Possible Confession in Egg Harbor NJ Prostitute Murders

(Post by Stephen McCaskill, CrimeSceneBlog.com. Originally posted by Stephen at CrimeBlog.US.)

The remains of 4 prostitutes were discovered Nov. 20, 2006 in a trench close to the Golden Key Motel in Egg Harbor Township, NJ. Since that strange discovery, police have waded through tons of evidence and countless interviews.

A person of interest was eventually developed -- Terry Oleson, age 35.

Word comes now from Terry Oleson's attorney that another man who was already in jail called his office and confessed to the murders.

Leonard said the man called his office from the Atlantic County jail, where he was being held on unrelated charges, and said "he had some things he wanted to get off his chest."

"He talks about strangulation, and mentions one of the women by name," said Leonard, who recorded several phone conversation with the man.

"In the recording, he takes responsibility for the killings. He said one of the reasons he was coming forward was he didn't want to see an innocent man go to jail."

The man's identity has not been released, since he has not been formally charged. James Leonard, Oleson's attorney has turned over the recordings of the six phone conversations he had with the man over to prosecutors.

[Source]

This evidently is the solid evidence that Leonard alluded to earlier this week when he abruptly cancelled the hearing that was scheduled to compel the prosecutor's office to release the findings of the DNA sample that was given by Oleson.

UPDATE: 9/28/07 6:28 PM

The Press of Atlantic City states that the man who confessed is William "Bill" Schule (or Schlue). Schlue was considered a suspect early in the investigation.

Earlier reports stated that Schlue had admitted to picking up the women, but claims he did not have sex with them or hurt them.

William Schlue is also the man that Pam Cavelli told police, from her jail cell, may be responsible for the murders.

Pam also claimed in earlier reports that she had been picked up by a man named "John," who police told her was a man named Bill. During her encounter with him, she also claims to have been with Barbara Briednor and later Tracy Ann Roberts and Kim Raffo, all of whom became victims of what police believe is a serial killer.

Chester Arthur Stiles Wanted in Connection with Nevada Child Sex Tape

Police in Nye County, NV have named a person of interest in connection with a tape of child sexual abuse turned into Nye County authorities. They are seeking Chester Arthur Stiles, a sex offender wanted by the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department. Click the image on the left to see a comparison between Stiles's mugshot and a still from the video distributed by the Nye County investigators.

Chester Arthur Stiles is 6'3", weighs 190, has brown hair and green eyes. He is 34 years old.

Nye County authorities would not call Stiles a suspect in a press conference aired on MSNBC. They did give a description of Stiles and stated that they wanted to talk to him about the tape of a little girl being sexually abused that recently came to national attention after a man named Darren Tuck gave the tape to investigators [link].

In the same press conference, police gave a possible name for the young victim seen on the tape -- it is believed she is named Madison.

Stiles is a fugitive already from non sex-related charges. His whereabouts are unknown.

This entry will be updated.

UPDATE 1, 3:55 p.m. ET

Chester Arthur Stiles is wanted in connection with another abuse case, according to The Smoking Gun.

In 2003 a six-year-old little girl reported to Clark County NV authorities that Stiles had touched her private parts and kissed her, sticking his tongue in her mouth. Stiles told the girl to not tell anyone because he liked her and wanted to be able to see her again.

America's Most Wanted has an update to their pages about this case as well.

Chet Stiles lives in a very small world at the moment.

UPDATE 2, 4:19 p.m. ET

Stiles is a habitual criminal. He pled guilty to a charge of criminal conspiracy and motor vehicle theft in Clark County, NV in 2001.

In 1999 Stiles was charged in the same County with "aiming/discharging a weapon at" a person. With that came a charge of carrying a concealed weapon.

Stiles pled guilty to the latter charge and negotiated a sentence for the former charge.

He may be a danger to anyone he encounters if the charges from 1999 are any indication.

UPDATE 3, 9:14 p.m. ET

As was noted in the comments left on this entry, the little girl seen in the tape has been found and is said to be safe. Hopefully there may be some lead to the whereabouts of Chester Stiles to be found in the people around her.

Body found in search for Nailah Franklin (Cross-post from CrimeBlog.US)

(CHECK FOR UPDATES AT THE BOTTOM OF THE ENTRY.)

Authorities have not said that human remains found in Calumet City, Illinois are Nailah O. Franklin's, but her family has come to the area where the unidentified body was found on Thursday.

The nude body was found in the Wentworth Woods Forest Preserve, very close to Hammond, Indiana. Nailah's Chevy Impala was found parked at a vacant house in Hammond after the 28-year-old pharmaceutical rep's disappearance on or about September 18, 2007. Some of Nailah's personal effects had also been found in Calumet City after she vanished.

A reader commented on the first entry about Nailah's disappearance that the website set up to help further the search for the missing woman was no longer accessible as of Thursday morning.

