01x02 - Hidden in Plain Sight

[bunniefuu]

Rachanda Pickle

is still missing.

Friends and family

scramble for answers.

What really happened that day?

How did it happen?

Only the one who took her

knew the truth.

And, of course, the trees.

The trees always saw

the monster's deception.

John goes to work.

Comes back early.

Which, in and of itself,

is not unusual.

But it's It's a flag.

Why would he come home early?

He talks to Rachanda.

He leaves.

He comes back, she's gone.

He's not too worried about her

even though he doesn't

see her anywhere.

The location.

Those things are flags.

And as the afternoon

and the evening wears on,

there's still no concern,

that's gonna be a flag.

The whole thing seems very odd.

No one is calling 911

on a 13-year-old child,

you know,

in this rugged environment,

who rarely strayed from home.

Then this development happens

that really stood out

to investigators.

On the day of his

stepdaughter's disappearance,

he is all over Linda.

And then, when asked by police,

"Well, how was it?"

He goes on to

describe this encounter.

Anybody that's

been a parent knows

the gut-wrenching feeling

when your kids

are five minutes late

let alone

You come home, they're not

there and you can't find them.

That being said, before

she is reported missing,

that night, they had the

nest sex of their married life.

Detectives were suspicious

'cause in other cases,

men may have difficulty

getting an erection

unless they are committing

an act of violence.

Sweet Home, is, you

know, right there in the foothills.

And so there's green trees,

and beautiful mountains

and it's just like this picturesque

little quaint, small town.

Some days it can be,

like, idyllic and sunny

and you look out, and you're

like, "It's so beautiful here."

It looks so pretty to the eye.

But the spirit is not pretty.

I remember thinking,

"Sweet Home?

"There's nothing

sweet about this place."

There's a lot of hidden

secrets inside that town.

I remember talking

to the officers.

I remember telling them,

you know, "We know who did this.

"We know what happened."

One day, when

Rachanda's nine or ten,

she started coming to school with

real, real apparent signs of abuse.

She was not doing

her hair as much,

which was a big deal before.

She was anxious.

Not smiling as much.

And just sad.

And, like, I do remember,

she had a black eye

and she had a little

cut under her eye.

She would,

literally, count down the hours.

There'd be two

Exactly two hours

before we'd have to go home.

She was like, "My gosh.

"Two hours and

we're going home."

And I'm like, "I know."

'Cause I didn't

wanna go home either.

Well, my stepdad

was very physically,

emotionally a*usive,

sexually a*usive.

And that's that was our life.

I mean, it's

not like I asked Rachanda,

"Are you being

molested?" You know.

I just remember, she

taps me on the shoulder,

and she said, um

"You know what you told me

that happened to you and Mandy?"

And I said, "Yeah?"

She's like, "Well,

that's happening to me."

Her stepdad, John Ackroyd,

was coming in to her room.

I think that is what

brought out a lot of our talks

and just knowing that we

all felt like we're going to hell.

I remember one night,

I'm 14, Rachanda's 13.

My mom was gone. I think she

was staying down at Sweet Home.

And it was just John

Rachanda and me.

And I don't even know

how I woke up but woke up.

And there was John in

Rachanda's bedroom,

kneeling down on

the side of her bed

and Rachanda's there in bed

and it was weird, I'm

like, "What's going on?"

Allegedly, John heard

Rachanda, you know,

possibly having a nightmare.

Screaming, "Mom,

no!" And went in there.

And I thought that was weird.

So when I asked

Rachanda, "What's going on?"

She "I don't wanna

talk about it." I'm like

"'Chanda, what's going on?"

One day, Rachanda told an adult

a trusted person,

what was happening.

And we were like, "Good

for you, Rachanda. Good for you."

But she honestly

She never said anything,

what happened after that.

I also had

confided in the same adult

about what was

happening in our home.

And I remember just saying,

"I'm tired of getting beat

up. I'm tire of getting hit.

