November 6, 2025 • 44 mins
Right now in true crime: Christopher scholtes death, Jake Haro sentence, Alex Murdaugh update.
On today’s episode we discuss the 1962 homicide of 9 year old Carol Ann Dougherty. Her case was finally solved after 63 years.Let’s discuss the case and how investigators finally solved this one after so much unknown for so many decades.
Sources for episode:
https://law.justia.com/cases/louisiana/supreme-court/1988/87-k-1059-1.html
https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/F2/904/282/388759/
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/192904548/francis_joseph-dougherty/photo#view-photo=330188717
https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/suspect-identified-1962-murder-9-212816518.html
https://bucks.crimewatchpa.com/da/29567/post/cold-case-finds-justice-suspect-identified-1962-murder-carol-ann-dougherty?brid=J75r3MqcTRgf9uWOGwky_A&fbclid=IwZnRzaANvppRleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHr4jg9Cs5koAQ_Py0ojfv5bztIiRqEb5uKe1-wkTIjtc9o3GsasK5ERGS35e_aem_doJ6Yxkb-9foCzkGtl4IDA
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Carol_Ann_Dougherty#:~:text=Carol%20Ann%20Dougherty%20was%20a%209%2Dyear%2Dold%20girl,on%20her%20way%20to%20return%20library%20books.
https://nypost.com/2025/11/01/us-news/schoolgirls-decades-long-cold-case-murder-solved-with-dna-confession-evidence/
https://youtu.be/FuVQ52tJkKg?si=HjoRoqfHOJezExGx
https://abcnews.go.com/amp/US/9-year-carol-ann-killed-church-1962-murderer/story?id=127013830
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/139287618/carol_ann-dougherty
https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/1962-bristol-church-murder-carol-171326617.html
https://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news/local/cold-case-murder-rape-carol-ann-dougherty-bristol-bucks-county-pennsylvania/4293649/
The Coldest Murder: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-coldest-murder/id1760811235
On today’s episode we discuss the 1962 homicide of 9 year old Carol Ann Dougherty. Her case was finally solved after 63 years.Let’s discuss the case and how investigators finally solved this one after so much unknown for so many decades.
Sources for episode:
https://law.justia.com/cases/louisiana/supreme-court/1988/87-k-1059-1.html
https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/F2/904/282/388759/
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/192904548/francis_joseph-dougherty/photo#view-photo=330188717
https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/suspect-identified-1962-murder-9-212816518.html
https://bucks.crimewatchpa.com/da/29567/post/cold-case-finds-justice-suspect-identified-1962-murder-carol-ann-dougherty?brid=J75r3MqcTRgf9uWOGwky_A&fbclid=IwZnRzaANvppRleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHr4jg9Cs5koAQ_Py0ojfv5bztIiRqEb5uKe1-wkTIjtc9o3GsasK5ERGS35e_aem_doJ6Yxkb-9foCzkGtl4IDA
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Carol_Ann_Dougherty#:~:text=Carol%20Ann%20Dougherty%20was%20a%209%2Dyear%2Dold%20girl,on%20her%20way%20to%20return%20library%20books.
https://nypost.com/2025/11/01/us-news/schoolgirls-decades-long-cold-case-murder-solved-with-dna-confession-evidence/
https://youtu.be/FuVQ52tJkKg?si=HjoRoqfHOJezExGx
https://abcnews.go.com/amp/US/9-year-carol-ann-killed-church-1962-murderer/story?id=127013830
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/139287618/carol_ann-dougherty
https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/1962-bristol-church-murder-carol-171326617.html
https://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news/local/cold-case-murder-rape-carol-ann-dougherty-bristol-bucks-county-pennsylvania/4293649/
The Coldest Murder: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-coldest-murder/id1760811235
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Warning, this episode contains graphic crime scene detail as well
as talk of sexual assault. Please listen with discretion. Welcome
to Primetime Crime. I'm your host, Kylie. Let's talk right
now in true crime, and then together we're going to
work on warming.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
Up some cold cases. Let's go.
Speaker 1 (00:16):
Hey, guys, welcome to this week's episode of Primetime Crime.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
It's Kylie.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
We have a quick little right now in true crime,
a little housekeeping to do, and then we're going to
get into today's episode, so housekeeping.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
Next week, I am going to be bringing you.
Speaker 1 (00:32):
A guest episode case from my friend Holly with Crime
with Holly. If you have been listening to my podcast,
you've heard from Holly before. And then I will be
back the following week, and then I am going to
be doing another guest episode the week of Thanksgiving from
(00:54):
my friend Kadra from Perplexity, a mystery podcast. She has
so graciously also shared an episode with me so that
way I can share it with you guys. And mostly
it's so I can have a little bit of time
off just to completely unplug from my real job and
the podcast job, especially the week of Thanksgiving, because I
(01:18):
am really trying to give myself that time off from work,
my real work and my podcast work just to very
much take some time off. So I am going to
be sharing those two episodes in the coming weeks, but
I did just want to kind of give you guys
a heads up because I typically am very consistent and
(01:41):
I still want to be consistent in sharing episodes. So
both of those episodes are going to be very good,
and it's also going to give you an opportunity to
hear from different people and be able to check out
their podcasts as well.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
And they are two friends of mine and two people.
Speaker 1 (01:59):
That I support, and they support me and always are
willing to share an episode when the time comes that
one of us needs it, So please check both of
them out and you will be able to cure their
episodes in the coming weeks. So right now, in true crime,
let's get into it. So this case out of Arizona,
(02:20):
I haven't been super following. I've seen different things on
social media, but I haven't been super keeping up with it.
But there was a man named Christopher Schultez out of
Arizona and his daughter. Two year old daughter died last
year because he left her in a very very hot
(02:41):
car while he played video games. So he was set
earlier this week to accept officially accept this plea agreement,
and he was going to be sentenced, and then the
night before his sentence, before he was doing court, he
took his own life. And it's just so frustrating the
(03:02):
lack of accountability that this individual has.
Speaker 2 (03:07):
I don't even have.
Speaker 1 (03:09):
Words for his actions that led to his daughter's death
and then this whole thing transpiring the way it did.
It's just really sad. It's all really unfortunate. None of
it should have ever happened. But as of right now,
that's all I really have on that. If there is
anything else that transpires or comes out, I will be
sure to share it with you. Now, moving on to
(03:31):
somebody that surprisingly I guess is taking accountability is Jake Harrow,
who is the father of Emmanuel Harrow, who was reported
missing in August.
Speaker 2 (03:41):
And there was a story about the fake.
Speaker 1 (03:45):
Kidnapping and the mom had a black eye and so
on and so forth. It ended up coming out that
Jake had some really bad prior child abuse allegations. One
of his children is actually quadriplegic from being abused when
she was very very young. She now is living with
(04:07):
a different family. Her name is changed. She is very,
very medically fragile. She has a lot of complications from
the abuse that she received from her father, Jake.
Speaker 2 (04:18):
And then Jake goes on and.
Speaker 1 (04:20):
Has baby Emmanuel, who allegedly also suffered from this horrific
abuse at the hands of his father, and then he
goes quote unquote missing, and everything kind of comes to
life that this isn't all that. It looks like there's
way more to it than him being kidnapped. So he
(04:43):
again did plead guilty and he has been sentenced to
twenty five years to life in prison. He is thirty
two years old, and he was sentenced on November third,
so earlier this week. And even though he played guid
to murdering his son, his body still has not been found,
(05:05):
which I think is really really interesting. What is he
holding back? What isn't he telling investigators. There was one
point in time when he took investigators to an area
and they were searching, hopeful I think that they would
find Emmanuel's remains, and they came up empty handed. So
I don't really know where things are going with this.
(05:26):
But he was sentenced twenty five years is not nearly
enough time given the fact that he's only thirty two
years old. I hope it's more on the life side,
because he obviously took the life of am Manuel, he
pled guilty to it, and he took the life of
his other daughter as well, because she has lifelong disabilities
(05:49):
because of the abuse that he inflicted on her. This
is not a good person. This is a horrible, horrible human.
He should have never been allowed to have more children
after he.
Speaker 2 (06:00):
Abused his daughter. It's just awful.
Speaker 1 (06:03):
So if there is anything new and breaking on that,
I will be sure to let you guys know. But
the mom, Rebecca, she has still decided to keep her
plea of not guilty. There is set to be a
settlement conference on January twenty first, so that is kind
of where things stand today as far as she goes.
I don't know what Jake has said versus what she
(06:27):
has said, because initially Jake said he was not guilty
and then he decided to change his plea to guilty.
So I don't know what's going on behind the scenes,
but I know investigators are probably doing everything they can
to try to figure out where baby Emmanuel's remains are.
So if there is any update in it, I will
be sure to give you guys the latest. All right,
(06:48):
last thing I want to talk about. I'm sure there's
plenty more going on in the true crime world, but
this one was a little interesting to me.
Speaker 2 (06:56):
It was just a weird headline.
Speaker 1 (06:58):
Alec Murda is disturbed and disappointed with the Hulu's portrayal
of his family. Now I don't even have words. So
this man is serving life in prison for the murder
of his wife and son, amongst many other things, financial
(07:19):
crimes stacked on.
