned several of Madalina's personal belongings in the backyard fire pit. These reportedly included Madalina's mattress, clothing, a Halloween costume, and family photographs. Warrants also noted that carpeting from an upstairs spare bedroom had been cut out and burned in the fire pit.

4. Madalina's missing belongings

Police noted that Madalina's backpack and several articles of clothing were missing from her room. During the investigation, authorities also seized more than 40 items from the home, including three iPhones and a computer.

5. Diana's Text Message to Her Cousin, Octavian Cebanu

On December 2, 2022, Diana texted her cousin, Octavian Cebanu, saying that she urgently needed to speak with him. She signed the message from "myself and Madalina." This appears to contradict the timeline she later gave police, in which she claimed Madalina had disappeared on November 23.

6. The Sugar Mountain Sighting

Search warrants showed that on December 4, 2022, Diana drove into the North Carolina mountains, claiming she was searching for her daughter. Investigators later obtained surveillance footage from Sugar Mountain that was recorded on December 4. The footage showed a young girl and an adult man who were described as being "physically consistent" with Madalina and her cousin, Octavian Cebanu, her only known blood relative in the United States.

Investigators considered the possibility that Diana may have smuggled Madalina to relatives or another third party before she was ever reported missing. When Moldovan authorities later interviewed Octavian, he stated that Diana had been planning to leave the United States with Madalina because she claimed they were in danger from a third party.

7. Suspicious money transfers around the time Madalina disappeared

Investigators found receipts inside Diana Cojocari's green Toyota Prius showing that she had wired thousands of dollars through Western Union. The transfers were sent to both a priest and her own mother, Rodica (Madalina's grandmother), in Moldova.

_________________

Christopher Palmiter (Madalina's stepfather)

His trip to Michigan shortly after Madalina was last reportedly seen by her mother:

On the morning of November 24, 2022 (Thanksgiving Day), just hours after Diana Cojocari claimed she last saw Madalina, Christopher Palmiter drove from their home in North Carolina to his family's residence in Lansing, Michigan, a round trip of roughly 1,500 miles. He completed the drive, visited family, retrieved items, and returned home in just over 48 hours, from the morning of November 24 to the evening of November 26. According to Christopher, he made the trip for two primary reasons: to visit his family and to retrieve winter clothing for Madalina.

How investigators examined Christopher's involvement:

Investigators used federal resources to verify Christopher Palmiter's timeline and determine whether Madalina was ever in his vehicle or whether he was involved in her disappearance:

1. Search of Christopher's vehicle for evidence: Law enforcement obtained and executed multiple search warrants targeting both parents' vehicles, including Christopher Palmiter's car and Diana Cojocari's green Toyota Prius. Forensic investigators searched the interiors of the vehicles for any evidence that Madalina had been inside, including DNA, hair, fibers, clothing, or other trace evidence. Although investigators seized several items from the vehicles, such as passports and legal documents, there has been no public indication that they found physical forensic evidence linking Madalina to Christopher's vehicle, such as blood or signs of a struggle.
2. Interviewing Christopher's family in Michigan: The FBI and local investigators interviewed Christopher Palmiter's family members to verify his timeline and alibi. His relatives confirmed that he arrived in Michigan during the Thanksgiving holiday and visited them as he had claimed. They also stated that Madalina was not with him and that they had not seen her.
3. Recorded phone calls with family members: To determine whether Christopher's family was covering for him, the FBI monitored and recorded phone calls between Christopher Palmiter, his brother, and his sister-in-law. During those conversations, his brother attempted to reassure him about financial matters and family tensions. Nothing publicly released from those calls suggested that his family in Michigan had any involvement in hiding Madalina.
4. Reviewing Christopher's travel records: Investigators relied heavily on digital tracking rather than highway camera footage to verify Christopher Palmiter's trip. Because highway and toll booth cameras often do not provide a clear view inside a vehicle, especially at night, the FBI used cellular tower pings, GPS location history, and other digital data from his phone to reconstruct his route. The digital evidence was consistent with his reported timeline of driving directly to Michigan and back. Investigators also found no indication that secondary phones or other digital devices were traveling with him that would suggest he had taken Madalina or another person with him.
5. Diana's allegation that Christopher trafficked Madalina for $5 million: Diana claimed that Christopher had trafficked Madalina for $5 million. Investigators, however, found no public evidence supporting that allegation, including no evidence of a $5 million payment or any unusually large suspicious deposits connected to Christopher.

Suspicious actions by Christopher Palmiter:

1. Google searches about truancy laws: Christopher searched Google for truancy laws and penalties in the days before Madalina was reported missing.
2. The homeschooling text message: On December 13, 2022, Christopher sent Diana a text message advising her to tell Bailey Middle School that they were transitioning Madalina to "homeschooling."
3. Ignoring the school's warnings: Call and email records showed that Christopher received multiple voicemails and emails from Bailey Middle School guidance counselor Danice Lampkin regarding Madalina's prolonged absence. Despite these repeated attempts to contact him, he did not respond.

_________________

Lack of physical evidence

Despite extensive searches, investigators have not publicly disclosed finding physical forensic evidence revealing what happened to Madalina inside the family home, either parent's vehicle, or in the area around Lake Cornelius.

Law enforcement executed multiple search warrants targeting both Christopher Palmiter's vehicle and Diana Cojocari's green Toyota Prius. Forensic investigators searched the vehicles for DNA, hair, fibers, clothing, blood, or other trace evidence that could indicate Madalina had been transported or harmed. Although investigators seized numerous items, including passports, legal documents, phones, and computers, no publicly released information indicates that physical forensic evidence of Madalina, such as blood or signs of a struggle, was found.

Investigators also relied on surveillance footage to track Diana's movements. They obtained video from a gas station in Hickory, North Carolina, as well as highway surveillance near Sugar Mountain. One witness who observed Diana's vehicle reported seeing children's toys inside the car but did not see a child.

In the days immediately after Madalina was reported missing in December 2022, local police, the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation (SBI), and the FBI expanded their search well beyond the family home. Because the home is located near Lake Cornelius, investigators deployed K-9 units, dive teams, boats, and search crews to thoroughly search the surrounding land and water. Divers searched the lake, while tracking dogs combed the shoreline and nearby wooded areas. Despite these extensive searches, investigators found no public evidence or trace of Madalina.

_________________

What each parent was convicted of

Diana Cojocari (Mother)

• Convicted of: Failure to report the disappearance of a child to law enforcement.
• Diana was convicted after waiting 22 days to report that Madalina was missing. She was sentenced to prison and later released after receiving credit for time served.

Christopher Palmiter (Stepfather)

• Convicted of: Failure to report the disappearance of a child to law enforcement.
• Christopher was also convicted for failing to report Madalina missing, despite receiving repeated calls and emails from Madalina's school regarding her unexplained absence. He was sentenced to prison and later released after receiving credit for time served.

Important note

Neither Diana Cojocari nor Christopher Palmiter has been charged with or convicted of kidnapping, murder, human trafficking, or causing Madalina's disappearance. As of today, Madalina's disappearance remains unsolved, and the investigation is ongoing.

_________________

The Grooming Theory / Discord

Evidence recovered during the investigation led authorities to investigate the possible "sexual exploitation" of a minor.

Investigators discovered that Madalina had been secretly communicating with someone on Discord. While searching the family home, detectives seized a hidden Samsung smartphone containing an active Discord account with 37 unread messages that had accumulated around the time Madalina disappeared in late November 2022.

The exact text and content of those 37 Discord messages have never been made public. Authorities have also never identified the users who sent the messages, nor have they announced whether they successfully traced the IP addresses to a specific suspect.

One theory is that Madalina's sudden failure to open the messages suggests she abruptly lost access to the phone or was suddenly unable to use it after her disappearance.

According to the unsealed search warrants, federal investigators used the discovery of the phone to obtain search warrants for Discord's records. Investigators sought message history, IP address information, and account details associated with the Discord accounts involved in the communications.

**Personal Thought:**

I just don't understand this part.

