March 12, 2024 • 41 mins
Retribution came slowly for Skidmore, Missouri’s town scourge, Ken Rex McElroy. After committing a string of heinous crimes and never facing consequences, the townspeople took justice into their own hands. As McElroy sat in his truck in full view of more than 30 people, multiple gunshots rang out and the town bully was gone.
SOURCES
In Broad Daylight: A murder in Skidmore, Missouri - By Harry N. MacLean
https://www.crimelibrary.org/notorious_murders/classics/ken_mcelroy/index.html
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/autumn-s-oddities--5307439/support.
SOURCES
In Broad Daylight: A murder in Skidmore, Missouri - By Harry N. MacLean
https://www.crimelibrary.org/notorious_murders/classics/ken_mcelroy/index.html
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/autumn-s-oddities--5307439/support.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:31):
Dark Cast Network. Welcome to thedark Side of podcasting. Hey, hey,
welcome back to Autumn's odd Ease.I'm Autumn. Got a small bit
of business up top. I'd liketo ask you to please rate and review
this podcast wherever you listen. Idon't have like a ton I don't even
(00:53):
think I've cracked like a hundred reviewsor ratings on iTunes or whatever the hell
it is Apple Podcasts, so thatwould be a great treat for me.
And if you are a Patreon familymember, I'm working on getting an exclusive
episode recorded this week, just tryingto narrow it down. I've got quite
a few, several many outlines going. That is all the business that I
(01:18):
have on the docket. Let's getinto today's case. Retribution came slowly for
Skidmore and Missouri's town scourge ken RexMcElroy. After committing a string of minor
to heinous crimes and never facing consequences, the townspeople took justice into their own
hands. As McElroy set in histruck in full view of more than thirty
(01:41):
people, multiple gunshots rang out,and the town bully was gone. The
killing was a shocking end for anotoriously brutal man who had terrorized the area
for years with seeming impunity from thelaw, that is, until he was
struck down in a moment of vigilantejustice. It was also the first major
case for a young county prosecutor,not far removed from law school and just
(02:05):
months into the job, who saidhe was confident that the case would be
solved soon, but the silence ofthe towns people held, and more than
forty years later, Prosecutor David A. Baird left office with his first and
most famous case still unsolved. Noone has ever been brought to trial in
mister McElroy's I don't know how yousay his name, and I don't really
(02:28):
care Micelroy McElroy's death, And althoughthere is no statute of limitations for murder,
most people around the town suspect thatno one ever will be charged.
Ken Rex McElroy was born. I'mgonna go with Micelroy McElroy was born in
nineteen thirty four, one of sixteenchildren. Author Harry McLain explains in his
(02:50):
book In Broad Daylight, which Iused for research in this case. His
father was a tenant farmer, hismother was a housewife. Obviously, overwhelmed
with the feeding and the caring forof sixteen freaking children. His parents,
Tony and Mabel, moved around betweenKansas and the Ozarks before finally settling outside
(03:10):
of Skidmore. There obviously was notmuch parental supervision. I don't know how
there could be with sixteen kids,but McElroy had a knack for taking care
of himself. He never finished highschool, but he apparently knew how to
hunt, drive fast, and navigatethe back roads of Nodaway County by his
early teens. McElroy dropped out ofschool at age fifteen in the eighth grade.
(03:35):
That ain't lining up. I'm guessinghe was held back, which is
not surprising, and he quickly establisheda reputation as a local cattle wrestler,
small time thief and womanizer, andjust all around scumbag. Described as charismatic,
I don't know how. With jetblack hair and piercing eyes, McElroy
could sweet talk his way around womenand had been married three times by his
(03:59):
early four To that end, McElroyfathered more than ten children with several different
women. He met his last wife, Patrina McLeod, when she was twelve
years old, and in eighth gradeand he was thirty five, and he
raped her repeatedly. McLeod's parents,Trina McLeod, They initially opposed the relationship,
(04:24):
you know, because their child wastwelve years old, but after McElroy
burned down their house and shot theirdog, they seemed to have no choice
but to allow the marriage. Ifyou're wondering, like, you know,
oh, why is she being socallous? She said, this man is
dead. Why is she saying shedoesn't care how she pronounces his name?
This is why. Yeah, hewas raping a twelve year old girl.
(04:47):
And because her parents were like,no, you cannot come near our daughter,
he burned down their house and hekilled their dog. Yeah, so
Trina became pregnant when she just fourteen, and she dropped out of school in
the ninth grade to go and livewith McElroy. And get this, his
(05:08):
second wife, Alice McElroy devoced,divorced Alice and married Trina, not because
he loved her, but in orderto escape charges of statutory rape, to
which she was the only witness.Sixteen days after Trina gave birth, she
and Alice fled to Trina's parents' house. So the current wife that she moved
(05:31):
the head when she moved in thepregnant fourteen year old that he's with and
marrying to avoid statutory rape charges.Those women or one as a girl.
One is a woman run away tohide at Trina's parents' house, and according
to court records, McElroy tracked themdown and brought them back to his home.
(05:54):
When Trina's parents were away, McElroywent to their home where he once
again burned down the house and shotfrom the Cloud family's new dog. So
not only he did this not once, but twice based Yeah, I have
no hard time getting these sentences out, you know, because of the rage
(06:15):
based on Trina's version of events.McElroy was indicted in June of nineteen seventy
three for arson, assault and statutoryrape. You would think he would go
to jail for a long time,right, So he was arrested, booked,
arraigned, and then released on twentyfive hundred dollars bail. Yeah.
Trina and her baby were placed infoster care at a home in Maryville,
(06:38):
Missouri, you know, because she'sfourteen. McElroy apparently wasn't having that,
and he sat outside the foster homefor hours just staring at it, and
he told the Foster family that Trinawas living with that he would trade quote
girl for girl to get his childback, since he knew where the Foster's
family's biological daughter went to school andwhat bus route she wrote, so he
(07:01):
was threatening to kidnap their biological daughterin order to get Trina and his child
back. For more than two decades, McElroy was suspected of being involved in
the theft of grain, gasoline,alcohol, antiques, and livestock, but
he avoided conviction when charges were broughtagainst him twenty one times, often after
(07:26):
witnesses refused to testify because he allegedlyintimidate them. I don't think that's an
allegation. I'll say it's not.It's alleged because he wasn't convicted of it.
But he's dead, so who's comingafter me. I'm sure he did
intimidate them, and he apparently didthis pretty frequently. He would follow his
targets or park outside their homes andwatch them, and it wasn't just like
(07:46):
a one time thing. I'm gonnaget a little more into some of these
incidents. Police had charged him withvarious alleged crimes. You know, from
the hog stealing to assault, butnothing stuck. And I'm sure you're like,
what the fuck is happening? Heburned down a family's house two times,
he killed two of their dogs,he raped their twelve year old,
and now he's stalking the Foster family, who has no vault or part in
(08:09):
this really whatsoever other than they tookin a girl and her freaking baby.
Okay. So one reason that McElroyseemed to never get a charge, or
he got charged, but he neverseemed to get a conviction was that he
had a really skilled defense attorney namedRichard Jen McFadden, and he apparently just
(08:31):
ran circles around inexperienced prosecutors, ofwhich you know, like I just told
you the town of Skidmore had aprosecutor who had just come out of law
school. So yes, inexperienced ascompared to a skilled defense attorney. Another
was McElroy's intimidation tactics. Once afarmer who caught Ken red handed stealing two
(08:52):
horses filed charges but withdrew them afterMcElroy smashed him across the face with a
rifle. Yeah, I would say, so it wasn't just you know,
regular people in town who felt thewrath of McElroy. It was also the
police. One night, after hepulled a speeding pickup truck over, an
(09:13):
officer named Boyer came face to facewith the town scourge. He said that
he had his service weapon drawn andthat he wouldn't have been the least bit
surprised if you know, ken RexMcElroy tried to do something. He said
that his eyes just really put youin self defense mode, that he looked
like a mean person, and thatyou know, he looked like a person
who should be afraid of a fewdays later, a pickup truck showed up
(09:35):
in the wee hours outside Boyer's remotecountry home. It cruised up the street,
came back, and then just kindof sat there for twenty thirty seconds.
Boyer said that he couldn't prove itwas McElroy, but waited behind a
tree with his shotgun just in case. On July twenty seventh, nineteen seventy
six, Skidmore farmer Romain Henry saidMcElroy shot him twice, once in the
(10:00):
stomach with a shotgun after Henry confrontedhim for shooting weapons on Henry's property.
