Gary Muehlberg

Last updated
Gary Muehlberg
Born
Gary Randall Muehlberg

(1949-02-27) February 27, 1949 (age 75)
St. Louis, Missouri, U.S.
Other names"The Package Killer"
Conviction(s) Murder x5
Criminal penalty Life imprisonment without parole x5
Details
Victims5–6+
Span of crimes
1990–1993
CountryUnited States
State(s) Missouri
Date apprehended
March 27, 1993
Imprisoned at Potosi Correctional Center, Potosi, Missouri

Gary Randall Muehlberg (born February 27, 1949), known as The Package Killer, is an American serial killer who killed at least four women and one man in and around St. Louis, Missouri, from 1990 to 1993. Originally convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of a man in 1993, he was linked to the murders of four prostitutes via DNA in 2022, to which he pleaded guilty and received additional life terms.

Contents

Early life

Gary Randall Muehlberg was born on February 27, 1949, in St. Louis, Missouri, one of three children born to William and Christina Muehlberg. [1] He grew up in a prosperous environment, as both parents took good care of their children and his father, a WWII veteran, served on the Board of Governors in several districts from 1955 to 1957. In 1966, William Muehlberg accepted a high-paid position at Gulf Oil, after which the family moved to Salina, Kansas. [1]

After graduating from school in 1968, Gary and his older brother Ronald were drafted into the Army to fight in Vietnam. Gary did not see combat and was stationed around various military bases on American soil, while his brother was killed in action on August 21, 1968, during one of the battles in the Mekong Delta. Upon completing his service, Muehlberg returned to his parents' home, and in June 1970, he married his highschool sweetheart, with whom he had one son shortly after their wedding. [2]

First crimes

In February 1972, Muehlberg was arrested for allgedly robbing and raping an 18-year-old girl in Salina. [2] The victim told police that he had broken into her home while she was alone and then raped her at knifepoint, and after he had finished, the rapist stole some money and valuables before fleeing. [3] Shortly after his arrest, Muehlberg was ordered to undergo a forensic psychiatric examination, where he was found to be insane. [3]

At trial, he was convicted of the robbery charge, but was found not guilty by reason of insanity. After spending a month in the county jail, Muehlberg was transferred to a veterans' hospital in Topeka, where he underwent treatment for several months. When he was considered to no longer be a threat to society, Muehlberg was released in December of that year, whereupon he left Kansas and returned to St. Louis. On January 5, 1973, his father passed away from a heart attack. [1]

Later that month, Muehlberg was arrested again, this time for assaulting a 14-year-old girl. The victim told police that he had knocked on the door of her house, ostensibly asking to use the telephone. After he got inside, he threatened her with a knife, bound and gagged her, and then locked her in the bathroom. He then attempted to search the house for valuables, but was forced to flee after a car pulled up to the house. After the 14-year-old was rescued, she reported the incident to the police and later identified him as her assailant from a series of photographs, resulting in his arrest.[ citation needed ]

At his trial, his attorneys requested that he be acquitted on the grounds of insanity, but this time the medical examiner found him sane. As a result, he was convicted of assault and sentenced to five years imprisonment. Shortly after his conviction, his wife divorced him, and Muehlberg permanently lost contact with her and his son. In 1977, he was paroled.[ citation needed ]

Downward spiral

After his release, Muehlberg enrolled at the Central Methodist College, where he studied psychology. [2] After graduating, he attended graduate school at the University of Central Missouri, and in 1980, he married for the second time and had two additional children. During this period, he worked as a teacher for the Hubert Wheeler School, but soon lost interest and quit.

In the following years, Muehlberg experienced employment problems and financial hardship, resorting to doing low-skilled labor and repairing houses across St. Louis. He also worked as a repairman for the Moolah Shrine Center, maintaining various structures on the grounds. His relationship with his second wife deteriorated rapidly, and they divorced in 1986 - similarly to his first wife, Muehlberg lost contact with her and took no part in raising his children.

