Tsutomu Miyazaki: deeply disturbed Japanese serial killer who practiced cannibalism and necrophilia on his young victims.
Joseph Duncan III : paedophilic killer who wiped out an entire family to get to the object of his desire, an 8-year-old girl.
Erno Soto: a deadly phantom who preyed on the children of Harlem and went by the terrifying sobriquet “Charlie Chop-off.”
Jeanne Weber: the babysitter from Hell. Weber strangled to death 10 children left in her care.
Robert Black: a remorseless child killer who sexually assaulted and murdered at least three little girls and may have killed many more.
Gordon Stewart Northcott: axe murderer from the 1920’s who tortured, sexually abused and murdered young boys.
Marc Dutroux: kidnapped six young girls and held them as sex slaves, eventually killing two and allowing two to starve to death.
Marcelo Costa de Andrade: sex fiend and necrophile who targeted slum children in Rio de Janeiro, killing 14 in just eight months.
Arthur Gary Bishop: repulsive paedophile who murdered five young boys, drowning, bludgeoning and strangling them to death.
Plus 10 more riveting true crime cases. Click here to get your copy now.
Beyond Evil
Westley Allan Dodd
Like most serial killers, Westley Allan Dodd showed an
interest in sex from an early age. He was just 13 years old when he began
exposing himself to younger children, standing at an upstairs window at his
home and flashing them as they walked by. That inevitably led to complaints
being lodged with the police, but the result was little more than a reprimand.
Unperturbed, Dodd took his show on the road. He began cruising the neighborhood
on his bicycle, flashing any young kid he encountered. When the police again
came knocking, Dodd's father agreed to have a "father-son chat" with
the boy.
Whether or not that conversation actually happened, it seems
to have had little impact on young Westley. A year after the flashing incident,
his parents divorced and he went to live with his father. At around this time,
his deviant behavior escalated from flashing to sexual assault.
At first, Dodd molested the children close to him. An
8-year-old cousin and her 6-year-old brother were first, then the children of a
woman his father was dating. But Dodd soon cast a wider net. He began
volunteering to babysit neighborhood kids. Later, he became a camp counselor.
All the while, he tweaked and perfected his M.O. He learned, for example, that
it was easy to manipulate children into inappropriate behaviors by posing those
behaviors as a dare or a game. He played on the natural curiosity that children
have, on their uncertainty and their desire to act “grown-up.” He also became
an expert at concealing his crimes, using intimidation or convincing his young
victims to keep the abuse a secret.
Inevitably, though, some of the children did report him. By
the age of 15, Dodd had already accumulated several arrests for inappropriate
behavior with minors. Yet, amazingly, he was never prosecuted. In each case,
the authorities decided on counseling rather than incarceration.
By the age of 18, Dodd had already molested over 250
children. And his perverted lust was nowhere near to being sated. He was
constantly on the hunt, constantly looking for new victims. As yet, though,
he'd never used violence against a child. That would change.
In September 1981, Dodd enlisted in the US Navy. He would
later claim that he'd joined the military in order to quell his unrelenting
lust for children. However, military life did nothing to control his appetites.
While stationed at Bangor, Washington, he started preying on kids living on the
base. Then he began making excursions into Seattle, accosting children in movie
theater bathrooms and amusement arcades. By now, he'd started using money as an
enticement. He would offer a reward to a child to help him look for a lost
item, lure him to a secluded area, and then attack. One time, he offered $50 to
some boys to join him in his motel room for a game of strip poker. The boys
reported the incident and Dodd was arrested, although he was later released
with a warning.
But Dodd's luck was not going to last forever. The next time
he appeared before a judge charged with indecent assault, he earned 19 days in
jail. It was no more than a slap on the wrist, but enough to see his military
career brought to an abrupt end. Discharged from the Navy early in 1984, Dodd
stepped up his pursuit of young boys. In May 1984, he received a suspended
sentence for molesting a 10-year-old. It did nothing to discourage his
nefarious activities.
Dodd's life had by now become a perpetual hunt for victims
(or "targets," as he described them in his diaries). He moved into an
apartment building with lots of young families, he took jobs at fast food
restaurants and became a driver for various charities, which required him to
call on homes to pick up donations. If he spotted a boy he liked, he would
write down the address, and later return to cruise the neighborhood, hoping to
catch the child alone.
Such was his need that he also took huge risks by attacking
children who were known to him. He once abused a co-worker's son on a fishing
trip; he repeatedly molested a neighbor's two and four-year-olds. When the
mother found out she confronted Dodd, although she declined to press charges
for fear of traumatizing her children further.
In 1986, Dodd moved to Seattle and was soon stalking the
streets of his new hometown. His initial attempts, however, met with failure,
the city kids perhaps more adept at spotting a predator than his earlier
victims. Frustrated, Dodd resolved to use force with his next target if
necessary. When he went hunting again, he was carrying a length of rope. And
the act of subduing and restraining his target had an unexpected impact on
Dodd. He found it sexually stimulating. From that point on, he began
fantasizing about murder.
