22-year-old Todd Geib decided he had enough of the kegger and set out on his own to make the short walk home. Between 12:47 and 12:57 AM on Sunday, June 12, 2005, Todd made a series of calls to loved ones, the last one stating that he was "in a field". The call was cut off, and no one would hear from Todd again.
At the time, Todd was living with his cousin at 291 Moon Court in Casnovia, Michigan, located just off North Newaygo Road (M-37) at Half Moon Lake. By all accounts, Todd was a smart and capable young man who happened to be an avid outdoorsman. He delighted in sports and spent time dirt-biking, fishing, and hunting. He was employed at Hager Distribution, Inc. in Wyoming, which is about 30 miles south of Casnovia. He was also a religious man who put stock in the afterlife. Earlier in the day on Saturday, June 11, Todd had spent time at his parents' home in nearby Ravenna. Afterward, he returned to the home he shared with his cousin before leaving for Half Moon Bar & Grille at around 7:30 PM, where he met his best friend, two other male friends, and two female friends. The group left the bar together at roughly 9:30 PM. That night, an annual kegger was being hosted in an abandoned orchard about two miles north of White Road, and Todd's group was in attendance. It was a large party, consisting of over 50 people. As was later reported by those in attendance, there was supposedly a fight that broke out around 12:45 AM and that there had been a gaggle of guys from Kent City there looking for a fight. Whether or not Todd was involved, it was apparently around this time that he decided to leave the party and return home. At 12:47 AM, Todd called the friend who drove him there to tell the friend he'd "had enough" and was leaving. A few minutes later, he phoned a contact and told them that he was "in a field." The last person to hear from Todd was his sister. After that, it was as though Todd had vanished into thin air. Even a search party 1,500 volunteers strong could not find him over the course of three different searches. Todd was simply gone. That is, until a couple saw him 21 days later, seemingly standing upright in Ovidhall Lake, which is located just to the north of the intersection of Peters and White Road. (Ovidhall Lake is less than two miles away from Todd's home on Moon Court.) Todd's head and shoulders emerged from the smooth surface of the lake, but Todd wasn't going for a swim. Todd was dead. Fully-clothed, wallet in his pocket, and partially submerged, Todd looked as though he had simply gone for a swim and somehow died. In fact, a police officer told Todd's mom Kathy that they suspected Todd had gone swimming (... Fully clothed WITH his wallet on him?! You'd have to be pretty drunk to do that, right?) and accidentally drowned due to being intoxicated (as he had a .12 blood alcohol level). The thing is, the autopsy revealed that Todd had no water in his lungs. Typically, when a person drowns, they will have a collection of water in their lungs. They also tend to float face-down. Guess what else complicates this case? The time-frame and time-of-death. At a 2009 medical examiners conference, Dr. Michael Sikirca presented crime scene recovery and autopsy photos to other forensic pathologists, and everyone who saw them agreed that Todd had only been dead two or three days before his body was found. So, what does this mean? It means that Todd Geib could have been the victim of foul play. Homicide. And not just plain old homicide, but kidnapping and unlawful detainment by an unknown captor... Or group of captors. Todd Geib wasn't a little guy. At 5'11" and 180 pounds, even an intoxicated Todd would've been tough to disable and kidnap. As an athlete and avid outdoorsman, Todd had physical strength and survival know-how. He likely wouldn't have spent three weeks wandering around, lost in an area so close to home. And he probably wouldn't have gone swimming fully-clothed after having been missing for so long. Someone killed Todd Geib. And, if you ask some of the conspiracy-minded folks online, they might just tell you that Todd was a victim of the same world-wide group of killers that have taken the lives of well over 40 college-age young men over the past few decades. I'm talking about the Smiley Face Killers. Law enforcement officials will tell you that this group is a fabrication, that the deaths are just eerily coincidental. And maybe, just maybe, they're right. It would be better if they were. But I don't think they are. I first learned about the Smiley Face Killers from watching this docu-drama a few years ago. At first, I thought it was merely a clever twist on the found footage genre, which it is... But it deals very much with real cases. While there are some differences between each of the deceased men, there are some striking similarities. For