transcript

Speaker 1:
[00:00] From sauce to dust to nuggets, Diablo Dusted Crispy Chicken Nuggets. No, they don't come in mild. That would make like zero sense with the name. New Diablo Dusted Crispy Chicken Nuggets, only at Taco Bell. At participating US Taco Bell locations for a limited time and while supplies last.

Speaker 2:
[01:43] On September 5th, 1982, 12-year-old Johnny Gosch vanishes while delivering Sunday newspapers in West Des Moines. His red wagon still full of papers is found near the start of his route, and just a short distance from his home. More than one witness reported seeing Johnny talking to a stocky man in a clean 1979 to 1981 model, blue two-tone car near the newspaper drop. It is believed that the vehicle had a Warren County, Iowa license plate. The suspect was described as a man around 5'9, approximately 175 lbs, with dark eyes, black eyebrows, black hair combed back, and a black mustache appearing to be in his early to mid 40s, with a heavy beard or unshaven appearance, and possibly of Latin appearance. Another witness saw a silver Ford Fairmont speed away northwards from where Johnny Gosch's wagon was found. Neither driver has come forward, nor has been identified. And what involvement, if any, either vehicle had in the abduction of Johnny Gosch remains a mystery. Less than two years later, on August 12th, 1984, another paperboy, Eugene Martin, disappears from Des Moines under nearly identical circumstances. Witnesses saw Eugene talking to a man near the intersection of Southwest 12th Street and Highview Drive. The man is described as clean cut, and he appeared to be in his 30s, possibly driving a 1972 or 1973 green Chevy Malibu with gray primer marks. He has never been identified. In September of 1984, Anderson Erickson Dairy in Des Moines, Iowa, printed photos of the two local paperboys who had disappeared while on their routes, on milk cartons, marking the official start of the milk carton kid phenomenon. In October of 1984, 37-year-old Frank Cicora was fired from his job in the circulation department of the Des Moines Register, after a private investigator claimed that Cicora had sexual relations with at least seven paperboys. Private investigator Sam Soda gave authorities a two-hour videotape in which Cicora admits he fondled almost all the boys and sexually assaulted a 14-year-old boy. Soda said Cicora let the boys sleep with him in his apartment and showed them pornographic magazines and films. But then, on March 29th, 1986, another boy disappears in Des Moines. 13-year-old Marc James Warren Allen left his home on Emma Avenue to visit a friend. He asked his mother to save some pizza for him to eat when he got home. Marc Allen never arrived at his friend's home. There are no witnesses and no suspect or vehicle descriptions in Marc Allen's case. In May of 1987, a former Des Moines Register employee, Wilbur Milhouse, 44 at the time, was sentenced to 30 years in prison after pleading guilty to six counts of third-degree sexual abuse. Milhouse gave money, drugs and alcohol, to six boys, ages 14 and 15, in exchange for them performing sex acts with him. In 1990, a young man named Paul Benassi was convicted of three counts of sexual assault on a child in Nebraska. He was sentenced to prison where he was incarcerated until at least 1992. While serving his sentence, Benassi alleged he was the victim of a powerful, widespread child trafficking ring. In 1992, it came out that the then 24-year-old Paul Benassi said that when he was 14 years old, he assisted a couple of men in abducting 12-year-old Johnny Gosch. Paul Benassi claims he was forced to participate in Johnny's abduction by a pedophile ring. These claims remain highly suspect and controversial. Paul Benassi is self-diagnosed as having multiple personalities. Detectives say that he is a liar, and his background as a convicted sex offender is central to the debate over his credibility. Johnny's mother, Noreen Gosch, famously claimed her son visited her in 1997 as an adult before vanishing again. In 2006, Noreen receives a mysterious envelope containing photos of boys bound in gag. She believes one is Johnny, though investigators later link the photos to an unrelated 1979 case in Florida. Johnny Gosch, Eugene Martin and Marc Allen all went missing from Des Moines, Iowa in less than a five-year period. None of these boys have been found. This is a conversation about where these cases sit today. Frigid cold. This is Chapter 6, The Lost Boys. I didn't know these boys, John. Why did you do this to them? John Juppert replies, I really don't know. All I can tell you is that for as long as I can remember, I've just had a need to kill. And that is John Juppert talking to Mark Pettit in their first interview that took place while John Juppert was sitting on death row, waiting to be executed for the murder of two boys, one of them a newspaper delivery boy, who he abducted early into the boy's route on a Sunday. And we've already talked about two other similar cases from the state of Iowa where we have Johnny Gosch who went missing one year before Danny Joe Eberly. We also have Eugene Martin who went missing again on a Sunday morning delivering the same newspaper that Johnny Gosch was delivering. And it's interesting to take a look at these cases, right? All of these cases are very similar in nature, very similar in modus operandi. And through the lens, we see a pair of solved cases in Omaha, Nebraska, and then three unsolved cases in Des Moines, Iowa, once you add in Missing Person's, Missing Person Marc Allen to the equation.

Speaker 3:
[09:33] Yeah, these all fall in the Midwest. So if you zoom out and look at it as a national issue, how many more cases are similar? And then did these cases inspire other killers?