Speaker 2 (07:20):
Top of each other, stacked on top of each.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
Other, stacked on top of each other, and apparently he
has access to Hulu in there.
Speaker 2 (07:28):
I don't know if I guess he has a tablet.
Speaker 1 (07:31):
We know that we've seen the selfies that he's taken
in prison, and I guess he has access to Hulu
and has watched this series that is on Hulu, which
I said is amazing, and I think it is so
well done. And yes there are parts that are dramatized
because it is not a documentary, but he is saying
(07:54):
that they way that his family is portrayed is not accurate,
and I think, personally watching it, I feel the accuracy
of things. I think it's so accurate watching him spiral
in the last few days leading up to the murders,
literally the financials of everything peering over his shoulder in
(08:19):
just days, his dad going into the hospital and him
being told that his dad wasn't going to make it,
and Maggie leaving Mozelle and going to the beach house,
like there is so much, in my opinion, that the
Hulu doc really lays out and probably accurately describes. I
(08:42):
think it shows his spiral, and I think it does
a really good job at showing his spiral. But he
does not like to take accountability for anything, so of
course he doesn't think it portrays things accurately because in
his head, he didn't do anything wrong and he shouldn't
be behind bars. And it's just actually insane that he
(09:02):
decided to make a statement about the portrayal of everything
and how his family is shown.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
It's wild, It's truly wild.
Speaker 1 (09:13):
But apparently he has access to Hulu behind bars, so
I think we still have a couple episodes to go.
This last week's episode was so well done and I
will say it so many times again.
Speaker 2 (09:26):
The guy that's playing Alec is amazing. His portrayal of.
Speaker 1 (09:31):
Him is so on point, I think that I'm watching
the real Murda.
Speaker 2 (09:36):
It's wild.
Speaker 1 (09:38):
Anyways, I just thought that was a very interesting little
headline because of course he has an opinion about it.
Speaker 2 (09:43):
It doesn't paint him in a good light. He's not
going to approve of it.
Speaker 1 (09:47):
Of course, not so interesting nonetheless, But with all of that,
we are going to go ahead and get into today's episode.
Speaker 2 (09:55):
Alrighty guys, we are getting into a brand new case today.
This week's episode is.
Speaker 1 (10:01):
Going to be one of those type of episodes that
is going to be hard to listen to, but I
do want to share it because we have a case
that has been solved after sixty two years, which is
so huge in the cold case community. So today we
are going to be talking about the now solved homicide
(10:23):
and sexual assault of nine year old Carol Ann Doherty.
Speaker 2 (10:28):
Now, just a little PSA.
Speaker 1 (10:30):
I did a lot of research on how to say
Carol Ann's last name, because I've heard this last name
said so many different ways. But given the area that
Carol Ann lived in Bristol, Pennsylvania, this is how they
said the last name, which is Dougherty.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
So that is how I am going to be saying it, but.
Speaker 1 (10:50):
Apparently there are a lot of different pronunciations of the
last name, and I always want to be sure that
I am doing my best to say things accurately and
get things as accurate as I can, So I did
just want to give a little psa. I think it
really depends on where you're from and where you live
and all of that in regards to how you say
(11:11):
this last name. So, Carol Ann's murder took place in
nineteen sixty two in like I said, Bristol, Pennsylvania, and
although her perpetrator passed away in two thousand and two,
we finally have some answers about what happened to Carol Ann.
And it won't come as a surprise that the man
who so violently took her life had a very violent
(11:33):
criminal history and was on the radar of law enforcement
for a super long time. He was even a suspect
in Carol Ann's death, but unfortunately, due to the time
being what it was and technology not being as advanced,
they were never able to bring charges against him for
Carol's murder. For my research, I listened to the Coldest
(11:55):
Murder podcast, which was actually created by a guy named
Mike Missinelli, and he is a sports talk host in Philly,
and he grew up in the same area as this
case took place. He lived in Bristol, and at the
time of Carol Ann's murder, his uncle was the town's.
Speaker 2 (12:13):
Police chief and he was only seven.
Speaker 1 (12:16):
He lived right around the corner from the church where
this crime took place, and he remembers all of the
events of that evening all too well. And he talks
about in the podcast how much of a market left
on him, but also on the town of Bristol. So
I highly suggest you give his podcast a listen. I
will be sure to link up below. In the show notes,
(12:36):
they do go into a lot more detail on all
of the different suspects and everything. I'm only about three
episodes in, but I think that he does a really
good job. He and his co host kind of going
through everything and talking about the events that happened, going
into details of.
Speaker 2 (12:51):
All the suspects.
Speaker 1 (12:52):
And I'm waiting for an update episode since this case
recently was solved. So with all of that being said,
let's go ahead and dive in to Carol Anne's story.
Carol Anne Doherty was born to her parents Francis Joseph
Frank Doherty and Dorothy. She had a younger sister named Kay.
(13:12):
Her family had previously lived in Philly before moving to
Bristol two years prior to her death. Carol was a
fifth grade student at Saint Mark's School in Bristol, Pennsylvania.
The Doherty family resided at sixty eight Manor Circle, which
was about one point two miles from Saint Mark's Roman
(13:33):
Catholic Church, where Carol Anne and her family attended. She
also went to the Saint Mark's School that was part
of the family's church. So Carol was raised in a
Catholic household and was a very good kid. She was
the kind of kid who would often pass by the
church and stop in to say a prayer on her
(13:53):
way to her destination. Now this was very common practice
for Carol An. This wasn't anything out of the ordinary
since she did grow up in the church and at school,
the nuns would often tell the children, if you pass
by a church, you should stop in and say a prayer.
And Carol Anne was known to bike around town and
(14:13):
she would kind of go back and forth to the
local library. She loved reading and spent a lot of
time going back and forth from her home to the
library to return different books and check.
Speaker 2 (14:25):
Out new ones.
Speaker 1 (14:27):
And when I was researching this case, reading about Carol
Anne's love for library books and going back and forth
to the library, it kind of made me sad because
so many things nowadays are so technology based, and I'll
be honest, I'm even guilty of it because I'm such
an audiobook person that libraries are just such a lost thing,
(14:49):
and it really just kind of makes me sad that
I feel like kids don't go to libraries as much
anymore like I did as a child, and it's just
something that I feel like we need to get back
to kids going to libraries, checking out library books, seeing
what the new books are. I feel like that was
so exciting when I was little, to go to the
(15:09):
library and see all the different books.
Speaker 2 (15:11):
That they had.
Speaker 1 (15:12):
So nineteen sixty two was a different time and place.
Like I said, Carol often rode her bike around town,
and Bristol was a really safe town and nobody ever
thought anything of a child going out and riding their
bike a couple of miles to go to the library
or to go to the local store.
Speaker 2 (15:31):
This was normal back in the day.
Speaker 1 (15:33):
People didn't think like they think now, where you can't
even let your child out of your sight for two
point two seconds at a fear of something bad's going
to happen to them. So it was a Monday, October
twenty second of nineteen sixty two. Carol Anne had attended
school that day and came home after school to change
out of her school uniform and then left on her
(15:56):
bike with two books to return to the Bristol Borough
Free Library. And she was also going to meet up
with a couple friends there as well. And Carol had
been excited about checking out another book in the mystery
series that she had been reading, so she was so
excited to get these other books back and check out
these other two books. Now, when I was first researching
(16:18):
this case, I did get some conflict information on if
Carol Ann made it to the library or not. But
it does not seem that she ever made it to
the library because the two books that she was set
to return were found with her bike outside of the
church where she would ultimately be found. So I did
just want to bring that up real quick because there
(16:40):
was a little bit of discrepancies there. But I think
from what I've been able to tell she never did
make it to the library and she was not able
to meet her friends that day. So now we're going
to get into kind of a timeline of the different
route that Carol Ann took that day, the different stop
she made, and how ultimately she ended up at.
Speaker 2 (17:02):
The church where she ultimately would lose her life.
Speaker 1 (17:05):
So, as I said, Carol Anne's mode of transportation was
her bike. She was on her bike going through town.
She stopped to get a coke and a candy at
Tommy's Cafe and was then seen traveling on her bike
down Lincoln Avenue, and then she was last seen at
Saint Mark's Catholic Church, which was located at ten twenty
(17:27):
five Radcliffe Street. So she passed by the church and
decided that she was going to stop in to church
to pray. And like I said, this was something that
was normal for Carol Anne. She would pass by the
church and she would hear what the nuns of her
school told her, if you pass by church, you need
to go in and pray.
Speaker 2 (17:47):
So that is exactly what she did.