"I'm tired of my stepdad

coming into our room."

And I remember, in my heart,

I felt like I was at

the end of a tunnel

I knew the police

officers were coming.

We were gonna be saved.

And then, this trusted person,

is like, "They didn't really feel

like you were telling the truth.

So they're not They're

not gonna do anything.

And I left it at that.

And so, when Rachanda

went and told them,

I felt, in my heart,

that nothing happened.

That they ignored her.

And she

was really, really scared.

Because she told

about the abuse.

So she was scared

on what John Ackroyd

might do.

It requires so much

for a child to come forward.

And then, for that, to be

treated with indifference

is deeply upsetting.

Clearly, there was a culture that

allowed men not to be held accountable.

Sexual abuse and

r*pe, at the time,

was not investigated

and treated the way

it is by police today.

While we were out

searching in the woods, for Rachanda,

I was one of the people that

was assigned to be with John.

And he would talk about

things that were so strange.

Talking about, like, his daughter's

Stepdaughter's breast size.

And what she's wearing.

And about her period.

We kept talking about

Rachanda in the past tense.

Not the present.

Then, when we decided to

change on to some other subject,

that's when he started talking

about about Kaye Turner.

It's about August.

So it would've been eight months

after Kaye Turner went missing.

This guy comes into the store.

And says that he found

some clothes in the woods.

I remember it really vividly.

It's etched there

because it was strange.

He just said he was the

last one to see her alive.

I didn't know at the time.

That was Ackroyd.

John Ackroyd goes

to the Camp Sherman store

and says, "I found the

missing jogger's clothing."

Then he says, "Why

did I have to find her?

"I was the last one

to see her alive."

It's an alarming statement.

And he would later say,

he was the last person to see

his stepdaughter, Rachanda, alive.

Ackroyd brought me here.

This was kind of a thicket.

So, from the road,

you couldn't see in here.

This area right here, is

where the clothes were.

They were just put there,

which was odd.

These clothes appeared

to be on top of the pine needles.

Investigators

would later surmise

that he had placed

these things there.

He didn't say

much. He seemed exited.

Like he Like he got

excited seeing these clothes.

Minutes after that, big police

showed up, the real guys.

We went and searched the area.

We found a lower jaw bone.

Couple of bones.

Ad it was determined

it was Kaye Turner.

While I was waiting by the

road, talking to the store owner,

John Ackroyd came up.

I didn't know him.

Hadn't really

talked to him before.

When Kaye Turner vanished,

on Christmas Eve, 1978,

police set up a roadblock.

Um, they began to look

for potential suspects.

John Ackroyd's name

had emerged early on

because he had been seen

by another highway worker

who knew John from work.

When Ackroyd's name came up,

we interviewed him

about Kaye Turner.

He said he did see her.

On January 11th,

John Ackroyd is interviewed.

John Ackroyd is treated as

nothing more than a witness.

John was just a good,

old boy. A local guy.

He liked to hunt, fish,

do things outdoors.

Police did seem to be

particularly interested in

following up with

him as a suspect.

Eight months after Kaye

Turner has gone missing,

Kaye's friends put

up a $1,000 reward.

And then, out of nowhere

John Ackroyd claims he's

found these clothing in the woods.

As soon as I found out

Ackroyd had

found these articles,

I had a I had a suspicion

that John Ackroyd was

Knew more than

he was telling us

and asked him to

take a polygraph.

Well, he failed the polygraph.

I was a detective sergeant.

And a lieutenant for the Oregon

State Police had come to my office,

asking me if I

knew John Ackroyd.

And I said, "Yeah,

for a fact, I do."

I said, "I kinda

grew up with him."

And I knew his mother.

We'd been in the same

community all our lives.

And he said, "Well

"He's had something to do

with that Kaye Turner thing."

And I said, "How

do you know that?"

He said, "I polygraphed

him and he's dirty."

