there's a way to make an entrance my destiny it was now a conspiracy of witches download veli today a serial killer was on the loose in western new york he chose his victims for the color of their skin the community was gripped by fear not knowing when or where he would strike next the only evidence he left behind was spence shell casings to focus their search local authorities called on an fbi profiler for help they needed to stop his murderous rampage before the killer ended another life [Music] [Applause] [Music] in buffalo new york a sniper targeted african-american men he held a city hostage and threatened to ignite a racial powder keg and it looked like others might be following his bloody example i'm jim calstrom former head of the fbi's new york office when it became clear that physical evidence alone wasn't enough to conor the killer profile has developed other means their work provided the only hope of flushing him out and connecting him to his crimes on september 22 1980 in buffalo new york larry robinson drove up to a supermarket with glenn dunn dunn promised to wait while robinson went into cash's paycheck while he waited dunn decided to step out of the car for a cigarette [Music] at about 9 45 p.m psychiatric nurse madonna gorney just finished her shift on her way home she decided to pick up some groceries not far from where she parked gourney spotted done fidgeting in the shadows she was alone and felt unsafe there had been robberies in the area and gorney did not want to be another victim she headed straight for the lit entrance where she passed another man who appeared to be waiting for a ride gorney felt safer once inside larry robinson had only a short wait in line to collect his money looking for his ride he noticed dunn's car parked at the end of the building when robinson tried to get in the door was locked dunn did not respond robinson came around to the driver's side and discovered dunn was not moving he was bleeding from the head robinson ran back into the store to summon help when madonna gorney left the store she noticed commotion at the end of the building and asked if she could be of any help the security guard replied that it wasn't necessary the situation was under control with three bullet wounds to his head dunn was in critical condition [Music] paramedics struggled to save the young victim his heart had stopped efforts to revive him were futile he was pronounced dead on arrival when police informed dunn's family they discovered he was only 14 years old the forensics team searched for clues to the killer's identity fingerprints lifted from the car belonged to dunn and robinson the blood was confirmed as duns the only trace left by the assailant was spent bullet casings [Music] they had been fired from a 22 caliber weapon a check of the car's license plates revealed it had been stolen the night before from a local dealer [Music] police questioned robinson he told them that he only knew done casually from the neighborhood and did not know the car had been stolen robinson said he'd been walking to the supermarket earlier in the evening when dunn drove up and offered a ride friends and family would later confirm that he and dunn barely knew each other the crime was already making news as the story broke madonna gorney returned home from the supermarket still troubled by the incident but they did confirm that he is a 14 year old local resident gorney was upset to learn that a young boy had been killed in the parking lot she decided to call police the next morning to see if she could be of any help buffalo homicide detective john regan initially thought the slaying might be a result of a car theft ring exploring where the stolen car had come from and the people that may have been responsible for it it became apparent that this was not the focal point of the investigation to develop leads police canvassed nearby residents hoping someone may have witnessed the shooting a uniformed officer found a witness willing to cooperate and called a detective to question her barbara wozniak lived next door to the supermarket she told the detectives that she had heard the gunfire and seen the assailant at around 9 45 on the previous evening she was cooking when she heard three pop-like sounds she hurried to her window to see what had caused the noises she saw a white man running from a parked car he wore a hooded sweatshirt that obscured his face while the detective spoke to wozniak he was informed that a witness from the supermarket had called offering her help it was psychiatric nurse madonna gorning the real reason i called was because a 14 year old kid had been killed in that car the night before and all i could think of at the time was i'm a mother if somebody killed my kid i would really want to know who it was gorney recounted what she had seen that night at the supermarket hoping it would be of some help when i pulled in i noticed a man standing under the lamppost near the edge of the parking lot when i got out of the car i purposely walked farther away from him with the idea that yeah i was alone it was dark probably if he was standing there he was probably up to no good and i didn't want to be part of it anxious gourney looked for other people who might be of assistance if she were to become a victim of crime my first reaction was wow there is somebody else out here as i walked closer to the door and was able to get a better look at him i thought to myself if something does happen he's not going to be of any help to me because basically he had a very dazed or very dopey look on his face and i wasn't impressed she described him as a slender white man with dark hair who held a brown paper bag on his lap he wore metal rimmed glasses and a hooded sweatshirt which