Crime Raven

Urban Creeper

• Mark Rein • Episode 29

Share episode
Marcy:

When Constance opened the front door, the officers immediately smelled an odor that every experienced cop knows. They will never forget the unmistakable smell of decaying flesh. Welcome to Crime Raven; true crimes, real life stories from law enforcement and issues crime fighters face. This podcast highlights crimes researched by retired Detective Sergeant Mark Rein, using publicly available information, court records and personal recollections. Content may be graphic, disturbing, or violent. Listener discretion is advised. Suspects are considered innocent until found guilty in a court of law. One of the places that you can listen to Crime Raven is on Audible. With an Audible membership, you can access podcasts, audiobooks, and original content. To support Crime Raven, Audible is allowing our listeners to try it for free for 30 days if you visit audibletrial.com/crimeraven. That's free access for 30 days at audibletrial.com/crimeraven. We'll also put the link in the show notes.

Mark:

There was nothing particularly special about the way the creep looked. He wasn't a big guy. More average in terms of height and weight. He wasn't the guy that would attract attention in a room full of people. His insecurity about a lack of formal education caused him to avoid complicated conversations. He preferred simplicity and the company of people he could control. The creep wasn't a stupid person, per se. What he lacked in book smarts. He made up with cunning. He took advantage of his ordinary facade. Those who encountered him consistently underestimated him. It was also a benefit when he ran afoul of the law. He wasn't one of the usual suspects that spring to local cops minds. even though the creep fit neatly into the"black male adult, average height, average build" description, that was so unhelpful in actually solving a crime, particularly in the area of the city he called home. The creep had always liked the ladies, and in the waters he fished. The ladies liked him. Carrying that analogy further, the creep wasn't the northern pike or bass of the lake. He was more the catfish looking for action in the murky depths of the pond. An opportunist and omnivore sifting the debris and detritis until he chanced to cross a tasty morsel. One chilly evening, the creep made his way over to High Street. Living close to his favorite open air drug market was like a surfer living on the beach of his favorite break. Simultaneous agony and ecstasy, all packed into the same quarter mile. He loved the action Dealers and their touts pacing the corners as hordes of patrons from across the city converged like seagulls on a Cape Cod fishing trawler. The creep threaded his way through the high street fraukus, pushing past people as they scurred around him. He kept a watchful eye on the street ahead as cars pulled to the curb for stops that lasted 15 seconds. He was on the prowl. It wouldn't be good to get caught up in a drive by or some stupid cop shit. Seeing nothing but the usual neighborhood pharmaceutical commerce. He continued to walk, scanning the sidewalks and alleys. The girl the creep was searching for would be easy to spot because she was a fellow hunter. Having little money, she'd be looking to make the cheapest deal she could. The creeps aim was to be the answer to her prayers. The problem was he had high standards. Most of the ladies he saw were too far gone, burned out, eyes vacant, staggering from tout to tout. Those were the women who got the harshest rebuke because they were vermin who would not go away. A few nights prior, he had finally had to slap the shit outta one that had followed him down the street, propositioning him. He yelled at her."I wouldn't let your lips anywhere near my cock. Get the fuck outta here, bitch." The creep wasn't looking for a zombie. He wanted a girl who was reasonably cute and pliable. Luckily for him, he was a decent looking guy considering the rough surroundings. None of the women who were walking down here were doing so by choice. They all had a need. He had cultivated his approach over time to maximize his chances of success. To the girl, the creep exuded streetwise, confidence. He could be extremely charming when he wanted to be and forceful when necessary. On that night, the creep had already walked for several blocks, passing people and dealers he knew. They recognized him as a homeboy and they weren't threatened by him. In the past, he had bought retail from all of them, and the creep had never sold the kind of weight that anyone would give a shit about. some of them knew he what he was looking for, and they pushed the broke ass ones towards him. The word was that he was a kinky fuck. So the regular girls who still look good, gave him a wide birth. The creep spotted the girl he wanted from a half block away. He had never seen her before. She was Latina, maybe 30. Her tight clothes advertised a decent body. Like she'd been taking care of herself before addiction had pulled her in. Her long, dark hair shifted in the breezes as she walked toward him. The girl had the inquisitives seeking look of an addict, but didn't have the gaunt desperation and the dead eyes of the veteran fiends. She made eye contact with him and held it. In this part of town, that was the invitation, but also the question. The creep didn't waste any time. He confidently