Dark Dreams: Sexual Violence, Homicide And The Criminal Mind

by Hazelwood, Roy

  At approximately 10:40 she heard a noise and saw a flashlight beam through her window. Turning off her air conditioner, Lory could hear someone attempting to remove the wood-frame screen from her bathroom window. She turned on her apartment lights, peeked out the front door, called a friend in the complex, and then ran to the friend’s apartment. From there she telephoned the police.

  The responding officer accompanied Lory back to her apartment, where he noted that the screen had been removed from the bathroom window. Lory spent the night at her friend’s place. The next morning she returned to her apartment and found that her bedroom had been ransacked. The bathroom window screen had been slashed several times in the center.

  Nearby lived twenty-two-year-old Beth Freedman.* From what investigators were able to piece together, sometime after 11:00 that Saturday night, the intruder tried to get through a window of her apartment. He slashed the screen, removed it, and broke out the pane. However, her front door was locked, and there was no evidence that the offender had gotten into the apartment.

  The police surmised that after the attempts against Lory Taylor and Beth Freedman, the intruder remained on the complex grounds, still searching for a victim. When Frankie Burget arrived home, she must have caught his attention.

  He apparently entered Frankie’s apartment through an unlocked living room window. When he awakened her, she screamed. He struck and choked her, telling her, “Just go limp and I won’t hurt you.”

  He had brought with him a filthy, ragged towel, with which he tried to mask the bottom of his face, but it kept slipping. When it did, Frankie could see he was a white male, in his late-twenties or early thirties, and that he wore his hair in a crew cut.

  He began to fondle her and to compliment her on her “gorgeous” body. He said he knew that the only way he could ever have her was to “fuck” her. “Do you know you look like a goddess?” he asked. “You look so beautiful. As soon as I saw you through the window, I knew I had to have you.” He also said that he had tried to speak to her on two occasions, and she had ignored him.

  Frankie Burget struggled again, and he reacted by hitting her and choking her until she couldn’t breathe. When she went limp, he tore up a pillowcase to make ligatures. She ran for the window and tried to scream for help. He grabbed her again, managed to dodge a kick from her knee, closed the window, and pulled her back to the bed.

  “I won’t hurt you if you just stay still,” he said again. “I’m going to have to tie you up because you aren’t cooperating.”

  He ripped the pillowcase and ordered Frankie to lie down on her stomach with her arms behind her. When she asked to have her wrists tied in front so that she could breathe more easily, he refused.

  He raped her anally. As he did so, one of her hands came loose. As Frankie brushed back hair from her face, he hit her again and tightened the knot.

  In all, Frankie Burget suffered scratches and bruises to her hands, right arm, and lower neck. Her right eye was severely swollen and bloodshot, and her lower lip and jaw were bruised. She also suffered the physical and psychological traumas that usually accompany a rape.

  When he finished with the anal rape, she thought he was about to leave. Instead, as the intruder sat on the edge of the bed looking down at her, he changed his mind. “You know,” he said, “I was only seeing you from the back. You look so good from the front I just can’t leave yet.”

  The victim later reported that he now had trouble maintaining an erection. He pushed her onto her back and raped Frankie vaginally even as he lost rigidity. “You feel great,” he said.

  Frankie told him he was hurting her and asked him to stop. He responded by saying, “Okay, okay, I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” But he didn’t stop.

  When she asked again, he answered, “Just shut up! You try anything, I’ll kill you.”

  When he finished for the second time, he said he planned to stay all night to prevent her from calling the police. She told him that if he intended to avoid detection, leaving while it was still dark was a smarter idea.

  He saw the logic in what she said. Before departing, however, he made a strange request. “I want you to do something for me. I don’t want you to hate me. Hate will just eat you up inside. So don’t hate me.” He apologized for the assault and then added something even odder. “I know this is going to sound stupid. I feel like we have been friends for years. You know, like we’re old friends and we’re just sitting here.”

  She noted that he hadn’t brought a weapon or worn gloves. But Frankie did see him wipe the doorknob with his shirt on his way out.

  The next known assault took place nearly four and a half months later, on Friday, September 8, 1995. Peggy White,* twenty-three, had just graduated from college and was spending her last night in the apartment she had occupied with another young woman during the previous nine months. This evening her roommate was out of town.

  Peggy spent most of Friday packing and hauling trash to a Dumpster located a hundred feet from her apartment. She was in and out so often throughout the day that she saw no need to lock the door.

  That evening, a male friend visited her from 5:30 until 10:30. Afterward, Peggy continued packing for another forty-five minutes or so before carrying out one last load of trash. She left her apartment door open while she was outside then closed it and went upstairs to watch television.

  Moments later, a white male she would later describe as being in his early forties jumped out from a closet and ordered her into her roommate’s bedroom. There he produced a pocket knife.

  “Get undressed,” he demanded.

  As she began to do so, he asked if she had a roommate. Peggy said the woman was away in Augusta, Georgia. She took off her outer clothing and then stopped. He touched her with the knife, and she removed her undergarments.