In the late 1980s, gave up on legal ways of making money and started dealing drugs. [4] He built a fake wall in the basement of his house with bricks, behind which he set up a cache where he stored dozens of kilos of marijuana. He spent most of his free time at one of the fast-food restaurants near his home, where he soon made many acquaintances. During this period of time, Muehlberg started frequently using the services of prostitutes, which he invited to his home. He was known as a manipulator and a liar, and was generally disliked by the local community. [4]

In the early 1990s, Muehlberg got into the business of buying and selling used cars. He attempted to get a number of his friends and acquaintances involved in this business, but was unsuccessful in this endeavor. [4]

Murders

"Package Killer" murders

On March 22, 1990, 18-year-old Robin J. Mihan went missing. A mother-of-two with a drug addiction, she worked as a prostitute alongside a friend named Faye Sparks. In order to avoid getting into trouble, the pair always had to know where the other one was, wrote down each other's car license plate numbers and never got into the same car. [5] According to Mihan's brother, on the day of her disappearance she disregarded those rules due to her addiction and got into a car that was out of Sparks' view. Under questioning, Muehlberg stated that after kidnapping Mihan, he attacked, beat and stabbed her several times, including in the head. He then drove back to his house and locked her in his basement for the next several days, where he sexually assaulted and tortured her in various ways before strangling her. Four days later, Muehlberg dumped her corpse along a highway northwest of St. Louis, in Silex. [6] The body was found tied between two mattresses.

On October 4, 1990, the body of a woman was found wrapped in a plastic trash can in Maryland Heights. [6] An investigation revealed that the victim had been bound with Conex electrical cable, which was used by a number of construction companies in St. Louis to run electrical wiring during apartment and home renovations. Because a fragment of the same cable had been used to bundle the mattresses between which Mihan's body was found, police linked the two murders. After determining that the trash bags were manufactured by a company called Beiner Hardware, police started interviewing employees and obtained a list of regular customers - Muehlberg was never suspected. In March 1991, coroners used dental X-Rays to identify this victim as 27-year-old Brenda Pruitt, who went missing on May 5, 1990.

On June 11, the body of 40-year-old Donna Reitmeyer was found inside a dumpster, all wrapped up in plastic garbage bags. [5] She was last seen on a street in St. Louis on her way to meet an acquaintance. Reitmeyer was a mother of three, but lived in poverty and developed a drug addiction, due to which she resorted to prostitution and was repeatedly arrested for it. An exact cause of death could not be determined, but it was concluded that it was the result of a homicide.

On September 4, 21-year-old Sandy Little was reported missing. Unlike previous victims, she was not a prostitute, but had spent most of her life in foster homes and orphanages, running away from school quite often. Shortly before her death, she had been living with her fiancé (who was jailed for a misdemeanor at the time of her disappearance), with whom she had one son. Her skeletal remains were found on February 17, 1991, on the side of the I-70, near O'Fallon. [6] After committing the murder, Muehlberg placed the girl's body in a wooden box before disposing of it. Dog hair was found on the bodies of Mihan, Pruitt and Little, and when queried about this, Muehlberg admitted that he did indeed have a dog at his home during the 1990s.

During interrogations following his identification as "The Package Killer", Muehlberg claimed that he had picked up a young woman in his car in south St. Louis sometime in 1990 or 1991. [5] He could not recall the order in which he had killed his victims, but remembered that he had kept this particular victim's remains in his basement for the longest period. He originally kept them in an oversized cardboard box, but after it started deteriorating due to decomposition, he bought a steel barrel and stuffed them inside. He then claimed that the dumped the barrel near a self-service car wash, "Ram Jet", just outside Berkeley. During an interview with the car wash owner's son, he stated that such a barrel had indeed been found, but in the nearby town of Pagedale, where his father had another car wash. An officer from the Pagedale Police Department confirmed that such a barrel had indeed been found, but it was unknown what happened to it. [5] When confronted with this information, Muehlberg continued to insist that he had dumped the barrel in Berkeley, not Pagedale.

