Going through the truck stops, I'd heard about women getting their throats slit or strangled. But Rhoades held desires went well beyond the limits of consensual sexual activity. You didn't do it.". That first ride was a preview of how it would often go for me with truckersdodging sex and getting strandedbut I had learned one crucial lesson: When a truck slows down, you get up. His first known murder victims were 28-year-old Douglas Zyskowski and his wife, 24-year-old Patricia Walsh, a couple he'd picked up as hitchhikers at the end of 1989near El Paso, Texas. Debra also talked about Robert having sex with her against her will one time, which finally pushed her to end things with him. "Of course," Lee says, "Lisa was talking all sorts of crazy stuff. Between 1975 and 1990, Robert Ben Rhoads, now 73, savagely murdered at least three victims and possibly, investigators believe, as many as 50 during his treks across North America as a professional truck driver. He was convicted for three murders, and slated to be tried for two more before charges were dropped due to the wishes of victims' families. Walters and Walsh had been held captive by Rhoades while he traveled the interstate highways in his truck. "The defendant essentially agreed to stack the life sentences in Illinois, which means he'll never get out," Smith said. Young, a six-foot-four Texan and third-generation lawman, opened his laptop and pulled up a picture of a woman named Shana Holts. She had a stocking down her throat, I think. In Robert Ben Rhoades's truck, authorities recovered a briefcase filled with sex toys and torture devices which the hitchhiker said the trucker had used to abuse her over the course of several hours. Walsh's remains were found in October 1990 in central Utah, but not identified until 2003, with the help of dental records. "So was the trucker I met a true psychopath?" "That's him! The FBI theorized Robert had killed at least three women per month. Griselda Blanco. I wrote him back and told him that journalistic standards wouldn't allow me to pay for interviews. A week before the girl was found in the Dumpster, though, I'd gone to see my dad in Virginia. Eventually she was left unbound. TV-14. Getting sleep was pretty easy with a boyfriend, because one of us could always stay awake. His wife, Debra Davis, was from Texas. "How many of those guys could there be?". When they found her, there was shouting. I flew to Austin to meet with two retired FBI men, special agents Mark Young and Robert F. Lee, who'd both worked on the case. The whole thing seemed so uncanny. She didn't do what he expected. When I first saw his apartment, I thought I'd walked into the showroom of a furniture store. Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information. The store for professional drivers was clean and quiet. It was a woman, probably in her midfifties. In that one, driven by penis envy, a woman's inner child taunts a man into seducing her so that she can be freed from guilt for her own "sadistic fantasies." Patricia and Douglas were later confirmed as victims of serial killer, Robert Ben Rhoades. Condamn la prison vie pour une srie de meurtres, il en a confess un nouveau . Suspected of killing and raping 100+ women while on the road in the 1980s and early 1990s. I thought that maybe in a truck stop where known murders had occurred, people would be more forthcoming. She also had children from another marriage. All rights reserved. There was going to be no more talking. He'd never heard the phrase. I had a guitar and a knapsack full of souvenirs of my girlhood: notes from friends, earrings, and song lyrics. According to her, in the summer of 1985, Rhoades was driving for a trucking company based in Georgia that has an office right on I-95. Robert Ben Rhoades, 66, is already serving a life sentence without parole for the 1990 murder of 14-year-old runaway Regina Walters in Illinois. While passing through various states, he thought he could pick up a hitchhiker here or a sex worker there and no one would notice if they disappeared. The interior of the truck's cab contained a hidden compartment that could only be seen if you were between the seats. She never reported the incident, as she had promised Robert. It's supposed that Rhoades quickly killed Jones and disposed of his body (via The Telegraph). Robert kept her for over a week, torturing and raping her repeatedly. The paper records had been destroyed for file space, and so nothing from the 1980s remained. Truck stops in the 1980s were closed worlds where what went on passed unnoticed on the outside. Initially, agents had disagreed over whether the young girl on Rhoades's film was Regina. It is glossy black and long. After all, it's just going to be his word against mine. Robert Benjamin Rhoades (born November 22, 1945), also known as The Truck Stop Killer, is an American serial killer and rapist. So, if youre curious about where Debra might be today, heres what we