The Disappearance of Jami Hagel Sherer

 

Jami (photo source: imdb)

Jami

Jami Hagel was a pretty, outgoing 22-year old in 1986 when she first met Steven Sherer.  Unfailingly happy and never moody, the only daughter of a family with three sons, she had been a feisty tomboy in her childhood and teens who had loved horses, baseball and climbing trees and was fearless.  She delighted in her younger twin brothers and had a very close relationship with her mother, Judy, which never wavered, even into adolescence and adulthood.  

The energetic girl matured into a caring and compassionate young woman who retained the bubbly, outgoing, and friendly nature of her youth.  She had a serious high school boyfriend, one she began dating during her sophomore years and with for five or six years, remaining friendly with him thereafter.  Jami not only kept her bonds with her school friends but with her family as well.  Even after moving out of the family home and into, first, an apartment she shared with a roommate and then into her own apartment in Redmond, Washington, less than ten miles from the Hagels' home in Bellevue, she called Judy four or five times a week and spent most weekends with her parents and siblings.  She had a secure job with a computer company and her life was just beginning to blossom in front of her when Steven Sherer entered her world.

The first time that Jami's parents saw Steve Sherer, he rode up on a motorcycle with Jami.  He was proud of the motorcycle as he had bought it from his winnings at the racetrack, as Judy Hagel recalled.  The Hagels were less than impressed with Steve.  While Jami had previously brought home boyfriends that were polite and took every opportunity to be friendly, Steve Sherer was completely uninterested in Judy and Jerry Hagel and anxious to leave their home.  At that time, neither Jami's family nor friends were overly concerned, feeling that she couldn't seriously be interested in someone like him.

Steve (photo source: CrimeMysteryandMayhem)

Steve

Steve had been born in California to a 22-year-old father and 17-year-old mother.  Like Jami's parents, Steve's father David originally came from North Dakota.  David was a bricklayer but he possessed business savvy and wasn't afraid of hard work.  He moved his young family that included Steve's mother Sherri, Steve and Saundra to Washington (youngest daughter Laura would be born there) as the building boom was happening.  Thanks to fortuitous timing and drive, David David started a construction company and bought cheap acreage in what would end up being the Seattle suburb of Mill Creek.  Although Steve physically resembled his father, he possessed none of David Sherer's drive and ambition.  They did, however, share a love of alcohol which caused many problems in his marriage with Sherri.  In an attempt to wean himself off alcohol and get himself together, in November of 1983 he left their Washington home to head for their Palm Desert, California home (the Sherers also owned homes in Rancho Mirage, California and Scottsdale, Arizona).  David was reportedly distraught over the state of his marriage, a fact that was certainly not helped by being alone around the Thanksgiving holidays.  

He was apparently intoxicated when Sherri called him on  Thanksgiving evening and again, several hours later.  David reportedly told her he would be better off without him and stated he had a gun and was going to do something about it.  The comment apparently didn't worry Sherri enough to contact law enforcement; she later said she didn't believe him.  Despite that, she got on a plane to California, arriving around 11 p.m. on Friday, November 25.  Arriving at their Palm Desert house, she found David sitting on the sofa, a wound from the blast of a .32 caliber automatic gun in his right temple.  The gun was found on the carpet next to the sofa.  An empty shell casing was beside it.  Forty-four year old David was already in rigor mortis and his body showed signs of lividity, indicating he had been dead for some time.  Investigators from the Riverside County Coroner's Office discovered a bullet hole in the north wall of the den with blood spatter and what appeared to be bone fragments staining the nearby wall.  Other than that, the house was neat and clean.  David himself had been full dressed and had no defensive wounds on his hands.  Although he had left no suicide note, his blood alcohol level was .10 percent, legally intoxicated.  His death was classified a suicide and his body was sent back to Washington for burial.   Although there was no evidence that Steve accompanied his mother to California, rumors would remain that Steve had killed his father.         

When he met Jami, Steve was twenty-four, only two years older than Jami, but he seemed completely unlikely to be her type.  He stood only five-foot-seven, but still towered over the tiny Jami, who was five feet tall and not even a hundred pounds.  What he lacked in height, though, he made up for in personality, which could alternate between charming and abrasive.  On first meeting Jami, he turned on the charm, telling her that he was the son of a very wealthy family and his being flush with money seemed to support that.  Not that she cared about the money; she was attracted to Steve's strong personality.

Jami, surrounded by her family on her wedding day
(photo source: tvnow.de)

Jami and Steve

What Jami's family and friends didn't know was that Steve Sherer had a lengthy rap sheet, a nasty temper and an addiction to gambling, alcohol and drugs.  He had little respect for women, jumping from girl to girl, much as he jumped from job to job.  

Shortly after beginning to date her, he questioned Jami about men she had known before him.  He called Jami's high school boyfriend and threatened to kill him, only stopping once Jami got on the line to apologize for Steve's behavior.  Jami was so young that she believed Steve's controlling and possessing ways were a sign that he was in love with her.  His jealousy, at least then, made her feel secure.     

Steve's run-ins with law enforcement ranged from assault to resisting arrest to malicious mischief and always seemed to stem from alcohol and women.  He had a type - pretty, petite blondes with big breasts - and never seemed to be without them, although the relationships would burn out due to his emotional, verbal, and physical abuse, not to mention threats and stalking.  Many of the women were smart, educated and confident, like Jami - at least before they got involved with him.  He seemed to have a power over them, controlling them and keeping them close long after they should have left.  

Even after he started dating Jami Hagel, Steve continued to harass, threaten and physically assault his previous girlfriend, who had gotten a restraining order against him.  Unbelievably, both his ex-girlfriend and Jami lived in the same apartment building, something Steve had arranged to make everything more convenient for him.  Both women knew about the other and both thought the other was the true problem; neither seemed to realize that Steve Sherer was the real problem.  The other woman finally left the triangle after Steve threw a shot glass at her, causing a concussion and deep gash in her scalp, and threatened to kill her in front of law enforcement.  He was convicted of second-degree assault.  The other woman's freedom, however, meant that Steve transferred all of his attention to Jami Hagel.  

For her part, Jami was determined to marry Steve.  As he liked his women very thin, she gave up her favorite candy, M&Ms, to fit his ideal.  He liked blonde women and so she dyed her pretty brunette hair blonde to satisfy him.  Her personality also shifted, taking her from one a confident and zealous young woman to a nervous, submissive one.  A true abuser, Steve systematically distanced Jami from her friends and family, even going so far as to move them to California.  (The move also had to do with a residential burglary he had committed in which stereo equipment, jewelry and a handgun were stolen.)  Soon, Jami's entire world was Steve and about making him happy.   Judy Hagel had seen purpling bruises on Jami's arms and legs and she, along with Jami's other loved ones, hoped that the two would never marry.

Jami as a bride (photo source: Charley Project)

Marital Ties and Arrests

In November of 1986, however, the two were engaged, with Steve giving Jami a diamond engagement ring appraised at $13,500.  On his suggestion, the couple had the ring insured, along with their other possessions. That same month, Steve called the Riverside County Sheriff's Department to report that someone had broken into their mobile home and stolen a number of their possessions, including Jami's engagement ring, valued at over $32,000.  Despite their uneasiness over the timing of the policy and then alleged burglary, the insurance company paid the claim.  Steve had expensive tastes, however, and the money did not last long, sending the couple back to Washington.  While the Hagels were happy that Jami was back in Washington, they were distressed by her appearance -- very blonde and very, very thin.  Steve had also decided that Jami needed bigger breasts and so she agreed to get implants, a surgery that turned out to be very painful for her.  The implants left her very top-heavy and out of proportion for her petite size; Jami soon regretted the decision but Steve was thrilled with the results.  

