The Washtenaw County Murders--1967-1969

Photo credit: The Detroit Free Press

Over a period of three summers, the bodies of seven Michigan young women and a high school student from Oregon visiting in California were found discarded in the countryside. The prime suspect was a handsome, high school sports star from Center Line, Michigan, who began his killing spree at Eastern Michigan University in 1967. Part two of this three part feature recounts the murders.

The Victims 

Montreal's Canadian Expo 67, a Souvenir Medallion Necklace, and John Norman Collins

Remembered as a source of Canadian national pride, the Montreal Exposition 67 was Canada's first world's fair. It also marked its centennial year as a confederation. The exposition's motto was "Man and His World/Terre Des Hommes." Expo 67 became known as one of the most successful world's fairs of the twentieth century but not without overcoming many obstacles.

First, the Soviets were awarded the fair by the Bureau International des Expositions (BIA) on May 5, 1960. The Cold War was heating up and Moscow cited financial and security concerns, bowing out as the host country in April 1962. Six months later on November 13, the BIA changed the location of the World Exhibition to Canada. Despite an Ottawa government report showing the likely failure of such a project, Montreal Mayor Jean Drapeau convinced lawmakers that it was possible to prepare for the expo and have its grounds ready for the scheduled opening day.

It was Drapeau's idea to create two new islands in the St. Lawrence River and enlarge the existing Ile Sainte-Helene. The result would prevent wholesale land speculation which could rock the Montreal economy if the exposition was built on the northern reaches of the city as others had advised. The mayor's plan seemed far fetched at first, but it started to make more sense the closer Canadian ministers took a look at it. 

United States Pavilion - Buckminster Fuller's geodesic dome.

Montreal was already in the midst of a huge public works project, the expansion of their Metro system. The rubble and excavations from that project would become back fill for the man-made islands. The first batch of twenty-five million cubic tons needed to create the islands was ceremoniously dropped on August 13, 1963.

Working around the clock, a legion of dump truck drivers and heavy equipment operators finished the job on time. The newly graded grounds were turned over to the Expo 67 Corporation by the City of Montreal on June 20, 1964. This left 1,042 days to have everything else built and functioning by opening day on April 27, 1967.

Expo 67 was politically and culturally seen as a landmark moment in Canadian history. In the six months it was open, the official attendance tally was 50,306,648 despite a thirty day transit strike in September. The exposition set the single-day attendance record for a world's fair of 569,500 visitors on its third day.

The Canadian Exposition was projected to have a deficit shared by the federal, provincial, and municipal governments, but the exposition performed better financially than expected. In 1967 Canadian dollars, Expo 67 took in revenues of $221,239,872 with costs of $431,904,683. That left a deficit of $210,664,811 for the Canadian taxpayers to pick up. In return, Montreal got some new public land and improved infrastructure, and Canada received unprecedented global media exposure, a boost in international prestige, and a feeling of national pride for a job well-done.

***

Nineteen year old Mary Terese Fleszar convinced her parents to allow her to drive the family station wagon to the Montreal Expo 67 with her sister and two friends. Mary had planned out the trip in great detail. She knew how far Montreal was from Willis, Michigan, how much gasoline it would take to get there, and all the costs they might likely incur. Her mother and father had confidence in Mary's judgement and wished the girls well as they left on Thursday, June 1. Mary had even planned to beat the weekend traffic.

While on their visit, Mary purchased an Expo 67 medallion necklace with the logo of the exposition on it. The logo for the exposition was designed by Montreal artist Julien Hebert. The basic unit of the design was a pictogram of two "ancient men" linked together in friendship. This basic icon is repeated in a circular fashion eight times representing "friendship around the world."

If the viewer looks carefully at the symbol to the right, an M for Montreal can be seen in each icon. The rest of the icon looks like a W, perhaps representing the World. The fair's logo did not enjoy unanimous support from Canadians who felt it was too vague and cryptic. The design didn't include the name of the event or any reference to Canada or Montreal. But a nationwide contest was held by a group of Canadian intellectuals, and they choose Hebert's design.

After Mary Fleszar's return from her successful excursion to Canada, she sublet an apartment in Ypsilanti to be near her job at Eastern Michigan University. At about 9:00 PM on July 9th, Mary was last seen taking an evening walk by two people sitting on their front porch. The man and woman reported to police that she had been harassed twice on Ballard St. by someone driving a blue-grey Chevy. She waved the guy off a second time and then turned the corner on Washtenaw Ave leading to her apartment building. She was never seen alive again.

