September 9, 2022 • 22 mins
On December 1st, 1987 Daniel Laplante broke into the Gustafson home and in a twisted tale of events murdered 31 year old Priscilla, her unborn child, and her other two children William and Abigail. Daniel had a long record of burglary and stalking. Daniel never should have been released from prison on previous charges. This case is what nightmares are made out of. Sources: https://law.justia.com/cases/massachusetts/supreme-court/volumes/416/416mass433.html https://casocriminal.org/en/weird-cases/daniel-laplante-the-man-who-lived-hidden-inside-the-victims-house/ https://m.ranker.com/list/danny-laplante-facts/laura-allan Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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(00:21):
Hello, Hello everyone, and welcomeback to Murder Squared, the true crime
podcast. I'm your host, MICHAELA. Here we talk about the solved,
the unsolved, the missing, andthe murdered. In today's case that I
high for you is one that youmay have heard of before. It does
circulate through the true crime community,and it is a scary one, to
(00:43):
say the least. I do wantto put out a trigger warning for you.
I try to do this whenever Ican remember it, and this one's
a biggie. If sexual assault orthe death of a pregnant woman is not
something that you are capable of hearing, I know that cases that involve sexual
assault and especially the death of anyonewho is carrying a child, can be
(01:07):
definitely hard to hear. So Ijust want to put that out for you
before we begin today's episode. Soif you're ready, get squared away and
let's talk murder. On December oneof nineteen eighty seven, Andrew Gustafsson came
(01:33):
at home ready to celebrate with hiswife, Priscilla and their children. So
Andrew was a lawyer and he hadjust closed a really big deal at work.
He had been excited all day longto tell Priscilla about it, and
this was a huge accomplishment for himat his firm, and he had called
her a couple times that day,and every time he tried to call,
he never got through to Priscilla,and he wanted to take her out.
(01:57):
He was calling not only to tellher about this big that had gone through,
but he wanted her to find sittersfor the kids. So he had
Abigail, who was eight, andWilliam, who was five, and then
Priscilla was carrying their third child,so really day nights weren't going to be
coming very often anymore. But whenAndrew finally makes it home after not being
(02:19):
able to get ahold of Priscilla allday, he was really happy to see
that her car was parked in thedriveway. But when he came inside,
he couldn't hear his wife or thekids moving about in the house. It
was completely silent, so Andrew calledout for his wife, but he received
no answer. He then assumed thatmaybe she was over at the neighbor's house
(02:42):
and perhaps they could get these neighborsto babysit the kids for their date.
But he called over there and Priscillawasn't there either. Andrew eventually goes upstairs
and when he gets down the hallto their bedroom and makes it inside the
room, he finds his wife layingface down. It was very clear that
she had been shot twice in theback of the head. The bodies of
(03:05):
both Abigail and William were found inopposite bathrooms, and both children had been
drowned. Police use search dogs totrack a trail that they believed to be
left by the killer. Now,the reason that they think this trail was
left by the killer was because ofa shoeprint that was found in the Gustafson's
flower bed, and this was neara window that they believed was the point
(03:28):
of entry for the attacker. Thetrail led them through a wooded area,
but it was getting dark and eventhough things were escalating with the search dogs,
they locked down the scene until thenext day. And the next day
when they searched the woods, theyfound a blue and white flannel and tucked
inside of this flannel kind of woundaround. It really was a pair of
(03:51):
gloves, like wet gloves from someonewho was wearing them when they drowned two
children in a bathtub. So theybelieved that this for sure came from whoever
was in the Gustafson's home that day. Also, on a trail in the
woods, they found a name playwith a Gustafsson's name on it, and
this was missing from that flower bedthat the footprint was found in. They
(04:14):
searched through the woods with the searchdogs and they ended up bringing them to
a house and this would be thehome of Daniel Laplant. Now, I
just want to interject right here,I have seen a few different pronunciations of
this last name, it being laplantor LaPlante, I'm not sure, but
for the remainder I will probably justbe referring to him as Daniel. So
(04:38):
that day they ended up interviewing Daniel, and they end up getting a warrant
to go through his things at hishome. Now when they're interviewing him,
actually they are interviewing him in apublic library because at this point they have
no idea who could possibly be responsiblefor this heinous crime. So there are
a couple people living in the homenow. They end up ruling out his
(05:01):
brother Stephen, his brother friend wholives with them often, Michael, and
other people in the home. Butthe last partson they had to talk to
was Daniel and Daniel was at alibrary, so that's where they end up
doing this interview with him. Andfrom this interview and from the search dog
leading to the house, they geta warrant to go into the house and
to go through Daniel's things. Whilesearching the home, Stephen, Daniel's brother,
(05:28):
provided police with a description of whatDaniel had been wearing the day before.
