Remains found confirmed as Jacob Wetterling/Suspect led LE to Remains #1

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I don't know why he would make up a story like that. If anything it's more incriminating because it suggests he knew of the strong police involvement and moving him again to evade capture. If he wanted to make himself look good as a sociopath such as himself, I can't see why he would add the morbidity of going back and digging up remains. The bobcat is irrelevant and that's why I also think it's true, because it means nothing in the grande scheme of things.

Could be. I tend to bias toward what I think is the simplest narrative. The simplest narrative that will still likely comport with the physical evidence is one burial site, no bobcat.
 
What is also sad is that there is most likely someone out there right now like Heiny looking for their next victim.


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Yep and it scares the crap out of me as a mother.

Last year, after I had joined WS and spent a good deal of my time reading about pedophiles, sex offenders, etc. I found out my brother in law was molesting his daughter, my four year old niece. No one had a clue until she said something. He was with us on family trips, I let him take my boys skateboarding and the whole time he was a child molester.

It just blows my mind.
 
Could be. I tend to bias toward what I think is the simplest narrative. The simplest narrative that will still likely comport with the physical evidence is one burial site, no bobcat.

Agree - the simplest answer is usually the truth. OTOH truth IS stranger than fiction. But I agree with you Sigrun - my gut reaction to the Bobcat was that it was highly improbable. The odds that when you kill someone and need to bury a body there is a Bobcat handy with keys?! The guy was in a quiet country area, "spooked" by a passing cop car, and yet was comfortable stealing and then operating noisy excavation equipment?! I agree also though that there seems no purpose in making it up. Unless he is simply trying to account for his time - the more time he is "at home," stealing vehicles, locating shovels, moving the body, the less time he was doing unspeakable things to a child.
 
Could be. I tend to bias toward what I think is the simplest narrative. The simplest narrative that will still likely comport with the physical evidence is one burial site, no bobcat.

I have a hard time believing the Bobcat story too. Just like I have a hard time believing that all of a sudden he became Mr. Bashful and asked JW to turn around because he had to go to the bathroom. What a stupid liar, amongst all the other descriptors there are for him.
 
Agree - the simplest answer is usually the truth. OTOH truth IS stranger than fiction. But I agree with you Sigrun - my gut reaction to the Bobcat was that it was highly improbable. The odds that when you kill someone and need to bury a body there is a Bobcat handy with keys?! The guy was in a quiet country area, "spooked" by a passing cop car, and yet was comfortable stealing and then operating noisy excavation equipment?! I agree also though that there seems no purpose in making it up. Unless he is simply trying to account for his time - the more time he is "at home," stealing vehicles, locating shovels, moving the body, the less time he was doing unspeakable things to a child.

Yes, here are the "additional" complexities we have to add to make bobcat work:
1. Bobcat is running on a pitch black night around midnight or so. So, it is in an empty field with no lighting and probably running headlights, directly beside highway 23.
2. Bobcat is stolen by a man without a vehicle to tow it, who has to walk 1/4 mile to get it (Jacob's body just lying out there).
3. Bobcat has to be driven back to the gravel pit area with headlights, parallel to a major highway.
4. Bobcat has to return to the shop, park in exactly the same spot, and keys must be replaced in exactly the same place, and no one notices about 2 hours of fuel consumption.
5. Bobcat needs to be careful not to leave tracks visible to anyone the next morning, so stay on pavement until you get away from the heavy equipment store and when you return.
6. Bobcat is loud, too, and all this just a couple hours after DH was "spooked" when a police car drove nearby.
7. DH took 45 minutes to get to the gravel pit. I think the abduction was 8:30 ish? So, 9:15 he gets there. Spends at least 30 minutes with Jacob. Goes home and zones out for 2 hours. Walks 1/2 mile because he can't tow anything.
8. Relocates Jacob's "camouflaged" remains and digs a 2 feet deep, approximately 5 foot long trench.
9. So far, no passerby, civilian or police, reports someone with swirling headlights beside the highway all while every police department in the area has heard about the Jacob abduction and is bound to check out such a sight. Highway 23 was a major road to patrol.
10. An inadequate burial site is dug nonetheless, then DR returns a year later to dig a 26 year grave with a shovel by hand.
11. DR is driving by the burial site a year later and sees the red jacket sticking out of the dirt *beside a major highway*. But he was the first one on that highway, or the first who drove around that gravel pit, to see the red jacket half-buried in the ground surround by loose fill.
12. And so he puts all the remains and personal effects into a trash bag, carrying a shovel, and walks down the highway for a mile
13. He describes this walk as "crossing the highway" (?) to the farm, and makes this gross geometric error not because he has been living in Annadale all these years and maybe forgot just how far the farm was from the gravel pit.

