Ambiguity Mars The Jane Mixer Case

Forty-eight years after the murder of University of Michigan coed Jane Mixer, a University of California San Diego professor believes the man convicted of the crime--Gary Earl Leiterman--may be innocent. After consulting with six DNA experts, Distinguished Professor of Psychology John Wixted has written an article in this month's Association for Psychological Science Observer in support of his belief that contaminated DNA evidence convicted the wrong man.

In 2005, Gary Earl Leiterman was identified through DNA analysis as Mixer's assailant in her March 20, 1968 murder. Mixer's presumed murderer, long held by the public to be John Norman Collins, was exonerated by default when Leiterman was convicted of Mixer's murder thirty-six years after her death. 

Perspiration stains found on a nylon stocking tied around Mixer's neck were examined for DNA. The FBI using their CODIS (Combined DNA Index System) database came up with a direct hit on Leiterman. Complicating the DNA evidence in this case was a spot of blood found on Mixer's hand. It matched the blood of John Ruelas, who was only four years old at the time. 

The obvious contamination at the crime lab did not sway the jury. They found Leiterman guilty of murder in the first degree after deliberating less than three hours. Since his incarceration, Leiterman has been proclaiming his innocence because of irregularities at the crime lab where the Mixer forensic analysis was done.
 
Professor Wixted believes Collins may still be the prime suspect in Jane Mixer's murder. He believes there is compelling evidence pointing to Collins's involvement--though there is no hard evidence to support that finding. Leiterman hopes he and his lawyer can get a new trial clearing him of the crime after serving over ten years of his life sentence.

Giving Leiterman hope are updated FBI standards and protocols for DNA labs (Quality Assurance Standards for Forensic DNA Testing Laboratories) effective September 7, 2011. Of its seventeen provisions, #7 Evidence Control, #9 Analytical Procedures, and #14 Corrective Action look the most promising for Leiterman's defense. The new provisions were tightened to ensure the quality and integrity of DNA data generated by these labs. Had these protocols been in place during the Leiterman trial, it is doubtful the DNA evidence would have been admissible in court. What that means for Leiterman's future is yet to be determined.

Professor Wixted's article: http://www.psychologicalscience.org/publications/observer/2016/nov-16/whether-eyewitness-memory-or-dna-contaminated-forensic-evidence-is-unreliable.html

The Jane Mixer Murder--John Norman Collins or Gary Earl Leiterman

In her profoundly personal memoir, The Red Parts, Maggie Nelson gives readers a glimpse of what lies behind the curtain of American jurisprudence and its affect on the surviving members of one family. Miss Nelson is the niece of Jane Mixer, John Norman Collins' alleged third victim.

Thirty-six years after Jane's perplexing murder on March 20, 1969, the Mixer family had to endure testimony of the details of her tragic death in a trial held in Wayne County, Michigan, in 2004. For over three decades, Jane's murder was lumped together with the six other unsolved killings in the Ypsilanti/Ann Arbor area, despite fundamental differences including where, how, and what condition the body was found.

Armed with a positive DNA match, as well as convincing circumstantial evidence, Gary Earl Leiterman, a retired male nurse working in Ann Arbor at the time, was found guilt of her murder. John Norman Collins claimed since the beginning he never knew Jane, now he was exonerated for at least one of the seven Michigan murders he was accused of. Even a broken clock is right twice a day.

With unflinching honesty, Miss Nelson tells us the ins-and-outs of her aunt's case with brutal clarity and a benumbing sense of self-awareness that only comes from profound emotional trauma. Early in her book, she asks herself, "Who am I to tell Jane's story?" I can think of nobody better. Later in the book, she finds herself getting drawn into the media vortex of the trial and its aftermath. Miss Mixer has some insightful things to say about American media's fascination with the "dead-white-girl-of-the-week" club.

After reading Maggie Nelson's memoir, I am reminded that disturbing the feelings and memories of the families of the other victims in the Collins case is not to be taken lightly. These girls deserve to be remembered as living human beings, rather than victims of something wicked that happened in another time no longer relevant today. For their memories and what happened to them to simply fade away is unacceptable.