Mary's family believes she was abducted from the parking lot in front of her apartment building. One month later, her body was found by two teenagers among the weeds near the barn of an abandoned farm on Geddes Rd, one-third of a mile from LeForge Rd.

Early in the investigation, police asked Mrs. Fleszar to take an inventory of Mary's things to see if anything was missing from her apartment. Mary's purse and wallet were there, but her keys were missing and her light-blue Comet automobile was parked across the lot from Mary's assigned spot. Mrs. Fleszar thought that was very odd.

Mr. Fleszar removed the ignition switch for evidence before selling the car in case a set of matching keys was ever recovered. The front door lock to Mary's apartment was also removed and turned over to police as potential evidence for the same reason.

In addition to her keys, there was one other missing item. The Montreal Expo 67 medallion necklace Mary had purchased at the fair a month earlier. It was conspicuous by its absence. As a piece of jewelry, it had no value beyond a keepsake souvenir.

Two years later, after John Norman Collins was arrested for the sex-slaying of Karen Sue Beineman on July 31, 1969, Michigan State Police had probable cause to obtain a bench warrant to search his room. Found on top of his dresser was an Expo 67 medallion necklace that was entered as evidence with about one hundred other items collected by police from Collins' room and Oldsmobile Cutlass.

Items not directly related to the Beineman case were returned to the Collins family. The only item they refused to accept on John's instructions was the Expo 67 medallion. Collins denied owning or having any knowledge of the medallion and accused the police of planting it as evidence against him. The necklace was placed in an envelope and stored in an evidence vault in East Lansing, Michigan where it presumably lies today.

For more information about Expo 67, check out the following link:
http://www.cbc.ca/history/EPISCONTENTSE1EP16CH1PA3LE.html

Two That Got Away from John Norman Collins and Andrew Manuel

In the summer of 1968, fourteen year old Robert Fox was hitchhiking alone on Washtenaw Ave. when a gray convertible with the top down stopped to pick him up. Two guys were in the car.

Interior of 1956 DeSoto convertible.

He remembers that "as smooth as can be, the passenger door swung open, and the darker of the two men stepped out smiling. I unthinkingly slid between them. Within seconds, I realized I was trapped. Their talk was immediately suggestive. The vibe was the spookiest I ever felt.

"I was frightened and decided to patronize them and told them I was broke and hungry, hoping they would buy me something. Lucky for me, they pulled into the A&W on Washtenaw Blvd. Thank God it was a convertible - the moment the car stopped, I jumped from the center seat into the back seat, and leaped out onto the parking lot. Then I ran into the marshland between Washtenaw and Packard Rd. I was never so glad to get my feet wet! Don't know what I would have done if the top hadn't been down.

"I didn't study their faces - in fact - I avoided eye contact. I remember the passenger the most. He frightened me because he had run the trap on me. His hair was darker than the driver's, and he was heavier set than the driver. He looked Mexican to me. I have a vague recollection of the side of his face. His dark hair was wavy but not curly, not a thin face and pock marked with zit scars. It was absolutely a two-man operation. The trap was very smooth - rehearsed if not practiced."

Like many people who recognized Collins after his photograph was plastered all over the front pages, Robert Fox had the same reaction when he recognized a photograph in the newspaper of Andrew Manuel taking a perp walk with two FBI agents outside the Federal Building in Phoenix, Arizona.

"This episode scared the hell out of me," Fox said. "What surprises me looking back is that I did not make the connection that those guys might be the murderers."

Although Fox couldn't identify the make and model of the car, he did remember the color - gray. It sounds like the same car Collins drove when he first arrived on campus, a 1956 DeSoto Coupe convertible, previously owned by his older brother.

This is likely the car identified by one on Mary's neighbors that Collins used to harass Mary Fleszar when she was walking home the last night of her life. It was the same car that took Collins to Moore's Funeral home in Ypsilanti where he showed up at closing to take a photograph of Mary's body in her closed coffin. He claimed to be a friend of the family. 

Harold Britton, the funeral home director, refused the young man's request. After he left, Britton called the Fleszar family. They hadn't given permission for anyone to take pictures of the body. 

Then Britton called the police and identified the car as being blue/gray. He didn't get the license plate number nor could he identify the car's make or model as it pulled away in the dark. But he did say it was an older model car.