shattered his features the description seemed promising since the previous witness had described a similar man running from the scene detectives hoped that gorney could provide details for a sketch [Music] after talking to gorney buffalo detectives got word of a similar shooting in the nearby suburb of cheektowaga the victim 32 year old harold green was rushed into emergency surgery as detectives arrived at the hospital his situation was critical after being shot in the left side of the head with 22 caliber slugs detectives found his wife in the waiting room and asked what she knew of the shooting [Music] her husband had stopped at a fast food restaurant he was sitting in his car eating his lunch when a hooded white assailant walked up and shot him [Music] when an employee heard the gunfire and saw the shooter sprint from the scene with a brown paper bag she called her manager the method of this attack resembled the one from the night before detectives speculated that there was a possible connection between the two victims mrs green said neither she nor her husband knew glendon or his family her husband was a successful engineer and a pillar in his community he moved in different circles than the teenage car thief investigators found the two victims shared nothing in common green died without regaining consciousness only one piece of evidence linked both shootings lieutenant thomas rowan of the cheektowaga police department led the forensic investigation we had our first piece of hard physical evidence that connected the shooting in chickawag at the fast food restaurant the shooting which took place in buffalo new york that single fact that tied everything together was spent cartridge casings from a 22 caliber at that point it was only identified as a firearm because we didn't know what type of firearm had produced the spent shell casing that same night homicide detectives were summoned to another shooting it was the third attack on an african-american man in less than 36 hours 31-year-old emanuel thomas had been killed while crossing a residential intersection from eyewitness accounts the investigators pieced together the chain of events an hour earlier frenchie cook left the home of his friend emmanuel thomas thomas a freelance house painter told his wife he was going to the store and would be right back be careful neighbor thomas jackson saw the two friends walk by and head for the corner of east ferry and zenner's streets as thomas and cook crossed the intersection the killer struck from out of the darkness [Music] with a gun concealed in a paper bag he shot thomas several times in the left side of the head thomas collapsed to the pavement frenchie cook was in shock he never saw the assailant approach he did not know anyone that would want emmanuel thomas dead the teenage witness who saw the shooting from across the street described the suspect as a hooded white male around 5 8 or 5 9. the forensic team retrieved 22 caliber shells resembling those found from the previous shootings they were sent to the lab for comparison detectives had little else to go on in this particular case we had two common denominators we had black men and we had a 22 caliber weapon that was used to kill them other than that there were no connections between the victims either collectively or even singly and no connection with a shooter startled investigators came to the realization that buffalo had a serial killer on the loose police had no leads and only one apparent motive assistant district attorney john de france was called in to monitor the case we uncovered no evidence that there was a robbery motive we uncovered no evidence that this was a situation involving bad blood between the attacker and the victim what we had was an assassin randomly shooting people on the basis of race with the identity of the racist assassin unknown the press dubbed him the 22-caliber killer he was already on the prowl for his next victim the 22-caliber killer was preying on african-american men in buffalo new york killing three in 36 hours and leaving little evidence behind emanuel thomas had been the killer's latest victim gunned down crossing the street in front of his home medical examiners performed an autopsy they found powder burns near the entry wounds this meant that the muzzle of the murder weapon was placed close to his temple from the pattern and severity of the burns examiners believed they were caused by a sawed-off rifle they removed two mangled 22-caliber slugs from his head and sent them to the ballistics lab for analysis as investigators searched for answers community fear turned into anger erie county district attorney ed cosgrove was in charge of coordinating the hunt the black community demanded action by the police and of course because of the nature of the of the attacks and because of the the the psychotic nature of the person ultimately responsible it wasn't going to be an easy task the next day on september 24th joseph mccoy walked down a residential street in niagara falls 20 miles north of buffalo in front of a church the 43 year old man was ambushed and killed a witness described the shooter as a slender white man dressed in khakis once again police found nothing but 22-caliber shells at the scene the shells along with the slugs extracted from the victim were sent to the erie county department of central police services to compare to the others lieutenant thomas rowan conducted the ballistics analysis in this case it presented a rather difficult challenge to the firearms examiners and law enforcement is that the bullets themselves as it went into the body they broke up they disintegrated and broke into tiny little pieces making a specific identification of the weapon from the bullets