Speaker 1 (17:50):
Carol Anne did not return home for dinner, so her parents,
of course became very concerned and they went to go
search for her. Her father Frank, found her bike outside
of the church, Saint Mark's Church and went inside to
look for her. Now, when he went in, he found
the most horrific scene. Around five thirty pm that Monday evening,
(18:15):
he found his daughter's body on the upstairs landing leading
to the church's balcony and choir loft area. She was
unfortunately deceased, and he ran out of the church in shock,
trying to get somebody to help him, and authorities were
of course then alerted. So once investigators arrived, it was
(18:39):
determined that Caroline had been sexually assaulted and strangled with
some type of ligature. Now, whoever did this, obviously is
a real sick human to do this to a child,
but especially in a church setting. Now, there were some
tissues and a couple of cigarettes that were found outside
(18:59):
of the church, and there were also some pubic cares
that were in Carol Anne's hand. Now, it was nineteen
sixty two, DNA was not a thing. But the investigators
took what they had at the scene and took it
into their possession and they began their investigation. They asked
(19:21):
some local neighbors if they saw anything and nobody really
had come forward and said that they saw anything notable
that day, so initially there wasn't really any persons of
interest right off that, but they kind of were going
the route of checking into anyone that had a record
of sex crimes. So this crime awful. For it to
(19:44):
happen in a church, a young kid in a small
little town like Bristol, it just really shocked the community.
There was a lot of kids that lived in this neighborhood,
and of course all of the members of the church,
all of their families.
Speaker 2 (20:02):
It was a pretty tight knit area.
Speaker 1 (20:04):
I can't imagine the fear and horror that just went
through the community after Carol Anne was discovered, So investigators
started kind of doing their work and gathering suspects. There
were four main suspects that were named over the course
of the investigation into Carolan's case. I am going to
(20:25):
talk about them all a bit because I think that
they are important in the grand scheme of things in
carol An's case, and one of these men did end
up being the one who was named.
Speaker 2 (20:34):
As the killer in carol Ann's murder.
Speaker 1 (20:38):
So I think it's important to talk about all of
them because they all kind of do have some type
of connection where they could have been involved, and this
is how investigators kind of go through things. They look
at everything that they're presented with, and then one by
one they cross them off until they get to their
loan suspect. So we are going to get into the
(20:58):
details of them. If you want way more in depth details,
I do suggest you go listen to the Coldest Murder
podcast that I brought up earlier, because Mike and his
co host go.
Speaker 2 (21:10):
Into details on all of these guys.
Speaker 1 (21:12):
I'm just going to kind of talk a little bit
about each of them and then we're going to get
into where the case stands today. So the first suspect
was a man named Frank Zukerro and he was a
handyman and older guy, but was known as the town drunk.
He was described as mentally below average intelligence, having only completed.
Speaker 2 (21:35):
A fifth grade education.
Speaker 1 (21:37):
So he was seen in the area of the church
that day, and when he was questioned, he gave a
confession to the murder of Carol Ann, but they later
determined that it was unreliable due to his decrease mental capacity,
and I'd imagine the details he gave probably didn't match
up with the actual crime. And during this questioning, he
(21:59):
was of course subjected to hours of being isolated and
being questioned, and the alibi that he had was later
confirmed to be true. So although Frank gave a false confession,
this was not the guy. The next suspect is a
nineteen year old guy named Wayne Roach, and he was
(22:20):
from a nearby town. Now, the reason he kind of
came to be is because a few days after Carol
Ann's murder, his parents found a notebook or a piece
of paper that had Carol Ann's name written on it
and other details about her murder. So they actually phoned
police and said, we don't know what to do with this,
(22:43):
but something is going on here. So they were able
to track this guy down and they were able to
confirm that he was out of state and had an alibi,
so he was cleared of any involvement in Carol Ann's murder.
The next man was Reverend Joseph Sabotish. Now this guy
is very interesting because he was a reverend and he
(23:06):
worked at Saint Mark's Church, so the fact that he
could have been.
Speaker 2 (23:10):
There that day is highly likely.
Speaker 1 (23:13):
So when he was questioned, he initially lied to investigators
about where he was on October twenty second. He said
that he was visiting with parishioners, but when they circled
back and asked the parishioners if that was true, they said, no,
he was not visiting with us. And it turns out
that he was in fact not visiting with parishioners, and
(23:34):
he was lying because he needed to cover his tracks,
but not because he was a killer, but because he
had been at a store buying lingerie for a female
friend of his, and he was pursuing this female friend
romantically although she was married, and given the fact that
he was a reverend, he had taken a vow of celibacy,
(23:58):
so he to investigators essentially because he was trying not
to get caught doing something that he wasn't supposed to
be doing, so they were able to confirm his whereabouts
during Carol Ann's murder.
Speaker 2 (24:14):
So this guy is also not our guy. Now.
Speaker 1 (24:17):
I do think that a lot of people before the
announcement of who the real killer is, thought that the
reverend was probably the strongest suspect, and I can fully
see that because there were apparently other reports that he
was just kind of a little odd.
Speaker 2 (24:33):
He was kind of a little creepy.
Speaker 1 (24:35):
Maybe a few other people had come forward and said
that he made them uncomfortable something to that effect.
Speaker 2 (24:42):
But you can be creepy and weird and also not
be a murderer.
Speaker 1 (24:46):
So this guy, although he might have been weird, he
was not in fact the killer. So the last suspect
was a drifter named William Schrader. And there was a
couple of eyewitnesses who said that they saw a man
coming out of the church around the time of Carol
Ann's murder, and they had reason to believe that that
(25:09):
man was William Schrader. So he was twenty four at
the time of Carol Anne's murder. He worked in town,
but was a drifter. He was kind of back and forth.
He was staying in Bristol with family, and he was
staying in Bristol on Lincoln Avenue, which was right near
Saint Mark's Church. So he was questioned following the crime.
(25:31):
He ended up giving a pubic care sample and also
took and failed a polygraph test, which I've said it before,
I'll say it again. I don't put a lot of
weight in polygraph tests, especially back in the sixties.
Speaker 2 (25:44):
But it was everything else that William did that was shady.
Speaker 1 (25:48):
So he gave an alibi, which was basically him saying
that he was at work, but his time card proved.
Speaker 2 (25:55):
That was false.
Speaker 1 (25:56):
In fact, he had clocked out of work on October
nineteen and didn't return until October twenty fourth. Police confronted
him with this information, and he then changed his story
and said that he was at a local junkyard replacing
the motor on his car on October twenty second, and
that he had finished replacing it the following day, which
(26:17):
was October twenty third. Now, they tried to confirm the
story with the owner of the junk shop, but they
weren't able to. William left town shortly after this and
headed for Florida. So over all of the years and
all of the different testing and everything that they did,
the only person that they couldn't fully exclude as belonging
(26:38):
to the pubic care that was at the scene was
William Schrader's hair. Now, technology was not advanced like it
is now back then, and every time they tested it
it was just inconclusive. They couldn't eliminate him as the
owner of this hair, so he was always kind of
on the radar. It said that it had striking similarities
(27:01):
to the ones that were found at the scene, and
over the course of this decade long investigation, they tested
over one hundred and forty one samples and all the
others were ruled out, but his was never able to
be really ruled out. But it also wasn't conclusive that
it belonged to him. So from this I think, personally,
(27:23):
just reading what I'm reading at this point in time,
that William Schrader was likely the strongest suspect, although the
others are compelling and it does kind of make sense
that all of them could have been involved in some way,
shape or form, but he is the one for me
that stands out the most. His alibi wasn't able to
be confirmed. The hair sample of it all, it all
(27:46):
just kind of isn't tied up as a nice little
he didn't do it. His alibi checks out, the hair
doesn't match, So for me, he would be somebody that
would just kind of be on the radar, and law
enforcement agreed. So it happened in nineteen sixty two, and
by the nineties it had pretty much vanished from the headlines.
There was a renewed interest in nineteen ninety two when
(28:09):
the Bucks County Courier Times published a series on Carol's murder,
and it basically just kind of went through everything. There
was different information from the police files and interviews with
some of the original investigators, and that kind of renewed
interest in everything. And at this point in time is
(28:32):
when William Schrader really became a focus of law enforcement.
But by this point in time, he was already serving
time in Louisiana for murder, which we're going to get
into soon. But the DA at the time ended up
extraditing him back to Pennsylvania from Louisiana for questioning.
Speaker 2 (28:53):
And when they questioned.
Speaker 1 (28:55):
Him, they gave him a polygraph, it was shown that
he was deceptive, and then he ended up pleading the
fifth in front of a grand jury. So with that,
he was basically returned to Louisiana and he was never
charged in anything in regards to Caro Lan's case. So
(29:15):
from nineteen ninety two till twenty twenty four, that's kind
of where things stood. There was no movement, there was
nobody held responsible. And obviously, in the midst of all
of this, technology is rapidly advancing day to day and
Mike started his podcast in twenty twenty four as well,
(29:38):
and just started kind of putting the pressure on everybody
that had a hand in overseeing Caro Lan's case, talking
about it, spreading the word, getting it out there on
a more national level versus just local. And I really
(29:59):
think that that that's what makes the biggest difference in
these super old and cold cases, is not letting the
pressure off, keeping that person's name out there, keeping the
case out there, making sure that nobody forgets about it,
because that is what is solving these cases.
Speaker 2 (30:17):
It's public pressure, it's.
Speaker 1 (30:19):
Families not giving up and not letting the people that
are basically in charge of these cold cases forget that
they exist. We have to keep the pressure on, and
that's exactly what I believe. When Mike started the podcast
The Coldest Murder, I think that really helped kind of
propel things forward because everything started changing in twenty twenty
(30:43):
four as it pertained to Caro Land's case.
Speaker 2 (30:46):
In twenty twenty four, the.
