EP. 14 MINNESOTA - The Abuse & Murder of Three Year Old Dennis Jurgens
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He's the most terrifying serial killer you've never heard of. Haddon Clark has confessed to several murders, but investigators say he could have over 100 victims. At the center of the mayhem, a cellmate of Haddon's that was able to get key evidence into Haddon's murder spree across America

April is Child Abuse Prevention Month.

So today we want to tell you a story about a little boy named Dennis Juergens who lived in Minnesota. He was born in 1961 and his child abuse story not only opened the eyes of people in Minnesota, but of people all around the world.

Abuse happens everywhere, to people of all ages. And we hope that this story will bring awareness to this overwhelming issue. An issue that continues to deeply haunt society today. And before we start this episode, we want to add an extreme warning.

What we are about to discuss is horrific and may not be suitable for all audiences. This story contains extremely disturbing details of physical abuse to a child, so listener discretion is strongly advised. And I'm just going to hop in here and add this in. This is the day that we're releasing the podcast, and we just found out some shocking details about this case. Listen to the end to find out what happened today in the history of the Dennis Juergens murder case.

You're listening to Murder in America. ♪♪

In the western central part of Minnesota is a town named Sauk Center. It's a pretty quiet place. I've actually been to Sauk Center a few times. In the middle of town lies the Palmer House Hotel. It's known as one of the most haunted hotels in America and is the crown jewel of Sauk Center. Interestingly enough, the spirits of children are seen there frequently. I stayed there for a night a few years ago and although I didn't experience anything too crazy, the place is definitely spooky.

Minnesota's most popular cities tend to get the most media attention, but this definitely wasn't the case back in the 1960s. It was in the 60s when a baby boy by the name of Dennis Juergens was born in Sauk Center, and the story of this child would stain the reputation of this small town forever. Within the city of Sauk Center, Minnesota was a girls' school. A lot of girls in this school were minorities with troubled pasts.

Either their parents didn't want anything to do with them, or they found them too delinquent to discipline them themselves. One of the girls within the school was 17-year-old Jerry Sherwood.

Jerry's mother wasn't involved in her life and after years of getting in trouble, her father sent her to a reform school when she was just 14 years old. It was here she was considered a ward of the state, which basically means that the state has legal custody of her. She was sent back and forth from reform school to different foster care centers throughout her adolescence. At one of the foster care centers that she stayed at, Jerry met a boy named Dennis.

She and Dennis fell deeply in love with one another. But after her foster parents found out that they were sexually active, they sent her to the girl's school in Sauk Center. But one thing that the people at the girl's school in Sauk Center didn't know about Jerry was that she was pregnant at the time that she was sent to the school with her boyfriend Dennis' child.

And despite only being 17, Jerry was excited about the baby and thought that she'd be a great mother. But officials at the school thought otherwise. They were very insistent that she give up her baby for adoption. They tried to coax Jerry into giving up her baby, telling her that she didn't have a great support system outside of the school. She was far too young to have a child, she had no money, and lastly, that there were amazing families out there that could give her baby a much better life. Jerry listened to their advice, but something inside of her kept telling her to hold on to her kin.

On December 6, 1961, Jerry gave birth to her beautiful baby boy and named him Dennis Craig Puckett. Jerry was in awe of her baby and she loved him deeply, even going as far as to get him baptized.

But this happy phase of parenthood wouldn't last long. Soon after Dennis' birth, Jerry found out that the baby's father had given up his rights to be a father to Dennis. Jerry was at a crossroads, and knowing that she wouldn't have any assistance raising her baby, she decided that her only option was to put him up for adoption. After all, the nurses consistently assured her that he would have a better life with another family, and Jerry believed them.

Adoption as a practice was growing exponentially more popular in America in 1961. This was before the 1973 Roe v. Wade case that legalized abortions, so many younger unwed women chose the adoption process if they weren't ready to be mothers themselves. And at the end of the day, adoption is a beautiful and rewarding task, but most people know that it's definitely not easy.