It's been close to four years since Madalina disappeared, and nothing has been made public about the person she was communicating with on Discord. It isn't known whether investigators identified that person, whether they were ruled out, or whether they were ever connected to Madalina's disappearance.

The search warrant also references investigating the possible **sexual exploitation of a minor**, which makes me wonder what investigators found. Did they discover inappropriate or illegal messages, or was there another reason they pursued that angle?

At the same time, because so much time has passed without any public announcement, I also wonder if the person on Discord ultimately had nothing to do with Madalina's disappearance. It's possible investigators identified them, determined they weren't involved in her disappearance, and that any issues related to the Discord messages were handled separately. Since law enforcement has never publicly explained what they found, it's difficult to know what role, if any, those messages actually played in the case.

_________________

After spending hours researching this case, I feel like I have more questions than answers. Every document, interview, search warrant, and timeline seems to raise another mystery instead of solving one.

More than anything, I just hope Madalina gets justice one day. Whether she's alive or not, she deserves to be found, and the truth deserves to come out. No child should simply disappear without answers.

This case has genuinely stayed with me. It's one of those cases that keeps replaying in my mind because so many things don't add up. I really hope that one day investigators are able to tell the full story of what happened to Madalina.

.

.

sources:

• Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI): FBI Missing Person Registry – Madalina Cojocari — Verified Madalina's physical description, date of birth, official missing person status, and case information.
• Town of Cornelius Government Portal: Cornelius News Update Archive — Contained official police updates, the release of the age-progressed forensic image, reward information, and ongoing investigation updates.
• Mecklenburg County Search Warrants (via WCCB Charlotte): Madalina Cojocari Search Warrants (PDF) — Primary source containing the unsealed search warrants, including details on vehicle searches, Discord records, the backyard fire pit, Western Union transfers, Sugar Mountain surveillance, interviews, and seized evidence.
• WCNC Charlotte Court Reporting Team: WCNC – Madalina Cojocari Coverage — Provided detailed reporting on the unsealed SBI search warrants, unread Discord messages, the backyard fire pit investigation, court proceedings, and Diana Cojocari's self-deportation.
• WBTV News Charlotte: WBTV Investigation Archive — Documented newly unsealed warrants, the mother's suspect designation, divorce records, search warrant analysis, and the North Carolina Court of Appeals timeline.
• WSOC-TV Channel 9: WSOC-TV Madalina Cojocari Coverage — Reported on Bailey Middle School's involvement, including School Resource Officer J. Nobles and guidance counselor Danice Lampkin's attempts to locate Madalina.
• The Charlotte Observer: The Charlotte Observer – Madalina Cojocari Coverage — Documented jail phone calls, court proceedings, trafficking allegations, financial evidence, and extensive case reporting.
• Court TV: Court TV Trial Archives — Covered the May 2024 trials, including Christopher Palmiter's testimony regarding his Michigan trip, the Flonase setup, and the December 13 homeschooling text.
• ABC News: ABC News National Report — Reported on the national and international aspects of the investigation, including the cousin's interview, Moldovan investigative leads, and the Agroindbank debit card.
• WRAL News: WRAL News Database — Reported on possible sightings, including the California Valero gas station report and other investigative developments.
• North Carolina Court of Appeals: North Carolina Judicial Branch Opinions — Provided the published opinion affirming the convictions of Diana Cojocari and Christopher Palmiter for failure to report the disappearance of a child.

Hi everyone. I'm currently searching for an old documentary (which was more of a reenactment) of Paul Bernardo and Karla Homolka's crimes. It detailed everythint from them meeting to the trial. I vividly remember a scene which showed them hiding the tapes in this. It used to be on YouTube, but I can't remember the name / have been unable to find the video. I'm almost certain it came in a series with other crimes too.

It is not the Karla movie!

FYI: I'm interested in your thoughts about this topic irrespective of whether you've read mine. Feel free to join the conversation if you saw the episode and/or are familiar with the case but don't want to read my admittedly lengthy review. Cheers y'all

---------------

As an older millennial from Minneapolis, the tragic story of Jacob Wetterling unquestionably affected my childhood. I didn't follow much of the investigation over the years, but Jacob's kidnapping was always on my radar. I did follow its sad resolution in 2016, and voraciously consumed the first season of Madeleine Baran's brilliant podcast In the Dark at that time. Not only have I always felt an emotional connection to the case given my proximity to Jacob in age and location; but also, Patty Wetterling's activism over the years has left an indelible impact on child safety education in Minnesota.

20/20's new episode "Where Are You Jacob?" is the first of two anticipated portrayal's of the Wetterling case in documentary form (the second being upcoming feature-length documentary Echoes In The Night, whose filmmaker is briefly interviewed in the 20/20 episode). I'm more interested in Echoes In The Night, but I also have some thoughts about the 20/20 episode:

• In general, I think 20/20 did a pretty good job summarizing the case and speaking to the most relevant parties. Deborah Roberts' interview style plays well throughout.
• Compared to In the Dark, the 20/20 episode is much less comprehensive in its description of the investigation. That was to be expected given the format. I also found that the episode painted law enforcement in a more endearing light. I don't necessarily think this was superior to the more critical approach taken on In the Dark, but in general I appreciated the contrast between the two.
• The interview clips with Jared Scheierl, another victim assaulted by Jacob's murderer in the late 1980s, were especially compelling. Scheierl's case was integral to solving Jacob's, so the inclusion of his interview in the episode did not surprise me. What surprised me was how impressed I was by Scheirel himself. It's relatively rare to see men speak so candidly, insightfully, and openly about their experiences as victims of sexual assault, especially for such a mainstream audience. Scheierl is clearly cognizant of how his words can impact societal perceptions about male victims of sexual trauma. Moreover, he seems mindful of his potential to reach other men via modeling and normalizing the combination of vulnerability and courage needed to be open about such a profoundly personal experience. Sure, it makes a lot of sense that Scheierl would be the kind of individual capable of checking all these boxes. It's still impressive to see nonetheless, and it was a big part of why I think the 20/20 episode lands well.

Overall: I don't watch much 20/20, as I often feel like the program presents watered-down versions of true crime cases that have already been more comprehensively portrayed elsewhere. While the latter half of that statement holds true in this case, the former does not. Far from being watered-down, this was one of the most watchable 20/20 episodes I have seen. While it won't add much in the way of new factual information for people who have followed the Jacob Wetterling case, the outstanding interviews will help viewers connect to the tragic events in a way that constructively adds meaning. For viewers who are unaware of the case, the show will do a good job of balancing key factual details with emotionally-salient perspectives of many key players.

This is all just my opinion, and I'm definitely interested in yours even if it deviates strongly from mine. Did you see the episode? Have you followed the Wetterling case in the past? I'm curious about your thoughts here, as well as thoughts regarding the upcoming documentary. There are numerous important lessons to learn from a case like this. Now feels like as good a time as any to revisit the longitudinal, ongoing conversation about it.

(I don't normally include the names of those who are not directly the victim or the perpetrator, but I did make a bit of an exception here. I thought it could avoid some confusion or redundancy when writing about the initial investigation. Fortunately, for privacy's sake, most of them aren't provided with their full names anyway.

Since I now work on two cases at once, one being a case on my backlog and another being a suggestion, this write-up was basically already finished by the time I uploaded yesterday's case)

Metin Büyükşen, born in 1963, was well respected by those in his life and community, earning him the title "Metin Hoca" for decades of work as a civil servant and the many acts of generosity he displayed towards those he met. He also met his wife, Necla Büyükşen, born in 1964, through his job, as she also worked as a civil servant. After Necla was diagnosed with breast cancer, the two decided it was finally time to retire.

The couple, now in their mid-50s, settled in their rural hometown of İsmil, a farming community outside Karatay, a relatively small city in Konya Province in Central Turkey. The home they had built was a humble single-story dwelling with few valuables inside, not even a couch; the two made do sitting on a mat. The two would regularly make trips into the city for Necla's cancer treatments, and she wound up beating cancer.

During the course of their lifetime, the couple had three children: a son named Osman who had become a pediatrician, another son named Uğur who was living in the same neighbourhood as them with his family and their 24-year-old daughter Fatma Büşra, who lived with them.