one, the profile (just take a look at the cover photo of this Facebook group) of the victim is consistent: young adult males (many of whom were in college), predominantly white, and reported missing by loved ones after going to bars or parties. Many of these victims had been missing for several weeks and, after their bodies were found, were discovered to have only been dead for a few days. All of these victims were found in or near bodies of water, and most of them were possibly staged to look like accidental drownings. The killings started just about 20 years ago, in 1998, and appear to be ongoing. While the largest concentrations of these deaths have happened in the northeastern Atlantic and Midwestern United States, similar reports have been circulating the world over. Now, if you ask Todd Geib's family what happened, they also don't put much stock in the official report and ruling of accidental death. In fact, back in 2012, his mother, Kathy, told mLive that she believed - as did many professionals - that Todd had been killed elsewhere and his body dumped in the lake, staged to look like an accidental drowning. Kathy has spent a lot of time fighting for the truth, for justice. In 2012, she formed a rally in Ravenna called Justice For Todd in hopes that it would inspire police to re-open the investigation. However, it appears that Michigan State Police have been hesitant to do so. Who is responsible for Todd Geib's bizarre and tragic death? Surely, someone must know something. Casnovia is a small town where you end up knowing your neighbor's business, whether you meant to or not. Yet it seems like Todd's story was just a blip on the radar when it came to local news. Todd is not going to be forgotten, nor are the dozens of other young men who've met similar fates. References Case Studies in Drowning Forensics - Kevin Gannon & D. Lee Gilbertson "Drowning the Smiley Face Murder Theory" - Drake et. al, for the Center for Homicide Research Footprints At The River's Edge "Mother of Muskegon County's Todd Geib hosting rally urging police to reopen death investigation" - mLive "The 'Smiley Face Killer' Theory That Connects 40 College Students' Deaths" - Jim Goad, for Thought Catalog
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Grand Rapids, Michigan, was once considered to be a safe place. That was before my birth in 1984. As my mother and grandparents told me, there was once a time when you could leave your windows open at night and doors unlocked, and nobody ever thought twice about something bad happening.
That is, until the community's sense of safety came screeching to a halt in 1970. By all accounts, Shelley Speet Mills should have felt secure in her home at 314 College Avenue. She had just gotten married to Lowell band teacher Bill Mills 17 days before her life was viciously taken from her. Shelley's mother, Vesta, was driving all the way from Holland on the morning of September 15, 1970 to take Shelley to lunch. With Vesta was her father - Shelley's grandfather - who was blind. When Vesta reached the home, she left her father in the car while she went to knock on the front door after Shelley failed to appear upon Vesta honking the car horn. No one answered. It was unlike Shelley to not answer, especially since the women had made plans for that day. Vesta was able to get in through the unlocked door and entered the home. She found what no mother should ever have to see - her daughter, lying in a pool of blood on the kitchen floor, her matted hair cloaking her face. Vesta quickly phoned the police, followed by a call to Bill Mills, but it was too late; Shelley was already deceased. Shelley had been stabbed 32 times - once in the chest, once in the back, and 30 times in the neck, which nearly decapitated her. The weapon (which was certainly a knife) was never found, and DNA testing did not exist back then like it does today. Who would do this? There were no obvious suspects, and Bill Mills was ruled out. Was this just a random attack? Shelley wasn't a careless young woman and reportedly locked her doors. The case ran cold as leads dried up. A year later, another woman - 25-year-old student Barbara Larson - was found stabbed to death in her mobile home, with the majority of her wounds occurring in the head and neck area, just like Shelley's. Barbara attended school in the Heritage Hill area, so police became concerned that they might be looking for the same suspect. In May of 1975, another woman was found deceased. This time, it was 20-year-old Laurel Jean Ellis, whose boyfriend, Carl Novak, found her body in her apartment at 627 Fountain Street NE. Laurel had not been seen or heard from in about a week, so Carl decided it was time someone checked on her. He found his girlfriend's body nude and decomposing, having been stabbed 60 times (45 of