He's like you're shooting weapons on myproperty. Please don't do that. Please
go away, which is a reasonableask. You know he's trapped. McElroy
was trespassing and for shooting this manon his own property. McElroy was only
charged with assault with intent to kill. How about attempted murder. McElroy denied
(10:26):
that he was even at the scene. He's like, I don't know anything
about that shooting. I've never seenthis man before in my life. And
as the case dragged on without acourt date, Henry said McElroy had also
parked outside his home at least onehundred times. At the trial, McFadden,
his attorney, produced two supposed witnessesto alibi McElroy. They were two
(10:48):
raccoon hunters that testified that they hadbeen with him the day of the shooting
and that they all three were nowherenear Henry's property. Also, Henry was
forced to admit in court, underquestion by McFadden the attorney, that he
had concealed his own petty criminal convictionfor more than thirty years previous. And
I don't really know what that hasto do with someone trespassing on his property
(11:09):
and then shooting him, but Iguess that McFadden was able to cast enough
doubt on Henry's credibility and McElroy wasacquitted. The fuck Really, As author
Harry McLain later wrote in his bookon McElroy's story, the most baffling component
of the whole thing was that thisman did not have a bank account,
(11:31):
he did not have a social Securitynumber, and he could not read.
So how did this uneducated person cawwas he able to outwit the criminal justice
system for twenty years? Well,again, I believe it was attorney McFadden's
doing. And this man had tosay of McFadden had this to say McElroy,
He said he was his best client. He paid him in cash and
(11:54):
said do whatever you have to doto keep me out of jail. So
that shows you the scruples and ethicsof the attorney. He's the kind of
attorney who gives attorneys a bad name. Yes, is everyone entitled to a
defense, certainly they are, butit becomes an ethical It really is a
gray area. It's an ethical grayarea where you know that this man is
(12:16):
committing these crimes, that he's rampingup, that he's gonna eventually kill someone,
but you just keep aiding him andalso finding people who will perjure themselves
in order to aliby your client.So in nineteen eighty, after a misunderstanding
about a candy purchase from a Skidmoregrocery store that involved one of McElroy's daughters
(12:39):
because remember he has ten, notdaughters but kids, McElroy shot popular owner
Bo Bowen Camp in the neck.So he's going to jail, right.
Let's see. In the inciting incident, one of McElroy's children got into an
argument with the clerk, Evelyn Summyat the store owned by seventy year old
seventy year old Bowen Camp, allegedlybecause the try the child tried to steal
(13:03):
candy, something kids do. McElroybegan stalking the Bowen Camp family and eventually
threatened Bobo and Camp in the backof his store with a shotgun in hand.
In the ensuing confrontation, you know, again he's showing up to someone's
property armed and being the aggressor,but then later claiming I wasn't there or
(13:26):
I was defending myself, and McElroyin that instance shot Bowen Camp in the
neck. You know, when heshows up to the store holding a gun
and the man, I'm sure talksback to him like he has every right
to do. When the call wentout, State Police Corporal Richard Stratton was
ready. Stratton knew McElroy from aprevious stop when he threatened the trooper with
(13:46):
a shotgun. Why was that mannot jailed right then? Anticipating McElroy's typical
nonsense, Stratton waited on a backroad near the Kansas border. His hunch
paid off, and McElroy found himselfhandcuffed and charged with assault again assault.
How you shot someone in the neck? You walked onto their property and shot
(14:09):
them in the neck. Good God. Shortly after, Stratton's wife, Margaret
so the police corporal's wife, Margaretwas headed to church when she saw a
strange truck in the driveway. Itwas a man, and it turned out
to be McElroy, who pointed ashotgun at her. She said she didn't
(14:31):
know what to do. She justgot in the car and was shaking terribly,
but she gathered her strength and threwthe car in reverse. And I
would have done the same thing ifhe was blocking my car, I would
have just gunned it reversed. I'dbe like, I don't care, I
don't care if I ruined this car. I don't care if I total it
my own and his. I'm gettingout of here. McElroy began backing out
too, then tailed Margaret until sheradioed her husband and squad cars showed up.
(14:56):
Yeah, so she was seventy eightat the time. He was doing
this to a seventy eight year old. Well, he's a tough guy,
right first, A seventy year old, A seventy eight year old. It's
always like older or a younger people, never anyone who physically could take him
on. And she said that shebelieved he treated the entire town of Skidmore
that way. She said that shedidn't feel brave, you know, standing
(15:18):
up to him, but it gotto the point that it made her mad.
She was just sick and tired ofthe shit, and good on her
bowen camp. The store owners survivedthe shooting, and McElroy was arrested and
charged with attempted murder. I'm guessingthe charge got bumped up once the details
of you know, the whole incident. He shot a man in the neck,
(15:41):
you know, when all that cameout. Meanwhile, tensions in Skidmore
swored as McElroy's trial neared. Inthe meantime, though, McElroy, instead
of, you know, staying outof trouble, he decided to stalk the
bowen Camp family and just sat outsideof their house day and night leading up
to the trial, and Bowen Camp'sdaughter, Cheryl Brown gave her account of
that time. She said the townwould just empty out every time McElroy came
(16:06):
into it. Everyone was so uncomfortableand afraid of him. In court,
Bowencamp testified about how McElroy confronted himin the loading dock of the grocery store
while he was cutting up boxes andjust shot him in the neck. Then
McElroy, described by veteran journalist PhilConger as quote a big brute of a
guy with slicked back elvis like hair, took the stand. Why in God's
(16:29):
name, anyone, any attorney wouldlet this man take the stand in his
own defense is beyond me. That'swhere it begins to become an ethical because
his attorney full well knew that hewas lying. He knew he was lying,
and he knew that his client waswilling to go on stand and commit
perjury, which he did. Sohe testified that bowen Camp attacked him with
(16:51):
the knife and that he acted inself defense. Well, it's not self
defense. You came into this man'sgrocery store that he owns with a weapon,
so you are the aggressor. Hedefended himself and then you shot him.
Yeah, that's not how self defenseworks. It would be self defense
if you walked back unarmed to theloading dock started talking to him calmly.
(17:12):
He attacks you with a knife,and then you find some sort of weapon
and defend yourself with it. Butthe fact that you brought a shotgun into
the store lends itself to premeditation,and if he had died, it would
have been murder, not self defense. Apparently, his lawyer cast enough doubt
yet again, and the verdict wassecond degree assault for attempted murder. McElroy
(17:38):
would only face two years in prison. The breaking point for Skidmore seemed to
be when McElroy was freed on bailpending his appeal. Immediately after being released
at a post trial hearing, McElroywent to the d Andng Tavern, a
local bar, with an m oneGarrand rifle and a bayonet attached, and
(18:00):
went ahead and made graphic threats aboutwhat he would do to Bobo and Camp.
This led to several patrons deciding,like, let's just see what we
can legally do to prevent ken RexMcElroy from harming anyone else because nobody's protecting
them, they're clearly on their own. McElroy's appeal hearing was delayed several times,
and the tension finally reached a breakingpoint. On the morning of July
(18:25):
tenth, nineteen eighty one, agroup of frustrated townspeople met at the Legion
Hall in the center of town withNoraway County Sheriff Dan Estes, you know,
to just try and figure out howcan we protect ourselves since you assholes
won't do it. During the meeting, McElroy showed up at the D ANDNG
tavern yet again with Trina. Ashe sat drinking at the bar, word
(18:45):
got back to the men at theLegion Hall that he was in town.
Sheriff Estes instructed the group not toget into a direct confrontation with McElroy,
but instead that they should seriously considerforming a neighborhood watch program, and then
Estes went ahead and drove out oftown in his police cruiser. Wow,
thanks for nothing, officer. Ilove how the police were like, we
(19:08):
can't make the charge of stick,so there's nothing we can do. Did
he not pull guns on police officers? Call me crazy, but I don't
think you're allowed to do that.I'm pretty sure it's a crime with a
stiff penalty. And if he hadbeen a black man, he would have
been shot in the head, ora woman or anybody else. Just the
fact that he was a white dudeback then, he just kept getting away
with the shit, likely realizing thatthey were going to have to take matters
(19:32):
into their own hands, since McElroynever faced a consequence really in his twenty
years of criminal activity. Citizens atthe meeting decided to go to the tavern,
and soon the bar was filled withangry patrons. After McElroy finished his
drinks, he purchased a six packof beer, left the bar and got
into his pickup truck, where Trinawas waiting. I'm assuming he didn't allow
(19:55):
her to go into the bar.What is she at this point, like
fifteen? I don't even think shecan go into a bar. The crowd
migrated to the parking lot, andwhile sitting in his truck, McElroy was
shot at several times, but hitonly twice, once by a center fire
rifle and once by a twenty tworimmed fire rifle. In the crowd of
roughly forty six potential witnesses, itwas impossible to say who had shot McElroy.
