Gary Heidnik

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Hello, everyone, and welcome to episode 424 of the Criminology Podcast. This is Mike Ferguson.

And this is Mike Morford.

Mr. Morford, how you doing this week, buddy?

I'm doing pretty good. How you doing?

I'm doing great. It is about 95 degrees here in Ohio, a little warm. That's, that's norm for you, I'm sure. But we're having a little mini heatwave up here.

Yeah, it's always a mini heatwave here. So, but I feel you. I know there's a, that August and the September timeline up in the Northeast is still pretty brutal.

Yeah, it can be, but then, you know, it'll drop. It'll drop to the 70s and then it's like 95. It, it, it's all over the map. You know, that's what makes it strange, I think, for us.

Well, for you know, you'll be shoveling snow. You'll be happy about that.

I'm not complaining, to be honest with you, because I am not ready for the snow. All right, let's go ahead and give our Patreon shout outs. We had new support from Matthew Cosgrove and Scott Frazier. So, we really appreciate that.

Thank you so much, Matthew and Scott, and thanks to everyone else that helps support the show. If you want to help support the show, head over to patreon.com/criminology to get started.

All right, buddy, let's jump right into this week's case. And we are sort of piggybacking on last week's case when we covered the father and son duo Raymond and Eugene Horsch in the Philadelphia area. And police believe that one or both of them are responsible for a series of crimes that are still unfolding. And that got us thinking, you know, although the Horsch's had a, a house of horrors of their own, which we talked about, it was not the original house of horrors to make news in Philadelphia. The man that owned that infamous home might say to the Horsch's, you know, hold my beer, because he did some awfully shocking things that we'll get into in this episode. But before we get into what

Gary Heidnik did, we want to just give a quick couple of updates on the Horsch case as some new things have come out since last week's episode. The first development is that there is now a fifth missing woman linked to the Horsch house and only, but her name has not been released publicly. Like the others, authorities believe that she is dead based on digital evidence. And we spent some time, more, if you know, speculating about what kind of images or videos could have investigators so sure that the women were dead. And a little bit more has come out about that as well. Investigators now believe

that Raymond Horsch actually filmed himself strangling the woman to death. They are so sure that this was not acting and special effects, that they have notified the victim's relatives. So, this will undoubtedly continue to unfold. So, stay tuned. But for now, we're going to turn our attention to Gary Heidnik. And he became infamous for terrorizing North Philadelphia long before the Horsch's hit the news or, you know, anyone knew about what they were doing.

On March 24th, 1987, Josefina Rivera made a frantic 911 call. She was at a pay phone near a gas station in Philadelphia, and she didn't have much time. She frantically told the 911 dispatcher that she needed officers right away. Police raced to the phone booth and found a very shaken up and distraught Josefina. She was so upset that she could barely talk. She tried to get the words out, obviously in shock, saying, you have to help me. Finally, she was able to compose herself just long enough to tell the officers that she had been abducted and held captive for four months. The man who was holding her was waiting for her at the gas station, and it wasn't just her that would be in danger if he found out she was speaking to authorities. The officers were trying to process what

they were hearing when Josefina blurted out that her abductor was also holding three other women captive in his basement. She said that he had already killed two others. She gave the officers a description of her captor and told them where he was parked nearby. Police quickly spotted him and rushed in to apprehend him. According to court documents, the man simply said, what's this all about, officer? Didn't I pay my child support? Police quickly identified the man as 43-year-old Gary Heidnik. For Josefina, she was safe and she was free. But for police, this was just the beginning of something that seemed to have come right out of a horror movie.

So, to tell this story properly, we have to go way back. Gary Heidnik had dropped out of high school, both public high school and the military academy he attended, and went on to join the United States Army. He completed his GED while he was stationed in West Germany and was trained as a medic. But he was discharged just 14 months after enlisting due to signs of mental illness. Whether he was really experiencing mental health issues, or whether he made them up to get out of an assignment he was unhappy with, is still debated to this day. According to oxygen.com, one friend of his claimed

that he did have a legitimate, real nervous breakdown, but recovered and then began to fake it, so that his disability payments wouldn't stop. Before long, Heidnik was working as a licensed practical nurse at a Veterans Administration Hospital in Coatesville, Pennsylvania. That job didn't last long, because Gary was eventually fired from the VA hospital.

In 1978, Heidnik went to Harrisburg State Hospital and kidnapped Alberta Davidson, the sister of his girlfriend at the time. She was intellectually disabled, which is why she was at the hospital. But she was allowed to go places with her family and friends during the day. But Heidnik signed her out for the day and just never brought her back. He locked her in a large closet in his basement where he sexually assaulted her. As if this terrible rape by Heidnik wasn't enough, he also infected Alberta with gonorrhea. Police soon pieced together that Gary had likely taken Alberta, and after two weeks, she was finally rescued. It took two searches of Gary Heidnik's home to find her.