Speaker 1 (30:48):
District Attorney announced that they were taking a fresh look
at everything, rerunning all the evidence and going back through
everything in the investigation, and then they announced the results
of their investigation in twenty twenty five, the man who
killed Carol Ann Doherty was in fact none other than
(31:08):
William Schrader. There was also this alleged confession that William
had given to somebody that he had met in prison,
somebody who would later become his stepson. We're going to
get into all of that, but there was also this confession.
So we're going to talk about the confession here in
a little bit. But I do want to talk about
(31:29):
William because this.
Speaker 2 (31:32):
Guy is awful, awful, awful awful. Now.
Speaker 1 (31:36):
He passed away in two thousand and two, and he
did some really really bad things. Trigger warning on everything
we're going to be talking about, because this guy is
a demon, and he's the type of person that makes
me really really hope that there is a hell, because
that is exactly where this man belongs. And if you
(31:57):
want to talk about the proof in the pudding that
a leopard doesn't change his spots, look no further than
William Schrader. So he was born on February first of
nineteen thirty eight, and he spent his childhood in Pennsylvania.
He started his life of bad choices and behavior and
being a horrible human when he was only eight years
(32:18):
old when he would go up to random girls in
school and stop on their feet for no reason. He
was then sent to a reform school where he would
go on to go up to girls and just punch
them in the mouth unprovoked. At age twelve, and then
at age fifteen, he stole a car, and then at
(32:38):
seventeen he decided he was going to join the army
and was given a dishonorable discharge.
Speaker 2 (32:44):
Just a year later at.
Speaker 1 (32:45):
Age eighteen, when he was twenty, he was arrested for
attempted murder with a handgun, and according to a Yahoo
News article at the time of this arrest, for this
attempted murder, he is quoted as telling a newspaper, each
day I spend in prison means the victim will live
(33:06):
one day longer. The next time I shoot him, I
won't miss end quote. So this guy is very heinous,
so bad that the jail that housed him didn't even
want him there.
Speaker 2 (33:18):
They wanted to send him elsewhere.
Speaker 1 (33:22):
He was then placed in Eastern State Prison in Philadelphia,
and then after that, after he was released, he went
to live with his brother Frank in Bristol, Pennsylvania, where
he at some point in time, threatened his sister in law,
and as we now know, also went on to kill
Carol Ann. He then left after he kind of became
(33:46):
a suspect. He went to Florida and Texas, eventually ended
up in Louisiana and married a woman named Audrey. So
Audrey had children of her own. There were some that
were a and there was one who was younger. So
she had an adult son who were going to talk
about in a little bit, and had an adult daughter
(34:08):
and an underage daughter. Both of the daughters had special needs,
and William, being a complete creepy pervert, ended up having
a child with one of these children and would go
on to sexually abuse that child as well.
Speaker 2 (34:24):
Yes, he is a horrible person.
Speaker 1 (34:27):
They even at some point in time adopted a child,
and there was also a.
Speaker 2 (34:34):
Neighbor child that lived with them who was twelve.
Speaker 1 (34:37):
All of this is really confusing to me because I
don't know how he got away with everything he did
for such a long time and how he just had
nothing but access to children. But it was a different time,
so I have to just kind of put that in
my mind as well.
Speaker 2 (34:54):
So there was a physical fight that.
Speaker 1 (34:57):
Happened between him and Audrey on Halloween in nineteen seventy
and he ended up being kicked out of the house.
He became very upset and verbally threatened to come back
and burn the house down, And that is exactly what
he did on Holloway night in nineteen seventy. He went
to the gas station, he got gasoline and came back
(35:19):
and set the house on fire that he shared with
his family.
Speaker 2 (35:24):
Now, everybody was able.
Speaker 1 (35:25):
To get out, except for twelve year old Catherine Smith,
who was in a room trying.
Speaker 2 (35:31):
To protect her two year old foster sister.
Speaker 1 (35:35):
And I read the case files that are available online
on the arson and murder of Catherine Smith. There's a
lot of information in there. I'm going to link them
both below in the show notes so you can go
read them for yourselves. But this guy was horrible and heinous.
He was calculated. He was a monster, a true sociopathic monster.
(36:00):
And the fact that he was able to rain all
of this terror over everybody that he came in contact
with for such a long time is absolutely atrocious. The
fact that nobody ever realized what a horrible person this was.
It's just insane to me that all of this was
(36:20):
able to go on. So even though he did what
he did in nineteen seventy, he ended up not being
tried for it until nineteen eighty six and he was
convicted and sentenced to twenty one years. Now he was
still serving time in two thousand and two when he
died from a heart attack at age sixty four. In
(36:42):
the press conference that the District Attorney had recently about
this case being solved, the DA said that he had
a pattern of preying on young children. There was also
two family members that he impregnated. One was a child
and one was an adult with mental disabils. That was
Audrey's children. I believe so this guy is majorly deranged,
(37:07):
and I'm sure that there is more in his past
that investigators haven't even uncovered yet, because this.
Speaker 2 (37:12):
Is just what we know now.
Speaker 1 (37:15):
When the Bucks County detectives were relooking into everything and
reinvestigating the Carol Ann case, they found a two thousand
and seven letter that said that William had confessed to
Carol Ann's murder and the person that had come forward
with this was a man named Robert LeBlanc. And this
(37:36):
Robert LeBlanc guy was somebody that William had met in
prison in nineteen sixty, so Robert was actually the adult
son of Audrey, who William would later marry.
Speaker 2 (37:49):
Can you follow that? Because I was so confused?
Speaker 1 (37:52):
So Robert told his parole officer that William had confessed
to him. He said that he and William and another
friend were out drinking at a place called the Devil's
Swamp when William said that he had committed the perfect
murder and very much gave details which matched up to.
Speaker 2 (38:10):
Carol Ann's murder.
Speaker 1 (38:12):
And back when this confession was given, Robert wouldn't have
had any knowledge of Carol Ann's murder in the details
that he was able to give. So this was another
reason and another little checkmark for William Schrader is definitely
guilty of killing Carol Ann. So they had that, and
then they also had the fact that the pubic care
(38:35):
did officially belong to him.
Speaker 2 (38:36):
They sent it off in twenty twenty.
Speaker 1 (38:38):
Four to a lab in Texas and they were able
to confirm that, in fact, the pubic care did belong
to William Schrader. And the same cigarettes that were found
outside of the church were also the kind that William
was known to smoke during a twenty twenty five press
conference in which Carol Ann's sister Kay was in attendance.
They said Schrader's life was marked by a pattern of
(39:02):
violence and sexual violence, particularly against young, pre prebescent and
adolescent females. Investigators determined he sexually abused nearly every female
child he lived with or had access to end quote,
and that is just absolutely disgusting, not only that he
was able to do this for so long, but that
he accessed so many children and seemingly flew under the radar.
(39:28):
I really don't know how he was able to get
away with it for so long. He definitely had a
lot of different undiagnosed mental things going on. Not giving
him any excuse at all because he is a absolute monster.
But it's interesting this day and age, if somebody were
to exhibit those traits, I would hope and think that
(39:52):
they would be locked up and they would be behind
bars and not just allowed to be out and about.
He seemingly just bounced around from town to town to town.
He manipulated people, he took advantage of people, and he
always had access to children, which just makes me absolutely
sick to my stomach knowing what he did and knowing
(40:14):
that he's probably done things that we don't even know
about at the moment. So Kay, who is Carol Ann's sister,
She was only three when her sister died, and she
remembers just the absolute horror of that evening and her
dad screams and cries, And unfortunately, Carol's parents passed away
(40:38):
without knowing what happened to their daughter. Dorothy, Carol's mom
died in nineteen seventy five at only fifty four years old,
and Frank died in two thousand and one at age
seventy seven. And Kay is the only immediate family member
that is left of Carol Anne's And like I said,
she attended the press conference and she's and it's very powerful.
(41:02):
I'm going to link it below in the show notes.
You guys can go watch and listen. And she said
that Carol Ann's murder changed my family's life forever, and
our family lived without answers, and the uncertainty surrounding Carol's
death became a part of who we were. My parents
both passed away without knowing on this earth who murdered
(41:24):
their daughter. After so many decades of unknowing, this finding
finally brings closure and a truth to a wound that
never healed, And when you think about it, it has
been such a long time since Carol Ann's life was
taken Her poor parents had to live out the rest
of their entire lives without ever knowing what happened to
(41:45):
their daughter, and knowing that the person that did that
probably was walking around harming other people as well. But
when I always say time is running out for these
horrific humans that have gotten away with stuff for such
a long time, I mean it.
Speaker 2 (42:03):
This happened in nineteen sixty two.
Speaker 1 (42:06):
DNA didn't even exist and the small town of Bristol,
the police department took the DNA and they stored it,
and they stored it in an attic of the police department,
and a lot of it was degraded, and every time
they tried to run it, they couldn't run it because
it was degraded. But twenty twenty five technology solved Carol
(42:29):
Ann's case, a case that happened in nineteen sixty two.
So it's only going to get better. They're only going
to be able to solve more.
Speaker 2 (42:39):
Crimes with less.
