Hi, Crime Junkies. I'm your host, Ashley Flowers, and listen, summer is officially coming to
an end, but I hear you guys, you guys have been so vocal about loving the Thursday throwback
episodes we were doing. So I figured maybe we could keep it going a little bit longer.
It just so happens we have 16 weeks left in 2024. So for each Thursday through the rest
of the year, I'm going to be giving you a different episode of Crime Junkie from the
archives. Or if you're a new listener, it's stuff buried in the back catalog of hundreds
and hundreds of episodes. It's almost like my very own era's tour, if you will, honoring
these past cases and the evolution of Crime Junkie Nation. But there's also a secret message
hidden among these 16 episodes. So see if you can find the Easter eggs among them.
And to start, I'm starting right here in my hometown of Indianapolis with a case that
we released just a couple of months after we launched Crime Junkie. So be kind, because
this is Ashley and Brit circa 2018 when we were just baby crime junkies. This is the
story of one of Indianapolis's most infamous serial killers, Herb Baumeister.
This is the story of one of the most famous serial killers in the world.
All right, Crime Junkies, I heard you and I'm finally covering the local Indianapolis
serial killer Herb Baumeister. This has been requested over and over and over. So let's
just do it. And a quick note, as I was like researching this case, I've always known about
this case at a very high level. Yeah. But for whatever reason, I always thought that
it took place in like the 70s. It didn't? No, it took place in like the I mean, really
when everything blew up was like the late 90s. Really? Yeah, I don't remember this like
because that would make it contemporary to us. Yeah, to a certain extent. Yeah, which
I don't know why. But it's super recent. And for some reason, it makes it way more interesting
for some reason to me. So I'm into it. Let's do it. Yeah. So I'm gonna start the story
in 1993. There was a 32 year old man named Roger who goes out to an Indianapolis gay
bar one night and never returns home. His mother is immediately concerned the next
morning when he doesn't arrive home by 1030. And she just has a feeling that something
is wrong. She says the first thing she did was call his friend Rick. And just a side
note, like I was watching this on a documentary and the mom's talking about the friend Rick
and cut to Rick. His title is partner. So mom's straight in denial. But okay, cool. This
I mean, the documentary is like in the 90s. So, you know, indies come a long way since
then, at least I like to think. So his partner of 17 years, Rick said that he knew all of
Roger's friends, he knew where he hung out. And after he exhausted all of those leads
and still couldn't find him, he basically started this crazy calling tree where everyone
in the community was calling around asking if anyone had seen him asking if they saw
anything suspicious asking if they saw him out at the club that night. But after 48 hours
of not hearing anything from him and not having a sighting of him, his mother goes to report
him missing. But apparently, in 1993, there was this crazy rule that there was a 30 day
waiting period before police could do an investigation into a missing person case. 30 days. 30 days.
I've heard like a 24 48 hour thing, but I've never heard of 30 days. I had never heard
this either. So I didn't know if this is maybe like an adult thing or if I mean, this was
early 90s, maybe people in the gay community weren't getting the kind of attention. I
have no idea. But I was shocked. But basically, they said they wanted to make sure they just
didn't show back up. So Roger's mom and his friend slash partner, Rick, are like, forget
this, like, we're doing this ourselves. And they go and hire a PI. He's a retired officer
named Virgil, who is on the case full Colombo style. He starts asking around, putting feelers
out and a few days into his investigation, he gets a really worrisome call. Another family wants to
hire him and they too have a gay son who went missing after he was last known to have gone out
to a gay bar in Indianapolis. And the similarities don't end there. This missing man's name is Alan,
and he's about the same height, same weight as Roger. They both have similar jobs. Neither one
had a cell phone or credit cards that they could track down. So the only thing Virgil could do was
hit the streets and talk to people. He made up flyers for both men and had a team that would go
out when the clubs were crowded and talk to the usuals there. And really, their legwork pays off
because they start getting tips that the night Roger was out, he was seen getting into a car
with a man in the front of the library downtown. The only details they can get from these witnesses
was that the car was blue and it had an Ohio license plate. They also went down a little bit
of a rabbit hole at this point because they got a tip that there was this male prostitution ring
being run out of a downtown business in Indianapolis and Roger might have been involved with it. So the
investigator has his team spend a ton of time staking this place out, but absolutely nothing
comes of it. So it was a little bit of time wasted. They eventually go back to staking out the clubs,
looking for this blue car with an Ohio license plate, since they felt that it was really the
best lead that they had to go off of. Weeks go by, no one spots this car. So police start to think
that maybe this was a bogus tip as well. Then another tip comes in that makes Virgil really
concerned. A publisher for gay magazine calls Virgil and says, I just want you to be aware
that the two guys you're looking for are not the only ones. We've been getting reports of a number
of gay men going missing in Indianapolis. And I don't know how this publisher knew this. My only
thought is that perhaps families were having trouble getting law enforcement to take these
cases seriously and went to the media. Yeah. And maybe they were trying to like get articles
published in magazines that they thought would be circulated in the communities that their sons
were tied to. I have no idea, but that's what I can assume. And this is when Virgil gets his first
inclination that he might be dealing with a serial killer. At this point, the 30 day mark has finally
hit on Roger's case and police were going to look into his disappearance and take it seriously.