The possibility that the dead body in the Wentworth Woods Preserve is Nailah Franklin unfortunately seems pretty solid. Google Maps seems to indicate that the preserve is less than one mile from 6311 Blaine Ave. in Hammond, where Nailah's car was discovered.

CrimeBlog.US is seeking further information about Nailah's disappearance and any potential suspects in the case. If you have any additional tips or information, please use this contact form.

Updates will be posted below as needed.

UPDATE 1, 12:01 p.m. ET

MSNBC has reported that Nailah Franklin's family has confirmed that the body found in the Wentworth Woods Forest Preserve was Nailah's. Their source for this information was apparently a Chicago-area TV station. Reporters there say they received the confirmation from Nailah's uncle, who has been acting as a spokesperson for the Franklin family.

Additional source(s):

MSNBC

Bomb Strapping Bandits, again?

(This entry was authored by Eyes for Lies. The author can be contacted at her site.)

*Update(s) at end of Post*

Yesterday in Hollywood, Florida, a Wachovia bank teller told police that two people (some reports suggest a third) with masks and guns kidnapped him at home. He said they strapped a bomb to his chest with duct tape. The teller reported that they then questioned him for over two hours about bank procedures before forcing him to drive with them in his car to the bank where he works to rob it.

Reports vary as to what happened once the robbers and teller reached the bank. Some sources say the man was forced to open a side door near the drive-thru. Once inside, the two kidnappers told the teller to hand over money or they would detonate the bomb they'd strapped to his body. Another report says the men went to the drive-thru window to demand the money. A more current report published today states the men actually went inside the bank to open a safe.

In the end, the robbers got away with more than $10,000. Reports say the robbers fled the scene, leaving the man and his bomb behind.

Police arrived on the scene, removed the bomb, and then detonated it. The fragments of the device are now being investigated to determine if, in fact, the bomb was real. The two suspects who fled the scene have not been caught, but police did speak to and release the teller who had the bomb strapped to his chest. His name has not been released.

Several things jump out at me when I look at this story. In news reports, you can see the man sitting on the curb at the drive-thru waiting to be rescued by police. What is so odd is the man is wearing a dress shirt, pants and a tie (no tie, sorry). Yet he reports being at home with his girlfriend when he was kidnapped.

According to reports from Local10.com, a Hollywood police captain told one of their reporters that it was this teller's day off.

Why was he dressed up as if he was going to work when he was hanging out with his girlfriend on his day off?

When I look at the photos from this crime, I don't see the bomb on the outside of his shirt. Do you? If I see this correctly, they strapped it underneath his shirt and not on top of it. Why would someone who kidnapped a man take the time to have the man undress to strap on a bomb? Why waste the time in doing this? What does it serve? If I see this correctly, this is perplexing, too.

Also, what robbers spend two hours in a stranger's house -- risking that someone could come home and surprise them -- to ask a teller about the bank's security before robbing it? Most robbers have a plan before they rob a bank. And the robbers were depending on the kidnapping victim having a car -- and gas in that car -- as well as keys to the bank (depending on the story). I find this odd, as well. The event seems unplanned and unprofessional, if you ask me.

One thing is for certain -- if this bomb-strapped man is not involved, he knew the robbers because they were depending on him for so much. The robbers had to know that no one would come home during their two-hour bank learning lesson. They also depended on their victim for transportation, gas and keys. Yet the bomb-strapped-man can't give any description of his kidnappers even though he spent two hours with them. He just says they wore masks and carried guns.

I find the story suspicious at this point, but I suppose it could be explainable with some incredible one-in-a-million odds. I'll be keeping my eyes and ears open for any developments. How I would love to watch this man talk about this ordeal!

Sources:

* http://cbs4.com/topstories/local_story_269075628.html

* http://cbs4.com/topstories/local_story_268192500.html

* http://www.local10.com/news/14206695/detail.html

Update 2:09 pm, 9-27-07:

Police have released the identities of the man strapped with the bomb as Christopher W. Ferreira, 23. Reports now say that his girlfriend Cindy Wade, 23, was also abducted. Furthermore, it is being reported that the two live together in the gated Paradise Pointe Apartments.

Open Thread: A photo of Madeleine McCann?

Madeleine McCann disappeared in May of this year. Since the 4-year-old vanished the mystery of what may have happened has consumed people all over the "Western" world. CrimeBlog.US has always had a good number of visitors from outside the United States, but hits from readers in places like Portugal, Spain, and the U.K. have risen exponentially. (Though the second highest number of visitors have usually come from the United Kingdom.)

Recently, Portuguese authorities made it clear that they were targeting Madeleine's physician parents, Kate and Gerry McCann.

Yet like so many supposed developments in this case, this one has seemed to lose its spark since it was first announced.