(20:21):
Was it impossible? He was struckby two different firearms and bled out
behind the wheel of his truck.No one called an ambulance. I'm not
surprised. Only Trina, who hadbeen in the truck when he was shot,
claimed to be able to identify agunman. Every other witness was either
unable to name an assailant or claimednot to have seen who fired the fatal
(20:41):
shots. Within hours, District AttorneyBaird heard that there had been a shooting
downtown. He didn't even think aboutit. He's like, I'm sure it
was McElroy who'd done the shooting,you know, because why wouldn't it be.
And he's going to not catch acharge yet again. It was hours
before he learned that it was misterMcElroy who had been shot. Bullet casings
(21:03):
from two guns were found, andagain upwards of thirty people were reported to
have been at the scene, butnot one of them could or would say
who had wielded the weapons. OfficerBoyer was out showing a trainee the ropes
when he got the call of ashooting in Skidmore. When he arrived,
he found a pretty maccob scene.McElroy's rear window was shot out and the
(21:26):
front window was as well, andpart of his teeth were lying on the
dashboard. Trina McElroy identified a localrancher as one of the gunmen, but
he denied the claim. And Iwould have too. I'd been like,
never been there, never seen himbefore in my life. I don't know
what you're talking about. Here's eightguys who will say I was somewhere else,
entirely on the stand, they'll commitperjury. Why not? Shockingly,
(21:48):
only Trina claimed to know who shotMcElroy. The local Major Cases Squad investigated,
then the Federal Bureau of Investigation.Three grand jury heard evidence, but
even after a federal prosecutor forded tomister Baird what he called substantial new evidence,
no one was indicted. Instead ofplaying out in court, the details
(22:11):
emerged in newspaper and magazine accounts,as well as a best selling book in
Broad Daylight, A Murder in Skidmore, Missouri, which was later made into
a television movie. The DA declinedto press charges, and that extensive federal
investigation also did not lead to anycharges. Missouri based journalist Steve Booher described
(22:32):
the attitude of some townspeople as quote, he needed killing. And you know,
I don't condone murder, but Iwill make an exception in this case.
This man was disgusting. He wasa pedophile, and that's enough for
me wipe him off the face ofthe earth. Pedophile, rapist, arsonist,
and an all around nightmare who threatenedpeople's lives every chance he got and
(22:53):
just shot people willy nilly, andluckily they didn't die. And even if
they had died, he would commitperjury on that stand constantly and say people
were attacking him, or they werethe aggressor, or he was defending himself
with no one to cast any aspersionson that, Like there wasn't surveillance,
the victim would have been dead.How you know, there are two people
(23:14):
who know what happened, and hewas lying and saying no, that didn't
happen. So you know, thetestimony of any witnesses and his testimony cancels
out. If he's willing to commitperjury. Although there were many witnesses at
the scene of McElroy's murder, noone talked. It seemed as though the
entire town had collectively decided that they'dhad enough and were willing to turn in
(23:36):
the person or persons who pulled inthe trigger. They were not willing to
do it. They were just like, I didn't see a damn thing.
Once the shroud of silence fell,there was going to be no one talking,
said Cheryl Huston. And if youremember, her elderly father had been
shot in the neck by McElroy.Uh and she also had seen the killing
(23:56):
of mister McElroy from her family's grocerystore. But like the others, she
said, she did not see thegunman. She said that they could have
pushed and dug, pushed and dugand gotten nothing, meaning she knows.
Ain't nobody talking there. She said, we were so bitter and so angry
at the law letting us down thatit came to somebody taking matters into their
own hands. No one has anyidea what a nightmare we lived for some
(24:21):
residents, resentment against McElroy was projectedonto the police, and yeah, kind
of should have been Officer Boyer wastaking trajectory measurements at the crime scene when
a town official scolded him. He'slike, why are you here, what
are you doing? Why are youeven investigating this? Like you know how
he threatened all of us, andhow dangerous he was and how many crimes
(24:41):
he committed and just kept getting awaywith. He's like, I don't believe
that you're coming now, you know, after we needed your help for all
this time and for real though,Like why are you going to thoroughly investigate
this shooting and none of the crimesthat McElroy committed. Why you know,
how about the family whose dogs hekilled and the same family who you know
he burned down two of their houses. Also he could rape their child?
(25:04):
Like fuck this nonsense, truly.Trina McElroy accused Skidmore Residence of turning her
husband into a escapegoat, which isI want to say hilarious, but it's
not. You know, this manwas a violent criminal and had physically assault,
assaulted, shot, or threatened tokill most of the people in town,
not to mention he'd been raping andgrooming Trina. She said, this
(25:29):
is so sad. She said thathe was a good hearted person, that
he'd help anyone that needed to behelped. Do you mean by shooting them
in the neck or stalking them?Uh? Yeah. And he'd also groomed
you as a child, Trina,she's dead now and burned your family's house
down twice. You know, Ican't be upset with her. She was
abused by him and beaten down.And you know, if he treated total
(25:49):
strangers like like he did, Ican only imagine what he was doing to
her. Yeah, I don't wantto imagine, but just for what he
did to her, I feel goodabout somebody shooting him because truly the stuff
of nightmares. So yeah, youcould talk to anybody in this case and
(26:10):
they'd give you a different answer,apparently, and no one really knows that
the question's going to be answered ofwho killed McElroy. Richard McFadden, the
lawyer who represented McElroy in numerous cases, said he believed there was enough evidence
for a prosecution. Well maybe youshould become a prosecutor then, asshole.
(26:30):
I'm assuming he's also dead, butcome at me. He believes one of
the gunmen was the suspect named bythe widow. He said the town got
away with murder, and your clientgot away with a lot more. So
go ahead and sit the hell down, sir, wherever you are in a
hell dimension. Probably the police chiefwho oversaw the investigation. Hal Riddle disagrees.
(26:52):
He said that Da Baird pushed aggressivelyto bring a case to trial,
but that investigators were never able tosecure an enough evidence to charge someone with
a crime. How would they Noone saw anything. Mister Riddle said that
if we could have proved who doneit, these are his words, he
would have prosecuted him. That I'msorry Hal Riddle, that sentence didn't make
(27:15):
any sense, but he also describedthe case as the most frustrating of his
career. Yeah, you got alot of people standing around. Somebody knows
who shot him. Nobody's telling.The last three to four decades have been
tough on the agricultural community of onlythree hundred and forty two people that is
about an hour and a half northof Kansas City. Like so many other
(27:36):
small towns, Skidmore has shrunk insideitself, watching businesses, clothes, and
residents depart. Somehow, the town'sshare of tragedy has only grown. Road
signs bear a picture of a youngman who disappeared years ago and is feared
dead. A memorial in the tinydowntown park displays the name of an expectant
(27:59):
mother who was murdered, her fetuscut from her womb. Even with these
raw wounds, the memory of thenightmare surrounding ken Rex McElroy during his years
of if you want to call it, trouble making and after a killing that
many feel was forced by an impotentcriminal justice system, continues to loom over
(28:19):
the tiny town. As his longtenure came to an end. Questions about
the lack of resolution in the murdercase, perhaps the most infamous in the
area since Jesse James was shot nearbya century before, continued to follow Da
Baird. He was charged with waitingthrough the sensational details and moral ambiguities of
(28:41):
the case to ensure that, inhis words, justice was served. But
justice is really a loaded term ina case that challenges the typical assumptions of
victim and perpetrator, and Da Baird, all these years later, is still
unwilling to give his own view onwhether justice was served, even though or
(29:02):
because the killer was never tried.McElroy has been dead for more than four
decades now, a round number thathas residents bracing for the next round of
visits by reporters. You know,anytime an anniversary comes up. The bar
that provided the backdrop for the shootingclosed and sold for something like twenty thousand
dollars. The man identified by thewidow as the main gunman died in the
(29:25):
last decade, something that Die Bairdraised in suggesting that the case may never
be reopened. Yeah, this isa long time ago. People probably died.
Baird did lose the election the followingcycle and blamed McElroy's case for his
loss. His successor decided not topursue the case any further, so I
(29:45):
think we know how his successor feelsabout that. As of twenty twenty four,
many of the main players in McElroy'sstory have died, including McFadden,
Trina McElroy, Bowen Camp, andthe rancher accused of pulling the trigger.
Veteran Kansas City criminal defense attorney J. R. Hobbes said that theoretically the
murder could be reinvestigated, but unlessa very credible witness came forward, it's
(30:10):
not likely to happen. You couldtalk to everybody in this case and they'd
give you a different answer. I'mnever going to answer that question. It's
never going to happen. I thinkso too. Speaking about the incident decades
after it occurred, retired Missouri HighwayPatrol trooper Richard Stratton said he understood why
the people of Skidmore felt they neededto take matters into their own hands.