Following Heidnik's arrest, he was charged with unlawful restraint, interfering with the custody of a committed person, and recklessly endangering another person, as well as kidnapping, rape, and false imprisonment. Unfortunately, because Alberta wasn't able to testify against Gary Heidnik, the kidnapping, rape, and false imprisonment charges were dropped. While he was still convicted on some of the lesser charges, he was sentenced to only three to seven years in prison. Judge Charles Mararchi, who presided over the trial, said, if it had been in my power to give him longer, I would have. Gary Heidnik wound up serving

four years in prison and in various psychiatric hospitals for what he did to Alberta. According to oxygen.com, during one of those stints in psychiatric care, one psychiatrist found a high probability that Heidnik would commit a similar crime in the future.

When he wasn't raping helpless victims or in prison, Gary Heidnik found time to have a family. He was a father of three. He had his first son named Gary Junior with a developmentally disabled woman named Gal Linckow. Gary Junior was placed in foster care because Gal was unable to care for her child due to her disabilities. Then Heidnik and Anginette Davidson, who was the sister of Alberta, had a daughter named Maxine. Anginette was also developmentally disabled, and so was Maxine. Because of this, Maxine was taken from her custody and placed in foster care. Heidnik kidnapped Alberta right after Maxine's birth and placement into foster care. By the time he was released from prison, Maxine and Angie Net were both gone.

So let's take a minute morph and just kind of discuss what we know about Gary Heidnik. I think there's a, there's one thing that jumps out to me in particular, and that's the type of women that he's preying upon. I don't think there's any doubt that he was absolutely preying upon women who were in some way developmentally disabled.

Yeah, I think to do any of these things that he did to any woman are terrible enough, but to prey on the most vulnerable people that he thinks he can, you know, maybe persuade easier, maybe get away with his crime because they won't be able to report it. You know, it just seems like he's picking on the most, you know, people that are most vulnerable in society. And I think that tells a lot about his character.

Well, we know this guy's a monster, right? But it really struck me that, you know, these crimes against Alberta for which he was arrested, charged and convicted, just shocking to me that he only got to serve four years in prison. Now, I get it. She was unable to testify and that probably, you know, hurt the prosecution's case, but I feel as though if that were to happen today, there would have to be, you know, something that would allow for more time, right? We're talking about a man who took advantage of

an intellectually disabled woman, locked her in his basement and sexually assaulted. I feel as though even today, if she wasn't able to, you know, testify, they'd still be able to get him for more than they did back in 1978.

Yeah, we talk often about those sentences that they handed down back then and they just, you know, for the level of crime, for the violence that were, was involved in a lot of those crimes, you know, some of those sentences were shockingly short.

And, and what does that do to these perpetrators? Now, I think about it a lot because obviously we're early on, we're getting ready to talk about a lot more crimes that Gary Heidnik committed. And there's no doubt that this short sentence, and I would call four years short for what he did, these short sentences, they embolden these guys, right? They already have it in their head that they want to do these horrible things. And then even when they're caught, to them, it's just a slap on the wrist. I mean, it's not something that's going to deter them, you know, when they get out, when they become free again.

Gary Heidnik ended up finding a wife through a mail order service. After two years of being pen pals, a woman named Betty Disto moved from the Philippines to the US to marry Heidnik. Their marriage wasn't a happy one. Almost immediately, Heidnik started bringing women home and sleeping with them, sometimes three at once. And he didn't even try to hide it. He was also abusive and controlling. Just months after the wedding, Betty told the police that Heidnik had sexually assaulted her. He was arrested and charged with spousal rape and assault, but the charges were dropped because Betty simply fled the area instead

of having to face Heidnik again. She was three months pregnant when she wrote a letter in tagalog to the Philippine consulate, asking for help to escape her marriage.

In September, 1986, Heidnik heard from Betty again. She was requesting child support. He had a son. His name was Jesse John Disto. She only wanted the child support and didn't wish to see him or rekindle their relationship. She didn't want him in Jesse's life. Gary Heidnik could certainly afford to support his son because he was very good with investments and was able to turn $1,500 into more than half a million on the stock market. Just one month after learning he had a son, Heidnik kidnapped Josephina. So for Gary Heidnik, this made two known kidnappings right after he received big and upsetting news about a child.

After Gary Heidnik was taken into custody for his attack on Josephina, the Philadelphia Police Department immediately sent officers to search his row home, located at 3520 North Marshall Street in North Philadelphia. When they got there, they could hear a television blaring from somewhere inside. That TV, which was always on, was set to drown out any other noises coming from the home. Based on something Josephina said, one of the officers went straight to the kitchen and there was no way he could have been ready for what he found. Nearly 30 pounds of human body parts were found inside the freezer. Other officers

headed downstairs to the basement where they found even more unimaginable horrors. Three women were secured in chains, just like Josephina had described. One of them was in a dugout hole in the floor, covered by bags of dirt and old pieces of wood. This was a scene that even seasoned officers were caught off guard by. So we already knew that Gary Heidnik was a bad individual, but wow. I mean, this is, you know, to me, kind of reminiscent of Silence of the Lambs. I mean, this guy had a pit in his basement where he was holding women.

