robert peters obituary; marion county police scanner frequencies; buffalo, missouri obituaries; mike mcdermott steve wilkos; k028613 cross reference; fedex express employee covid policy; . In June 1989 he married Cindy Jacobs, a secretary for an accounting firm whom he had met earlier that year at the Hilton hotel bar. . (Paula and Cindy would not be interviewed, but they have not retracted the sworn statements they gave Bittner.) Family devastated as mom and unborn baby tragically die after 'unexpected' medical emergency, Was Beckett Rex edited out of 'American Idol' Season 21? In fact, Texas Monthly reporter Skip Hollandsworth explained Roberts ordeal by saying, Once his name came out, he was this pariah in south Texas. Photo by The Signal reporter Agueda Jimenez In 1993, a search was conducted in Abel's home but no evidence was found connecting him to the murders. The 25-year-old cocktail waitress disappeared after she left her parents' home to hitch a ride to Houston to visit her boyfriend. Leave them blank to get signed up. Somethings down there, Miller shouted as people came running with their flashlights. . Dozens dead and several serial killer suspects: The haunting reality of the Texas Killing Fields. In 1997 one police department ran a computer search of registered sex offenders living between Houston and Galveston, and more than 2,100 names popped up. If we had any hope of getting man to the moon, we had to get the maximum Saturn payload into orbit, says Robert Gottlieb, a veteran aerospace engineer who now works at Boeing. The Texas Killing Fields comprise a particular plain near I-45 off Calder Road in League City. They hadnt. Soon after, he purchased the eleven-acre property for sale next to the oil field and made preparations to open Stardust Trailrides. The young cocktail waitress was found murdered in the same location as three other females. Want to Buy a West Texas Ghost Town? It remains unclear if Abel had taken his own life. Suppose youre such a confident killer that you think youre smarter than the police, he says. Lauren Larson is a former features writer and editor. Mosquito Hawks Are Flitting All Over Texas. Coming here was my chance to keep working at NASA and be able to work some cattle on the weekends, he says. The League City police were so convinced he murdered those women and buried them, creating his own private graveyard, that they filed a court affidavit calling him a serial sexual offender who displayed the kind of rage and violent behavior often seen in serial killers. 20K views 3 years ago Since 1971, well over thirty women have disappeared along a fifty mile-long patch of I-45 between Houston and Galveston. Some refer to this stretch of the Gulf Freeway as a. One of Netflix's latest true-crime docuseries, Crime Scene: The Texas Killing Fields, tells the story of the unsolved murders of four Texas women that occurred in the 1980s and 1990s in League . Between 1984 and 1991, the remains of four young women were found on the same patch of land near Calder Road in League City. He seems like someone who should be washing windows instead of being a police detective.. Why would she still be paying money to a private investigator unless she wanted the reward? Abel asked. . Most people whose remains were found in the land were little girls or adult women, all between the ages 12 to 25. Its an unforgettable episode in a story that still remains a perplexing and tragic mystery. And none of them have been more interesting than a former NASA engineer, Robert Abel, who owned a small horseback-riding business outside the town of League City. Then he turned, got into his pickup, and headed down the dirt road, away from the killing fields, disappearing behind the dust like a ghost. Crime Scene: The Texas Killing Fields, a true crime documentary on Netflix, is one of the top 10 shows on the service, thus it should not be missed at all. But he could never shake loose of the past. So in November, Bittner presented an affidavit before a state district court judge outlining Gomezs profile and reporting the statements made by two of Abels ex-wives. Mom, I love you, reads a note on the nightstand in Krystal Jean Bakers bedroom in Texas City. LEAGUE CITY, Texas -- League City police say two women who were found dead decades ago in the infamous "Killing Fields" have been identified. Nov. 3, 2001. However, as the show portrays, the investigation soon led to Robert Abel, who was considered a suspect for a long time. We just want the chance to tell our daughter good-bye., It is impossible for an outsider to understand the shattered psyches of parents whose daughters will never grow older. If you fill out the first name, last name, or agree to terms fields, you will NOT be added to the newsletter list. There was no evidence, in fact, that he had committed any crime. A few construction workers, employees of Millers, were on hand to help, as were friends and even Millers ex-wife. In July 2022, Tim Miller won a wrongful death lawsuit against Hedrick for $24 million in liability and damages that he filed in 2014. Many people who live in the surrounding towns and bedroom communities wont come near the place. Confessed killer details murder of Texas Killing Fields victim - February 16, 2016; What Are The Texas Killing Fields? Two years ago, FBI statistics showed Texas leading the nation in unsolved serial highway homicides. Some young women have never been found: More than ten years after Ren Richerson, an achingly pretty college student, vanished from a condominium complex in Galveston, her parents are still paying a private detective to search for her. ga('create', 'UA-67136960-15', 'auto', 'ads'); Moreover, an organized killer prefers working in what the FBI calls a comfort zone, an area very familiar to him where he receives little or no interference from outsiders. if(document.querySelector("#google_image_div")){ However, everything changed once two young boys located Lauras body in the same stretch of land in 1986. And there were other occasions when I felt as if Abel talked a little too much about the allegations against him. But nothing turned up, which Abel says should have been no surprise, because what the hell did they think they were going to find after all those years? Texas Monthly interviewed Abel in 1999. 