He had on gray sweatpants, grayand white thermal shirt, and athletic
socks which they end up finding inthe corner of Daniel's bedroom and they were
soaking wet, and police ruled outStephen and his Michael, and this would
because of solid alibis they had attheir jobs or with other people. But
(05:50):
these two were instrumental in finding agun, a gun that had been hidden
away in an abandoned car on theirproperty. Now skun was used in Priscilla's
murder and it was also stolen.It was stolen in a prior robbery in
the neighborhood, and this was aburglary at the Pendleton's home. They also
(06:14):
found out that this wasn't the firsttime that Daniel had been in the Gustafson's
home. Daniel had robbed them beforeand Daniel was a serial burglar, but
on December one of nineteen eighty seven, he had moved from a burglar to
a rapist into a murderer. SoI'm going to talk about something else that
(06:38):
happened with Daniel. And this isprobably why most people know this case because
it is very, very creepy.So in nineteen eighty six, a year
before the murders, Daniel had startedcatfishing a sixteen year old named Annie Andrews
that lived in the neighborhood. Danielhad started calling Annie and he told her
(06:59):
that he wanted to get to knowher. He told her that he had
gotten her number from a mutual friendof theirs at school. Spoiler alert,
this friend doesn't exist. He foundher number in a house that he was
robbing, so they flirted on thephone, and even though Annie didn't know
who it was on the other line, Daniel was interested in her and she
(07:24):
began talking to him almost every day. And he had described himself as blonde,
athletic, and attractive, and thisis actually far from Daniel's actual appearance.
Daniel and Annie eventually end up planninga date to go get ice cream,
but when Daniel comes to her houseto pick her up. This is
not at all who she expected.Daniel had dark hair, he had acne
(07:47):
scars all over his face, andhe was wearing very dirty clothes. So
Annie's dad, Brian, had noidea what was going on between his daughter
and this mystery boy. Brian Andrewswas a single dad with two ten inch
daughters. Annie's mother had recently diedfrom cancer, and the entire Andrew's family
(08:07):
was just trying to get back andrecreate a new normal for them, and
this involved Jessica and Annie being homea lot by themselves. Annie even going
on this date to begin with wasa very big step. So even though
Daniel isn't exactly who she thought hewould be, she still went on this
(08:28):
date with him anyways. But sheends up cutting the date short, and
this was because of Daniel's behavior.Daniel had been asking very inappropriate questions about
Annie's mom. He was asking herthings about the cancer, about the pain
that she was in, and whatit was like when she died. Annie
was obviously very uncomfortable with these lineof questions and she ended up ending the
(08:52):
date with him early. But talkingabout her mom ends it bringing up some
feelings and some emotions that obviously arelaying right there on the surface. You
know, Annie, Jessica and BrianAndrews are all going through a terrible time
and they're grieving. So Annie andher sister Jessica decide that they're going to
(09:13):
get out a Wuiji board and thatthey're going to hold a little seance and
that they're going to try to connectwith their mother that has passed. And
when they start this little seance,they can't believe the results because that night,
through the Ouiji board, they startedhearing knocking coming from inside the walls,
(09:35):
and these encounters would continue for severalmore nights after this little seance.