inside of the victims very difficult not impossible for the firearms examiners the shell casings could tell them more every gun leaves specific marks on a shell when it fires the firing pin ejector and extractor from a weapon make impressions on the casings for examiners this is the gun's fingerprint they found that the markings on the casings from the four crime scenes all matched the relationship of the firing pin impression the ejector and the extractor marks suggested fairly early on that a specific type of weapon was used and that was a ruger model 1022 the fourth shooting sent more shockwaves through the black community and investigators still had no suspect local officials had no answers they called on the fbi for assistance special agent chip amrozowicz realized the case had the greatest urgency for the community [Music] it was important for the fbi to get involved in this case because there were african-americans being killed in in the area and everybody was was scared to walk the streets daytime and nighttime a composite sketch was rendered by an fbi artist who worked with several witnesses that had gotten glimpses of the killer the sketch was circulated through patrols newspapers and television police also carried the sketch door to door hoping that someone would recognize the suspect when thousands of calls began to pour in detective regan realized the composite did little to focus the investigation basically the composite sketch was like every man as a result of it being published i think we got somewhere around in the neighborhood of 6 000 calls that had to be checked out and one of the fears really is that you may actually get the suspect in but and because you've done so many of these it becomes routine and you don't pay attention that's the ultimate fear that you go right by the man while local investigators tracked down leads in the buffalo area fbi agents pursued those outside of erie county [Music] leads were followed in pennsylvania ohio all of new england and across the border in canada they have that many leads we were occupied 24 hours a day we were looking for one lone white male who possibly could be walking next to you in the street or having lunch with you at some cafeteria and you don't know if you had the 22 caliber killer next to you on october 8th 1980 workers on a construction site in the buffalo suburb of amherst came across an abandoned taxi on the service road of the new york freeway when no one returned to move it they contacted the state police the trooper who responded inspected the empty cab he found a wallet under the front seat that held a driver's license but no money it belonged to 71 year old parlor w edwards an african-american cab driver the keys were missing and edwards was nowhere in sight the trooper decided to search the trunk that found it locked using a crowbar he forced it open he found the missing driver parlor edwards was literally bludgeoned to death in a parking lot in the town of chicdawaga we found pieces of his skull parts of his mouth teeth that had been knocked out great deal of blood before throwing edward's body into the trunk the killer had also cut open the driver's chest and removed his heart it wasn't clear that the edward slaying was connected to the others since a 22-caliber rifle was not used the fact that he was a black male certainly raised suspicion in the minds of the investigators said could the killer have now progressed to mutilation of the body in this case no one knew for sure perhaps it was an isolated incident perpetrated by a copycat killer manpower dedicated to the murders swelled to 150 personnel from various agencies the hotline rang 24 hours a day no calls led to a suspect with community pressure mounting the frustration grew for special agent richard ferrei in this case we had several crimes occurring we had no evidence to indicate who that person was responsible and for an investigator it was extremely difficult for us to accept the fact that we could not find anything that could identify this person positively early on october 9th a water worker was driving towards a dock area in the town of tonawanda just a few miles from buffalo on the edge of the road he spotted a man laying face down near the tall grass the worker approached and saw that the man wasn't breathing [Music] he immediately called authorities they arrived within minutes investigators identified the victim as 41-year-old ernest jones like edwards jones was a taxi driver who had his throat slashed and heart cut out before his body was moved to a remote location he was the sixth african-american male to be murdered in the buffalo area in less than three weeks authorities were baffled with little evidence to guide them they weren't sure if one person was responsible for all six homicides only one aspect linked the first four shootings with the deaths of the two cabbies basically what you have is a the four shootings which are definitely linked you have the two cab drivers who are linked to each other but not necessarily to this there's controversy even within the police within teams of investigators as to whether or not they're connected agents and local authorities had no way of knowing if there were one or two serial killers out there killing black men by october 9 1980 six african american men had been found slain in the buffalo area authorities were not certain that only one person was responsible in just three weeks the serial killings had split the local community along racial lines district attorney edward cosgrove led the investigation it's hard to even describe the community mind at that time there were demands for action all over from the black community for the police to stop what was happening here i had press conferences