(30:32):
He said, those were fathers andgrandfathers on the street in Skidmore that day,
ordinary hardworking people. They did whatthey did because we didn't do our
job. Then they went home andkept their mouths shut and kept them closed
all these years. There wasn't muchDavid Baird could do about that. Whoo,
So what do you think happened here? Well? I think someone shot
(30:55):
ken Rex McElroy. That's what happened. And I am not going to speculate
on how specific or who specifically landedthe fatal shot, but clearly someone in
that crowd. Did you know?Snitches get stitches, like I always say,
And if I had witnessed anything thatday, I would have kept my
mouth shut too. Again, Idon't condone murder or killing someone, but
really this was a town wide caseof self defense. I don't think I've
(31:19):
ever seen anything like this before McElroyhad attempted to murder several people, was
stalking anyone who pissed him off ordid anything he didn't like. And because
his attorney found people who were willingto commit perjury on the stand to give
his client an alibi, dude justkept walking free, like he had so
many freaking children that he was nottaken care of. He groomed and raped
(31:41):
at least one child for certain,who knows how many more. He stalked
anyone who looked at him wrong,threatened their lives. He burned down not
one, but two houses owned bythe family of a child that he was
raping so that he could marry herand not be convicted of statutory rape.
I mean, come on, ifanyone had it coming, ken Rex,
McElroy did. And I'm all forthe justice system doing what it's supposed to
(32:02):
do, the police doing what they'resupposed to do. But in the case
of McElroy, the system failed andthe police failed, and they admitted as
much. They said they understood.It's like, you know that you have
the power to arrest him and jailhim for the rest of your life if
you want to. He pulled agun on a cop like many times,
(32:23):
you cannot do that. I thinkwe all know you cannot do that.
You can't do it. You know, there's a reason that no one,
not a single soul, has comeforward in the more than forty years since
his death to name his killer.And that's because he had it coming.
If somebody felt bad about what happened, they would have come forward, but
(32:45):
nobody did. You know, ifthere was ever a case for Dexter to
take on like this would really beit. This is like a Freddy Krueger
scenario to me, the parents ofthe town banding together to kill the child
rapist and murderer because he keeps slippingthrough the cracks. That's exactly what it
sounds like to me. I wonderif I know what a Nightmare on Elm
(33:07):
Street was based on, and I'vealready done an episode on that, the
Cambodian Sleep Deaths. But I dowonder if the inspiration for the like the
character of Freddy Krueger and the towncoming together and killing him in a vigilante
style murder. I wonder if thatif ken Rex McElroy's case in the town
of Skidmore had any inspiration there.I didn't see that anywhere when I researched
(33:30):
that case. But it's very,very, very similar to me, you
know, like, really, thetown gave the police and the justice system
so many opportunities to do their jobs, to do the right thing, to
get this man off the street,for the love of God. Like they
were desperate. They were being threatened, stalked, shot raped, yikes.
(33:52):
Like, you know, they didwhat they had to do. You can
argue with me on the morality ofthis all day long, but what about
the morality of the hand acts committedby McElroy and his willingness to just lie
in open court to me? Theycancel each other out. You know,
I don't need to be lectured aboutthe law either. I know the law.
I also know that the legal systemfails us often, which is why
(34:13):
I don't practice it anymore. Iwon't. I'm not going to get into
that. But if you know whokilled Ken Rex McElroy, don't tell me.
Just keep that to yourself. I'msure a lot of people know who
the trigger person was, but they'renot talking, and they probably were considered
a town hero from then on out. You know, it is a strange
thing to sit and talk about likeE like me being I don't know,
(34:35):
like feeling indifferent. I feel likeI should feel bad. It's what I'm
trying to articulate. I feel likeI should feel bad that someone killed this
guy. I just don't would I'vekilled him if I had to? Sure,
would I have vigilante mob style huntedhim down? I don't know,
you know, shit gets crazy mobmentality all that. If I had been
(34:57):
in the crowd and seen who killedhim, wouldn't have said a word.
I mean also, like me beinga woman in the town, I probably
wouldn't have been allowed in the mob, and he would have probably already,
you know, tried to do somethingto me or somebody in my family.
If he was as disgusting as youknow he was, and we know he
was not, we know he was, but the townspeople said he was.
(35:21):
And that poor poor girl that heI don't even I don't even want to
get into that. That's awful.It's kind of reminding me of what I
watched last night, the movie Priscilla, about you know, Elvis dating a
fourteen year old Priscilla and pursuing herwhen she was fourteen and having her move
in with him when she was extremelyyoung, like fifteen or sixteen something like
(35:45):
that, and grooming her to beexactly what he wanted and changing her appearance
and the way she acted and notletting her leave Graceland and all that.
That movie pissed me off, Ohseverely. I already knew that he did
that, But I'm just like,why is no one saying, like,
why is no one condemning that,the fact that he started dating a fourteen
(36:06):
year old girl when he was inhis mid twenties and his serviceman in the
United States Army and living in Germany, Why did no one condemn that?
I'm very confused on that. Whyis that okay because he's famous? No,
Like, the law is the law, that's what that's my practicing.
(36:27):
Law is difficult for me because it'sopen to laws, open to interpretation,
and it's also not when someone isa child, they cannot consent. And
I'm not saying they had sex.I don't know if they did or not
when she was that age, buthe moved she moved in with him.
I'm not going to go down thisElvis and Priscilla rabbit hole, but you
know she moved in with him.Yeah, her parents letter. They did
(36:50):
not, I believe, sign anylegal documentation for that to happen. They
just allowed it, which is no. You know, she was in Germany
and he was in the United States, and all all they have to do
is just say no and not lether go move in with a full grown
adult man with a lot of moneyand a lot of power. And then
(37:12):
she, of course, you know, was just groomed to be whatever the
hell he wanted. I'm not sayingthat Elvis was on the same level as
this. What I'm guessing is sociopathor psychopath ken Rex McElroy. I'm not
a doctor. I'm not here todiagnose them. And also he's dead so
I don't have to. But hewas just a disgusting, disgusting human being.
(37:36):
He committed many many crimes, andwe can say alleged there were not
they're only allegations because he wasn't convictedfor them. And again he's not gonna
assume me because his lawyer's dead andso is he. So I mean,
if his estate wants to come,I guess, go ahead. I don't
have a lot of money, sogood luck collecting assholes. And also like
(38:01):
go fuck yourselves. This is anold ass case, and I feel like
other podcasts have covered it and probablysaid the same thing. I know of
at least one other like a longtime ago, that covered it, and
I'm pretty sure they said the samething. But the fact that he committed
crimes, so many people, youknow, came forward and said, this
man committed crimes against you know,civilians, against cops, against elderly people
(38:24):
and children, and nothing happened tohim. And then the town was just
like, we've had enough. Wejust we had a town hall meeting.
It's so bad that we had tohave a town hall meeting about how to
protect ourselves from this man because thecourts and the police won't. And then
the police, the sheriff, hisgrand plan is like, okay, well,
(38:46):
don't go confront him. You shouldjust start a neighborhood watch. It's
like, and then do what whatdo we do when we start a neighborhood
watch and he shows up with thegun and shoots us like he does everybody
else. He's already shot two peoplethat we know of in town, just
for slightly inconvenience him. Why wouldn'the do the same to them? What
good does a neighborhood. Watch dowhen the dude shows up with a gun
and kills people, you know whatI mean? And then if someone shot
(39:09):
him and killed him or didn't killhim, meaning McElroy, he would lie
if he lived on stand and saythat this person was the aggressor and that
they shot him and it was notself defense, that they were attempting to
murder him. And that's how thatwould have gone, and he probably would
have gotten out of that too.All right, Well, we don't have
(39:30):
to speculate, because you know hefaced the ultimate justice and that's that.
I hope you didn't take offense tothis episode of me saying I think it's
okay if a pedophile is killed,because I'm always I'm always okay with a
pedophile dying. I'm cool with that. If you got a problem with a
pedophile dying, uh, you shouldtell me. We should talk about that
(39:53):
about you having a problem or havingno problem with a pedophile not being on
this earth anymore. They should allgo away, and I don't care how
that happens, but they should notbe allowed to live amongst other human beings.