shredded towards her, keeping her eyes. When the two stood face to face. The creep laid down his rap. First confirmation that he hadn't misread the situation. He hadn't. One time the woman he was trying to scoop up turned out to be a social worker. She had all kinds of solutions to street life. No thank you. This time he wasn't mistaken. She had all the right answers. The creep felt fortunate. These brief words wouldn't have been adequate for a pickup anywhere but a place like High Street. The important part was that he said he had what she needed. There were far worse options. She'd endured some real freaks, but he had a pleasant smile. By the time they made it to the creeps place, it was already dark. The sodium vapor street lamps illuminated the small house. Light blue in the daylight, the yellow light they cast gave the cottage a sickly green hue. With some prompting, the girl followed the creep down the worn dark stairs into the basement. As they descended, she could smell the pungent odor of earth, moldy damp decay. She tried to talk to the creep to lighten the mood as he fumbled the door lock. But he shushed her motioning that the landlord was upstairs. The girl felt better once the creep opened the door, and he snapped on the lights. Inside was a sparse, wobbly table, rickety chairs, a tiny clothing piled shelf, and a small bed covered by a single stained blanket. The creep dropped into one chair, pulled a bottle of brandy from the table, unscrewed it, took a wig, and held it out. The girls' dark eyes went from surveying the scene to scrutinizing the bottle. There was dust on it. The label peeled back. It looked like it'd been kicking around for a while."Sit down and have a drink." The creep nodded at the only other chair. The girl did as she was told. The creep made small talk with the girl, asking her about where she was from, where her family was. None of it made a bit of difference to him, but he wanted her at ease. She was attractive. The girl was attentive. Every move was like a dog waiting for a master to magically produce a treat. He loved her neediness. He loved to be needed. No other aspect of his life made him feel so successful. After a few minutes of watching the girl jitter in her chair, impatiently sipping the brandy with increasing urgency. The creep pulled out the pipe and torch. She perked up. She leaned forward. She spoke louder. Excited. The creep frown."Yeah, baby. We're gonna smoke, but you gotta be fucking quiet." His emphasis on quiet."I'm not gonna get kicked outta here because of you. My landlord is a bitch." The girl sat back a little nodding urgently. They smoked. For a minute the only sound was the click of the butane torch. The crack of the burning rock and sucking inhalation. After her rock was gone, the girl smiled. She leaned back in her chair looking at the ceiling. She wrapped her arms as if giving herself a hug and started giggling uncontrollably. creep also felt the usual welcoming rush. His inhibition and anxiety dropped away as he rode the euphoric wave. He'd always felt bulletproof as the cocaine hit the brain. He owned this world and everything in it. The girl's giggling, brought him back, focused his attention on her."Shut up." He said almost to himself. She persisted. The creep a little louder, angrier,"shut the fuck up." But she still wasn't paying attention. Giggling at the ceiling. The creep leaped out of his chair, fist balled and closed the two paces between them. He leaned over the girl, his face, a mask of rage. The girl smile, fled her eyes wide, then confused. The creep, broke the quiet with a scream."I said, shut the fuck up, bitch."He punched her in the face, a right hook followed by the left. The chair pitched backwards. The creep followed it down. The girl led out a screech that was cut off as the creep landed on her, compressing her chest and face with his body. The man didn't pause movement as the cocaine superpower kicked in, springing to a crouch. He grabbed the girl by her long hair and dragged her up onto the bed. The creep began ripping the girl's clothes off. She was stunned beneath him, barely struggling as her mind tried to make sense of the sudden assault. She tried to rally, cry out. The creep, pressed the towel over her mouth, repeating his order to shut up, adding,"or I'll fucking kill you." The girl mind swimming was trapped between compliance, or fight as the man continued to attack. She felt his blows. And they subsided only as he progressed in ripping her clothes, then more torture. Then he was raping her. The girl wanted to relent to let it happen, but her body did something else. It rebelled. It fought. It screamed. The creeps fury grew as the bitch refused to obey him. He was raping her, choking her, hitting her, but she was still struggling, crying out, and that was against his rules. The creep reached under the bed and pulled out one of his toys, prepositioned for just such an occasion. It was a club. really just a piece of two by four spiked with nails jutting outta one end. The creep held it up for a second to look at it. Smiled, shrugged. She asked for it. With each swing, the club connected with a satisfying slap. He felt the nails drag ripped through the flesh as he pulled for another hit. The girl thrashed and squealed as he hit her. The creep was suddenly overcome with his own uncontrollable laughter. The louder she cried, the funnier it was.