So Annie and Jessica started to thinkafter a while that Mambulus wasn't their mom
that they contacted after all, maybeit was something else, and maybe it
was something even evil, because thingsare in the house started disappearing, or
things in the house would just popup, like Annie would fix a bowl
(10:00):
of popcorn before they watched a movie. While she'd go back to get in
the kitchen, it would be gone. There would be drinks left in the
house that didn't belong to any ofthe Andrews. So Eventually, the girls
had been so spooked and so scaredthat they told their dad what they did,
and they told their dad that theyhad held the seance, that they
were trying to communicate with mom andall of the stuff, and he is
(10:24):
so weirded out by it that he'slike, you all have just scared yourself
into thinking all of this. You'rebasically this Squigiboord was a placebo to make
you think that the house was hauntednow when it's not. You're just noticing
or hearing things that have always beenthere. After basically telling the girls that
they are imagining things, he weget a call a few nights later,
(10:48):
and this is when Annie finds writingon the wall in their basement. So
she had heard some noises coming fromthe basement and she decided that she was
going to check it out. Andwhen he gets down there, she finds
that in red which any very muchthought that this was blood, it said
I'm in your room, come andfind me. The girls were obviously terrified
(11:09):
by this and they went running tothe neighbor next door. So the neighbor
calls Brian at work to tell himwhat's going on, and when he is
home, he is mad, andI mean he is mad because he's come
home, he's had to leave workearly. He's thinking that his girls are
in trouble somehow. But when hegets to the basement and he looks at
(11:33):
the words on the wall, they'rewritten in ketchup. So he's thinking that
the girls have planned this to makeit look like that the house is really
haunted or something's going on. Andafter this he puts both girls in therapy.
At the root of all of it, he just believed that they wanted
attention and that they were not dealingwith their mother's death in a very healthy
(11:54):
way. But a while after this, the knocking began again and then another
note was left, and this timein Annie's room once again and read and
it said I'm back. The girlsfound the writing, they ran next door
like before, and this time whenBrian got home and he went to investigate,
(12:16):
he found a seventeen year old boystanding in his deceased wife's wedding dress
holding a hatchet, and Brian foughtwith this boy, but somehow he was
able to get away. Brian istrying to get back to his girls to
make sure that they are safe whilethey wait on the police to come and
check things out. And when thepolice get there and they hear the story
(12:39):
from Annie and Jessica Andrews saying thatthis torment had been going on for close
to a year now, they startedlooking closely at some other things. They
started looking at the structure of thishouse. One officer just so happened to
move a dresser in Annie's room andhe found small holes the wall. From
(13:01):
there, they find out that thereis a crawl space. They go to
this crawl space that's located behind thedryer in the utility room, and in
this space was the seventeen year oldboy, Daniel Laplant hiding. He had
been living in the walls for almosta year. He had food rappers in
(13:22):
there, he had trash, hehad the girls undergarments that he had stolen
and tucked away, and he hadsome other very gross things in there,
as you can imagine. So hewas arrested and then he ended up being
released a little early because he wasa miner to await trial. So in
the time that he was arrested andthen released from his release, this is
(13:46):
when he would go and kill PriscillaGustafson, William and Abigail and then in
a later confession, this is whatDaniel says happened that day on December first
of night eighty seven, Daniel wascarrying a stolen pistol with him that he
had convinced his brother's friend to givehim ammunition. Four. Daniel was robbing
(14:13):
the Gustafson's home when he heard thirtyone year old pregnant Priscilla and her five
year old William come home, andat first Daniel thought that he would just
jump out the window and avoid confrontationaltogether, but instead he decides to confront
them with the gun. He ledboth of them to the master bedroom,
(14:35):
where he tied William up with nylonstockings in the closet. He then tied
Priscilla to the bed, and thisis when he thought again that he would
leave, but instead he raped Priscillaand then he put a pillow over the
back of her head and shot hertwo times with his twenty two pistol that
(14:56):
he had stolen from there, hetook William out of the closet and took
him to the bathroom in the upstairsand drowned him. And then while he
was leaving, seven year old Abigailhad returned home from school and he had
got her. He had hit herover the head, choked her, and
(15:18):
then began drowning her in the downstairsbathroom, and Abigail fought. Abigail fought
so hard, and they could tellthis later on the autopsy as well.