Before their marriage in July of 1987, the two separated several times but always got back together.  Steve served a 60-day sentence in the county lock-up in May of 1987 for residential burglary but that didn't dissuade Jami.  Rather than realizing her freedom and regaining her spirit, she was miserable while he was gone and filled with anxiety and terror at the thought that he might break up with her. 

Jami had started a new job with Microsoft, something she thrived at and loved.  Steve too had found a new love:  cocaine.  Cocaine fueled many of their fights, particularly when Jami would hide some of his stash from him.  Steve would eventually draw Jami's brothers and Jami herself into addiction as well, although not nearly as deep as his own.  

Their wedding was a lovely one and although the Hagels were not happy with their daughter's choice, they determined to give her the best wedding they could.  Steve, only two months out of jail, wore a white tux and had bleached his hair very, very blonde.  Although traditional in her choice of china patterns, wedding showers, invitations and all other things bridal, Jami chose a low-cut dress that  showed off her enhanced breasts, much to Steve's approval.    

Within months of their marriage and while still in their honeymoon period, Steve was once again arrested, this time for drunk driving.  While under arrest and at the Bellevue police station, he leapt at an officer, attempting to choke him with both hands and threatening to kill him.  The officer later remembered Steve Sherer's eyes and the look in them, convincing him that he would have died had another officer not intervened.  

Despite being convicted of felonious assault, Steve served little time and walked away with community supervision.  He always seemed to have incredible luck in avoiding spending much time incarcerated or serving an appropriate sentence for his crimes.

When Steve wasn't sober, he was increasingly derisive and cruel to Jami.  She knew his faults but she loved him and shifted the blame to others.  When confronted by her mother over the insurance fraud they had committed in California, Jami claimed she had not known what was going on until it was too late.  She made excuses for Steve when he insisted on Jami accounting for every minute of her day and even called her repeatedly, sometimes as often as every 15 minutes, while she was visiting her parents in Bellevue.  

The only area that Jami stood firm on was her job.  Steve had cost her jobs before she was hired at Microsoft and joining that company, Jami worked her way up to the human resources department, where she was considered a valuable employee.  At work, unlike at home, Jami was confident, outgoing and friendly; none of her coworkers guessed how dire her home life was.   She had carefully compartmentalized her professional and private life.

It was around this time she found out she was pregnant.  Jami was thrilled at the prospect of being a mother.  While Steve was impressed with his own virility, he had little to no interest in putting family first; he was still most interested in gambling, drinking and doing cocaine.  When Jami went into false labor at work one day, Steve told her coworker that he was watching something on TV and would come to the hospital when it was over.  Although Jami wanted her mother in the delivery room with her when she gave birth, Steve wouldn't allow it.  He told Jami that if Judy Hagel were there, he wouldn't be.  He eventually relented when Jami was in hard labor and did allow Judy to be present for the birth of their son, Tyler.  

While Tyler instantly became the center of Jami's world, Steve proved to be as indifferent a father as he was a husband.  If Jami were at work and he had somewhere to go (as he rarely managed to hold down a job for long) and Jami's parents weren't available, he would simply take the child with him, even if it were to the racetrack.  He also threatened Jami's parents, telling them if they interfered with the marriage, he would take Jami and Tyler and move out of state.  His verbal and emotional outbursts became more frequent and physical, ending in him hitting and punching Jami and even pulling her around by the hair.   

On November 5, 1989, police were called to their Bothell, Washington home on a domestic dispute call.  The responding officer found Jami, hysterical and holding Tyler, with red blotches on her face and a bloody spot on her scalp where her hair had been pulled out.  A long lock of her hair, with the scalp attached, was lying on the kitchen table.  Although Jami called her parents to come and get her and Tyler, after several days of phone calls and flower deliveries, she once again returned to her husband.  Jami refused to testify against Steve, thinking she was saving their marriage and providing Tyler with both a mother and a father, and so the charges against him were dismissed.   

Like many couples on the brink of collapse, the Sherers thought that buying a house would fix their problems.  With stock Jami now had at Microsoft as collateral, Steve's mother agreed to loan the couple the money to purchase a split-level home with a yard in Redmond.  Although Jami had initially wanted the house, she told friends that she probably wouldn't stay with her husband after they moved into it.  She seemed to finally realize, in 1990, that neither her marriage nor Steve was going to change.  If not for herself, she wanted to change things for her son.  In May, they closed on the house; Jami still wasn't quite ready to leave.  

She had suspected that Steve had been unfaithful but there could have been no doubt when, after moving into their new home, he urged her to join him in "swinging."  Although impotent due to the quantities of drugs and alcohol he was consuming, he took ads out in swingers' magazines without telling Jami.  During one of his sporadic periods of work, he had little discretion in talking about his sex life with his wife, even claiming that they hosted orgies at their home.  

Even while working, he still managed to call Jami continuously while she was working and even went so far as to show up on the Microsoft campus and stand outside, watching her windows, as if he sensed that she was slowly inching away from him. 

Jami, around the time of her disappearance (photo source: Charley Project)

Missing

Ironically, it was Steve that put the catalyst into place.  Joe Graham*, like Steve, was a cocaine addict; in fact, he was one of Steve's sources to score the drug and had been for a number of years.  He was married but had separated from his wife and so spent many nights sleeping on the Sherers' sofa.  Steve suggested that Joe make up a sexual threesome with himself and Jami, something that embarrassed both Joe and Jami.  As Steve was often impotent due to his excessive drug and alcohol consumption, his suggested threesome because a twosome between Joe and Jami that Steve not only watched but filmed.  One thing he didn't consider was Joe forming a relationship with Jami that didn't include him.  Jami eventually confessed to Joe the abuse Steve subjected her to and Joe was disgusted.  

By September of 1990, Jami seemed to be optimistic over a new life with Joe and was finally ready to leave Steve.  Joe Graham was certainly no catch but he gave her the strength to face Steve and take her life back.

On Friday night, September 28, 1990, Jami visited her parents and left Tyler with her mother.  On Saturday, September 29, she spent the day with Joe.  She lied to her parents and to Steve about where she was, saying that she was going to a promotional event in nearby Tacoma with a girlfriend.  Steve spent part of that Saturday with Jami's twin brothers, Rich and Rob, who later remembered how angry Steve seemed and how he commented of what he would do to Jami if he ever caught her cheating on him.

Judy Hagel spoke to Jami around seven that night, when Jami called to say she would be a little late in picking Tyler up.  Around two a.m., Steve called Judy to ask if Jami was at the Hagel house.  Judy answered in the negative but was concerned.  It wasn't like Jami to stay out that late but Judy tried to rationalize that Jami must have stayed the night with the girlfriend she had spent the day with.