Marcy:

Springfield, Massachusetts with a population of 160,000 is the state's third largest city behind Boston and Providence. It's the largest city in the eastern part of the state. Away from the Atlantic Coast, it sits up in the Connecticut River Valley. The city has a rich history as part of the birth of our nation and has grown to host a diverse economic base. It's headquarters for many companies with prominent representation from the education, finance, business, and manufacturing sectors. Springfield has a densely packed urban population center with all the benefits and challenges of similar regional centers. One challenge which has grown in recent years is that Springfield experiences a relatively high crime rate with almost twice that of the statewide averages. This holds true for relatively minor offenses as well as violent crimes like assault, robbery, rape, and murder. The criminal case against Stuart Weldon started as a simple traffic stop on May 27th, 2018. The car he was driving had a taillight out. A patrol officer tried to pull him over and Weldon tried even harder not to stop. He drove desperately wrong way, one way, caroming off civilian vehicles and crashing into police cruisers. The difference was the cops had a plan. Weldon didn't. After a brief pursuit, they boxed in Weldon's car on Wilbraham Road in Springfield's pine Point neighborhood. After he was subdued and handcuffed, officers discovered the 40 year old Weldon had a large knife hidden in his clothing.When they ran his name through the state computer, it turned out that Weldon was a fugitive from a pending criminal assault case. A few weeks prior, he had cut off a court ordered GPS ankle monitor. The old charges compounded by the new eluding vehicular assault mishmash were enough to ensure him a lengthy stay in jail. But there was more. That day weldon had a passenger or rather a prisoner with him in the car. At the scene of the car pinning and arrest, after Weldon was taken into custody, officers were surprised to discover a woman tied up in the backseat. As they carefully removed her from the car, the badly injured woman said, thank you for saving my life. I thought I would never get away. An ambulance transported the woman to the hospital where they treated her for injuries described as grotesque and violent. It turned out that she was the mother of one of Weldon's two children. Held against her will for the prior month, she reported Weldon had repeatedly raped her and assaulted her with his fists and various weapons. She had stab wounds, a fractured jaw, and bruises all over. There were pattern injuries from being hit with what the victim claimed was a hammer and a metal pipe. There were strangulation marks on her neck. She described one of Weldon's weapons. She didn't know what a wire connected between two wooden handles was called, but the investigator recognized that she was describing a garrot On May 30th, three days after Weldon was remanded to the Hampton County Correctional Center, constance White, Weldon's 72 year old mother called the police. She wanted officers to investigate a strange smell coming from her son's area in the basement. The house was at 1333 Page Boulevard. Weldon's mother had allowed him to live underneath the thousand square foot House since she'd bought it in 2016. The officers who responded to the call didn't have all the background information on Weldon. It was a fairly common category of police response referred to as suspicious circumstances. It could literally be anything. They found the small, blue gray house with white trim, a little rundown with overgrown landscaping. Otherwise, the house was unremarkable. When Constance opened the front door, the officers immediately smelled an odor that every experienced cop knows. They will never forget the unmistakable smell of decaying flesh. As officers descended into the basement backtracking the smell, they swatted away, flies headed in the opposite direction. They tracked to the bathroom barely larger than a closet. With the door open the odor was almost unbearable. Tucked back in a corner, there was a box. A reddish brown liquid was leaking from the box, spread across several squares of linoleum. The officers did just enough investigation of the box to confirm that the rotting remains inside looked human. Then they got the hell out of there. Back in the zone of breathable air. They called for assistance. By the time the first investigators arrived, they knew more about the house and Weldon. It gratified them to find out he was still in custody at the county lockup. Weldon was the father of two children. A young son and a six month old baby girl. Its mother had taken the baby away when she was released from the hospital. Officers took the son who was there with the old lady into protective custody as the crime scene investigation cranked up. Weldon's mother was not a font of information. Other than generalization, such as her son had a drug problem and noticing the suspicious odor, she claimed to have little other knowledge about what he'd been up to. She did not know who the body in the basement could be. Investigators combed inside and out. It was a double lot room enough for a grassy yard and two small out buildings. It was on the floor of one of these, the detached garage. Where they found a second body wrapped in a tarp. These remains were in slightly better condition than the first. This new discovery sent a shockwave through the police department that echoed across the city. The processing of the 1333 page Boulevard crime scene would last for more than a week. By the end ground penetrating radar scans found several subsurface anomalies that had to be excavated. They found one additional set of human remains and a hole under the shed. The scene gained unwanted notoriety is media and rubberneckers converged. The neighbors up and down the street grew tired of answering their front doors, weary of successive interviews as initial police canvassing became investigator follow-up questions became public interest pieces by various media outlets. It seemed that everyone was looking for the juicy scraps. In that regard, the neighbors were a disappointment. Nobody had anything significant to say about that specific house. Loud disturbances were not uncommon in that area. No one claimed to know anything out of the ordinary was happening in their neighbor's basement. The publicity had one positive effect. Several women came forward claiming that Weldon had attacked them in the recent past. Investigators interviewed all of them. Some were merely attention seekers who were easy to weed out, but many gave corroborated details. The stories were all eerily similar variations on a theme. While the police were busy processing the crime scene, tracking down leads and talking to witnesses and victims, many families across Springfield held their collective breaths. Every city in the United States has people who go missing. Many of them are women who clinging to the fringes of society. Poverty goes hand in hand with a host of other issues, drugs, mental health domestic violence. As the facts of the situation with Weldon leaked out across Springfield. Those who had missing loved ones found themselves in an unenviable club and a week long vigil was beginning. Investigators hadn't gotten around to taking a hard look at Weldon after the car chase assault, kidnapping incident three days prior. Now, that initial arrest compounded by a growing body count and new victims seemingly crawling out of the woodwork. Weldon had Springfield detectives complete attention. He was born in Jamaica, Queens, New York and was raised in Montclair, New Jersey. His father died during his teenage years. Weldon was the farthest thing from an outstanding student. In fact, he didn't attend much school after the first grade, and he didn't graduate high school. He was functionally illiterate and had never held down a steady job. Weldon found support