Daniel left from their house, leavingthrough the woods. He returned home and
then he attended his niece's birthday party. So basically all of this had happened
(15:41):
because he was released and not heldand me and the rest of the world
would like to know why he wasnot kept in jail after living inside the
walls, stalking and tormenting two teenagegirls for what they knew had been almost
(16:02):
a year. So after daniel Leplant, they went to his house and
they went through all of his things. They ended up finding that yes,
he in fact did this. Thegloves where his the seamen left in the
Gustafson's bedroom belonged to him. Hewas sentenced to life with the possibility of
(16:23):
parole after thirty years. So Danielactually came up for parole in two thousand
and seventeen, and from all accounts, he gave a very unapologetic apology and
what I mean by that is,there was no remorse by him whatsoever for
(16:44):
what he had done to Priscilla andthe three children. So he was sent
back to prison and his next opportunityto be released will be in two thousand
and thirty two. All Right,you guys, thanks for coming along with
(17:08):
me for this crazy case. Idid want to talk a little bit about
Daniel's history. You know, it'svery hard when you hear about someone so
young doing so many awful things,the stocking being awful, being a burglar,
a rapist, a murderer, anda child murderer at that. You
(17:30):
know, it's awful, it's terrible, and it makes you wonder what happened
in this person's life for them tobe all of these things at seventeen years
old. And you know, Danielreally did not have an easy life at
all. And that's not an excuse, that's a fact. Daniel was physically
(17:52):
abused by his father as well assexually. Things got so bad for him
that he was going to school andhe would be just looked, very neglected.
He would be in these awful,dirty clothes. The kids knew him
as the smelly kid, and eventuallythe school decided him because of all the
bullying and just the way that hewould come to school that he probably needed
(18:17):
to see somebody like a psychiatrist togo to therapy and to talk about things.
So they send him to one thatwas recommended by the school, a
psychologist, and from there this psychologistends up also sexually abusing Daniel. So
with this kid, it just seemslike there's one thing after another, just
(18:38):
of abuse, neglect, and whicha lot of people know the reason that
some kids have such bad hygiene likehe had, and you know, not
taking care of themselves as that's actuallya defense mechanism to keep predators away from
you, because if you are thisstinky, smelly person, then maybe that'll
deter them from messing with you.But yeah, it's just he didn't have
(19:02):
a great life, and I mean, how could anyone think that he would
have with doing all these awful thingsat the young age of seventeen. It's
just so awful, all of it. The thing that really got me too
was it was just the fact thathe was released from jail for stalking and
literally living in the walls close toa year, is what the Andrews said
(19:26):
when all this knocking and the seanceand the day and all this happened.
And that makes me believe too thatwhen he came to pick Annie up that
day, I nothing in me believesthat that was the first time that he
had ever been to the house.There's no way he had probably been in
their house way before that. ButI haven't read that anywhere specifically, And
(19:48):
a lot of people think that thestory of him living in the walls and
having the wedding dress on and holdinga hatchet and all that stuff, a
lot of people say that that isnot true, that that's like a fabrication
of what happened, and it couldbe just because the truth may be so
far pushed down. But I reallydidn't find else that contradicted what happened.
(20:11):
And in the court documents that Ifound, it's all about the trial in
Massachusetts of the Gustafsson's murders, sothere wasn't anything in there even about Annie
and Jessica Andrews. But yeah,I just have had this case citing and
(20:33):
my notes for a while and it'sdefinitely a big one. And honestly,
I was going to say this onefor Patreon because it is such a doozy,
but it's also one of those thateven though it is so awful,
it is so interesting. And I'mone of these people too that kind of
get behind the psychology of why killersdo what they do and why they think
(20:55):
the way that they do, andit's just in this case, it's just
awful, awful stuff. Actually,after Daniel was caught quote unquote by police,
or at least they were in hishouse, he fled from the police
and it took them two days tofind him, and they ended up finding
him hiding in a dumpster on aconstruction site. And through this he had
(21:19):
like stolen a car and held someoneat gunpoint. And it was this huge
chase in Massachusetts that had went onfor two days of them trying to find
this kid. And I mean italso just shows you too, how absolutely
dangerous this kid was. So likeI said, this is one of those
it's just so wild, and Ifeel like it does get out there in
the true crime community and get talkedabout quite a bit. So if you
(21:44):
have heard this case before, orif you haven't, let me know.
I would like to know how manypeople actually haven't heard this one before.
