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Author Topic: Long-haul truckers/serial killings  (Read 12462 times)
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jaggard19
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« on: April 19, 2009, 03:28:23 PM »


http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-me-serialkillers5-2009apr05,0,2434292.story?page=1

FBI establishes Highway Seril Killing Initiative... above link gives some information on the FBI unit. 

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« Reply #1 on: May 10, 2009, 05:10:27 PM »

FBI taking closer look at truck stop killings, including Oklahoma
MAN INVESTIGATED IN DEATHS OF WOMEN IN OKLAHOMA, OTHER STATES
Published: May 9, 2009
How many women has John Robert Williams killed?

In 2005, he pleaded guilty to murdering one in Mississippi, but he has been charged in other slayings and is a "person of interest” in more cases, including some in Oklahoma. At one point, he admitted to killing as many as 12 people, officials said, but he later recanted.

Authorities suspect the long-haul trucker is a serial killer, exactly the sort being tracked under the FBI’s recently announced Highway Serial Killings initiative. Using an FBI database, analysts have identified more than 500 victims nationwide found dead near or along highways, as well as about 200 suspects.

"The suspects are predominantly long-haul truck drivers” who target women living high-risk lifestyles, such as homeless women and truck stop prostitutes, the FBI said in a news release last month.

The FBI initiative grew out of work by the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation. In September 2003, the OSBI began investigating the death of Sandra Beard, 43, whose body was found along Interstate 40 in eastern Oklahoma. Analyst Terri Turner sent out a teletype with information about the case to other law enforcement agencies.

Within 72 hours, she’d learned of two cases that seemed eerily similar. In July, Margaret Gardner, 47, had been found dead in Arkansas. A month later, the body of Jennifer Hyman, 24, of Oklahoma City was discovered in the Tallahatchie River near Oxford, Miss.

Three deaths in three months. Each victim had been bound in a similar manner, Turner said. All were truck stop prostitutes. Two had direct ties to Oklahoma City.

Turner started watching for more that matched the pattern — and they kept coming...
• Oct. 16, 2003: An unidentified woman was found dead in the Texas Panhandle. She was later identified as Vickie Helen Anderson, 45, who last was seen alive in Sayre.
• Nov. 22, 2003: Sandra Richardson, 39, of Oklahoma City was found dead in Okfuskee County, just north of I-40 on State Highway 62.
• Jan. 1, 2004: Patsy Leonard, 23, was found dead in Pottawatamie County.
• Jan. 31, 2004: Casey Jo Pipestem, 19, of Oklahoma City went missing from an Oklahoma City truck stop. Her body was found in Grapevine, Texas.

A multistate task force formed, and Turner and representatives from other agencies sent information to the FBI’s Violent Criminal Apprehension Program, or VICAP. The past few years, Turner said, the FBI has led the investigations.

"The ultimate goal is to identify possible offenders and sync those up with the victims that have been identified,” she said. "One of the ways they do that is by not only identifying the offenders but doing a lot of the timelines and analytical backgrounds.”

State cases ‘still open’
Williams, now 32, and his girlfriend were arrested later in 2004. In an unrelated case, Williams pleaded guilty to kidnapping and murdering Mississippi resident Nikki Hill, 28. He was sentenced to life in prison. His girlfriend, Rachel Cumberland, pleaded guilty to manslaughter and received a 20-year prison sentence.
Days after the sentencing, Williams and Cumberland were charged in Hyman’s death. Those charges were dropped because of a lack of evidence.

Earlier this week, Williams was charged with capital murder in Anderson’s death. He is facing similar charges in the Pipestem slaying.

"Williams is an interesting character. ... He doesn’t look like, you know, he’s not the bogeyman,” Turner said.

"He’s just a guy. And I think he seems pretty soft-spoken, at least from the tapes I’ve heard of him. He has kind of a slow Mississippi drawl to his speech. "I can see where he could just go and talk to these girls, and they wouldn’t think anything was wrong until it was too late.”

Law enforcement has been unable to link Williams to the other cases in Turner’s series.