What INPD hadn't told Virgil, but Virgil has heard rumors of through that magazine publisher,
was that there were in fact a number of gay men who had vanished into thin air in Indianapolis.
To be exact, there were a total of eight men over two years that police believe could have been
connected. That's so many. As Roger's family, that would be infuriating. His case should have
been taken so much more seriously. Yeah. I mean, you would think that they would have connected
them and realized that Roger probably just didn't run off if there's this pattern. And police even
had a suspect for these. Apparently, there was a man who they were able to link to three of the
missing men and all three had a relationship with him at some point. But this guy actually ended up
being super cooperative and he submitted to a voluntary search of his home and even let
the police take cadaver dogs through his property and they couldn't find anything to link him to
the missing men. So they eventually had to let that lead die. And police at this point have nothing
to go on. They're basically waiting for one of these guys to either show back up or for another
man to go missing and maybe leave some more clues. Well, thank God at this point, while they're just
sitting and waiting, a man named Tony calls into police with a crazy story and it totally gives
them the first credible lead that they've had in a long time. So here's the story that Tony tells them.
He's out at one of the bars that night where the missing men had frequented and he meets
a white male in his 40s. They're getting along, they have a couple drinks and this guy who says
his name is Brian Smart invites him back to his place for some more drinks and to go for a swim.
And Tony agrees. So they get in this guy's car, drive and drive and drive and he realizes he's
driving him way north out of downtown to what he calls a mansion. And when they get to the house,
Brian offers Tony a cocktail, which he refuses and Brian seems flustered by that. He excuses
himself for a couple of minutes and when he comes back, he's looser, he's chatty. So Tony thinks
that maybe he like went to the bathroom and did drugs or something. Brian leads Tony to this
indoor lap pool that he has for a dip, but the pool room was straight up the creepiest thing
like I could ever imagine. Okay, if a man takes you home and he takes you to his pool, what is
the creepiest thing that could be in this pool room that would just give you the heebie jeebies
from head to toe? I know what's in there so I can't say. Oh, you already know. Okay. So all
the listeners had a chance to guess. The creepiest thing is surrounding the entire pool are mannequins
dressed up and posed. And Brian says he gets lonely there and he likes to stage these mannequins
like he's having a party and these are his friends. Can you imagine walking and like,
especially because like I imagine it like a like a hotel pool when it's closed, you know,
so it's kind of dark, but there's lights in the pool. Oh, yeah. And it's humid and it smells like
chlorine and you just see this party literally of mannequins. And you can see like the water and
like the light ripples and like it's full body chills. So Tony doesn't go out running at this
point. And this is my crime junkie life rule number five. Oh my God. If someone is creeping
you the F out, it is okay to be rude. I don't know why people don't trust their senses. This
guy is home alone in a mansion with mannequin friends. And that's weird. And it's okay to
tell this guy that he's being weird. Like side note, I'm going to go off on a tangent for just
a second. I was reading a story just yesterday on Facebook about how this girl at a local mire here
in Indiana was kind of being followed around by this guy. I read that too. Yeah. And she's like
in a store and he's following her and he's asking her all the questions that we know people ask
when they're like going to take someone like, do you have family? Would someone be waiting for you?