in a dotting mother, street crime and low level drug dealing. Springfield investigators did not have access to Weldon's juvenile record, but his adult years were documented in lengthy court records, including a sexual assault kidnapping in 1997 when he was 19, illegal weapons possession, multiple burglary charges, a 2005 felony assault with a weapon, a 2006 attempted theft and burglary, and an October, 2008 burglary and probation violation. Some of these netted him short stints In jail. He served two years for a 2010 burglary and felony assault. The regular police contacts and frequent arrests for low end crimes continued until October 14th, 2017, near Forest Park in Springfield, Massachusetts, when police stopped him for reckless driving and he subsequently earned bonus charges of assault with a deadly weapon, resisting arrest, and assaulting a police officer. Weldon's documented pass told detectives they were dealing with a career criminal. They wanted to know if Weldon was the kind of guy who was always destined to kill somebody, or if something had recently changed. Some of Weldon's relatives, while acknowledging he was a criminal, said he hadn't always been a violent person. His aunt was certain that something had just snapped in him, asserting that perhaps drugs had driven him crazy. In contrast, other associates, some going way back, weren't surprised when they found out Weldon was a murderer. They said Weldon considered himself a ladies man, always on the prowl. He didn't like to be turned away, and he was very quick to anger. Five days after the bodies were recovered, as the detectives worked to bring facts about their suspect into focus, the identities were publicly released. Three Springfield families found out that they had won the Nightmare lottery. The woman in the box from the bathroom turned out to be Kayla Escalante, 27 years old. Kayla had been missing since December, about five months. Only partially clothed, her wrists and ankles were tightly bound. She also had tape wrapped around her head and mouth. The body had clearly suffered trauma and sexual assault. They ruled the cause of death to be strangulation. She still had an electric cord wrapped around her neck. The remains discovered, wrapped in a tarp on the garage floor, turned out to be 47 year old ernestine Ryans, missing since March 8th, 2018. Autopsy showed that she died by violence, including sexual assault. When Ernestine disappeared, her brother filed the missing person report and started searching. Her silence was unusual. As time passed, they all assumed that she had relapsed and had returned to her former city because that's where she had connections. American Canals- Liden, 34 years old, had been missing since June, 2017. Americans remains were discovered during the backyard excavation, buried in a hole under the shed. The arms and legs of her now skeletal remains were still bound with cord and bundled in bedding. With the identifications, complete investigators could look at victimology, which told them more about their suspect. The obvious common themes were crushing poverty, drug addiction, and repeated victimization. Each victim had family members who had tried to help them out of their situation, and when they went missing, had tried to locate them. Families put up missing flyers. The community was still plastered with photos that American's sister had printed, scrolled with the prescient words"missing and could be in danger." Springfield, major crimes unit detectives had worked with the families attempting to track down these women in some of the city's most drug addled and violent precincts. They combed through the shelters, the hospitals, and old hangouts. They interviewed friends, even some in jail, and they documented these efforts in investigator's notes, and despite their work, the name Weldon never came up. As the dust settled on the murder investigation, they added a host of additional charges to those that Weldon was already facing. There were three counts of first degree murder, eight for strangulation, nine for aggravated rape, two for rape, five for aggravated kidnapping, and four counts of kidnapping. These new charges included crimes against some of the surviving victims. Weldon initially pled not guilty, and his bail increased to$2 million. They set the trial for April, 2020, but had to be postponed several times because of the pandemic. During the delay, weldon's team said they were considering an insanity defense, so the judge ordered a psychiatric evaluation. A few months later, Weldon was ruled mentally competent. Three years after that fateful traffic stop, on the brink of trial, Weldon pled guilty to 39 counts of various crimes, including murder, rape, and assault on 11 victims. At the sentencing hearing, a detective was called to summarize Weldon's crimes. In reference to the kidnapping and murder victims, the officer referred to Weldon's Mo as choreography. He enticed them with dope. He took them home to his basement where they used drugs, and then he would attack them as if a switch flipped. He raped them. He choked them all. The detectives described"they could not breathe, they could not scream, they could not make any noise. It was personal, slow and agonizing." three of the women's survivors testified at sentencing. Several more were too traumatized to speak publicly of the ordeal. One victim described a brutal rape and beating, turning to the judge tearfully and emphasized"I really thought I was gonna die on that day." another victim described Weldon becoming angry that she was bleeding all over the floor. He made her clean up all the blood before he let her go. Family members of the three murder victims described how Weldon's crime had robbed them of hope. Hope that they would ever see their child, sister, mother or friend again, hope that she would beat the addiction that was holding her back in life. They talked about their regrets and they talked about how the victims were people who should not be summed up by their addiction or the circumstances of their death. America Canals, Liden is dearly missed by two daughters and her family and friends. Marie Canals said her sister struggled with addiction, but was a good human being. She was kind, sweet, generous, loving, and good natured. Ernestine ryan's had parents, siblings, two daughters, grandchildren, and many friends that mourn her loss. Her brother Anthony, is racked with guilt and he said she was a very good person. This happened to be the time when she needed me the most. He said, and I'll have to live with that regret for the rest of my life. If she were here now, I would start by telling her I'm sorry, and I love her. I want my big sister back. One of Ernestine's daughters told the judge"For three months, I wondered every single day where my mom was and if she was okay.Then to find out she was lying alone in a dirty, dark garage. Kayla Escalante's family included parents, grandparents, brothers, sisters, cousins, aunts, uncles, and one young daughter. Kayla's mother spoke on behalf of the family expressing their grief and heartache. She said, her daughter will never know how wonderful her mother was or how much she loved her." kayla was a woman who struggled with opioid addiction. She had been through cycles of rehab, had tried to kick the habit with methadone. It had not been effective. Kayla was honest with Facebook followers about the daily ups and downs of a life with addiction. People sent Kayla words of encouragement over social media, cheered even the smallest progress, and supported her on her down days. The Hampton District Attorney Anthony Giluni gave emotional thanks to the police investigators, to the families, and to the living victims for their courage. Weldon sat expressionless through the lengthy emotional testimony. His sentence, three consecutive life terms with no possibility of parole. So Mark, let's talk about how the start of this all began with a traffic stop.