"None of our cases have been solved,” said Jessica Brown, OSBI spokeswoman. "Ours are still open, but we certainly are still looking at Williams as a possibility.”

http://newsok.com/fbi-taking-closer-look-at-truck-stop-killings-including-oklahoma/article/3368102
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I'd just like to state that IMO and my personal experience of working with truck drivers from all over the country for 12 years in raw potato shipping/logistics, that MOST are fine people. I was married to one for 7 years (wouldn't hurt a fly - he was afraid of me, lmao). In many cases they can and have solved many a crime...and will be instrumental in solving many in the future. Their eyes and ears are wide open. Anyway....just sayin'...lol.
« Last Edit: January 14, 2010, 05:00:17 PM by Nut44x4 » Logged

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« Reply #2 on: May 26, 2009, 07:23:59 PM »

Chattanooga Times Free Press (Tennessee)
May 24, 2009 Sunday 
 
FBI data points to killer-truck driver link

Serial killers working as long-haul truckers may be responsible for a string of homicides that stretch from coast to coast and cut right through the tri-state area, according to the FBI.

Law officers have compiled a stack of 500 unsolved homicides and 200 potential murder suspects as part of the bureau's Highway Serial Killer initiative. Most of the suspects are truckers.

The victims are highway prostitutes, hitchhikers and people who just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Many are nameless Jane and John Does whose bodies were found tossed along the nation's busiest highways. There are 10 such cases in or near the Chattanooga area, the FBI said.

One unsolved Chattanooga homicide dates back to 1999, when contractors clearing brush in a dirty creek just below Interstate 75 on Cannon Avenue found the body of a 35- to 40-year-old woman.

"When you don't know who your victim is, there really isn't anywhere to start," said Lt. Tim Carroll, head of the Chattanooga Police Department's major crimes division. "You can't even start to ask questions until you know that."

The body was badly decomposed, but the woman had been strangled and bound with cord. Lt. Carroll feels certain the killer brought the woman to the area and dumped her remains.

"They treat these people like they are disposable," he said. "We have to figure out who they are before we can figure out who did this to them."

TRACKING THEM DOWN

The FBI's Highway Serial Killer initiative, started five years ago, is the key for local law enforcement to connect unsolved killings -- often with unidentified bodies -- to suspects and families yearning for answers.

"The mobile nature of the offenders, the high-risk lifestyle of the victims, the significant distances and involvement of multiple jurisdictions, the lack of witnesses and forensic evidence combine to make these cases almost impossible to solve using conventional investigative techniques," said Special Agent Ann Todd, a Washington, D.C.-based FBI spokeswoman.

Truckers who kill have skirted the nation's laws for years by committing their crimes in one state and transporting the bodies for hundreds -- if not thousands -- of miles.

That throws investigators such as Lt. Carroll off course. When a body is found, investigators turn to their missing-persons lists, but if someone was killed states away, the local list is no good, he said.

The 1999 homicide in Chattanooga is typical of the crimes listed in the Highway Serial Killer initiative. So is a 1988 Jane Doe homicide victim found along Interstate 59 in Dade County, Ga.

There are more than 40 unidentified remains listed on the Georgia Bureau of Investigation's Web site. "It's the prevailing feeling that many of those victims are victims of this sort of crime," said John Bankhead, GBI spokesman.

A TRUSTING VICTIM

Lisa Manis was a free spirit who had no fear when encountering strangers.

"She never met anyone she didn't trust right away," said Rebecca Allen, Ms. Manis' sister.

So when the 23-year-old didn't call her family for a few months in 1993, no one back home in Michigan paid much attention. After all, Ms. Manis was known to hitchhike, and she was looking to establish a relationship with her estranged father in Tennessee.

But police believe her trusting nature fell victim to a highway serial killer. Her body was found June 12, 1993, off Mountain Creek Road, just a few hundred yards from U.S. Highway 27.