And she says that she's checking out and he's following her and he only buys like a gum or
something. Yeah. Just buys a stick of gum and she's like trying to act like her car doesn't work.
And then she's walking out to her car and she, the guy's still following her. She's getting
freaked out. So she like goes, she sees a guy getting out of his car and she's like, Oh,
Ted, I haven't seen you in so long. And she writes this message on her phone. Like
this guy's following me. Pretend I know you. And this guy plays along, but I'm like,
cause she's like, she said something like, I think I've been trying to get a hold of you,
but I think I have the wrong number. Can you check and shows him in his phone? Which honestly,
brilliant. No, but, but why, why go through this whole charade? If this guy is being a weirdo,
just like acknowledge that he's being a weirdo and he's following you, go straight to security or
tell this guy, you know, he's following you. You're not going to fall for this. I don't know why
everyone is so afraid of being rude because honestly, worst case scenario, like this guy is
totally normal and you're, he's just going to think you're a weirdo who's rude, but like,
you'll never see him again. Be a weirdo. Yeah. Be a weirdo, be rude, stay alive. Who cares what
this guy thinks? I mean, if you really, I don't know. I don't know why people don't trust their
senses. I don't know why this guy saw these mannequins around the pool and like played it cool.
I'm going to take a deep breath because I'm really worked up right now, but that's my rule. The
weird, be rude, stay alive. So this guy is polite though. And as a result, he is about to almost
straight up die. Tony is swimming and while he's swimming, Brian asked him if he's ever tried to
be choked during sex. He tells them that it really heightens everything. It's unlike anything you've
ever experienced. And he asked him if he wants to try it. So wait, a man who has mannequin friends
wants to choke you. That's yeah, totally normal. I get it. Okay. Yeah. Well,
Tony thinks it's totally normal too. He'll try anything once, I guess, because he agrees.
He lets Brian wrap a pool hose around his neck and Brian begins to pull. And Tony says that
there was this moment when he realizes Brian's pulling tighter and tighter. And in his mind,
he says, oh crap, this guy isn't going to stop. He is going to kill me. So instead of fighting,
what Tony does is he pretends to pass out and Brian lets up. But when Tony opens his eyes,
he says that Brian looks totally shocked and he tried to play it off like, oh, yep,
that's exactly how it was supposed to go. And Tony eventually gets out of the home alive
and well, but he was sure that whatever was happening to the men in Indianapolis,
this guy had something to do with it. But police are fearful that Brian isn't done with Tony
because Brian actually keeps reaching out to Tony afterwards. He calls him. He even shows up at his
house. So they're afraid that he's like thinking that Tony is a loose end. But for as much as
Tony learned about Brian Smart, he really knew nothing. Police knew that this guy was using a
nickname because they couldn't find anything on him. And while Tony remembers that they drove
north and he saw a sign with the word farms on it, he didn't remember anything else. He said that the
house had a like really long curvy driveway, but he couldn't remember specific directions. He
couldn't remember what road they were on. So police convinced Tony to act as bait for them.
Since Brian is reaching out to him and obviously wants to get back together with him, whether
it's to kill him or be with him or whatever, they say, you know, we're going to have you meet up with
him and then go to his house so we can follow you. They set up a meeting time, but Brian either got
really lucky or he knew the police were on to him because he didn't show up. So police are extra
concerned that this guy might be their man. So they take what they have to the drawing board,
man named Brian, long curvy driveway somewhere north of Indianapolis and a sign out from the
mansion that says farms on it. Also, Tony reconfirms the tip that police had gotten earlier
that the car he was in did have Ohio license plates. Police really hone in on the Ohio police
and they actually reached out to detectives there and wouldn't you know it, they have something to
add. Yes. Police in Ohio tell them that what they're experiencing has been going on in Ohio
since the mid 80s. In 85, 86, 89, and 90, they were finding bodies of strangled men off of I-70,
which runs east to west from Indiana to Ohio. They had traced all of these men to the gay
community in Indianapolis and found out that all of them were last seen there. The police are
confident that this is the same guy, but why change MOs? Why start dumping bodies in a state
away and then just stop? And was he dumping them somewhere else? Or why aren't they showing up? Is
he keeping them alive? Everyone close to the investigation believed that the guy's confidence
was growing. And this was concerning because he's getting more comfortable. The murders were getting
closer and closer together. He's clearly getting better at what he's doing because police can't
even find the bodies now. Right. And he is showing no signs of slowing down.