Speaker 1 (42:41):
If you have a minuscule amount of DNA and it's degraded,
they're going to be able to solve crimes with that
super minuscule degraded DNA because technology is advancing and predators
that are out and about lurking, their.
Speaker 2 (42:58):
Time is running out now.
Speaker 1 (43:00):
Unfortunately, William Schrader passed away in two thousand and two,
so he never had to pay for his crimes. And
that is why I say I hope that there is
a hell, because if there's somebody that belongs there, it
is a thousand percent William Schrader. So thank you guys
so much for tuning in to Carol's story. I think,
(43:21):
of all things, it's important to remember who she was
in her nine short years of life. She was well loved,
a good student, a good kid, she loved reading, she
always said her prayers, and unfortunately her life was taken
while she was at a church saying her prayers. So
(43:42):
that is how Carol should be remembered for who she was,
not how her life was taken. And I'm so glad
that her sister Kay has some answers as to who
is responsible and what happened, so hopefully she can start
trying to piece everything back together and start to heal
a lilt a little bit, and hopefully, although her parents
(44:02):
have passed on. They are also at peace knowing that
the person that did this to their.
Speaker 2 (44:09):
Daughter is not able to harm anybody else.
Speaker 1 (44:13):
Thank you guys so much for listening to Carol Ann
Doherty's story. Like I said, if you want a little
more in depth coverage and different episodic details about it,
I'm going to link that podcast in the show notes
below for you guys. Again, it is called The Coldest Murder,
(44:33):
so be sure.
Speaker 2 (44:34):
To check that out.
Speaker 1 (44:35):
I actually have to go finish myself home only on
episode three, so I'm going to be tuning into that
today while.
Speaker 2 (44:41):
I decorate for Christmas.
Speaker 1 (44:43):
I hope you guys have a wonderful weekend ahead, and
I will see you next week for a brand new
Unsolved case.
Speaker 2 (44:50):
Bye.
Warning, this episode contains graphic crime scene detail as well
as talk of sexual assault. Please listen with discretion. Welcome
to Primetime Crime. I'm your host, Kylie. Let's talk right
now in true crime, and then together we're going to
work on warming.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
Up some cold cases. Let's go.
Speaker 1 (00:16):
Hey, guys, welcome to this week's episode of Primetime Crime.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
It's Kylie.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
We have a quick little right now in true crime,
a little housekeeping to do, and then we're going to
get into today's episode, so housekeeping.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
Next week, I am going to be bringing you.
Speaker 1 (00:32):
A guest episode case from my friend Holly with Crime
with Holly. If you have been listening to my podcast,
you've heard from Holly before. And then I will be
back the following week, and then I am going to
be doing another guest episode the week of Thanksgiving from
(00:54):
my friend Kadra from Perplexity, a mystery podcast. She has
so graciously also shared an episode with me so that
way I can share it with you guys. And mostly
it's so I can have a little bit of time
off just to completely unplug from my real job and
the podcast job, especially the week of Thanksgiving, because I
(01:18):
am really trying to give myself that time off from work,
my real work and my podcast work just to very
much take some time off. So I am going to
be sharing those two episodes in the coming weeks, but
I did just want to kind of give you guys
a heads up because I typically am very consistent and
(01:41):
I still want to be consistent in sharing episodes. So
both of those episodes are going to be very good,
and it's also going to give you an opportunity to
hear from different people and be able to check out
their podcasts as well.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
And they are two friends of mine and two people.
Speaker 1 (01:59):
That I support, and they support me and always are
willing to share an episode when the time comes that
one of us needs it, So please check both of
them out and you will be able to cure their
episodes in the coming weeks. So right now, in true crime,
let's get into it. So this case out of Arizona,
(02:20):
I haven't been super following. I've seen different things on
social media, but I haven't been super keeping up with it.
But there was a man named Christopher Schultez out of
Arizona and his daughter. Two year old daughter died last
year because he left her in a very very hot
(02:41):
car while he played video games. So he was set
earlier this week to accept officially accept this plea agreement,
and he was going to be sentenced, and then the
night before his sentence, before he was doing court, he
took his own life. And it's just so frustrating the
(03:02):
lack of accountability that this individual has.
Speaker 2 (03:07):
I don't even have.
Speaker 1 (03:09):
Words for his actions that led to his daughter's death
and then this whole thing transpiring the way it did.
It's just really sad. It's all really unfortunate. None of
it should have ever happened. But as of right now,
that's all I really have on that. If there is
anything else that transpires or comes out, I will be
sure to share it with you. Now, moving on to
(03:31):
somebody that surprisingly I guess is taking accountability is Jake Harrow,
who is the father of Emmanuel Harrow, who was reported
missing in August.
Speaker 2 (03:41):
And there was a story about the fake.
Speaker 1 (03:45):
Kidnapping and the mom had a black eye and so
on and so forth. It ended up coming out that
Jake had some really bad prior child abuse allegations. One
of his children is actually quadriplegic from being abused when
she was very very young. She now is living with
(04:07):
a different family. Her name is changed. She is very,
very medically fragile. She has a lot of complications from
the abuse that she received from her father, Jake.
Speaker 2 (04:18):
And then Jake goes on and.
Speaker 1 (04:20):
Has baby Emmanuel, who allegedly also suffered from this horrific
abuse at the hands of his father, and then he
goes quote unquote missing, and everything kind of comes to
life that this isn't all that. It looks like there's
way more to it than him being kidnapped. So he
(04:43):
again did plead guilty and he has been sentenced to
twenty five years to life in prison. He is thirty
two years old, and he was sentenced on November third,
so earlier this week. And even though he played guid
to murdering his son, his body still has not been found,
(05:05):
which I think is really really interesting. What is he
holding back? What isn't he telling investigators. There was one
point in time when he took investigators to an area
and they were searching, hopeful I think that they would
find Emmanuel's remains, and they came up empty handed. So
I don't really know where things are going with this.
(05:26):
But he was sentenced twenty five years is not nearly
enough time given the fact that he's only thirty two
years old. I hope it's more on the life side,
because he obviously took the life of am Manuel, he
pled guilty to it, and he took the life of
his other daughter as well, because she has lifelong disabilities
(05:49):
because of the abuse that he inflicted on her. This
is not a good person. This is a horrible, horrible human.
He should have never been allowed to have more children
after he.
Speaker 2 (06:00):
Abused his daughter. It's just awful.
Speaker 1 (06:03):
So if there is anything new and breaking on that,
I will be sure to let you guys know. But
the mom, Rebecca, she has still decided to keep her
plea of not guilty. There is set to be a
settlement conference on January twenty first, so that is kind
of where things stand today as far as she goes.
I don't know what Jake has said versus what she
(06:27):
has said, because initially Jake said he was not guilty
and then he decided to change his plea to guilty.
So I don't know what's going on behind the scenes,
but I know investigators are probably doing everything they can
to try to figure out where baby Emmanuel's remains are.
So if there is any update in it, I will
be sure to give you guys the latest. All right,
(06:48):
last thing I want to talk about. I'm sure there's
plenty more going on in the true crime world, but
this one was a little interesting to me.
Speaker 2 (06:56):
It was just a weird headline.
Speaker 1 (06:58):
Alec Murda is disturbed and disappointed with the Hulu's portrayal
of his family. Now I don't even have words. So
this man is serving life in prison for the murder
of his wife and son, amongst many other things, financial
(07:19):
crimes stacked on.
Speaker 2 (07:20):
Top of each other, stacked on top of each.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
Other, stacked on top of each other, and apparently he
has access to Hulu in there.
Speaker 2 (07:28):
I don't know if I guess he has a tablet.
Speaker 1 (07:31):
We know that we've seen the selfies that he's taken
in prison, and I guess he has access to Hulu
and has watched this series that is on Hulu, which
I said is amazing, and I think it is so
well done. And yes there are parts that are dramatized
because it is not a documentary, but he is saying
(07:54):
that they way that his family is portrayed is not accurate,
and I think, personally watching it, I feel the accuracy
of things. I think it's so accurate watching him spiral
in the last few days leading up to the murders,
literally the financials of everything peering over his shoulder in
(08:19):
just days, his dad going into the hospital and him
being told that his dad wasn't going to make it,
and Maggie leaving Mozelle and going to the beach house,
like there is so much, in my opinion, that the
Hulu doc really lays out and probably accurately describes. I
(08:42):
think it shows his spiral, and I think it does
a really good job at showing his spiral. But he
does not like to take accountability for anything, so of
course he doesn't think it portrays things accurately because in
his head, he didn't do anything wrong and he shouldn't
be behind bars. And it's just actually insane that he
(09:02):
decided to make a statement about the portrayal of everything
and how his family is shown.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
It's wild, It's truly wild.
Speaker 1 (09:13):
But apparently he has access to Hulu behind bars, so
I think we still have a couple episodes to go.
This last week's episode was so well done and I
will say it so many times again.
Speaker 2 (09:26):
The guy that's playing Alec is amazing. His portrayal of.
Speaker 1 (09:31):
Him is so on point, I think that I'm watching
the real Murda.
Speaker 2 (09:36):
It's wild.
Speaker 1 (09:38):
Anyways, I just thought that was a very interesting little
headline because of course he has an opinion about it.