100% on Rotten Tomatoes. His stepdaughter while out riding located another set of skeletal remains. But there would be no peace. It was Paula, he said, who had the fits of rageI was scared to death of her at one point, to be honest with you, and I told the police thatand he said Cindy Jacobs was angry with him after the honeymoon only because he wouldnt put her name on his checking account and didnt let her see his will. pg.acq.push(function() { She had been reported missing by her family in . The League City Police Department naturally wound up under increasing pressure to nab a culprit, and they came to believe they'd found one, courtesy of an FBI profile that matched a local: Robert. window.googletag.pubads().addEventListener('slotRenderEnded', function(event) { During this week in true crime history, Suzanne Rene Richerson was reported missing after she disappeared while working at a Galveston resort in October of 1988. As per reports, once Robert became a suspect in the Calder Field murder investigation, people began alienating him from their lives. One of Abels friends, a man who sang cowboy songs at Stardust Trailrides, was approached by a private detective who asked several questions about him and then said he was working for one of his ex-wives. In 1991, a fourth woman was found in the same area but was unidentifiable. Tim Miller, founder of Texas EquuSearch, won a default judgment in his 2014 wrongful death lawsuit filed against Clyde Edwin Hedrick. Abel shrugged, appearing neither anxious nor relieved. However, the man who has been in the minds of everyone who watched the show and read up on the case is Robert Abel. In June 1983 Abel moved from Houston into a pleasant middle-class neighborhood in League City. Just before he shook my hand good-bye, he said, Do I really look like a killer? One day a group of teenage boys, hoping to prove their courage when they spotted him cruising through town in his pickup, rolled down their car windows and shouted, Hey, Killer! Over the years, he has become such a focus of fear and hostility that in 1997, nearly two hundred people fanned out over his land without his permission, looking for the body of a pretty college student who had disappeared from a Bennigans restaurant not far from League City and who to this day has never been found. Lets start here. Nearby were a dozen search dogs, including four trained to detect the scent of decomposing human flesh. Thats because while attempts to recover her remains as safely as possible were being made on February 2, 1986, local law enforcement came across a third body, which remained unidentified at the time. eventCategory: event.slot.getSlotElementId(), Yet according to Gottlieb, Abel was successful with women. Youtube/TexasEquuSearch100 Intelligent, methodical.sounds exactly like how a scientist would be described. 2023 National City and Regional Magazine Awards Finalists Announced, Texas Monthly Receives a Nod From the American Bar Association, HBO Max Releases Official Trailer for Love & Death, Get Out and Celebrate 100 Years of Texas State Parks, Two Assistant Editors Join the Texas Monthly Staff. What made Abel a suspect was that he owned the property right next to the land where the bodies were found. [2] Yet he haunts people. The Texas Killing Fields. Right here, shouted Tim Miller, a grim, wiry building contractor who was at the controls of a large backhoe. Gomez added that the murderer was in all likelihood preoccupied with the media accounts of the crimes and perhaps had kept newspaper articles about them; he also could possess jewelry or clothing from the dead women to serve as his trophies. Gomez gave Bittner a list of other characteristics about the killer, including superior attitude, multiple sex partners, a history of cruelty to animals, usually described as a troublemaker, and will act out his anger. Bittner was intrigued: Gomez could have been describing Abel. During the search for Miller, another woman's body was found, but unfortunately, she couldn't be identified and became known as Jane Doe. Since all of the Killing Fields victims were killed by the same unknown killer, his confession may have only been a way to improve his prison rep with other inmates. } It's the kind of place where you'd be hard-pressed to find activity beyond oil rigs and the. let gads_event; As it turns out, Tim Miller might have found an old garbage dump.. I sat on the tailgate of a pickup truck with Millers construction buddies watching the late-afternoon sun turn red and then a sullen orange before it began to sink beneath the horizon. Before leaving, Paula told Bittner he needed to talk to Cindy Jacobs, the woman Abel had been