At around 10:00 p.m. on September 3, 2018, Metin, Necla and Fatma were sitting in the living room; they had left the front door unlocked, something most of their neighbours did in kind as the area was rather safe, but that night, somebody opened the door.

The man who then helped himself into their home was tall and heavily built, standing approximately 175 centimetres tall, wearing a balaclava that completely covered his face, a black short-sleeved T-shirt, black trousers, and black gloves. But the most alarming thing of all was the shotgun he was carrying in his hands, fitted with a homemade suppressor.

Without a single word, the shooter opened fire, striking Metin first and then Necla, killing the couple instantly. Their daughter Büşra was with them and directly in the killer's line of fire, but when he pulled the trigger on her, the weapon jammed. Seeing her oppertunity, Büşra threw a teapot at the killer and tried to run away, with the gunman giving chase. Eventually, he caught up, striking Büşra across the head with the butt of the shotgun.

The killer chased Büşra into her bedroom and held her against the bed, repeatedly striking her on the head with the butt of the rifle. The blows almost knocked Büşra unconscious, but still alive, she decided to play dead until the killer stopped striking her. Eventually, convinced he had beaten her to death, the shooter then left their home the same way he came in.

With the killer gone, Büşra escaped through an open window, jumping from the window onto the street below, where she broke some bones in her foot from the impact but through sheer adreline alone continued limping away.

She flagged down a passing car, which took her to the nearest police station, where she told the officers what had happened. While Büşra was taken to the hospital, police were dispatched to the couple's home in İsmil, where they found Metin and Necla's bodies.

The police began their investigation absolutely stumped; the living room was covered in blood, but only the victim's, and while two spent shotgun shells were recovered, the police found themselves unable to trace their origin. Robbery was ruled out not just because of the swift execution style of the murders or the lack of any valuables missing, but also because the family weren't wealthy at all and had barely any material goods someone would want to break in to steal.

Additionally, the crime scene had been disrupted prior to the police's arrival by the other locals who discovered the bodies on their own. Many walked inside the home carrying drinks like tea and soda, and others tried to put Metin and Necla's bodies into body bags on their own without either of them calling the police despite with 5 phones being present at the crime scene.

The only conclusion the police could reach at the scene was that, based on the manner in which the murders were carried out, the couple had likely been targeted in a professional hit, which only raised further questions, as initially, there seemed to be no convincing reason why one would want to contract a hitman to murder the family.

The first suspects were their son, Uğur, and daughter-in-law, Betül Büyükşen. The police detected gunpowder residue on Uğur's hands and clothes, so just like that, case closed? Well, no, despite how damning that seemed at first, he had an excuse; he said the gunpowder came from when he hugged his sister after hearing the news. His alibi was eventually verified. But that didn't mean the police dropped all suspicions against Uğur; in fact, looking into the family's background made them suspect Uğur had recruited the gunman.

Uğur's parents were not the biggest fans of Betül, with the dispute stemming from a mehr, a mandatory marital payment under Islamic tradition. In other words, a dowry. Neither Uğur nor Betül were willing to make this payment, which was the source of fierce arguments in the family.

On August 14, only 20 days before the murders, Betül had temporarily driven her in-laws from their own house, telling them they had no claim to the property and instead she and Uğur were entitled to it due to the dowry. During this period, Metin and Necla lived in Istanbul and told the relatives hosting them that they were scared they might be harmed. They returned to İsmil 20 days after their temporary exile and less than a full day later, the two were shot dead.

Despite the circumstantial evidence now stacked against them, such as Betül deleting more than 200 messages off her phone the day of the murder, a phone that was never seized or examined, no hard evidence implicating Uğur or his side of the family ever emerged, though everyone in the community now believed them responsible.

Meanwhile, the couple's other son, Osman, resigned as a pediatrician in April 2019 and left Istanbul, almost as soon as he opened his practice, so that he could devote his time strictly to seeking justice for the murders of his parents, launching a never-ending public campaign on social media and whatever television station he could get on as a guest, petitioning to the police to reopen the case.

In 2020, Osman appeared on the TV show Müge Anlı ile Tatlı Sert, a program for relatives of victims of unsolved crimes or missing persons, to discuss their cases with a live audience and draw more attention to the crimes that had befallen their relatives.

While on the show, Osman broke down into tears, stating that because the investigation had gone cold, he could never look at his family the same way, as he had no way of knowing if they were truly innocent of his parent's murders or not. In an emotional display, despite COVID-19 measures technically forbidding it, Müge Anlı teared up herself and embraced him.

However, Büşra defended herself and her siblings, arguing that they would have no reason not to come back and finish the job if she had just watched them kill their parents and therefore be able to identify them.

Betül called into the show herself after Osman brought up the 200 messages she had deleted in an effort to defend herself and give her side of the story. And her side of the story was as follows

"I never did anything like that. I wasn't like that; she's the one who did it. I know how many boyfriends she's had. I myself gave two of my phones to the gendarmerie. I was 11 years old when my aunt's son was born; he's my cousin. Actually, Büşra was messaging much more than me. How shameful. I deleted the messages on my phone from the day before. Then funeral messages came, and I deleted those too. It was Büşra who cleaned up the messages. She was also boasting to us, saying, 'If you don't sign, no one can access your phone.'"

This became one of the most-watched episodes in the show's history. The publicity from that episode prompted the police to reopen the case in November 2020.

This new investigation began simply enough: they reviewed all the interviews and reports from the initial investigation to see if they had missed anything, and sure enough, they did. Living 500 meters away from Metin and Necla, Tuğba Dayanır was their closest neighbour.

When the police questioned Tuğba after the murders, she gave a similar description to everyone else: that there was a single masked assailant. But on April 13, 2019, when she was being interviewed as part of a TV show, Tuğba now claimed that there were two masked attackers and he was the only individual questioned to give such an account. So the police were quite interested in why he changed her story.

The police also looked into Tuğba's background and discovered that back in August 2018, he walked into the police station to file a report against Emre E., accusing him of having created two different social media accounts to send her a barrage of messages of a sexually harassing nature. In these messages, Emre threatened to "put two idiots on her trail".

It looked like the police found out why she said there were two gunmen, but it begs the question: if she was the target, why was the Büyükşen home attacked instead? Well, one curious fact that immideately jumped out at the police is that Tuğba later changed her phone and SIM card immediately after reporting these threats. She was also allegedly in contact with Betül's father the day of the murders, a fact she never told anyone.

The police then put Tuğba under surveillance and also dug a bit deeper into her background. She had worked alongside a man named Beyazıt Y. and had been in a relationship with a man named Tacettin S.; however, Tacettin had ended the relationship only a few days prior to the double murder.

On November 9, 2019, Tacettin would go on to marry a woman named Feride S. Feride and a 28-year-old woman named Esra Taş both shared the same great-aunt's husband's sibling as a common relative, and the police started looking into Esra, her associates and the call and phone records of all of them, and in so doing believed they had finally solved the case after being unsolved for three years.

On July 13, 2021, multiple raids were conducted across Konya, leading to the arrests of 25 people, ranging from those suspected to be directly involved in the murders to others who were innocent and later released.

The police then searched the homes and workplaces of those arrested, seizing 2 ski masks, 2 pairs of gloves, 31 mobile phones, 11 external storage devices, 8 shotguns, 3 computers, 42 SIM cards, 8 memory cards, and 2 tablets.

Among those arrested were Esra and her current partner, who would both confess, leading the police to finally paint this picture of what had likely gone down.

Esra worked at a cafe in İsmil and had begun a relationship of her own with a man named Hüseyin Kalınkayış, who was the son of a neighbouring family located only 500 meters away from the Büyükşens', or rather, the two began an affair with one another as both parties were already married at the time.

Eventually, after just one year, Hüseyin would break off the relationship of his own accord after mounting pressure from his family. Esra was furious and blamed his parents for bringing their relationship to an end and preventing her from being with him and only them, as Hüseyin himself was never the recipient of any threats over breaking up with her.

