Speaker 1: Hi, guys, come on in Hio. Where are you?
Speaker 2: I'm good, Larry, Little Susie Peters, how Larry John Sorry,
Speaker 2: we have to hug. Yeah. Good Singulary, Good, Singulary. Welcome
Speaker 2: to a special bonus episode of Monster BTK. This is
Speaker 2: a sit down interview I did with my former k
Speaker 2: TV colleague Larry Hadiberg last summer. I caught up with
Speaker 2: Larry at his home in Wichitah. He and I reflect
Speaker 2: on our work together covering the BTK story all these
Speaker 2: years later.
Speaker 3: So what does it feel like for both you to
Speaker 3: have such a major role in the BTK story.
Speaker 2: We felt like we needed to be part of the
Speaker 2: process of catching him, and we knew every time we
Speaker 2: would say something on TV or we would do a story,
Speaker 2: which was ever all day, but we knew every time
Speaker 2: we would react to his communications was the chance for
Speaker 2: him to communicate again. And all we were trying to
Speaker 2: do is the media, in addition to informing the public,
Speaker 2: was to try and get communication out of him. And
Speaker 2: I know there was one instance with you, Larry, where
Speaker 2: you said something directly to him on the air.
Speaker 1: Yes, I decided that we should communicate with him because
Speaker 1: my feeling was if he's communicating with us, He's not
Speaker 1: killing So I went on the air and said BTK
Speaker 1: if you're listening, and then gave a little spiel about that,
Speaker 1: indicating that the PD wanted to keep the communication going,
Speaker 1: and then we got some feedback. I do remember one
Speaker 1: of the postcards that we got talked about you and
Speaker 1: Jeff having a cold on the air, and that was
Speaker 1: I think after I had gone on the air and
Speaker 1: asked for the communications to continue.
Speaker 2: BTK from the get go made the media and in
Speaker 2: particular CAKETV, part.
Speaker 1: Of the story, and I think for a journalist that's
Speaker 1: a terrible place to be. Is part of the story,
Speaker 1: but there was no way to get out of it
Speaker 1: because he enjoyed communicating with Cake TV. CAKETV was his
Speaker 1: favorite station. He had watched it since he was a child.
Speaker 1: He had been out there when we brought in Renten
Speaker 1: ten one time, when ABC came out. He had been
Speaker 1: out there for other children's shows. So he was very
Speaker 1: much a part of the Cake family. He knew all
Speaker 1: of us. He watched it every night. He still watches
Speaker 1: it to this day, and it's a very odd feeling
Speaker 1: to go to work every day and know that you
Speaker 1: have to feed the national media, you have to feed
Speaker 1: the local media, because many times Susan and I would
Speaker 1: either be on a morning show or an evening show
Speaker 1: like Larry King Live back in the day, and you're
Speaker 1: serving two masters. And in journalism there is no book
Speaker 1: written about how you do this. You know, we were
Speaker 1: writing the book on how you cover BTK when you
Speaker 1: are part of the story, and that was very difficult
Speaker 1: for me.
Speaker 2: I don't know about you, but it made me feel
Speaker 2: a little bit gratified that we had a small part
Speaker 2: in finally getting the sky well.
Speaker 1: I think if it wasn't for the media, the communications
Speaker 1: might have stopped. The very difficult part for me was
Speaker 1: working with the police department. They did a great job
Speaker 1: over the thirty years. It was a tough case. But
Speaker 1: when we would get a postcard, obviously the police department
Speaker 1: would want a copy of that postcard. Well, we would
Speaker 1: give them the original and we would have a copy.
Speaker 1: But it became many times a little difficult because the
Speaker 1: police department, i think, sometimes resented us because we were
Speaker 1: part of the story and they didn't want the media
Speaker 1: to be part of the story. We couldn't help it,
Speaker 1: we were, and so here we are trying to do
Speaker 1: our job while the police department is trying to do theirs.