All right. That was a sortof a heavy episode, got heavier
than I thought it was gonna getyou know, got a little fired up,
(40:13):
came in hot. If you likewhat you hear, you can hear
more episodes every Tuesday and Friday,released on all podcast platforms. On social
media, you can find me onInstagram at Autumn Podcast, Facebook at Autumnsodities,
Patreon at Autumnsodities, what else exTwitter at autumnzod Pod, TikTok at
autumns Ooditis Podcast. And that ishopefully all the places. I pray that
(40:37):
no more social media platforms are invented, because who in the hell has the
time to keep up with all ofthese? It's so many things. As
always, I appreciate you listening andcould be cold
Dark Cast Network. Welcome to thedark Side of podcasting. Hey, hey,
welcome back to Autumn's odd Ease.I'm Autumn. Got a small bit
of business up top. I'd liketo ask you to please rate and review
this podcast wherever you listen. Idon't have like a ton I don't even
(00:53):
think I've cracked like a hundred reviewsor ratings on iTunes or whatever the hell
it is Apple Podcasts, so thatwould be a great treat for me.
And if you are a Patreon familymember, I'm working on getting an exclusive
episode recorded this week, just tryingto narrow it down. I've got quite
a few, several many outlines going. That is all the business that I
(01:18):
have on the docket. Let's getinto today's case. Retribution came slowly for
Skidmore and Missouri's town scourge ken RexMcElroy. After committing a string of minor
to heinous crimes and never facing consequences, the townspeople took justice into their own
hands. As McElroy set in histruck in full view of more than thirty
(01:41):
people, multiple gunshots rang out,and the town bully was gone. The
killing was a shocking end for anotoriously brutal man who had terrorized the area
for years with seeming impunity from thelaw, that is, until he was
struck down in a moment of vigilantejustice. It was also the first major
case for a young county prosecutor,not far removed from law school and just
(02:05):
months into the job, who saidhe was confident that the case would be
solved soon, but the silence ofthe towns people held, and more than
forty years later, Prosecutor David A. Baird left office with his first and
most famous case still unsolved. Noone has ever been brought to trial in
mister McElroy's I don't know how yousay his name, and I don't really
(02:28):
care Micelroy McElroy's death, And althoughthere is no statute of limitations for murder,
most people around the town suspect thatno one ever will be charged.
Ken Rex McElroy was born. I'mgonna go with Micelroy McElroy was born in
nineteen thirty four, one of sixteenchildren. Author Harry McLain explains in his
(02:50):
book In Broad Daylight, which Iused for research in this case. His
father was a tenant farmer, hismother was a housewife. Obviously, overwhelmed
with the feeding and the caring forof sixteen freaking children. His parents,
Tony and Mabel, moved around betweenKansas and the Ozarks before finally settling outside
(03:10):
of Skidmore. There obviously was notmuch parental supervision. I don't know how
there could be with sixteen kids,but McElroy had a knack for taking care
of himself. He never finished highschool, but he apparently knew how to
hunt, drive fast, and navigatethe back roads of Nodaway County by his
early teens. McElroy dropped out ofschool at age fifteen in the eighth grade.
(03:35):
That ain't lining up. I'm guessinghe was held back, which is
not surprising, and he quickly establisheda reputation as a local cattle wrestler,
small time thief and womanizer, andjust all around scumbag. Described as charismatic,
I don't know how. With jetblack hair and piercing eyes, McElroy
could sweet talk his way around womenand had been married three times by his
(03:59):
early four To that end, McElroyfathered more than ten children with several different
women. He met his last wife, Patrina McLeod, when she was twelve
years old, and in eighth gradeand he was thirty five, and he
raped her repeatedly. McLeod's parents,Trina McLeod, They initially opposed the relationship,
(04:24):
you know, because their child wastwelve years old, but after McElroy
burned down their house and shot theirdog, they seemed to have no choice
but to allow the marriage. Ifyou're wondering, like, you know,
oh, why is she being socallous? She said, this man is
dead. Why is she saying shedoesn't care how she pronounces his name?
This is why. Yeah, hewas raping a twelve year old girl.
(04:47):
And because her parents were like,no, you cannot come near our daughter,
he burned down their house and hekilled their dog. Yeah, so
Trina became pregnant when she just fourteen, and she dropped out of school in
the ninth grade to go and livewith McElroy. And get this, his
(05:08):
second wife, Alice McElroy devoced,divorced Alice and married Trina, not because
he loved her, but in orderto escape charges of statutory rape, to
which she was the only witness.Sixteen days after Trina gave birth, she
and Alice fled to Trina's parents' house. So the current wife that she moved
(05:31):
the head when she moved in thepregnant fourteen year old that he's with and
marrying to avoid statutory rape charges.Those women or one as a girl.
One is a woman run away tohide at Trina's parents' house, and according
to court records, McElroy tracked themdown and brought them back to his home.
(05:54):
When Trina's parents were away, McElroywent to their home where he once
again burned down the house and shotfrom the Cloud family's new dog. So
not only he did this not once, but twice based Yeah, I have
no hard time getting these sentences out, you know, because of the rage
(06:15):
based on Trina's version of events.McElroy was indicted in June of nineteen seventy
three for arson, assault and statutoryrape. You would think he would go
to jail for a long time,right, So he was arrested, booked,
arraigned, and then released on twentyfive hundred dollars bail. Yeah.
Trina and her baby were placed infoster care at a home in Maryville,
(06:38):
Missouri, you know, because she'sfourteen. McElroy apparently wasn't having that,
and he sat outside the foster homefor hours just staring at it, and
he told the Foster family that Trinawas living with that he would trade quote
girl for girl to get his childback, since he knew where the Foster's
family's biological daughter went to school andwhat bus route she wrote, so he
(07:01):
was threatening to kidnap their biological daughterin order to get Trina and his child
back. For more than two decades, McElroy was suspected of being involved in
the theft of grain, gasoline,alcohol, antiques, and livestock, but
he avoided conviction when charges were broughtagainst him twenty one times, often after
(07:26):
witnesses refused to testify because he allegedlyintimidate them. I don't think that's an
allegation. I'll say it's not.It's alleged because he wasn't convicted of it.
But he's dead, so who's comingafter me. I'm sure he did
intimidate them, and he apparently didthis pretty frequently. He would follow his
targets or park outside their homes andwatch them, and it wasn't just like
(07:46):
a one time thing. I'm gonnaget a little more into some of these
incidents. Police had charged him withvarious alleged crimes. You know, from
the hog stealing to assault, butnothing stuck. And I'm sure you're like,
what the fuck is happening? Heburned down a family's house two times,
he killed two of their dogs,he raped their twelve year old,
and now he's stalking the Foster family, who has no vault or part in
(08:09):
this really whatsoever other than they tookin a girl and her freaking baby.
Okay. So one reason that McElroyseemed to never get a charge, or
he got charged, but he neverseemed to get a conviction was that he
had a really skilled defense attorney namedRichard Jen McFadden, and he apparently just
(08:31):
ran circles around inexperienced prosecutors, ofwhich you know, like I just told
you the town of Skidmore had aprosecutor who had just come out of law
school. So yes, inexperienced ascompared to a skilled defense attorney. Another
was McElroy's intimidation tactics. Once afarmer who caught Ken red handed stealing two
(08:52):
horses filed charges but withdrew them afterMcElroy smashed him across the face with a
rifle. Yeah, I would say, so it wasn't just you know,
regular people in town who felt thewrath of McElroy. It was also the
police. One night, after hepulled a speeding pickup truck over, an
(09:13):
officer named Boyer came face to facewith the town scourge. He said that
he had his service weapon drawn andthat he wouldn't have been the least bit
surprised if you know, ken RexMcElroy tried to do something. He said
that his eyes just really put youin self defense mode, that he looked
like a mean person, and thatyou know, he looked like a person
who should be afraid of a fewdays later, a pickup truck showed up
(09:35):
in the wee hours outside Boyer's remotecountry home. It cruised up the street,
came back, and then just kindof sat there for twenty thirty seconds.
Boyer said that he couldn't prove itwas McElroy, but waited behind a
tree with his shotgun just in case. On July twenty seventh, nineteen seventy
six, Skidmore farmer Romain Henry saidMcElroy shot him twice, once in the
(10:00):
stomach with a shotgun after Henry confrontedhim for shooting weapons on Henry's property.