that were attended by the national press everybody descended upon buffalo and everybody wanted answers for me i didn't have the answers the story made national headlines a hundred thousand dollar reward was offered for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the 22 22-caliber killer [Music] president jimmy carter took notice with the wedge of civil rights violations dividing the buffalo community the president declared the investigation of federal case local lawmen now had the full resources of the fbi at their disposal as federal agents began sifting through the collected information another incident rocked upstate new york on the night of october 10th colin cole slept in buffalo general hospital cole was an inmate from a local jail recuperating from a drug overdose as visiting hours were coming to a close a man walked down the hall of the seventh floor looking for calls wrong [Music] the recovering addict gasped for breath as the man tightened the ligature a nurse administering medication surprised the strangler he fled leaving coal alive [Music] the nurse alerted hospital security but the call came too late it was the seventh attack on a black man in just three weeks no one knew for sure if the 22 caliber killer was responsible for this attack lieutenant thomas rowan and his team had little understanding of serial killers at the time glimpsing into the mind of a serial killer is like twinkling your toes into the abyss of the very weird you're never really sure what's there local investigators needed someone who was more familiar with these types of offenders they called upon john douglas of the fbi behavioral sciences unit to provide a profile of the 22-caliber killer through this process douglas would provide the team with insight to the killer's psychological behavior currently senior analyst of apbnews.com and online crime news website douglas spent 20 years pioneering the science of profiling a profile is designed to to come up with the most probable offender its goal is is to eliminate a lot of false leads this is an attempt is being made as well to maybe refocus the investigation of law enforcement or possibly reinforce the investigation by telling them that you're on the right track here douglas was on the next plane to buffalo during the trip he familiarized himself with the case files i have to walk on the shoes of both the subject and walk in the shoes of that victim to truly understand really what took place during that assault [Music] i'm going to be asking myself the question why why this this victim [Music] he confirmed what local investigators believed the only connections among the six murder victims were their race and sex they were black men who had been chosen by at least one killer as targets of opportunity the strangled survivor colin kohl was not a random victim since he had been sought out in his hospital room the profiler believed cole's attacker was at the very least a racist copycat not necessarily responsible for any of the murders douglas needed to probe further he had to meticulously recreate each murder from the known evidence reviewing all six attacks the profiler looked for behavioral characteristics that could be ascribed to just one offender when you look at serial killers you look at patterns as well as signature signature is something that the offender does is kind of repetitive behavior but behavior that that the subject has to do it's more of a ritual douglas found the behavior from each of the four shootings to be similar the 22-caliber killer had surprised random victims fired quickly from close range then bolted leaving his prey before they were dead the assassin's signature was a blitz style of attack the cabbie murders didn't seem to fit that pattern in those two cases the killer had severely bludgeoned the victims mutilated then dumped them far from where they were killed the killer had spent a great deal of time with the bodies even after death to douglas this suggested two different killers there are different types of serial killer they're very personal types of serial killers and the impersonal style and type of serial killer the personal type of an offender wants to look in the eyes of the victim and they want to spend hours if at all possible with their victims being in a position of total control and domination that's what really is going to to turn them on it appeared the cabbies were murdered by a personal type of serial killer those crimes demonstrated a rage and overkill that were not evident in the shootings douglas believed that the psychopathology of the 22 caliber killer left a seemingly different behavioral thumbprint the assassination style of serial killer are somewhere in an age group between 25 to 28 is when they first begin to surface how they could be described as really even more of an asocial type of personality not so much antisocial with asocial keeping to themselves they generally become obsessed with with weapons they may be found with having multiple weapons as well the person would probably if he was in the military i said that he'd have difficulty in in any branch of the service and would probably at some point would even receive a a discharge to the profiler it looked as if western new york may have had two distinct serial killers on the loose douglas reported his findings to local investigators because the technique of profiling was new in 1980 a few had doubts about its reliability some people look at this this is some type of voodoo or witchcraft i mean how are you able to determine for example age of the offender and actually it's pretty easy once you do enough of these cases from his experience with similar cases the profiler added that the 22-caliber killer would most likely be