Speaker 1: I had one thing happen in which we got a
Speaker 1: postcard that indicated there was a package or another message
Speaker 1: at one of the It was like a low's I
Speaker 1: forget what It wasan home depot, that's right. So I
Speaker 1: went out to Home Depot and we'd call the detectives
Speaker 1: to come out to the station to get it. I
Speaker 1: arrived there before they did. I went in talked to
Speaker 1: the manager. I said, did you get a package?
Speaker 2: No?
Speaker 1: Did you get a message from anyone that was unusual?
Speaker 1: And I never used the term BTK? And he said no.
Speaker 1: I said, okay. Later on in that day I get
Speaker 1: a call from the district attorney indicating that they would
Speaker 1: like to see me, the general man, manager, the news director,
Speaker 1: and our attorney in her office eight am the next morning.
Speaker 1: And when we got to her office, she said, you
Speaker 1: arrived before the detectives And I said, well, that's a
Speaker 1: matter of physics. Our station is just closer. She said,
Speaker 1: but you got there ahead of them, and I said,
Speaker 1: I walked in to home Depot like any other customer
Speaker 1: would do. I asked a couple of questions. He didn't
Speaker 1: have any answers. I left, and she said, we're considering
Speaker 1: charging you with a felony interfering with a federal investigation.
Speaker 1: And I said, how did I interfere? Tell me how
Speaker 1: I interfered? I just walked in the store, asked the
Speaker 1: manager a couple of questions, and left. And there wasn't
Speaker 1: a great answer for that, and our attorney was already
Speaker 1: going crazy. But I think what was happening was the
Speaker 1: police department was feeling pressure from the media and didn't
Speaker 1: like someone, as it appeared, showing up and interfering with
Speaker 1: their investigation. So I took that as a warnt. But
Speaker 1: that's the only time that I ever got crossways with them.
Speaker 2: Like you say, our goal was the same, but we
Speaker 2: had two goals, and that was informing the public and
Speaker 2: catching BTK. Their only mission was to catch BTK, So
Speaker 2: sometimes it crossed ways. And sometimes the investigators totally loved
Speaker 2: us and used us, which we had no problem with.
Speaker 2: But sometimes we crossed the line because we had another job.
Speaker 2: And there were several times when I was am I
Speaker 2: walking the line all right, and police would say no,
Speaker 2: in so many words, you're not walking the line. All right,
Speaker 2: go back to your journalism. And so it was a
Speaker 2: very very tough thing. There was one time when I
Speaker 2: called Detective John Spear during the ten o'clock news because
Speaker 2: the guy who they thought was BTK that they arrested,
Speaker 2: and said, who is this guy that you arrested? DA.
Speaker 2: Of course he couldn't tell me, And the next day
Speaker 2: I got a call from him and he said, don't
Speaker 2: ever call me direct again. That kind of thing. So
Speaker 2: the problem was we wanted to inform the public and
Speaker 2: still get the scoop, so to speak. We never wanted
Speaker 2: to ruin any investigation. We did follow the police department's
Speaker 2: rules as much as we could because we wanted to
Speaker 2: catch him as much as they did, because we were
Speaker 2: in fear for our lives.
Speaker 1: And a really strange thing was the day that I
Speaker 1: had two detectives who I knew, both of them show
Speaker 1: up in the front lobby of KKETV. They said, Larry,
Speaker 1: is there someone where we can talk private? So I
Speaker 1: took him up into the conference room and they said, Larry,
Speaker 1: we need your DNA and I said why do you
Speaker 1: need my DNA? And he says, well, we're getting tips
Speaker 1: to the BTK hotline. That you're BTK. And I said,
Speaker 1: why are they saying I'm BTK? And they said, well,
Speaker 1: when you talk about it on television, you seem to
Speaker 1: know a lot about it. You've been to the crime scenes,
Speaker 1: you've followed it since nineteen seventy four, and what we're
Speaker 1: trying to do is to rule you out. And I said, okay,
Speaker 1: let's do it. So they swabbed me and I said,
Speaker 1: how will I know for the results? And they said, well,
Speaker 1: if you don't see a swat team coming into Cake,
Speaker 1: you'll know that you passed. I said, okay.