Eventually, Esra began a new relationship with a married father of three and firearm enthusiast, 45-year-old Abdullah Başdemir, who worked on a farm outside of Konya.

However, Esra was still enraged over her initial break-up and continued blaming Hüseyin's parents for it, and eventually she wanted to see them dead. She told Abdullah about this desire, and he agreed to help her make it come true. Unfortunately, neither Esra nor Abdullah knew the home address of Hüseyin's parents, which they needed to pass along to whatever hitmen the couple would hire.

To get that address, Esra telephoned a 40-year-old friend of Hüseyin's named Zekeriya Okşen on August 31, 2018, and told him, "I am pregnant with Hüseyin's child. His family won't let him see me. He won't answer my phone calls. I need to reach him. Can you give me his address?" Seeing no reason to doubt this claim, Zekeriya freely gave up his friend's address.

The problem, it wasn't really an address. Rather, Zekeriya, not actually knowing the exact address itself, such as the numbers and street name, had instead given Esra just the general location where Hüseyin's home could be found.

Mustafa Okşen, another friend, gave Esra additional information as well but still fell short of an actual address. Esra also called Mustafa shortly before the murders to ask if Hüseyin's parents were home, to which he said yes.

With every home in the area looking mostly the same, this was a far-from-helpful description, but regardless, Esra passed it along to Abdullah, who then recruited a 47-year-old secruity guard and friend of Abdullah's named Ertuğrul Çelik and according to their confessions, an Afghan national named Abdulhamid Uzbek, a shepherd who worked on Abdullah's farm.

On September 3, 2018, Ertuğrul obtained a shotgun, likely form Abdullah, which he fitted with a homemade suppressor and then denned some black clothing and black gloves before making his way to the address he had been given, or rather lack thereof. He wandered the streets until he found the first house that matched the description he'd been given, which, unfortunately, happened to be Metin and Necla's.

After Ertuğrul reported back to Abdullah, he told Ersa, "I had those who were bothering you dealt with. I had them killed," and then said, "You're getting away with it today." Ertuğrul, having also not been given a description of his targets, just their phone number, had no way of knowing he had killed the wrong people and therefore Abdullah erroneously believed Ertuğrul was talking about Hüseyin's parents.

On July 18, based on this confession, the police later arrested Abdulhamid in the Turkish capital, Ankara, and why was he in the city, well because he quit his job three days after the murder, though when the police began their interrogation he vehemently denied any involvement. When asked why he ran away so abruptly, he said that he was in Turkey illegally, having hopped across the border in 2015 and therefore feared being deported when the police began swarming the countryside in response to the double murder.

When Abdulhamid had his phone searched, the police saw pictures of him and Abdullah posing with firearms; however, Abdulhamid claimed those pictures were old and taken elsewhere and therefore not evidence implicating him before then exercising his right to remain silent.

Eventually, Büşra was brought in to point out the killer from a line-up, with everyone involved made to wear ski masks, just as Büşra would've seen the killer.

One might wonder how she'd be capable of identifying the shooter, and the answer was simple: although the gunman's face was obscured by the masks, his eyes were still distinctive and recognizable. Although she didn't recognize Abdulhamid, she confidently identified the eyes of the gunman as belonging to Ertuğrul.

Zekeriya and Mustafa Okşen were also arrested, accused of being accomplices to the murder as they were accused of providing Esra with the address. However, Mustafa passed away on August 17 while behind bars of a heart attack at the age of 39.

Meanwhile, Abdulhamid continued to profess his innocence; he said that Abdullah approched him and asked, "I have enemies. Would you kill them?" and offered him 100,000 Turkish Lira. Abdullah said he refused, so Abdullah simply went to one of his other shepherds, also an Afghan national, and made the same proposition. Abdullah admitted the interaction took place but claimed he was simply joking when he said it.

On October 22, due to a lack of evidence implicating him, Abdulhamid was later released, with Ertuğrul going on trial as the only man accused of carrying out the murder.

That trial began before the Konya 5th High Criminal Court on September 21, 2022, with only 4 of those arrested being brought to the court as defendants, those being Ertuğrul Çelik, the suspected murderer, Esra Taş and Abdullah Başdemir accused of inciting the murders and Zekeriya Okşen, accused of being an accomplice and helping Esra obtain the address of Hüseyin's parents.

Ertuğrul also denied any involvement. He told the court that he had never met the Büyükşen family, had never been to their home and that he was simply a scapegoat to cover up for one of Metin and Necla's sons, whom he claimed to be the real murderer. He said that the police "Put the family's own internal actions onto me".

He also told the court that he would confess if the police were able to use the cell towers to track his cell data and put him at the scene of the crime that night. They couldn't; his phone was nowhere near, but this wasn't the bulletproof defence Ertuğrul thought it was, since the prosecutor said he could've easily kept his phone at home.

Ertuğrul's defence attorney also attacked the credibility of Büşra's identification, arguing that her initial description of the assailant, from everything to the height, build and clothing, was provided after having gone through a traumatic event and therefore unreliable. Ertuğrul also said that he had aged considerably in the three years after the murders and even more by the time of the trial, questioning how anyone could confidently identify him based on a brief encounter 3 years prior in near total darkness with all but the eyes obscured.

Zekeriya was also brought to trial for his role, and he denied any involvement or knowledge of Esra's plan. He said that he sincerely believed Esra's pregnancy story, and as evidenced by the call, he didn't even know the exact address to begin with.

Abdullah retracted his confession and told the court that he had only met Esra recently and that the two were never in any serious relationship, only sometimes meeting her at parties or events; therefore, he said he had no motive to arrange a murder on her behalf. To quote Abdullah himself, "Why would I do something like that for a woman I've only known for three days?"

He argued that the prosecution's main evidence against him, his phone records, didn't show what the prosecution claimed and argued that his initial confession was given under duress. Finally, Abdullah repeated Ertuğrul's claim of being a scapegoat, addressing Osman directly by saying he had no desire to see the real murderers face justice and simply wanted a scapegoat instead.

Esra said much the same; she denied ever having a grudge against Hüseyin's parents and argued that her confession should be deemed inadmissible. She went on to accuse the police of bringing in her brother to instruct him to tell her to say that Abdullah was the culprit.

Esra was a believer of many superstitions and black magic which led to a bizzare devlopment during the trial. During a phone call she made made from prison, Esra instructed her mother to take a piece of cloth tied to the chin of a deceased person and pray on the day of the trial and to say while praying "May the judge's mouth be tied, may the prosecutor's mouth be tied." and then instructig her to tie and untie it three times hoping it would cast a spell preventing the judge or prosecutor from speaking.

On May 5, 2023, the court passed down the following sentences for the double murder of Metin and Necla Büyükşen. Ertuğrul Çelik was handed down two life sentences for the double homicide alongside 4 years' imprisonment for trespassing into their home and 9 months' imprisonment for non-fatally assaulting Büşra.

Esra Taş was also given two life sentences for the incitement of two murders as well as 4 years' imprisonment for inciting a home invasion. Abdullah Başdemir was handed down an identical sentence on the same charges.

The final defendant, Zekeriya Okşen, would be found not guilty after the court ruled the prosecution had submitted essentially no evidence that he knew what Esra was planning. That meant that Mustafa Okşen hadn't suffered from that heart attack and lived to see the inside of a courtroom; he'd likely have been acquitted as well.

As Metin and Necla's son, Osman, walked out of the courthouse after the verdicts to address the press, members of Abdullah's family verbally confronted him and the rest of the Büyükşen children before they began to assault them, forcing the police to separate the families and then provide Metin and Necla's children with protection as they escorted the three away from the court.

Zekeriya's acquittal ultimately went uncontested, but Ertuğrul, Esra and Abdullah all appealed their convictions, and on December 5, 2023, the 1st Criminal Chamber of the Konya Regional Court of Appeals upheld their sentences, prompting the three to then appeal to Turkey's Court of Cassation.

On July 20, 2025, the Supreme Court's 1st Criminal Chamber issued a final ruling in the case, upholding all convictions and sentences.