“The more I thought about it,” he'd later recount, “the more
exciting the idea of murder sounded. I planned many ways to kill a boy. Then I
started thinking of torture, castration, and even cannibalism.”
So it was, that in 1987, Westley Allan Dodd began planning
his first murder. His intended victim was an 8-year-old he'd met while working
as a security guard. Dodd drove to the area where the boy lived and tried to
lure him to an isolated stretch of woodland by telling him that he needed his
help to find a lost child. But the boy must have sensed that Dodd was
dangerous. He insisted on going home to fetch a toy for the child. Once there
he told his mother what had happened. Dodd was arrested, but the charge was not
a serious one, and the sentence was correspondingly light. Dodd spent only 118
days in jail.
The following year, 1989, Dodd moved to Vancouver,
Washington, and immediately started scouting the places where kids hung out.
David Douglas Park, located about a mile from his new apartment, seemed like a
good hunting ground. Before long, Dodd was walking the dirt paths and wooded
areas, marking out isolated spots where kids might wander. In his diary he
wrote,
“David Douglas Park is a good place for rape and murder.”
But Dodd's initial hunting expeditions all came up empty. By
Labor Day weekend 1989, he was growing increasingly frustrated. Having spent
the whole of Saturday and Sunday trawling the park without finding any likely
victims, he returned again on Monday, September 3. He was carrying with him a
murder kit – a large knife and some shoestrings to tie up his victims.
But, as on the previous two days, Dodd was unable to find a
victim, at least, one that could be taken without risk. By 6:15 p.m., he was
aggravated and ready to quit and head home. That was when he spotted two boys
racing their bicycles along a path.
Cole Neer, 11, and his brother, William, 10, were late for
dinner and had decided to take a shortcut through David Douglas Park on their
way home. As they sped along the dirt path, a man suddenly appeared from the
bushes and stepped in front of them, holding up his hand in a "stop"
gesture. The boys came skidding to a halt and then dismounted their bikes when
the man told them to. He spoke with such authority that the boys were sure he
must be a policeman, or perhaps a park official. When he ordered them to follow
him into the bushes, they obediently did so. Before long they were deep into
the undergrowth and no longer visible from the path. Then the man came to a
stop and turned towards them. He was holding something in his hand.
Dodd ordered the boys to lay down their bikes and then to
stand back to back. He then tied their hands with the bootlaces. Having secured
the boys, he said that he was going to have to pull down their pants. Perhaps
to protect his younger brother, Cole agreed to do it. Dodd then began molesting
Cole, all the while promising that he'd let them go once he was done. He then
started on Billy, but the younger boy began crying so hard that Dodd was forced
to stop and turn his attention to Cole again. Then, after what must have seemed
an eternity to his young victims, he cut them loose and told them they could
go. “There's just one more thing,” he said as the boys picked up their
bicycles. Neither boy had seen the knife in his hand right up until the moment
that it arced through the night air and buried itself in Billy's stomach.
Cole Neer barely had time to comprehend what was happening
when he too was stabbed, the blade slicing through his flesh under the ribcage.
With Dodd's attention temporarily diverted, Billy seized his opportunity and
ran, while Dodd plunged the knife twice more into his brother's prostate form
and then followed. He caught the mortally wounded Billy before he made it to
the road. “I'm sorry!” Billy cried, as the killer stabbed him twice more and
then fled into the night.
Billy Neer was found soon after by a passerby. He was rushed
to hospital, but it was too late. The vicious knife attack had snuffed out his
young life. The boys' father had meanwhile been searching the neighborhood for
them and had called in the police when that search proved unsuccessful. A
search was immediately launched, spreading out to cover the path Billy and Cole
would have taken. They found Cole in the woods, lying dead on the ground where
Dodd had left him.
While the Neer family mourned their murdered sons and the
parents of Vancouver banded together to protect their children, Westley Dodd
was already contemplating his next crime. The murders of Cole and Billy had
left him both exhilarated and frustrated. The killings had thrilled him much
more than molesting children had ever done. But there were things he had wanted
to do to his victims, things he hadn't got the chance to do. Next time would be
different. And he was absolutely certain that there would be a next time. As he
sat recording his thoughts in his diary he knew one thing for sure. He wanted
to kill again.
Toward the end of October, the compulsion that had been
building up in Westley Allen Dodd had become so powerful that he could no
longer ignore it. He decided to go hunting again. David Douglas Park, however,
was out of the question, as was the whole of Vancouver. The shockwaves from the
Neer murders had still not dissipated. The city was in a state of virtual
lockdown. Not that Dodd was going to let that stop him. On Saturday, October
28, he drove to Portland, Oregon, just over the bridge from Vancouver, and
started trawling.
Dodd's first stop was at Oaks Park, where he approached a
little boy and was chased off by the child's father. Next, he passed by the
Richmond School but found the playgrounds abandoned. Finally, he tried his luck
at a movie theater but failed to lure any of the children he approached. With
frustration growing, he decided to call off his hunt until the next day.