Speaker 2: They swabbed some two hundred people. I knew two or
Speaker 2: three people were swabed. Not only Larry Hadiberg, the godfather
Speaker 2: of my second child, was swabbed as well, because he
Speaker 2: went to Wichita State the same time as BTK. That's
Speaker 2: what was so weird about all this. We knew BTK
Speaker 2: was the guy next door. What if he really was
Speaker 2: the guy next door? What if he really was Yeah,
Speaker 2: what if he really was the godfather of my child?
Speaker 2: You know? What if he really was an anchor person?
Speaker 2: I mean, nobody knew at that particular point in time.
Speaker 2: That was also frightening. Of course, I knew it wasn't Larry.
Speaker 1: But thank you. But at the time, we're not talking
Speaker 1: about each other's feelings. We're just trying to survive the
Speaker 1: day to get the story on the air. She's working
Speaker 1: her sources, I'm working my sources. I remember one day
Speaker 1: we showed up at btk's attorney's office together.
Speaker 2: At the same time.
Speaker 1: I didn't know she was going to be there. She
Speaker 1: didn't know I was going to be there, you know.
Speaker 1: So we're all trying to do our job, but we're
Speaker 1: not talking to each other about feelings. What we're talking
Speaker 1: about is trying to get the story and trying to
Speaker 1: inform the public. And that's what is so weird. Just
Speaker 1: us talking about it now is probably the first time
Speaker 1: we have ever talked about feelings about it, because the
Speaker 1: rest of the time it was just the job. We're
Speaker 1: doing the job and we're trying to inform the public
Speaker 1: to the best way that we can. And Susan and
Speaker 1: I weren't working together. She was working on her stories.
Speaker 1: I was working on my stories. But in reality, we
Speaker 1: were working together because of this thing of trying to
Speaker 1: inform the public. So it was a different time.
Speaker 2: Larry's one hundred percent right. We didn't talk about our feelings.
Speaker 2: Larry had no idea how scared I was. No one
Speaker 2: had any idea how scared I was. We didn't talk
Speaker 2: about things like that. Larry and I never talked about
Speaker 2: her anyone in the newsroom. I'm afraid we hate this guy.
Speaker 2: No feelings were talked about at all.
Speaker 1: Do you remember one night when we were walking out
Speaker 1: of Cake. It was quarter eleven or so, and we
Speaker 1: get just past the concrete stepping into the thing, and
Speaker 1: a bicyclist is down at the end of our driveway
Speaker 1: and he comes at us seemed like one hundred miles
Speaker 1: an hour, and I thought we're in trouble. Thought I
Speaker 1: didn't know who that guy was. And he's coming at
Speaker 1: us a one hundred miles an hour on that bicycle
Speaker 1: pulls up in front of us, and I thought we're
Speaker 1: going to shot stab something here something. And he was
Speaker 1: just a viewer. But I felt fair at that point,
Speaker 1: and I'm sure you did.
Speaker 2: I was glad you were with me. I had tremendous fear.
Speaker 2: BTK knew where we were every single day at ten
Speaker 2: o'clock and ten thirty and six o'clock and six thirty
Speaker 2: after we got the postcard that said, I hope Susan's
Speaker 2: and Jeff's cold gets better. From that day on, I
Speaker 2: had a reporter or a photographer follow me all the
Speaker 2: way home because he knows where we are. He was
Speaker 2: watching us every night.
Speaker 1: In this case, I mean, we really care about each other,
Speaker 1: and we've anchored together and done so many projects over
Speaker 1: the course of time that I think we really understand
Speaker 1: each other. And as I say, we don't agree on everything,
Speaker 1: but that's okay. You know, that's okay. We are completely
Speaker 1: and totally different personalities, but Susan is the finest co
Speaker 1: anchor slash anchor who I've ever worked with in my career,
Speaker 1: and we understood each other. We don't always agree on everything,
Speaker 1: but I love her to death and always will because
Speaker 1: she is the most professional anchor that I have ever
Speaker 1: had the opportunity to be with. And when we were
Speaker 1: anchoring together, if I got into trouble, she could take over,
Speaker 1: and she knew instantly if she got into trouble, I
Speaker 1: took over and we saved each other that way, and
Speaker 1: we did that without talking. We just instinctively could respond
Speaker 1: to each other's feelings, and that's rare that is rare
Speaker 1: in television. I know in many stations the co ankers
Speaker 1: don't like each other. You know that happens a lot.