One aspect of this case that remains continuous is if there was another man who accompanied Ertuğrul to the home owing to Tuğba's statement. However, after Abdulhamid's release, no further investigations into the possibility of a second man were conducted.

With the case now over and the truth revealed, the three siblings, Osman, Büşra and Uğur, have all repaired their relationship, resolving their disputes and apologizing and forgiving one another for suspecting each other of being involved in the murder of their parents. The three have also stated that they were satisfied with the sentences.

Sources

https://pastebin.com/beHrE0Ye

Posting this in the hopes somebody will take a deeper dive into this whole case, specifically concerning/stood out to me was the scope and span of the CSAM publication and distribution along with the numerous people involved in that portion of this that seemed to have used their resources to evade justice :

On September 10, Halvorsen, Woodall, and 18-year-old Lloyd Schwegmann were arrested. At their homes, detectives confiscated index cards listing the names and home addresses of children in several states. They also seized child pornography of fifteen different victims and magazines titled "Boys For Sale", "Naked Boyhood", and "Young Boys and Oral Sex". Halvorsen and Woodall were charged with multiple sex offenses, while Schwegmann was charged with contributing to the delinquency of minors and possession of the drug Tuinal.[28] Cramer, Pass, and Lang fled and were apprehended soon after.[29][30]

Kirizumi Onsen sits deep in the mountains of western Gunma Prefecture, Japan. Its name comes from the mist that often hangs over the area.
During the Meiji era, it was one of Japan’s best-known hot spring and summer resorts.

In August 1972, 23-year-old Keiko Inoue, an office worker from Isesaki in Gunma Prefecture, was planning to spend the weekend of August 12 and 13 at Kinyukan, an inn in Kirizumi Onsen, with her mother and younger brother.

But shortly before they were supposed to leave, both her mother and brother had something come up and had to cancel. Keiko loved traveling and didn’t want to give up the trip, so she decided to stick with the original plan and go by herself.

She arrived at Kinyukan without any problems.

Although Keiko had originally booked a room for three people, hotel staff later said that she simply asked for a single room when she arrived and never mentioned the family reservation. Some believe she may have done this to avoid the awkwardness of explaining that the other two guests had canceled at the last minute.

The next morning, she woke up early. After breakfast at the inn, she asked one of the staff members to take a few photos of her in front of the hot spring.

Staff also recalled that Keiko had planned to walk through the mountain area wearing high heels. Several people at the inn warned her that the shoes were not suitable for the trails and suggested that she buy something more practical. She eventually purchased a pair of athletic shoes from the inn’s shop before setting out.

She planned to check out at around 10:00 a.m. But instead of taking the inn’s shuttle, she decided to walk down the mountain alone.

At around 1:00 p.m., witnesses saw Keiko resting near Shinobi Pond, about 800 meters from Kirizumi Onsen. While she was there, she asked someone to take a few photos of her in front of Shinobi Falls.

About an hour later, a family leaving the hot spring area spotted Keiko walking down the mountain alone, roughly two to three kilometers away. They stopped and offered her a ride, but she politely turned them down.

That was the last confirmed sighting of Keiko alive.

When she failed to return home, her family grew increasingly worried. They put together a small search party of their own and traveled to the hot spring area to look for her.

On the evening of August 16, a private search team found a woman’s body inside a cabin near the dam, about four kilometers from Kirizumi Onsen. There was a large amount of blood at the scene, and the wooden floor beneath her body was heavily stained.

The woman was later identified as Keiko Inoue.

According to an autopsy conducted by Gunma University, she had been stabbed 24 times. Investigators believed she was killed sometime during the afternoon of August 13.

Among her injuries was a fatal stab wound to the heart, and three of her ribs had been broken. Cuts on her left hand were believed to be defensive wounds, suggesting that Keiko had fought back during the attack.

The cabin was divided into two rooms, and a trail of blood led from one to the other. Investigators believed she had been dragged away from the entrance and into the second room after the attack, possibly to keep her body from being seen by anyone looking through the doorway.

Forty-three of Keiko’s belongings were found hidden inside the cabin. Among them were a white knit cap, her camera, a blue cloth bag, a travel guide tucked beneath her clothes, and a watch that had stopped at 10:09 a.m.

Wounds on her back suggested that she had also been attacked while trying to get away from her killer.

Despite extensive searches of the surrounding forest and dives in the nearby Kirizumi River, the murder weapons were never found. Based on the different types of wounds, medical experts believed that two knives may have been used: a blade about four inches long, possibly a survival knife, and a larger butcher-style knife.

It was also determined that she had most likely been sexually assaulted before her death.

Police also found tire tracks near the cabin where Keiko’s body was discovered, leading investigators to believe that the killer had used a car. Since two different murder weapons appeared to have been used, police also could not rule out the possibility that two people were involved.

Police quickly formed a special task force and began a large-scale investigation. They questioned people who had been in the area, including dam workers, fishermen, tourists, and others working in the mountains.

The killer appeared to have planned the attack carefully and left very little evidence behind.

Investigators also ran into another problem: because it was Obon, the dam workers had already left the area to return to their hometowns. Most of the visitors staying at Kirizumi Onsen were families, and the inn’s staff members all had alibis.

Police eventually focused on fishermen who had been in the area around the time of the murder. But without any solid evidence linking them to the crime, the investigation slowly reached a dead end.

Police carefully examined Keiko’s belongings for anything that might point to her killer. Among them was her camera.

After developing the film, investigators used the photos, along with statements from hotel staff and other tourists, to retrace her movements during the final hours before her death.

Keiko had taken a total of five photos during her time in the area. The first two were taken near Kinyukan, while the third and fourth showed two different waterfalls. One of those photos showed Keiko standing near one of the falls.

The inn’s owner later identified one of the locations as Kondō Falls, which could also be seen from the Kirizumi Onsen area.

By comparing the photos with statements from hotel staff and other travelers, police were able to piece together at least some of her movements between August 12 and 13. They confirmed that the first two photos had been taken by members of the inn’s staff.

The family who later offered Keiko a ride said they had not taken any photos of her.

On August 19, six days after the murder, a 22-year-old man named Yoshida Ishida, who claimed to live in Shimokitazawa in Tokyo’s Setagaya Ward, contacted local media in Gunma Prefecture and said that he had helped Keiko Inoue take photos at the waterfall.

He claimed that he had gone fishing with a friend at Shinobi Pond on the afternoon of August 13 and met Keiko there. She asked him to take a few photos of her. At first, he told her that he didn’t know how to use the camera, but she reportedly said, “Just press the shutter button. It’s easy.” He then took the third and fourth photos out of the five found on her camera.

The man, who was now considered a key witness, promised the newspaper that he would go to the police right away to discuss what he knew, but he never showed up.

He had provided his name, address, and place of work, so police decided to investigate him themselves. And that was when they discovered something disturbing:

The man didn’t exist.

His name, occupation, and address were all fake. To this day, no one knows who the man really was or what he wanted. Did he know something? Had he actually taken the photos? Was he the killer?

We may never know.

The fifth and final photo is represented here by a recreation, since the original image was never released publicly (first picture).

It was taken from the road near Kondō Falls. According to people who saw the original, a strange glow appeared near the bottom of the photo, partially obscuring the image.

Keiko was said to be standing knee-deep in vegetation, with a serious expression and a stiff posture.

The location was less than an hour’s walk from the crime scene. Police believed the photo had been taken shortly before Keiko was murdered.

Because forensic techniques such as DNA testing and surveillance cameras were not yet widely available at the time, and because Kirizumi Onsen was located in a remote mountain area of Gunma Prefecture, investigators faced an uphill battle from the very beginning.

There were no suspects.

The motive behind Keiko’s murder has never been confirmed. Robbery seems unlikely, since many of her belongings were still at the scene. Some believe the attack may have been sexually motivated or triggered by rejection, while others think the killer may have been someone familiar with the remote area.

The number of stab wounds and the apparent attempt to hide her body suggest a deeply violent and personal attack, but without a suspect, the real reason she was killed remains unknown.

