[BenLurkin]

May I suggest they check prison records for persons who were incarcerated over this same period of time.

The killer may have been put away for another crime (though 25 years sounds like a "life" sentence) and has just now returned to the outside world.

[rogueleader]

That's an excellent idea.

[archy]

Beattie and Landwehr said they had no idea why the killer would contact the paper after remaining silent for nearly 25 years. The killer may have been put away for another crime (though 25 years sounds like a "life" sentence) and has just now returned to the outside world.

Or he's been living around Columbus, Ohio, and has just now returned to his old boyhood home. Ah, nostalgia.

LAUREL to the Columbus, Ohio, Dispatch and reporter Michael Berens, for seeing the forest and the trees. Using the computerized databases of local newspapers. Berens studied reports on the deaths of nine women whose bodies had been found along interstate highways in Ohio, Illinois, Pennsylvania, and New York between 1985 and 1990. The comparative analysis -- which for bureaucratic reasons no law enforcement agency at any level had managed to do -- revealed such unmistakable similarities that, within days of his page one March 10 piece, an investigative task force was at work in Ohio, the FBI was on the scene, and other links to other murders in other states began to emerge. By May 4, evidence was pointing to a single suspect in Florida in at least three of the serial killings.

[pepsionice]

We may be looking for some character within 150 miles of Wichita area. A point to note...he kept in his possessions...these personal items from the victums. This would be unusual for a guy in prison. Usually, you talk a relative into holding your important stuff and then hope they would hold it for 25 odd years. To have been in prison for 25 years, he had some other major arrest record, which would have been hard for him to arrange his personal affects and ensure they were kept. And to return to Kansas? Why? He has unfinished business. This guy is probably in his 50s and still quiet capable of carrying on his work.

[psychstudent]

Now that the FBI has checked release date from prisons how about checking mental institutions?