Murder of Kenneth Atchison

In early 1993, Muehlberg was advertising a 1989 Cadillac Fleetwood for sale when he was approached by an acquaintance, 57-year-old Kenneth "Doc" Atchison, who wanted to purchase it. On February 8, 1993, Atchison went to Muehlberg's home in Bel-Ridge with $6,000, after which he went missing. [2] Since a number of relatives and friends were aware that he had wanted to buy a car from Muehlberg, Atchison's brother Vernon reported his disappearance to the police, telling them that he had seen him at a local fast-food restaurant with a gun and a large wad of cash. The police were also contacted by a friend of Muehlberg, who in turn stated that he had been offered money to make a large wooden box, about two meters in length, that could be used as a coffin. [2]

About six weeks after Atchison disappeared, another acquaintance of Muehlberg named Ron Silancas contacted authorities. He claimed that Gary had tried to hire him for some unloading work to remove items from his basement, which he wanted to be moved to a nearby landfill. According to Silancas' claims, the basement contained a crudely-made coffin made of plywood sheets, with male socks sticking out of it. He had supposedly been offered a 1984 Mercury Cougar in exchange for the job, but Silancas declined. After receiving this information, officers obtained a search warrant and went to arrest Muehlberg, but by that time he had already fled the state. A search of the home led to the location of Atchison's body, whose hands had been handcuffed. An autopsy determined that he had been asphyxiated to death, but was repeatedly tortured, stabbed and shot while still alive. [2]

Arrest, trial, and imprisonment

After a brief manhunt, Muehlberg was located and detained in Wayne County, Illinois on March 27, 1993. [2] When questioned, he admitted the fact that he knew the victim and that his body was in his basement, but refused to admit he had killed him. Muehlberg instead attempted to place the blame on Chuck Nichols, a former employer who supposedly also wanted to buy the car and then murdered Atchison during an argument. [7] To support his claims, Muehlberg indicated that he later successfully sold the car to Nichols and that the murder weapon had been hidden at the home of Nichols' brother, Wilton. When Wilton Nichols' home was searched, officers located a .22 caliber handgun that was confirmed to be the murder weapon, additionally revealing that Muehlberg's car was being driven by Nichols' daughter.

Suspicion against the Nichols brothers increased after it was established that they were involved in drug trafficking, for which they were eventually tried and convicted. [7] However, only Muehlberg was charged in Atchison's murder, and he was found guilty in September 1995. In November of that year, he was sentenced to life imprisonment without parole. [7] Muehlberg's attorneys attempted to appeal his conviction, but it was rejected in 1999. During his subsequent years of detention, he was regarded as an exemplary prisoner who was never reprimanded for any violations.

For almost three decades, the murders attributed to the so-called "Package Killer" went unsolved. In 2008, the cases were reopened due to the advancements of DNA, and in March 2022, authorities got a hit on Muehlberg for one of the murders. [6] Shortly afterwards, he was interviewed and expressed willingness to cooperate with authorities, fully confessing culpability to most of the murders and confessing to the murder of a Jane Doe whose identity remains unknown. [8]

In exchange for his cooperation and the fact that he's suffering from kidney failure, prosecutors agreed not to seek the death penalty. Over the next several months, Muehlberg pleaded guilty to each individual murder, receiving four additional life terms without parole. [9] As of April 2023, he remains incarcerated at the Potosi Correctional Center in Potosi.

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Gary Ridgway</span> American serial killer (born 1949)

Gary Leon Ridgway is an American serial killer known as the Green River Killer. He was initially convicted of 48 separate murders committed between the early 1980s and late 1990s. As part of his plea bargain, another conviction was added, bringing the total number of convictions to 49, making him the second-most prolific serial killer in United States history according to confirmed murders.