Mark:

Yes. A simple taillight out.

Marcy:

Is that all it was? Or do you think that there was actually more?

Mark:

So the simple answer is that it was all about the equipment violation, but the more complicated answer is about why a traffic stop in that particular area for such a relatively minor violation

Marcy:

because it was actually a high crime area.

Mark:

Yeah. So police officers in cities are usually deployed in numbers based on anticipated call loads in each area. Basically, the more reported crime, the more officers are assigned to any given area. And this is particularly true where there are higher rates of violent crime. Not only are those officers available to respond to crimes in progress, but they're also deterrent to additional crime. Police officers have what's referred to as unallocated time where they're not busy or, on a call. And that at that time, especially in high incident areas, they're often encouraged to conduct traffic law enforcement.

Marcy:

But when they stopped him for a taillight out, they weren't really just looking for a taillight out, were they?

Mark:

They, no, they weren't. When an officer, especially in an area like this, makes a traffic stop on a violation, They're also looking for other collateral crimes common to the area, and that's what's called a pretext stop. The area Weldon was stopped in or the where they tried to stop him has a high level of narcotic sales. And it's very possible, and I'd say probable that the real motive for that traffic law enforcement at that time was was for the drugs.

Marcy:

Is that legal to do it that way?

Mark:

Yeah. Yes. Pretext stops had been ruled legal by the US Supreme Court. On patrol many crimes are detected on traffic stops. Particularly in those high crime areas. Once I stopped an armed robber based on a vague vehicle description when I spotted that vehicle, it's, late at night, it seemed to be like the vehicle, but I wasn't sure it was the right one. So I waited, 30 seconds and I spotted a traffic violation, it turned out to be the right guy and it turned out to be a very intense takedown.

Marcy:

And if it hadn't been the right car?

Mark:

Yeah, it would've been, sir, ma'am, I'm not gonna write you a ticket for the traffic violation. Be careful and have a good night. And that happens all the time for every correct identification of a suspect vehicle we're looking for. There are many of those kind of stops. For the listener, if you are pulled over and the officer seems to be checking you out, doesn't really take action, ask you a couple questions and you're on your way, it's likely you weren't the droids they were looking for. The Weldon traffic stop is a good example of a stop for a small reason that turns into a legitimate, huge criminal case.

Marcy:

You worked in an area like the one that you described as patrons from across the city converging like seagulls on a fishing boat.

Mark:

Yes. And I also described it as agony and ecstasy all in the same quarter mile. The ecstasy is making easy money. Scoring drugs that are gonna make you feel, however you want to feel. The agony is the violence that goes with it. The people out of their minds doing all kinds of crazy things. When the high is over. Depression, paranoia, anger, suicides, homicides. I'll give you an example that is representative of this area, town I'm talking about. And this area town is represented in across major cities in this country. From time to time, I'd be out on patrol and I'd be flagged down by a person who had a loved one or somebody they knew that was missing. Just like in the welding case it was usually parents or sometimes spouses or friends. And, the person they're looking for often has an addiction, and these people are out searching the streets. So one night I'm out getting gas and a young military guy approaches me. He's looking for his wife who has a drug problem and he thinks she's somewhere in the area. So I talk to him for a few minutes, give him some advice, wish him well, and then go on to my next call. Later on in the night, I'm sent to a suicidal person at a well-known kind of low end hotel. I don't wanna name it, but everybody in Anchorage would know this hotel in the Spenard area. And when I arrive, the same guy that I talked to earlier at the gas station is standing outside the, that hotel's office. He says his wife has locked herself in her room. She won't leave with him, says she wants to die, and she wants him to leave her alone. So I go in and check with the desk clerk, who of course I know. He confirms the room is rented out to the guy's wife. I get a key, I tell the guy, their limits to what I can make her do, but I'll talk to her. So I go to the room. It's a familiar room for reasons I'll get into in a minute. This young lady, like late twenties is laying on the bed crying. She's real sad sack. She's coming down from a high, has been heavily drinking. In fact, she says she wants to drink herself to death. Says she's a failure as a mom, wife, all that stuff. She doesn't wanna leave with me or him, and she wants to die. The husband wants her to leave and says he has arranged treatment for her. I'm limited on what I can make her do. Psychiatric care in my city at that time was only available to somebody who was sober, ironically. Almost everybody who is depressed and wants to commit suicide has had some kind of substance on board. So I can't take her anywhere except the drunk tank, and that's not really where she needs to go. So I play my ace as I'm talking to her. So I'd been in, I'd been in that room, that exact room, standing above that exact bed about a week prior for a guy who had indeed drunk himself to death. That poor guy had died on that same bed with a giant pile of liquor bottles and beer cans surrounding him on the floor. When I get there, the guy had been dead for a couple days and believe me, room cleaning was not a priority at this place. His body had purged liquid of all of its orifices, which is not uncommon for somebody who's been dead for a little while. And those liquids had seeped into the bedding and mattress like an ink stamp. The way I got that poor drunk high lady to get off the bed and leave with her husband was to tell her that story and point out that purge liquid was seeping back up out of that mattress into the bed clothes that she was currently laying on. And the stains were obvious to her as she looked around. To me, that story represents hitting bottom. Unfortunately, I have no idea what happened to that lady, but she got up and went with her husband. So that was a step in the right direction.