Ms. Manis had been in the Chattanooga area for a few weeks, hanging out at the Palomino Club on Rossville Boulevard and applying for jobs at various restaurants. She told her family that she had ridden with a trucker to get to Tennessee, Lt. Carroll said.

When police found her body, it had no identification. After local media showed a post-mortem photo of Ms. Manis, "people at the restaurants recognized her and called us," Lt. Carroll said.

Now that case is in the FBI database with nameless victims. Police hope that the facts of Ms. Manis' death will link her case to some other victim and then, perhaps, to a suspect.

JUST A START

In 2007, there were more than 40,000 unidentified human remains known to exist nationwide. Not all were victims of crimes, a handful were suicide victims.

The FBI admits that its listing of 500 homicide victims is a paltry start.

"We feel that there are many more victims than the estimated 500 who could be included in the database," Agent Todd said. "In fact, the purpose of publicizing the initiative is to encourage law enforcement agencies to send cases to (the FBI's Violent Criminal Apprehension Program)."

Chattanooga police invited area law enforcement authorities to a 2005 workshop to discuss the Highway Serial Killer initiative and to encourage other cities and counties to take part.

"No matter how small the department, they can enter the information into the system," Lt. Carroll said.

The wider the network, and the more victims and suspects entered, the more likely police are to make an arrest. So far, there have been successes.

"Electronic timelines have been developed on 46 trucker drivers and are available to law enforcement investigators," Agent Todd said. "At least 10 suspects, who are responsible for more than 30 homicides, have been placed in custody since 2004. All of the suspects are truck drivers, but not all were on duty at the time of their crimes."

Lt. Carroll hopes to use one such timeline from Bruce Mendenhall, a trucker accused of killing four women in Tennessee and Georgia. Officials here want to know when Mr. Mendenhall was in the area and if his truck log corresponds with local cases.

NOT ALL BAD GUYS

Truckers say knowing that a few people in their profession have been involved in such crimes is not a surprise, but it is yet another black eye for an often-maligned profession.

"I've been doing this 15 years, and truckers are some of the best folks you could know," said Bruce Blankenship, a Michigan-based trucker refilling off Interstate 75 last week. "There are bad guys on the road, yes, but there are really good guys, too. I'm the kind of person that would give somebody a ride and tell them about my grandkids."


The FBI acknowledges that the trucking industry has been helpful in assembling the data.

"While the list of subjects involved in the HSK initiative consists of long-haul truckers, this represents a very small percentage of the drivers within the industry," Agent Todd said. "The vast majority of the drivers are honest, law-abiding citizens. We have received overwhelming support and cooperation from the trucking industry throughout the initiative."

Still, it pays to be wary, one trucker said.

"For every 10 guys who read their Bible at the truck stop, there are others looking for drugs and hookers," said William Morgan, a New Orleans trucker passing through the area. "It's scary, but this is a good profession for guys like me and a whole bunch of others who are just working-class guys doing the best we can."

BY THE NUMBERS

The FBI's Highway Serial Killer initiative keeps track of unidentified remains found along interstate trucking routes as well as suspected serial killers in a effort to solve hundreds of killings across the country.

* 500 unidentified human remains recorded
* 200 suspected serial killers
* 10 cases with in 60 miles of Chattanooga
* 10 suspects arrested for 30 homicides
Source: Federal Bureau of Investigation

ON THE WEB

States and local government list unidentified remains in hopes the public can help identify the victims.

* In Chattanooga: tinyurl.com/Hamilton-listing

* In Georgia: tinyurl.com/GBI-listing

* In Alabama: tinyurl.com/alabama-listing

* National: www.doenetwork.org/ 

http://www6.lexisnexis.com/publisher/EndUser?Action=UserDisplayFullDocument&orgId=574&topicId=100020825&docId=l:978499839&start=13
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« Reply #3 on: June 09, 2009, 12:17:04 PM »

Missing foot found in Seattle Washington..

http://www.clickorlando.com/video/19661674/index.html

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« Reply #4 on: June 09, 2009, 12:21:41 PM »

This map shows the more than 500 cases in our Highway Serial Killings Initiative database; the red dots mark where bodies or remains have been found along highways over the past 30 years.