If a full-blown blog entry here was devoted to each turn and twist in the McCann mystery, this would just be a blog about Madeleine McCann, and it is not. (When I say "blog," I do NOT mean a single post, I mean the entire body of the weblog. A "blog" is not a single entry, it is the whole shebang. Again, this is an area where people get confused. You are reading a blog post. It is part of a weblog. Any questions? Ask me later.)

However, open thread discussions do provide a forum for intelligent, thoughtful people to talk about new developments, to debate, and update one another. Open threads also come close to letting commentators do what they sometimes think they are doing -- blog about this case. If you are unfamiliar with my pet peeve about commentators who write as if they are blogging ("I've never blogged before, but..."), just go here.

Most current developments in the search for Madeleine:

* Is Madeleine McCann in Morocco? It seems like a bizarre question, a non-sequitur. Yet I must admit that this photo gave me pause. That's saying something, because I usually am a skeptic about new developments in this particular mystery. At the same time, I must admit -- the picture of a little girl who may look like Madeleine smells a lot like many other past (non) developments in the case. It's vague, suggestive, anything but concrete.

* How reliable is the lead detective in the case? Joana Cipriano, age 9, vanished from the Algarve in Portugal in 2004. The circumstances seemed to resemble those surrounding the McCann disappearance. Her 36-year-old mother Leonor was eventually convicted of Joana's murder. Now Leonor is apparently saying that Gonçalo Amaral, one of the main investigators in the McCann disappearance, sat idly by as police literally beat her into confessing to her daughter's murder.

There's always plenty to talk about where the McCann disappearance is concerned. So, talk amongst yourselves. Please keep it civil and on-topic.

(Alleged) Creep of the Week: Ricky "Funboy" Meuir

(Hat-tip to Websleuths.com.)

Fort Worth Texas (TX) authorities arrested a 43-year-old man named Ricky Meuir last Friday.

He may be one of the most prolific distributors of child pornography that the police in Fort Worth have ever encountered.

Police say that there as many as a thousand different faces seen on the images found in Meuir's possession.

The cops think Ricky collected and traded child porn, and they've got an evidence trail stretching back to the 1980s.

Ricky Meuir has been hit with a felony count of promotion of child pornography.

Police in New Hampshire managed to have Mr. Meuir e-mail them images and videos. Then in July they got in touch with Fort Worth P.D. Evidence was collected from Ricky's residence earlier this month, prior to Meuir's arrest.

Ricky's parents are either clueless or in deep denial. Wayne Meuir told the press that Ricky "didn't know" child porn was illegal.

I suspect Ricky knew precisely what he was doing.

First, there's this Youtube account: http://www.youtube.com/rickymeuir. Of this Ricky Meuir's 99 favorite videos, the majority appear to be of young boys. If they were pornographic, they would have been flagged and deleted by YouTube by now. So it is likely they are videos that seem innocuous at a glance. Yet just the still images that you see representing each video make it clear that the boys are often shirtless, in shorts, sometimes wrestling or doing some other kind of backyard sport -- swimming, touch football.

Same Ricky Meuir? Not sure. But it wouldn't be a big surprise to find out that it was.
Attention will be paid by the authorities to Youtube RickyMeuir's friends footie66 and Kronamalasa too, I am sure. Just check the stills for their own favorite videos to see why.
Another personal profile came up in searching Muir's name, and in its way it was even creepier, if possible: http://funboy222.multiply.com/.

The page is titled "ric's site" and the profile pic is of a young male actor or model -- under-12 young. The caption at the top of the page: "Thanks for stopping by check out my pics and vids;you find no nudies here but i got some good ones."

"ric" left weird comments on other profiles, like the page kept by a man named Tomy, where "ric" wrote "thank you for addin me sir."

It seemed almost like funboy222 was role-playing as if he were a young boy at times.
Another comment seemed to indicate that funboy222 had his videos and images removed by the multiply site owners as well. Probably after they received a subpoena from Fort Worth PD (just a guess).

And if you're wondering how I associated Ricky Meuir with creepy ole 'funboy222', just go here: http://profiles.yahoo.com/rickymeuir.

Maybe Ricky Meuir really was spectacularly clueless or stupid and didn't realize there was a difference between all those videos and photos he allegedly possessed and adult pornography. I kind of doubt it, though.

And if Meuir is found guilty of selling this stuff over the net, if he is suspected of making it, perhaps one year in prison per unique child's face on a recorded image might be an adequate punishment for the man.

A final note: there is questionable content on Youtube, I'm sure, but generally the site has a reputation for being a place pretty much anyone can use. The possible presence of Meuir on that site and the types of videos he favored should raise an alarm for anyone considering putting their kids' videos there, or anywhere online where you cannot completely control viewer access.

Source:

WFAA.com: "Man caught with 'thousands' of child porn pictures."