Yeah, very disturbing. And then you've got, you know, body parts in the freezer. That's bringing up some memories of Jeffrey Dahmer, making me think of like Texas Chainsaw Massacre or just, and we mentioned earlier, something out of a horror movie, and this seems like a scene out of a horror movie. Josephina was abducted by Gary Heidnik on November 25th, 1986, when she was just 25 years old. At the time, she had been a sex worker for five years, mostly to support her drug addiction. Heidnik agreed to pay her $20 for her services. She agreed to go to his house to have sex because Heidnik said he was too tall for them to do it comfortably in his car. But the last thing she could remember before waking up in handcuffs was

Heidnik choking her from behind. She lost consciousness and the next thing she knew, she was in a basement chained to a pipe.

Gary Heidnik kidnapped 24-year-old Sandra Lindsay on December 3rd, 1986, when she was walking to the store at around three in the afternoon. Sandra was experiencing menstrual cramps and needed to buy some medication for it. As she was walking, Heidnik drove past and stopped. The two were already acquainted. They had known each other for about two years at that point. And with it being winter, it's not hard to imagine that she accepted when he offered her a ride in a warm car. She had no reason not to trust him. Sandra knew Heidnik as Gary, the bishop of a church he created, called the United Church of the

Ministers of God. He was fun to be around and it seemed that he took care of her. Her sister, Tracy Lomax, told PhillyMag.com that Sandra told her that Gary was going to take Sandy and her friends to great adventure and he was always buying them dinner at McDonald's.

Sandra worked at Elwin Institute in West Philadelphia, a center that provides comprehensive intellectual and developmental disability services. Heidnik showed up there looking for people to join his church, which was based out of his house. He met many people at the Elwin Institute. Most of them had some sort of intellectual disability. He would buy them food and things they wanted. He would let them ride in his new car. He would give them money, take them places. While some of the people Heidnik targeted there were duped, the staff was suspicious of him. They became aware of Heidnik's prowling and even reported suspicions that he was taking advantage of the women sexually. But since they were adults, nothing was done. Sandra was intellectually disabled and walked with a noticeable limp.

One article in the Philadelphia Daily News described her as childlike.

So more if this goes back to our earlier discussion about the type of victim that Heidnik looked for. And now I think we can clearly see that he was grooming these individuals, right? He was gaining their trust. He was giving them things, taking them places. I don't think there's any doubt. He was grooming these women.

And I think he probably counted on them, on their disabilities to keep his secret. Maybe they wouldn't be able to tell people, explain what was going on. Maybe they didn't have anybody they trusted there at that facility enough to share this stuff. So, you know, the fact he was hanging out in this place, just looking for, for potential victims is pretty disturbing.

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didn't circle back for a follow-up. Her brothers spent a lot of time outside the house, watching, waiting. Around Christmas time, they received a card from her. It was postmarked from New York. Despite the clue pointing to New York, her family still suspected that Gary Heidnik had something to do with her disappearance, and they were right. Heidnik had forced Sandra to write what she did in the card, and then he drove to New York in order to direct attention away from himself. When Sandra's family told police that they felt the New York letter was a red herring, authorities were of the belief that she was fine and just simply didn't

want to come home. In fact, she wasn't fine. She was trapped in Gary Heidnik's house of horrors, experiencing untold terror.

On December 23rd, 1986, just 20 days after Gary Heidnik had abducted Sandra, he kidnapped 19-year-old Lisa Thomas. He was driving a very nice car and offered her some money to come to his home. By the time she sensed any danger, she was handcuffed and being dragged down to the basement. Just two days later, on Christmas, when Heidnik thought one of the women was pregnant, he celebrated. He bought champagne and a ton of Chinese takeout to share with his victims.

And I can't help, Morph, but try to imagine what these women were experiencing. Being kidnapped, handcuffed, dragged to this basement, and put into a pit in that basement. And I keep coming back to Silence of the Lambs. Obviously, it's a very famous movie, but they do have that scene in the movie where, you know, that woman is in the pit, and I always thought that was scary.

Yeah, that's a classic horror movie scene, and, you know, it is scary. And the fact that it had happened, you know, in a real-life scenario here is even more frightening.

And then this, this thought that, you know, Heidnik is celebrating with his victims. He's buying champagne. He's buying Chinese takeout and sharing it with them when he thinks one of the women is pregnant.

Man, it makes me wonder what he's celebrating. Does he think that one will give birth and then he'll have some new family of his own, or, you know, potential new victim that he can victimize one day? It just, just a very, very bizarre scene here.

Well, and that part is a little reminiscent of the Ariel Castro situation, right? Where he abducted women, held them for many, many years, had children with them. I mean, this, this Heidnik guy is kind of a mix of some of the scariest predators ever. On January 2nd, 1987, about a week and a half after abducting Lisa Thomas, Gary Heidnik abducted 23-year-old Deborah Dudley. And he didn't stop there. Just over two weeks later, on

January 18th, he kidnapped 18-year-old Jacqueline Askins, or Jackie, as she was known. She was also earning money through sex work at the time. He offered her $500 to come home with him, and once there, he overpowered her and added her to his growing list of captives. $500 is a lot of money, and it was a heck of a lot of money in 1987. But this is something that I think about quite a bit when it comes to these types of predators. My thought is, he can offer her as much money as he wants to, because he knows he's never going to pay

it. You know, if she accepts the offer, comes home with him, she's going to become one of his captives, and he's never going to be out that money.