On Sunday, October 29, Dodd returned to the playground of
the Richmond School. There he spotted four-year-old Lee Iseli, sitting atop a
slide, watching some older kids playing football. Dodd approached the child and
smiled. “Hi,” he said to the blonde toddler. “You want to have some fun and
make some money?”
The child appeared uncertain. He shook his head. “Come on,”
Dodd coaxed, still smiling. He held out his hand and Lee took it. Then, as they
approached Dodd's car, Lee froze and said he didn't want to go. Dodd reassured
him by saying that he'd been sent by Lee's father to pick him up. That seemed
to convince the child and he got into the vehicle. As they drove off, Lee told Dodd
that he was going in the wrong direction, that he lived the other way. “Don't
worry,” Dodd said, “We're going to my house to have some fun.”
Back at the school grounds, Lee's older brother had broken
off from his football game long enough to notice that the toddler was missing.
He and his friends then carried out a frantic search before he ran home to tell
his father that Lee had disappeared. A distraught Robert Iseli immediately
called the police and a search was launched. Ultimately, it would prove
fruitless.
We know the horrific details of Lee Iseli's death only
because Westley Alan Dodd was so forthcoming in his later confession. With
obvious relish, he described to investigators how he had tied the child up and
molested him, recording meticulous details in his diary and with Polaroid
photographs. When Lee began to cry, Dodd took him to K-Mart where he bought him
a toy and to McDonalds for a meal.
Back at the apartment, he continued molesting Lee throughout
the night, breaking off only to make sickening entries in his diary. “He
suspects nothing now. Will probably wait until morning to kill him. That way
his body will be fairly fresh for experiments after work. I'll suffocate him in
his sleep when I wake up for work.”
Not content with that, he took to taunting the child. When
the boy dozed off, Dodd woke him. “I'm going to kill you in the morning,” he
said. “No, you won't!” Lee cried.
But Dodd had already decided. Realizing that it was a risk
to leave Lee alone in his apartment, he strangled the child, then hung his body
in a closet with a leather belt. He recorded all of this with his Polaroid
camera and then calmly left the apartment to go to work. When he returned that
evening, he loaded Lee's tiny body into his car and drove to Vancouver Lake
where he dumped it in the undergrowth. Later he burned the child's clothing in
a barrel in his backyard, all except for Lee's little Ghostbusters underwear,
which he kept as a souvenir.
On the morning of November 1, 1989, a man walking near
Vancouver Lake discovered Lee's body and called it in. Within minutes, the area
was crawling with police officers, some of them close to tears at the little
corpse so callously discarded, others shaking with rage. “What could a
four-year-old do to make someone kill him?” one of the officers was heard to
comment. “Who would do such a thing?”
The answer to that question lay just a few miles away.
Westley Alan Dodd was still basking in the glow of his atrocious acts, writing
in his diary and masturbating over his horrendous Polaroid collection. He was
also busy constructing a torture rack out of boards and ropes. Already, he was
planning his next crime.
On November 13, 1989, Dodd was at the New Liberty Theater in
Camas, Washington. He wasn't here to watch a movie, though. He was hunting.
After a while, he spotted a likely target, a young boy walking up the aisle
toward the lobby. Dodd waited until the child passed, then got out of his seat
and followed him into the restroom. A moment later he emerged, carrying the
shrieking and kicking 6-year-old over his shoulder.
Theater employees initially thought that it was just a kid
throwing a tantrum, but the child's persistent cries of "Help me! Help
me!" disturbed them and they ran after Dodd, who had by now reached his
car and was fumbling for his keys while trying to restrain the boy. As Dodd
spotted the approaching movie theater employees, his attention must have
wavered for a moment because the boy managed to wriggle out of his grasp and
run back towards the theater. He made it just as his stepfather, Ray Graves,
entered the lobby looking for him.
Graves paused just long enough in the lobby to hear what had
happened. Then he sprinted out of the theater after Dodd. He caught the killer
trying to start his car. Grabbing Dodd by the neck, he dragged him out of the
car and back to the theater. Staff meanwhile had called the police, and they
arrived to take Dodd into custody.
Dodd had been caught red-handed trying to kidnap a child and
with three recent child murders in the area, detectives immediately started
pressing him regarding the Neer brothers and Lee Iseli. He initially denied any
involvement in the murders, but after less than an hour of interrogation, he
cracked and admitted that he had killed the three boys.
Dodd was charged with three counts of first-degree murder
and one of attempted kidnapping. Initially, he entered not guilty pleas to each
of the charges, but in January 1990, he changed his pleas to guilty, saying
that he wanted to die. After listening to excerpts from his diary and viewing
the sickening photographs he had taken of Lee Iseli, the jury had no problem in
granting his wish.
Westley Allan Dodd died on the gallows at Washington's Walla
Walla Prison on January 5, 1993. There have been few killers in history who have
been more deserving of that fate.
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