1956 DeSoto Fireflight Adventurer Coupe

And this was likely the same car that John Norman Collins used to take Joan Schell to Ann Arbor on her final ride. Not long after Schell's disappearance and murder, Collins sold the DeSoto to someone in the Detroit area. From then on, he had full use of his mother's new 1968 silver Oldsmobile Cutlass.

***

A woman who wishes that I not use her name related this up close and personal John Norman Collins anecdote to me:

"A person introduced to me as 'John and his date' were in the back seat of my date's car. We were going to a spring fraternity formal. The person seemed really nice and cute. He was talking to me a lot and I liked it.

"All of a sudden, he asked his date 'Are you having your period?' The poor girl was mortified. It was awful. He told her she was stinky. He went on and on. I had tears in my eyes for her.

"When we got to the party, I told my date that I refused to go home with that guy. My godfather lived in Detroit. I gave him the choice of dumping this guy and his date, or I would call and have my godfather pick me up.

"It was about six months after that when a person came up on me while I was leaving my night class at Washtenaw Community College. He started walking and talking to me. I thought I had met him before but wasn't certain. He was real pleasant at first. But when I walked up to my car in the parking lot, he yelled, 'Get the bitch!' There was a Hispanic man hiding in my backseat. There was a darkness in his eyes that was terrifying. He tried to pull me into the car.

"I dug my feet in the ground, and resisted the best I could. I yelled 'help' then 'fire' then 'rape.' No one heard at first. I started screaming the name of some guy I knew at a parking space some distance away. Finally, three guys started running towards me to help. I was dropped by the two men who jumped in a truck parked next to my car and drove quickly away.

"When I reported it, the first thing I told the police was 'I've seen one of them before.'

Corvair Corsa

"Somehow, he got my phone number and started calling me at home several times a day. He told me that I was a 'rich bitch' because I had a new Corvair convertible.... He would call and say how cool I thought I was in my car and how he would end that. He told me there was no place for me to be safe. He would tell me where he saw me and what I was wearing. I had two jobs and he knew where I worked. I was scared.

"My dad worked for the phone company and was close friends with Ann Arbor police chief of detectives. Michigan Bell tapped my phone so it rang at the police station. I was told that the police were keeping an eye on several other people too. 

"When the police came and put me under house arrest for my safety, I still didn't know who the caller was.... It wasn't until Collins was arrested that a frat guy called and told me who he was. Only then was I able to put things together. The caller remembered how uncomfortable I was when I wouldn't ride in the same car with Collins. I was just blessed to get away.

"Recently, I met a woman from Holland, Michigan. I have told very few people about this, but I told her. She said I was living for all those girls.... I am so surprised that I wrote to you. It is part of my life, but maybe this story will make people be more careful."

The Media, the Police, and the Washtenaw County Murders - 1967-1969

Before law enforcement and the public realized there may be a serial killer in their midst, three local coeds were found murdered and left scattered around the rural countryside of Washtenaw County outside of Ypsilanti and Ann Arbor, Michigan.

Mary Fleszar (19) disappeared on the evening of July 9, 1967. She was an Eastern Michigan University student whose body was found a 150 yards from the road on an abandoned farm thirty-two days after she disappeared. In the absence of any real clues, police investigators surmised that she may have been killed by a transient and dumped there. The condition of her remains shocked detectives on the scene.

Just over a year later, on July 30, 1968, another EMU coed, Joan Schell (20) was hitchhiking and seen getting into a car with three young men. Her body was found a week later on the outskirts of Ann Arbor. Police determined that she had been killed elsewhere, and her nude body was dumped 12 feet from the road and covered with grass clippings. Little effort was made to conceal the body. 

A couple of investigators familiar with the Fleszar case the year before thought that these murders could possibly be related, but Schell's murder was generally regarded as an isolated incident by most investigators.

A third coed was found murdered eight months later; University of Michigan graduate student, Jane Mixer (23). Her fully clothed body was laid out on a grave site just inside the gate of Denton Cemetery; a yellow raincoat covered her up. 

Detectives on the scene felt that this murder was significantly different than the previous two, but the press ran with the story and began linking the three murders together in the public's mind.

A self-perpetuating engine of public opinion was fueled by the public's desire for the latest news and the media's commercial and competitive interests. This relationship led to the breakdown of collective solidarity in the communities of Ypsilanti and Ann Arbor. A generalized fear gripped the public psyche, suspicion ran rampant, and faith in law enforcement efforts declined. Fear fed upon itself and magnified divisions already in the community.