  She tried to cover herself, but he told her to move her arms so he could see her breasts. When she sat on the bed, he removed her only remaining garments—her socks.

  White asked that he not rape her anally, as it would be too painful. He seemed agreeable to the request, telling her that if she performed oral sex he would leave. But after she began to do so, he pulled away. “You’re not doing a good job,” he said. “Stop.”

  Then he told her to lie on her stomach as he applied lotion to her anus and penetrated her with his finger. She pleaded again that it was painful, so he rolled her over, lubricated her some more, and raped White vaginally.

  As he did so, he asked if she had a douche. He didn’t want her to become pregnant.

  “That wouldn’t help,” she said.

  “It would a little bit,” he answered.

  “Why don’t you just pull out?” White asked.

  He said he had already ejaculated.

  She asked him to leave.

  “I want to do it some more,” he said, and vaginally raped her again.

  “You’re sexy,” he said. “You have a really nice butt.”

  When he stopped, he told her that he was going to leave. “I’m sorry I hurt you. I’m sorry I had to do this to you.”

  But he didn’t leave. When Peggy asked if she could dress, he said, “No, I want to watch you lie there naked.”

  After allowing her to use the bathroom, he raped her a third time. Finally he dressed and prepared to go. When he tried and failed to unplug her telephone, White helped him in order to keep him from breaking it.

  Before leaving, he used a towel to wipe her vaginal area, the lotion bottle, and the doorknob.

  More than six months passed before he struck again. On Sunday, March 17, 1996, Marti Joseph,* twenty-one, went out for a bottle of milk about seven in the evening then came home and cooked dinner. Around 8:15 she slipped into the shower. As Marti washed, she heard footsteps in the hallway and assumed that her male roommate had returned home.

  After the shower she wrapped a towel around her and walked into her bedroom, closing the door behind her. Just then a white male, somewhere in his thirties, “sort of wrinkled and scary-look
ing” with “saggy,” bloodshot eyes, came up behind her wielding a butcher knife from the kitchen.

  Marti immediately asked him not to kill her. He said that he wouldn’t as long as she did as she was told. He asked her age.

  “Drop the towel,” he demanded. Marti did so. He placed the knife tip on her navel, and with his other hand he touched her breast.

  “Stand right there and turn around,” he told her. “Stand right here in front of me.” He then fondled her vagina from behind.

  “Turn around and get down on your knees.”

  As Marti did so, her roommate suddenly knocked on her door. He had come home from school and wanted to know if she was on the telephone. She called out that she was.

  The intruder instantly headed for the closest window, which was painted shut. Marti helped him open a second window located above her dresser, which he crawled through with an assist from the victim.

  The butcher knife and a towel from the house were later recovered outside.

  The final assault occurred three hours later. Mary Gilbert,* age twenty-two, spent the early evening painting the front bedroom of the duplex apartment she shared with another young woman. At nine o’clock Mary, her roommate, and her roommate’s boyfriend shared a pizza. The couple then left.

  At ten, a friend dropped by for coffee. She suggested that Mary prop open a window to air out the place. The friend departed for home about eleven, and Mary headed for the shower.

  Ten minutes into the shower, the curtain was pulled open and there stood the rapist, threatening her with a long, bread knife from her kitchen. She thought that he was in his midthirties. She described him as tanned and weathered, with rough hands and hair the length of an outgrown crew cut.

  He had come in through the window she had propped open for ventilation. He was using a pair of her pants to try to conceal the lower part of his face.

  Mary grabbed the curtain rod and tried to jab him with it. He tore the rod from her hands, threw it to the bathroom floor, and then forced her into her roommate’s bedroom, where he told her to lie on the floor. She screamed and tried to resist.

  “Shut up!” he said, covering her mouth with his hand.

  He struck her head against the floor, punched her, then picked up a nearby flashlight and beat Mary in the face and abdomen with it before choking her to the point of breath-lessness.

  “Either be fucked or killed,” he repeatedly said.

  Mary kicked him and made a dash for the door. He grabbed her again, forced her to the floor, inserted his fingers into her vagina, then raped her. He also inserted his fingers into her anus.

  She told him, “My roommate and her boyfriend are going to be home any minute.”

  He said he would kill them both and then hit her again in the stomach and abdomen with the flashlight and pushed her up onto the bed. She kicked him in the groin, and he hit her several times in the stomach. Then he raped her vaginally once again.

  “It won’t take long,” he said.

  This time he quickly withdrew. “I’m not going to come,” he said. “I’m going to leave.”

  The rapist arose, dressed, and left the room, then returned. “Roll over, I want to fuck you in the ass,” he demanded.

  But when Mary didn’t respond, he said, “Well, I better be going before your roommate gets back.” Then he grabbed both her breasts, saying, “Ya got nice titties,” and walked out of the room. He smashed her telephone and cut the lines on his way to the front door.

  There was no doubt that a single perpetrator had committed the rapes; all the DNA specimens matched.