If you're looking for ways to supportthe podcast, you can always rate,
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wherever you're listening. If you arelooking for another great way to support the
(22:08):
podcast, you can join us overon Patreon and following over on the Instagram
page. And if you have acase that you would like to suggest,
I'm always open to those, youcan put those on over at Instagram or
at Murder Squared at gmail. Sountil next time, stay square and I'll
(22:32):
see you next Murder
Hello, Hello everyone, and welcomeback to Murder Squared, the true crime
podcast. I'm your host, MICHAELA. Here we talk about the solved,
the unsolved, the missing, andthe murdered. In today's case that I
high for you is one that youmay have heard of before. It does
circulate through the true crime community,and it is a scary one, to
(00:43):
say the least. I do wantto put out a trigger warning for you.
I try to do this whenever Ican remember it, and this one's
a biggie. If sexual assault orthe death of a pregnant woman is not
something that you are capable of hearing, I know that cases that involve sexual
assault and especially the death of anyonewho is carrying a child, can be
(01:07):
definitely hard to hear. So Ijust want to put that out for you
before we begin today's episode. Soif you're ready, get squared away and
let's talk murder. On December oneof nineteen eighty seven, Andrew Gustafsson came
(01:33):
at home ready to celebrate with hiswife, Priscilla and their children. So
Andrew was a lawyer and he hadjust closed a really big deal at work.
He had been excited all day longto tell Priscilla about it, and
this was a huge accomplishment for himat his firm, and he had called
her a couple times that day,and every time he tried to call,
he never got through to Priscilla,and he wanted to take her out.
(01:57):
He was calling not only to tellher about this big that had gone through,
but he wanted her to find sittersfor the kids. So he had
Abigail, who was eight, andWilliam, who was five, and then
Priscilla was carrying their third child,so really day nights weren't going to be
coming very often anymore. But whenAndrew finally makes it home after not being
(02:19):
able to get ahold of Priscilla allday, he was really happy to see
that her car was parked in thedriveway. But when he came inside,
he couldn't hear his wife or thekids moving about in the house. It
was completely silent, so Andrew calledout for his wife, but he received
no answer. He then assumed thatmaybe she was over at the neighbor's house
(02:42):
and perhaps they could get these neighborsto babysit the kids for their date.
But he called over there and Priscillawasn't there either. Andrew eventually goes upstairs
and when he gets down the hallto their bedroom and makes it inside the
room, he finds his wife layingface down. It was very clear that
she had been shot twice in theback of the head. The bodies of
(03:05):
both Abigail and William were found inopposite bathrooms, and both children had been
drowned. Police use search dogs totrack a trail that they believed to be
left by the killer. Now,the reason that they think this trail was
left by the killer was because ofa shoeprint that was found in the Gustafson's
flower bed, and this was neara window that they believed was the point
(03:28):
of entry for the attacker. Thetrail led them through a wooded area,
but it was getting dark and eventhough things were escalating with the search dogs,
they locked down the scene until thenext day. And the next day
when they searched the woods, theyfound a blue and white flannel and tucked
inside of this flannel kind of woundaround. It really was a pair of
(03:51):
gloves, like wet gloves from someonewho was wearing them when they drowned two
children in a bathtub. So theybelieved that this for sure came from whoever
was in the Gustafson's home that day. Also, on a trail in the
woods, they found a name playwith a Gustafsson's name on it, and
this was missing from that flower bedthat the footprint was found in. They
(04:14):
searched through the woods with the searchdogs and they ended up bringing them to
a house and this would be thehome of Daniel Laplant. Now, I
just want to interject right here,I have seen a few different pronunciations of
this last name, it being laplantor LaPlante, I'm not sure, but
for the remainder I will probably justbe referring to him as Daniel. So
(04:38):
that day they ended up interviewing Daniel, and they end up getting a warrant
to go through his things at hishome. Now when they're interviewing him,
actually they are interviewing him in apublic library because at this point they have
no idea who could possibly be responsiblefor this heinous crime. So there are
a couple people living in the homenow. They end up ruling out his
(05:01):
brother Stephen, his brother friend wholives with them often, Michael, and
other people in the home. Butthe last partson they had to talk to
was Daniel and Daniel was at alibrary, so that's where they end up
doing this interview with him. Andfrom this interview and from the search dog
leading to the house, they geta warrant to go into the house and
to go through Daniel's things. Whilesearching the home, Stephen, Daniel's brother,
(05:28):
provided police with a description of whatDaniel had been wearing the day before.