After they talk to police in Ohio, they decide to have a meeting with the police from the
Northern District in Indiana. They explain what little info they have and ask everyone,
do you know of a property that has this winding driveway that leads to a big house with an indoor
pool and would be called something farms? And sure enough, police in Hamilton County recognize this
as a home off of 156th Street. Not a couple of homes like V1 home. Yeah. Yep. It's 156th Street
is in a suburb off of Indianapolis called Westfield. They send investigators to do a drive by,
basically check this place out. And they come across this estate called Fox Hollow Farms and
it matches Tony's description to a T. They find out that the home doesn't belong to anyone named
Brian. It's the home of Herb and Julie Baumeister and their three children.
Indie police are ready to turn this place upside down and look for anything that will connect
this house to their missing men. But the home isn't located in their jurisdiction. And when
they go to the Hamilton County judge, the judge won't sign off on any search warrant based on
one quote, unreliable witness. And they say Herb is an upstanding businessman in their community
and they won't infringe on his rights based on a rumor. So no help from them. About the same time,
there's a man in one of these gay clubs that sees a suspect exactly like the police have described
getting into a car with Ohio license plate and he actually takes down the license plate number.
And when he gives that to police, sure enough, the car is registered to Herb.
They even show a picture of Herb to the guy who he almost killed. And Tony says,
yeah, it's definitely a close match to the guy I went home with that night. And they take both of
this to Hamilton County and Hamilton County still won't approve a search warrant. At this point,
all they can do is learn about Herb and keep an eye on him. And they really dig into his backstory,
find out who he is now, who he was. And this is what they learn about him. He came from a pretty
well-to-do family in Indianapolis. His dad was an anesthesiologist and Herb was one of four kids.
Early on in his life, he displayed some disturbing and unusual signs. For example,
the Department of Psychology at Radford University studied Herb's life and found that in
adolescence, he used to ponder what it was like to taste human urine. And he would pull unusual
pranks like he found this dead bird once. And he would place it on a teacher's desk just to like
see her reaction. And according to this research, his father knew that something wasn't right with
him. And he would take him to get these like secret tests done. And very few results remain
from what they found. But it appears that he was diagnosed with schizophrenia and the possibility
of multiple personalities. But there wasn't any more documentation outside of this. So his dad
more than likely knew that there was something wrong with him and didn't attempt to get him help
from everything we can see. Yes, like he took him to get these tests, but there was like no follow-up
done. He didn't have him like get treated. He wasn't in therapy. So unless he did and it wasn't
documented, then likely no. And really likely he wasn't didn't get help because he went on to
do these horrible things. Right, right. So he grew up as kind of a loner. And when he graduated,
he went to IU, spent like one semester there, dropped out, tried working. He eventually went
back to IU in the fall of 1967. And there he met a woman named Julia. Julia was quoted as saying,
he was nice, fun to be with, good looking. We both liked cars and we're both young Republicans.
And that's stating it lightly. They were both like mad conservatives. And they actually stated
this as one of the things that brought them together. And they got married in 1971 and
ended up buying a house together in Indianapolis. We know dad saw some crazy tendencies or something,
but Julie didn't. From all of her interviews, no, she didn't see any signs of the schizophrenia
or the multiple personality. She said that they even did everything together too. So it's not like
they were apart. She said like when they were doing yard work, he was mowing, she was trimming,
they were together all the time. She didn't see anything. But I think there were little signs that
you know, looking back on, you want to point out, but maybe in the time just seemed like weird herb.
During the early years of their marriage, Julie taught English and he began clerking at the State
Bureau of Motor Vehicles. And he would end up working his way up to supervisors. So he had to
be able to function pretty normally. But during his time there, people remember him doing some
strange stuff. For example, one time he was upset with his boss. So he peed on his desk. And another
time a coworker said that she caught her. He had actually been keeping a cake in like his bottom
desk drawer and not to eat it like or to snack on, but he would open it up every day and look at it
because he wanted to watch it deteriorate. So are you familiar with the McDonald triad? No. Okay,
so I was gonna bring this up when he brought up his dad noticing things. So the McDonald triad,
I don't know a ton about the history of it, but it's basically three things that you can see in
the future. Ooh, can I guess what they are? Sure. Cruelty to animals, setting fires?