  From an investigative point of view, the fact that he was growing progressively more violent made it all the more urgent that he be stopped. In the Margaret Jones case, he choked her and hit her with his fists. But he didn’t rape her when she asked him not to. One year and five victims later, he severely beat Mary Gilbert with his fists and a weapon and raped her twice.

  I began my profile by noting that age is always the most difficult of all offender characteristics to determine. The victims varied widely in their estimates. I surmised that chronologically he was between twenty-six and thirty-three, but sexually and emotionally, he was immature. His initial actions were to look at and touch his victims. In his later assaults, when he encountered resistance, he immediately resorted to threats and violence.

  I advised that the perpetrator’s wife or girlfriend would report similar behavior, a tendency to look at and play with her, and a habit of pouting or getting angry and leaving the room if he didn’t get his way.

  His behavior also suggested that he had low self-esteem and was intimidated by his victims. That may sound like an odd thing to say about a rapist, but recall that he told Frankie Burget that he had tried to talk to her and how he knew that raping her was the only way he could ever have her.

  He told Mary Gilbert as he raped her, “This won’t take long,” as though he was trying to assure her that he would be leaving quickly. I felt this lack of self-esteem would be perceived by others as a lack of confidence and that he would exhibit a lack of pride in his appearance. He would be poorly groomed, just as the victims themselves reported.

  I believed that he drove a pickup or sedan, that it would be in poor condition and improperly maintained, would have high mileage, and would be at least five years old. His lack of personal pride would extend even to the care of his vehicle.

  I also doubted that he had taken part in any team sports. It was far more likely that he had engaged in solo pastimes.

  Sexual offenders are usually experiencing stress at the time of their attacks, and I said such would be the case with this offender. The stress might be relational, medical, financial, sexual, or caused by substance abuse. The rapist had discovered that the assaults momentarily relieved the stress and restored to him, at least for a while, his personal sense of power and control.

  I felt that this would explain the reason why he was so determined to find a victim on the night of April 22-23, 1995. Having been unsuccessful at Lory Taylor’s and Beth Freedman’s apartments before midnight, his stress increased and he remained at the complex until 1:30, searching for a victim. When he spotted Frankie Burget, she became his target. We see the same persistence with this offender several months later. Scared off early in the evening by Marti Joseph’s male roommate, he acted out three hours later against Mary Gilbert.

  What he failed to understand was that the temporary relief he experienced after each rape was illusory. In reality the crimes had a cumulative effect of actually increasing his stress and therefore his emotional burden.

  I advised the police that the unidentified offender more than likely had an arrest record involving crimes against property, such as burglary or breaking and entering; alcohol-related crimes, such as disorderliness or DWI; or “nuisance” sexual offenses, particularly window peeping, but also quite possibly obscene telephone calls.

  His preoccupation with anal assault suggested the possibility that he had served time in jail or prison. But the anal rape also signified something else. Taken together with his profanity and physical violence, it reflected deep anger toward women.

  His crimes reflected neither planning nor patience. None of his victims (all of whom were college students) believed that he was a student. Additionally, he used vulgar street language for the female anatomy, even when complimenting the women. All of this told me that me probably had no more than a high school education, if that.

  Nothing about his crimes suggested a high intellect or even street-smart craftiness. He relied entirely on physical and verbal violence to control the victims. Nor did he seem to learn from previous crimes. For example, he never figured out a reliable way to hide his face. It would have been simple to bring a mask with him. He did seem to have some concern about fingerprints, but nevertheless left DNA evidence at each rape.

  The victims were selected impulsively. He apparently acted without knowing anything about their habits, living arrangements, or personalities
.

  Everything about his crimes, from the victims to the weapons he used, stemmed from opportunity not forethought.

  I felt that impulsiveness would be reflected in his consenting relationships, both in the beginning and ending of them. He would be the type of person who makes purchases without considering their long-term implications, including whether he could afford them. His credit rating would be poor. He would frequently change jobs as well as addresses.

  His low tolerance for frustration was amply shown in his behavior in the Lory Taylor case. After unsuccessfully trying to capture her, he returned later and ransacked her bedroom, obviously in anger. After also failing to enter Beth Freedman’s apartment, he took out his rage by using excessive, and unnecessary, violence against Frankie Burget. Similarly, following the interrupted assault on Marti Joseph, Mary Gilbert was violently assaulted.

  I suggested that he had defective relations in his everyday life, that he was probably divorced, and that he collected pornography, especially material with bondage themes, as well as magazines and other materials emphasizing breasts and buttocks.

  His anger toward women was increasing, and I believed that the violence would continue escalating. If he had a consenting sexual partner, she would note that he was becoming more demanding, more sexually selfish, and more abusive, both physically and verbally.

  He worked with his hands, probably outdoors. I doubted that he was employed at any job requiring more than vocational training and experience.

  He seemed to be comfortable moving around the university campus. Of course, the college environment provided him with an attractive victim pool, but I thought he might have previously lived in the vicinity or perhaps worked there or maybe even regularly visited someone who lived there.