Speaker 2 (09:43):
It doesn't paint him in a good light. He's not
going to approve of it.
Speaker 1 (09:47):
Of course, not so interesting nonetheless, But with all of that,
we are going to go ahead and get into today's episode.
Speaker 2 (09:55):
Alrighty guys, we are getting into a brand new case today.
This week's episode is.
Speaker 1 (10:01):
Going to be one of those type of episodes that
is going to be hard to listen to, but I
do want to share it because we have a case
that has been solved after sixty two years, which is
so huge in the cold case community. So today we
are going to be talking about the now solved homicide
(10:23):
and sexual assault of nine year old Carol Ann Doherty.
Speaker 2 (10:28):
Now, just a little PSA.
Speaker 1 (10:30):
I did a lot of research on how to say
Carol Ann's last name, because I've heard this last name
said so many different ways. But given the area that
Carol Ann lived in Bristol, Pennsylvania, this is how they
said the last name, which is Dougherty.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
So that is how I am going to be saying it, but.
Speaker 1 (10:50):
Apparently there are a lot of different pronunciations of the
last name, and I always want to be sure that
I am doing my best to say things accurately and
get things as accurate as I can, So I did
just want to give a little psa. I think it
really depends on where you're from and where you live
and all of that in regards to how you say
(11:11):
this last name. So, Carol Ann's murder took place in
nineteen sixty two in like I said, Bristol, Pennsylvania, and
although her perpetrator passed away in two thousand and two,
we finally have some answers about what happened to Carol Ann.
And it won't come as a surprise that the man
who so violently took her life had a very violent
(11:33):
criminal history and was on the radar of law enforcement
for a super long time. He was even a suspect
in Carol Ann's death, but unfortunately, due to the time
being what it was and technology not being as advanced,
they were never able to bring charges against him for
Carol's murder. For my research, I listened to the Coldest
(11:55):
Murder podcast, which was actually created by a guy named
Mike Missinelli, and he is a sports talk host in Philly,
and he grew up in the same area as this
case took place. He lived in Bristol, and at the
time of Carol Ann's murder, his uncle was the town's.
Speaker 2 (12:13):
Police chief and he was only seven.
Speaker 1 (12:16):
He lived right around the corner from the church where
this crime took place, and he remembers all of the
events of that evening all too well. And he talks
about in the podcast how much of a market left
on him, but also on the town of Bristol. So
I highly suggest you give his podcast a listen. I
will be sure to link up below. In the show notes,
(12:36):
they do go into a lot more detail on all
of the different suspects and everything. I'm only about three
episodes in, but I think that he does a really
good job. He and his co host kind of going
through everything and talking about the events that happened, going
into details of.
Speaker 2 (12:51):
All the suspects.
Speaker 1 (12:52):
And I'm waiting for an update episode since this case
recently was solved. So with all of that being said,
let's go ahead and dive in to Carol Anne's story.
Carol Anne Doherty was born to her parents Francis Joseph
Frank Doherty and Dorothy. She had a younger sister named Kay.
(13:12):
Her family had previously lived in Philly before moving to
Bristol two years prior to her death. Carol was a
fifth grade student at Saint Mark's School in Bristol, Pennsylvania.
The Doherty family resided at sixty eight Manor Circle, which
was about one point two miles from Saint Mark's Roman
(13:33):
Catholic Church, where Carol Anne and her family attended. She
also went to the Saint Mark's School that was part
of the family's church. So Carol was raised in a
Catholic household and was a very good kid. She was
the kind of kid who would often pass by the
church and stop in to say a prayer on her
(13:53):
way to her destination. Now this was very common practice
for Carol An. This wasn't anything out of the ordinary
since she did grow up in the church and at school,
the nuns would often tell the children, if you pass
by a church, you should stop in and say a prayer.
And Carol Anne was known to bike around town and
(14:13):
she would kind of go back and forth to the
local library. She loved reading and spent a lot of
time going back and forth from her home to the
library to return different books and check.
Speaker 2 (14:25):
Out new ones.
Speaker 1 (14:27):
And when I was researching this case, reading about Carol
Anne's love for library books and going back and forth
to the library, it kind of made me sad because
so many things nowadays are so technology based, and I'll
be honest, I'm even guilty of it because I'm such
an audiobook person that libraries are just such a lost thing,
(14:49):
and it really just kind of makes me sad that
I feel like kids don't go to libraries as much
anymore like I did as a child, and it's just
something that I feel like we need to get back
to kids going to libraries, checking out library books, seeing
what the new books are. I feel like that was
so exciting when I was little, to go to the
(15:09):
library and see all the different books.
Speaker 2 (15:11):
That they had.
Speaker 1 (15:12):
So nineteen sixty two was a different time and place.
Like I said, Carol often rode her bike around town,
and Bristol was a really safe town and nobody ever
thought anything of a child going out and riding their
bike a couple of miles to go to the library
or to go to the local store.
Speaker 2 (15:31):
This was normal back in the day.
Speaker 1 (15:33):
People didn't think like they think now, where you can't
even let your child out of your sight for two
point two seconds at a fear of something bad's going
to happen to them. So it was a Monday, October
twenty second of nineteen sixty two. Carol Anne had attended
school that day and came home after school to change
out of her school uniform and then left on her
(15:56):
bike with two books to return to the Bristol Borough
Free Library. And she was also going to meet up
with a couple friends there as well. And Carol had
been excited about checking out another book in the mystery
series that she had been reading, so she was so
excited to get these other books back and check out
these other two books. Now, when I was first researching
(16:18):
this case, I did get some conflict information on if
Carol Ann made it to the library or not. But
it does not seem that she ever made it to
the library because the two books that she was set
to return were found with her bike outside of the
church where she would ultimately be found. So I did
just want to bring that up real quick because there
(16:40):
was a little bit of discrepancies there. But I think
from what I've been able to tell she never did
make it to the library and she was not able
to meet her friends that day. So now we're going
to get into kind of a timeline of the different
route that Carol Ann took that day, the different stop
she made, and how ultimately she ended up at.
Speaker 2 (17:02):
The church where she ultimately would lose her life.
Speaker 1 (17:05):
So, as I said, Carol Anne's mode of transportation was
her bike. She was on her bike going through town.
She stopped to get a coke and a candy at
Tommy's Cafe and was then seen traveling on her bike
down Lincoln Avenue, and then she was last seen at
Saint Mark's Catholic Church, which was located at ten twenty
(17:27):
five Radcliffe Street. So she passed by the church and
decided that she was going to stop in to church
to pray. And like I said, this was something that
was normal for Carol Anne. She would pass by the
church and she would hear what the nuns of her
school told her, if you pass by church, you need
to go in and pray.
Speaker 2 (17:47):
So that is exactly what she did.
Speaker 1 (17:50):
Carol Anne did not return home for dinner, so her parents,
of course became very concerned and they went to go
search for her. Her father Frank, found her bike outside
of the church, Saint Mark's Church and went inside to
look for her. Now, when he went in, he found
the most horrific scene. Around five thirty pm that Monday evening,
(18:15):
he found his daughter's body on the upstairs landing leading
to the church's balcony and choir loft area. She was
unfortunately deceased, and he ran out of the church in shock,
trying to get somebody to help him, and authorities were
of course then alerted. So once investigators arrived, it was
(18:39):
determined that Caroline had been sexually assaulted and strangled with
some type of ligature. Now, whoever did this, obviously is
a real sick human to do this to a child,
but especially in a church setting. Now, there were some
tissues and a couple of cigarettes that were found outside
(18:59):
of the church, and there were also some pubic cares
that were in Carol Anne's hand. Now, it was nineteen
sixty two, DNA was not a thing. But the investigators
took what they had at the scene and took it
into their possession and they began their investigation. They asked
(19:21):
some local neighbors if they saw anything and nobody really
had come forward and said that they saw anything notable
that day, so initially there wasn't really any persons of
interest right off that, but they kind of were going
the route of checking into anyone that had a record
of sex crimes. So this crime awful. For it to
(19:44):
happen in a church, a young kid in a small
little town like Bristol, it just really shocked the community.
There was a lot of kids that lived in this neighborhood,
and of course all of the members of the church,
all of their families.
Speaker 2 (20:02):
It was a pretty tight knit area.
Speaker 1 (20:04):
I can't imagine the fear and horror that just went
through the community after Carol Anne was discovered, So investigators
started kind of doing their work and gathering suspects. There
were four main suspects that were named over the course
of the investigation into Carolan's case. I am going to
(20:25):
talk about them all a bit because I think that
they are important in the grand scheme of things in
carol An's case, and one of these men did end
up being the one who was named.
Speaker 2 (20:34):
As the killer in carol Ann's murder.
Speaker 1 (20:38):
So I think it's important to talk about all of
them because they all kind of do have some type
of connection where they could have been involved, and this
is how investigators kind of go through things. They look
at everything that they're presented with, and then one by
one they cross them off until they get to their
loan suspect. So we are going to get into the
(20:58):
details of them. If you want way more in depth details,
I do suggest you go listen to the Coldest Murder
podcast that I brought up earlier, because Mike and his
co host go.
Speaker 2 (21:10):
Into details on all of these guys.