He's like you're shooting weapons on myproperty. Please don't do that. Please
go away, which is a reasonableask. You know he's trapped. McElroy
was trespassing and for shooting this manon his own property. McElroy was only
charged with assault with intent to kill. How about attempted murder. McElroy denied
(10:26):
that he was even at the scene. He's like, I don't know anything
about that shooting. I've never seenthis man before in my life. And
as the case dragged on without acourt date, Henry said McElroy had also
parked outside his home at least onehundred times. At the trial, McFadden,
his attorney, produced two supposed witnessesto alibi McElroy. They were two
(10:48):
raccoon hunters that testified that they hadbeen with him the day of the shooting
and that they all three were nowherenear Henry's property. Also, Henry was
forced to admit in court, underquestion by McFadden the attorney, that he
had concealed his own petty criminal convictionfor more than thirty years previous. And
I don't really know what that hasto do with someone trespassing on his property
(11:09):
and then shooting him, but Iguess that McFadden was able to cast enough
doubt on Henry's credibility and McElroy wasacquitted. The fuck Really, As author
Harry McLain later wrote in his bookon McElroy's story, the most baffling component
of the whole thing was that thisman did not have a bank account,
(11:31):
he did not have a social Securitynumber, and he could not read.
So how did this uneducated person cawwas he able to outwit the criminal justice
system for twenty years? Well,again, I believe it was attorney McFadden's
doing. And this man had tosay of McFadden had this to say McElroy,
He said he was his best client. He paid him in cash and
(11:54):
said do whatever you have to doto keep me out of jail. So
that shows you the scruples and ethicsof the attorney. He's the kind of
attorney who gives attorneys a bad name. Yes, is everyone entitled to a
defense, certainly they are, butit becomes an ethical It really is a
gray area. It's an ethical grayarea where you know that this man is
(12:16):
committing these crimes, that he's rampingup, that he's gonna eventually kill someone,
but you just keep aiding him andalso finding people who will perjure themselves
in order to aliby your client.So in nineteen eighty, after a misunderstanding
about a candy purchase from a Skidmoregrocery store that involved one of McElroy's daughters
(12:39):
because remember he has ten, notdaughters but kids, McElroy shot popular owner
Bo Bowen Camp in the neck.So he's going to jail, right.
Let's see. In the inciting incident, one of McElroy's children got into an
argument with the clerk, Evelyn Summyat the store owned by seventy year old
seventy year old Bowen Camp, allegedlybecause the try the child tried to steal
(13:03):
candy, something kids do. McElroybegan stalking the Bowen Camp family and eventually
threatened Bobo and Camp in the backof his store with a shotgun in hand.
In the ensuing confrontation, you know, again he's showing up to someone's
property armed and being the aggressor,but then later claiming I wasn't there or
(13:26):
I was defending myself, and McElroyin that instance shot Bowen Camp in the
neck. You know, when heshows up to the store holding a gun
and the man, I'm sure talksback to him like he has every right
to do. When the call wentout, State Police Corporal Richard Stratton was
ready. Stratton knew McElroy from aprevious stop when he threatened the trooper with
(13:46):
a shotgun. Why was that mannot jailed right then? Anticipating McElroy's typical
nonsense, Stratton waited on a backroad near the Kansas border. His hunch
paid off, and McElroy found himselfhandcuffed and charged with assault again assault.
How you shot someone in the neck? You walked onto their property and shot
(14:09):
them in the neck. Good God. Shortly after, Stratton's wife, Margaret
so the police corporal's wife, Margaretwas headed to church when she saw a
strange truck in the driveway. Itwas a man, and it turned out
to be McElroy, who pointed ashotgun at her. She said she didn't
(14:31):
know what to do. She justgot in the car and was shaking terribly,
but she gathered her strength and threwthe car in reverse. And I
would have done the same thing ifhe was blocking my car, I would
have just gunned it reversed. I'dbe like, I don't care, I
don't care if I ruined this car. I don't care if I total it
my own and his. I'm gettingout of here. McElroy began backing out
too, then tailed Margaret until sheradioed her husband and squad cars showed up.
(14:56):
Yeah, so she was seventy eightat the time. He was doing
this to a seventy eight year old. Well, he's a tough guy,
right first, A seventy year old, A seventy eight year old. It's
always like older or a younger people, never anyone who physically could take him
on. And she said that shebelieved he treated the entire town of Skidmore
that way. She said that shedidn't feel brave, you know, standing
(15:18):
up to him, but it gotto the point that it made her mad.
She was just sick and tired ofthe shit, and good on her
bowen camp. The store owners survivedthe shooting, and McElroy was arrested and
charged with attempted murder. I'm guessingthe charge got bumped up once the details
of you know, the whole incident. He shot a man in the neck,
(15:41):
you know, when all that cameout. Meanwhile, tensions in Skidmore
swored as McElroy's trial neared. Inthe meantime, though, McElroy, instead
of, you know, staying outof trouble, he decided to stalk the
bowen Camp family and just sat outsideof their house day and night leading up
to the trial, and Bowen Camp'sdaughter, Cheryl Brown gave her account of
that time. She said the townwould just empty out every time McElroy came
(16:06):
into it. Everyone was so uncomfortableand afraid of him. In court,
Bowencamp testified about how McElroy confronted himin the loading dock of the grocery store
while he was cutting up boxes andjust shot him in the neck. Then
McElroy, described by veteran journalist PhilConger as quote a big brute of a
guy with slicked back elvis like hair, took the stand. Why in God's
(16:29):
name, anyone, any attorney wouldlet this man take the stand in his
own defense is beyond me. That'swhere it begins to become an ethical because
his attorney full well knew that hewas lying. He knew he was lying,
and he knew that his client waswilling to go on stand and commit
perjury, which he did. Sohe testified that bowen Camp attacked him with
(16:51):
the knife and that he acted inself defense. Well, it's not self
defense. You came into this man'sgrocery store that he owns with a weapon,
so you are the aggressor. Hedefended himself and then you shot him.
Yeah, that's not how self defenseworks. It would be self defense
if you walked back unarmed to theloading dock started talking to him calmly.
(17:12):
He attacks you with a knife,and then you find some sort of weapon
and defend yourself with it. Butthe fact that you brought a shotgun into
the store lends itself to premeditation,and if he had died, it would
have been murder, not self defense. Apparently, his lawyer cast enough doubt
yet again, and the verdict wassecond degree assault for attempted murder. McElroy
(17:38):
would only face two years in prison. The breaking point for Skidmore seemed to
be when McElroy was freed on bailpending his appeal. Immediately after being released
at a post trial hearing, McElroywent to the d Andng Tavern, a
local bar, with an m oneGarrand rifle and a bayonet attached, and
(18:00):
went ahead and made graphic threats aboutwhat he would do to Bobo and Camp.
This led to several patrons deciding,like, let's just see what we
can legally do to prevent ken RexMcElroy from harming anyone else because nobody's protecting
them, they're clearly on their own. McElroy's appeal hearing was delayed several times,
and the tension finally reached a breakingpoint. On the morning of July
(18:25):
tenth, nineteen eighty one, agroup of frustrated townspeople met at the Legion
Hall in the center of town withNoraway County Sheriff Dan Estes, you know,
to just try and figure out howcan we protect ourselves since you assholes
won't do it. During the meeting, McElroy showed up at the D ANDNG
tavern yet again with Trina. Ashe sat drinking at the bar, word
(18:45):
got back to the men at theLegion Hall that he was in town.
Sheriff Estes instructed the group not toget into a direct confrontation with McElroy,
but instead that they should seriously considerforming a neighborhood watch program, and then
Estes went ahead and drove out oftown in his police cruiser. Wow,
thanks for nothing, officer. Ilove how the police were like, we
(19:08):
can't make the charge of stick,so there's nothing we can do. Did
he not pull guns on police officers? Call me crazy, but I don't
think you're allowed to do that.I'm pretty sure it's a crime with a
stiff penalty. And if he hadbeen a black man, he would have
been shot in the head, ora woman or anybody else. Just the
fact that he was a white dudeback then, he just kept getting away
with the shit, likely realizing thatthey were going to have to take matters
(19:32):
into their own hands, since McElroynever faced a consequence really in his twenty
years of criminal activity. Citizens atthe meeting decided to go to the tavern,
and soon the bar was filled withangry patrons. After McElroy finished his
drinks, he purchased a six packof beer, left the bar and got
into his pickup truck, where Trinawas waiting. I'm assuming he didn't allow
(19:55):
her to go into the bar.What is she at this point, like
fifteen? I don't even think shecan go into a bar. The crowd
migrated to the parking lot, andwhile sitting in his truck, McElroy was
shot at several times, but hitonly twice, once by a center fire
rifle and once by a twenty tworimmed fire rifle. In the crowd of
roughly forty six potential witnesses, itwas impossible to say who had shot McElroy.
(20:21):
Was it impossible? He was struckby two different firearms and bled out
behind the wheel of his truck.No one called an ambulance. I'm not
surprised. Only Trina, who hadbeen in the truck when he was shot,
claimed to be able to identify agunman. Every other witness was either
unable to name an assailant or claimednot to have seen who fired the fatal
(20:41):
shots. Within hours, District AttorneyBaird heard that there had been a shooting
downtown. He didn't even think aboutit. He's like, I'm sure it
was McElroy who'd done the shooting,you know, because why wouldn't it be.