To provide the community with a sense of psychological comfort and help contain the threat, the police floated the story that the killer or killers were a bunch of drug crazed transients. This well-publicized fiction was based on wishful thinking and may have prevented police from recognizing the killer when he was in their custody. Their suspect was clean cut and simply didn't fit the profile.

The universities attracted lots of non-student hippie types who always seemed to be hanging around causing trouble. After all, the murdered girls were college students, so the threat may be limited to EMU and U of M and not the general populace.

Only five days after the Mixer murder, Maralyn Skelton's dead body was found horribly abused along a roadside. She was a sixteen year old who recently had dropped out of Romulus High School and was last seen hitchhiking in front of Arborland on Washtenaw Ave. 

Twenty-one days later, Dawn Basom (13), a local Ypsilanti junior high school student was snatched less than 100 yards from her house. Now the frenzied community felt no one was safe. The time between slayings was decreasing as the death toll was rising.

When the police were powerless to capture the killer, the public appealed for divine intervention. The media reported on prayer vigils held in local churches, and some religious people believed that the deaths of the victims had some sort of sacrificial purpose and spiritual significance. 

Marjorie Beineman, the mother of the last victim, believed, "God must have sent Karen to find the killer." She was convinced that her daughter's sacrifice was according to God's divine plan to save others, precious little comfort for a grieving mother.

Still, others believed that the killer was thought to have a Svengali type of hypnotic, superhuman power to spirit his victims away without a trace. If God's divine presence can take human-saintly form, then the opposite must be true, the devils' disciples exist on Earth as evil incarnate.

The public was desperate for its deliverance from evil. Faith in the local police was at an all time low, and there were too many reporters chasing too little news. Something had to be done to move this case along.

Enter the psychic - Peter Hurkos. His presence gave the media something new to report on, but the police were not happy with this interloper. Assistant Prosecutor Booker T. Williams had a more proactive attitude, "What is there to lose? Maybe he can help break the case."

In the Shadow of the Water Tower - The John Norman Collins' Story

The Ypsilanti Water Tower

Forty-five years ago, a series of seven horrific sex slayings of young women began in the Ypsilanti, Michigan area. The first mutilation murder was of Mary Fleszar (19), an Eastern Michigan University coed majoring in accounting. On July 9, 1967, Mary went for a walk on a hot summer evening and never returned to her apartment. A month later her, body was found in a fallow field in an advanced stage of decomposition. It took dental records to identify her.

This was the worst sight most of the detectives called to the scene had ever witnessed. Everyone involved in this gruesome episode hoped that it was an isolated incident committed by a deranged transient, but it appeared that the murderer had returned to the scene twice, maybe three times.This suggested that the killer was someone local.

Almost a year passed before another brutal murder of an EMU coed occurred on July 1, 1968. Twenty year-old  Joan Schell was last seen just before midnight on June 30. When her body was discovered a week later, it had been mutilated and dumped not far from where Mary Fleszar's body had been dumped, just north of Ypsilanti. Police began to worry they had a maniac murderer on their hands - maybe two. Not wanting to cause the public to panic, law enforcement downplayed any connection between the two murders, but some police detectives believed differently.

Eight months later on March 20, 1969, a third murder was discovered neatly placed in a cemetery in Denton Township just inside the Wayne County line with Washtenaw County. Jane Mixer was a twenty-three year-old University of Michigan coed who had identification in her belongings. The coroner sent the body to University Hospital morgue in Washtenaw County. Now the press showed a deeper interest in connecting the three murders. But police thought things were fundamentally different about this murder.

Then a mere five days later, Maralynn Skelton (16) was last seen hitch-hiking in front of Arborland Shopping Center on March 25. When her body was found, there was such an overkill, that some cops felt her murder might have been a drug related message murder for talking with the police. Maralynn was a drug informant and may have owed money to some people. Her body was found approximately in the same area as the first two, north of Ypsilanti in Superior Township.

Dawn Basom

Dawn Basom, a local thirteen year-old Ypsi junior high school student, went missing while walking home on April 15 just before dark. She walked part of the way home on the railroad tracks which was and is the local shortcut. The next day, her body was found in the same vicinity as the previous three of four murders of young women in the area.