Speaker 1: I am so thankful that during the BTK years she
Speaker 1: was by my side. It made a huge difference, huge difference.
Speaker 2: It made a huge difference that he was by my side.
Speaker 2: Larry was very protective of me when he walked me
Speaker 2: out to my car. I knew BTK would never harm
Speaker 2: Larry had to work. They had like a little relationship
Speaker 2: from the seventies. I knew BTK would never harmle Larry Howdeberg.
Speaker 2: So I felt very safe with Larry walking me out
Speaker 2: to the car because I knew BTK would never do
Speaker 2: anything to Larry.
Speaker 1: I didn't know that, Yeah, no, I didn't know that.
Speaker 1: And we knew that he basically attacked mostly women, with
Speaker 1: exception of the Atero family. We didn't know that. I
Speaker 1: just knew that this was an odd time in my
Speaker 1: journalism history, and the Susan and I were in it together,
Speaker 1: and Jeff and several of the other reporters who worked
Speaker 1: very hard on this, and we had to cover each
Speaker 1: other's butts in this thing because we didn't know where
Speaker 1: it was going. We didn't know how it was going
Speaker 1: to end. And you know, when we do interviews like this,
Speaker 1: we all have the benefit of hindsight. But when you're
Speaker 1: living with the BTK story before he's caught, you have
Speaker 1: no idea who this guy is, You have no idea
Speaker 1: where the story's going, you have no idea of the outcome.
Speaker 1: So it's a really different time. And to be able
Speaker 1: to talk about it in hindsight is one thing, but
Speaker 1: when you're living it, as I say, Sudan and I
Speaker 1: never had these conversations. We were just scrambling to get
Speaker 1: the story on the air in hopes to serve the
Speaker 1: viewer every night.
Speaker 2: This is the first time I've realized that. I think
Speaker 2: it says that we had to put all of our
Speaker 2: feelings aside, as Larry said, all of our fears, all
Speaker 2: of our sadness, all of our frustration, all of our anger,
Speaker 2: like everybody had, we had to put all that aside
Speaker 2: and do our job. It was really good with Larry
Speaker 2: and I because Larry chased the whole BTK angle, the
Speaker 2: whole the criminal, and I chased the victim angle, and
Speaker 2: so we were all working on different things. Larry was
Speaker 2: working on reaction from BTK, and I was working on
Speaker 2: let's find these victims' families and tell the real story
Speaker 2: of these victims that are still out there. And so yeah,
Speaker 2: we each had our own little thing that we were
Speaker 2: working on and that made it successful.
Speaker 1: And that was Susan's specialty working with those family members,
Speaker 1: and she did an absolute great job with it and
Speaker 1: really got some incredible insight from the family members. And
Speaker 1: I think it's important to remember the family because you know,
Speaker 1: what happened to us is nothing. What happened to the
Speaker 1: families is everything. Those families' lives have been changed forever
Speaker 1: in so many difficult and unusual ways that we'll never
Speaker 1: know about. But it's the families who bear the ultimate
Speaker 1: suffering of what bt did. And you know, we concentrate
Speaker 1: on BTK because A, he's still alive, b he's still
Speaker 1: being BTK. But the families are basically sitting all across
Speaker 1: the city, all across the state, and in silence because
Speaker 1: they don't want to think about it. They don't want
Speaker 1: to relive the moments, and I'm guessing that they would
Speaker 1: not want to do this to have their comments on
Speaker 1: the air, so they live in silence. And I think
Speaker 1: that burden for me would really be overwhelming.