1958-'59 school year.

That was at Pleasant Valley.

I knew John Ackroyd because

we went to school from

From the first grade

to the 12th grade.

We were never close friends.

He was

quiet.

Kind of a loner type.

I never really knew him

to have much

association with anybody.

I remember an incident

in in the sixth grade.

There were a

couple of little rabbits

that lived right there,

where we got off the bus.

And one day, John set

one of those rabbits on fire.

Somebody said, "John,

you set that rabbit on fire!"

And the rabbit

was scurried off.

And he just kinda had

a grin on his face, like

He was proud of what he'd done.

I thought, you know, "Why?"

I was raised that you don't

hurt anything or k*ll anything

unless you're gonna

eat it, you know.

You didn't go sh**ting

deer just for the horns,

you know, unless

you needed the meat.

You just You just

didn't k*ll anything.

After Kaye Turner

came up missing,

I reached out to

the investigators.

From the standpoint that

I thought that it might

be a little more difficult

for John to avoid

pertinent questions with me

than a total stranger.

Because I knew John's mom.

We worked together, in law

enforcement, in the late '70s.

At that time, there was only

one police officer in Sweet Home

on the graveyard

shift, and that was me.

And she was the dispatcher.

I'd quite often ask

her about John.

You know, as what

we had to talk about.

Some of the police officers

came to interview me.

I was really disappointed

on how they perceived me.

They asked me questions

that were totally inappropriate.

I don't think they had ever had

that type of investigation, before.

And at that time, I

ended the conversation,

I said, "We have

nothing to talk about."

At the time of

Turner's disappearance,

law enforcement weren't

necessarily in the habit

of collaborating and sharing.

And we're talking about a

rural law enforcement agency.

Me, in the Jefferson

County Sheriff's office.

And we're talking about,

you know, a small community,

and the Oregon State Police.

And there's not email. No one's

sending these reports to one another.

Small town politics.

Law enforcement doesn't share

a lot of information with other

Unless it's a

need-to-know basis.

After Ackroyd finds Kaye

Turner's clothing in the woods,

his story begins to shift.

After he failed the polygraph,

I interviewed him in my office.

And he denied

everything except

He said that he talked to her.

He discloses

that he spoke with Kaye.

That they actually had

a brief conversation.

They exchanged

holiday greetings.

And it's all very

charming and cordial.

The polygraph asked

if he'd ever touched Kaye Turner.

And he said no.

But the polygraph

showed that he did.

So we ask him about

not touching her.

And he said, well, he

did touch her in February,

when she was laying

on top of the snow.

That's be two months

after she disappeared.

There were three feet of

snow in February that year.

She couldn't have

been on top of the snow.

What he ends up

admitting acknowledging is that

he find a decomposing

body in the woods,

and that he stops and

touches these remains

and then does not tell anyone

despite knowing about the extensive

search and investigation for Kaye.

His disclosure is disturbing.

Because it's

It's very graphic.

He says that he saw a

body lying next to a large log.

That he was repulsed

by what he saw.

That he had seen her

neck had been slashed.

And that it appeared she had

a b*llet wound in her chest.

So, suggesting how

she had been k*lled.

You know, she had been cut or

stabbed and then she had been shot.

Another element emerges

in this crucial Oregon

State Police interview.

And that is that John

Ackroyd was not alone.

He was with his

friend, Roger Dale Beck.

So, police go interview

Roger and Roger's wife, Pam.

Pam Beck provided an alibi for

Roger Beck and John Ackroyd.

According to Pam, Ackroyd arrived at

their house on Christmas Eve morning.

And Ackroyd and Beck

did not go out that day.

There are all of

these troubling signs

that implicate Ackroyd in

the m*rder of Kaye Turner

But there is actually

no physical evidence.

There's no eyewitness.

There's no clarity.

That Ackroyd was involved.

We had no evidence to hold him

so we let him go.

