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The Oakland County Child Killer is the name given to the unknown person responsible for the unsolved murders of four or perhaps more children (but confirmed two girls and two boys) in Oakland, Michigan between 1976 and 1977.
The facts
From February 1976 to March 1977, in Oakland County, Michigan, four children were kidnapped, held for approximately 15 days, and then murdered. Once their crimes were accomplished, the murderer would dress them in his own freshly ironed clothes and leave their bodies carefully placed on blankets, lying in plain sight along some road.
The murders sparked the largest homicide investigation in US history to that point, but no suspects were arrested.
Mark Stebbins
On the afternoon of Sunday, February 15, 1976, 12-year-old Mark Stebbins, born in Ferndale, Michigan, disappeared after leaving American Legion Hall, a veterans facility, to go home to watch television.
Four days later, on February 19, her body was found some 20 kilometers from her home. He was lying in a snowdrift in a parking lot in Southfield. He was wearing the same clothes he had on the day he was kidnapped, perfectly ironed and clean.
The autopsy determined that she had been sexually abused with an object, and the cause of death was strangulation. Rope marks were also discovered on his wrists and ankles, indicating that he was tied up tightly during his capture.
jill robinson
Late in the afternoon of Wednesday, December 22, 1976, 12-year-old Jill Robinson of Royal Oak had an argument with her mother and decided to pack up and run away from home. It was the last day she was seen alive.
The next day, December 23, his bicycle was found behind a store on Main Street in Royal Oak. Three days later, his body was found dumped in the ditch of Interstate 75 near Troy, visible to the naked eye from the police station.
The cause of death was a shotgun blast to the face. Like Mark Stebbins, she was fully dressed in the clothes she had been wearing when she disappeared. Placed next to her body, the police found her backpack intact. Like Mark, her body seemed to be carefully placed on a pile of snow.
kristine mihelich
On Sunday, January 2, 1977, around 3 pm, 10-year-old Berkley-born Kristine Mihelich went to the nearby 7-Eleven and bought some magazines, but did not return home.
His body was discovered 19 days later by a postman while on his usual route. Kristine was fully clothed and her body laid out on the snow. The killer also closed Kristine’s eyes and crossed her arms over her chest.
His body, abandoned on a country road in Franklin Village, was left in plain sight of several houses in the area. It was later revealed that she had been asphyxiated less than 24 hours before the autopsy was performed.
the working group
Following the murder of Kristine Mihelich, authorities announced that they believed the children had been killed by a middle-aged man lurking in the area, meaning someone who knew the town well. An official task force was formed with the sole purpose of investigating the murders. It consisted of law enforcement officers from 13 communities and was run by the Michigan State Police.
Timothy King
On Wednesday, March 16, 1977, around 8 p.m., 11-year-old Timothy King left his Birmingham home on his scooter with 30 cents to buy trinkets. He was going to a pharmacy near his house. After shopping, he left the store through the back door, which opened onto a parking lot.
Authorities, already with another case on their hands of a kidnapped and likely murdered child, decided to conduct a massive search of the entire Detroit area. Television news programs and Detroit newspapers reported extensively on Timothy and the other murdered children.
Timothy King’s father appeared on television, pleading with the kidnapper not to harm his son and to release him. Marion King, Timothy’s mother, wrote a letter saying that she hoped to see Timothy soon so that she could offer him her favorite food, chicken from Kentucky Fried Chicken. The letter was published in a local newspaper, The Detroit News .
On the night of March 22, 1977, Timothy King’s body was found in a ditch along a road in Livonia. He was fully clothed and it was evident that his clothes had been laundered and ironed. His scooter had been placed next to his body. An autopsy report showed that Timothy had been sexually assaulted with an object and killed by asphyxiation. It is also revealed that he had eaten chicken before he was killed.
Before Timothy King’s body was found, a woman came to police with information about the missing boy. The woman told the task force that the same night the boy disappeared she saw him talking to an older man in the parking lot behind the pharmacy where she went to buy candy. She accurately described Timothy, and mentioned the scooter.
Not only had she seen Timothy, but she was also able to get a pretty good look at the man she was talking to, as well as his car. She informed authorities that the man was driving a blue AMC Gremlin with white stripes on the sides. With his help, a police cartoonist was able to make a sketch portrait of the man, and a highly realistic drawing of the car he was driving. The sketch was published and shown on the news programs.
killer profile
The task force developed a profile of the killer based on descriptions given by several witnesses who saw Timothy talking to a man the night he was abducted. The profile described a white, dark-skinned male, between 25 and 35 years of age, with unkempt hair and long sideburns. Because the person seemed able to gain the children’s trust easily, the task force thought the killer could be a police officer, doctor, or clergyman.
The profile also indicated that the killer was familiar with the area and likely lived alone, likely in a remote area so that he could hold victims for several days without their friends, family, or neighbors knowing.
The investigation
The task force investigated more than 18,000 leads. Although there were other crimes that the police uncovered while conducting their investigations, the group never came close to catching the killer.
Allen and Frank
A Detroit psychiatrist, Dr. Bruce Danto, and a member of the police task force received a letter a few weeks after the murder of Timothy King. The letter had been written by someone calling himself Allen who claimed to be the roommate of the Oakland County child killer.
In the letter, Allen described himself as guilty, remorseful, scared, suicidal and on the verge of losing his mind. He said that he had been with Frank, the killer, on many road trips looking for children, but that he was never present when his “partner” kidnapped the children or when he committed the murders. Allen also wrote that Frank drove a Gremlin, but that he had “wrecked it up and left it in Ohio, never to be seen again.”
As a motive for the murders, Allen said that Frank had killed children while fighting in Vietnam and was traumatized by it. He was taking revenge on the rich for suffering like he did while he was in Vietnam.
Allen stated that he wanted to cut a deal with the authorities and even offered to turn over incriminating photographs that could be used as evidence against Frank. In exchange, he wanted the Michigan governor to sign an agreement granting him immunity from prosecution. Dr. Danto arranged to meet Allen at a bar, but Allen did not show up and was never heard from again.
In December 1978 the decision was made to suspend the task force and the state police took over the investigation, which remains unresolved.
TV series
A television series, Child Killer in the Snow , based on the events described, was released at the end of 2020.
References
Crime Channel. (2019).WAYNE WILLIAMS – documentaries of serial killers in Spanish. Available at: https://youtu.be/opFLBR4B7TA