Yeah, that was a lot of money back then. And we talked a little bit earlier that he was successful in the stock market and had made quite a bit of money. So, I guess even if he wanted to pay her, he could have. But, you know, I'm with you. I don't think he ever would have paid her. He would have just chained her up and, you know, kept the money in his wallet.

But think about, you know, this woman is 18 years old. I started to say, girl, she's very young, but technically, you know, she's a woman, she's an adult, she's earning money through sex work, for whatever reason. Maybe that's just to pay the bills, maybe, you know, it's to, to feed a drug habit. We don't know all the details of that. But regardless, how is she going to turn down $500? Because as we said, that would have been a lot of money.

Once Heidnik had multiple victims together, he began to lose control trying to manage the situation. He became enraged when he realized that the women could hear him coming and going from the house because they could hear the front door opening. He hatched a plan to make sure they wouldn't be able to coordinate with each other and plan anything to escape. He tied them up, gagged them so their screams were muffled, and pushed screwdrivers in their ears. The women were fed only bread, dog food, and dog treats. He sexually assaulted them randomly. He beat them. He forced them to beat each other. This was a terrible situation for all of these women.

Heidnik seemed to treat Sandra the worst. When she wasn't eating the measly amount of bread he allowed her to have fast enough, he tied her up and hung her from the ceiling by her wrists. He left her that way for days. Due to starvation, a fever, being beaten, and eventually suffocating due to the position she was left in, Sandra died. This poor girl must have suffered unimaginably. But even in death, Gary Heidnik terrorized her body and his remaining victims. He showed Josefina Sandra's corpse and forced Jacqueline to help dismember her.

And that wasn't all. Heidnik told the women that they had eaten parts of Sandra. He claimed to have cooked parts of her body and mixed it in with the dog food, which he then fed to his victims. He said to have boiled her head and put her ribs in the oven. More recent articles claim that there is no evidence of any cannibalism in the home, and that this didn't happen. But to this day, there remains some dispute about it. After Sandra's murder, neighbors reported a hard stench to police, like burning flesh coming from Heidnik's home. An officer stopped by the home to investigate, and Heidnik claimed that he fell asleep while he was cooking a roast, and it got badly burnt. With that explanation, the officer left.

The remaining women felt that it was only a matter of time before they too would be dead, and that it seemed unlikely that anyone would rescue them. They decided to push back against Heidnik and stand up to him. Deborah decided to stop listening to Heidnik. She wouldn't be quiet when he told her, and he became enraged. He filled the pit in the floor with water and put Deborah in it, still in metal chains. Then he forced Josefina to touch a live wire to the chains. She was forced to do it multiple times. The electric current shocked Deborah multiple times, and she died from electrocution.

After Deborah's murder, Heidnik changed his strategy. Instead of dismembering her and trying to cook or freeze any part of her remains, he drove her body to Wharton State Forest near Hamilton, New Jersey, in what's known as the Pine Barrens, an area made up of thousands of acres of sand and scrub pine trees. It's very isolated. He took Josefina with him and forced her to help dispose of Deborah's body. Later, after Josefina was rescued, she would lead investigators to that area in the Pine Barrens, and Deborah's remains were recovered. After she helped him hide Deborah's body, he made Josefina sign a confession detailing her responsibility in Deborah's

murder, to likely use as leverage against her. The letter read, "Gary Heidnik and Josefina Rivera electrocuted Deborah Dudley on March 17 in the basement of 3520 North Marshall Street by electrocution."

You know, one of the things that I keep thinking, Morphe, is that some of these things that we're talking about, they're so horrible that I don't know if you wrote this in a script, if people would buy it. Now, I get it, we have horror movies, we have all types of those movies, but I think some of these things that people do, they just, they just sometimes don't even seem believable. And this is kind of what I'm getting with Gary Heidnik. I mean, this guy was an absolute monster.

Yeah, this is all very cruel and disgusting stuff that's being done. And then he sort of twists it to a new level. It's not enough that he's inflicting, you know, pain and suffering on people. Now, he's enlisting his victims to help do that as well. And that's just, you know, a whole nother level of depravity, I think.

And I know I mentioned Silence of the Lambs, you know, I'm getting some Saw here, you know, parts of Dahmer. I mentioned Ariel Castro, some other individuals as well. I mean, there's just, this is a sick individual, no doubt about it. Many people believe that Gary Heidnik didn't mean for Sandra and Deborah to die. But Sandra's sister disagrees. She told PhillyMag.com, "He killed Deborah on purpose because she was a fighter. She was strong, and she would have killed him." And I actually agree with Deborah's sister. I think Gary Heidnik did feel threatened

by Deborah. I think he knew what he was doing when he electrocuted her, or had one of his other captors, Josefina, electrocute her. I know I talked about it earlier, but, you know, Gary, I feel he was used to preying on the most vulnerable of victims. And normally, people like that, they don't want to take that risk of, you know, someone standing up to them. And I feel that that was what happened here. You know, Deborah was fighting. She was standing up to him.