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« Reply #5 on: June 09, 2009, 01:06:39 PM »

BREMERTON, Wash. —  Bones were dug up at a Washington state construction site by detectives investigating the discovery of a severed foot.

Kitsap County sheriff's spokesman Scott Wilson says the bones uncovered Monday have been turned over to forensics specialists with the King County medical examiner's office.

Authorities believe they are human bones.

The burial site was indicated by cadaver dogs brought in to help search, after a foot was found Saturday in a boot at the south Kitsap County construction site.

The Kitsap Sun reports sheriff's detectives and investigators from the Kitsap County coroner's office and State Patrol crime lab have been digging slowly and carefully to preserve any evidence.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,525554,00.html


The only reason I put this here is because LE says there are no missing persons reported in the area of this body being found.
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« Reply #6 on: June 14, 2009, 08:01:21 PM »

I have for a long time figured this was going on.  I did not know they had a specific task force for these killings.  I am so glad to see they do have one.

If anyone here is working on trying to identify any of the bodies found which seem to be connected to longhaul truckers, please let me know.  I would like to help.
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« Reply #7 on: January 09, 2010, 08:34:29 AM »

Happy Face Killer pleads guilty to slaying

Friday, January 8th, 2010.

RIVERSIDE - A serial killer known for drawing smiley faces in his correspondence pleaded guilty today to the 1992 slaying of a woman whose body was found in a remote area on the eastern edge of Riverside County.

Keith Hunter Jesperson, dubbed "The Happy Face Killer,'' is already serving a life sentence for the 1995 slaying of an Oregon woman and has admitted killing women throughout the country.

Jesperson pleaded guilty this afternoon to first-degree murder in connection with the death of an unidentified woman whose remains were found near Blythe and was sentenced to 25 years to life in prison.

"We were able to achieve justice on behalf of an innocent victim regardless of the fact that we may never even know her identity,'' District Attorney Rod Pacheco said.

"Each and every victim deserves the opportunity to have justice and to have their perpetrator held accountable.''

Jesperson will be returned to Oregon to continue serving his time there, said Deputy District Attorney Laura Ozolz. The sentence imposed in Riverside County will be tacked onto his life term there.

The woman's remains were found by deputies on Aug. 30, 1992, west of state Route 95, just outside of Blythe.

"When we found her, she was more or less just bones,'' said Ozolz.

Investigators determined the victim was 5-foot-3, blonde, between 20 and 30 years old. She is still listed as a Jane Doe, according to the prosecutor.

The initial investigation went cold until 1994, when Jesperson was identified as a possible suspect, but was not arrested.

In 1996, he provided a written account of the murder and the specific location where he disposed of the victim's body. The defendant referred to her as "Claudia,'' according to sheriff's officials.

Authorities believe Jesperson's killing rampage started around 1990. His career as a long-haul trucker took him through numerous towns. He picked up his first victim, 23-year-old Taunja Bennett, in a Portland, Ore. bar.

Jesperson boasted about killing women in letters to the police and the media, often signing the correspondence with a smiley face.

http://www.myvalleynews.com/story/44542/
« Last Edit: January 09, 2010, 08:36:29 AM by Nut44x4 » Logged

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« Reply #8 on: January 09, 2010, 08:40:35 AM »

Unidentified White Female

The Doe Network:
Case File 130UFCA

SKETCHES of victim at DOE link...I can't get them here
Located on August 30, 1992 in Blythe, Riverside County, California.
Estimated Date of Death is 2 - 6 weeks prior
Cause of death is suspected to be homicide.

Vital Statistics

Estimated age: 21-26 years old
Approximate Height and Weight: 5' 4".
Distinguishing Characteristics: She had blonde or light brown hair, possibly shoulder length.
Clothing: Wearing a gray shirt and jeans. Gold glitter on her fingernails and toenails.
Other: She was possibly using the name of Claudia and hitchhiking at truck stops.
Dentals: Dental records are available. She had some missing teeth and amalgam fillings.