Speaker 2: The relationship between Larry and I during that whole year,
Speaker 2: it was something very special. We became very very good
Speaker 2: friends during that year and very protective of each other.
Speaker 3: Can we get into the capture of Dennis Raider.
Speaker 2: I'll never forget it.
Speaker 1: Oh, go ahead, be my guess.
Speaker 2: Of course, all the TV stations were live covering every
Speaker 2: single millisecond of his way to prison. He leaves downtown Wichita.
Speaker 2: We have a helicopter in the sky following the caravan
Speaker 2: to Eldorado Prison, which is about thirty miles away. The
Speaker 2: helicopters in the sky. I remember following the car. I
Speaker 2: remember watching the car. I remember the car pulling up
Speaker 2: to the Eldorado Prison doors. I remember them getting Dennis
Speaker 2: Raider out in his jumpsuit, foot ankle cuffs and handcuffs,
Speaker 2: and then walking him into that prison. I remember the
Speaker 2: live shot of the prison door shutting. I have never
Speaker 2: been so relieved, so for lack of a better word,
Speaker 2: emotionally spent. I remember I started to cry, thinking to myself,
Speaker 2: the nightmare is over for Wichita. The nightmare is finally over,
Speaker 2: not only for us, for Larry and I and other
Speaker 2: members of the media, because it was a nightmare for
Speaker 2: us as well, but for all of Wichita, the nightmare
Speaker 2: was over. I started crying, and one other thing that
Speaker 2: struck me from that. Of course, that day we led
Speaker 2: with his incarceration forever and ever. All those stories aired
Speaker 2: that day, the five, six, and ten o'clock news, and
Speaker 2: all that I remember. The next day and the day
Speaker 2: after and the day after, we didn't mention his name,
Speaker 2: and it was so refreshing not to have his name
Speaker 2: mentioned on our newscast. And I'm sure it's what he
Speaker 2: wanted forever and ever and ever. I don't know if
Speaker 2: we mentioned his name for a couple months after that,
Speaker 2: and that's what was so refreshing. I don't know how
Speaker 2: Larry felt, but when the prison doors closed, I could
Speaker 2: physically feel this huge weight lifted from my shoulders. Mind you,
Speaker 2: we've covered a zillion trials, a zillion homicide cases, a
Speaker 2: zillion never one like this where you'd feel this weight
Speaker 2: lifted off of you when the prison doors closed. I mean,
Speaker 2: anchor people don't feel that. Journalists don't care. We felt
Speaker 2: this huge weight lifted off our shoulders and a huge
Speaker 2: sense of relief.
Speaker 1: You know, it's interesting. I'm listening to you give that
Speaker 1: moment by moment feeling, and that's incredible because my memory
Speaker 1: the day he was caught is just trying to get
Speaker 1: stuff on the air. And all I remember is all
Speaker 1: I could think about was Okay, we've got to get
Speaker 1: this bite in, We've got to get this story in,
Speaker 1: and so on and so forth. I don't remember my
Speaker 1: feelings that day. I don't, I don't not at all.
Speaker 1: I remember the week before he was caught, the week
Speaker 1: before they finally took him to prison, that I went
Speaker 1: over to the El Dorado prison and did a story
Speaker 1: on the cell. I went inside his cell where he
Speaker 1: would be kept, and I remember, you know, when that
Speaker 1: door slams on that cell, it is terrifying for me
Speaker 1: because I can't be in an enclosed place. It would
Speaker 1: drive me crazy. And when the door slams on that cell,
Speaker 1: that scared me more than anything, because I couldn't imagine
Speaker 1: spending the rest of my life in this very small area.
Speaker 1: But on the day, I remember all of the coverage
Speaker 1: of it, but I have no recollection of how I felt.
Speaker 1: I just nothing there.
Speaker 2: Not only did I feel that way the day he
Speaker 2: went to prison, but the day he was arrested, I
Speaker 2: was at the mall because it was in the morning
Speaker 2: before we went to work at two o'clock and the
Speaker 2: boss called and said, you got to get into work
Speaker 2: right away. I said, why, We're almost positive BTK was caught.