He had on gray sweatpants, grayand white thermal shirt, and athletic
socks which they end up finding inthe corner of Daniel's bedroom and they were
soaking wet, and police ruled outStephen and his Michael, and this would
because of solid alibis they had attheir jobs or with other people. But
(05:50):
these two were instrumental in finding agun, a gun that had been hidden
away in an abandoned car on theirproperty. Now skun was used in Priscilla's
murder and it was also stolen.It was stolen in a prior robbery in
the neighborhood, and this was aburglary at the Pendleton's home. They also
(06:14):
found out that this wasn't the firsttime that Daniel had been in the Gustafson's
home. Daniel had robbed them beforeand Daniel was a serial burglar, but
on December one of nineteen eighty seven, he had moved from a burglar to
a rapist into a murderer. SoI'm going to talk about something else that
(06:38):
happened with Daniel. And this isprobably why most people know this case because
it is very, very creepy.So in nineteen eighty six, a year
before the murders, Daniel had startedcatfishing a sixteen year old named Annie Andrews
that lived in the neighborhood. Danielhad started calling Annie and he told her
(06:59):
that he wanted to get to knowher. He told her that he had
gotten her number from a mutual friendof theirs at school. Spoiler alert,
this friend doesn't exist. He foundher number in a house that he was
robbing, so they flirted on thephone, and even though Annie didn't know
who it was on the other line, Daniel was interested in her and she
(07:24):
began talking to him almost every day. And he had described himself as blonde,
athletic, and attractive, and thisis actually far from Daniel's actual appearance.
Daniel and Annie eventually end up planninga date to go get ice cream,
but when Daniel comes to her houseto pick her up. This is
not at all who she expected.Daniel had dark hair, he had acne
(07:47):
scars all over his face, andhe was wearing very dirty clothes. So
Annie's dad, Brian, had noidea what was going on between his daughter
and this mystery boy. Brian Andrewswas a single dad with two ten inch
daughters. Annie's mother had recently diedfrom cancer, and the entire Andrew's family
(08:07):
was just trying to get back andrecreate a new normal for them, and
this involved Jessica and Annie being homea lot by themselves. Annie even going
on this date to begin with wasa very big step. So even though
Daniel isn't exactly who she thought hewould be, she still went on this
(08:28):
date with him anyways. But sheends up cutting the date short, and
this was because of Daniel's behavior.Daniel had been asking very inappropriate questions about
Annie's mom. He was asking herthings about the cancer, about the pain
that she was in, and whatit was like when she died. Annie
was obviously very uncomfortable with these lineof questions and she ended up ending the
(08:52):
date with him early. But talkingabout her mom ends it bringing up some
feelings and some emotions that obviously arelaying right there on the surface. You
know, Annie, Jessica and BrianAndrews are all going through a terrible time
and they're grieving. So Annie andher sister Jessica decide that they're going to
(09:13):
get out a Wuiji board and thatthey're going to hold a little seance and
that they're going to try to connectwith their mother that has passed. And
when they start this little seance,they can't believe the results because that night,
through the Ouiji board, they startedhearing knocking coming from inside the walls,
(09:35):
and these encounters would continue for severalmore nights after this little seance.