And he's going to not catch acharge yet again. It was hours
before he learned that it was misterMcElroy who had been shot. Bullet casings
(21:03):
from two guns were found, andagain upwards of thirty people were reported to
have been at the scene, butnot one of them could or would say
who had wielded the weapons. OfficerBoyer was out showing a trainee the ropes
when he got the call of ashooting in Skidmore. When he arrived,
he found a pretty maccob scene.McElroy's rear window was shot out and the
(21:26):
front window was as well, andpart of his teeth were lying on the
dashboard. Trina McElroy identified a localrancher as one of the gunmen, but
he denied the claim. And Iwould have too. I'd been like,
never been there, never seen himbefore in my life. I don't know
what you're talking about. Here's eightguys who will say I was somewhere else,
entirely on the stand, they'll commitperjury. Why not? Shockingly,
(21:48):
only Trina claimed to know who shotMcElroy. The local Major Cases Squad investigated,
then the Federal Bureau of Investigation.Three grand jury heard evidence, but
even after a federal prosecutor forded tomister Baird what he called substantial new evidence,
no one was indicted. Instead ofplaying out in court, the details
(22:11):
emerged in newspaper and magazine accounts,as well as a best selling book in
Broad Daylight, A Murder in Skidmore, Missouri, which was later made into
a television movie. The DA declinedto press charges, and that extensive federal
investigation also did not lead to anycharges. Missouri based journalist Steve Booher described
(22:32):
the attitude of some townspeople as quote, he needed killing. And you know,
I don't condone murder, but Iwill make an exception in this case.
This man was disgusting. He wasa pedophile, and that's enough for
me wipe him off the face ofthe earth. Pedophile, rapist, arsonist,
and an all around nightmare who threatenedpeople's lives every chance he got and
(22:53):
just shot people willy nilly, andluckily they didn't die. And even if
they had died, he would commitperjury on that stand constantly and say people
were attacking him, or they werethe aggressor, or he was defending himself
with no one to cast any aspersionson that, Like there wasn't surveillance,
the victim would have been dead.How you know, there are two people
(23:14):
who know what happened, and hewas lying and saying no, that didn't
happen. So you know, thetestimony of any witnesses and his testimony cancels
out. If he's willing to commitperjury. Although there were many witnesses at
the scene of McElroy's murder, noone talked. It seemed as though the
entire town had collectively decided that they'dhad enough and were willing to turn in
(23:36):
the person or persons who pulled inthe trigger. They were not willing to
do it. They were just like, I didn't see a damn thing.
Once the shroud of silence fell,there was going to be no one talking,
said Cheryl Huston. And if youremember, her elderly father had been
shot in the neck by McElroy.Uh and she also had seen the killing
(23:56):
of mister McElroy from her family's grocerystore. But like the others, she
said, she did not see thegunman. She said that they could have
pushed and dug, pushed and dugand gotten nothing, meaning she knows.
Ain't nobody talking there. She said, we were so bitter and so angry
at the law letting us down thatit came to somebody taking matters into their
own hands. No one has anyidea what a nightmare we lived for some
(24:21):
residents, resentment against McElroy was projectedonto the police, and yeah, kind
of should have been Officer Boyer wastaking trajectory measurements at the crime scene when
a town official scolded him. He'slike, why are you here, what
are you doing? Why are youeven investigating this? Like you know how
he threatened all of us, andhow dangerous he was and how many crimes
(24:41):
he committed and just kept getting awaywith. He's like, I don't believe
that you're coming now, you know, after we needed your help for all
this time and for real though,Like why are you going to thoroughly investigate
this shooting and none of the crimesthat McElroy committed. Why you know,
how about the family whose dogs hekilled and the same family who you know
he burned down two of their houses. Also he could rape their child?
(25:04):
Like fuck this nonsense, truly.Trina McElroy accused Skidmore Residence of turning her
husband into a escapegoat, which isI want to say hilarious, but it's
not. You know, this manwas a violent criminal and had physically assault,
assaulted, shot, or threatened tokill most of the people in town,
not to mention he'd been raping andgrooming Trina. She said, this
(25:29):
is so sad. She said thathe was a good hearted person, that
he'd help anyone that needed to behelped. Do you mean by shooting them
in the neck or stalking them?Uh? Yeah. And he'd also groomed
you as a child, Trina,she's dead now and burned your family's house
down twice. You know, Ican't be upset with her. She was
abused by him and beaten down.And you know, if he treated total
(25:49):
strangers like like he did, Ican only imagine what he was doing to
her. Yeah, I don't wantto imagine, but just for what he
did to her, I feel goodabout somebody shooting him because truly the stuff
of nightmares. So yeah, youcould talk to anybody in this case and
(26:10):
they'd give you a different answer,apparently, and no one really knows that
the question's going to be answered ofwho killed McElroy. Richard McFadden, the
lawyer who represented McElroy in numerous cases, said he believed there was enough evidence
for a prosecution. Well maybe youshould become a prosecutor then, asshole.
(26:30):
I'm assuming he's also dead, butcome at me. He believes one of
the gunmen was the suspect named bythe widow. He said the town got
away with murder, and your clientgot away with a lot more. So
go ahead and sit the hell down, sir, wherever you are in a
hell dimension. Probably the police chiefwho oversaw the investigation. Hal Riddle disagrees.
(26:52):
He said that Da Baird pushed aggressivelyto bring a case to trial,
but that investigators were never able tosecure an enough evidence to charge someone with
a crime. How would they Noone saw anything. Mister Riddle said that
if we could have proved who doneit, these are his words, he
would have prosecuted him. That I'msorry Hal Riddle, that sentence didn't make
(27:15):
any sense, but he also describedthe case as the most frustrating of his
career. Yeah, you got alot of people standing around. Somebody knows
who shot him. Nobody's telling.The last three to four decades have been
tough on the agricultural community of onlythree hundred and forty two people that is
about an hour and a half northof Kansas City. Like so many other
(27:36):
small towns, Skidmore has shrunk insideitself, watching businesses, clothes, and
residents depart. Somehow, the town'sshare of tragedy has only grown. Road
signs bear a picture of a youngman who disappeared years ago and is feared
dead. A memorial in the tinydowntown park displays the name of an expectant
(27:59):
mother who was murdered, her fetuscut from her womb. Even with these
raw wounds, the memory of thenightmare surrounding ken Rex McElroy during his years
of if you want to call it, trouble making and after a killing that
many feel was forced by an impotentcriminal justice system, continues to loom over
(28:19):
the tiny town. As his longtenure came to an end. Questions about
the lack of resolution in the murdercase, perhaps the most infamous in the
area since Jesse James was shot nearbya century before, continued to follow Da
Baird. He was charged with waitingthrough the sensational details and moral ambiguities of
(28:41):
the case to ensure that, inhis words, justice was served. But
justice is really a loaded term ina case that challenges the typical assumptions of
victim and perpetrator, and Da Baird, all these years later, is still
unwilling to give his own view onwhether justice was served, even though or
(29:02):
because the killer was never tried.McElroy has been dead for more than four
decades now, a round number thathas residents bracing for the next round of
visits by reporters. You know,anytime an anniversary comes up. The bar
that provided the backdrop for the shootingclosed and sold for something like twenty thousand
dollars. The man identified by thewidow as the main gunman died in the
(29:25):
last decade, something that Die Bairdraised in suggesting that the case may never
be reopened. Yeah, this isa long time ago. People probably died.
Baird did lose the election the followingcycle and blamed McElroy's case for his
loss. His successor decided not topursue the case any further, so I
(29:45):
think we know how his successor feelsabout that. As of twenty twenty four,
many of the main players in McElroy'sstory have died, including McFadden,
Trina McElroy, Bowen Camp, andthe rancher accused of pulling the trigger.
Veteran Kansas City criminal defense attorney J. R. Hobbes said that theoretically the
murder could be reinvestigated, but unlessa very credible witness came forward, it's
(30:10):
not likely to happen. You couldtalk to everybody in this case and they'd
give you a different answer. I'mnever going to answer that question. It's
never going to happen. I thinkso too. Speaking about the incident decades
after it occurred, retired Missouri HighwayPatrol trooper Richard Stratton said he understood why
the people of Skidmore felt they neededto take matters into their own hands.