Yes. Now I'm forgetting the triad, but possibly. Okay, what's a triad? Because I don't know. So
there's a bedwetting, cruelty to animals, and I think it is setting fires. But he had tendencies
to want to drink people's urine, which reminds me of bedwetting. And the teacher had a dead bird
that he found on her desk. What's the likelihood that the bird was already dead when he found it?
So that's two out of three. Plus he peed on a desk as an adult and wanted to watch something decay
at his workplace. Those seem like pretty big indicators of the triad to me. Right. So he,
again, he had these signs and his dad was seeing these signs and his coworkers even were like
seeing some of this at work. They said at work, he was actually a perfectionist given to like
sudden unprovoked rages. And all of this stuff, again, in hindsight is creepy AF. But I can
imagine at the time, Herb's just like the coworker everyone has who you're like, Oh, just her being
crazy herb. It's that one crazy guy I work with. Like, yeah, avoid him, but we work together. He's
benign, whatever. Herb's just looking at his cake in the drawer. Like he, you know what I mean? Like,
I feel like I worked with people who are like, weird. The closest Julie ever got to recognizing
something was truly wrong was in the early 70s. Herb became so depressed that his father actually
had him committed for over a month to a psychiatric hospital. Julie didn't dispute the decision. She
said that he was, quote, hurting and needing help. So again, they're saying it's just depression. I
don't know if it was something else. And again, it was his father that hadn't committed. So I don't
that like he saw his red flags, but didn't share it with Julie. But he gets out and it seems that
this was his only hospitalization as an adult. Julie and Herb go on to have three kids and they
open a chain of thrift stores in Indianapolis that end up doing pretty well to begin with.
And he and his family buy this $1 million estate called Fox Hollow Farms. Something police note
is that at the time they purchased this estate, bodies stopped showing up in Ohio.
So was he just dumping bodies in Ohio and now he has a place for them or something?
What they're thinking is that like before they had this small house, they didn't have a ton of land.
So if he were to kill somebody, he can't dump them in the front yard. You don't want to bury them on
public property. It's likely they'll be found. So they think he was taking them to Ohio. Now he
doesn't even have to leave his own home. He can bury them on property that no one else can step
foot on without permission. So at this point police know his house is a dead ringer for Tony's story.
They know Herb is still a little bit off but they don't have anything solid and they know to get
evidence they need to get on to this property. They make an attempt to confront Herb face to face
at one of his thrift stores and he denies any involvement. He refuses to let them search his
home but police say that while they're talking to him, they can just see the vein in his neck
like pulsing out of his body. He's getting worked up. Oh yeah, they know he's lying.
So without his cooperation, their investigation is at a standstill. So three months pass before
they learn that Julie and Herb are getting a divorce and Herb is moved out. So the home
is just occupied by Julie and they're like bingo. Julie is our inn and they're hoping
that if they tell Julie that Herb is this suspect because at this point she still has no idea
that she and Herb will be on bad terms and maybe she will cooperate with them because of that.
So police go to Fox Hollow Farms confront Julie at the door telling her that they were investigating
her husband for quote homosexual homicide. That seems pretty specific. Is that a real thing?
Julie said the same thing. She was like what is the homosexual homicide? And I don't know if this
is again just them being like ignorant in the time. They would say they were searching for these guys
in quotes gay Indianapolis or if this is them attempting to like kind of like side eye wink
wink let her in on the fact that her husband was probably gay without saying it because again at
this point they couldn't prove that he had had sex with any of them. So I don't know. Julie says
I don't know what that is and when they go on to explain to her this these rash of disappearances
of gay men in Indianapolis along with bodies found in Ohio she's like nope getting a divorce but I
don't hate the man enough to help you say he's a murderer. Peace shut the door in your face.