The woods witnessed

exactly what John had done.

Helpless, they

watched him walk free,

to hide once more.

Justice failed.

What else would happen

before he stopped?

It was very important to Durr

that we keep the spirit

of Kaye Turner alive.

He even checked me

up before I made a drive

to the top of Santiam Pass,

introduced me to

John, personally.

To look at him,

you wouldn't think

he was the smartest

person in the world.

But John was clever.

Clayton Durr told me this is

the guy that k*lled Kaye Turner.

He says, "You need

to know this guy

"because this'll happen

again sometime."

And the next time we

came across John Ackroyd,

his stepdaughter

shows up as missing.

And John's back in

the spotlight again.

For me, as a

journalist on the story,

you're asking questions,

"Well, who is this guy?"

I thought, "Well,

I'm gonna dig in

"to the big file cabinet."

Buried among all that

was this slim set of reports

that showed Ackroyd had

had this violent encounter

with a stranger,

a year before Kaye

Turner's m*rder.

It was an incredibly important

moment in the timeline

of Ackroyd's criminal exploits.

This woman, she had not talked

about this since it happened.

John Ackroyd

could have been stopped.

If the police would

have listened to me,

none of this would

have ever happened.

I'm never gonna forget about

what happened that night.

Every time I wash I can

never get him out of my mind,

I can never get that dirt off.

I still can't, and I'm 66.

There was times I'd wake up in

the middle of the night, screaming.

And flailing, and throwing

punches and kicking.

I gave my husband

a black eye once.

It was always

right there with me.

It was like he was

on my shoulders.

Like i was carrying

him on my shoulders

but no one could see

him or feel him but me.

My husband Bill and

I, we went to the rodeo.

And got all dressed up.

We used to wear, you

know, cutoff work pants

and gym pants,

you know, to take care

of a baby, all day long.

And it was the first time I had

on a pair of jeans, real nice.

Looking good and smelling sweet.

And I had these boots on

that I waited for a very long time

and my husband did without

to buy me those boots, for me.

We got there and that's

when I started drinking beers.

And Though they

really hit me fast

'cause I hadn't been

drinking since What?

Eight months and then nine

months. It had been over a year.

We had some food and

then some people came over.

"Bill, I heard you were

over." Some buddies of his.

"Let's go to this bar."

I can't go in a bar.

I was 19.

You have to be 21 in Oregon

to get in a bar and drink.

So, I got angry.

"No, we came here, you and me,

"first time we've been

out since, you know"

But he hadn't seen his buddies

in so long and blah-blah-blah.

So, I said, "Fine,

I'm going home."

I was always

used to hitchhiking.

In Oregon, back in those days,

you didn't have to

really worry about it.

So I went to Highway 20

and I stuck my thumb out.

And lo and behold, the first

ride I got was John Ackroyd.

He pulls over and I

run up to the truck.

And I opened the door and I

kinda glanced at the door like this,

and got all the

way in and shut it.

Then I looked at the little knob

that you push up and down for

the lock, and there wasn't any.

By that time, he was off

on Highway 20, driving.

I passed out and

I went to sleep.

Just before dusk, I feel

my feet being grabbed

and he was dragging me out

by my feet o the passenger side

And my head hit every from

the seat to the car truck floor,

and to the outside

edge of the truck,

the door, and then, all

of a sudden, the ground.

And I I tried to te to

scream. I couldn't scream.

He even put the

knife to my throat.

And it hurt. 'Cause he pressed.

And he says, "You're gonna do every

thing I tell you to do, aren't ya?"

And I go, "Yes, sir.

"What do you want? Anything

I'll do anything you want.

"Just don't hurt me."

He took my pants by the

front of them, belt and all

and just ripped all the

way down to the boots.

And then he got pissed 'cause

he couldn't get 'em further

so he took a knife and

he cut my boots off.

I wanted my baby

to have a mother,

I had to stay alive for her.