which were to the face and neck) before being strangled. DNA evidence was located near the door to the apartment, but analysis could not be conducted because science just wasn't there quite yet. Several months later, social worker Linda King was murdered at her home on Clancy Avenue NE, having been stabbed numerous times in the chest and strangled with her own clothing. If there had been any doubt about a serial killer before, there was little doubt to be had after Linda's death. Sadly, Linda would not be the final victim. Kathryn Darling, who was two months pregnant at the time, was murdered in her home in March of 1976. Friends that had gone to check on her discovered Kathryn (whose husband was then serving a five-year prison sentence) in the bedroom, having been beaten and stabbed. Her toddler son was found uninjured. Just two months later, the killer struck again, this time slaughtering Lois DeRitter in the Walker area, just to the west of Grand Rapids. On Christmas Eve of 1976, Nancy Sweetman was walking to her boyfriend's house. Around 12:55 AM, a loud ruckus was heard and reported by a neighbor. The responding officer found Nancy stabbed to death and a trail of blood leading to a water spigot on a neighboring lawn where the killer had apparently tried to wash their hands. That responding officer? He was Nancy's own brother, Officer Ronald Sweetman. Ida Mae Luchie was the next unfortunate victim. In November of 1977, she was found stabbed to death in the laundry room of her apartment located at 440 Crescent Street NE. She had also been bludgeoned with a banister spindle. Joanne Eggleston was the next victim. She was 21 at the time and had just returned to her home to take a nap on the sofa. Suddenly, a man entered and put a belt into her mouth. Joanne resisted, fighting back as hard as she could, which earned her a nasty stab wound to the throat. The thrust was so strong that the knife's blade actually broke off in her neck! This caused the killer to flee, and Joanne, who was paralyzed in all but an arm, to call for help. Joanne should've died. But she didn't. A few days after her attack, the Grand Rapids Press ran a scoop on her story. That night, the killer, probably feeling disempowered by their inability to finish Joanne off, struck again, likely to prove that they could still get the task done. This sadly left 21-year-old Catherine Fingleton dead, her body unceremoniously dumped near the I-96 expressway overpass, just a few blocks away from the home she shared with her fiance. A figure would eventually emerge from the shadows as a main suspect in the cases. Lamont Marshall was in his 20's when the murders were taking place and seemed to always be sniffing around at the crime scenes while police were investigating. Remember the banister spindle used to bludgeon Ida Mae? It was finally linked to being from Marshall's home after he had been questioned by detectives. Marshall was finally put away, and Joanne - the only surviving victim - was able to positively identify him as her attacker before Marshall became eligible for parole. In 2011, a man named Russell Vane was convicted of murdering Kathryn Darling. But did Marshall murder the other women? Unfortunately, many of these murders remain technically unsolved, even though they ceased with the death of Catherine Fingleton. Many of these victims have loved ones who are still seeking that extra bit of closure. As of right now, Detective Sergeant Chris Postma with the Grand Rapids Police Department's Major Case Team, is handling Shelley Speet's case. Any information that you might have regarding these unsolved murders should be forwarded to him. Let us hope that, in an era booming with forensic technology, that these cases can be finally solved. Resources: Delayed Justice "Heritage Hill killer eluded police in pre-DNA era" - mLive "Revisiting a Murder" Ghosts of Grand Rapids by Nicole Bray & Robert DuShane (Recommended read!) I decided to start a weekly blog dedicated to the murder cases, mysteries, and other forms of mayhem that pique my interest and ultimately drive me to write the things I write.
I have a lot of ideas buzzing around in my mind. The mysterious death of Elisa Lam. The disappearances of ships and aircraft in and around the Great Lakes (which is where I've spent my entire life). The possibility that the Titanic was deliberately sank and not even really the Titanic. The Smiley Face Killers who murder young men and dump their bodies in fresh waters. The massive number of people who go missing in national parks and forests every year. These are what is to come. I will also ask you, my lovely readers... Is there a topic that you would like to have me cover? If so, leave a comment! I'm always interested in learning more and educating others on the mysteries of our wacky and wonderful world. |