This is Ypsilanti, Michigan history, however unpleasant for some individuals or for the city. The six other murdered girls deserve to have their stories told for the record as well, like Maggie Nelson did for the memory of her aunt, Jane Mixer. I want to honor these lost young women by relating the most accurate account of these matters as possible and bringing some degree of closure to people who cared about these young girls. In the end, the public deserves the truth.

http://www.trutv.com/library/crime/serial_killers/predators/collins/13.html

The Rainy Day Murders - Light at the End of the Funnel

For the last three years, my researcher Ryan M. Place and I have been compiling as many official documents as we have been able to get our hands on concerning the alleged John Norman Collins' murder cases. 

I say "alleged" because the deaths of six of the eight women killed have never been adjudicated. These young women were brutally murdered in Washtenaw County between July 9th, 1967, and July 23rd, 1969. 

Collins was convicted only of the last of these brutal, power and control killings. He was convicted of first degree murder for the sex-slaying of Karen Sue Beineman, an eighteen year old freshman new to the campus of Eastern Michigan University.

Gary Earl Leiterman

The murder of the third victim originally believed to be the work of John Norman Collins was Jane Mixer. In 2005, thirty-five years after the fact, Collins was exonerated of her murder when DNA proved that Gary Earl Leiterman had killed Jane. 

For some of the public, particularly those not born when these frightening murders happened, the shadow of doubt hangs over these events. Collins is cast as a victim of circumstance and not of hard evidence. Many believe he was railroaded by a hungry press and a vindictive county police department bent on venting their revenge upon him.

The comment threads on the John Norman Collins sites are full of incorrect perceptions and blatantly false statements all taken from the John Norman Collins media playbook.

Once the other six cases are presented with the documentable facts, along side what we have recently learned from our extensive research and first-person interviews, readers can make up their own minds. The facts as they exist in these other cases have never been fully revealed to the public.

Ryan and I have read thousands of pages of vintage newspaper clippings, complaint reports from the Michigan State Police, records from the Michigan Department of Corrections, the Ypsilanti Historical Society archives, the archives of the Halle Library at Eastern Michigan University, The Michigan Murders novelization, and Catching Serial Killers detailing police errors of procedure in this case. 

Additionally, we've read all the magazine articles, the internet material, and many of the top titles of the true crime genre in preparation for writing The Rainy Day Murders. 

Now to funnel this heaving mass of information into a coherent and readable book that will withstand the test of time. A thorough accounting of these matters has never before been accomplished, and if the truth be known, without a full confession on the part of the murderer, the complete story will never be known. 

The purpose of this book is to restore the lost identities of the victims and to pay a debt to history. Ryan and I want to tell the truest and most complete version of these events as we are able. 

The families and friends of the victims deserve to know the truth as it exists, and the public has the right to the freedom of information.

For more information on Jane Mixer's murder, see:
http://fornology.blogspot.com/2012/07/redezvous-with-death-part-four.html

She Lived to Tell Her Tale - Don't Get in a Car with a Stranger - Part Two

Note to the Reader: In my previous blog post, a University of Michigan alumna wrote me about narrowly escaping an attack and possibly much worse in 1969 when she accepted a ride from a stranger one rainy spring afternoon in Ann Arbor, Michigan.

In Part Two, I give her my response to the details of her email, as together, we try to work out "the  who and the what" of this forty-four year-old incident.

*****

My response to [her name withheld by request],

I'm beside myself. You were very lucky indeed. The car John Norman Collins drove then was a 1968 silver Oldsmobile Cutlass, a car much like you described.

Picking up women on rainy days was his specialty.

Collins was a devout Catholic, I'm told by some of his friends at St. Clement's High School. Your religious talk with him may have saved your life. He was a confused and tormented person who must have felt like a condemned soul by then. How could he not? 

[He may have felt like she was in a "state of grace" and that may have put him off his plan, though I didn't mention this theory to her.]

The "I was going to rape you" and "Say a prayer for Dave" remarks made my eyes well up. This is a direct link to the murder of Jane Mixer (third alleged victim of John Norman Collins), which another man is in jail doing life for. Look up Gary Earl Leiterman. 