So Annie and Jessica started to thinkafter a while that Mambulus wasn't their mom
that they contacted after all, maybeit was something else, and maybe it
was something even evil, because thingsare in the house started disappearing, or
things in the house would just popup, like Annie would fix a bowl
(10:00):
of popcorn before they watched a movie. While she'd go back to get in
the kitchen, it would be gone. There would be drinks left in the
house that didn't belong to any ofthe Andrews. So Eventually, the girls
had been so spooked and so scaredthat they told their dad what they did,
and they told their dad that theyhad held the seance, that they
were trying to communicate with mom andall of the stuff, and he is
(10:24):
so weirded out by it that he'slike, you all have just scared yourself
into thinking all of this. You'rebasically this Squigiboord was a placebo to make
you think that the house was hauntednow when it's not. You're just noticing
or hearing things that have always beenthere. After basically telling the girls that
they are imagining things, he weget a call a few nights later,
(10:48):
and this is when Annie finds writingon the wall in their basement. So
she had heard some noises coming fromthe basement and she decided that she was
going to check it out. Andwhen he gets down there, she finds
that in red which any very muchthought that this was blood, it said
I'm in your room, come andfind me. The girls were obviously terrified
(11:09):
by this and they went running tothe neighbor next door. So the neighbor
calls Brian at work to tell himwhat's going on, and when he is
home, he is mad, andI mean he is mad because he's come
home, he's had to leave workearly. He's thinking that his girls are
in trouble somehow. But when hegets to the basement and he looks at
(11:33):
the words on the wall, they'rewritten in ketchup. So he's thinking that
the girls have planned this to makeit look like that the house is really
haunted or something's going on. Andafter this he puts both girls in therapy.
At the root of all of it, he just believed that they wanted
attention and that they were not dealingwith their mother's death in a very healthy
(11:54):
way. But a while after this, the knocking began again and then another
note was left, and this timein Annie's room once again and read and
it said I'm back. The girlsfound the writing, they ran next door
like before, and this time whenBrian got home and he went to investigate,
(12:16):
he found a seventeen year old boystanding in his deceased wife's wedding dress
holding a hatchet, and Brian foughtwith this boy, but somehow he was
able to get away. Brian istrying to get back to his girls to
make sure that they are safe whilethey wait on the police to come and
check things out. And when thepolice get there and they hear the story
(12:39):
from Annie and Jessica Andrews saying thatthis torment had been going on for close
to a year now, they startedlooking closely at some other things. They
started looking at the structure of thishouse. One officer just so happened to
move a dresser in Annie's room andhe found small holes the wall. From
(13:01):
there, they find out that thereis a crawl space. They go to
this crawl space that's located behind thedryer in the utility room, and in
this space was the seventeen year oldboy, Daniel Laplant hiding. He had
been living in the walls for almosta year. He had food rappers in
(13:22):
there, he had trash, hehad the girls undergarments that he had stolen
and tucked away, and he hadsome other very gross things in there,
as you can imagine. So hewas arrested and then he ended up being
released a little early because he wasa miner to await trial. So in
the time that he was arrested andthen released from his release, this is
(13:46):
when he would go and kill PriscillaGustafson, William and Abigail and then in
a later confession, this is whatDaniel says happened that day on December first
of night eighty seven, Daniel wascarrying a stolen pistol with him that he
had convinced his brother's friend to givehim ammunition. Four. Daniel was robbing
(14:13):
the Gustafson's home when he heard thirtyone year old pregnant Priscilla and her five
year old William come home, andat first Daniel thought that he would just
jump out the window and avoid confrontationaltogether, but instead he decides to confront
them with the gun. He ledboth of them to the master bedroom,
(14:35):
where he tied William up with nylonstockings in the closet. He then tied
Priscilla to the bed, and thisis when he thought again that he would
leave, but instead he raped Priscillaand then he put a pillow over the
back of her head and shot hertwo times with his twenty two pistol that
(14:56):
he had stolen from there, hetook William out of the closet and took
him to the bathroom in the upstairsand drowned him. And then while he
was leaving, seven year old Abigailhad returned home from school and he had
got her. He had hit herover the head, choked her, and
(15:18):
then began drowning her in the downstairsbathroom, and Abigail fought. Abigail fought
so hard, and they could tellthis later on the autopsy as well.