At 7:30 on the morning of Sunday, September 30, Steve called Judy once again to say that Jami had come home and was on her way over to pick up Tyler.  Judy's relief turned to elation when Jami showed up and announced to her parents that she wanted to move home.  Jami confessed to her mother that she had spent the previous day with Joe, something that Judy did not approve of.  Then the phone calls from Steve started.  Jami took one of the calls and at last told Steve that the marriage was over, she no longer loved him and wanted a divorce.  Steve begged her to speak to him face to face and she eventually agreed, over Judy's protestations, and left for their arranged meeting.  She soon called to say that she was at her Redmond home as Steve had taken her purse from her and gone to their house; she had driven there to retrieve it and pack some clothes for herself and Tyler.  She was going to take a shower and then return to Bellevue.  Three hours later, at 11:45, Jami called once again to say she was on her way and would be stopping at Taco Time, her favorite fast food restaurant, to bring food.  It was the last time Judy Hagel ever spoke to Jami.

The calls from Steve began at 12:15.  Told Jami was not there, he called again at 12:30.  However, he broke with his usual pattern of calling every 15 minutes and went silent until 6:30 that evening.  Judy assumed that Jami must have been with Steve and might have gone back on her decision to leave him.  Steve showed up at the Hagel home, picked up Tyler and took him home.  By 9:30, though, he called Judy and asked if he and Tyler could return.  Arriving back, he told Judy that he hadn't heard from Jami all day.  

The following day, Monday, October 1, 1990, Judy began calling Jami's office at Microsoft at 7:30 in the morning.  Her concern became full-fledged terror when her daughter did not answer and never showed up for work.  She was so frightened that she called Joe Graham's wife in her search for Jami.  Joe's wife had Joe call Judy; Joe was as unnerved as Jami's mother.  He said he had begged her not to go back to the Redmond house.   Judy called the Redmond Police Department and reported Jami Hagel Sherer as a missing person.

Jami's friends launched searches of their own, with the Hagels' Bellevue home as grand zero.  Microsoft printed up thousands of flyers with pictures of a smiling Jami on them and gave many of their employees paid leave to join in the search for her.  Although Steve was staying at the Hagel home, he didn't join in the search for his wife or distribute the flyers.  He played the victim, speaking of how terrible things were for him and how Jami's disappearance could happen to him.   From the start, Steve was the prime suspect but he repeatedly denied any involvement in his wife's disappearance and unlike Joe Graham, was less than willing to speak to the police.   

Steve cashed out Jami's Microsoft stocks (stocks that would have made her a millionaire had she lived) and began going out to bars with her undergarments tied around his arm and her diamond necklace around his neck, claiming they made him feel closer to her.  His sister noticed a red spot on the carpet in the Redmond house and notified the police.  A friend of the Sherers said that he saw a shovel in Steve's truck on October 1, the day after Jami disappeared.  It stuck out in  his mind because he had never noticed a shovel in Steve's truck before.  

On October 5,  police found Jami's 1980 Mazda RX-7 in a church parking lot in Shoreline, a community just over 20 miles from her home in Redmond.  In the car was a suitcase containing some of her clothing but, interestingly, only sports clothes and no underwear.  The driver's seat of the car had been pushed far back, as if a tall person had last been driving.  The tiny Jami would not have been able to reach the pedals with the seat in that position.   Perhaps coincidentally, perhaps not, it was Steve's maternal uncle, a King County sheriff's deputy, who responded to a call about the abandoned car.  The deputy said that Steve had called him and asked him to search for Jami's car in his patrol area.   A rescue bloodhound, after picking up a scent from the headrest of the driver's seat, tracked it along the I-5 to a bus stop on the off-ramp and then lost it, suggesting the person whose scent the dog picked up got on a bus.  At the Sherer home, different bloodhounds were given scent from Jami's clothing; they were unable to track it.  However, when given a scent from Steve's pants, they tracked the exact same route the first bloodhound had tracked to the bus station.  

When Jami's car was processed, it was found the car alarm had not been set and keys to the car were found in the pocket of the ladies' leather coat found on the passenger seat.  In a small manila envelope secreted under the driver's side of the console were Jami's diamond wedding ring and a diamond-studded wristwatch.    There was no blood and no fingerprints that might give police any idea what might have happened to Jami and where she might be.    

On October 8, Steve allowed police to walk through his house, where they noted the red stain Steve's sister had been concerned about, as well as a stain near the downstairs door to the garage.  A day later, he had the carpets in the home professionally cleaned.  He told patrons at a bar later that afternoon that he was happy and "the bitch is gone," despite having told police the day before he missed Jami.

The Redmond house (photo source: FindAGrave)

On October 10, just before two p.m., a 911 operator received an emergency call from the Sherers' Redmond home.  Steve had apparently attempted to kill himself in the garage with carbon monoxide poisoning.  Found semiconscious, he had trouble speaking and moving and his condition was determined to be critical.  He was airlifted to a hospital in Seattle while detectives determined that Steve had placed a picture of Jami on their wedding day on the seat next to him and had used a cordless phone to call 911 himself.  He left a note apologizing for what he was supposedly planning to do and saying that he could not live without Jami.   Although he was placed on a respirator, Steve Sherer survived.  Detectives doubted he had any true intention of killing himself, as he had called 911 in plenty of time to be rescued.  

The following month, in November of 1990, Steve went on a date with a woman, informing her he was a recent widower who had lost his wife in a car accident.  Eventually he would tell others that Jami had fallen victim to the Green River Killer or she had been taken away by another man.   

Reinvestigation 

Time went on.  Jami did not contact her family, she did not use her credit cards or her bank account, nor did she apply for new ones.  The flyers throughout the city, tacked on telephone poles and taped to windows, began to fade.  Other cases took priority over hers.  In June of 1991, Steve got into a fight outside a bar with a man who pulled a pistol and shot him in the forearm.  In 1992, he was back in jail for using cocaine and failing to meet with his probation officer, violations of his probation.  That same year, he sold the Redmond house, which led to him being sued by his mother for return of the money she had loaned him and Jami toward the purchase.

The Hagels hired private detectives, none of whom could deliver on their promises of finding Jami.  They were awarded custody of Tyler and raised him in a loving environment, accepting that Jami was dead.   Steve saw his son infrequently and when he did, Tyler was hardly a priority.  

In May of 1997, Jami was declared legally dead.  A few months before that, a new investigation was begun into her disappearance.  Detectives followed leads that led them to California, Arizona, Hawaii, Wisconsin, North Carolina, British Columbia, Germany and even Colombia and spoke to hundreds of people.    

In the fall of 1998,  Steve, who had moved to Arizona, returned to Washington to surrender on his multitude of drunk-driving warrants and was sentenced to eight months in the King County Jail.  Detectives continued investigating him; many people, including his ex-girlfriends of more than a decade, who had been afraid to speak out against him when he was free became more willing when he was behind bars.  By October, prosecutors began presenting evidence and witnesses before an inquiry judge, including Joe Graham, who had moved to Idaho.  Steve Sherer was presented as a mean, sadistic individual who had been in run-ins with the law since he was 18 and routinely flouted not only the law but had regularly humiliated women, including his wife.   By the time he was released from jail in late May of 1999, Steve knew the clock was ticking on him.

He was arrested once more, in June of 1999 for threatening a police officer and a senior deputy prosecutor, for which he was bailed out, before the end finally came.  On January 8, 2000, eight months shy of a decade after Jami disappeared into oblivion, Steve Sherer was arrested on the charge of first-degree murder.  His bail was set a a million dollars. 

Guilty (photo source: seattlepi.com)

Trial and Conviction

His trial was scheduled to begin on April 17, 2000 but it would take until May 3 before a jury was chosen and seated.  