Speaker 2: I've never done this on a story. I mean stories
Speaker 2: or stories. You know, we're immune to this kind of thing.
Speaker 2: I was standing in the middle of the mall. The
Speaker 2: mall started going round and round and round, and I thought,
Speaker 2: oh my god, I'm going to faint. I'm going to faint.
Speaker 2: And I started crying and I sat down and put
Speaker 2: my head between my legs. That was over a news story.
Speaker 2: We've never done that before, but it involved us so
Speaker 2: much that we became part of the fear, part of
Speaker 2: the story, part of the extreme relief when he was
Speaker 2: finally caught.
Speaker 1: The moment for me was sitting in the courtroom when
Speaker 1: the judge asked him to go through his murders, and
Speaker 1: it was as if it was a three ring circus.
Speaker 1: He was in the center ring, the spotlight was on him,
Speaker 1: and he was the star, and he went through each
Speaker 1: murder in a way that you would talk about getting
Speaker 1: bread at the bakery or picking up your laundry, devoid
Speaker 1: of any emotion, just very factual. And I thought, how
Speaker 1: can a man stand up there and it was televised
Speaker 1: in front of everyone and go through those murders. And
Speaker 1: he was proud of it. He was I don't want
Speaker 1: to use the word happy about it. You could tell
Speaker 1: that this was his moment in the sun. This was
Speaker 1: his time in which everybody could see his work. And
Speaker 1: I remember thinking, what kind of person could do that,
Speaker 1: what kind of person could tell the most evil things
Speaker 1: that humanity can do and be proud of it. He
Speaker 1: was proud of it. He did it. It was his
Speaker 1: moment in the sun.
Speaker 2: Because you were in the courthouse and Jeff and I
Speaker 2: were feeling on the anchor set sick to our stomach,
Speaker 2: you had to have been even more sick to your
Speaker 2: stomach sitting there in the courtroom watching him.
Speaker 1: It felt like it was not real that this is
Speaker 1: a movie and this is the guy they hired to
Speaker 1: be BTK because so far, so devoid of reality, because
Speaker 1: human beings are not supposed to act like that. Human
Speaker 1: beings are not supposed to crave killing, human beings are
Speaker 1: not supposed to be proud of the fact that they
Speaker 1: have snuffed ten lives, and for him to stand up
Speaker 1: there in front of everyone and do that, it was
Speaker 1: just kind of like a movie script, almost didn't seem real.
Speaker 1: And then of course you brought back down to earth
Speaker 1: and it is reel.
Speaker 2: I also remember another feeling, and I don't know if
Speaker 2: it's relevant or not, but I'd like to ask Larry
Speaker 2: whether he felt the same way. I don't think you did,
Speaker 2: because I don't think Jeff did either. But I kept
Speaker 2: wanting to tell the judge, quit asking him questions, this
Speaker 2: is exactly what he wants. Quit asking him details of
Speaker 2: every single murder he's on stage. He's delighting in this.
Speaker 2: And I kept wanting to say to the judge, just
Speaker 2: let him plead guilty and go. But he had the
Speaker 2: opportunity because the judge kept asking him question and then
Speaker 2: there was this murder, and then there was this murder.
Speaker 2: What about this murder? He stood up like he was
Speaker 2: accepting an Academy award, answering the judge's questions about ten
Speaker 2: different murders, and I kept wanting to tell the judge,
Speaker 2: quit asking him, this is what he wants. He's delighting
Speaker 2: in this. And he had already pled guilty.
Speaker 3: Why do we need.
Speaker 2: To hear this?
Speaker 1: See this is a point when Susan and I probably disagree.
Speaker 1: I was very happy that the judge went through and
Speaker 1: had him describe each murder because I felt that there
Speaker 1: are probably still people out there who would say, oh,
Speaker 1: the media is pouring down negative things about this guy.
Speaker 1: You know what could be so terrible about Dennis Raider?