Speaker 2:
[09:48] Yeah, you have to wonder that when you, I hate to say this because it, but it's the truth, you know? And I've had people look at me with the side eye before when it's, but these predators are hunting humans. And it's the same as a hunter who is hunting for deer or rabbit or a fisherman. You, you know, you don't stand in the middle of a field hoping to catch fish. You go to a lake where the fish are. And it's just like with people who hunt people, you go to where the people are. That's why if back in the 70s and 80s, these maniacs that were looking to abduct teenage girls, they would go to the mall. And here you have a weird scenario of newspaper boys being plucked off the streets during their paper routes. And it's sadly, it's obvious, right? If there's a man out there that's looking to abduct a teenage boy, you have a teenage boy that's out there alone in the dark. We have, yeah, we have some witnesses in some of these cases, but in a lot of the cases, we don't have, in some of them, we don't have any type of witness. And so it's interesting to kind of compare these cases. Now, right out the gate, we should say a couple of things, because I've heard it reported on other podcasts and questioned if John Juppert could be responsible for Johnny Gosch. Now, we know that he would not be responsible for Eugene Martin, because he was already apprehended by that time. And some podcasters have come up with the question, and it's a good question. I'm not saying this to tear them down. I'm saying it so we can explore it here, but also move on from this idea. We talked about this briefly, where Robert Ressler said, no, John Juppert didn't do the Johnny Gosch case. And the short of his answer was very simple, that Juppert's victims were found and located. Johnny Gosch has never been recovered. That makes sense to me, number one. Mark Pettit, who interviewed Juppert extensively on Death Row, says no, he didn't do it. And Mark Pettit has a different reason. He goes, I think he would have told me if he killed Johnny Gosch, that he would have eventually confessed to it, which makes sense because he did confess to the crimes that we know that he did. In fact, he confesses to killing Ricky Stetson in Maine. And they didn't know anything about that. In fact, at one time, they had a different man locked up for Ricky Stetson's murder. Now, one thing that eventually got him off, from my understanding, the wrongfully accused man, he was locked up for months and months because he failed a lie detector test. His alibi didn't check out where he said he was at the time. He wasn't there. So he has no alibi. He fails the lie detector test. He had some priors, this guy. But ultimately, the bite mark on the victim didn't match. The bite mark is part of John Juppert's signature. We talked about it with Danny Joe Eberle, and we talked about it with Christopher Walden. And in fact, he tried to cover up the bite marks on Christopher Walden by doing damage with a knife, trying to conceal that bite mark. In fact, it was two bite marks on Christopher Walden. So Mark Pettit says, no, John Juppert didn't kill Johnny Gosch, isn't responsible in that case. Robert Restler, who is one of the biggest experts he can talk about here in the garage, says, no, the crimes were different. But the reason why people have questioned this is because what we do know about John Juppert is he kills Ricky Stetson. And then shortly afterward, he enlists in the Air Force. Now I believe, and Mark Pettit could tell us better, but I believe that John Juppert probably enlisted in the Air Force, one, because he had nothing really to fall back on. By this point in his life, he had already flunked out of college in his freshman year in Vermont. I believe that it was flunking out of college that was the trigger. We always talk about their stressors that take these people that have these violent, murderous, homicidal fantasies. But there is a tipping point. There's oftentimes a stressor, a trigger that sets them over the edge that takes them from fantasy to living their fantasy, acting it out. And finding a victim. And I think that it was him flunking out of college and moving back in with mom in Maine that led to being the stressor, the trigger of killing Ricky Stetson. So he kills Ricky Stetson. The way that that goes down is Ricky Stetson was out jogging and this is, you know, I hate the expression, wrong place at the wrong time. Oh, he was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. But it's true, though. It's such the truth with a lot of these victims, especially when you're talking about a serial offender, that it's, remember, we talk about the three abilities, desirability, vulnerability and availability. And a lot of times the vulnerability and availability comes down to wrong place at the wrong time. John Juppert wasn't looking for Ricky Stetson. He was looking for a Ricky Stetson. He was looking for a victim. And it happened to be this kid who was out jogging and John Juppert's out riding his bike.

Speaker 3:
[15:35] But the accessibility, right? And the vulnerability trumps the desirability.

Speaker 2:
[15:42] Exactly.

Speaker 3:
[15:42] This victim might not match their perfect victim type, but hey, they're there. It's an opportunity. But a couple of things that you said, one, talking about True Crime Podcasts. One, True Crime Podcasts should collaborate more, but we also should talk more shit about each other, just for fun, you know, like East Coast, West Coast rivalry. In the next couple of weeks, I'll determine which podcasts I want to talk shit to, and I'll start talking shit to them publicly. It'll be fun. But also, you're talking about this interviewing a killer, which would be, I think, extremely fascinating if I was ever afforded that opportunity. And I don't want to get off on a crazy tangent, but is there somebody that you have in your mind that if you had the opportunity to talk to in prison that you would talk to?

Speaker 2:
[16:35] I think I've said this before here, right?

Speaker 3:
[16:37] That I- I don't pay attention.

Speaker 2:
[16:40] I wrote a rather lengthy letter to Edmund Kemper, and I got a reply. It wasn't the reply that I wanted. I got a phone call from another inmate. He gave my information. You want to talk about a guy that plays games. He loves to play games. He gave all my information that I sent to him, so he would reply to me, to another inmate for his own amusement. And then I had to deal with this other inmate that I had no desire to talk to, calling me for weeks upon weeks. He would tell me about Edmund Kemper and his interactions with Ed, and those were interesting. But other than that, I didn't want to hear from this other guy. So really, he must have been annoyed by my letter, and he found a way to pay me back tenfold on the annoyance by having this other inmate call me.

Speaker 3:
[17:36] Well, it helps if you type the letter and you don't write it in Crown.

Speaker 2:
[17:39] I wanted to play a game with him, and the game I wanted to play is, and I thought he might, he would have some very good insights to this, were the Zodiac killings. That was my letter to him. I was like, hey, let's work on this together. Let's work on the unsolved Zodiac thing. But back to, back to our, well, you, I guess you're going to tell us who you would want to talk to.