(30:32):
He said, those were fathers andgrandfathers on the street in Skidmore that day,
ordinary hardworking people. They did whatthey did because we didn't do our
job. Then they went home andkept their mouths shut and kept them closed
all these years. There wasn't muchDavid Baird could do about that. Whoo,
So what do you think happened here? Well? I think someone shot
(30:55):
ken Rex McElroy. That's what happened. And I am not going to speculate
on how specific or who specifically landedthe fatal shot, but clearly someone in
that crowd. Did you know?Snitches get stitches, like I always say,
And if I had witnessed anything thatday, I would have kept my
mouth shut too. Again, Idon't condone murder or killing someone, but
really this was a town wide caseof self defense. I don't think I've
(31:19):
ever seen anything like this before McElroyhad attempted to murder several people, was
stalking anyone who pissed him off ordid anything he didn't like. And because
his attorney found people who were willingto commit perjury on the stand to give
his client an alibi, dude justkept walking free, like he had so
many freaking children that he was nottaken care of. He groomed and raped
(31:41):
at least one child for certain,who knows how many more. He stalked
anyone who looked at him wrong,threatened their lives. He burned down not
one, but two houses owned bythe family of a child that he was
raping so that he could marry herand not be convicted of statutory rape.
I mean, come on, ifanyone had it coming, ken Rex,
McElroy did. And I'm all forthe justice system doing what it's supposed to
(32:02):
do, the police doing what they'resupposed to do. But in the case
of McElroy, the system failed andthe police failed, and they admitted as
much. They said they understood.It's like, you know that you have
the power to arrest him and jailhim for the rest of your life if
you want to. He pulled agun on a cop like many times,
(32:23):
you cannot do that. I thinkwe all know you cannot do that.
You can't do it. You know, there's a reason that no one,
not a single soul, has comeforward in the more than forty years since
his death to name his killer.And that's because he had it coming.
If somebody felt bad about what happened, they would have come forward, but
(32:45):
nobody did. You know, ifthere was ever a case for Dexter to
take on like this would really beit. This is like a Freddy Krueger
scenario to me, the parents ofthe town banding together to kill the child
rapist and murderer because he keeps slippingthrough the cracks. That's exactly what it
sounds like to me. I wonderif I know what a Nightmare on Elm
(33:07):
Street was based on, and I'vealready done an episode on that, the
Cambodian Sleep Deaths. But I dowonder if the inspiration for the like the
character of Freddy Krueger and the towncoming together and killing him in a vigilante
style murder. I wonder if thatif ken Rex McElroy's case in the town
of Skidmore had any inspiration there.I didn't see that anywhere when I researched
(33:30):
that case. But it's very,very, very similar to me, you
know, like, really, thetown gave the police and the justice system
so many opportunities to do their jobs, to do the right thing, to
get this man off the street,for the love of God. Like they
were desperate. They were being threatened, stalked, shot raped, yikes.
(33:52):
Like, you know, they didwhat they had to do. You can
argue with me on the morality ofthis all day long, but what about
the morality of the hand acts committedby McElroy and his willingness to just lie
in open court to me? Theycancel each other out. You know,
I don't need to be lectured aboutthe law either. I know the law.
I also know that the legal systemfails us often, which is why
(34:13):
I don't practice it anymore. Iwon't. I'm not going to get into
that. But if you know whokilled Ken Rex McElroy, don't tell me.
Just keep that to yourself. I'msure a lot of people know who
the trigger person was, but they'renot talking, and they probably were considered
a town hero from then on out. You know, it is a strange
thing to sit and talk about likeE like me being I don't know,
(34:35):
like feeling indifferent. I feel likeI should feel bad. It's what I'm
trying to articulate. I feel likeI should feel bad that someone killed this
guy. I just don't would I'vekilled him if I had to? Sure,
would I have vigilante mob style huntedhim down? I don't know,
you know, shit gets crazy mobmentality all that. If I had been
(34:57):
in the crowd and seen who killedhim, wouldn't have said a word.
I mean also, like me beinga woman in the town, I probably
wouldn't have been allowed in the mob, and he would have probably already,
you know, tried to do somethingto me or somebody in my family.
If he was as disgusting as youknow he was, and we know he
was not, we know he was, but the townspeople said he was.
(35:21):
And that poor poor girl that heI don't even I don't even want to
get into that. That's awful.It's kind of reminding me of what I
watched last night, the movie Priscilla, about you know, Elvis dating a
fourteen year old Priscilla and pursuing herwhen she was fourteen and having her move
in with him when she was extremelyyoung, like fifteen or sixteen something like
(35:45):
that, and grooming her to beexactly what he wanted and changing her appearance
and the way she acted and notletting her leave Graceland and all that.
That movie pissed me off, Ohseverely. I already knew that he did
that, But I'm just like,why is no one saying, like,
why is no one condemning that,the fact that he started dating a fourteen
(36:06):
year old girl when he was inhis mid twenties and his serviceman in the
United States Army and living in Germany, Why did no one condemn that?
I'm very confused on that. Whyis that okay because he's famous? No,
Like, the law is the law, that's what that's my practicing.
(36:27):
Law is difficult for me because it'sopen to laws, open to interpretation,
and it's also not when someone isa child, they cannot consent. And
I'm not saying they had sex.I don't know if they did or not
when she was that age, buthe moved she moved in with him.
I'm not going to go down thisElvis and Priscilla rabbit hole, but you
know she moved in with him.Yeah, her parents letter. They did
(36:50):
not, I believe, sign anylegal documentation for that to happen. They
just allowed it, which is no. You know, she was in Germany
and he was in the United States, and all all they have to do
is just say no and not lether go move in with a full grown
adult man with a lot of moneyand a lot of power. And then
(37:12):
she, of course, you know, was just groomed to be whatever the
hell he wanted. I'm not sayingthat Elvis was on the same level as
this. What I'm guessing is sociopathor psychopath ken Rex McElroy. I'm not
a doctor. I'm not here todiagnose them. And also he's dead so
I don't have to. But hewas just a disgusting, disgusting human being.
(37:36):
He committed many many crimes, andwe can say alleged there were not
they're only allegations because he wasn't convictedfor them. And again he's not gonna
assume me because his lawyer's dead andso is he. So I mean,
if his estate wants to come,I guess, go ahead. I don't
have a lot of money, sogood luck collecting assholes. And also like
(38:01):
go fuck yourselves. This is anold ass case, and I feel like
other podcasts have covered it and probablysaid the same thing. I know of
at least one other like a longtime ago, that covered it, and
I'm pretty sure they said the samething. But the fact that he committed
crimes, so many people, youknow, came forward and said, this
man committed crimes against you know,civilians, against cops, against elderly people
(38:24):
and children, and nothing happened tohim. And then the town was just
like, we've had enough. Wejust we had a town hall meeting.
It's so bad that we had tohave a town hall meeting about how to
protect ourselves from this man because thecourts and the police won't. And then
the police, the sheriff, hisgrand plan is like, okay, well,
(38:46):
don't go confront him. You shouldjust start a neighborhood watch. It's
like, and then do what whatdo we do when we start a neighborhood
watch and he shows up with thegun and shoots us like he does everybody
else. He's already shot two peoplethat we know of in town, just
for slightly inconvenience him. Why wouldn'the do the same to them? What
good does a neighborhood. Watch dowhen the dude shows up with a gun
and kills people, you know whatI mean? And then if someone shot
(39:09):
him and killed him or didn't killhim, meaning McElroy, he would lie
if he lived on stand and saythat this person was the aggressor and that
they shot him and it was notself defense, that they were attempting to
murder him. And that's how thatwould have gone, and he probably would
have gotten out of that too.All right, Well, we don't have
(39:30):
to speculate, because you know hefaced the ultimate justice and that's that.
I hope you didn't take offense tothis episode of me saying I think it's
okay if a pedophile is killed,because I'm always I'm always okay with a
pedophile dying. I'm cool with that. If you got a problem with a
pedophile dying, uh, you shouldtell me. We should talk about that
(39:53):
about you having a problem or havingno problem with a pedophile not being on
this earth anymore. They should allgo away, and I don't care how
that happens, but they should notbe allowed to live amongst other human beings.
All right. That was a sortof a heavy episode, got heavier
than I thought it was gonna getyou know, got a little fired up,
(40:13):
came in hot. If you likewhat you hear, you can hear
more episodes every Tuesday and Friday,released on all podcast platforms. On social
media, you can find me onInstagram at Autumn Podcast, Facebook at Autumnsodities,
Patreon at Autumnsodities, what else exTwitter at autumnzod Pod, TikTok at
autumns Ooditis Podcast. And that ishopefully all the places. I pray that
(40:37):
no more social media platforms are invented, because who in the hell has the
time to keep up with all ofthese? It's so many things. As
always, I appreciate you listening andcould be cold
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