In 1987, exactly fifteen years after Keiko’s murder, the statute of limitations expired. Even if her killer were identified today, they could no longer be prosecuted for the crime. Keiko Inoue’s murder remains unsolved, and the truth may never be known.

The cabin where Keiko was murdered is no longer standing. Even so, many urban explorers still travel to the area to search for the place where it once stood.

Some locals believe the site has been cursed ever since the murder and that Keiko's spirit still lingers there.

Or should I say, the similarities are striking.

In 1991, 3 year old Jamie Campbell was abducted from his grandmother's garden by 11 year old Richard Keith in Glasgow.

Keith lured the toddler to a burn near his home and beat him with sticks and stones, before drowning him in the burn.

He had also attempted to harm another little boy three weeks previous.

I know about this case because my partner is a chef and his chef friend was working with a bit of a weird guy. This man then told his chef co-workers one day that he'd "killed someone once", and it wasn't long before they found out the details.

Jamie's mother was quoted talking about the similarities to the James Bulger case. The family feels their plight has been "forgotten".

“It upset me because seeing that brings it all back and I just want to keep Jamie’s memory alive.

“It’s strange because there are so many similarities in the cases but no one remembers our Jamie.”

https://www.theguardian.com/uk/1999/jan/14/gerardseenan

On May 31, 2017, the then 23-year-old Brian BORMS left with his bicycle to Zele station in the morning. He left his parental home, located in the Rinkhout in Zele. Brian regularly takes the train from Zele to Antwerp, where he has contacts in the drug world. Brian Borms had a difficult childhood and is struggling with drug addiction. The investigation shows that Brian Borms withdrew money in Zele at 10.57 am. At around 11:14 am he bought his train ticket to Antwerp and at 12:59 am he collected money for a second time in Borgerhout. Afterwards he took the train home again. But Brian did not get off in Zele, but at Lokeren station. This must have been around 3.15 pm. He called his mother at 3.21 pm to pick him up at the industrial estate of Lokeren, more specifically from the company “Bakkerij Roelandt”. His mother drove to the place of appointment but couldn’t find him. She went back home afterwards and tried again at 4.13 pm to call Brian on his mobile phone but got no more answer. Brian’s mobile phone, however, remained active until June 5, 2017 under the transmission tower of the Nieuwstraat in Lokeren, but Brian himself is missing any trace. Did Brian Borms run into the wrong people while on his way to the place of appointment with his mother, did he become unwell and unhappy somewhere or did he himself decide to disappear, all these pistes remain open.
On March 28 and 29, 2018, there were major searches that were coordinated by the missing persons cell. The searches took place on the water and in the vicinity of the transmission tower on which Brian’s cell phone was last captured. Brian’s body was not found.
During the searches a jacket was found: a black raincoat of the Adidas brand, size 8. This may be by Brian Borms, but there is no definite answer about that. But if someone recognizes this jacket or if someone has lost / forgotten this jacket in the forest, the investigators would like to know.

https://missingdoe.com/mm-0020/

(Thanks to LoydoRedi2910 for suggesting this case. If you'd like to suggest any yourself, please head over to this post, which asks for case suggestions from my international readers, as I focus on international cases.

This is another example of me describing the crime using the killer's confession before the investigation, something I usually do only when the case is solved fairly quickly and there's little in the way of an investigation.

I'm hoping that this write-up won't come off as too slanted in the killer's favour, but the only series of events that have been outlined come from the killer's words himself, who would naturally want to try and defend himself, so if it seems that way, that's why.

There's also just not a lot of information on the victims or their stories either)

Thijs Hermans was born in 1992 and raised in Brunssum, a small mining town in Limburg, the southernmost province of the Netherlands. As a child, he was described as cheerful, and as a teenager/young adult, he was described as intellectually driven and curious, though unfortnuately, he had poor motor skills, which led to him being bullied at school, with the bullying so severe that his parents eventually transferred him.

He also didn't have much interest in sports like the rest of his classmates. His mother ran an advocacy firm in southern Limburg while his father worked as a lawyer.

Unlike many serial or spree killers who are said to torture animals in their youth, Thijs was instead seen as "overly sensitive" toward them and would put captured beetles and insects safely back in the grass outside if he saw any.

At secondary school, Thijs tried going the ambitious path, enrolling in the highest and most demanding level of the Dutch secondary school system before scaling back to a lower level. Thijs also studied abroad as an exchange student in Gqeberha, South Africa, on at least two seperate locations. Thijs would later describe his time in South Africa as liberating, allowing him to live free of his parents' shadow and expectations. He also did charity work in South Africa, teaching some local children and helping prevent them from becoming homeless.

In 2012, Thijs obtained his propedeuse in Social Work in Sittard. He then pivoted and got another degree in Cultural Anthropology at Leiden University, where he studied from 2012 to 2016. During his time in Leiden, he was a member of the student association for cultural anthropology and lived in or near The Hague, as that particular city was close to the sea and Thijs was said to be a passionate surfer. In addition, he also enjoyed jogging and playing the piano.

From 2016 to 2017, Thijs worked as a data analyst at a startup in Amsterdam until the company went defunct, prompting him to pursue a Master's programme in Industrial Ecology at TU Delft. This was the last institution he studied at, and he never got another job either.

With all of this out of context, Thijs seemed to have a bright future ahead of him, but it was not to be. Thijs's first exposure to drugs came when he smoked a joint of cannabis when he was 15; after that, he expanded to taking a bunch of other drugs during his studies at TU Delft, such as cocaine, speed, ecstasy, DMT and psilocybin truffles; and on top of this substantial hard drug abuse, he also smoked two joints daily.

Predictably, this completely destroyed Thijs's mind and only exacerbated the psychosis that was starting to take hold.

Thijs became convinced that the world was controlled by psychopaths who communicated through a system of coded language that the average person was incapable of seeing. He reached this conclusion upon looking up psychopathy, fearing that he might've been a psychopath, only for the search results to convince him that he was in fact perfectly sane and everyone around him was the psychopath instead.

He then believed that innocuous things such as license plates, news broadcasts, and other mundane occurrences actually contained coded messages giving him orders. Even when he watched TV on Netflix, citing the shows BoJack Horseman and That '70s Show as examples, he stated that their content seemed to change and was now tailor-made for him, giving him coded messages.

On September 8, 2018, he was staying at his sister's home when, after consuming alcohol and cocaine, he became convinced that his sister's boyfriend was planning on murdering him that very night. The outburst from this event prompted his parents to try to commit him, but they were unable to get him to a psychologist until November due to the long waiting lists and even then, he would be committed to any institution as it was deemed "unnecessary"

Upon meeting with said psychologist, he found Thijs unnerving almost immediately, noting that his facial expressions and smiling were out of place relative to what he was describing during their interview.

Shortly after his intake at Mondriaan, Thijs's paranoid episodes grew stronger, and he now believed that every single friend he had made was planning on kidnapping him to torture and later murder him. This time, Thijs would cut deeply into his own wrist and even his own neck, where he managed to survive and call emergency services 11 hours after inflicting these wounds.

Upon arriving at the hospital, Thijs told the staff that this was not a failed attempt at suicide; in fact, he never wanted to die. Rather, he said he simply wanted to try and prepare for the inevitable "torture" his friends would subject him to, and that he was so scared that he needed to know what he would be in for so he wouldn't be blind sided by what he imagined was to come.

One would probably expect that Thijs would be institutionalized after this, or at least held for observation, but instead, the doctor merely gave him dexamfetamine, a medication meant to treat those suffering from ADHD, advised him to stop his drug use, and then simply sent him on his way. As you might expect, this did nothing to impede the downward spiral his mental state was undergoing.

However, externally, few would know this was going on. At university, his fellow students said he was withdrawn, quiet, and rarely spoke to them. His neighbours also said that Thijs would never say anything whenever he walked by them.

Thijs's parents continued to try to get him institutionalized; the two psychiatrists they spoke to told them that Thijs's symptoms were just side effects of the ADHD medication they had given him and that they once again would not admit him as an indefinite patient.

In April 2019, Thijs's maternal uncle, one of the relatives he loved the most, passed away and losing him proved to be the final domino before Thijs had a complete psychosis induced breakdown.