Speaker 3:
[18:02] I don't have anybody off the top of my head. I mean, I think BTK would be fascinating, but he's probably not going to admit to crimes that I think he's responsible for. And I think that would be a fascinating angle of a conversation. These crimes seem similar to yours, and is there a reason why he's not taking credit for them? Or is it simply that he didn't do it? The problem with all these individuals is we know that they lie. And so then, what do we choose to believe? Now, there's several people, like, out of, in the True Crime space. I mean, wrestler would have been a fascinating conversation. And I've heard John Douglas' conversations with you, and those have always fascinated me. Those were, like, an honor and a privilege to edit, even though John Douglas is hard to edit. But I would love to talk to Jason Baldwin or Damien Echols just because that case, there's just so much more information that, even though that case has a lot of information out there.

Speaker 2:
[19:10] You have spoke with Jason Baldwin, just not in a venue that was...

Speaker 3:
[19:13] We drank heavily together.

Speaker 2:
[19:15] Yeah, so probably not much about the case. I've talked to Terry Hobbs. He almost came on the show. The invite is still out there, Terry, if you are listening. But back to our case here, and this is something that other podcasters have pondered, you have this scenario where John Juppert, he kills Ricky Stetson in Portland, Maine. And this is 1982. So Ricky Stetson is 11 years old at the time, and he fits very much that desirability portion of the three abilities too. If you look at all three of his victims, they're all on the smaller side. And so he fits that smaller build of victim that he's looking for. And we've already talked about how small John Juppert is, and not just was up to the point of his execution. He was even smaller when he was apprehended. He put on weight while he was on death row. But he was a smaller man. And I think that that played into the type of victim he was looking for. I think he was looking for smaller individuals that were, but he also wanted a teenager. He wanted that 12 year old, 13 year old type victim. You look at his three victims, 11, 12, 13 years old. But he wanted a smaller victim. Why? Because he was smaller, and that played into his ability to control the victim, his need to control.

Speaker 3:
[20:51] Well, hold on, let's just say the other obvious. With a small victim, it's easier to control, so easier to kill or to live out whatever fantasy that you're trying to live out. But also it's the aftermath. Now you have a smaller victim to dispose of.

Speaker 2:
[21:09] Yeah. And we know that in one of the cases, he disposed of the victim. In the other case, he walked the victim to where they were eventually found. So on August 22nd, 1982, John Juppert kills 11-year-old Ricky Stetson in Portland, Maine. On September 5th, 1982, Johnny Gosch disappears off the streets of West Des Moines, Iowa. And if you were to make the quickest route, driving route from Portland, Maine out to Bellevue, Nebraska, Omaha, Nebraska, where we know John Juppert ends up eventually, because we know that he killed Danny Joe Eberle the following year, September 18th, 1983, he abducts the boy on his paper route. Johnny Gosch disappears on his paper route one year prior. That route would take you right through Des Moines, Iowa. And so the question has always been with some folks, did he stop along the way or did he or was he in Des Moines, Iowa, for any period of time and abducted and killed Johnny Gosch? It's interesting to ponder, the problem with that equation is, he didn't go straight from Portland, Maine to Omaha, Nebraska. He was actually stationed in two different locations before he ends up in Omaha, Nebraska. So the best that I can pin John Juppert down at the time of Johnny Gosch's abduction, he was actually in San Antonio, Texas, and he was completing his training for his Air Force training, and then he ends up in Biloxi, Mississippi, both before he is in Omaha, Nebraska.

Speaker 3:
[23:00] Yeah, so one, you have to put the guy in the area for him to be able to commit the crime. But I think the other thing that should be noted here is if he's not responsible, that just is an indication that there's more and more creeps out there. Should scare the shit out of everybody.

Speaker 2:
[23:16] Johnny Gosch, while he is the same age as Juppert's victims, he's quite a bit bigger. I mean, actually, at the time of his disappearance, he's larger than John Juppert. He's an inch or two taller than John Juppert, and would have weighed about a little less than Juppert at the time. But I think that even if he were, which we know that he wasn't, even if he were to have been in Des Moines, Iowa by chance on September 5th, 1982, I think he would have looked for a smaller victim. I think that the size of Johnny Gosch would have made him just keep driving. And we know that Johnny Gosch was not the only newspaper boy out that morning. There's a lot of stuff that takes place in the Johnny Gosch case, and people that are familiar with the case, they know this. There's a lot that went on with that case over the decades. And it's a case that refuses to go quiet. And a big part of that is Johnny Gosch's mother, Noreen Gosch. We know the last place that we can tie him to is the corner of 42nd and Marquardt Avenue. One thing that we should talk about here, Captain, is there's been a lot of speculation as to what happened to Johnny. And there's been talk of, well, he's not dead. He's been sold into child sex rings. And we have Noreen Gosch who says that Johnny visited her many years after he was abducted. He came and spoke with her one night in the middle of the night. And he was an adult and he was there with another man who seemed to be keeping an eye on Johnny and controlling the situation. He was living under a different name. Look, I don't know if that really happened. We know that Noreen and John Gosch Sr., Johnny's dad, they eventually separate. John Gosch moves to, I believe, Arizona. He says, look, I question if that really happened or not. I'm not going to sit here and drag Noreen through the mud. She says it happened. I don't know. It doesn't seem likely to me. Look, these parents go through a lot. This is enough to break anybody.