She wasn't acting like maybe some of his other victims had, so he felt threatened. And he killed.

Yeah, to me, this just demonstrates that this guy is the weakest of the weak to, you know, not only target these very vulnerable victims that he did, but then, when they show any sign of resistance and fighting back, he's, you know, afraid of that too. So he takes steps to minimize the risk to himself, and he's just a very pathetic person. On March 23, 1987, just days after Deborah's murder, Heidnik captured 24-year-old Agnes Adams. She had been living on her own after running away at the age of 12. She would always remain in some kind of contact with her family, though. Heidnik and Josefina, along with a man named Tony,

we'll discuss later, picked Agnes up in a new Cadillac. She told her father they were going to Atlantic City. Instead, she ended up in Heidnik's basement chained to a pipe. This likely was the last straw for Josefina, and it seems she knew her time was running out and had to try and escape.

On March 24, 1987, the day after Agnes Adams was abducted, Josefina was able to convince Heidnik to let her try to lure a victim on her own. She talked him into letting her out on her own, and that he could wait nearby in his car while she found a victim to take back to his house. Some reports say that Josefina talked Gary into taking her to see her family, but whatever the case, Heidnik let his guard down, and Josefina was determined to make her escape. So she took her chances that day and ran, looking for help. While she could have ran and hid,

her thoughts turned to the victims still in Heidnik's basement. She called police and put an end to Heidnik's horror show. And man, I just have to think, Morphe, you know, how brave Josefina was. I imagine that if you're in a situation like that, you are constantly thinking about ways to possibly escape. Now, if you're locked in a basement, there probably aren't many. But it sounds to me like, you know, she was smart. She kind of turned the tables on Gary Heidnik,

talking him into doing something that would allow her to escape. Because as we know, he had talked many women into doing things that would allow him to abduct them.

And thankfully, once she was out, she made a break, got to that phone and called police. It wouldn't surprise me at all if she was so terrified even being out and not next to him, if she was still under his spell and frightened, you know, if she backed out and just went back to him. I remember in the Elizabeth Smart case, after she was abducted, she was under so much control that she would move around people, you know, with a disguise on, her face covered, and just move right amongst them instead of trying to run away and contact, you know, an adult, police officer, or somebody to help her because she was so frightened that he felt

that he could even just bring her right out in public and walk her down the street, and she wouldn't do anything. And unfortunately, in her case, he was right about that. Here, Josefina had the courage to get in that phone booth and call police and stop this monster once and for all.

Well, you know, Josefina was a little older than Elizabeth Smart. I also think that the timeframe here, right? She had been with Gary Heidnik for a while, but Elizabeth Smart was kept longer. Yeah, I don't know the exact timeframes, but, you know, this, this being too scared, I can imagine that in a lot of cases...

It's going to be hard for people to even think about screaming for help or running up to a police officer because you've experienced so many horrors at the hands of this person. It's like you don't know what they're gonna do.

Yeah, and I certainly don't mean to shame Elizabeth Smart as if it was her fault that she didn't escape. I just think, you know, time to time, again, we see some of these monsters that do this stuff. They have so much control over their victim and they're so powerful that, you know, some of these, these people that go through these things that are victimized just feel like if they try and escape, things could get even worse. After his arrest, Gary Heidnik was held without bail. A second person, an alleged accomplice, was also arrested and held without bail. This man was Sandra's boyfriend, 31-year-old Cyril Brown, who went by the name Tony. The two men were very close and considered each other best

friends. Tony was charged with murder, kidnapping, rape, and conspiracy. He denied having any hand in either of the murders, but did admit that he saw Sandra die and also saw parts of her body in Heidnik's bathtub. And shocker, it turns out that Tony was also intellectually disabled and seemed to be suggestible. One more example of Heidnik preying on intellectually disabled people. Tony was released on $50,000 bail, but didn't have to pay any of it if he continued to show up in court. He became a witness agreeing to cooperate with the investigation. A judge decided he was no longer a threat to the public once he wasn't around Gary Heidnik.

Gary Heidnik was charged with multiple counts of murder, kidnapping, and rape, as well as aggravated assault, and involuntary deviant sexual intercourse. He was denied bail and waited in jail for his day in court. In his cell, Gary Heidnik tried to end his life. Some reports say he tried to hang himself. Others say he tried to swallow a light bulb, but he survived and eventually the case went to trial. His only shot was to plead not guilty by reason of insanity. It took less than six months for Heidnik to capture seven victims. He might have taken his second victim even sooner than he did

if it hadn't been for Sandra Lindsay's family, watching his home, hoping to spot her coming or going.