It goes on, and it just gets too complicated. It sounds too much like a small child's tale.
 
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DH had no motive to lie about a Bobcat .... it would not lessen what he did in the slightest .... he said he tried it with a shovel but that didnt work .... driving a Bobcat is easy to figure out for a person who knows how to operate equipment. He said he knew of the construction site nearby and maybe had even worked there at one time.

Digging a hole with a Bobcat does not work very well in hard ground , thus the shallow grave became exposed by the next year so he moved the remains across the highway.

He heard police radio activity then saw a police car go by , but it would be long gone and he would have no fear of them hearing the shot..

He said he was right beside the highway so I figure the location is approximately in the picture below. (Red-first burial site) (Blue- second site at the farm).
 

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Agree - the simplest answer is usually the truth. OTOH truth IS stranger than fiction. But I agree with you Sigrun - my gut reaction to the Bobcat was that it was highly improbable. The odds that when you kill someone and need to bury a body there is a Bobcat handy with keys?! The guy was in a quiet country area, "spooked" by a passing cop car, and yet was comfortable stealing and then operating noisy excavation equipment?! I agree also though that there seems no purpose in making it up. Unless he is simply trying to account for his time - the more time he is "at home," stealing vehicles, locating shovels, moving the body, the less time he was doing unspeakable things to a child.

I also tend toward the simple narrative. With no other kids missing, I wonder if the murder of Jacob scared the daylights out of the monster. I think he was trying to replicate his own sexual abuse and got gratification from the fear and sexually abusive acts performed. I believe the situation had gone too far and out of his control, then, the monster got scared and began peeping more actively rather than abducting and abusing. If he saw the police and knew they could stop him/incarcerate him, he could have gotten enough gratification from the visuals-- photo and real life-- to not physically attack someone else.

He is clearly a monster with some sort of DSM-V disorder. Somehow I don't get a sense that he is a serial killer. A serial rapist and abuser, definitely. His story (from accounts of those present) is detached and carefully stated, no remorse or sadness seems evident. I think he scared himself with Jacob. So, his dirty old man statement when he was arrested is even more interesting. He sees himself as a dirty old man who stopped molesting and started gratifying himself in situations where he could say no harm occurred ( I don't believe no harm occurred but can certainly see that he might argue that). The monster was abused and probably was marginal before that. He probably justified his actions due to the fact that he was "not harmed" in the long run by the abuse he suffered.

I am not sure we have all the facts but I tend to think his narrative is pretty close. The monster was probably freaked out by Jacob crying and the human connection (asking what he did wrong, stating being cold and asking to go home) and it touched something more human than he could cope with. Then, add that he was fearful of being caught and going to prison where he would probably be out of control and abused again. I think the monster has very few coping skills and reacted, thus killing him. We know he kept trophies. We know he had to have learned somethings about guns in the National Guard--(Didn't the National Guard help with the search for Jacob?)-- and had some skill set, so the idea that he couldn't fire the gun and missed (sounds like 2x) may speak to his disorganized self, the idea that he wanted to rape but didn't think about the next steps like killing even though he purchased the gun, and inability to make decisions once the script was not in his control.