Speaker 3:
[25:36] Well, you wonder, is it, was it a dream that just felt so real? But also, my argument to other people would be like, show me where she's lied before. Show me, show me her as a liar. Show me her as somebody that hasn't gone, gone above and beyond to try to help other missing children's families. And just the whole conversation, she's advanced the conversation of what should we do when a child goes missing. And so my argument is if you can't point to her as a liar, why should I not believe her? And then you've also, in the Johnny Gosch case, and even if the story was made up from Noreen, but it pushes the narrative or gets people to keep talking about the case, hey, she's a parent, there's nothing that you won't do. But there's been other people in the Johnny Gosch case have come forward and said, I helped abduct Johnny.

Speaker 2:
[26:34] Well, that's what I want to get into right here. So this is from a 1992, I pulled all the information from information that was coming out in 1992, okay?

Speaker 3:
[26:45] So if I sound a little pissed off, I'm a little pissed off. Well, not at you, just in general. I think these cases, they're frustrating. And I think sometimes when people are trying to put out information or try to give information, I don't know. I think the narrative of these cases and how people have fudged them over time, and not just in this case, but in true crime as a whole, the more we look into the cases, the more I realize the initial narratives really matter because they stick.

Speaker 2:
[27:23] Yeah, but again, this child sex ring and all of this extra stuff, all this other stuff was not part of the original narrative.

Speaker 3:
[27:31] Right, right.

Speaker 2:
[27:33] And to circle back to something too, I get it, if Noreen makes up this story to keep her son's story alive, I can sympathize with that. The problem with that, though, is it's just, frankly, it's just wrong. I mean, and if you were to be caught in a lie of that magnitude, then you're not helping your son's case. You just aren't. So I mean, it would seem a bit of cutting off your nose to spite your face situation. But let's go to something that we know absolutely 100% did take place in the Johnny Gosch case. Speaking of original narrative, let's go back to the beginning here, right? On the morning of September 5th, 1982, Johnny Gosch left his home around 6 a.m. to deliver the Sunday register, something that he did most Sundays. Now, keep in mind, most of these days, if not all, the way that the original narrative is, this is the first day that he was going to go out there and do it by himself. And if that is true, speaking of truth, if that is true, I think that plays into the facts of what probably happened that day, of who might be responsible. Now, and keep that in mind as we go through this portion of the story. So around 745, someone calls to ask why their paper hadn't been delivered. Noreen and John, they rush out. They're looking through the neighborhood trying to find their son. This is a nice neighborhood. The search didn't lead them to Johnny, obviously. It led them to something worse. They find his wagon still filled with newspapers, sitting near the beginning of his route, as if the route had barely started before it was abruptly interrupted. They report their son missing around 8.30 that morning. Now, detectives would learn that Johnny had last been seen talking to a man in a blue car around that 6 a.m. mark. This man's identity has never been confirmed. The blue car became a detail that hung over this case. It sounded like a lead, but really, it's just a bigger, it's just part of a bigger mystery. In the first days after Johnny vanished, police were reluctant to say that he had been kidnapped, even though there's no trace of him. And we can sit here today, I feel we know the kid's missing, right? But he's often referred to as a missing kid. I don't know why we're not saying abducted kid. It's clear to me this kid was abducted. Now, two weeks into this investigation, according to Noreen, the case was put on the back burner, as she states it. She was very vocal in 92, because she's saying, look, we've uncovered the biggest break in this case. It's not a suspect, not a confession, well, of sorts, right? But a person who had or claims to have involvement with Johnny Gosch's abduction. This all ties into some of the sex ring implications and also with a circle of pedophiles as well as child pornography, child sex abuse material, things of that nature. What we get here, Captain, is an attorney in Omaha, Nebraska. Very weird that we're right back there in Omaha, Nebraska. All these things, they're just tied together in my mind permanently. So an attorney from Omaha, Nebraska contacted Mr. Gosch and he tells Mr. Gosch that he has a client sitting in prison who claims to have been involved in the abduction of their son, Johnny Gosch. What we have to decide here, Captain, is this story true or is it false? Is it just another part of this big, strange mystery that's become a mystery wrapped in a riddle?

Speaker 1:
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Speaker 3:
[32:49] All right, we are back. Tall Cans in the Air, power to the people in the back. Much love to everybody that's on Patreon and Apple Podcast subscriptions. Cheers to you, Colonel.

Speaker 2:
[32:59] Cheers to you, Captain Tall Cans in the Air, everybody. So what we're talking about here is Paul Benaki.

Speaker 3:
[33:07] Old Benaki.

Speaker 2:
[33:08] At this, so at the time, he's 24 years old. He's sitting in prison in Omaha, Nebraska. And he tells his attorney that he was involved in the abduction of Johnny Gosch. Johnny's father hires a private investigator to first meet with this Paul Benaki and the attorney. And then he goes and meets with him as well. And both the private investigator and Mr. Gosch walk away from those meetings with the same conclusion, that they believe that this Paul individual is telling the truth. And that is what Noreen is saying. Look, this is the biggest break. We took this information to the police department investigating our son's abduction, and they don't want to do anything with this information. Now, the way that this story works is that he says that he had been being abused by a child sex ring. And that he claims that he was part of abducting Johnny Gosch. Look, if you have a kid in the car, it would be easier to entice another kid to get in the vehicle, is the general idea here. Or send Paul out to talk with a possible victim and lure them back to the abductor. His story, he claims that there's a couple of problems with Banaki's story. Okay, and I know that the parents, Johnny's parents feel like he's telling the truth.

Speaker 3:
[34:50] Well, part of it is that they want to believe somebody with new information. That's part of it. And so you have to look at this information with a clear head. And it's going to be impossible for anybody that has had a child abducted and they don't know where their child is to come at a lot of this information with a clear head.