Among the witnesses for the prosecution was a former girlfriend of Steve's, one who was only sixteen or seventeen when she dated him after Jami's disappearance.  She testified that he admitted to her that he had gotten in a physical altercation with Jami at the Redmond house and had given her a bloody nose.  He also told her about the insurance scam in California, where he had taken things from the house he shared with Jami and pretended they were stolen.  According to her, he used part of the insurance proceeds to pay for Jami's breast augmentation.  It did not go unnoticed by the jury, when shown photos of how she looked back in 1991, that she bore an eerie resemblance to Jami.  

Another witness testified that he had cleaned the carpet in the Redmond home after Jami's disappearance (and after the police had done a search).  He said that an area in the basement by the door to the garage had urine and fecal stains, where somebody or something had evacuated.  Steve had blamed it on the dog and eventually had that patch of carpet replaced and primer put down on the flooring underneath.  After multiple cleanings and treatments with Kilz, no criminologist could say exactly who or what had lost bodily fluids there.

Compared to the prosecution, the defense had much fewer witnesses to call - Steve had never had many true friends.  And so they attempted to besmirch Jami's image as a loving mother and daughter.  Their first motion was to enter into evidence a videotape of Jami having sex with both Steve and Joe Graham, filmed and directed by Steve.  With the threat of many court watchers vowing to leave the courtroom if the video was shown, the judge refused to allow it.  The defense still did their best to make Jami out to be a woman of little or no morals who had left her life of her own accord.  

Most court watchers were waiting to see if Steve would take the stand in his own defense - and were disappointed when the defense rested without the jury hearing from him.  Given that Steve was a loose cannon, given to furious outbursts, his attorneys couldn't afford to subject him to cross-examination. 

The case went to the jury on June 1, 2000.  The eight women and four men spent nearly seven full days deliberating and examining the evidence.  Even without her body, they were all in agreement that Jami was dead.  They needed to decide if Steve was responsible for her death.  Normally, the longer a jury stays out, the better for the defense.  Not so in this case.

On Thursday, June 8, the jury reached its verdict.  Steve Sherer was found guilty of first-degree premeditated murder and guilty of second-degree felony murder.  It was one of the only times in Washington's history that a conviction was won without a body.  He was shocked, as he had told several people he expected to be going home that day.  He told the jurors that when Jami came back, they could "rot in hell."   The jurors had already been excused when he made his next outburst, this time to Judy Hagel, to whom he yelled "Fuck you, Judy!" 

On July 22, 2000, Steve was sentenced to sixty years in prison.  The judge said he based his decision on the emotional scars Tyler Sherer, then 12 years old, would have throughout his life, thanks to his father killing his mother.  He also cited how much planning Steve likely had done to murder Jami and then prolong her family's suffering by continuing to insist she was alive and not letting them know where her body was.  His lack of remorse also did him no favors.  Always a classic abuser, when leaving the courtroom after sentencing, Steve faced Judy Hagel once again and this time, he blew her a kiss.  

Steve's mother told the gathered reporters that she did not believe her son was guilty and the "injustice" would be appealed, at which time "it will all come out then." 

Life Following Lockup

Like Mark Winger, Steve Sherer's story did not end with his incarceration.    He was sent to the Washington State Prison near Walla Walla to serve his sentence.  In May of 2001, he paid $80 for a "pen-pal" ad on prisonpals.com, submitting three studio portraits of himself from 1998.  He claimed "my main goal for doing this is to meet a companion or very close friend."  Adding he's "a sun and outdoor type of guy" who loves sports and his son, he was seeking "an attractive and honest woman who isn't very religious" and with "no sexual hang-ups."   If such a woman was "willing to take a chance and look past the charge I'm being held for, which I did not do," Steve was happy to have this woman write to him and see "where this goes."  

As his mother had promised, he filed an appeal, stating that the evidence presented against him was insufficient to warrant a claim of premeditated first-degree murder.  He also claimed that the jury should not have heard self-incriminating statements that were provided by witnesses, nor his history of violence against Jami; he had attempted to block those during the trial but the trial court had denied his motions.  He also felt the trial court had erred in allowing witnesses to testify they had seen him assault Jami.  The appeals court sided with the trial court in all matters and denied his appeal.

News broke in the spring of 2003 that in December of 2001, while he was preparing his appeal, Steve had approached a cellmate and asked him to set fire to a house in Bellevue - the home where Jami's mother and Steve's own son lived.   The cellmate would be paid for the arson with $17,000 in jewels that Steve said were buried beneath a Mill Creek house.  The motive seemed to be revenge for Judy Hagel's testimony during his trial.  Police had received a tip on the arson plot at the end of 2001 and found it credible enough to begin listening to Steve's prison phone calls and bugging his cell.  When the cellmate was released in February of 2002, police searched him and found a book with Judy Hagel's address and driving directions.  He admitted he had agreed to burn down the house in exchange for the jewelry and cooperated with police rather than be returned to prison.  He told law enforcement the entire arson plan, as well as Steve wanting him to show proof that he had burned down the house. 

Even more amazing was that arson wasn't the only thing on Steve's mind.  He had wanted the people in the house killed, although he never disclosed to his cellmate who the people were who lived in the house.  His former mother-in-law and his own son weren't the only people he wished to eliminate.  Steve also wanted his cellmate to kill Marilyn Brenneman, the attorney who had prosecuted him, and her four children.  He had offered the Brenneman hit to a former cellmate but that cellmate had wisely chosen not to accept.  

The Bellevue Fire Department, working with the police, staged a fire at the Hagel home, generating enough smoke to make it look like the house was burning.  A local newspaper, who also was lending a helping hand, reported that the house could have been targeted.  That article was then mailed to Steve, who responded by mailing his former cellmate directions to his mother's previous house in Mill Creek.  At that location, according to Steve, the cellmate would find jewelry buried in a crawl space. The property was searched but no jewelry (or cash) was found.

Steve was charged and convicted of solicitation to commit arson; that jury needed less than two hours to find him guilty.  As it was his third conviction under Washington's persistent offender law (the other two being his conviction for Jami's murder and a 1987 felony assault charge), Steve was automatically sentenced to life in prison.  

Inmates at Washington State Prison have reported that Steve Sherer repeatedly told them that he strangled Jami because she was going to leave him and he hid her body.   Judy Hagel believes that Steve did indeed strangle her daughter at the top of the stairs and Jami fell down them, leaving the stains on the carpet below.  

Steven Sherer is currently incarcerated at the Clallam Bay Corrections Center on the Olympic Peninsula in the western part of Washington, where he serves his sentences alongside nearly 900 other inmates.   

Jami and her father Jerry (photo source: Dignity Memorial)

Jami's father Jerry died in 2016 at the age of 75, following a battle with cancer.  A memorial to his daughter was added to his headstone, complete with Jami's picture, which reads:  "Deeply missed, forever loved."  

Tyler Sherer, who was two years old when his mother vanished, is today 33 years old, older than his mother was when she died.  She has been gone more years than she lived.  

Jami Hagel Sherer's body has never been found.

*pseudonym  

(photo source: FindAGrave)

Christopher Wilder: The Cross Country Killer

Ask any true crime "fan" who Ted Bundy, Jeffrey Dahmer, The Green River Killer, John Wayne Gacy are and you'll get an answer.  Christopher Wilder, while just as heartless and cruel, is a forgotten killer in the annals of crime.

