Month: August 2018

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Magee, Christian

Murderer: Christian Magee

Alias/Nickname: The Mad Slasher
Type: Serial Killer
MO: Was either acquainted with victims or picked them up hitchhiking
Characteristics: Sexual Assault, Stabbing, Strangulation, Mutilation
Time Span of Killings: 1974-1976
Number of Murder Victims: 3
Number of Sexual Assaults: 2+
Location: Strathroy and Mount Brydges, Ontario
Date of Birth: 1948
Hometown:
Diagnosis: Personality Disorder with classic sexual sadism including fantasies of torture, necrophilia, cannibalism, and dismemberment.
Outcome: Found not guilty by reason of insanity in 1977, and has been held at the maximum security Penetanguishene Mental Health Centre ever since.

Christain Magee grew up in an emotionally and physically abusive household.

The Victims

Judith Barksey

Judith Barksey, 19, was murdered on March 1, 1974.

She was attacked by Magee as she walked home after getting take-out from a local Strathroy Pizzeria. He threw her to the ground and cut her throat. As she lay bleeding, he undid her pants and fondled her genitals, and then stole any money she had on her.

The next day a man on his way to the mailbox found Judith’s body with her take-out: a pizza box, pop bottles, and a chocolate bar.

Rosalie Winters (survived)

In June of 1975, Rosalie Winters, 18, was walking to Alexandra Park when she was attacked by Magee.

He made known his intentions to sexually assault her and strangled her to subdue her. When Magee tried to rip her pants off, the zipper broke and could not remove them. Instead he strangled her into unconsciousness and groped her vagina before leaving her at the side of the road.

Patricia Jenner

Patricia Jenner, 19, was murdered on October 20, 1975 in her home in Mount Brydges.

She was a friend of Magee’s and had let him into her home when he knocked on the door. Police later reported that photographs were scattered around the crime scene leading them to believe Patricia’s killer was known to her, and that she was showing him pictures at the time of the attack.

While her baby daughter, Rachel, slept in her crib upstairs, Magee pushed Patricia to the floor and tore off her clothes. He then stopped without explanation. Then when Patricia began to redress herself, Magee strangled her with a black bootlace until she was unconscious then cut her throat with his jackknife.

Her husband Denys found her on the kitchen floor at 5 pm with their baby unharmed.

An elderly neighbour reported seeing a man with shoulder-length dark hair pull into Jenner’s driveway in light-coloured, late-model Oldsmobile.

Sylvia Holly Jennings (survived)

On November 3, 1974, Magee picked up Sylvia Holly Jennings as she hitchhiked outside of London.

He drove her to an isolate Mount Brydges road and demanded she take off her clothes. When she hesitated, he ripped them off. She fought back and Magee punched her to subdue her. He then brutally sexually assaulted her.

Afterwards, he choked her into unconsciousness, fractured her skull with a bottle and left her on the side of the road.

Susan Lynn Scholes

On June 15, 1976, 15-year-old Susan Scholes planned to hitchhike to her parent’s cottage in Hillsboro Beach. Her brother dropped her off in Forest to purchase batteries before she left and she was seen walking towards County Road 12 around 1:30 pm.

A forklift driver in the area saw Susan get into a ’75 pickup truck that he recognized as belonging to a Strathroy company that removed road kill. The company’s owner later told the OPP that Magee had been driving that truck on that day.

A farmer found Susan’s body the next day around 2:15 pm. She had been viciously sexually assaulted, strangled into unconsciousness, then stabbed in the throat and chest. She also had a 20 cm laceration above her vagina.

Sources

‘Mad Slasher’ wants to apologize, UPI, January 16, 2006

Murderpedia

Ontario ruling raises ire of mental patients, The Globe and Mail, May 18, 2006

Mellor, Lee. Cold North Killers, Canadian Serial Murder, Dundurn, Toronto

Videos

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Johnson, Russell Maurice

Murderer: Russell Maurice Johnson

Alias/Nickname: The Bedroom Strangler, The Balcony Killer
Type: Serial Killer
MO: Would stalk his victims and watch them sleep for hours before attacking them, he would scale the sides of apartment buildings and enter their homes through their balconies. His rape victims were strangled into unconsciousness.
Characteristics: Stalking, voyeurism, sexual assault, strangulation, stabbing, necrophilia
Time Span of Killings: 1973-1977
Number of Murder Victims: 7
Number of Sexual Assaults: 11
Location: London and Guelph, Ontario
Date of Birth: 1947
Hometown: Guelph, Ontario
Diagnosis: Sexual sadism, necrophilia, fetishism, voyeurism, transvestic fetishism and a “personality disorder not otherwise specified.”
Outcome: Johnson was found not guilty by reason of insanity for the murders of Beitz, George, and Veldboom. He has been institutionalized every since.

Early Crimes

Russell Maurice Johnson experienced a lot of trauma in his childhood including sexual abuse at 14-year-old. His Juvenile Record showed arrests for several sexual offences.

Johnson was an auto worker from St. Thomas. He was described as obsessed with cleanliness and was a compulsive hand washer. He wore gloves and petroleum jelly at work and at the gym.

He began attacking and raping women as early as 1969, but it wasn’t until the 70s that he graduated to murder.

The “Natural Causes” Victims

Johnson’s murder victims were all between 20-49 years-old. He stalked his victims for days and would break into their homes to watch them sleep for hours. He was able to crawl up the sides of apartment buildings to gain access through balcony doors.

Johnson graduated to murder on October 19, 1973 when he murdered Mary Hicks, a 20-year-old student in London. Her death was attributed to an allergic reaction to medication because she was found in a natural sleeping position with no obvious signs of violence on her body.

Johnson took great pains to methodically clean-up the Hicks crime scene and make her death appear natural. He did the same with his next three victims.