Now things get complicated. Someone used the name "David Johnson" when he answered the ride board ad in the basement of the (Michigan) Union. Jane Mixer wrote the name down on a page of her campus telephone directory. She disappeared that night and was found dead the next morning laid out neatly at Denton Cemetery in neighboring Wayne County.

[I didn't tell her that "David Johnson" was a Theta Chi fraternity brother of Collins who had "bad blood" between them. I'm thinking that Collins may have tried to implicate Johnson by throwing out a false lead.]

Your general description of the driver fits Collins. A number of people have come forward with interesting stories, but what you have written here is by far the most useful and has the ring of truth.

May I use your story in some contextual way in my book? The fictionalized version of these murders did a disservice to the memory of the girls and to the history of this era. That's why I am writing this difficult book using real names and up-to-date information.

Thank you.

*****

Here is the message chain that followed:

Greg,

I really had no idea that your reply would link my incident with Collins. I had thought all these years that it was more than likely not related at all to the famous murders.

You may indeed use my story in your writings, but I would prefer that you not use my name.

*****

 My response:

You may want to read The Red Parts, by Maggie Nelson. It is about the Gary Earl Leiterman case and what impact it had on Jane Mixer's family, thirty-five years after the fact. I have a hunch you will find it very interesting. I wrote a blog post on it. Search in the <fornology.blogspot.com> archives for it.

*****

Greg,

I found the archives and am reading the information. I read quite a lot about Leiterman yesterday. Funny that the first site I found when searching for him had his high school picture on it. It was a shock to see him just as I remember him. The more recent pictures would have been of no use to me.

I've been wondering if it would have done any good if I had reported the incident to authorities at the time. I was a terrible witness... no license plate number or make of car. I don't know what I would have told them. Maybe I could have described him.

I'm glad to know that he was convicted of Jane Mixer's murder. I only pray that somehow our close encounter had an influence on him. I really did pray for him off and on over all these years.

*****

My response:

I hate to admit this, but every big campus in America has a serious problem with rape and the abuse of young women. University authorities go to great lengths to downplay incidents, so they don't cause a panic or tarnish the reputation of the institution.

Just last summer, there was a serial rapist in Ann Arbor. Don't beat yourself up about not going to the police; the report would have been of little use to them. DNA nailed Leiterman; he was an unknown quantity at the time. I feel a sense of satisfaction at helping you solve your nagging mystery. We did it together!

*****

Greg,

And thanks for that. I am grateful to have closure and to know that he is behind bars. There is no question in my mind that he killed the girl, grandfatherly persona be damned.

*****

And so it goes.... this wasn't the outcome that I had anticipated, but as a seeker of truth, I'm very pleased and satisfied with the outcome.

If anyone has information about the Michigan murders or about John Norman Collins, please don't hesitate to contact me at www.gregoryafournier@gmail.com or mail me at:

"Terror In Ypsilanti" - Who Were the Victims?

 

Without a full confession and tangible corroborative evidence, it may never be proven that John Norman Collins was the killer of Mary Fleszar (19), Joan Elspeth Schell (20), Maralynn Skelton (16), Dawn Basom (13), Alice Kalom (23), or Roxie Ann Phillips (17) - the California victim from Milwaukie, Oregon.

Collins was only brought to trial for the strangulation murder of Karen Sue Beineman (18), which occurred on the afternoon of July 23, 1969. Three eyewitnesses were able to connect Collins and Beineman together on his flashy, stolen blue Triumph motorcycle. Then an avalanche of circumstantial evidence buried John Norman Collins. The lack of a credible alibi also worked heavily against his favor with the jury.

Technically, the term serial killer does not legally apply to Collins. He was only convicted of one murder. It wasn't until 1976 that the term was first used in a court of law by FBI profiler, Robert Ressler, in the Son of Sam case in New York City. 

When the Washtenaw County prosecutor, William Delhey, decided not to bring charges in the other cases, Collins was presumed guilty in the court of public opinion by most people familiar with the case.

Today, however, not everyone agrees because of the ambiguity that surrounds this case and the many unanswered questions. To prevent a mistrial in the 1970 Beineman case, prosecutors suppressed details and facts about the other unsolved killings. 