Case History
The victim was found in open desert area, in Blythe. 100 feet west of Highway 95 and one mile north of Second Avenue. It is unknown where the death occurred, it is believed she was dumped where she was found. Investigators determined that she had been dead for a number of weeks.
Serial-Killer Keith Hunter Jesperson confessed to her homicide. He claimed her name was Claudia and that she wanted a ride to Phoenix, Arizona with him.

Investigators
If you have any information concerning this case, please contact:
Riverside County Sheriff's Department
Coroner
909 443-2300

Agency Case Number:
75783
NCIC Number:
U-767634511
Please refer to this number when contacting any agency with information regarding this case.
Source Information: Riverside County Sheriff's Department
The Crimelibrary
The Press-Enterprise
http://www.doenetwork.org/cases/130ufca.html
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
NaMus has the case.....

https://identifyus.org/cases/2918
« Last Edit: January 09, 2010, 08:44:21 AM by Nut44x4 » Logged

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« Reply #9 on: January 09, 2010, 08:54:15 AM »

Here is a more recent bone find that I have had my eye on. I suppose this could be anybody....but, could be another KHJ victim.......need more info on the bones...

Skull and bones found in desert
 
08:24 AM PST on Wednesday, December 9, 2009
A skull and jawbone are among human skeletal remains found yesterday in the desert near Blythe, according to Riverside County sheriff's officials.

Detectives arrived at the scene about 2:30 p.m. Tuesday along Graham Pass Road about five miles south of Chuckwalla Road.

The bones were taken to the coroner's office for examination by a forensic anthropologist in an attempt to identify the person. Anyone with information about the case may call homicide detectives at 760-393-3300.
http://www.pe.com/localnews/inland/stories/PE_News_Local_S_webskull09.13bd2eb.html
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I should take some time and search how many unidentified bodies/remains have been found in the Blythe area over the years...
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« Reply #10 on: October 05, 2010, 07:19:56 AM »

Along Highways, Signs Of Serial Killings
10/5/2010 6:06:48 AM 

(USA TODAY) A passerby found the severed head on Feb. 10, wrapped in two plastic bags and stuffed inside a backpack in Barstow, Calif. Authorities still haven't identified the victim or her killer, but the circumstances point in a particular direction.

The teenage girl likely had been killed days earlier, Barstow police say. Her head lay a few hundred yards from a truck stop just off Interstate 15, not far from I-40. To authorities, the proximity to the truck stop and the interstates suggests that the slaying might have been the work of a distinctive type of criminal: a serial killer operating along the nation's highways.

During the past four decades, at least 459 people may have died at the hands of highway serial killers, FBI statistics show. Investigators do not know how many people may be responsible for the killings but at least one such case - of murder, attempted murder or unidentified human remains - has been reported in 48 states, along roads as far north as Alaska and as far south as Key West. They believe the killers find their victims and dispose of the bodies along highways, sometimes near quiet roadside rest areas or at bustling truck stops.

Often, the victims are prostitutes, abducted in one state and dumped in another. And the killers? Authorities say they have 200 suspects; almost all are long-haul truck drivers. To date, the FBI says it has helped local authorities arrest at least 10 suspects believed to be involved in more than 30 of the killings.

That still appears to leave hundreds of killings unsolved, and the cases continue to mount. Not every killing along the nation's roadways is related, but since the FBI went public with the Highway Serial Killings initiative last year, local authorities have been sending information about unsolved slayings that fit the profile to FBI analysts.

Their hope: that the analysts can offer leads or find connections to other killings that may have happened years ago or several states away. Some of the killings recently added to the Highway Serial Killings database date back several years. Others, such as the one in Barstow, are relatively new.

"We seem to have one a week that comes in," says Michael Harrigan, the special agent who oversaw the FBI's effort for the past three years. "It could be a killing that's 30 years old. It could be one that happened a week ago." Whether the oldest and coldest cases can be solved, Harrigan is uncertain. But he's hopeful.