The Snowtown murders were a series of murders committed by John Justin Bunting, Robert Joe Wagner, and James Spyridon Vlassakis between August 1992 and May 1999, in and around Adelaide, South Australia. A fourth person, Mark Haydon, was convicted of helping to dispose of the bodies. The trial was one of the longest and most publicised in Australian legal history.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Maury Travis</span> American serial killer (1965–2002)

Maury Troy Travis was an American serial killer. Travis was named in a federal criminal complaint for the murders of two women. At the time of the murders, he was a hotel waiter, and on parole for a 1989 robbery. While Travis claimed in a letter to have murdered 17 women, some authorities were doubtful; others thought he may have murdered up to 20 women. He died by suicide by hanging in custody in St. Louis County, Missouri, after being arrested for murder.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Richard Cottingham</span> American serial killer (born 1946)

Richard Francis Cottingham is an American serial killer who was convicted in New York of six murders committed between 1972 and 1980 and convicted in New Jersey of twelve murders committed between 1967 and 1978. He was nicknamed by media as the Torso Killer and the Times Square Ripper, since some of the murders he was convicted of included mutilation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kenneth McDuff</span> American serial killer

Kenneth Allen McDuff was an American serial killer from Texas. In 1966, McDuff and an accomplice kidnapped and murdered three teenagers who were visiting from California. He was given three death sentences for these crimes but avoided execution after the 1972 U.S. Supreme Court ruling Furman v. Georgia. He was resentenced to life and was paroled in 1989. Between October 1989 and March 1992, Mcuff raped and killed at least six women, receiving another death sentence and was later executed in 1998.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kendall Francois</span> American serial killer

Kendall Francois was a serial killer from Poughkeepsie, New York, convicted of killing eight women, from 1996 to 1998.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Richard Biegenwald</span> American serial killer

Richard Fran Biegenwald was an American serial killer and arsonist who murdered six people, four women and two men, in Monmouth County, New Jersey, between 1958 and 1983. He is suspected in at least two other murders.

James Clifford Carson and Susan Barnes Carson are American serial killers convicted for three murders between 1981 and 1983 in Northern California and the San Francisco Bay Area.

Nathaniel White is an American serial killer. Active in the Hudson Valley region, in and near Orange County, NY during the early 1990s, White confessed to beating and stabbing six women to death while on parole.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rodney Alcala</span> American serial killer (1943–2021)

Rodney James Alcala was an American serial killer and sex offender who was sentenced to death in California for five murders committed between 1977 and 1979. He also pleaded guilty and received a sentence of 25 years to life for two further murders committed in New York and was also indicted with a murder in Wyoming, although charges were dropped due to a technicality. While he has been conclusively linked to eight murders, Alcala's true number of victims remains unknown and could be much higher – the actual number could be as high as 130.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Michigan Murders</span> Series of homicides in the U.S. state of Michigan

The Michigan Murders were a series of highly publicized killings of young women committed between 1967 and 1969 in the Ann Arbor/Ypsilanti area of Southeastern Michigan by an individual known as the Ypsilanti Ripper, the Michigan Murderer, and the Co-Ed Killer.

The Edgecombe County serial killer is an unidentified serial killer in the surroundings of Edgecombe and Halifax counties in North Carolina, United States. There are ten suspected victims, all African-American women, and the remains of eight have been recovered. Because some of the victims had been found near the Seven Bridges Road in Rocky Mount, the culprit has also been called The Seven Bridges Killer. All the victims were black, engaged in prostitution and had problems with drug addiction at various times.

The Peterborough ditch murders were a series of murders which took place in Cambridgeshire, England, in March 2013. All three victims were male and died from stab wounds. Their bodies were discovered dumped in ditches outside Peterborough. In Hereford, two other men were stabbed but survived. The perpetrator was Joanna Christine Dennehy, a Cambridgeshire woman, who was later sentenced to life imprisonment with a whole life order.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Anthony and Nathaniel Cook</span> American criminal brothers

Anthony Cook and Nathaniel Cook are American brothers and serial killers who committed at least nine rape-murders between 1973 and 1981. They were active in Toledo, Ohio, and surrounding areas with most of their victims being young couples. Anthony was arrested and convicted for the final murder, but his and Nathaniel's guilt in the other killings would not be uncovered until Nathaniel was detained for a misdemeanor in 1998, after which DNA profiling exposed their involvement. Both brothers were later convicted and sentenced to long terms of imprisonment; Anthony received multiple life sentences, while Nathaniel was sentenced to 75 years with a minimum of fifteen years served, and he was paroled after eighteen years in 2018.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Robert Ben Rhoades</span> American serial killer and rapist