There are some people who believe Collins was railroaded for these crimes by overzealous law enforcement and that he should be given the benefit of the doubt and released. That can happen only with a pardon by a sitting Michigan governor. the chances of this are slim and none.

When the sex slayings stopped with the arrest of Collins for the murder of Karen Sue Beineman, everyone was relieved. Most certainly, other young women were murdered in Washtenaw County after Collins was arrested, but none with the same signature rage and psychopathic contempt for womanhood. These were clearly brutal power and control murders.

The six other county murders of young women in the area from July 1968 through July 1969 were grouped together and considered a package deal. Law enforcement felt they had their man. The prevailing attitude of Washtenaw County officials was that enough time and money had been spent on this defendant.

DNA testing and a nationwide database was not available in the late 1960s. Even if it had, Collins would not have been screened because he was not in the database. He had never been arrested or convicted of any crime and had no juvenile record.

Still, in 2004, over thirty years since Collins was thought to have murdered University of Michigan graduate student, Jane Mixer, DNA evidence exonerated him and pointed the finger at Gary Earl Leiterman, a male nurse in Ann Arbor at the time of Jane's murder.  For some people, the Mixer murder cast the shadow of doubt over Collins' alleged guilt in the remaining unsolved murders attributed to him.

*** 

Authors Edward Keyes and Earl James changed the names of the victims and their presumed assailant in their respective books on Collins. Between them, they left readers with a mishmash of fifteen fictitious names. Then William Miller wrote a script about these murders called Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep and once again, the names of the victims were changed. Even people familiar with the actual case became confused.

John Norman Collins officially changed his last name in 1981 to his original name Chapman, his Canadian birth father's last name. Collins/Chapman attempted unsuccessfully to engineer an international prisoner exchange with Canada. The end result was that the real identities of the victims and their assailant were obscured over the years and all but forgotten by the public.

Using the real names of the victims, here is a micro-sketch of each of the remaining young women whose cases have yet to be solved but are considered open by the Michigan State Police. The Roxie Ann Phillips California case is the exception.

Roxie Ann Phillips

Mary Fleszar (19) went missing on July 9, 1967, and was found a month later on August 7, 1967. She was not killed where her body was found. It had been moved several times and was unrecognizable. Mary taught herself to play guitar left handed and played for church services for several denominations on Eastern Michigan University's campus. People who knew her said she was very sweet and vulnerable.

Joan Elspeth Schell (20) was seen hitchhiking and getting into a car with three young men in front of McKinney Student Union on EMU's campus. She was last seen with Collins just before midnight on June 30, 1968, by three eyewitnesses. Prosecutors felt this case was promising but never pursued it.

Maralyn Skelton (16) was last seen on March 24, 1969 hitchhiking in front of Arborland shopping center. An unidentified witness said she got into a truck with two men. Of the seven presumed victims, Maralyn took the worst beating of the lot and then in death was pilloried by the county police and the local media.

Dawn Basom (13), the youngest of the victims and a local Ypsi girl, was abducted while hurrying to get home before dark on April 16, 1969. Dawn was last seen walking down an isolated stretch of railroad track that borders the Huron River. She was less than 100 yards from her front porch. Police discovered where she had been murdered not far from her home. Her body was found tossed on the shoulder of Gale Road in Superior Township. A fifteen mile, triangular drop zone began to reveal itself to investigators.

Alice Kalom (23), who was the oldest victim, was on her way to a dance on the evening of June 7, 1969. Two people report that she had a date with someone she had only recently met at a local restaurant--the Rubaiyat in Ann Arbor. Another person said he saw her standing outside a Rexall Drug store on Main and Liberty streets that evening. Alice's body was found two days later with the earmarks of the previous killings. Her murder site was discovered also - a sand and gravel pit north of Ypsilanti. Her body was deposited on Territorial Road furthest north of any of the victims. Police claimed they found evidence in the trunk of Collins's Oldsmobile Cutlass that linked Collins to Miss Kalom. This was another case the prosecution thought they could win but never brought to trial

Roxie Anne Phillips (17) was from Milwaukie, Oregon visiting a family friend in California for the summer in exchange for babysitting services. On June 30, 1969, Roxie had the misfortune of crossing paths with John Norman Collins in Salinas, California where Collins was "visiting" to escape a narrowing dragnet in Washtenaw County. In many ways, the California case was the strongest of any of the cases against Collins. Extradition was held up so long in Michigan that Governor Ronald Reagan and the Monterey County prosecutor lost interest in the case and waived extradition proceedings. This remains a cold case. 