Born in 1945 to an American naval officer and Australian woman in Sydney, he barely survived his birth (he was reportedly given last rites by a priest) and then nearly drowned in a swimming pool two years later.  At the age of three, a sickly child, he suffered convulsions that led to fainting spells.

Despite his shaky health, his childhood appeared to have been average until his teens.  He started peeking in windows and in 1962, at the age of seventeen, he participated in the gang rape of a teenage girl on the beach in Sydney.  Pleading guilty, Wilder received a year of probation to be combined with counseling and electroshock therapy.  Rather than helping him, it seems the shock therapy fueled his violent fantasies.  He began to foster a need to dominate women and hold them against their will.

At 23, Wilder married but his new bride left him after only week, once she discovered his dark fantasies.  She had also discovered that one of Wilder's passions -- photography -- led him to have photographs of naked women in his briefcase.

In 1969, now divorced, he headed for Florida, settling in Boynton Beach.  The building boom led him to a large economic success, making a fortune in real estate and construction.  He bought himself a nice home, boat, and cars, began racing and developing his photography.  From the outset, Christopher Wilder looked every bit the successful playboy.

In 1971, he landed in hot water again.  This time he was turned in to local authorities for attempts to get various women to pose nude for him.  He received a fine.  He kept his nose clean briefly but he simply couldn't stay out of trouble.  He forced a high school student to perform oral sex on him in a house he was renovating. She turned him in, resulting in him being taken to court.  Wilder told the judge that he was masturbating at least twice a week to the image of raping a girl and did not think what he had done was wrong.   Doctors that examined him believed he was not safe in an unstructured environment and needed supervised treatment.   Efforts to make a deal fell through and the case went to trial.  The jury, somewhat amazingly, acquitted Wilder.

In 1974, Wilder approached two girls in a shopping center and, posing as a photographer, attempted to entice them into a "modeling job" with him.  One girl agreed; he drugged and raped her in his truck.  He was allowed to plea bargain those charges down to probation with therapy.  Claiming he suffered from blackouts, the sex therapist Wilder was required to see believed that he was making progress.

In 1982, on a trip home to  Australia, he was accused of grabbing two 15 year old girls and forcing them to pose nude on a beach.  He bound them into subservient positions and masturbated on them before letting them go.  Wilder's parents posted his hefty bond and Wilder was allowed to return to Florida to await trial.  That trial would be postponed multiple times before the final date was set for April of 1984.

Rosario Gonzalez

On February 26, 1984,  an aspiring model by the name of Rosario Gonzalez vanished.  Rosario was 20, a beautiful girl who was working a temporary job distributing aspirin samples at the Miami Grand Prix racetrack.  Rosario reportedly knew Christopher Wilder and had posed for a book cover with Wilder as the photographer.  Witnesses recounted that she left with an older man around noon.  She never returned; she didn't even pick up her paycheck for the day's work.  Wilder was at the race that day, racing a Porsche 911.

On March 5, 1984, Elizabeth Kenyon vanished.  Beth, 23, a Miss Florida finalist and former Orange Bowl Princess, taught emotionally disturbed students but hoped to return to modeling in the future.  She too knew Christopher Wilder; she had dated him.  She was close to her parents and drove from her home in Coral Gable to theirs in Pompano Beach every weekend.  Her last visit with them would be on March 4, where they had seen a news report on television about the missing Rosario Gonzalez.  The following day, she went to work as usual.  The school's security patrol officer watched her climb into her car and drive away.  He was the last person, save her killer, to see Beth Kenyon.

Elizabeth Kenyon

The Kenyon family hired a private investigator to search for Beth and the investigator found that Beth had recently gone out with three different men - - one being her former boyfriend, Christopher Wilder.  Wilder had even proposed marriage to Beth but she turned him down, feeling their 17 year age difference too much.   As far as Beth knew, they had remained friends.  In fact, she had told her parents on March 4 that Wilder had gotten her several modeling jobs.

Wilder claimed that he had not seen Beth in over a month and the case seemed to stall before two attendants at a local gas station where Beth frequently purchased gas recalled seeing her on March 5.  She was filling up when a man in a gray Cadillac drove up behind her and paid for her gas.  They identified the man as Christopher Wilder.  According to the two witnesses, Beth stated the pair was headed for the airport, although she had not packed nor told anyone she was leaving.  Her car would later be found at the Miami International Airport.

The Kenyons' investigator also spoke with authorities in Boynton Beach and found that Wilder had a lengthy rap sheet for sexual offenses.   The noose was beginning to tighten around Wilder.

March 13, 1984 was his 39th birthday.  On March 16, the Miami Herald reported that a wealthy contractor and racecar driver was suspected in the disappearances of Rosario and Beth.  He kept his appointment with his counselor that day, who asked him if he had anything to do with the disappearances.  He denied it.   On March 18, he dropped off his beloved dogs at a kennel and withdrew close to $50,000 from the bank.   He told his business partner he was being framed and would not go to jail.  Then he climbed into his car, a 1973 Chrysler New Yorker, and took off on a trip that would result in death for many women.

Terry Ferguson

On March 18, 1984, 21 year old Terry Ferguson had gone shopping at a mall close to home in Satellite Beach, roughly two hours from where Wilder had fled.  When Terry didn't return home, her stepfather located her car in the mall parking lot.  About an hour after she had been last seen at the mall, a tow truck was called to a state road by Canaveral Groves to pull a car out of sand.  Wilder, claiming he had gotten lost, had placed the call.  He paid for the tow with his business partner's credit card, which he had stolen.

On March 20, 1984, Wilder had moved on to Tallahassee, where he had grabbed 19 year old Linda Grover.  Like Terry Ferguson, Linda had been shopping close to Florida State when Wilder approached her.  He conned her into accompanying him to his car by telling the pretty blonde he could get her on the cover of Vogue.  Once at his vehicle, he clubbed her and headed north, into Georgia.  He pulled off once to bind her hands and tape her mouth.  At another stop, he placed her in the trunk of his car.  In the town of Bainbridge, Wilder checked into a motel and removed Linda from the trunk, wrapped in a blanket.  Once inside, he glued her eyes shut, shocked her with electrical wires, raped and throttled her.  Linda managed to get into the motel bathroom, where she locked the door and began beating on the walls and screaming, hoping to awaken other guests.  Panicked, Wilder grabbed his belongings and beat a hasty retreat, leaving nothing of himself behind.  Terrified, Linda Grover waited for over half an hour before she would even venture out.  She then wrapped herself in a bedsheet, as her abductor had also taken her clothes, and hurried to the manager's office, where the police were called.

Linda Grover proved to be an excellent witness, as she remembered her kidnapper's car and his appearance perfectly.  As Wilder had used his own Florida driver's license to register at the motel, he was quickly identified.  An APB was put out immediately for both Wilder and his vehicle.

Despite the quick action, Wilder slipped out of Georgia and headed west.

Terry Walden

On March 21, 1984, Terry Walden, a 24 year old nurse, wife and mother from Beaumont, Texas, informed her husband that an older, bearded man had approached her and asked if she would model for him.  He pressed her, asking if she would go to his car to see samples of his work.  She refused and firmly told him to leave her alone.  Two days later, on March 23, Terry vanished.  A friend had seen her around 11:30 that morning, at the student union on campus where she took classes, but Terry was not seen after that.  Her orange Mercury Cougar was also missing from the parking lot.