Robert Benjamin Rhoades, also known as The Truck Stop Killer, is an American serial killer and rapist. He is confirmed to have tortured and killed at least two couples in Illinois and Texas in 1989 and 1990, and is additionally suspected of torturing, raping, and killing more than fifty women between 1975 and 1990, based on data about his truck routes and women who went missing during those years and who met the profile of his preferred victims. At the time he was caught, Rhoades claimed to have engaged in these activities for fifteen years.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Harrison Graham</span> American serial killer

Harrison Frank "Marty" Graham is an American serial killer who murdered seven women in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania between mid-1986 to mid-1987, keeping their remains in his apartment. In 1988, he was found guilty on all charges and sentenced to death, but his sentences were later commuted to life imprisonment. Graham lived less than a mile and a half away from the home of another murderer, Gary M. Heidnik, who was also arrested during the same time period for similar crimes.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Samuel Little</span> American serial killer (1940–2020)

Samuel Little was an American serial killer who confessed to murdering 93 people, nearly all women, between 1970 and 2005. The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)'s Violent Criminal Apprehension Program (ViCAP) has confirmed Little's involvement in at least 60 of the 93 confessed murders, the largest number of confirmed victims for any serial killer in United States history.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Anthony LaRette</span> Executed American serial killer

Anthony Joe LaRette Jr. was an American serial killer and rapist. Convicted of one murder in St. Charles, Missouri in 1980, he later confessed to thirty-one murders in eleven states dating back to the late 1960s, fifteen of which were closed based on information provided by him. Sentenced to death for his sole conviction, LaRette was executed in 1995.

Joshua Alan Wade was an American serial killer who was convicted of two separate murders committed in Alaska in 2000 and 2007 respectively, and sentenced to 99 years imprisonment. Wade pled guilty to one of the murders in federal court to avoid execution. Seven years later, as part of a plea deal, he confessed to three additional murders dating back to 1994, including one for which he had previously been acquitted, in exchange for a transfer to a federal prison.

John Peter Malveaux is an American serial killer and rapist who committed between four and five murders around Opelousas, Louisiana from January to October 1997. Following his arrest and confession to the crimes, Malveaux pleaded guilty on all counts and was given four life terms without parole.

References

  1. 1 2 3 "William Muehlberg obituary". The Salina Journal . January 15, 1973 – via Newspapers.com.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Christine Byers (September 19, 2022). "Alleged serial killer charged with murders of 4 women 30 years after bodies found across St. Louis region". KSDK . Archived from the original on September 20, 2022.
  3. 1 2 "Mental exam ordered for Gary Muehlberg". The Salina Journal. February 20, 1973 – via Newspapers.com.
  4. 1 2 3 Ryan Krull (September 19, 2022). "How Notorious Serial Killer Gary Muehlberg Terrorized St. Louis". Riverfront Times . Archived from the original on May 4, 2023.
  5. 1 2 3 4 Christine Byers (September 20, 2022). "'He just looked like a typical grandpa': Detective describes hearing confessions of alleged Cherokee Street stroll killer". KSDK. Archived from the original on May 4, 2023.
  6. 1 2 3 4 Kevin S. Held (September 19, 2022). "Accused 'package killer' Gary Muehlberg charged in 1990-91 murders". KTVI . Archived from the original on May 4, 2023.
  7. 1 2 3 William C. Lhotka (September 30, 1995). "Sept. 30, 1995: Bel-Ridge man convicted of murder". St. Louis Post-Dispatch . Archived from the original on May 4, 2023.
  8. ↑ Erin Hefferman and Kim Bell (September 20, 2022). "One man linked to St. Louis 'package killer' serial murders after DNA breakthrough". St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Archived from the original on May 4, 2023.
  9. ↑ Ryan Krull (March 31, 2023). "Serial Killer Gary Muehlberg Pleads Guilty to First Known Slaying". Riverfront Times. Archived from the original on April 1, 2023.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.