Following news of Gary Heidnik's arrest, his own father, Michael Heidnik, who is estranged from and hadn't seen in two decades, didn't feel that his son deserved any mercy. According to upi.com, his father said, "I hope to hell they hang him for what he did," and you can quote me on that. "I'll even pull the rope."

Okay, all right. You don't hear that all the time. In a lot of instances, you have family who, while they may despise what their loved one did, you know, they still stand behind them, you know, they don't want them to die. Not Gary's dad, you know, he's even willing to pull the rope.

Yeah, that's definitely something you don't hear often. If anything, a lot of times, families are accused of being too overly sensitive or too supportive of their family members when they do heinous things like this. But his, his father wasn't in that, that camp. And I wonder, you know, maybe that could tell us something, his lack of caring, if you could call it that, at all, it seems, maybe that could put some light on Gary Heidnik's childhood. And I mean, that's a whole nother ball of wax, probably.

Well, they were estranged. We don't know, you know, all of the details around it. But yeah, I think you could be on to something there. As far as, you know, maybe his dad didn't have a lot of empathy for Gary. Now, it's kind of hard to have empathy for Gary because once the facts come out, that's, it's gonna be tough. But maybe his dad didn't have empathy even before that, and maybe that's where Gary got it. I mean, we're speculating here, right?

Yeah, and I think in any case like this, you always look in the background of the perpetrator and say, "Oh, my God, what could have caused this?" And, you know, you start looking down, you know, rabbit holes, trying to find anything that might explain these, these terrible things.

And one of the big things that people always look at is, you know, the childhood, the parents, I mean, you gotta, you gotta do that. Two psychiatrists and a psychologist testified that Gary Heidnik suffered from schizophrenia and that at the time, he was abducting, holding, torturing, and killing women, he was unable to tell right from wrong. Heidnik did have a 25-year history of receiving mental health treatment, and he was diagnosed with schizoid personality disorder during his time in the military. But that is definitely not the same as being actually

legally insane. And according to Josephina, Heidnik bragged that he would get away with his crimes, even if he got caught, because as he put it, he would, quote, "act crazy for long enough that they would have to let him go." A third psychiatrist, this time testifying for the prosecution, agreed that Heidnik had schizophrenia, but disagreed about his state of mind.

Heidnik's attorney, Chuck Perudo, certainly tried to play up appearances in front of the jury, dressing Heidnik in an unkempt manner and letting him go without shaving. He rationalized this action, saying to oxygen.com, "If you want to demonstrate that someone is insane, then they gotta fucking look insane." Those who knew Heidnik before his arrest noticed the stark difference. Heidnik's next-door neighbor, Doris Sebalka, said, "You're making Gary look crazy. He never looked like that. His attorney is making him look like Manson."

And to me, Morf, that's always a very interesting strategy, right? How does the defense portray the defendant in court? And I'm not saying with words. I mean, what do they have them look like? Because you know, all of that is choreographed, right? It's staged, what they wear. Like you said, you know, he wouldn't, he told him not to shave. They might say, "Hey, don't brush your hair." It's all calculated.

Yeah, a lot of times in trials, the attorney wants their defendant to not have to wear an orange jumpsuit and to be, you know, clean-cut, fresh-shaven, a nice suit. Here, it seems like it was the opposite. It seems like his attorney was trying to make him look a certain way that was maybe not flattering.

Gary Heidnik's attorney painted the dark picture of his childhood. And Heidnik's niece, Shannon Heidnik, told oxygen.com that his mother and father were really sick parents, and they gave their kids some serious problems. His brother was also receiving disability payments due to mental health issues. So there may be a genetic susceptibility to mental illness here. But again, being mentally ill is not the same thing as being legally insane. And the question remains, did Gary Heidnik know right from wrong?

While Gary Heidnik and his defense team prep for trial, a lot of attention turned to Josephina Rivera, the victim who called police after escaping. You would think that the attention on her was all good and was praising of her, but that wasn't the case. The surviving victims of Gary Heidnik don't speak of Josephina fondly. She's technically the one who actually killed Deborah Dudley. Agnes Adams, who was kidnapped the day before Heidnik was caught, told CNN, "She helped kidnap me." And survivor Lisa Thomas told the Latrobe Bulletin, "She was the only one not handcuffed." Lisa also said that Josephina would hit her even when Gary Heidnik wasn't home,

saying she enjoyed it. According to Jacqueline Askins, Josephina followed her plan to overpower and escape Heidnik by warning him about it. She was also allowed to wear clothes and slept in Heidnik's bed instead of the hole in the basement with the others. They ate meals together while the other women ate dog food, if anything. He even took her out of the house on shopping trips.

Gary Heidnik's attorney told Latrobe Bulletin, "If it were up to him, Josephina would be behind bars." As a co-conspirator, she was never charged, cooperated with the investigation and the prosecution, and maintains that she only did what she had to do to survive and trick Heidnik into letting his guard down. It's hard to know what to think. Are some of these opinions about Josephina from the women that survived merited? Was she coerced or terrified into cooperating? Or was she somehow a willing participant? The only thing we know for sure is that it was

Josephina who called police, and it led to Heidnik being stopped and the survivors being free. That's a really tough one, Morf. You know, you have some of the survivors kind of bad-mouthing Josephina. But I could see a scenario where she is doing what she has to do to survive, and she's also doing some things that, obviously in hindsight, look very mean, or they look brutal to the survivors, but she's doing it to ultimately get Heidnik to trust her enough, to put her in a situation where she can escape.

