When Good Guys Turn Bad

Source: C. Davis

One of the most chilling cases of domestic murders I’ve heard is the infamous wood chipper case out of Connecticut. Flight attendant Helle Crafts went missing in 1986. She’d been working her way toward a divorce, citing infidelity and abuse. Her husband, Richard Crafts, said that she’d gone to visit her sister and had never returned. She’d told friends that if something happened to her, Richard had done it.

Not only had he done it, but his calculated method of body disposal challenged the best investigators. Crafts’ credit card records showed the purchase of a large freezer, new truck, and rental of a wood chipper. A state employee reported seeing a man using a wood chipper on the riverbank in the middle of the night during a raging snowstorm.

At this site, police found a pile of wood chips mingled with light blue fibers and scraps of paper, one of which bore Helle’s name. A search team melted the snow and found blond hair strands, bone fragments, and other items. Then several human bone fragments turned up, followed by a tooth fragment and part of a finger with red fingernail polish.

Yikes!

In her new book, Masking Evil, Carol Ann Davis shows us the motives that turn seemingly good people into criminals. Most make sense, from greed to jealousy to the fear of discovery. You’ll also find pedophiles who want to possess, and people who want to punish. Some of those profiled in these cases are predators, but some just got themselves into bad circumstances. Many were accomplished, intelligent people: an airline pilot, a monk, a minister, even a criminal justice student. Several were law enforcement officers, including FBI agents.

Among the truly bizarre cases was the priest who killed a nun. On the morning of April 5, 1980, Sister Margaret Ann Pahl was found strangled and stabbed in a hospital chapel. Her killer had wrapped a cloth around her neck and stabbed her multiple times. A series of wounds resembled an upside down cross. In addition, the killer had rolled up her dress and yanked down her girdle and underwear.

Quite a few people directed police to Father Gerald Robinson, who had a sour relationship with the nun. A cleaning woman found a letter opener in his quarters shaped like a sword, with a slightly curving four-sided blade. It matched the wounds and an impression left in the victim’s blood. An investigation uncovered a number of odd things about this man, including accusations of satanic practice.

Not to leave out the ladies, obstetrics nurse Norma Jean Armistead wanted desperately to please her lover by giving him a child, but she’d had a hysterectomy. Still, she was clever. She waited until the right woman came along who was ready to deliver.

Armistead figured out how to drug the woman, snatch her baby, and replace it with a stillborn infant. She nearly got away with it, but because this child was female, the lover wasn’t satisfied. He wanted a boy. So, she tried it again. Her botched fetal snatching opened up an investigation.

Fetal snatchers are unique offenders and it can be difficult to understand how they can so coldly harm mothers to steal a fetus. In cases like this, Davis seeks a professional opinion.

In fact, she asked me about one of the most disturbing cases, that of David Young. His mission nearly ended up as the worst school massacre in history, except that the offender (and his clueless wife) hadn’t prepared sufficiently to pull it off. But they came very close.

Young had been considered a smart guy. He’d graduated near the top of his class in law studies. He’d believed himself superior, which inspired him to work up an idea for achieving greatness. Under the influence of a serious and untreated mental illness, Young envisioned a reincarnation scheme in which he would massacre a school full of intelligent children, commit suicide, and control them in the afterlife as his minions.

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He traveled to a town in Wyoming in 1986 where he’d briefly been the town marshal and took 135 children hostage at an elementary school. Fortunately, his plan went awry. Wherever he is now, he probably has no minions.

This page-turner covers a wide variety of personalities and motives, along with context for how these ordinary people became serious offenders, from pedophiles to serial killers. You’ll no doubt be left wondering who among your acquaintances might be harboring similar creepy secrets.