Speaker 1 (21:12):
I'm just going to kind of talk a little bit
about each of them and then we're going to get
into where the case stands today. So the first suspect
was a man named Frank Zukerro and he was a
handyman and older guy, but was known as the town drunk.
He was described as mentally below average intelligence, having only completed.
Speaker 2 (21:35):
A fifth grade education.
Speaker 1 (21:37):
So he was seen in the area of the church
that day, and when he was questioned, he gave a
confession to the murder of Carol Ann, but they later
determined that it was unreliable due to his decrease mental capacity,
and I'd imagine the details he gave probably didn't match
up with the actual crime. And during this questioning, he
(21:59):
was of course subjected to hours of being isolated and
being questioned, and the alibi that he had was later
confirmed to be true. So although Frank gave a false confession,
this was not the guy. The next suspect is a
nineteen year old guy named Wayne Roach, and he was
(22:20):
from a nearby town. Now, the reason he kind of
came to be is because a few days after Carol
Ann's murder, his parents found a notebook or a piece
of paper that had Carol Ann's name written on it
and other details about her murder. So they actually phoned
police and said, we don't know what to do with this,
(22:43):
but something is going on here. So they were able
to track this guy down and they were able to
confirm that he was out of state and had an alibi,
so he was cleared of any involvement in Carol Ann's murder.
The next man was Reverend Joseph Sabotish. Now this guy
is very interesting because he was a reverend and he
(23:06):
worked at Saint Mark's Church, so the fact that he
could have been.
Speaker 2 (23:10):
There that day is highly likely.
Speaker 1 (23:13):
So when he was questioned, he initially lied to investigators
about where he was on October twenty second. He said
that he was visiting with parishioners, but when they circled
back and asked the parishioners if that was true, they said, no,
he was not visiting with us. And it turns out
that he was in fact not visiting with parishioners, and
(23:34):
he was lying because he needed to cover his tracks,
but not because he was a killer, but because he
had been at a store buying lingerie for a female
friend of his, and he was pursuing this female friend
romantically although she was married, and given the fact that
he was a reverend, he had taken a vow of celibacy,
(23:58):
so he to investigators essentially because he was trying not
to get caught doing something that he wasn't supposed to
be doing, so they were able to confirm his whereabouts
during Carol Ann's murder.
Speaker 2 (24:14):
So this guy is also not our guy. Now.
Speaker 1 (24:17):
I do think that a lot of people before the
announcement of who the real killer is, thought that the
reverend was probably the strongest suspect, and I can fully
see that because there were apparently other reports that he
was just kind of a little odd.
Speaker 2 (24:33):
He was kind of a little creepy.
Speaker 1 (24:35):
Maybe a few other people had come forward and said
that he made them uncomfortable something to that effect.
Speaker 2 (24:42):
But you can be creepy and weird and also not
be a murderer.
Speaker 1 (24:46):
So this guy, although he might have been weird, he
was not in fact the killer. So the last suspect
was a drifter named William Schrader. And there was a
couple of eyewitnesses who said that they saw a man
coming out of the church around the time of Carol
Ann's murder, and they had reason to believe that that
(25:09):
man was William Schrader. So he was twenty four at
the time of Carol Anne's murder. He worked in town,
but was a drifter. He was kind of back and forth.
He was staying in Bristol with family, and he was
staying in Bristol on Lincoln Avenue, which was right near
Saint Mark's Church. So he was questioned following the crime.
(25:31):
He ended up giving a pubic care sample and also
took and failed a polygraph test, which I've said it before,
I'll say it again. I don't put a lot of
weight in polygraph tests, especially back in the sixties.
Speaker 2 (25:44):
But it was everything else that William did that was shady.
Speaker 1 (25:48):
So he gave an alibi, which was basically him saying
that he was at work, but his time card proved.
Speaker 2 (25:55):
That was false.
Speaker 1 (25:56):
In fact, he had clocked out of work on October
nineteen and didn't return until October twenty fourth. Police confronted
him with this information, and he then changed his story
and said that he was at a local junkyard replacing
the motor on his car on October twenty second, and
that he had finished replacing it the following day, which
(26:17):
was October twenty third. Now, they tried to confirm the
story with the owner of the junk shop, but they
weren't able to. William left town shortly after this and
headed for Florida. So over all of the years and
all of the different testing and everything that they did,
the only person that they couldn't fully exclude as belonging
(26:38):
to the pubic care that was at the scene was
William Schrader's hair. Now, technology was not advanced like it
is now back then, and every time they tested it
it was just inconclusive. They couldn't eliminate him as the
owner of this hair, so he was always kind of
on the radar. It said that it had striking similarities
(27:01):
to the ones that were found at the scene, and
over the course of this decade long investigation, they tested
over one hundred and forty one samples and all the
others were ruled out, but his was never able to
be really ruled out. But it also wasn't conclusive that
it belonged to him. So from this I think, personally,
(27:23):
just reading what I'm reading at this point in time,
that William Schrader was likely the strongest suspect, although the
others are compelling and it does kind of make sense
that all of them could have been involved in some way,
shape or form, but he is the one for me
that stands out the most. His alibi wasn't able to
be confirmed. The hair sample of it all, it all
(27:46):
just kind of isn't tied up as a nice little
he didn't do it. His alibi checks out, the hair
doesn't match, So for me, he would be somebody that
would just kind of be on the radar, and law
enforcement agreed. So it happened in nineteen sixty two, and
by the nineties it had pretty much vanished from the headlines.
There was a renewed interest in nineteen ninety two when
(28:09):
the Bucks County Courier Times published a series on Carol's murder,
and it basically just kind of went through everything. There
was different information from the police files and interviews with
some of the original investigators, and that kind of renewed
interest in everything. And at this point in time is
(28:32):
when William Schrader really became a focus of law enforcement.
But by this point in time, he was already serving
time in Louisiana for murder, which we're going to get
into soon. But the DA at the time ended up
extraditing him back to Pennsylvania from Louisiana for questioning.
Speaker 2 (28:53):
And when they questioned.
Speaker 1 (28:55):
Him, they gave him a polygraph, it was shown that
he was deceptive, and then he ended up pleading the
fifth in front of a grand jury. So with that,
he was basically returned to Louisiana and he was never
charged in anything in regards to Caro Lan's case. So
(29:15):
from nineteen ninety two till twenty twenty four, that's kind
of where things stood. There was no movement, there was
nobody held responsible. And obviously, in the midst of all
of this, technology is rapidly advancing day to day and
Mike started his podcast in twenty twenty four as well,
(29:38):
and just started kind of putting the pressure on everybody
that had a hand in overseeing Caro Lan's case, talking
about it, spreading the word, getting it out there on
a more national level versus just local. And I really
(29:59):
think that that that's what makes the biggest difference in
these super old and cold cases, is not letting the
pressure off, keeping that person's name out there, keeping the
case out there, making sure that nobody forgets about it,
because that is what is solving these cases.
Speaker 2 (30:17):
It's public pressure, it's.
Speaker 1 (30:19):
Families not giving up and not letting the people that
are basically in charge of these cold cases forget that
they exist. We have to keep the pressure on, and
that's exactly what I believe. When Mike started the podcast
The Coldest Murder, I think that really helped kind of
propel things forward because everything started changing in twenty twenty
(30:43):
four as it pertained to Caro Land's case.
Speaker 2 (30:46):
In twenty twenty four, the.
Speaker 1 (30:48):
District Attorney announced that they were taking a fresh look
at everything, rerunning all the evidence and going back through
everything in the investigation, and then they announced the results
of their investigation in twenty twenty five, the man who
killed Carol Ann Doherty was in fact none other than
(31:08):
William Schrader. There was also this alleged confession that William
had given to somebody that he had met in prison,
somebody who would later become his stepson. We're going to
get into all of that, but there was also this confession.
So we're going to talk about the confession here in
a little bit. But I do want to talk about
(31:29):
William because this.
Speaker 2 (31:32):
Guy is awful, awful, awful awful. Now.
Speaker 1 (31:36):
He passed away in two thousand and two, and he
did some really really bad things. Trigger warning on everything
we're going to be talking about, because this guy is
a demon, and he's the type of person that makes
me really really hope that there is a hell, because
that is exactly where this man belongs. And if you
(31:57):
want to talk about the proof in the pudding that
a leopard doesn't change his spots, look no further than
William Schrader. So he was born on February first of
nineteen thirty eight, and he spent his childhood in Pennsylvania.
He started his life of bad choices and behavior and
being a horrible human when he was only eight years
(32:18):
old when he would go up to random girls in
school and stop on their feet for no reason. He
was then sent to a reform school where he would
go on to go up to girls and just punch
them in the mouth unprovoked. At age twelve, and then
at age fifteen, he stole a car, and then at
(32:38):
seventeen he decided he was going to join the army
and was given a dishonorable discharge.
Speaker 2 (32:44):
Just a year later at.
Speaker 1 (32:45):
Age eighteen, when he was twenty, he was arrested for
attempted murder with a handgun, and according to a Yahoo
News article at the time of this arrest, for this
attempted murder, he is quoted as telling a newspaper, each
day I spend in prison means the victim will live
(33:06):
one day longer. The next time I shoot him, I
won't miss end quote. So this guy is very heinous,
so bad that the jail that housed him didn't even
want him there.