Speaker 2:
[35:13] Well, speaking in clear head, I'm allowing my speculation to get in the way of telling, of laying this story out. So Noreen meets with, she eventually meets with Paul Benaki as well. This would be just before Thanksgiving 1991. OK, she said that he told her things that he could only have known from speaking with Johnny. And Benaki's story is expansive and horrifying if it's real. He claims that Johnny had been sold to a pedophile in Colorado and said that he traveled, quote, on the road with Johnny Gosch and other kids for about seven years and that the last time he saw Johnny was in Colorado in 1989. And he said that eventually Johnny was later shipped to a country in the area of the Netherlands where this type of activity is legal and that Johnny had been renamed Mark. He had black hair and he stood six foot four. Johnny was a big kid, so the six foot four thing makes sense to me. Some of what he's saying makes sense to me. The problem that I have with Banaki's story is this. One, at this time he is in prison. We know that. What's he in prison for? Sexually assaulting three boys.

Speaker 3:
[36:36] Oh, but that shows that part of his story is true.

Speaker 2:
[36:39] The other part of his story that I don't like is that he says that. So the reason why Mr. Gosch and the private investigator walk away from their meetings with Paul Banaki think that he's telling the truth is that they they basically gave him a photo lineup without telling him it was a photo lineup, right? They gave him the description of the man, the description we have of the person that was talking to Johnny Gosch. And they said that he picked up the picture, said that this is the man that abducted Johnny Gosch and named that person, the mystery man. He named him. They took that information to police and the police weren't so interested. They didn't arrest the guy. I think Noreen claims that they didn't interview him. The police say that they did interview him multiple times. But the police also say that they don't believe Paul Banaki and that that's going to be a problem for arresting the guy. They can't just go arrest the guy because Paul Banaki says, this is Johnny Gosch's abductor. The other part of the story that I don't like is Banaki says that he was in a motel the night before Johnny Gosch was abducted. And he says that that man, who he named, came to the motel, gave him a picture of Johnny Gosch and said, this is the boy that you're going to take tomorrow. Okay, let's examine that part of it. I'm not saying that all parts of Paul Banaki's story are completely false, but this would seem false to me because the original narrative, back to the idea of original narrative, has always been that Johnny went on that paper route for the first time alone that morning. So if you were targeting that, his Paul story would implicate that Johnny Gosch was targeted. And if he was targeting Johnny Gosch, you're not going to do it on his paper route when he's being accompanied by his father. So that part of the story, I don't know, just doesn't ring true to me.

Speaker 3:
[38:47] Well, and he knows about certain birthmarks and the fact that Johnny would have a stammer when he'd get nervous. But a lot of this stuff you could learn through.

Speaker 2:
[38:58] I found all of that in the newspapers.

Speaker 3:
[39:00] Right.

Speaker 2:
[39:01] I found that in the newspapers because all of that was well reported. I mean, obviously it would be, they're looking for the boy.

Speaker 3:
[39:09] But this is strange to me because Paul's not coming forward, or Benaki is not coming forward and trying to go, hey, I'm awesome, I'm a hero. You know, he's telling you what he is. I'm a degenerate, horrible individual. And when I was younger, I helped abduct Johnny Gosch. I'd also wonder if he helped abduct other individuals. But so to me, it's like when somebody confesses to a crime and then the next time they confess, they implicate themselves more and they make themselves look worse, right? I tend to believe the story where it makes him look worse. So again, if he was trying to tell this story or try to sell it as if he was...

Speaker 2:
[40:01] Does it make him look worse though? I mean, how many times does somebody end up on trial for murder? And at their sentencing, once they're found to be guilty, at sentencing, all of a sudden, they're telling stories of, oh, I was abused and neglected as a child and all this stuff happened to me and this is why I am the way I am. I'm a victim, too. And that, to me, is what his story is, is more of, oh, I was victimized as a child and that's why I've done the stuff that I am now sitting in prison for. And on top of that, too, wouldn't you believe for a moment that he's trying to use this information to leverage him into a better situation? Hey, this kid you've been looking for for 10 years, I've been sitting on information.

Speaker 3:
[40:48] It could just be his lack of intelligence. The information that he's given is not going to get the answers needed to help him out in any possible way. He can sit there and tell you what happened, but if you're not able to find Johnny because of this information, I don't know how much it helps him. But that doesn't negate the fact that he might not understand that. So then you just wonder, is he trying to tell the truth? And the truth still makes him a shitbag that participated in this stuff, whether it's willingly or non-willing. I mean, that's a whole other argument. Or is he just a complete bag of horse shit and he's just telling this story to possibly get something out of it? You know, some of these people, they're so dumb that they think, well, I can just make up nonsense and feed them information and maybe I'll get a lighter sentence. Not understanding that if you don't give them enough, where we get some results, that this does nothing for you. So you could just...

Speaker 2:
[41:52] It doesn't hurt to try. It doesn't hurt to try. The problem with his story is this for me. Whether it's real or not, I believe it to be false, completely false. But the problem with his story is this. Either it's completely a lie or it's the truth and the truth is so strange and fantastical that nobody will believe it.