know. Further compounding this problem is that Rhoades did not presumably kill his victims where he met them. It brought her back to that terrifying night in 1985. "He was on the interstate everywhere.". Looks too much like a target.". After Debra Davis interviewed about life with her ex-husband, serial killer Robert Ben Rhoades, Kentucky state troopers reached out, telling her that they suspected Rhoades in a 1985 cold case. They are more like habits, he said, and can adapt to circumstances or mood. Police photo. : r/pics r/pics 10 yr. ago Posted by punkindrublicrpp Before serial killer Robert Ben Rhoades killed his victims, he like to snap a photo of them. I was accepted, and that provided a thin strip of pride on which to stand while I made contact with my family. He stopped responding to my questions. Serial Killer and Rapist Robert Ben Rhoades Case Review Profiling Evil The Interview Room Profiling Evil 129K subscribers 28K views Streamed 2 years ago Robert Benjamin Rhoades, also known as. 1983. The question of what you do with your old SWAT jacket when you retire had never entered my mind. Viswa Vanapalli. Records on her would provide a date and a place that could then be checked against Rhoades's trucking logs. I said he could do it in a few minutes. The two had a few drinks together and danced that night. The rig was equipped with handcuffs on the ceiling, which enabled Rhoades to chain his female victims so that he could torture them before killing them. Her murder happened twenty-seven years ago and was essentially pre-Internet. Among the photographs recovered from Rhoades' home while he was jailed was several of Walters. Rhoades was a great lover of games. I had not told him or anyone else how I felt about failing to go to the cops. One game in the book is called "Courtroom." There was always a sick mom or dead grandparent involved, and I was almost always abandoned by my jerk of a boyfriend, who'd made off with all my money and my car. I asked. Rhoades in Bond County IL Barn. Being up high, warm, and looking out over the traffic was a great improvement. These were my private feelings. To revisit this article, visit My Profile, thenView saved stories. Please include what you were doing when this page came up and the Cloudflare Ray ID found at the bottom of this page. After that, she spoke of feeling inadequate and questioning if something was wrong with her. I pulled up a map of Martinsburg, Pennsylvania, and that's where things started to get hazy. The more I learned about Rhoades, the more I saw parallels between us. The Daily Nonpareil reports that Robert Ben Rhoades was set to be free on work release when Illinois police identified the body of 14-year-old Regina Walters. The same week that I got the letter from Rhoades, the senior officer from the Berkeley County sheriff's department who had been fishing returned. Murder Victim. He came around behind her and grabbed her shoulders. Between Pennal and Rhoades, it's Rhoades they believe. The victim began saying anything she could think of to try and save her own life. It would appear that crime was in Roberts blood. Could Debra help solve an active investigation? His clothes were gray or blue, but that may have been the light. From 1975 to 1990 he is believed to have tortured,. The more I learned about Rhoades, the more I saw parallels between us. But to ex-wife Debra Davis, when they. "The hairs on my arm stand up right now talking about it.". Robert Ben Rhoades is a 71 year old white male, 6' 1" 175 pounds, and currently resides in the Menard Correctional Facility in Chester Illinois. When officials searched the trucker's apartment a few days later, they discovered evidence that caused officials to believe Rhoades was even more dangerous than they had assumed. On April 1, 1990, Roberts murder spree finally came to an end. She was found running naked, screaming down a street in Houston with DNA all over her body, her head and pubic hair shaved, still with his chain around her neck. Similarly, Rhoades' hometown newspaper also noted that he was suspected of the torture, rape, and . Behind him was a shoulder-high pink plastic castle. She would be easy to dismiss. "Bob was obsessed with how they used an imaginary secret society to keep her from running away," Davis said. Narrowing the field to those last seen around truck stops and rest areas, the bureau counted over 500 bodies, almost all women. Debra said she looked about 18 or 19 and desperate. Nothing came up, but that wasn't too surprising. Wikipedia External References This gave me a screen behind which to observe drivers when they thought I was distracted. A month after Robert brutally murdered Douglas and Patricia, he picked up his next victim, an eighteen-year-old transient who lived in Houston. I called the office. What we do know about this dark story shines a light on the hell faced by as many as 50 women before they met their ultimate demise. She's tried to put the years with