Yeah, it's a slippery slope because, you know, on one hand, she is unquestionably the person that helped stop Gary Heidnik, but, you know, according to her, you know, co-victims, they hold some animosity, or held some animosity, at least at one point, about some of the things she did and how she acted. And I don't think any of us would know what we would do if we were in an unimaginable situation like this. The will to survive might make you do some things that you normally wouldn't do.

Yeah, absolutely. And I don't look at her the same way that I, that I look at some other people. You know, you look at maybe a partner, a husband, a wife who takes part in the crimes of their spouse. I mean, that's not the situation with Josephina. She was obviously, to begin with, a victim of Gary Heidnik. Now,

Did she enjoy hurting the others? Or was that a ploy to get Heidnik to trust her? I kind of lean towards the latter.

It seems like the jury almost believed the insanity defense mounted by Heidnik's lawyer, or at least had doubts one way or the other. One juror, Marcella Leonard, told Oxygen, "I just don't know if he was crazy or not." But despite any reservations, on July 1st, 1988, the jury made its decision in Gary Heidnik's trial. He was found guilty of two counts of murder of the first degree, six counts of kidnapping, five counts of rape, four counts of aggravated assault, and two counts of involuntary devet sexual intercourse. The same jury also recommended the death penalty. Marcella, the juror who was unsure about Heidnik's actual state of mind, went on to tell PhillyMag.com, "I regret voting for the death penalty."

She also said there was no choice, the way the law was written.

Yeah, I think if I was on that jury more, I too would have questions about this guy's state of mind. But I think it would be hard for me to believe that Gary Heidnik didn't know that what he was doing was wrong. I would have a tough time making that decision.

Yeah, I agree with you. I mean, he went through steps. He turned up his TV to drown out sounds that were coming from the basement. You know, he chained these women to the wall because he knew that if they escaped, you know, they would, they would get away and report him. So to me, that says he knows what he's doing is wrong and he has to keep these victims there so he doesn't get in trouble. So I don't buy the whole, you know, defense that he didn't know what he was doing.

Gary Heidnik headed to death row and the appeals process began automatically, as it does in all capital convictions. But Heidnik didn't want to appeal his conviction or his sentence. Instead, he wanted authorities to hurry up, to speed things along. He just wanted to be executed as soon as possible and get it all over with, even though he maintained his innocence and claimed that he could prove it. At a 1997 hearing, Heidnik told the judge, "You people think I committed murders that I have not committed," adding, "I resent this kind of shit being done," to a disabled veteran. His lawyer said it was very frustrating

that Heidnik didn't want to appeal, but he also understood how hard of a time he was having in prison and how difficult every day of his life would be if he spent the rest of it behind bars with the general population. The attorney said it was actually a wise decision to try to expedite the execution. And I believe, you know, most people who are convicted, they don't want to die. They don't want to be executed, but there are some who do. They prefer that rather than spending, you know, years and years of their life in prison. And that's a really tough one.

Because for me, I hate to see somebody get out from under, if you want to call it that, what they're fearing the most.

Yeah, I find it pretty ironic that he's, doesn't want to deal with being locked up for years for the rest of his life, and he wants to hurry it up. Well, he's the same person that locked up these women against their will in this basement and made them prisoners. You know, that, that part, you know, I don't have any sympathy at all for him.

Yeah, the fact that he doesn't want to be held captive, right? Even though that's exactly what he did to his victims.

Gary Heidnik claimed he was making himself into a martyr. According to the Princeton Daily Clarion, he said, "I want you to execute an innocent man so there will be no more capital punishment." His daughter, Maxine, filed appeals and motions on her own, trying to prolong her father's life. The appeals process and all the preparation took a year, which he spent behind bars. But for a death penalty case, it did speed along. However, just hours before his scheduled execution in April 1997, a stay of execution was granted. From what we can gather, third-party attorneys filed on Heidnik's behalf based on the idea that he may not be mentally competent. These attorneys were against the death penalty in general. The death warrant expired,

but eventually the state Supreme Court found him competent. A new death warrant was issued.

55-year-old Gary Michael Heidnik was executed on July 6, 1999. He died by lethal injection. He didn't say anything when he had the chance to make a final statement. Josephina did not attend the execution as a witness and would have preferred a life sentence for Heidnik. She told Oxygen.com, "It would have been better for him to sit in a four-by-four cell." Jacqueline Askins, Heidnik's last kidnapping victim, also did not attend. The two, along with other surviving victims, weren't allowed to witness the execution because, according to the Philadelphia Inquirer,

by law, only the survivors of murder victims are eligible to be there in person. Sandra Lindsay's sister, Tracy Lomax, did attend, but didn't find any satisfaction or closure. She told Oxygen.com, "He never looked at us, never acknowledged us, never said he was sorry. He didn't say anything. He didn't even look in our direction." And there's a couple of things here for me, Morph. Number one, I found it very interesting that victims' family members were allowed to attend, but not surviving victims. I thought that was very interesting.