He returned to his student dormitory after the funeral and called his father on May 1, asking to be picked up. Thijs continued to believe that news broadcasts and the license plates of any car he saw were delivering him coded instructions, and this time, he interpreted those messages to mean he had to kill two people, or his own family would be murdered, and they were telling him he had to carry them out immideately.

On May 4, 2019, Thijs turned off his phone, took a kitchen knife and left his family's apartment in The Hague. His destination was Scheveningse Bosjes, a forested park where dogs and other animals were allowed to run off-leash, making it popular not just for hikers but also for local dog walkers.

Thijs wandered the park looking for a victim and eventually came across a Japanese woman, a 56-year-old named Etsuko, who had moved to the Netherlands.

As she was walking her dogs through the park, Thijs suddenly rushed toward her, stabbing her 30 times, including repeated stabs to her head. Long after Etsuko had died, Thijs used his knife to sever Etsuko's pinky finger because, in his mind, the messages encoded in the license plates also wanted him to bring back proof of his kill. However, as he fled the scene, he threw the pinky finger away, finding it "too horrifying" to keep in his pocket.

Not long after Thijs's departure, a passerby also hiking through the park discovered Etsuko's body lying next to her cargo bicycle, where he dogs were also present. The passerby called the police.

As the murder was completely random and in a wooded area, the police didn't have any evidence or suspects to speak of; there was CCTV from the surrounding area, but it never showed Thijs approaching, and the actual crime scene wasn't covered by the cameras. Prospects of solving the case seemed dim right from the get-go. Believing the killer had likely lain in wait for his victim, all the police could do was simply ask the public to come forward if they saw any suspicious figures and if anybody saw anything.

Tragically for the police, the killer was right under their noses; Thijs hadn't ventured very far. He went straight home, where his neighbours heard a loud banging noise coming from Thijs's home. When they entered to investigate, they saw a dishevelled Thijs standing next to the bathroom door, which he had kicked down. He looked confused when asked what had happened to the door and simply answered that he had lost the key.

Afterward, he texted his mother to let her know he had been catching up with his ex-girlfriend and asked her to pick him up at the train station, which she did. However, once she arrived, Thijs's mother would, in hindsight, describe her son's facial expression as "demonic" and stated that he even hissed at her.

Instead of driving Thijs to her home, she took him to the Mondriaan psychiatric institution Thijs had been visiting regularly for his check-ups. There, the physician said his answers were coherent that day but said he looked "unrestful and verbose". Since he never showed anything more alarming than usual to those present even after committing the murder, Thijs remained a voluntary patient who was allowed to come and go as he pleased.

Thijs exhibited many strange behaviours this time; he hissed at his mother, shook his head violently back and forth, seemed distressed, and often fell onto his face, losing balance from how violently he shook his head. Again, his mother insisted, practically demanded that he be held overnight, but the clinic again declined to do so and gave him a sleeping pill and sent him home.

Two days later, on the evening of May 6, Thijs was watching TV when once again, he believed the TV spoke directly to him, telling him that he had to claim another victim the following morning or his mother would die and then one by one his other relatives until ultimately ending in Thijs's own murder.

On the morning of May 7, he set out to fulfill the order he believed he had been given. He left the psychiatric facility telling the staff he was heading to Brunssummerheide, another dog park in The Hague, of course neglecting to tell them about the kitchen knife he was still carrying.

Thijs was going to kill the first person who walked by him, but he ended up sparing him because he needed to "gather courage". The second person he encountered was not so lucky: a 63-year-old grandmother and volunteer at a local nursing home in Heerlen, Diny Meeuse, who was walking her dog through the park. Since nobody was looking, Thijs stabbed Denis in the back and then repeatedly to the front of her body.

After the murder, Thijs stepped away and hid in the tree line to "compose myself," as he would later go on to tell the police and courts that he was "Crying hard on the inside" after what he had done. But whatever distress Thijs was feeling wasn't enough to stop him as he began searching for a second victim because "the assignment," as he called it, required two kills.

This second victim would be a 68-year-old resident of Hoensbroek named Frans Verhees who was walking with his dog toward Thijs. Much like with Diny before him, Thijs allowed Frans to pass him before he turned around and stabbed him in the back. Frans actively struggled against Thijs, receiving several additional stab wounds, with even his dog Kyra receiving a wound to her neck as she tried protecting her owner.

Ultimately, Thijs prevailed and kept stabbing the elderly man until he finally passed away. There were some parked cars nearby, and when Thijs looked toward them, he claimed the license plates were sending him another message, a congratulatory one, cheering him on for what he had done.

It didn't take long for another hiker to discover Diny's body and call the police. The police arrived and, after speaking briefly with the caller, allowed him to leave as they began their investigation. The caller only made it 100 meters before he found Frans' body and frantically ran back to the police to alert them of the second corpse.

With the same M.O and same location, the police quickly connected these two murders and then connected them to Etsuko's murder three days earlier; the police now had a spree killer on their hands.

When Thijs fled the dog park, he went back to Mondriaan, where the staff saw that he was covered in blood from the two brutal murders. Thijs insisted there was an innocent explanation for this, and while none of the staff believed him, when they heard about the murders on the news, they knew Thijs to be responsible.

However, they didn't call the police right then and there; they were under the mistaken belief that Dutch law prohibited them from alerting the police without absolute proof that he had committed a crime or posed an active danger to anyone else, because of confidentiality.

He left Mondriaan and went home to his parents, who later drove him back to Mondriaan. Upon his return, the staff placed Thijs into a secure ward; however, Thijs would pull the fire alarm to cause a distraction while he made his getaway, which finally prompted the staff to alert the police. That same day, Thijs's name and face were published across the Netherlands, with the public warned not to approach him.

The manhunt was short-lived, lasting only two hours, before the police found Thijs wandering down a public street in southern Limburg with his hands in his pockets, where he was arrested without incident. According to the passerby who saw him and called the police, he said of Thijs, "He immediately struck me as not being entirely 100 percent." Once brought to the police station and interrogated, Thijs denied any and all involvement in the triple homicide.

Unfortnuately, Thijs's parents weren't any more cooperative and, at certain points, were outright obstructive. When the police searched their apartment, they found not just the entire apartment cleaned, but that the clothing Thijs was wearing on the days of the murders had been washed, as was the backpack he used to carry the knife and the knife itself, although a second knife, also one of the murder weapons, was found which hadn't been cleaned and contained Etsuko's DNA.

Thijs's parents denied any knowledge of what their son had done, and the two were never charged for cleaning all the blood off the evidence, as under Dutch law, direct family members of a suspect are not legally obligated to cooperate with the prosecution of their relative, because of that, when the trial started, neither Thijs's parents or his sister would ever show up to testify.

Mondriaan's staff was also uncooperative, at one point refusing to share CCTV footage with the prosecution or other materials not covered by doctor-patient confidentiality.

On August 16, when Thijs was brought to his first formal court hearing, he finally changed his tune and confessed to the murders, apologizing to the families of his victims. For his defence, he told the court that he heard voices and saw what he thought were coded messages commanding him to kill and that he was prepared to cooperate with the psychiatric evaluation.

In October, Thijs wrote letters to the victims' relatives; however, none of them opened or read them. Not wanting to hear his apology aside, they doubted it was genuine when they learned he had also sent letters to journalists.

His psychiatric evaluation was concluded in December and concluded that Thijs suffered from "a decompensated psychotic state," experiencing severe delusions, paranoia, and hallucinations. In the professional opinion of those who examined him, Thijs did not have a guilty mind and should therefore be acquitted.

When they received the report, the prosecution was unconvinced; they still believed that Thijs suffered from a severe mental illness, just not so severe as to render him incapable of understanding his actions; rather, they sought a sentence of 24 years in prison with mandatory treatment, opting not to seek a life sentence on grounds of diminished capacity.

The evidence they had in favour of Thijs having more sense than it seemed was the fact that he left his phone behind before committing the murders so he wouldn't be traced, left his own dog at home and waited for the younger of his potential victims to pass him by and only targeted the more elderly dog walkers.