Only a month later, another woman was found dead in a Guelph apartment. Alice Ralston, 27, was also found with no obvious signs of violence. Ralston’s death was attributed to a condition of hardened arteries.

On March 4, 1974, Eleanor Hartwick died at her home in London and, as in the case of Alice Ralston, her death was put down to a reaction to prescription drugs.

Doris (Dodi) Brown, 49, was found dead in August, and although the pathologist discovered minor abrasions to her body, as well as blood in her throat and rectum, her death was attributed to pulmonary edema.

The Vicious Murders

Russell’s next three victims suffered violent deaths and were sexually assaulted postmortem.

Diane Beitz, 23, was found dead in her Guelph apartment on December 31, She had been strangled to death with her bra and sexually assaulted postmortem.

Louella Jeanne George was found dead in her home in April, 1977. She had been strangled and sexually assaulted postmortem. Some of her jewellery and underwear was also missing. The items were later found in a garbage can nearby.

Donna Veldboom, 22, was found dead in her apartment not far from George’s residence. She had been stabbed to death and sexually assaulted postmortem. She was found dead in her London apartment after she didn’t show up for work at Union Gas.

The Victims

Mary Hicks

Mary Hicks, 21, was a senior at the University of Western Ontario when she was found dead in her ground floor Talbot Street London apartment on October 19, 1973.

Johnson had watched her sleep for a long time before killing her.

Mary was found dead the next morning in her bed by her room-mates. She had a pillow partially covering her face

Diane Beitz

Diane Beitz, 23, was found dead in her Drew Street apartment in Guelph apartment on December 31, 1976. She was described as “the girl next door.”

Beitz had just become engaged to her fiance, Jim Britton, on December 30, 1976. Jim and Diane enjoyed an early breakfast at her before he left for work at 5:45 am.

At 10:30 am, Johnson calls police to report a suitcase of clothing has been stolen from his car. He is only a few blocks away from Diane’s apartment.

At 6pm, Jim returns to Diane’s high-rise apartment. He finds Diane under a wad of blankets in her bed. Her hands are bound with pantyhose and her bra was left knotted around her neck. The pathologist reports that Diane was carried to the bedroom and strangled. She was raped and bound post-mortem.

Her building superintendent reports he looked out his window at 3:30 am and saw a brown Buick idling.

Other residents in Diane’s building remembered a brown car in the parking lot from 4-8 am that morning. The car was running with one person in the driver’s seat.

The police are puzzled by how tidy the rest of the crime scene is – no sign of a struggle. At first police believe that Diane knew her killer because there was no sign of forced entry.

A delivery driver says he dropped off flowers for Diane a few days before her murdered. Police then learn that the flowers were not sent by Jim.

It was later learned that Johnson’s ex-girlfriend had been a tenant in Diane’s apartment building at the time of her murder.

Alice Ralston

Alice Ralston, 27, was found dead in her Guelph apartment in November, 1973.

Luella George

Louella Jeanne George was found dead in her top floor London apartment in April, 1977.

George grew up on a farm and moved to London where she worked as a cashier in a hospital on Grand Avenue and lived in an apartment building directly across the street. She was engaged to be married.

When she did not show up for work,  a co-worker went to check up on her and found her dead.

She had been strangled and sexually assaulted postmortem. Some of her jewellery and underwear was also missing. The items were later found in a garbage can nearby.

Again, police note the tidiness of the apartment.

Nurses who live in the apartment building become very afraid.

Eleanor Hartwick

Eleanor Hartwork was found dead in her Westlake Street apartment in London on March 4, 1974. She was found with a book in her hand looking like she had just fallen asleep.

Donna Veldboom

Donna Veldboom, 22, was found dead in her London apartment not far from George’s residence on July 15, 1977. She had been strangled and stabbed to death, and sexually assaulted postmortem. She had also been bathed and posed in her bed.

Co-workers called police after she failed to show up to her job at Union Gas.

The night before, Veldboom spent the evening visiting a friend. That was the last time she was seen alive.

She had moved to Ontario from New Brunswick less than a year before her murder, and had roots in the Chatham-Kent area. She was described as very popular with a great social life.

Johnson, who lived in her building, had climbed through the door of her fifth-floor balcony.

He later admitted her slashed her check with a kitchen knife to “crawl inside her to be safe or warm.”

Doris (Dodi) Brown

Doris (Dodi) Brown, 49-years-old was found dead on August 9, 1974.

Dodi, a mother of two, had just separated from her husband of 30 years and rented an apartment on the 2nd floor. She lived alone with her two daughters, Laura and Colleen. She had also started a new job and was looking forward to a new life.

She was described as a graceful and refined woman who was involved in her church.

On August 8th, Brown’s youngest daughter Colleen was away visiting relatives and her oldest, Laura, was turning 16-years-old the next day. Dodi and Laura had planned to go to the Ministry of Transportation to get Laura’s learner’s permit to drive the next morning. Dodi and Laura go to bed in their own rooms that night.

On August 9th, Laura wakes up to the sound of Dodi’s clock-radio going off. When she entered her mother’s room, she saw her laying with her blankets tucked up underneath her. She knew immediately something was wrong with her mother.

There was nothing to suggest there had been a struggle. There was some slight blood found underneath Brown’s body, but the police were never notified.

Brown’s doctor later told Laura that there was no cause of death they could find and it was like a “crib death” of an adult – meaning, she just died in her sleep.

Sources

Victims’ families still ready to keep watch on unrepentant Bedroom Strangler, Toronto Sun, December 6, 2016

Serial killer Russell Johnson to remain in maximum security mental hospital, National Post, July 30, 2010

Mellor, Lee. Cold North Killers, Canadian Serial Murder, Dundurn, Toronto

Videos