Speaker 3:
[42:14] Well, and the thing too is he brought law enforcement to a location that he said they were holding children. He said before they get to the location where they're holding those children, they go to that location and find a basically like a secret door that leads you to this place that has all these names written and carved into it. And you go, okay, so maybe the Johnny Gosch part isn't correct, but other parts of his story are correct. And I think that's hard for law enforcement to deal with. I think it's hard for society to deal with that there's this crazy, sick, demented shit going on constantly. And sometimes it sounds insane. And I think some of the people that are doing this stuff know that, you know, in the mid-90s, they were talking about Bohemian Grove, which was an owl sanctuary where world leaders would meet to have conferences. And they had an outdoor amphitheater. And during some of these meetings, they would have a play. And the play would be a reenactment, sacrifice of a child, of a baby. And that sounds insane. Because if I'm at a party, and you turn to me, you give me a nice cold beer, cheers, tall cans in the air, and you say, hey, get ready, because in five minutes, they're going to have a play where we reenact a sacrifice of a child. I'm going, no thanks, I'm getting the hell out of here. And it sounds crazy. And if you tell people the story, you can tell a hundred people the story, and they all think it's crazy, but then when you can show them video evidence of it, then people don't know what to do. They don't know what to say. Every time we talk about anything about human trafficking or child trafficking, I get an email from somebody that says it doesn't exist. And I think that's part of them not wanting it to exist. And just because you want something not to exist doesn't mean it doesn't exist. And so, I don't know if Paul's story is connected to Gosch, but it is connected to other individuals. And I think, look, both can be happening at the same time. These individuals that do sick shit, they're looking for reasons why. And if they were physically abused, mentally abused or sexually abused as a child, this is them wrestling with the justification. And is it chicken or the egg? And so, I think this guy is a piece of shit. How he got there, I'm not for sure. But that is part of the story. And it's also should be part of the disclaimer. When these individuals are abused, they can become the abuser. And it's a sick, sad world.

Speaker 2:
[45:30] True, but a couple of names carved into a wall doesn't mean that his story is true. I mean, again, you said it, he's not able to prove any of these things. And that is where his story for me stops. Until any of that can be proven, his is just a story. And it's just one story, it's one story that made it to the spotlight with the Johnny Gosch case. But I can assure you this, and everybody out there listening, this is not the only story that made its way to police or to Noreen Gosch or anybody else regarding Johnny Gosch's, what happened to him.

Speaker 3:
[46:10] Well, but hold on, I do want to point out, he talked about being branded. And there was other individuals that came out saying that they were branded as well. That's something that if you are faking, brand yourself sometime and tell me what that feels like. Right? And so when that stuff comes out to me, I'm like, again, the 100% of the story doesn't have to be true. But even if 5% of it's true, this is a sick world. These are sick individuals. These, you know, you might not have to run down 100% of the story, but you have to run down the 5% of the story because this is happening all the time.

Speaker 2:
[46:49] Well, let's get out of the weeds here and go back to Des Moines, Iowa and examine this because what I want to truly examine here is, are these still outstanding cases connected? Right? We have Johnny Gosch. He's never been found. We got Eugene Martin two years later. So Eugene Martin is last seen between 530 and 6 a.m. on August 12th, 1984 in his hometown of Des Moines, Iowa. He was preparing to start delivering his morning newspaper route at that time. And he normally delivered the papers with his older stepbrother, but his stepbrother was not with him on this day. Witnesses saw Eugene talking to a man between 5 and 515 a.m. at Southwest 12th Street and Highview Drive. The man is described as clean cut and he appeared to be in his 30s. He has never been identified. You know, we talked about the vehicles in question in the Johnny Gosch case. They didn't call the drivers of those vehicles suspects, but you do have the detectives telling the papers in Johnny Gosch's case, because the papers kept kind of poking at police, like, well, are these suspects? Are these suspects? And they want to call them suspects, but they refuse to do so. But they tell the newspaper, look, our concern is, we're not calling them suspects, our concern is, here's all this time, we've described these vehicles over and over again, and nobody with these vehicles has ever come forward. No one has ever come forward. So that's where their suspicion lies, if you read between the lines there. The similarities in the two cases are fascinating with Eugene Martin and Johnny Gosch, both on a Sunday morning, both out delivering newspapers, and according to the original narrative, both delivering it alone, solo, for the first time. Now, when you dig deeper, one thing that's great about covering cold cases from the state of Iowa is Iowa has a fantastic cold case presence online, iowacoldcases.org. It's a great tool for us when we're doing our research. They cover just about every Iowa cold case that you could think of. I mean, it's extensive. With Eugene Martin, less is known about his story than Johnny Gosch's. And I wanted to really dig through the Eugene Martin stuff because I have to reconcile, are these connected? There are so many similarities that it says that they would be. The difficulty thing here, the difficult part of this is the person or persons responsible. Did they wait two years before they pulled another kid off the streets? That's difficult to say. So I found one person who posted a great comment about Eugene's case and gave much more information. Because he lived there, he grew up with the disappearance of Eugene Martin. And so Mike K posted, this is from almost six years ago. And I'm going to read his post because it's detailed and it's filled with information. He says, I clearly remember when Gene disappeared. I was 15 at the time. Gene was two years younger than I. He lived with his mother on the East side during the school year and visited his dad during the summer. So I didn't know him. But this happened in my south side neighborhood and it hit me pretty hard. As someone who grew up about a mile from where Gene's paper bundles were dropped, and about a quarter of a mile from where his bag was found, who also spent a few weeks in Iowa, August, beating the bushes and all over the south side of Des Moines with the organized search crews, I'd like to point some things out to the Internet sleuths here. First, from where his paper bundles were dropped, the city limits are approximately one mile straight south, and also about a mile and a quarter west on a state highway that ran straight to Interstate 35. The map today doesn't represent the area as it was because the airport bought out my entire neighborhood to expand and rerouted the highway a bit to the south. But if you look at the intersection of Southwest 14th and Army Post Road on the current map, then track a straight line west to I-35 through the airport, that is how the highway ran. Near the end of the last building shown on the airport on Google Maps today is where the city limit sign used to be. And if memory serves me correctly over 36 years later, Gene's bag was found on the side of the road, not too far past that sign. And he says that the bag was found by a person who he's calling RM. And we'll get to, well, sorry. The bag, as we know, was found by his route manager who saw it because it was on his path from where he was to Gene's bundle drop. Okay, now Mike K goes on to say, you can never miss those bright yellow bags lying on the ground anywhere. I didn't know Gene because he was two years younger than me, but this was my neighborhood. The biggest reason that there is more information about the investigation out in the public view about Johnny Gosch rather than Gene is because Noreen could not stay away from microphones and oftentimes said things on air that compromised the police investigation. Don Martin, Eugene Martin's dad, didn't do this. I can tell you that in the weeks after Gene's disappearance, there wasn't a field, barn, ditch, culvert, property, creek bed, river bank, railroad trestle, abandoned piece of farm equipment or park inside of a seven-mile radius that wasn't walked and checked by our group. So Mike is saying he was part of the organized searches for Eugene Martin. And that's a great description of, he's saying in a seven-mile radius, we checked everything. Oftentimes, they were accompanied by Gene's family on the searches. And part of Mike's post, his comment post here, is in defense of the Martin family, because there were people that were posting on iowacoldcases.org that they were suspicious of Eugene's father. And he's saying there's no reason to do that. And we also talked about, when we covered Eugene's case in chapter four, we talked about the detective that worked the Eugene Martin case. And he would go over to Eugene Martin's father's home every Friday after work, and they would sit and talk about the case. Every Friday for years. That was Detective Rowling.