Daniel left from their house, leavingthrough the woods. He returned home and
then he attended his niece's birthday party. So basically all of this had happened
(15:41):
because he was released and not heldand me and the rest of the world
would like to know why he wasnot kept in jail after living inside the
walls, stalking and tormenting two teenagegirls for what they knew had been almost
(16:02):
a year. So after daniel Leplant, they went to his house and
they went through all of his things. They ended up finding that yes,
he in fact did this. Thegloves where his the seamen left in the
Gustafson's bedroom belonged to him. Hewas sentenced to life with the possibility of
(16:23):
parole after thirty years. So Danielactually came up for parole in two thousand
and seventeen, and from all accounts, he gave a very unapologetic apology and
what I mean by that is,there was no remorse by him whatsoever for
(16:44):
what he had done to Priscilla andthe three children. So he was sent
back to prison and his next opportunityto be released will be in two thousand
and thirty two. All Right,you guys, thanks for coming along with
(17:08):
me for this crazy case. Idid want to talk a little bit about
Daniel's history. You know, it'svery hard when you hear about someone so
young doing so many awful things,the stocking being awful, being a burglar,
a rapist, a murderer, anda child murderer at that. You
(17:30):
know, it's awful, it's terrible, and it makes you wonder what happened
in this person's life for them tobe all of these things at seventeen years
old. And you know, Danielreally did not have an easy life at
all. And that's not an excuse, that's a fact. Daniel was physically
(17:52):
abused by his father as well assexually. Things got so bad for him
that he was going to school andhe would be just looked, very neglected.
He would be in these awful,dirty clothes. The kids knew him
as the smelly kid, and eventuallythe school decided him because of all the
bullying and just the way that hewould come to school that he probably needed
(18:17):
to see somebody like a psychiatrist togo to therapy and to talk about things.
So they send him to one thatwas recommended by the school, a
psychologist, and from there this psychologistends up also sexually abusing Daniel. So
with this kid, it just seemslike there's one thing after another, just
(18:38):
of abuse, neglect, and whicha lot of people know the reason that
some kids have such bad hygiene likehe had, and you know, not
taking care of themselves as that's actuallya defense mechanism to keep predators away from
you, because if you are thisstinky, smelly person, then maybe that'll
deter them from messing with you.But yeah, it's just he didn't have
(19:02):
a great life, and I mean, how could anyone think that he would
have with doing all these awful thingsat the young age of seventeen. It's
just so awful, all of it. The thing that really got me too
was it was just the fact thathe was released from jail for stalking and
literally living in the walls close toa year, is what the Andrews said
(19:26):
when all this knocking and the seanceand the day and all this happened.
And that makes me believe too thatwhen he came to pick Annie up that
day, I nothing in me believesthat that was the first time that he
had ever been to the house.There's no way he had probably been in
their house way before that. ButI haven't read that anywhere specifically, And
(19:48):
a lot of people think that thestory of him living in the walls and
having the wedding dress on and holdinga hatchet and all that stuff, a
lot of people say that that isnot true, that that's like a fabrication
of what happened, and it couldbe just because the truth may be so
far pushed down. But I reallydidn't find else that contradicted what happened.
(20:11):
And in the court documents that Ifound, it's all about the trial in
Massachusetts of the Gustafsson's murders, sothere wasn't anything in there even about Annie
and Jessica Andrews. But yeah,I just have had this case citing and
(20:33):
my notes for a while and it'sdefinitely a big one. And honestly,
I was going to say this onefor Patreon because it is such a doozy,
but it's also one of those thateven though it is so awful,
it is so interesting. And I'mone of these people too that kind of
get behind the psychology of why killersdo what they do and why they think
(20:55):
the way that they do, andit's just in this case, it's just
awful, awful stuff. Actually,after Daniel was caught quote unquote by police,
or at least they were in hishouse, he fled from the police
and it took them two days tofind him, and they ended up finding
him hiding in a dumpster on aconstruction site. And through this he had
(21:19):
like stolen a car and held someoneat gunpoint. And it was this huge
chase in Massachusetts that had went onfor two days of them trying to find
this kid. And I mean italso just shows you too, how absolutely
dangerous this kid was. So likeI said, this is one of those
it's just so wild, and Ifeel like it does get out there in
the true crime community and get talkedabout quite a bit. So if you
(21:44):
have heard this case before, orif you haven't, let me know.
I would like to know how manypeople actually haven't heard this one before.
If you're looking for ways to supportthe podcast, you can always rate,
review, and subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, Audible,
wherever you're listening. If you arelooking for another great way to support the
(22:08):
podcast, you can join us overon Patreon and following over on the Instagram
page. And if you have acase that you would like to suggest,
I'm always open to those, youcan put those on over at Instagram or
at Murder Squared at gmail. Sountil next time, stay square and I'll
(22:32):
see you next Murder
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