Rhoades behind her but still gets letters from him sporadically. It was agent Young who recognized the small gap in Regina's teeth and noticed that a few freckles were in the same place. I'd put off writing Rhoades, mostly because I didn't want him to write me back. Robert Ben Rhoades. Sleeping by myself on the street made me a target, and having sex with some creepy old guy for a spot on a mattress also held little appeal. His trucking logs place him in the area of fifty unsolved murders in the three years prior to his arrest alone. Modes of operation change. He kept Walsh alive for an undisclosed amount of time, subjecting her to the same cruel treatment that he would later dole out to Walters. Laying asleep next to her was the driver of the truck, Robert Ben Rhoades. Fondoleding a fourteen year old girl. At the bottom of the yellow legal paper, scrawled in all caps, he wrote, "IT WASN'T ME!!!" Who was the girl in the Dumpster? Akin to the murders of Douglas and Patricia, Robert killed Ricky immediately and disposed of his body but held Regina captive for a long period of time, periodically calling her father from a payphone. When it turned, when it downshifted, when it drifted toward the shoulderI woke. Like Regina, I also had a little journal and probably wrote something in it that night, because it was far too cold to sleep. Watch with discovery+. She had been missing from the Houston area since early 1990 after running off with her boyfriend. But an expert in what, I thought, killing? Look at Lisa Pennal. And who's going to believe him? The next morning, I drove to the Gateway Travel Plaza in Breezewood, Pennsylvania. new content, we kindly appreciate any donation you can give to help I was on my own. It was a raw moment. Robert Ben Rhoades. Born in Council Bluffs, IA #7. Police looked at the photos, noting that the growth of Regina Walters' hair and the changing color of her bruises meant that she had been in Robert Ben Rhoades' clutches for several weeks (per All That's Interesting). Robert Ben Rhoades, a Houston trucker who kept a torture dungeon in the cab of his long-haul rig, accepted two life prison sentences http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/sns-ap-tx--serialkiller-texas,0,3734866.story Houston trucker already imprisoned in Illinois for murder avoids Texas death penalty with plea After Debra Davis interviewed about life with her ex-husband, serial killer Robert Ben Rhoades, Kentucky state troopers reached out, telling her that they suspected Rhoades in a 1985 cold case. Lee told me that the final lines of Holts's police statement read, "I don't see any good in filing charges. "No," she said, "I never heard of anything like that anywhere.". Had she ever heard about it? I remember sitting in the drizzle in a truck while the crime-scene tape was strung around a Dumpster. It said he would see me if I promised never to say that I had seen him or what had passed between us. Rhoades is thought to have killed Zyskowski while the young man slept. If Rhoades hadn't been stopped by a patrolman on I-10 in Casa Grande, Ariz., in 1990, his crimes might never have been discovered. Regina Kay Walters is remembered among his victims for the terrifying photograph he took of her moments before he murdered her. He shaved her head and pubic hair, pierced her with fishing hooks, dressed her up in a black dress and heels, and photographed her in moments of terror, then killed her with a garrote made of baling wire, leaving her one-hundred-pound body to decompose in a barn in Illinois off Interstate 70. As a 15-year-old, the author left home and became a hitchhiker, hopping from semi to semi on the interstate. Robert's victims were hitchhikers. She came over and gave me an open smile. Rhoades avtjnar ett livstidsstraff p Menard Correctional Center i Chester i Illinois . Rhoades' attorneys did not respond to requests for comment from ABCNews.com. "Were there any murders that summer?" One library archivist explained that I was looking for the kind of news nobody wanted to read. Robert Ben Rhoades: From 1989 to 1990, Robert Ben Rhoades is believed to have tortured, raped and killed more than fifty women, although he has only three confirmed victims. Being 16 and in college is an easier thing to talk about. Rhoades antas ha torterat, vldtagit och mrdat fler n 50 kvinnor, [ 2] men endast 3 har bekrftats. The newspapers were equally silent. In the summer of 1985, the author was such a girl. "Well," said Lee, sitting back after I finished, "you're probably right. I called as soon as I landed. In a letter to his wife on the subject of psychological games, he wrote: "I always told you there were three things you could do: play, pass, or run." Robert Benjamin Rhoades, fdd 22 november 1945, r en amerikansk seriemrdare och vldtktsman, aktiv mellan 1989 och 1990. , Pennsylvania, we kindly appreciate any donation you can give to help I was my... 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