Also on March 23, a female body was found in a snake-infested canal 70 miles west of Satellite Beach.  It would take dental records to identify it as that of Terry Ferguson.  The local newspaper reported the finding and a witness came forward saying that she had seen Terry talking to an older man the day she disappeared.  Looking through mug shots, and without hesitation, she picked out Christopher Wilder as the man she saw.

Suzanne Logan

On March 25, 1984, Wilder abducted 21 year old Suzanne Logan from the Penn Square Mall in Oklahoma City.  Suzanne's husband, whom she had dropped off at work on her way to the shopping center, reported her missing when she didn't turn up for an appointment or to pick him up.  Suzanne was driven more than 180 miles north into Kansas, where he checked into the I-35 Inn in Newton.  As with Wilder's previous victims, she was tortured and raped.  He also cut her long blonde hair, leaving the locks in the motel room's trashcan.  After breakfast on the  morning of March 26,  Wilder drove to Milford Reservoir, just outside of Junction City, Kansas, where he stabbed Suzanne to death and left her body under a tree.  She would be found an hour after her death; some of her clothing had been removed and her face was badly bruised.  Suzanne wouldn't be identified for a week.

On that same day, March 26, 1984, the body of Terry Walden was discovered floating facedown in a canal.  She was fully dressed, tied with rope and her mouth covered by tape.  She had been stabbed multiple times.  There was no evidence of sexual assault.

Forty detectives were assigned to the case and by this point, the FBI had also entered the search for Wilder.

They found he had stayed at a motel near Beaumont, where Terry Walden went out, and a credit card in Wilder's partner's name was used for payment.  Wilder's abandoned Chrysler, without plates, was found; the assumption was that he was traveling in Terry Walden's Cougar.  They had a description of the car and a plate number but Wilder had a head start.  And they didn't know where he was headed.

Sheryl Bonaventura

On March 29, Wilder was in Grand Junction, Colorado when he spotted 18 year old Sheryl Bonaventura at a mall.  The pretty blonde teen, who had already done some modeling, was chatted up by Wilder and likely an easy mark for him.  Like the others, she was simply gone after speaking with him; her car remained locked and in the parking lot.

Unlike his previous victims, though, Sheryl was seen dining with Wilder in Silverton, where they told staff they were headed to Vegas with a quick stop in Durango.   On March 30, he and Sheryl were seen at the Four Corners Monument before he checked into a motel in Page, Arizona.

On March 31, Wilder was back in Utah, where he shot and stabbed Sheryl Bonaventura to death, leaving her body near the Kanab River.

Michelle Korfman

On April 1, 1984, Wilder arrived in Las Vegas and wasted no time heading to the Meadows Mall, where 17 year old Michelle Korfman was competing in a Seventeen magazine cover model contest.   Another photographer caught a photo of Wilder watching Michelle intently, with a broad smile on his face.  Witnesses would recall Michelle leaving with him, as well as Wilder approaching other women throughout the day with his modeling propositions.  Some of those he approached had agreed to meet him later in front of Caesar's Palace; he never showed.  Michelle's car was found in the center parking lot but Michelle was gone.

It's not known exactly when he killed Michelle Korfman but he disposed of her body near a rest stop by the Angeles National Forest in southern California.

On April 4, 1982, Wilder noticed 16 year old Tina Risico at a shopping mall in Torrance.  Tina had  just filled out a job application at Hickory Farms and he approached her as she left the store.  He told her he was scouting for models for a billboard and offered her $100 if she would pose for him.   She agreed and accompanied him away from the mall for her "test shots."  He took some photos before she told him she had to go home, at which time he became angry and pulled a gun on her.  He bound her, put her in Terry Walden's car, which he was still driving, and headed south to El Centro, just outside of San Diego and not far from the Mexican border.   He had already acquired a motel room, where he took Tina, tied her to the bed and assaulted her.  Unlike the unfortunate females before her, however, Wilder did not kill her.  A problematic childhood and sexual assault had left Tina more robotic after Wilder's assault, giving him no hysteria and panic to feed on.  It's possible he may also have considered that the young girl could help him to acquire other victims.

Tina was reported missing almost immediately.  The manager at the Hickory Farms in Torrance had seen Wilder loitering outside the store while she was inside; the manager identified Christopher Wilder from a mug shot.

By now, Wilder's image and dirty deeds were being reported on television and in the newspapers and the FBI had added him to their Ten Most Wanted list.  Knowing he had to get out of California, he headed east.  The two drove through Prescott, Arizona; Taos, New Mexico; Joplin, Missouri; and Chicago, Illinois.  In Merrillville, Indiana, he would spot his next victim.

Dawnette Wilt

Dawnette Wilt, like Tina Risico, was 16 years old and filling out a store application at the Southlake Mall when Tina approached her and, identifying herself as "Tina Marie Wilder," asked her to step outside the store to speak to the manager.  Wilder was waiting with his gun; he forced Dawnette into the car where, after putting tape on her eyes and mouth, he repeatedly assaulted her in the backseat while Tina drove east.   The trio would stop in Ohio for the night, where Wilder would terrorize Dawnette further, before driving across Pennsylvania and into New York the next day, stopping at Niagara Falls.  That night, Dawnette was once again repeatedly assaulted and both girls were threatened with death if they attempted to escape or make a sound.

It was while they were staying in the Niagara Falls area that Wilder saw a televised plea from Tina's mother for her daughter's safe return.  He bundled both his hostages in the car and directed Tina to drive to Penn Yan, stopping outside some woods.  He marched Dawnette into the woods, where he attempted to suffocate her but the girl struggled too much.  He then stabbed her once in the front and once in the back.  She pretended to be dead while he returned to the car and had Tina drive away.  Once she knew he was gone, she dragged herself to the roadside where a passing motorist saw her and called for help.

Dawnette Wilt told the police that Wilder was headed for the Canadian border in Terry Walden's car and had told her and Tina that he would not be taken alive.

Beth Dodge

Christopher Wilder, as always, was still hunting for victims.  On April 12, 1984 at Eastview Mall in Victor, New York, he laid eyes on 33 year old Beth Dodge, who was getting out of a gold Pontiac Trans-Am.  He had Tina persuade the woman to come over to their car, where he took her keys and forced her inside the Cougar.  He had Tina follow him in Beth Dodge's Trans-Am.

After a short drive, Wilder pulled in to a deserted gravel pit, where he had Beth get out of the vehicle and then shot her twice in the back.  The Mercury Cougar was then abandoned, with Wilder and Tina leaving the scene in Beth's car.

Wilder directed Tina to drive to Boston - - Logan Airport, more specifically where he told his captive that he was going to send her home.  After nine harrowing days, he bought Tina a ticket to Los Angeles and set her free.  So traumatized was the teen, she waited for him to shoot her in the back as she walked away to board the plane.  She told no one at the airport or on the plane of her ordeal. When she landed in L.A., she caught a cab to a boutique, where she purchased lingerie with money Wilder gave her.  She told the clerk that Wilder had cut her hair to resemble Jennifer Beals, the star of Flashdance.  She was spotted by friends, who took her to the police.  She told the police that Wilder had expressed a desire that she not be with him when he died.

Wilder, meanwhile, seemed to know that his time was running out.  After dropping off Tina Risico, he once again headed north toward Canada.