an avid hunter having a history of menial jobs douglas stressed that it was up to the local team to find or eliminate suspects based on his profile this is a good tool but really it's you you're the people out there you police you're going to solve the case i'm not going to solve the case to me this is the easy part i'm just going to try to help you maybe refocus the case give you an idea paint a portrait of the offender but really you're the one to knock on the doors and and wear out the leather soles and and come up with the suspect the national all points bulletin of the 22 caliber killers profile was received by law enforcement agencies around the country investigators had a description but still had no name late in 1980 the fbi and local police searched for leads in the unsolved murders of six black men from western new york hoping to focus the massive investigation an fbi profiler was called in to assess connections between the cases he believed it was possible that two distinct racist killers were responsible 2 000 suspects were interrogated but police made no arrests buffalo wasn't the only city in new york state facing terror in the streets 400 miles southeast in new york city a knife-wielding attacker was terrorizing midtown commuter ivan fraser was the victim of a subway knifing three days before christmas blocking the attack with his arm he survived and reported the assault to the nypd at 1 25 in the afternoon ivan frazier noticed another rider talking with an attractive woman to fraser it appeared the man was trying to pick her up the woman seemed annoyed and got up to exit at the next stop frasier returned to his article without warning the man across the aisle slashed frazier in the forearm and wrists then dashed away he described the assailant as a white man in his early 30s with brown hair wearing a blue jacket two hours later at 3 30 in the afternoon nineteen-year-old louis rodriguez was walking on the west side of midtown manhattan when he was jumped by a white man demanding his wallet rodriguez fought off the initial blow but the attacker lunged at him again stabbing him twice in the chest before he died rodriguez described him to police as a white man with brown hair wearing a blue jacket three hours after rodriguez antoine davis was found stabbed to death in front of a midtown bank by 10 35 pm richard renner died in front of a hotel on 49th street he was also stabbed by 11 pm the killer was back on the subway looking for another victim he spotted carl ramsey in the dim light no one noticed the knife bleeding severe ramsay crawled out of the subway by midnight he was dead in less than 24 hours four black men were dead the new york city press dubbed the killer the midtown slasher the rash of attacks on black men in manhattan had many similarities to the profile of the 22-caliber killer new york city investigators called on john douglas to provide a profile of the slasher as i did an independent analysis and when i started to paint a portrait of that person my goodness it was just like the buffalo new york case as well we have a subject here approaching his victims blitz style of attack there was one major difference the midtown slasher used a knife the 22-caliber killer used a rifle now we don't have the the 22-22 weapon but maybe the reason for that is we don't have the 22 weapon because now we're dealing in areas that are very highly populated if you have a 22 weapon the sound of this would draw attention to himself douglas determined that the signature behavior was identical with a gun or a knife the assailant attacked in the same way by late december district attorney cosgrove realized something else that bolstered the profiler's conclusion during that period of time there had not been any assaults here in the city of buffalo it was quiet with respect to the activity of this 22 caliber assailant by the early weeks of 1981 the killer seemed to have disappeared in january of 1981 the fbi and local investigators searched for the 22-caliber killer wanted for the murders of at least eight black men in new york city and buffalo following months of investigation buffalo detective john regan and his team were unable to come up with the name of a viable suspect the case is in limbo and everybody is frustrated they don't know where to go we don't have a name we have no idea then out of the blue there's a call made to the buffalo police department homicide an officer from the army's criminal investigative division in fort benning georgia the army was holding a 25-year-old private joseph christopher on charges of assaulting a fellow soldier on january 13 1981 private christopher attempted to stab an african-american enlistee while he was in custody christopher tried to castrate himself with a razor when captain dorothy anderson began administering medical aid to the prisoner he began muttering that he'd killed black men in the new york and buffalo area he didn't know the exact number of his victims it was just something he had to do [Music] troubled by his story anderson reported it to the army's criminal investigative division she told the cid officer of christopher's ramblings the cid officer remembered receiving an apb on the new york killings he called the buffalo police homicide division as instructed by the teletype for district attorney cosgrove this explained why the killings had stopped in new york state from the time of our discovery of the second cab driver's gruesome death until almost christmas of 1980 when we had the killings the four killings in new york city there had been a cessation of attacks and apparently that was when joseph christopher was in the army down in georgia as we later found out the fbi and the police finally had a name joseph gerard