Speaker 3:
[54:07] Yeah, something you probably want to do if you had something to do with the case.

Speaker 2:
[54:13] I think it's just bad speculation on the internet that has led to that. So his post goes on and says, No property owner, to my knowledge, told us, no, you can't look here. That's just the way we were back then. I also remember that, I also remember that neighborhood was literally crawling with police canvassing, checking, looking, et cetera, for at least a week. They were never denied access anywhere they wanted to look because us Southsiders were upset and actually wanted to help. Nobody in Gein's family hurt him or buried him in the basement under his own house. That was some of the speculation in the post, the prior post. Those things were extensively checked, he says. Detective Rowling followed every lead and idea that came his way. You can take that to the bank. I will say that in the interest of keeping investigation details under wraps to keep the cranks from wasting his time. He wouldn't or couldn't let people know what was or wasn't found. That's just standard investigative procedure. He goes on to say, I see names called out here that I remember hearing back then. So I can only assume they were thoroughly investigated as well. This is interesting because this whole pedophile ring hits a lot closer to home in Des Moines, Iowa than it does with some of Paul Benaki's accusations and other stories that we've heard. My case is, yes, The Register, which was the newspaper that both of these boys were delivering. The Register had a few pedophiles working in the delivery department at the time. But I recall every single one of them was checked thoroughly, as well as the route manager and the distribution manager and anyone else with the Register that might have had slight passing knowledge. Des Moines Police Department didn't want to miss a trick, and I don't recall hearing of anyone stonewalling them. What's interesting about this statement here with the pedophiles at the Register is, one, it makes sense they would be out there at the same time that these boys were, and two, the boys wouldn't have any problem talking to these guys. They essentially work with them. They're associates. These are people that they've seen before. They're not strangers. And what did Don Martin tell us about Eugene Martin? He says it had to have been somebody that he trusted or that he knew that took my son. And he says, my son was too shy, he wouldn't talk to a stranger. And that's what the father has always believed.

Speaker 3:
[57:02] Let me go a step further with that, because if this is somebody that you are technically working with or working for, then Eugene would have felt an obligation to talk to them. You see what I'm saying? So they don't have to be somebody that's familiar or friendly towards him. It's simply, I'm being paid to do a job, so if I'm talking to my manager or somebody delivering the papers, that's somebody, no matter if you're shy or not, you have to talk to.