Speaker 2 (33:18):
They wanted to send him elsewhere.
Speaker 1 (33:22):
He was then placed in Eastern State Prison in Philadelphia,
and then after that, after he was released, he went
to live with his brother Frank in Bristol, Pennsylvania, where
he at some point in time, threatened his sister in law,
and as we now know, also went on to kill
Carol Ann. He then left after he kind of became
(33:46):
a suspect. He went to Florida and Texas, eventually ended
up in Louisiana and married a woman named Audrey. So
Audrey had children of her own. There were some that
were a and there was one who was younger. So
she had an adult son who were going to talk
about in a little bit, and had an adult daughter
(34:08):
and an underage daughter. Both of the daughters had special needs,
and William, being a complete creepy pervert, ended up having
a child with one of these children and would go
on to sexually abuse that child as well.
Speaker 2 (34:24):
Yes, he is a horrible person.
Speaker 1 (34:27):
They even at some point in time adopted a child,
and there was also a.
Speaker 2 (34:34):
Neighbor child that lived with them who was twelve.
Speaker 1 (34:37):
All of this is really confusing to me because I
don't know how he got away with everything he did
for such a long time and how he just had
nothing but access to children. But it was a different time,
so I have to just kind of put that in
my mind as well.
Speaker 2 (34:54):
So there was a physical fight that.
Speaker 1 (34:57):
Happened between him and Audrey on Halloween in nineteen seventy
and he ended up being kicked out of the house.
He became very upset and verbally threatened to come back
and burn the house down, And that is exactly what
he did on Holloway night in nineteen seventy. He went
to the gas station, he got gasoline and came back
(35:19):
and set the house on fire that he shared with
his family.
Speaker 2 (35:24):
Now, everybody was able.
Speaker 1 (35:25):
To get out, except for twelve year old Catherine Smith,
who was in a room trying.
Speaker 2 (35:31):
To protect her two year old foster sister.
Speaker 1 (35:35):
And I read the case files that are available online
on the arson and murder of Catherine Smith. There's a
lot of information in there. I'm going to link them
both below in the show notes so you can go
read them for yourselves. But this guy was horrible and heinous.
He was calculated. He was a monster, a true sociopathic monster.
(36:00):
And the fact that he was able to rain all
of this terror over everybody that he came in contact
with for such a long time is absolutely atrocious. The
fact that nobody ever realized what a horrible person this was.
It's just insane to me that all of this was
(36:20):
able to go on. So even though he did what
he did in nineteen seventy, he ended up not being
tried for it until nineteen eighty six and he was
convicted and sentenced to twenty one years. Now he was
still serving time in two thousand and two when he
died from a heart attack at age sixty four. In
(36:42):
the press conference that the District Attorney had recently about
this case being solved, the DA said that he had
a pattern of preying on young children. There was also
two family members that he impregnated. One was a child
and one was an adult with mental disabils. That was
Audrey's children. I believe so this guy is majorly deranged,
(37:07):
and I'm sure that there is more in his past
that investigators haven't even uncovered yet, because this.
Speaker 2 (37:12):
Is just what we know now.
Speaker 1 (37:15):
When the Bucks County detectives were relooking into everything and
reinvestigating the Carol Ann case, they found a two thousand
and seven letter that said that William had confessed to
Carol Ann's murder and the person that had come forward
with this was a man named Robert LeBlanc. And this
(37:36):
Robert LeBlanc guy was somebody that William had met in
prison in nineteen sixty, so Robert was actually the adult
son of Audrey, who William would later marry.
Speaker 2 (37:49):
Can you follow that? Because I was so confused?
Speaker 1 (37:52):
So Robert told his parole officer that William had confessed
to him. He said that he and William and another
friend were out drinking at a place called the Devil's
Swamp when William said that he had committed the perfect
murder and very much gave details which matched up to.
Speaker 2 (38:10):
Carol Ann's murder.
Speaker 1 (38:12):
And back when this confession was given, Robert wouldn't have
had any knowledge of Carol Ann's murder in the details
that he was able to give. So this was another
reason and another little checkmark for William Schrader is definitely
guilty of killing Carol Ann. So they had that, and
then they also had the fact that the pubic care
(38:35):
did officially belong to him.
Speaker 2 (38:36):
They sent it off in twenty twenty.
Speaker 1 (38:38):
Four to a lab in Texas and they were able
to confirm that, in fact, the pubic care did belong
to William Schrader. And the same cigarettes that were found
outside of the church were also the kind that William
was known to smoke during a twenty twenty five press
conference in which Carol Ann's sister Kay was in attendance.
They said Schrader's life was marked by a pattern of
(39:02):
violence and sexual violence, particularly against young, pre prebescent and
adolescent females. Investigators determined he sexually abused nearly every female
child he lived with or had access to end quote,
and that is just absolutely disgusting, not only that he
was able to do this for so long, but that
he accessed so many children and seemingly flew under the radar.
(39:28):
I really don't know how he was able to get
away with it for so long. He definitely had a
lot of different undiagnosed mental things going on. Not giving
him any excuse at all because he is a absolute monster.
But it's interesting this day and age, if somebody were
to exhibit those traits, I would hope and think that
(39:52):
they would be locked up and they would be behind
bars and not just allowed to be out and about.
He seemingly just bounced around from town to town to town.
He manipulated people, he took advantage of people, and he
always had access to children, which just makes me absolutely
sick to my stomach knowing what he did and knowing
(40:14):
that he's probably done things that we don't even know
about at the moment. So Kay, who is Carol Ann's sister,
She was only three when her sister died, and she
remembers just the absolute horror of that evening and her
dad screams and cries, And unfortunately, Carol's parents passed away
(40:38):
without knowing what happened to their daughter. Dorothy, Carol's mom
died in nineteen seventy five at only fifty four years old,
and Frank died in two thousand and one at age
seventy seven. And Kay is the only immediate family member
that is left of Carol Anne's And like I said,
she attended the press conference and she's and it's very powerful.
(41:02):
I'm going to link it below in the show notes.
You guys can go watch and listen. And she said
that Carol Ann's murder changed my family's life forever, and
our family lived without answers, and the uncertainty surrounding Carol's
death became a part of who we were. My parents
both passed away without knowing on this earth who murdered
(41:24):
their daughter. After so many decades of unknowing, this finding
finally brings closure and a truth to a wound that
never healed, And when you think about it, it has
been such a long time since Carol Ann's life was
taken Her poor parents had to live out the rest
of their entire lives without ever knowing what happened to
(41:45):
their daughter, and knowing that the person that did that
probably was walking around harming other people as well. But
when I always say time is running out for these
horrific humans that have gotten away with stuff for such
a long time, I mean it.
Speaker 2 (42:03):
This happened in nineteen sixty two.
Speaker 1 (42:06):
DNA didn't even exist and the small town of Bristol,
the police department took the DNA and they stored it,
and they stored it in an attic of the police department,
and a lot of it was degraded, and every time
they tried to run it, they couldn't run it because
it was degraded. But twenty twenty five technology solved Carol
(42:29):
Ann's case, a case that happened in nineteen sixty two.
So it's only going to get better. They're only going
to be able to solve more.
Speaker 2 (42:39):
Crimes with less.
Speaker 1 (42:41):
If you have a minuscule amount of DNA and it's degraded,
they're going to be able to solve crimes with that
super minuscule degraded DNA because technology is advancing and predators
that are out and about lurking, their.
Speaker 2 (42:58):
Time is running out now.
Speaker 1 (43:00):
Unfortunately, William Schrader passed away in two thousand and two,
so he never had to pay for his crimes. And
that is why I say I hope that there is
a hell, because if there's somebody that belongs there, it
is a thousand percent William Schrader. So thank you guys
so much for tuning in to Carol's story. I think,
(43:21):
of all things, it's important to remember who she was
in her nine short years of life. She was well loved,
a good student, a good kid, she loved reading, she
always said her prayers, and unfortunately her life was taken
while she was at a church saying her prayers. So
(43:42):
that is how Carol should be remembered for who she was,
not how her life was taken. And I'm so glad
that her sister Kay has some answers as to who
is responsible and what happened, so hopefully she can start
trying to piece everything back together and start to heal
a lilt a little bit, and hopefully, although her parents
(44:02):
have passed on. They are also at peace knowing that
the person that did this to their.
Speaker 2 (44:09):
Daughter is not able to harm anybody else.
Speaker 1 (44:13):
Thank you guys so much for listening to Carol Ann
Doherty's story. Like I said, if you want a little
more in depth coverage and different episodic details about it,
I'm going to link that podcast in the show notes
below for you guys. Again, it is called The Coldest Murder,
(44:33):
so be sure.
Speaker 2 (44:34):
To check that out.
Speaker 1 (44:35):
I actually have to go finish myself home only on
episode three, so I'm going to be tuning into that
today while.
Speaker 2 (44:41):
I decorate for Christmas.
Speaker 1 (44:43):
I hope you guys have a wonderful weekend ahead, and
I will see you next week for a brand new
Unsolved case.
Speaker 2 (44:50):
Bye.
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