married to for 41 days in 1989. reporters on a platform technologically tailored to meet the needs of the modern reader. He was romantic. eventAction: 'click_image_ads' Jos R. Ralat is Texas Monthlys taco editor, writing about tacos and Mexican food. Several of Abel's ex-wives and partners had accused him of being aggressive, as well as beating animals, all of which Abel denied. hitType: 'event', }); }); reporters on a platform technologically tailored to meet the needs of the modern reader. And theres no doubt they would have kept going uphe pauses, shaking his head like a man under siegeif it wasnt for that so-called detective., That so-called detective was Bittner, who soon after the discovery of the fourth body asked Abel to come to the League City police station for a routine interview. A slightly built sixty-year-old with thinning brown hair and a mustache, Abel walks stiffly because of a bad back, wears reading glasses, and takes pills for his high blood pressure. We are one of the worlds fastest growing Without informing the League City police departmentThey think Im a little crazyMiller borrowed a tractor and a backhoe and persuaded the Greater Houston Search Dogs team to join him in his first dig. Everyone who knew him was certain he had taken his own life. Im not saying Robert was the perfect man, the woman said. When I was working on a story about the murders, I too focused on Abel (Is Robert Abel Getting Away With Murder?, October 1999). In the mini-documentary series, Netflix brings light to the Calder Road killings. Its hard to gauge whos telling the truth. On the advice of another father whose daughter had been murdered in another town, Miller checked himself into the psychiatric unit of a hospital for ten days, promising when he left not to hurt Abel but vowing that he would keep pressuring him to confess. Robert Abel - A retired NASA engineer died in early 2005. The 25-acre patch of land in League City along Interstate Highway 45, between Houston and Galveston, is known as The Texas Killing Fields. Some law enforcement officials said the beta-blockers he took for his high blood pressure could have affected the results of those tests. hitType: 'event', Somethings down there!. One afternoon in 1994, unable to contain his grief any longer, Miller called Abel and said that he planned to kidnap him, take him to Las Vegas, and bury him alive in a sand dune outside of the city. He had wanted to check on the horses he still kept there, all of which came up and nuzzled him. Because they were placed within a thousand feet of each other, a private investigator who has studied the scene many times thinks the killer created a walking path for himself to visually inspect his trophies one by one. Indeed, many police detectives and FBI agents are convinced that this is the personal graveyard of a vicious serial killer. Texas Monthly's Function from 1999 leads with the provocative headline: "Does Robert Abel walk away with murder?" Indeed, crime scene Circles around Abel, a former NASA scientist who owns the fields, part of which he converted into horse stables. You can spend a week driving through the towns south of Houston, visiting the parents of murdered daughters. Texas Killing Fields suspects. Bordering the Calder oil field and League City, the location is relatively remote and was even more so back in the 1970s. Netflix. He left threatening messages on Abel's answering machine and claimed he held a gun to the man's head after one night of heavy drinking. Then someone else saw a pair of womens pants with a drawstring waist, which was discolored and nearly shredded from decomposition. Despite being found civilly liable for Laura Miller's death, Hedrick has never been charged with her murder. It remains unclear if Abel had taken his own life. LEAGUE CITY -- A Texas prison inmate has confessed to killing as many as six women in Fort Bend and Galveston counties, including some at the infamous site here known as the "killing . He is the prime suspect in the murders of the four women found in the oil field, which is next to property he owns, and his name quickly surfaces whenever a teenager or a young woman disappears or is found dead in the area. In2005, he stopped his golf cart on the railroad tracks and waited for a train to slam into him. We had our rounds, our arguments and fights. The first body discovered in Calder Road Field (aka The Texas Killing Field) was 25-year-old Heide Fye, whose skull was found by a dog. Since 1984, the remains of four young women have been found hereeach one nude, on her back, under a tree, with her arms folded. Again, Abel just shrugged. He suggested that Abel left the womens bodies on the pastureland because he knew theyd be ravaged by animals. And if I did kill her, I couldnt have carried her out of my house. It was as if he was giving me a scenario of how one of the murders had happened. Located near Galveston, the Texas Killing Fields is a 25-acre stretch of land only a mile from Interstate 45. Look, there are still many questions that need to be asked, Bittner told me. On a stiflingly hot afternoon in late August, at an abandoned oil field twenty miles south of Houston, more than a dozen people hunted for the bodies of dead women. }); Laura was only twelve years old when she jotted those words on a message board on the morning of April 3, 1997, a couple of hours before she went jogging through her neighborhood and disappeared. 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