christopher agent amrozowicz and his team compared joseph christopher's background to the 22-caliber killer profile he was pretty accurate she described him as a white male but the early 30s a loner possibly if he were in the military he would be hospitalized he would be seeking psychiatric care prior to being in the military he would have had menial type labor as soon as you had the name joseph gerard christopher you knew that that profile match [Music] investigators tracked down several friends and acquaintances of christopher's detective david robinson had been a friend of the suspect for over a decade are you familiar with the gentleman they often shot target practice and went deer hunting together at christopher's family cabin [Music] he also told investigators that christopher had a gun collection that his father had left him when he died the collection included a 22 ruger rifle but robinson never saw one that was cut down investigators secured a search warrant for christopher's last known residence they arrived at his mother's house in buffalo new york on april 22 1981 [Music] in christopher's bedroom fbi agents recovered metal-rimmed glasses and khaki clothing that matched witness accounts of the perpetrator's apparel the fbi profile drawn up by john douglas predicted the 22 caliber killer would be fascinated by guns and the military [Music] the christopher basement was an underground firing range agents found the inherited gun collection and portions of a sawed-off gun barrel among the paraphernalia forensic specialists found boxes of 22 ammunition a misfired 22 caliber cartridge along with a rotary magazine ballistic specialist thomas rowan believed the evidence was significant finding the rotary magazine for the 1022 ruger was an important feature that supported a widely held theory throughout the investigation that the shooter specifically picked something so he could keep the profile of the weapon low enough to fit inside of a paper bag when he conducted these executions of these men on the street the rotary magazine enabled christopher to have a full load of ammunition and allowed the sawed-off weapon to remain concealed in a bag without having to reload a second warrant allowed investigators to search the family cabin in ellington new york detectives dug in the spot where robinson told them he and christopher shot rifles the excavation yielded two shells marred with a unique firing pin mark the same marking was on the shells collected at the crime scenes firearm specialists of the erie county department of central police services examined the shell casings that were found at the christopher holmen cabin they compared them to the casings found at the first four crime scenes they concluded that the shells were all fired from the same gun with this match assistant district attorney john de france was able to get an indictment from a grand jury the casings spoke for themselves put the casing under the microscope you had your evidence it couldn't be altered or tainted joseph christopher was extradited from georgia and returned to buffalo new york to stand trial officers fitted christopher with a ski mask to prevent witnesses from identifying him through the media we put a mask on him for purposes of preventing potential witnesses from observing his face on the television and then basing their identification on that rather than upon their own recollection all right thank you for coming down one of those key witnesses was madonna she had seen the 22 caliber killer the first night he struck in the parking lot of the supermarket [Music] on may 5th 1981 she confronted joseph christopher in a lineup it was a little scary i was concerned with the possibility of being actually anyone in the lineup being able to see us who are there to identify someone in the lineup gorney was protected by the bright lights that shone in the eyes of the subjects she was able to identify christopher in two different lineups agents and local police felt certain that they had the 22 caliber killer questions of christopher's mental competency delayed the trial in december 1981 the judge pronounced joseph christopher mentally incompetent to stand trial he was committed to the mid hudson state psychiatric center where he received treatment on february 17 1982 christopher was deemed fit for prosecution the trial began on april 6 1982. the community watched every step the prosecution took the media reported this entire case on a day-to-day basis sometimes on a minute-by-minute basis it was good for the community because they wanted answers they wanted information and it was good for us because it began to convince the community that we had the right individual and that their fears could be somewhat delayed the state jury found joseph christopher guilty for the murders of glen dunn harold greene and emmanuel thomas he was sentenced to 60 years to life imprisonment prosecutors never tried him for the manhattan knifings one question still remained was christopher also the taxi cab slasher though the fbi profile excluded christopher as the suspect he later revealed details of the cab driver's wounds that only the killer could have known we wanted to make sure here in buffalo and every county that we didn't we we satisfied the community's need for professionalism thoroughness competence and all the other things that that the community expects of its policemen and prosecutors and we were able to satisfy that need because we we were successful through science and good detective work joseph christopher would never be free to kill again he spent the rest of his life behind bars until his death curiously from a rare form of male breast cancer at the age of 37. 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