Speaker 1: But by taking him through murder by murder, and it
Speaker 1: just gets grosser and grosser and more terrible as he
Speaker 1: goes on, then you see what BTK was. Then you
Speaker 1: see the man behind the three letters, and he becomes real,
Speaker 1: and he becomes evil, and he would lose support, which
Speaker 1: is what I was hoping would happen. But still today
Speaker 1: I know that there are people who write, women who
Speaker 1: write him in jail. I don't get that, never have
Speaker 1: understood that. But I was just happy that judge went
Speaker 1: through all of those things so there was no mistake
Speaker 1: about what kind of human being this is and why
Speaker 1: he deserved those the death penalty, which he did not
Speaker 1: get because of Kansas laws. But I thought it was
Speaker 1: a great moment. I just felt it was surreal.
Speaker 3: Larry, can you tell us why you still communicate with Dennis.
Speaker 1: The reason I will occasionally write to BTK. We still
Speaker 1: to this day do not know what caused BTK to
Speaker 1: become a murderer. We just have no clue. And there
Speaker 1: are a million teachers out there with kids in their classroom,
Speaker 1: and they know something is wrong with a child, but
Speaker 1: they don't know what to do, They don't know how
Speaker 1: to do it. So the question becomes, how do we
Speaker 1: identify these children who are going to grow up to
Speaker 1: become a BTK. The first place that we would see
Speaker 1: that would be in the classroom, and so we need
Speaker 1: to find out what teachers can use to identify these kids.
Speaker 1: And we still don't know. Dennis Raider told me that
Speaker 1: he knew by the time he was in late grade
Speaker 1: school and certainly by early junior high who he was
Speaker 1: and what he was. That to me is terrifying because
Speaker 1: I'm guessing that there are thousands of other little btks
Speaker 1: out there being formulated right now. How do we find them,
Speaker 1: how do we detect them, and then how do we
Speaker 1: stop them? We still don't have those answers. And my
Speaker 1: hope is that all of the forensic psychologists who the
Speaker 1: FBI have employed and who others have employed. Can all
Speaker 1: get together instead of writing their own books, you know,
Speaker 1: from coast to coast, can all get together and say, Okay,
Speaker 1: here's what caused this to happen. Here's what teachers in
Speaker 1: the future and others and parents can look to to
Speaker 1: see that their child is going to grow up and
Speaker 1: be one horrible human being. But until we have those answers,
Speaker 1: the BTK story will never be dead. Even if he
Speaker 1: dies tomorrow, this story isn't done because we don't know
Speaker 1: what caused him to become the murdering monster that he was.
Speaker 1: We still don't know, and that's why I stay involved
Speaker 1: in it because I want to know, and I want
Speaker 1: to know for future generations.
Speaker 2: I one hundred percent agree with Larry. I don't think
Speaker 2: his death will do any good for closure for the families.
Speaker 2: It won't do any good for closure for other people
Speaker 2: who were affected by BTK. His death will mean almost
Speaker 2: nothing to them because they don't want to have any
Speaker 2: contact or anything to do with him. He's never really
Speaker 2: shown any remorse or sorrow or any has come anywhere
Speaker 2: near I made a mistake. He's admitted to Factor X,
Speaker 2: and he said Factor X made me do it. But
Speaker 2: he's never said I'm sorry, I let Factor X take over.
Speaker 2: I'm sorry I did this, I'm sorry I did that.
Speaker 2: I'm sorry. I'm a crazy person in my world. I
Speaker 2: think he knows he's a crazy person. I think he knows.
Speaker 2: He's never apologized for it. He's never apologized for the
Speaker 2: lives he's changed. And so for that reason, I don't
Speaker 2: think his death will do any good.
Speaker 1: In the letter that I just wrote to him, I
Speaker 1: asked him how he felt today about what he did
Speaker 1: as compared to two thousand and five, and the last
Speaker 1: time we talked, he didn't refer to that. He didn't
Speaker 1: answer that question. In this I said, recent stories in
Speaker 1: the news indicate that some believe that you may be
Speaker 1: responsible for two additional murders just asking questions like that.