Plus Julie has no clue that her husband might even be gay. Remember they fell in love because
they're uber conservative. So I'm sure in her mind she's like y'all got the wrong guy. There's
no way. Like she can't even fathom that he would be going to a gay club much less bringing back
these men and then murdering them at their home. But when they leave Julie obviously this stays
with her. She can't stop thinking about this and she remembers something strange that happened
several months earlier. Her son had come in from playing outside and he tells her that he found a
skull and you know little boys you're like okay so she goes out to check and sure enough there's
actually a cluster of bones and when Herb gets home she tells him about it and he's like oh
yeah that's just my dad's anatomy skeleton because my dad's a doctor and totally normal
never discussed it again. Herb cleaned up the bones and Julie just never saw that they never
totally normal yeah. Julie calls her attorney and she tells him about this visit from police
and she tells him this crazy story about the bones but she's like don't say anything to anyone like
this is just between you and me. WTF Julie come on. Oh I know I would be all about winning in
a divorce and this seems like a major trump card to play but while Julie is twiddling her thumbs
and trying to convince herself that her husband isn't a serial killer police get the idea to do
an infrared search of the property they don't need a search warrant to fly over and so they
get a team together with these special equipment that can detect body heat. Wouldn't it be a little
bit late for body heat to be detected if we're looking at actual piles of bones as opposed to
like even decomposing bodies? Yeah and that's what they find out if there are bodies anywhere on this
property they've been dead too long to show anything on these cameras so it is another
bust for law enforcement. While this is all going down the divorce between Julie and Herb
gets even more contemptuous and she starts fearing for her children and her lawyer says he even fears
for Julie's life and the final straw is when Herb took their son on a lake trip and refused to bring
him back home. So Julie's like all right I can't be in denial any longer when it comes to the safety
of my kids and myself so in June of 1996 she allows police to come on their property while
Herb's away and she shows them where her son had found the original skeleton but when police dig
up the area there's nothing there and they end up sitting Julie down and they try to take her
through their theory and their investigation and as they're walking her through this and talking
about when all these men have gone missing Julie compares those dates to her calendar and every
time a man went missing in Indianapolis she and the kids were out of town to this lake that they
would always go to so they would go for like a weekend or sometimes for a full week in the summer
and she said that Herb would always stay behind because he needed to tend to business and she
never even thought twice about it but now it was becoming clear to her that he was staying home for
other reasons. I was gonna ask how she had no idea that this was going on if it's happening in her
house but if she was out of town how could she? There was this lake that they would go to like an
hour hour and a half away and she would go with the kids all the time like just we're gonna pack
up for the weekend we're gonna go to the lake we're gonna go for a week and her being the family man
and like the guy in charge of he's got three thrift stores now like he has to stay home he
tend to the business he can't be gone for a week and with this link police are even more sure that
they have their guy and they start digging up the rest of the property with Julie's permission
when they start digging around on the rest of the property bones start popping up like whack-a-moles
they're everywhere and the police collect 11 bodies in total and 11 11 and in this documentary
like there was this passing note that they were like 11 bodies and no skulls were found and then
like excuse me no skulls were found what like you can't just be like but there were no heads
and keep going like i know we need to pause for a second and talk about the fact that
there were no heads i know but and like at some point there had to have been at least one head
right because that's what his son found so i don't know how legit this is i've seen it a couple of
times but where are the heads because they did have to identify the got the men that they found
the ones that they were able to identify there's still a handful that they haven't they identified
them through dna so not dental records wtf weirdy's heads up oh my god so police have 11 male bodies
on this guy's property they finally go back to hamilton county who would never give them a search
warrant and they're like okay we found this on our own we did it our own way we got permission
and we were proved right now we need to arrest this guy and hamilton county's like nah like i
know you found the bodies on his property but you can't prove that he killed them what right
so f this noise indian indianapolis police are getting nowhere herb's not coming home so
they're pretty sure he's gotten wind of the investigation is on the run and they go to
ohio police and ohio police decide that they're going to pick up the investigation since they
have bodies in their own territory julie had already confirmed with them that he had business
and date in ohio and all of his business trips coincided with bodies being found in ohio and
that is all ohio needed so they get a warrant for herb's car and tow it to ohio and process it
during this time that they're doing that police here in indianapolis here at that herb is in