Marcy:

God, if somebody would just take that mattress and throw it out the window ew. Okay.

Mark:

I think what happened is they just flipped the mattress, but there was so much there that, you know that, there you go.

Marcy:

All right, let's move along.

Mark:

I wanted to talk about the fact cops commonly could blame for lots of circumstances that are beyond their control. Can you think of some examples

Marcy:

like why wasn't Weldon in jail for all of his crimes?

Mark:

Yes, we've talked about that. He was good for several violent felonies. He was out on I ankle monitor. There's not much that police can do about the revolving door. That's decisions made by the community community leaders and corrections.

Marcy:

How about why didn't the cops arrest the victim and have them undergo mandated treatment?

Mark:

Yeah, so we get that from, people involved with the victims. It's very hard to make a person go to treatment and also very expensive and also not up to the police. In my state, we have Casey's law. But it's a process that the family has to initiate, and it's not an immediate solution.

Marcy:

How about why didn't the cops search day and night for the victim when she was reported missing?

Mark:

We've discussed missing people quite a bit on, on other episodes. I'll just say that no department has the staffing or funding for that kind of extensive and continuous search for adults. It comes down to community priorities, and nobody wants to pay for that kind of staffing. Another thing people commonly blame police for. Is the circumstances of a loved one's death, even when the police aren't directly involved.

Marcy:

Why do you think that is?

Mark:

There are a lot of reasons. I think they don't want to face the grief. People want something to focus on other than the loss. The most extreme example I've seen with this as suicide cases where family members refuse to believe that their loved one is capable of taking their own life. The result is something very ugly. There's lashing out. Sometimes they claim the police are covering up for a murder. I don't wanna get too much into that. There are instances where police do make mistakes and miss opportunities and should be held accountable. But most of those angry accusations or situations where the police, in our free and private society had no way of legally intervening before tragedy struck. So back to the point of my wanting to mention this is the interviews I read with family members about the Springfield Police. In this case, I would've expected them to be very negative about the situation of the missing not being found. But the family and friends interviews were largely positive and this is not the norm.

Marcy:

Why do you think it was different in this situation?

Mark:

Two things. The first one is communication. The police department in Springfield had its detectives talk to the families of the missing people as they went along. In so many missing person cases, families are pissed off and what you hear is the cops aren't doing anything or they don't think anything's being done. And when in reality there may be things being done, but the families are never told about it, communication is very bad. And what I've found is a little communication goes a long ways, and especially in these cases. I've mentioned the civilian search team I was a coordinator with. They did searches to rule out possible areas where they thought people may have gone missing. Now you can't spend all your time searching all areas of the city. But, I would talk to family members of missing people about the facts of the cases and, what we had done in areas we could possibly search. And some of those searches were done, and usually the family members were fine with just knowing that we were trying,, it's when they hear nothing, they assume the worst and they're unhappy. The second thing Springfield PD had going for it was that the detectives documented their efforts to find the missing people. So when this thing went down, the press asked for that information and it was there and they didn't get roasted in the press that they had done nothing.

Marcy:

Those were two positives. What are the negatives?

Mark:

Yeah, I can tell you as a former detective sergeant, one huge glaring deficiency in this investigation that I saw was lack of follow up from the original traffic stop was conducted by patrol. This organization should add somebody, patrol follow up, or detectives do the obvious follow up for that traffic stop. That was a kidnapping, rape, felony domestic violence assault case. There should have been a search warrant for the house right away. And what they should have been looking for was corroborative evidence based on what the victim said happened to her. For example, hammer and pipe, the garat. There's no better evidence for that trial as showing that garrot to a jury, and that was even before they knew there were any bodies involved.

Marcy:

You need to serve the search warrant fast in order to protect the evidence

Mark:

Yeah, that's right. You gotta get this evidence in a reasonable amount of time so that some of that evidence doesn't disappear. And the other thing is that I'm blown away. There wasn't some follow up on what's the status of the kids. You have a victim mom that was sent to the hospital and she was interviewed at the hospital so they could substantiate those charges for his booking. And that interview's gonna be a detailed interview. He's a freak. He's been holding her against her, will torturing her at her house. And they're gonna get to, what's your relationship with this guy? Oh, you have a kid. The next obvious question is,

Marcy:

where's the kid? And who's the kid with?