On Friday, April 13, Wilder attempted to grab another victim when he saw a 19 year old whose car had broken down on the side of the road.  He offered to give her a lift to a service station; when he began passing available service stations, she quickly realized what was up, threw open the door and leapt out of the car.  After she escaped, he threw out all of his belongings, including his camera and items of his victims' he had kept.  Then he drove into New Hampshire.

It was in Colebrook, about 12 miles from the Canadian border, that two state troopers spotted him at a service station.  They either recognized the car from BOLOs or Wilder's supposed erratic behavior.  His tan definitely indicated he was not from the area.  Although he had shaved off his beard, the troopers believed he resembled the FBI's wanted posters and so they pulled in.

New York Times article with photo of Wilder in death

When the troopers called out to him, Wilder dove into the Trans-Am, reaching for the .357 Magnum he kept handy.  A scuffle ensued with two shots ringing out.  Trooper Leo Jellison, who had jumped on Wilder's back, attempting to obtain the weapon, was hit as the first bullet passed through Wilder's body and into Jellison's chest.  The second shot decimated Christopher Wilder's heart, killing him instantly.  Leo Jellison would survive and recover.

Forty-seven days after Rosario Gonzalez disappeared and twenty-six days after his cross country spree began, it was over.

Found in Wilder's possessions when he died was the .357 Magnum, which would kill him, rolls of duct tape, handcuffs, rope, the electrical cord he had designed to shock his victims, a sleeping bag, his business partner's credit card and a copy of the 1963 book The Collector.  Written by John Fowles, it tells the story of a man who captures and imprisons a pretty young girl, keeping her in his basement and believing that because he treats her well, he will eventually win her love and loyalty.  Wilder had been so obsessed with The Collector, he had practically memorized in in its entirety.

Christopher Wilder's body was returned to Florida, where it was cremated.  Many questions remained though.  Did Wilder commit suicide?  Was he trying to escape?  Where were his victims that had not been found?  And how many victims did he truly take?

On May 3, 1984, the body of Sheryl Bonaventura was discovered under a tree in Utah.

On May 11, 1984, the body of Michelle Korfman was discovered.  She was so badly decomposed that it took a month to make a firm identification.

At his death, Wilder left an estimate reported to be somewhere between $2 and $7 million.  In 1986, a court appointed arbitrator ruled that the balance of the estate, after taxes, was to be divided between the families of his victims.

Rosario Gonzalez and Beth Kenyon have never been found.

Marianne and Christine

Over the years, Wilder's name has been connected to cases of other missing and murdered women.  It's impossible to say how many disappearances and homicides he's responsible for but it's entirely likely that he could have begun killing before February of 1984.

On January 11, 1965, Marianne Schmidt and Christine Sharrock, both 15, were murdered at Wanda Beach in Sydney, Australia.  They were discovered the following day, partially buried in the sand.  The girls had been bludgeoned, stabbed and slashed and their killer had cut their clothing and attempted to rape both.  These murders came just over two years after Wilder had been charged in the gang rape.  He was one of three potential suspects in the killings and he closely resembled the sketch of the suspect.  The murders remain officially unsolved.

Mary Opitz

On January 16, 1981, 17 year old Mary Opitz went to the Edison Mall in Fort Myers, Florida with her mother and brother.  Growing tired, she had grabbed a bag of pretzels and headed to the parking lot, to wait in the car for her family.  Roughly an hour later, her mother returned to the car to discover packages Mary had been carrying, and the bag of pretzels, sitting on the trunk.   Police initially believed Mary to be a runaway, although her family disputed this from the beginning.

On February 11, 1981, Mary Elizabeth Hare, an 18 year old who eerily resembled Mary Opitz, disappeared from the same parking lot at the Edison Mall.  Like the case of Mary Opitz, no clues were left behind.  Mary Elizabeth Hare's car was undisturbed.

In June of 1981, Mary Elizabeth Hare's body was located in a field in a relatively undeveloped area of Lehigh Acres, Florida.  She was fully clothed and had been stabbed in the back.

The murder of Mary Elizabeth Hare remains unsolved and Mary Opitz is still missing.

In May of 1982, two sets of skeletal remains were unearthed in Loxahatchee, Florida.  The bodies, both females, were found close to property that Wilder owned in Palm Beach County.  One woman had been dead for several months at the time of discovery.  The other victim, found in a green nylon bag, had been dead for anywhere from one to three years and her fingertips were missing -- sliced off by her killer in a probable attempt to keep her from being identified.  It would take just over 30 years but in July of 2013, she was identified as 17 year old Tina Marie Beebe.

Shari Lynne Ball

On June 27, 1983, 20 year old Shari Lynne Ball left her home in Boca Raton, Florida, telling her mother she was going to New York to model.  Two days later, she called her boyfriend to say she was in Virginia.  That was the last contact Shari had with her friends and family.  On October 29, 1983 a decomposed female body, partially sunk in swamp water, was discovered in Shelby, New York.  No identification was found and cause of death could not be determined.  She was buried as a Jane Doe.  In 2014, after the body was exhumed to be tested against other missing woman, it was finally identified as Shari Lynne Ball.

Tammy Lynn Leppert

On July 6, 1983, 18 year old Tammy Lynn Leppert disappeared some time after 11:30 a.m. from Cocoa Beach, Florida, after getting into a heated argument with a male friend.  Tammy was already an established model and an actress, having appeared in such films as Little Darlings, Scarface, and Spring Break.  It was after shooting of Spring Break had concluded and she had gone to a weekend party by herself that she returned home "different."  She left the set of Scarface unexpectedly after four days and was reportedly fearful for her life in the days leading up to her disappearance, as well as possibly pregnant.  Tammy's mother, a modeling agent, filed a wrongful death suit against Wilder before his death; she later dropped the case, citing that she never truly believed her daughter was Wilder's victim.  Tammy has never been found and remains missing.

Broward County Jane Doe

On February 18, 1984, the body of a young woman was found face-down in a canal in Broward County, Florida.  She was somewhere between the ages of 18 and 35, had curly blonde or strawberry blonde hair, hazel eyes and a gap between her front teeth.  It was estimated she was strangled to death around February 16, 1984.  She remains unidentified today, known only as "Broward County Jane Doe."

Colleen Orsborn

On March 15, 1984, 15 year old Colleen Orsborn left her Daytona Beach home and vanished.  Wilder was staying in a motel in Daytona Beach on the same day.  Despite intense searches, Colleen could not be located.  In 2001, Colleen's brother received an anonymous letter detailing where her body could be found.  The letter was postmarked from Manchester, N.H.  No body was found where instructed and the lead turned out to be a dead end.  In 2007, there was a DNA match on a body that had been discovered in April of 1984 in Orange County, Florida.  The body, which had been partially buried near a lake, had been unidentified for more than thirty years before it was determined that Colleen had been found.

Wilder, at the Meadows Mall in Las Vegas, immediately prior to abducting Michelle Korfman

After Wilder had gone on the run, some of his employees in Florida came forward to say that he was the best boss they ever had - - a nice, understanding man who always paid his employees on time and what they were worth.  It's hard to marry the image of a kind, generous business owner with a vicious rapist, torturer and murderer but it appears that Christopher Wilder had two sides to his personality.  Even Beth Kenyon, who went missing in March of 1984, after dating Wilder and turning down his marriage proposal, had told her parents that he was a real gentleman.