That's all I pictured in my

head, was her little bald head.

Perfectly round.

Afterwards, I was,

like, in a fetal position

'cause I was in pain.

And he was, like,

you know, um

zipping up his pants.

Straightening up his

jacket and shirt and stuff.

And I go And he looked at me and

he goes, "Now what do I do with you?"

I said, "Take me home."

I was just being nice to him

because I wanted to

go back to my baby.

I had John Ackroyd drop me off

at Bill's mom's house.

So, I'm knocking, knocking.

And that's when

she came to the door

and I go, "I've just been

r*ped, he r*ped me!

"Please call the police."

The police came over

and they took a report.

After they did that, I left

and went to the hospital

and did the r*pe kit.

And then they ask me if I

would submit to a lie-detector

and I go, "Yeah, I'll do it."

Because I know I

was telling the truth.

They asked if I egged him on.

If I, you know, came on

to him, you know, sexually.

Was I flirting with

him, you know?

"Do you do drugs, Marlene?"

"How much were you

drinking?" "That much?"

The police made

me feel like a liar.

Why would a mother

of a little, tiny baby

that's breastfeeding lie

lie about a r*pe?

His explanation was

Marlene, she had come onto him.

And he just kind

of submitted to her.

And that, apparently,

made sense to the detective.

I felt stupid.

They made me feel stupid.

Little woman, brown woman, don't

know what she was talking about.

They made me feel

like it was my fault.

They questioned him.

Didn't prosecute him

or even arrest him.

They believed him and not me.

How does that fly?

After that

incident with John Ackroyd,

I was so scared

so paranoid that he was gonna

come back and finish me off.

'Cause I You

know, I told on him.

That's how I got insomnia.

I'd get up, two or three

time, in the middle of the night

check every single

lock, every single door.

He got away with it.

If he would have

been held accountable,

you know, it could have

had a chilling effect on him.

He would have been known as

someone with a r*pe conviction.

Sometimes I almost wish

that he would have k*lled me

but I don't do that anymore.

Especially after I found

out that 13-year-old girl.

Really? A child?

It's just heartbreaking.

Marlene

tried, but no one listened.

Her pleas were silenced.

The monster was allowed

to continue hunting.

Getting bolder.

My family, in general,

was close with John, you know.

My grandmother

loved John. Loved John,

In her eyes, he was

the perfect son-in-law.

My grandmother died thinking

John was completely innocent.

That the law and

everybody in the State

was just against John, just

trying to destroy the family.

When you're around a family, you know,

a lot of people are high school dropouts.

And then you have this guy that appears

to have all of his together.

And he wants to come

and be a part of the family

and marry, you know, their

daughter, which is my mom.

They all felt like

it was a step up.

They didn't wanna let go of

that The happy ever after, kinda.

Well, for me,

'cause I was sexually assaulted

throughout most of my childhood

by older men

John was one of the very

few that never abused me.

So, to me, that was a win,

I felt comfortable and safe

whenever John was around.

I mean, I didn't like the

spankings and beatings that we got.

I definitely knew

that wasn't normal.

I knew that wasn't normal.

I knew that my other friends,

that I went to school with,

didn't suffer the crap

that me and my sister did.

This was a hellish existence

for Rachanda and her brother.

Ackroyd disclosed

in one police interview

that he had made a paddle that he

would use to discipline Rachanda.

He was a good liar.

He was truly two

different people.

I never saw the John

that Linda and the

kids had to live with.

When Rachanda went missing,

he was just like a

good old boy, you know.

"I'm just here to help."

John would come up with these

theories on what a guy would do.

With John, it was always

an another person.

"A guy would do this."

And, "A guy would do that."

I was convinced he was

demonstrating to me what he'd done.

When he talked

about tying her up,

there was a search done

of the house and his truck

and there was rope

with Rachanda's hair

in the back f John's truck.