I weep for all of the victims of this monster. On some level, I weep for the person the monster was before his own abuse. I have no sympathy for the monster now as many assault victims do not act out upon others. I believe that he will get what he deserves in this long prison sentence and the inability to look at child abusive *advertiser censored* to gain gratification for the rest of his life. I do hope that he gets some sort of therapy and may someday realize the extent of his monstrous actions so he can take his ownership of these abuses and killing in a way that offers apologies to his victims and their families.
 
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DH had no motive to lie about a Bobcat .... it would not lessen what he did in the slightest .... he said he tried it with a shovel but that didnt work .... driving a Bobcat is easy to figure out for a person who knows how to operate equipment. He said he knew of the construction site nearby and maybe had even worked there at one time.

Digging a hole with a Bobcat does not work very well in hard ground , thus the shallow grave became exposed by the next year so he moved the remains across the highway.

He heard police radio activity then saw a police car go by , but it would be long gone and he would have no fear of them hearing the shot..

He said he was right beside the highway so I figure the location is approximately in the picture below. (Red-first burial site) (Blue- second site at the farm).

If my sources are wrong, and they could be, then that is the gravel pit. But the sources I've read place it one mile from the farm near the area where the bypass intersects the old highway 23. That construction destroyed the gravel pit. You can see it in 1991 aerials.
 
Yep and it scares the crap out of me as a mother.

Last year, after I had joined WS and spent a good deal of my time reading about pedophiles, sex offenders, etc. I found out my brother in law was molesting his daughter, my four year old niece. No one had a clue until she said something. He was with us on family trips, I let him take my boys skateboarding and the whole time he was a child molester.

It just blows my mind.

That's horrible. Read "Protecting the Gift".


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I am not sure we have all the facts but I tend to think his narrative is pretty close. The monster was probably freaked out by Jacob crying and the human connection (asking what he did wrong, stating being cold and asking to go home) and it touched something more human than he could cope with.

Snipped by me.

I think he included those details because they would inflict the most pain on Jacob's lovely and loving family.

If he had any remorse or felt any connection to fellow humans, I don't think he would include those tender moments that made the world weep.

Everything about this perp is self-centered and self-serving, including the crime itself and the confession.

jmopinion
 
Arnie, is this location a deduction from DH's confession? News reports have the site located here:

crime_Scene_1991_Homicide_And_SA_001.png
 
Yes, here are the "additional" complexities we have to add to make bobcat work:

1....

It goes on, and it just gets too complicated. It sounds too much like a small child's tale.

RSBM, yes, it does sound like a child's tale. I would hazard a guess that the monster cruised this site in the darkness on a regular basis. He says he threw the shoes away (I read that somewhere) and it doesn't sound like he took a trophy- unusual for him?--- so the site was a trophy and I think he groomed it and watched to keep close to his victim and keep his secret safe.

Without his recorded statement and questions to clarify his actions, we are left with an incomplete picture. But, I do think he saw that site as part of Jacob and walked the area at night and drove by observing the scene frequently to get excited again.
 
Would any of y'all interview him if given the chance and a free flight to wherever he was?


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Originally Posted by Inthedetails

I think it's a strong possibility that he had more victims. He confessed about Jacob because it serves to his benefit right now. There could be other victims that he is not mentioning because it does him no good to do so.

He's not a criminal who is confessing out of remorse and he's not a criminal who brags and blabs about his deeds.

Knowing the details of Jacob's case could possibly solve other cases.

jmo

Exactly!!!!! Well said.
 
Stopped in 1993. They usually don't stop. I wonder if DH (monster) left the area. Does anyone know if monster stayed living with his mom and did he have a job? It'd be nice if we could help sleuth for LE.

I'd like to know what kinds and colors of Cars his mom, dad, and brother had In different time periods. DAH TOO! ( Think borrowed car, think crystal Rogers, think Lyons girls. )
 
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