Speaker 2:
[57:33] Yeah, and there were individuals that worked for the register, that were in the distribution part of that newspaper that did face charges years later. This idea, though, would make a lot of sense here to me. Now, this poster is saying that, to his knowledge, those individuals were checked, and he believes extensively, but I'm not saying that it was those individuals in particular, I'm just pointing out the idea that that would make some sense to me, that these are people that we know would be out there, number one. And again, it's back to the idea of humans hunting humans. Where do you go? If you know that your victim type is out there alone on these mornings, you go cruising, and it doesn't have to be a targeted Johnny Gosch like Paul Benaki says. It could be any of those paperboys. It could be any of them that fit those abilities, the vulnerability, the availability. I don't think that it's happenstance that two paperboys go missing on a Sunday, two years apart, from the same area, delivering the same newspaper. But it goes back to what you said earlier, Captain. It's either the same individual or one crime inspired the other crime. Without having any more information, the Eugene Martin case, the Johnny Gosch case and Marc Allen, all three of them, roughly three kids, the same area, roughly six years in time. Are they all connected? It's difficult to say. There's just not a lot of information, not enough to say that they're connected. When you cross-reference the statements of individuals who say that they saw Eugene Martin talking to someone and individuals that say that they saw Johnny Gosch talking to someone, I don't know that those descriptions completely match up. But back to the idea that if it were some kind of ring or persons working together, that would make some sense as well. The thing with the Gosch case, the Martin case and the Allen case, unfortunately, they to me have similarities to the Jacob Wetterling case. Why did that case remain unsolved for so many years? It's simple. There were witnesses in the Wetterling case. But it went unsolved because, unfortunately, the killer had the great idea to bury the body. And the difference between the cases in Des Moines, Iowa, and the cases that took place at the same time period, right down the road in Omaha, Nebraska, were that the bodies were found. And that provided a crime scene. It provided physical evidence. And in the John Juppert case, you had the champion. You know, we talk about the face of evil. We're looking for this guy. This is the face of evil. Look for him. Find him. We had a description of the suspect in the Eberly case and the Walden case. But what you had was you had the champion of justice. You had the adversary. You had the good versus evil. You had the side of good that stood up and called the suspect a coward and said, why don't you pick on someone your own size? And that is ultimately what led to John Juppert getting apprehended, identifying him as the killer because he went out that day when he attacked the preschool teacher, he went out that day looking to pick on someone his own size. He went out there to show the police, you think I'm a coward? I will go out and pick on someone my own size. But she spotted him and she said, I think he looks like the guy you've been looking for in these child cases. Now, when you look at Johnny Gosch, Eugene Martin, Marc Allen, it's easy to argue and say that they're all connected. At the same time, I try to stay water and a good example of that is this. We know John Juppert, we know about his crimes in Omaha, Nebraska, but one of Omaha's most infamous cold cases is that of another dead little boy, abducted and murdered. This took place back in March of 1986. John Juppert was apprehended in 1984. So this case is of Richard Ricky Chaddock, who left a friend's house only to never be seen alive again. His body was found eight days later. He was your typical 11 year old boy. He would have fit Juppert's ideal victim. This was a smaller 11 year old boy. He was into GI. Joe's, Legos, all that stuff. He wanted to be an astronaut. But on March 23rd, 1986, those dreams of becoming an astronaut came to an abrupt end. He disappeared while riding his bike near his home. His bike was found in a bank parking lot. And then, seven days later, his body was found. One strange part of this is when you compare when he went missing, March 23rd, 1986, and then his body is found March 31st. During that time period, Marc Allen disappears March 29th, 1986 in Des Moines, Iowa. But the reason why I bring up this cold case here of Ricky Chadwick, this case is still unsolved. We know John Juppert didn't do it because he was apprehended in 1984. If John Juppert was never caught for the murder of Danny Joe Eberly and Christopher Walden, I think we would be sitting here 30, 40 years later and going, this case is so similar. It's gotta be connected. It's gotta be part of the series. But we know 100 percent that it's not. So here I am, Captain, sitting in the garage with you and all I am doing is delivering information that just creates more questions and no answers.

Speaker 3:
[64:21] Yeah, but isn't part of this like maybe consciously or subconsciously, we want them to be connected because we don't want to face the reality that there's more monsters out there. Then there's more monsters out there.

Speaker 2:
[64:38] Yes, but for me, it's a bit of a selfish errand, right? It's comparing. I wanted to look at these cases and compare them together in hopes that it would lead me to some answers. Clearly, it did not. It's I'm taught time and time again by myself to stay water. You got to stay water in these cases. Now, I do sit here too and I really worry that we're never going to get any answers in Johnny Gosch's case. I worry that we're not going to get answers in Eugene Martin's case. Are they connected? It's very difficult to say. But what we do know all these years later is that in a matter of just... And sorry, I think I said six years earlier, but really it's just four years. Johnny Gosch goes missing 1982, Des Moines, Iowa. Danny Joe Eberle abducted in Nebraska 1983 in September. Christopher Walden December of 1983 in Nebraska. Eugene Martin 1984, Des Moines, Iowa. Marc Allen March of 1986, Des Moines, Iowa. And Ricky Chadwick March of 1986 in Omaha, Nebraska.

Speaker 3:
[66:02] Well, in a lot of these cases, I thought we'd have more answers, especially with the true crime genre becoming more popular and some of these things becoming re-examined by so many individuals. You hope that there was more information that came out on these cases, but we're 10 years in, and in some of these cases, there has been little to no movement.

Speaker 2:
[66:29] Police continue to work these cases, especially the Ricky Chadwick case. There's been a lot of work on that in the last 10... Well, these days, my throat will be back to normal.

Speaker 3:
[66:42] Don't worry, I'll karate chop it.

Speaker 2:
[66:43] Police continue to work these cases, especially the Ricky Chadwick case. There's been a lot of activity, a lot of work that's gone into Ricky's case in the past 10, 15 years. One thing that police have always said in Ricky's case is the individual that had him in his possession either was a good communicator or gained Ricky's trust somehow. There's something, some indicator of that for police to come to that conclusion. Ricky's body was discovered on Easter Sunday, March 31st. He was found in a field northwest of Omaha strangled. It was determined that he was kept alive for several days after his kidnapping. His body was found down in an embankment near 168th and Ida Street. His hair, clothes and body were all clean. Detectives say that he was kept alive, cared for and even fed for several days. They believe maybe even as much as seven days. They're basing part of that off of how clean he was and that there was food found in his digestive tract. Detectives found physical evidence at the scene, hair follicles. They have submitted this evidence for testing. But unfortunately, it returned only a partial DNA profile, not enough to enter into the national DNA database. A suspect has never been arrested in Ricky Chadwick's death. Police are still looking for any leads in that case. If you know anything about Ricky's murder or have information, call the Douglas County Sheriff's Tip Line at 402-444-6000. If you have any information in the disappearance of Johnny Gosch, Eugene Martin or Marc Allen, please contact the Des Moines Police Department at 515-237-1430. And there are a lot of people that have been critical of the Des Moines Police Department's work or maybe lack thereof in the Johnny Gosch case. So if you do not feel comfortable contacting the Des Moines Police Department, look, I wanna point out something. I saw nothing but great work out of them in the Eugene Martin case. But if you don't feel confident contacting the Des Moines Police Department regarding those still unsolved cases, contact the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children at 1-800-THE-LOST.

Speaker 3:
[69:40] I want to thank everybody for joining us here on The Garage each and every week. For everything True Crime, check out truecrimegarage.com. While you're there, sign up on the mailing list. And until next week, be good, be kind, and don't live.