He talked about holding her down

which was indicating

that she was

struggling, yet still alive.

And there was blood

found on the bedspread

near the front

door of the house.

The woods have

a way of getting darker,

entombing secrets.

Secrets John hopes

will never see the light.

John was a Jekyll

and Hyde kind of person.

He's Hyde when he was my uncle.

Somebody I can count on.

When he was doing bad things,

that's Jekyll.

But one time, I was

with John, in his truck.

It was a while after

Rachanda came out missing.

And he decided to go

off on some side road.

It was all brushy and secluded.

The bushes came right up

to the door, on both sides.

It was that dense.

And he said to me,

"You know, you could hide a body in

here and nobody would ever find it."

I said, "Yeah, you

can. Can't you?"

And he said, "Yeah. Do

you have to go potty?"

And I said, "No, I'm good."

And I had to go

really, really bad.

But something told me

to stay near the truck.

I watched him as he went

straight down to the left

and then, I couldn't

see him anymore.

I was terrified.

And I've never been

afraid of John, like that.

At the time, I wasn't aware

that John was capable of m*rder.

I just blocked it

out of my mind.

But you can bet

your sweet bottom

if I would have

gotten out of that truck,

he would have k*lled me.

When Rachanda came up missing,

a week went by,

two weeks, three weeks.

Now it was

She ain't coming back.

I need to know

where my sister is.

This is what you guys are

You guys are supposed to be

the good guys helping us out.

Help us out.

Let me know what's going on.

This is my sister.

This is my blood.

This is my best

friend, you know.

Where is she?

The monster is free.

And they are no closer

to finding Rachanda.

We searched for

Rachanda everywhere.

And we couldn't find her.

The evidence, the

blood spots and the rope,

were problematic for us

because she lived there.

There are many ways

that she could have bled.

She could have cut herself.

She could have had a nosebleed.

We didn't have any DNA evidence

to tie John directly to it.

It was very clear to all of us

that he had taken her life.

But we didn't have a body.

At that point in time, they would

not prosecute without a body.

You've gotta be able to prove

that she met with foul play

and she was k*lled.

If you can't prove your case,

You can't go try him again.

They're done. And you lost.

And they're out there, free.

Everything kinda just

went back to normal.

It was over pretty fast.

The searches were over

before school even started.

Being that

young and feeling helpless

The beginning of seventh

grade was horrible.

Because she wasn't there.

All I know is

that my sister's gone

and my family's destroyed.

It's done. game over.

Here we are, in the

world, by yourself.

I'd give up everything. Even

if that meant my last breath.

Just to let her know

that I love her. i miss her.

They sense, as with Kaye Turner,

Rachanda's life

had come to an end.

John Ackroyd remains unscathed

and enjoys his freedom.

After Rachanda went missing,

I don't think anybody

suspected John Ackroyd

capable of doing

anything like that.

A lot of the guys were

like, "There's no way."

And then we started hearing

that he actually had been

the main suspect in

Kaye Turner's m*rder

and he found Kaye's body.

I think everybody up

there was shocked.

You just think back. How

many times have you seen him?

How many times

have you talked to him?

How many times

when you're with him

in the maintenance

shop at night?

We didn't want him up there

anymore. We weren't comfortable.

Our only phone on the

compound, that was available to us,

was one phone up in the

wash-house in the trailer shed.

We kept telling the police we spend

a lot of time alone here, as women.

They got quite

a bit of pressure.

So they moved him.

And we were

thankful to see him go.

John Ackroyd was transferred

from the Santiam junction

to Corvallis,

Highway Department.

And I said, "That's nuts!

"That's a college

town full of girls!

"That's crazy!"

But I wasn't in control.

When we heard that

John had been moved

to the Highway

Department in Corvallis,

we were like, "Holy,

who's thinking that one through?"

We need to truly get this

guy before he kills again.

Nobody wants to have a

serial k*ller in their backyard.