Christopher Wilder, unlike other killers, including Ted Bundy, did not have the same sense of self-preservation.  Many, including Officer Leo Jellison who attempted to apprehend Wilder and was shot in the process, believe that the killer took his own life rather than face prison time and/or the death penalty.  Others believe that Wilder was going for the gun to shoot his way out of the situation and would have fled.  Tina Risico's statements seems to indicate that Wilder knew his freedom was coming to an end and he was going to choose how he would end his story.  Controlling to the very last.

His death, while sparing many from a public trial in which their daughters and loved ones' last moments would be painfully rehashed, also kept other families from knowing where their daughters were.   Had Wilder been taken alive, would he have talked?  I think it's possible that he would have been like Bundy, discussing his crimes, if at all, in a vague third person account before possibly disclosing details only when his own life hung in the balance.

Christopher Wilder is an enigma.  Like Ted Bundy, he was attractive to women, charming, intelligent, and successful.  He managed to sweet talk his victims exactly where he wanted them; appearing well-dressed and congenial, like Bundy, they trusted him until the monster awoke.

Wilder traveled great distances; although Bundy did so to widen his victim pool, Wilder took to the road because he knew authorities were on his trail.

He seemed to have multiple methods of death -- he would bludgeon, strangle, shoot, and stab -- although his victim type rarely waivered.  Some of his victims were taken due to proximity, opportunity and appearance; some, like Beth Dodge, merely as a means to an end (in her case, for her vehicle.)

Unlike Bundy, who once he had a victim firmly in his grasp, under his control and assaulted, he never intentionally let go, Christopher Wilder not only kept one -- Tina Risico -- alive but gave her spending money and put her on a plane back home.  Why?  Why demonstrate near compassion for one victim and show only cold, cruel brutality to others?  Was it her non-reaction to his assaults and promises of being killed?  Or did he see something in Tina that he recognized in himself?  A painful childhood or a question of where to fit in and belong?  Only Wilder could know, if he was even capable of recognizing it.

Did something happen to Wilder when he was forced to undergo shock treatments, which merged sexual desire and violence?  Did it start much earlier -- when he was having convulsions at three or a near drowning at two?  Or was he simply born void of conscience?

Headlines after Wilder's death; the male figure in the far left of the picture was Wilder

Photo:  Murderpedia

In Memory of Georgann Hawkins

During his murderous career, Ted Bundy took the lives of many bright, lovely young women; some of his abductions seemed nearly too crazy to happen.  The case of Georgann Hawkins is one of those.

Georgann, known as "George" to her friends, was a happy, confident and beloved girl.  A Brownie and competitive swimmer as a child, she was full of energy and loved to talk.  She had many friends of all types; people simply enjoyed being around her.

As a teenager, Georgann developed into a beautiful young woman, with long dark hair, dancing eyes and a beaming smile.  As a 17 year old high school senior, she was named a Daffodil Princess, an experience that allowed her to travel throughout Washington State, meeting children, attending charity events and participating in parades.  In the spring of 1973, she went to the state Legislature where she addressed lawmakers.

Georgann as a Daffodil Princess in 1973

In the fall of 1973, Georgann began her freshman year at the University of Washington in Seattle, not too far from her parents in Tacoma.  She had worked all summer to have money in her pocket for the fun extras to enjoy during her first year of college.  A broadcast journalism major, she was tapped by the Kappa Alpha Theta sorority and lived in the sorority house with a gaggle of other sorority sisters.  She had a boyfriend who lived in a neighboring fraternity house.  She had blossomed and found her element.

By June of 1974, Georgann was finishing up her freshman year, where she had maintained an A average, and was preparing to go back to Tacoma for the summer, where she had a job lined up.  She truly seemed to have it all, the quintessential golden girl.

Until Ted Bundy entered an alleyway behind Georgann's sorority house in the early morning hours of June 11, 1974 and stole Georgann away.  She had been cramming for finals all day on Monday, June 10, taking a break during the evening to attend a party with friends.  She socialized, drank a few beers and then planned to return home to continue studying for a Spanish test that concerned her.  She and her roommate walked down the very alley that Bundy would soon traverse, with Georgann stopping off to see her boyfriend briefly.  She left his fraternity safely, walking the 150 or so yards toward her own house, passing students doing their own studying in front of open windows.  She was spotted by a friend as she walked the brightly lit alleyway;  he called out to her and the two spoke for a few moments.  He would later recall hearing a cackling type laughter coming from somewhere in the dark, something that Georgann too noticed.  When she walked away from her friend's open window, around 1 a.m., she had less than 50 feet to walk to access the door to her sorority.  In those 50 feet, she disappeared without a sound.

For 15 years, Georgann's friends and family would be in the dark as to her whereabouts.  Her family knew immediately that she was dead; she was a happy, responsible girl who had no reason to run away, nor would she.  They were left with only their memories of this sweet, outgoing young lady.

The investigators had a case that seemed too fantastical to contemplate.  They couldn't wrap their minds around how a predator had grabbed this lively and energetic girl, leaving nothing behind and without making a sound.  Until a double abduction a month later, they had not considered their suspect might have acted injured or disabled in order to attract, and disarm, victims.

Days away from his execution, Ted Bundy, always considered to be Georgann's abductor and likely murderer, confessed to kidnapping and killing her.  He had been on the prowl around the University area late on the evening of June 10, 1974, seeking a victim.  Utilizing crutches and/or a cast or sling on his arm to appear helpless and needy, he encountered Georgann before she reached her back door and, dropped a briefcase he used as a prop for his nefarious purposes.  Asking her if she would help him with the case, the kind-natured Georgann never hesitated.  She knew of the missing Seattle area women from 1974; she and her friends had discussed it.  They took proper precautions -- they didn't go out alone, they traveled in pairs and groups and always looked out for one another.  She probably felt she had no reason to fear a well-dressed, attractive and apparently disabled young man who was certainly a student.

Georgann willingly accompanied Bundy away from the alleyway, carrying his briefcase.  It was after arriving at his car, parked in a darkened area, that he hit her over the head with a crowbar he had secreted by one of the tires.  She never would have seen it coming and did not have the chance to utter a cry or scream.

Fifteen years later, Bundy would recount that after striking her, he handcuffed Georgann and put her in the passenger side of his VW, where he had removed the seat to accommodate an unconscious female.  He remembered that during the drive to his preselected murder destination, she had regained consciousness and, in a state of shock, was quite lucid -- talking about the Spanish test she had the next day.  When he arrived at a locale near Issaquah, where he intended to do his dirty work, he struck her again with the crowbar and strangled her.  The next month, he would leave two victims from Lake Sammamish State Park, Janice Ott and Denise Naslund, close to where he had abandoned Georgann.  When their skeletons were discovered in September of 1974, an extra femur bone was found.  Bundy would confirm it was Georgann's.  Nothing else of hers - - not any other part of her body, not her blue bell bottom slacks with one button remaining, not her handbag with the little bottle of "Heaven Sent" perfume -- has ever been found.

In a single instant, Ted Bundy not only spirited away a daughter, sister and friend, he subjected Georgann's loved ones to the indescribable pain of not knowing what happened to her.

Within days of Bundy's execution in 1989, friends held a memorial service for Georgann at the high school she had graduated from 16 years earlier.  Her parents, who had never spoken to the media, shied away from interviews and declined book requests, did not attend.  They chose instead to remember their daughter from the photographs and the cards and notes in which the authors had written of how Georgann had touched him or her.

Georgann Hawkins

August 20, 1955 - June 11, 1974