Only twenty-two days separated the killings of the youngest teenage girls. The public was officially panicked and outraged. What were the police doing? Did the area harbor a multiple murderer? Where and when would he, or they, strike next? Nobody felt safe.

Then seven weeks passed until Alice Kalom (23), a University of Michigan student was last seen on June 7,1969. She was supposed to meet some friends at a place called The Depot House who said she never showed up. Others at the Depot House said they thought they saw a girl who looked like her dancing with a young, long haired guy, but they couldn't be sure. Just another one of the many unanswered questions and conflicting evidence the police were struggling with.

Things were getting red hot for the killer, whoever he might be. A female accomplice might be involved or maybe a copycat killer or killers. The police had theories but no suspect. The reality was that the police were no closer to solving any of these cases than ever, but they were scouring the town searching for the maniac killer. By this time, most experts believed the killer acted alone in the commission of these power and control murders.

There was a pause of sixty-four days until another EMU coed disappeared from the area. On Thursday, July 23, Karen Sue Beineman was seen driving off on a motorcycle with a young man she had just met. She took a ride with a stranger despite all the warnings she had heard from the university and the appeals made in the local media by police. Her body was found laying face down in a gully three days later on Sunday, the 26th, only a mile away from the police task force command center. Law enforcement officials were desperate for a break in the case and were about to get two major ones.

John Norman Collins

A twenty-three year-old EMU student, John Norman Collins was arrested on August 1, 1969, for the mutilation sex slaying of Karen Sue Beineman. John Norman Collins was convicted of first degree murder on August 28, 1970 to life in prison.

But what of the other murders? These cases were shelved and never prosecuted. And an additional murder surfaced in Salinas, California, of Roxie Ann Phillips (17) of Milwaukie, Oregon. Roxie went missing on June 30, 1969, and her body was found on July 13, in Pescarado Canyon. Collins had been "visiting" in Salinas and was linked to her. A Monterey County Grand Jury brought an indictment against Collins on April 16, 1970, for her murder.

All of these cases are still considered open, so evidence is not available and is closely guarded by Michigan State Police in Lansing. The official Washtenaw County Courthouse case transcripts have been "purged" from their records, and understandably, family members of the victims are reluctant to talk, including the family of John Norman Collins.

Apparently there was a point of diminishing returns for more jurisprudence. One conviction was as good as seven. The police got their man off the streets, the rash of sex slayings ceased, so the other cases were never pursued. This was the most expensive case in Washtenaw County history. Some people may not want this story re-examined, but history demands a full accounting.

As a writer and researcher, I am left with archival news clippings and the memories of people who knew the victims and the alleged serial killer, John Norman Collins. Remember, he was only convicted of one murder and officially doesn't qualify for the title of serial killer.

If anyone has information pertaining to this case, photos, or other relevant information, please send me a message at www.gregoryafournier@gmail.com or write me at:

                                                       Fornology
                                                   PO Box 712821 
                                             Santee, CA 92072-2821

All replies will be held in strictest confidence. I want to collect as many facts about this case as I possibly can for the true crime book I'm writing entitled In the Shadow of the Water Tower. Here's your chance to contribute information.

John Norman Collins' Nemesis - Washtenaw Country Sheriff Douglas J. Harvey - Part Two

Sheriff Harvey with Tear Gas Launcher

On July 9, 1967, a nineteen year old Eastern Michigan University business student majoring in accounting went missing after an evening walk.

Mary Fleszar's badly decomposed body was discovered thirty days later laying in a field of shoulder high weeds on the site of an abandoned farm just north of Ypsilanti by two thirteen year old boys. They phoned the State Police post in Ypsilanti to report what they saw.

Her brutal murder, and the six that would follow, shocked the residents of Ypsilanti and Ann Arbor, two university campus towns connected by Washtenaw Avenue. For two long years, the brutal sex slayings of young women took place.

The elusive serial killer appeared to have criminal intuition and easily evaded capture. In the minds of some people, the murderer seemed to have an almost "spectral" quality.

Every lawman in Washtenaw County made the capture and conviction of this deranged killer of young women their number one priority, but none more than Washtenaw County Sheriff Douglas J. Harvey.

At a Kiwanis Club "Morning Edition" breakfast in Ann Arbor on June 29, 2011, the former sheriff reminisces on this forty-five year old case. Not since Odysseus has anyone enjoyed telling his story more.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RK_-c1vqe8Q