Speaker 1: And the reason I write to him is that I hope,
Speaker 1: in a moment of sanity, he would write back to
Speaker 1: me and say, oh, yeah, I did kill that person,
Speaker 1: you know, back ten or fifteen years ago. But he
Speaker 1: hasn't done it yet. As a newsperson, you keep asking
Speaker 1: the question. And what we found is when you interview people,
Speaker 1: you ask the question many different ways and you get
Speaker 1: many different responses and you hope that the response would
Speaker 1: come out all right, guys, you know, yeah, okay, I
Speaker 1: did those others. He hasn't done that yet. What he
Speaker 1: wrote back to me this time, there's no news value
Speaker 1: in it. He said, I just want you to know
Speaker 1: I forgive you. I forget how he worded it. I'm
Speaker 1: trying to figure out what he's forgiving me for. He says,
Speaker 1: it's been a few minutes since we last corresponded, as
Speaker 1: I recall I recall you and others from KTV, How
Speaker 1: can I forget you you? And then he says something
Speaker 1: the media and I'm a man with extra which I
Speaker 1: couldn't read. But all is forgiven. So I'm not sure
Speaker 1: what he's forgiving me for. I did understand back in
Speaker 1: two thousand and five he was unhappy with me because
Speaker 1: in one story I referred to him as a monster
Speaker 1: and he took offense at that. So I'm always anxious
Speaker 1: to get a letter because you know, it may be
Speaker 1: a key to a solution to a piece of information
Speaker 1: that we don't have. And he said he in there
Speaker 1: he was getting away from letter writing. I understand why
Speaker 1: he's getting away from letter writing because it's very hard
Speaker 1: to read his handwriting. Now they apparently have tablets, he
Speaker 1: calls them. I'm assuming maybe it's a chromebook or maybe
Speaker 1: an iPad. I don't know what he has. So now
Speaker 1: he can text people, and he said he was also
Speaker 1: receiving texts. Having Denis Raider being able to text is
Speaker 1: a little bit terrifying. If you're sitting at the dinner
Speaker 1: table with your family and you get a text and
Speaker 1: it's Dennis Raider, B how do you feel about that?
Speaker 2: Doesn't matter. He's in prison. He gets things like this.
Speaker 2: Dennis Raider has access to a tablet, to a television,
Speaker 2: to all these things, and it's not fair. I have
Speaker 2: the feeling he wants publicity.
Speaker 1: Now, Well, what I understand is everybody in the prison
Speaker 1: has access to this and they only get it if
Speaker 1: they're good. Now, if they violate prison rules or regulations,
Speaker 1: then television has taken away, the tablets are taken away.
Speaker 2: Why would he violate any rules. He wants his tablet,
Speaker 2: he wants his television.
Speaker 1: He has in the past. Yeah, he's bad.
Speaker 3: He has.
Speaker 1: I don't know what he's done, but he's been bad
Speaker 1: in the past and they have taken things away from him.
Speaker 3: Susan in this most recent letter, it says that you
Speaker 3: were never a project? How does that make you feel?
Speaker 2: Wish I would have known that twenty years ago. Wish
Speaker 2: I would have known it twenty years ago. It would
Speaker 2: have saved me a lot of stress, a lot of fear,
Speaker 2: a lot of angst. But hearing that I wasn't a
Speaker 2: project now, First of all, how do you believe a
Speaker 2: murders who knows when he's lying and when he's not lying.
Speaker 2: But hearing it now it makes no difference whatsoever. It's
Speaker 2: almost like, how dare him even say my name nothing?
Speaker 1: Now?
Speaker 2: You're nothing now? You are nothing then, and you're even
Speaker 2: less than nothing now. This is the first time I've
Speaker 2: realized that we have never had these conversations about BTK,
Speaker 2: and that I've never really cried in front of Larry
Speaker 2: about BTK.
Speaker 1: It's interesting when I'm sitting across from Susan now, I
Speaker 1: am fascinated with her comments because it's the first time
Speaker 1: I've heard many of these things, and so we're sort
Speaker 1: of reliving it again.