Harrigan and other law enforcement authorities believe serial killers still operate along some of the most well-traveled roads in the nation.

"They're out there," he says.

Even so, the FBI won't divulge the names of the victims, the dates the victims were abducted or discovered, even the locations where the killers either found their victims or dumped the bodies - places motorists might wish to avoid.

Despite President Obama's pledge of a more transparent government, Harrigan says the bureau is bound by its promise to local law enforcement not to disclose any details of the slayings - even basic information that is public record. The FBI makes such a promise so that local agencies will share details of the crimes with the bureau, Harrigan says.

Through a Freedom of Information Act request filed this year, USA TODAY sought those details. "Many families drive from state to state and need accurate information to determine where they should and should not stop," USA TODAY wrote in its request.

The FBI denied the request, even though the bureau had posted on its website a small image of a U.S. map last year that shows the general location of many of the highway slayings.

Harrigan says a typical motorist isn't in danger. At least 234 victims were prostitutes, he says, and stranded motorists represent "a very, very small" number of the homicide cases. But Harrigan will not say how many, and he acknowledges that investigators know "nothing" about 130 of the victims. Among the mysteries are more than 80 cases - including the February case in Barstow - in which authorities couldn't identify the remains or recovered only body parts.

"It's creepy," says Keith Libby, the police detective in Barstow, Calif., who is handling the severed-head case. Libby says the victim appears to have been white or Hispanic, and police have released an image of how they think the victim looked. Beyond that, Libby says, investigators are hoping for help - from the public and from the FBI.

"We have nothing," he says. "Nothing."

A dangerous subculture

Although the FBI launched the serial killer initiative in 2004, violence along the nation's highways is hardly new. Stopping crime at the thousands of rest areas, truck stops and travel plazas, however, remains difficult. In part, that's because the responsibility for policing rest areas varies from state to state. That often means no consistent records are kept about the rate of crimes, and no single agency takes ownership for fighting it.

But crimes also are difficult to stop because of the location of the rest areas - along major roadways. That makes getting away easy; just jump onto an interstate and speed off. At some locations, private security guards try to keep watch or police cruise through. Elsewhere, cameras monitor the area. Neither of those approaches offer any guarantees.

Sometimes, the crimes at these stops along the highways are orchestrated by sophisticated criminals. Some deal drugs. Others sell sex. And, like weary travelers, other dangerous criminals might use rest areas for the purpose for which they were intended: to rest. The Beltway Snipers, who terrorized the Washington, D.C., area for weeks in 2002, were caught after they pulled into a rest area to sleep. (Whether the snipers, John Allen Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo, are suspects in any of the highway killing cases is unclear. Muhammad was executed last year; Malvo remains in prison.)

What makes crime at rest areas and truck stops unique and especially troubling is that it occurs in spots intended to be oases for travelers - places where motorists expect to be able to relax and unwind, grab a meal and use the toilet.

"It used to be the place to go. It used to be the safe haven," says Sgt. Pat Postiglione, a detective with the Metro Nashville (Tenn.) Police Department. "But now, I think the opposite is occurring."

That's not the case everywhere, says Lisa Mullings, president of NATSO, a trade group that represents the truck stop and travel plaza industry. Mullings says most of the areas remain "probably one of the safest places to stop. There's always people."

Indeed, some truck stops have become more like bustling neighborhoods - for better or worse.

"It's kind of like when you live in the big city," says Frank Silio, a long-haul trucker since 1990. "You want to make sure you look at the quality of the people there. Are they paying too much attention to you?"

At many truck stops, the area for cars is separate from the area for semi-trailer trucks. The worlds are just as distinct, especially after sundown. On the trucking side, prostitutes might wander from cab to cab, looking for business.

"It is dangerous," says Vednita Carter, the executive director of Breaking Free, a Minnesota-based group that helps women escape prostitution. "They're having sex with them in the trucks." The truckers "might drive off and say, 'Well we can't stay here,' and they'll never come back."

Truckers even have names for the truck-stop prostitutes: lot lizards or fender lizards. "Those are the terms we hear all the time. But you only hear it there," Postiglione says.