And then also, you know, I feel the same way as Josephina. I think it would have been better. It would have been harder for Gary to sit in a, a small cell for the rest of his life, just based on the fact that he tried to speed up the death penalty part. He, he didn't want that. That was his biggest fear. And so obviously, that would have been a more apt punishment in this situation.

There's an endless debate about the death penalty, whether it's justified, whether it's humane. You know, that's a subject for another day. But, you know, a lot of families, they prefer that the person's not executed because they, on one hand, they might think they're getting away with an easier outcome and not having to think about what they've done behind bars. And then sometimes they're just against the death penalty, whatever the reason. But it's a real, you know, a tough situation to be in as a family member of a murder victim. You know, this end process, when, when it comes, there's no remorse, there's no, I'm sorry, just nothing.

And that doesn't surprise me one bit, right? I know the family went there hoping for something like that. But I think with a guy like Gary Heidnik, there was little to no chance they were going to get any of that, and they did.

It's interesting to note that Gary Heidnik was the last person to be executed in the state. His execution was the end of capital punishment in Pennsylvania. This isn't likely to change anytime soon. The current governor of Pennsylvania, Josh Shapiro, announced in 2023 that he would not sign any death warrants, meaning there would be no executions while he was in office. The character Buffalo Bill in The Silence of the Lambs was reportedly heavily inspired by Gary Heidnik, along with a few other killers. These on-screen depictions of real murders adds to the feeling that this kind of thing only happens in movies. But as we're sadly seeing more and more, things like this really did happen in real life, and they're still happening today. As for Gary Heidnik's House of Horrors,

located at 3520 North Marshall Street in North Philadelphia, it still stands there now, a gruesome reminder of the terrible things that once happened there.

And that's kind of shocking to me, right? You and I have done many, many cases where somebody had a House of Horrors, we'll call it, you know, whether it's Dahmer's apartment or, you know, the case we just talked about last week with the horses. One infamous house right now is the one, you know, where the Utah college students were murdered. But normally, Morph, in the stories that we talk about, those houses are torn down. You know, they're, they're tough reminders for people. So it shocks me that this house is still standing.

And who in the world lives there?

Yeah, you think that this would be something they would tear down and maybe turn into a park, maybe some kind of facility to help develop mentally disabled people, something along those lines. But now they left it there and someone, I presume, lived there. And, you know, it makes me wonder, when they moved in, did they know that this place was the home of all this terrible stuff? Or were they unaware of it? And, you know, maybe they're living there now and have no idea.

Yeah, I know different states have different real estate laws, but a lot of states, you do have to disclose certain things. And, and one of them in many states is that, you know, a murder occurred there or, you know, something along those lines. But as we wrap this case up, I don't think there's any doubt that Gary Heidnik is up there, right? When you talk about some of the worst individuals, he's got to be on that list. I mean, when you have these really high-profile scary movies, kind of basing some of their characters around you, okay, you are a scary individual.

And this guy definitely was. You know, I, I think there's a ton of reasons to despise Gary Heidnik. You know, one of them being, as we talked about, right? He preyed on some of the most vulnerable in our population. People with developmental or intellectual disabilities. I mean, his crimes would have been horrible regardless, but in a way, I feel like that makes them that much worse. That he committed some, a lot of his crimes against people who...

You know, had those types of disabilities. And then I just keep going back to this kind of pit in the basement and how scary that must have been for these individuals. And it's amazing that some of these women made it out a lot. They survived.

Yeah, and I only hope that maybe today, all these years later, I hope that they have, you know, received help, counseling, support of some kind. And I hope that our lives are, they're leading the lives the best they can now.

And the last thing I'll say, because I did have this thought. You know, what happens if Josephina is not able to talk Gary into kind of giving her a little bit of freedom to the point where she can escape? I mean, how many more victims does he have? I don't think there's any way that this guy just all of a sudden stops what he's doing.

And that makes me wonder, is it possible there were other victims somewhere along the way that we just don't know about?

Yeah, I always have that question. But, you know, at the end of the day, Gary Heidnik was just a monster, pure and simple. But that's it for our episode on Gary Heidnik. As always, if you love the show, but you haven't done so yet, take a minute, go out, leave us a review, a rating. Also, keep telling your friends about the podcast. Word of mouth really helps us out.

If you want to find us on social media, we're on every major platform. Just search for Criminology Podcast on your favorites. And for news about the show, old episodes and more, head over to criminologypodcast.com. And finally, if you want to join a discussion about the podcast and the cases we discuss, head over to Facebook and search for Criminology Podcast Discussion and Fans.

So that's it for another episode of Criminology, but Morph and I will be back with all of you next Saturday night with a brand new episode. So until then, from Mike.

And Morph.

We'll talk to you next week.

Take care, everyone.