Mark:

Yeah. Where's that kid? Who's the kid with? That's exactly right. So as a police officer, you learn this pretty quick. Any involvement with kids should be ringing a bell. Where's that kid? This is a sit serious situation. He almost beat you to death. What's been going on with that kid? And is that kid safe? And, they would've known he's all got another kid and where's that kid gonna be? And these kids are with a mother that's been in the house where she's being tortured and there's evidence of that torture. And your kid and another kid of his is with her, it's a natural thing and it's a thing that we're, obligated to do. Go to that house, collect that corroborative evidence, check on the kids, see what's wrong with that suspect's mother that this is going on and she's there. I almost can't believe how badly the ball was dropped on that. It's almost like the mother called three days later to rub their noses in the failure.

Marcy:

Do you think that it's the kind of thing where they would've gotten around to it eventually?

Mark:

Maybe? Gosh, I hope so. Things fall through the cracks and have to be picked up later. But the welfare of children is, pretty high priority. Nobody wants to answer for the why didn't you get these kids? You still could, why could, why didn't you protect the children? And also collection of the corroborative evidence is very important in serious felony cases. And you can't go to court and explain why you don't have the evidence, because you just didn't get to it. And keep in mind, this guy's been in, in and out of jail and prison for a while. Some of that may have been due to not getting all the facts together so that you could hammer him. one thing that's important that you learn right away as a detective that doesn't really make the TV shows is investigation doesn't end when you make the arrest. That's actually something that's hard for. You have detective sergeants that were never detectives prior to becoming a sergeant. And the making detective sergeant, I had one and I loved him, but he had a hard time with case assignments because I'd make an arrest and it's Hey, good, I'll load mark up with some cases now and wait a minute, I gotta prepare for trial on all these cases. I just solved, but that's an important thing to remember in cases is you make an arrest and there's a whole bunch of stuff that has to come afterwards. The better the follow-up, the more likely the defendant is that he'll they'll accept responsibility. If you've as a detective, have built a bulletproof case against him.

Marcy:

Do you think this guy's mom knew what was going on?

Mark:

Yeah, I think the mom knew some of it and maybe suspected some of it, we did that episode that what happened in St. Louis, Missouri. I talked about a case that had stuck with me through the years where a little girl was abducted and raped by an unidentified young man who had kidnapped her as she walked to school. There's an old lady at the house where the man took her and it seemed like she turned a blind eye to the girl's victimization. This case strikes me like that kind of thing. The son is a low life street criminal. He's beating women, killing some, holding some captive in a thousand square foot house. How can you have no indication that something really bad is going down? I know that some of the victims are strangled, which could be, a fairly quiet death. But I put money on the mom being aware of some of it and letting it slide. The other thing is how did Weldon get to be Weldon? extreme domestic violence is learned behavior. I'd bet money that in Weldon's early life prior to his father's death, he witnessed or was subject to brutality at home.

Marcy:

And the timing of mom's call to police about the rotting corpse body odor is suspicious. By then she knows he's in jail. So seems like she's trying to shift blame.

Mark:

Yeah, I think it's more than that. He's been to jail before. But at some time the victim slash baby mama came by to claim her kid and probably laid it out for Weldon's mother. The mother waited a couple more days waiting for the cops to show up. She knows that smell isn't gonna go over well with the cops when they do arrive. And maybe she called because she wanted to get it over with.

Marcy:

Yeah. I don't think she called the police about the smell without having any idea what was going on. He's in jail. She can protect herself by Calling them before they just show up. And so she's distancing herself from this shit storm that's under the house. Did she ever say anything that indicated that she knew about the bodies or the murders?

Mark:

Not based on what I found. Everything indicated she, she claimed ignorance to that kind of, that, all that stuff.

Marcy:

So Weldon only went through the first grade at school and he apparently had diagnoses of bipolar, dyslexia, adhd

Mark:

yeah he really had some strikes against him.

Marcy:

Yeah. There's plenty of people that have those diagnoses and don't turn out to be serial killers. I really think that's where the unfortunate mental health stigmas come from.

Mark:

Yeah. But in his environment, he was certainly statistically more likely to get involved in the drug scene. I really think that one of the elements of his violent side is his inability to be anything but the subsistence level dope dealer who never got out of his mom's basement. He never had a real job. The drug dealing is just to finance his own supply. He reminds me of the guy from the Cynthia Hoffman case in Alaska that we did a episode on. He has no life. What he does have is a vicious anger toward the world that doesn't recognize him for anything, and he takes it out on people he has access to. He feels successful when he can dominate and destroy them.

Marcy:

Which just seems like more about that really deep poverty and exposure to violence in the neighborhood. And violence within the home is probably the biggest contributor to how he turned out. So if Weldon's mom hasn't really said much about him, did he have other family talking about him?

Mark:

Yeah, we mentioned it earlier. There were some family members that said some stuff. An aunt who thought Weldon must have just snapped suddenly because of the dope. She said that he has some weird quotes in, the media from her like she felt sorry for the girl. And she referred to her as a sex slave. She was also quoted as saying when I saw what happened to that girl, I said, that boy is sick. He really is. At least he gave her some water to stay hydrated.

Marcy:

What a weird thing to say.