"It's almost like a subculture, to be honest with you," Postiglione says. "You've got the family going to Myrtle Beach on one side, and you have the shady-looking truckers on the other. ... You have a lot of good truckers out there," Postiglione quickly adds, but "you have other truckers who go to these truck stops and get drugs or prostitutes."

Postiglione has good reason to think as he does. On June 26, 2007, the body of Sara Nicole Hulbert was found at a Nashville truck stop off I-24. Hulbert, 25, had been shot. Her killer also had used black electrical tape to fasten a plastic bag over her head. Postiglione contacted the FBI to tell analysts about that case and another similar killing in Lebanon, Tenn. He had little to go on except some surveillance tape of trucks coming and going from the Nashville truck stop around the time of the killing.

On July 12, 2007, Postiglione was near the truck stop when he noticed a semi that "seemed familiar." He followed it to the truck stop where Hulbert's body had been found and questioned the driver. When he looked inside the cab, he noticed a garbage bag. Inside was bloody clothing. The blood, he recalls, was fresh. The clothes, however, didn't belong to Hulbert.

Authorities now believe they belonged to another woman, Carma Purpura, who had disappeared the night before at a truck stop in Indianapolis. "There were items of female clothing ... that came back with Ms. Purpura's DNA," says Denise Robinson, a prosecutor in Marion County, Ind.

The trucker, Bruce Mendenhall, 56, was convicted in May in the Hulbert killing. He's likely to stand trial for at least three similar killings, including the slayings in Lebanon and Indianapolis. Postiglione believes other unsolved cases also might lead to Mendenhall.

"He's 56 and just starts killing people at 56?" Postiglione says, incredulous. "I have to believe that he may have been killing over the years but changed his methods. There's probably another victim or two out there that we're not linking yet."

Timelines are key

That search for connections between crimes is where the FBI effort has proved useful. Analysts continue to develop timelines for each of the 200 suspects, trying to determine whether their whereabouts match any of the unsolved killings.

Technology has made that effort easier - at least in terms of the most recent killings and any possible connections to truckers. Many truck companies, for instance, track their drivers using GPS. And when a trucker uses a toll road, systems such as E-ZPass log it. Credit card records and surveillance tapes also help pinpoint who used the truck stop around the time when a prostitute there vanished.

The timelines are "tedious," FBI agent Harrigan says. "We want to look back and try to figure out, were there any other killings where they were?"

Harrigan says analysts might hear about five cases a week. They seem to fit the profile, but further investigation shows a serial killer isn't to blame. No matter, Harrigan says getting information from local law enforcement is critical. Already, the FBI has heard from law enforcement in 340 jurisdictions. Even if some of those cases turn out to be unrelated to the serial killer inquiries, others do, and those that do might be key in solving slayings hundreds of miles apart, Harrigan says.

The FBI and other law enforcement authorities also are careful not to condemn truckers as a whole. "We don't view this as some sort of indictment of the industry," Harrigan says.

As Norita Taylor, a spokesman for a trucking trade group says, millions of truckers are on the roads each day. Even if all of the highway serial killers happen to be truckers, that's still a tiny minority of the profession, says Taylor, spokesman for the Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association.

Trucker Silio hopes motorists won't stereotype. "Not all people riding motorcycles are bad people, either," he says. Others, including Nashville detective Postiglione, wonder whether the trucking profession might be a draw for someone "predisposed to become a serial killer."

With help from the FBI, David Campbell, a detective with the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Office, was able to link trucker Eugene Upshaw to a year-old sexual assault near a truck stop in Castaic, Calif. In late August, authorities arrested Upshaw near Rochester, N.Y. He stands accused of beating and raping a woman and is "a person of interest in similar sexual assaults," Campbell says.

"What a perfect manner if that's what you're into," Campbell says. "What better way to mask your wrongdoings than by going from state to state doing a legitimate job?"

http://www.wltx.com/news/local/story.aspx?storyid=101202&catid=142
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