His search history turned up searches for "how do I act like a psychopath", "how do I deceive aid workers", and "Why do some good people become evil?". Outside of Google, he told somebody before the murders that he wanted to "impale someone with a knife "

Also, the day before his evaluation, Thijs said in a phone call with his mother, "Exciting tomorrow, isn't it, with Jan?" Jan being the doctor who examined him.

On July 30, 2020, the Court of Limburg found Thijs Hermans guilty of the triple homicide of Etsuko, Diny Meeuse and Frans Verhees; they rejected the defendant's claims of manslaughter or that he wasn't liable and instead convicted him of premeditated murder. The court also concluded that Thijs's deteriorated mental state was his own fault for excessive drug use despite several psychologists advising him not to and sometimes not taking the medication prescribed.

However, even if not criminally insane, they accepted that Thijs still suffered from diminished capacity, so he was handed down an 18-year sentence with mandatory treatment attached. Additionally, he was ordered to pay 103,498.08 Euros to the families of his victims. The relatives of the victims said they were satisfied with this sentence.

Both parties appealed to the Palace of Justice in 's-Hertogenbosch, with Thijs's lawyer seeking an acquittal while the prosecution demanded a harsher sentence. They presented 4 seperate expert opinions stating that Thijs could not be held responsible for his actions and also argued against the court's opinion that Thijs contributed to his own spiral by refusing to take medication. They argued that he did, but because the professionals misdiagnosed him and therefore erroneously prescribed him dexamfetamine, meaning it would've made no difference if he had taken his medication or not.

Eventually, the court ordered a second psychiatric evaluation, and the results were disappointing for both parties. The two doctors assigned to it declined to reach a conclusion on whether Thijs was in a state of psychosis at the time of the murders and therefore didn't state an opinion on whether he was culpable or not, leaving it open-ended. This report was criticized for being contradictory, disorganized, and incoherent, offering little to no insight.

Naturally, this haphazard report did nothing to convince the court of the defence's point of view, so on March 17, 2022, they not only upheld Thijs's conviction but also increased his sentence to 22 years, once again stating that even if his sense of reality was muddied, he still possessed enough personal agency to plan the murders.

Thijs's defence team filed another appeal, this time to the Dutch Supreme Court, where they essentially made the same argument: that he was incapable of being held responsible for his actions, while now also arguing that the appeal court had improperly ignored their 4 expert witnesses attesting to Thijs's insanity.

On October 17, 2023, they made the same ruling, upholding his 22-year sentence with mandatory treatment attached, affirming their belief that he was delusional enough to meet the criteria for acquittal on grounds of insanity.

The verdict was actually controversial among mental health professionals in the Netherlands, with one saying that the court had "put on a white coat" and overstepped their boundaries by judging Thijs's mental state themselves. But regardless of how they felt, the matter was now closed.

However, civil procedings were still ongoing. Thijs actually sued Mondriaan, the clinic he was occasionally treated at, arguing that they should bear some of the responsibility for his actions, arguing that if they hadn't misdiagnosed him and given him the ADHD medication, dexamfetamine, his delusions could've been kept in check.

Mondriaan's legal and PR Team denied his allegations in full, arguing that Thijs had lied about and hidden certain details from him during his time as their patient and that his heavy drug use was a choice he made that they had nothing to do with.

However, they did not address the severe misdiagnosis, why they didn't inform the police earlier, or their repeated refusals to hold Thijs for observation. Furthermore, showing that they were poorly run, there were other issues unrelated to Thijs.

For example, on May 8, 2019, a 51-year-old patient of Mondriaan who was supposedly left in a secured ward attacked and injured 5 people, including staff and patients, with a knife. At the time, the police had to clarify that Thijs was not involved in this incident due to the timing.

As of now, Thijs's lawsuit is still ongoing. However, he wasn't alone in seeking legal action against the clinic; the relatives of his victims have also considered suing Mondriaan for negligence.

On March 23, 2026, Thijs's attorney submitted a request to reopen the case and potentially order a retrial, arguing that "The real Thijs should not have been punished for the acts of the then seriously ill Thijs."

The report presented at his appeal trial was the crux of her argument. The fact that it was so disjointed and the noncommittal answers the two doctors gave were so controversial that the two were, in fact, put on review for submitting such a report, let alone as evidence for a court-ordered psychiatric evaluation, and later suffered reprimands from the Medical Disciplinary Board.

She argued that it was improper for the judges to use it as evidence that Thijs was in control of his actions and that it warranted a new trial. Her stated goal was never to put Thijs back on the streets, though; rather, she simply argued that he should be held in a mental hospital instead of prison.

As of today, the Dutch Supreme Court has yet to make a ruling on her request.

Sources

https://pastebin.com/AyTPwXbi

More info on this case: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warren_John_Nutter_Jr.

On January 4, 1956, 18-year-old Warren "Jack" Nutter obtained a 1954 model car from a dealership in Freeport, Illinois, under the pretense of a test drive. He drove to Rockford, picking up 16-year-old Joan Saur and two teenage boys he didn't previously know: Robert Wright (16) and David Jenkins (17). After selling the car's spare tire for gas money, they picked up 16-year-old Betty Zwiefel. Without telling the girls their destination, the group headed west toward California.

Along the way, the group aborted an attempted farmhouse robbery before burglarizing a gas station in Earlville, Iowa, for cash, gas, and a box of shotgun shells. At 2:00 a.m. on January 5, Independence, Iowa Officers Harold Pearce (52) and Henry Funk (61) spotted the group's car driving erratically. A chase reaching 100 mph ensued, ending when the fleeing car missed a turn and drove onto a gravel road. The teenagers were arrested and brought to the Buchanan County Sheriff's Office.

The girls were held in the front office with Officer Pearce, while the boys were held in a rear office with Officer Funk. Nutter asked Funk for permission to use the restroom. Once inside, he climbed out a narrow second-floor window, went to the group's car, and retrieved a 12-gauge shotgun hidden under the back seat.

Nutter loaded the shotgun, re-entered the front office, and ordered Officer Pearce to draw his service revolver with his left hand and place it on a desk. As Pearce stood up and approached with his gun drawn, Nutter pulled the trigger, striking Pearce in the left chest and killing him instantly. Nutter tried to reload, but the shotgun jammed. Officer Funk cracked the rear door to investigate, and Nutter pointed the jammed shotgun at him, ordering the other boys to grab Funk's gun. Instead, Funk slammed the door, drew his own weapon, and subdued the boys. Nutter stole Pearce's fallen revolver, threw the jammed shotgun down a stairwell, and fled. He was captured hours later hitchhiking on a nearby highway.

Nutter pleaded guilty to first-degree murder. Judge Shannon Charlton, despite having the option of imposing life imprisonment, gave the youth the maximum penalty: death by hanging. However, in April 1957, shortly after his appeals ran out, Governor Herschel Loveless commuted the sentence to life in prison, citing Nutter's youth and difficult family background.

By September 1998, Nutter had become the longest-serving inmate in Iowa history, having spent 42 years in the system. At age 61, he was housed in a cell block designated specifically for "honor" lifers. Reflecting on the physical and psychological toll of his decades of confinement, Nutter remarked, "I came in here when I was 18, and I still feel 18 inside... But I know I'm getting older outside. I go out and walk around the track, play a couple sets of tennis and wake up in the morning and feel like I'm 93 years old." Though he acknowledged that he would likely die in custody, he expressed a sense of community within the walls, stating, "This is like we're in our own little community. Everybody I know is in the penitentiary."

In a June 2006 interview with The Gazette, Nutter reflected on the killing, stating, "I know I killed a police officer. That's the worst crime." He characterized the incident as "not a planned murder" and expressed remorse, adding, "I'm sorry I did it. I can't change that." Regarding his long-term incarceration and personal growth, Nutter remarked, "I know people can change. I know I have changed."

Nutter spent the rest of his life behind bars, becoming the longest-serving inmate in Iowa history. He died in a prison hospice unit on December 8, 2021, having served over 65 years.