Mark:

Yeah. Weldon also had some relatives who tried to sell their perspectives on him. So he wasn't the only hustler in the family. He had a cousin who shopped around for me shopped around to the major media sites demanding an outrageous paycheck.

Marcy:

It seems like all these serial killers end up trying to plead insanity. What do you think about this guy's insanity defense?

Mark:

It seems like a great lifeline for a lot of these guys who don't really want to explain why they did what they did. It allows'em to shift blame to not them. But we've talked about this before. I'm not saying he's firing in all cylinders mentally and emotionally, but if you look at what he did, his actions, he Rico suave those girls in repeated the same violent acts with successive victims showing no remorse whatsoever. He did things to evade detection and capture. I think he'd have a hard time with insanity. And under Massachusetts law, a person is not guilty of a crime if he lacked criminal responsibility. By definition, a person is lacking criminal responsibility if. They suffer from a mental disease or defect and as a result either are substantially unable to appreciate the criminality of the act or the wrongfulness of the conduct, or they're substantially un unable to conform the conduct, so the requirements of the law. So that's a mouthful. In Weldon's case, the psyche evaluation found no mental disease or defect. They found that he was able to appreciate that his conduct was wrong and there's no reason he was unable to conform to the law. So that defense was dead before the trial was gonna get going.

Marcy:

So part of when Weldon pled guilty, one of his conditions that he was able to get was that he would be transferred to serve in a prison in Florida. Why would he do that?

Mark:

Yeah, simple answer is that his mom sold the house and moved to Florida.

Marcy:

Really?

Mark:

Yeah. I laugh at that now and I laugh when I read that. In a life full of poor decisions, this might turn out to be the one he regrets most. Massachusetts has a very low incarceration rate. It also has high taxes that pay for things like safe prisons. If you don't believe me, Google it. Look at the shit show that Florida prisons are. Florida's incarceration rate is comparatively high. Its prisons are notoriously overcrowded, underfunded and wet Hot sweltering in the summer Heat, you can count me out. I did find the real estate listing for the Page Boulevard House. It sold for$137,000 on March 18th, 2020. It looks like well below the market value. It's tiny, but it is a double lot near the downtown area. let me ask you this, Marcy, if you looked at that house and you liked it, would you buy it knowing what had happened there?

Marcy:

I'm gonna say no. I don't wanna take the chance that there might be bad juju there. I've never seen a ghost, but I haven't totally ruled them out, and I don't want my first encounter to be with spirits that have been so poorly treated and tortured.

Mark:

My concern wouldn't be haunting or karma or anything. My concern would be that the house might attract people interested in the murder scene, who could show up at any time for whatever reason.

Marcy:

In the wake of this case, there were a lot of questions about how these murders happened and why there were victims that had not previously come forward.

Mark:

One of the responses that I think was a good one by the mayor of Springfield, Dominic Sarno who basically placed the blame for some of this on the judiciary. He said,"this neighborhood is filled with good and diverse working class individuals and families who like me, ask, why was this guy out on the streets? Weldon is another choir boy. Let go by our judicial system. When will some of our judges realize that animals like this have no respect for life or our courts or GPS devices?" he went on to praise the police saying,"I firmly believe the proactive actions of our SPD saved this young lady's life, and to those affected families of this incident. My thoughts and prayers go out to them." I agree with them about the good work of the police. I wish that some of the victims that survived had come forward to expose Weldon earlier in this series of crimes.

Marcy:

What do you wanna say about the victims and street life?

Mark:

I feel like I had a long learning curve over the course of my career. When I first hit the street, I could hardly believe what I was seeing. I couldn't understand the cruelty and the violence. I didn't understand how people could end up living lives of such depravity like I was seeing. I admit I was judgmental and had a low patience or tolerance for some of the human weakness. And what changed over time was I talked to these people, I started identifying with them and relating to them. I started realizing that while these people are responsible for their actions, almost all of them have grown up in situations, have been caught up in situations and problems beyond their control. That didn't mean when I was involved in drug enforcement, I didn't still have a job. That was sometimes at odds with an addict's self-interest. But it does mean that I recognize the need for patients and the need for systemic change. Drug addiction is not a problem the police officers are equipped to solve, and we can't arrest our way out of this. Society benefits when people in addiction recover. The point I wanted to make as we wrap this up is that these victims did not deserve to die because they experienced addiction. Their lives had value and they should have lived and had the opportunity to recover.

Marcy:

Please rate and review Crime Raven wherever you listen. It helps us get better and it helps other listeners find us. Also, if you email us a screenshot of your review or send us a question or a case, we'll send you a promo code for$10 off our very cool merchandise. Send them to crimeravenpodcast@gmail.com. And if we use your question or your case in an episode, we'll send you a free Crime Raven t-shirt. Remember, email us at crimeravenpodcast@gmail.com. Thank you for listening. If you haven't already, please subscribe to Crime Raven, so you don't miss an episode Please recommend us to your friends too. Check our website at crimeraven.com crime Raven hosted by Mark Rein and Marcy Rein is written and directed by mark Rein and edited and produced by Marcy Rein And it's a 3 Little Birds, LLC production.

People on this episode

Head Shot

Mark Rein

Host
Head Shot

Marcy Rein

Co-host