What links these murders are the mode of operation of the killer, the ritualized behavior present on the bodies of the young women, and the geoforensics of the body drop sites.  

At the time of the murders, investigators thought that the killer may have had an accomplice, but that idea was largely discredited by people close to the case. The two likeliest suspects were housemates with Collins. Both men were given polygraph lie detector tests and were thoroughly interrogated by police detectives. Prosecutors hoped one or both of Collins's roommates  would roll over on him after being given immunity by the prosecutor. They didn't.

But investigators did discover that both friends of Collins--Arnie Davis and Andrew Manuel--were involved with him in other crimes such as burglary, fencing stolen property (guns and jewelry), and motorcycle theft. 

There was also a "fraud by conversion" charge brought against Collins and Andrew Manuel for renting a seventeen foot long travel trailer with a stolen check that bounced. They abandoned the trailer in Salinas, California. It is the suspected death site of Roxie Ann Phillips.

These guys were not Eagle Scouts--that's for certain. When the trailer was discovered, police found that it had been wiped clean of fingerprints inside and out. Both men vanished and returned to Ypsilanti two weeks earlier than planned, driving back to Michigan in the 1968 Oldsmobile Cutlass registered to Collin's mother but in John's possession for months.

Back in the sixties, police protocols and procedures for investigating multiple murders were not yet firmly established. For two long years, an angry killer of young women was able to evade police, but slowly a profile was developing and police were closing in on the suspect from two different fronts. Washtenaw County's long nightmare was about to end. 


Link to Amazon author site: http://www.amazon.com/Gregory-A.-Fournier/e/B00BDNEG1C 

Rendezvous with Death - Part Three

Since the 1980s, law enforcement experienced a gradual decline in the number of violent crimes in the United States. In 2003, the U.S. House of Representatives authorized one billion dollars to use DNA to reduce the huge backlog of cases that had gone cold. Two retired Michigan State Police Detectives volunteered to look into the Michigan Coed murders of the late 1960s.
 
In 2004, the Michigan State Police ran DNA samples from at least two of the murdered Michigan coeds through the FBIs Combined DNA Index System (CODIS). The third young woman John Norman Collins allegedly killed in the series of seven sex slayings attributed to him was twenty-three year old, Jane Mixer, a graduate law student at The University of Michigan.

Even though a few investigators most familiar with these cases felt from the start that Jane's murder was characteristically different from the two previous murders, she was included in the unsolved coed murder cache. Thirty-five years later, a DNA analysis of her pantyhose revealed copious amounts of perspiration on them that wasn't from Jane. DNA was extracted from the sweat cells and run through the FBI's CODIS database.

The first run through the system produced a "cold" hit on a retired male nurse who had been convicted on a prior fraud charge for writing bogus prescriptions. He was entered into the CODIS system at that time. Gary Earl Leiterman, dubbed by the local press as "The Elmer Fudd Killer," was found guilty of the murder of Jane Mixer. John Norman Collins was cleared.

Since DNA scientific evidence is considered so strong in court, many cold cases have been solved in the thirty years since it has been introduced as an effective crime fighting tool. Many guilty parties have been brought to justice, while some of the innocent have been exonerated of their crimes after years of unjust imprisonment.

It should be noted that John Norman Collins has refused DNA testing, which could prove him innocent of the murders he has steadfastly claimed he is innocent of committing for the last forty-five years. Even John's supporters must find that curious. Seems to me if he had a "Get Out of Jail" card, he would have gotten his ticket punched years ago.

(To be continued...)

http://www.murderpedia.org/male.L/l/leiterman-gary-photos.htm