northern michigan near the canadian border and he's been asking his brother to wire him money
but they can't pinpoint him ohio police are still processing the car and they realize that the trunk
liner has been totally removed and the only thing they can get is this itty-bitty spot of blood
that's too tiny to even process so even ohio hits a dead end and keep in mind with all of this
hamilton county still isn't even interested in this guy they're not looking for him come on i
know i don't know what more they need but they were so afraid of throwing one of their you know
upstanding citizens under the bus that i don't think i'll ever figure out what their deal was
like i'm not sure why they were so opposed to going after him i don't know if his father had
connections or he had connections who knows but bodies on your property still won't go after him
side note i did find this crazy clip online where herb had been interviewed by the local news about
how he was driving in the car with his son and he saw a government vehicle that was painting the
roadways like the stripes on the road this vehicle hits a raccoon and like paints over
him and just keeps driving and he acts like he is just totally appalled at their carelessness for
the life of this raccoon i said to my son they're gonna hit that raccoon with a spray gun and sure
enough they just swiped right over the space and didn't even move it you had no effort to you know
get it out of the way so i haven't had a pull right with me so i took a shot at the thing
a raccoon which met its demise on the yellow line became one with the paint the raccoon has since
been removed this is all that's left this was just you know a painter should have had a chalk line
drawn around his career by state officials there was no excuse for that i mean the third thing
is better faith than that so just what is the explanation so raccoon's a big deal meanwhile
this is like in the midst of his serial killer rampage where he's killing actual humans humans
and stowing them on his part and on his property yes i'll post the full video on our website so
you can see this guy but i assume this is the guy that hamilton county was seeing and was struggling
to arrest because they're like oh he feels bad for a raccoon i don't know how he could kill a human
um a little bit of a weird note too so the first thing he did when they run over this raccoon is
he like gets his polar camera and goes out and takes a picture he does like multiple pictures of
it so he's he plays it off like oh i wanted to show and you guys are here and i wanted to show
you what they did but maybe just maybe like young herb was coming out i'm gonna scrapbook this
in like some weird murder scrapbook right or frame it for its mannequin parties
eventually police don't end up even needing hamilton county's help hamilton never helps them
but they get a call that on july 4th 1996 herb had parked his car in the side of the road and shot
himself in the forehead he left behind a three-page suicide note kind of just rambling gibberish
talking about he was sorry for his failing business and how that contributed to his marital
problems nothing in the note about these murders or this apparently secret life that he lived
and in total there were 21 men between ohio and indiana attributed to him and who knows
possibly more if he ever found another dumping ground i mean i don't know where are these heads
are there more bodies with these heads herbs family have no closure on whether or not their
was a serial killer yeah so that's to me like the craziest part i can't imagine being the daughter
of herb or the wife of her or the son of her because they literally get bombarded by these
police they think their dad's this totally normal dad police come say your dad's a serial killer
they dig up all these bodies in on the property of the house that you've been living in and then
your dad kills himself yeah and then your dad kills him you don't even get the chance to sit
down with your dad face to face and ask him these questions and yeah i mean he did it like the bodies
are on his house the cases are closed police know it's him but this would like leave a huge open
wound if i were his family that i could never close without him yeah i can't imagine and based
on the time period his kids are probably around our age right like yeah a little bit older i think
i can't imagine like being where i am today like even remotely my age and living with this idea
that maybe he was maybe he wasn't there's no like complete closure or even being yeah like you said
even sitting down and being like did this happen be honest with me i'm your kid yeah like how why
were you like this like i didn't even know you were gay to be able to confront that yeah yeah
and was it really like was it all you were you this crazy psychopath or do you have these split
personalities and one of you is a wonderful family man and one of you is this gay serial killer like
i i just so many questions they actually went on to end up moving out of fox hello farms and it went
on to be rented and then sold and they say that it's haunted and there's been a couple of paranormal
shows that have gone out there and said there's been sightings of ghosts on the property but it's
like a pretty big well-known property within indianapolis i don't know who owns it now but
people definitely do like drive by still it's got to be weird to live there like knowing everything
that went down so crime junkie question would you pay less or more for the property knowing
what happened there um i hate to say it but i think more wait wait question does it come with
or without the mannequin
crime junkie is an audio chuck production so what do you think chuck do you approve