It's an extremely long process and it's quite expensive. And it's not just like anyone off the street can adopt a child. There are multiple screenings, background checks, home studies, reference letters, interviews, financial checks, the list goes on and on. And the fact that a family has to check all these boxes to become eligible for an adoption tends to make people trust in the system and even believe in it. If someone would go through all of this just to have a baby, then they have to be good parents.

These facts gave Jerry some peace, and when the time eventually came, she handed her baby over and hoped that he would have a good life. A year passed, and then another, and another, but Jerry never stopped thinking about her firstborn child. She and Dennis, the biological father, actually went on to get married and have four kids of their own after giving up their first.

But even though they started their own family, Jerry always hoped that when Dennis turned 18, he would reach out to her and they could reunite.

Even though Dennis wasn't with her, Jerry would sing happy birthday to herself in his honor on December 6th of every year. Jerry had no clue what happened to Dennis, but her curiosity started peaking in the early 80s, at which time Dennis would have been an adult. So she decided to give Scott County Welfare a call so she can try and locate her long-lost son. Eventually, she received a letter from Ramsey County, and inside this letter was all of Dennis' information. ♪

She held it nervously, not knowing whether or not her son would want to meet her. But when she opened the letter, she never expected to read what was on that paper. I called Scott County Welfare Department. Approximately six weeks later, I get a letter in the mail. Sorry to inform you, Dennis Craig Jurgens died April 11th of 1965 of peritonitis. Sincerely.

Her son Dennis, who she had dreamt of meeting for decades, had died when he was just three years old. Jerry was devastated. She had always felt a sense of sadness when she thought about Dennis, but she thought it was just because she missed him. But now she was starting to think that her motherly instincts knew that something wasn't right. Desperately wanting more information, Jerry decided to call Ramsey County so she could learn more information about her son. They gave her the location of where his body was buried and what his last name was.

His name, at the time of his death, was Dennis Juergens. Jerry quickly decided to visit the grave of her firstborn with a few of her kids and a friend. When they got to the area, they ran into a mortician who had been working at the location for decades, and this mortician knew exactly who Dennis Juergens was.

The mortician shuffled through some files and pulled one out with a newspaper clipping attached that read, "An autopsy on the body of a three-and-a-half-year-old Dennis Juergens, son of Mr. and Mrs. Harold Juergens, showed he died of peritonitis caused by a ruptured bowel," Dr. Thomas Vodal, Ramsey County coroner, said today. The body also bore multiple injuries and bruises, Dr. Vodal said. White Bear Police and the coroner's office are investigating the death. "And the first thing I did was I looked at my friend and my daughter, my son, I said,

My son was beaten to death. I just, I knew it. I felt it.

The visit to baby Dennis' grave and the realization that her baby's death was no accident lit a fire within Jeri. She was now determined to find out what had happened to her son. She started vigorously searching for Dennis' adoptive parents and their contact information, but she wasn't able to find much. What she did find was that their names were Harold and Lois Jurgens, and that Harold worked as an electrician in White Bear Lake.

After searching, she located the store that Harold worked at and decided to call them, telling them that she was a family friend of the Jergens and that she needed their home phone number. This was risky, and the plan was not guaranteed to work. But luckily for Jerry, the worker at the store willingly gave her the phone number. When Jerry called the number, she heard a woman on the other end pick up and say, Hello?

She sounded nice, like a kind, friendly woman. Jerry introduced herself to Lois, telling her that she was Dennis' biological mother and how she had just recently found out about what happened to Dennis. Lois instantly became uneasy and told Jerry that she was under the impression that someone had told her about Dennis' death a long time ago. Jerry, desperate to find out more information about her son, asked Lois what Dennis was like.

To which she responded, he was a good and happy little boy. The two women didn't say a lot to each other on this phone call given the circumstances, but Lois did add that when they found Dennis, he had black bruises on his body and they didn't know where they came from. Jerry didn't want to press her on her son's injuries, so instead, she asked if Lois could send her some baby pictures of Dennis. Lois promised that she would and Jerry ended the phone call by giving her her contact information.

Weeks and weeks passed, and Jerry hadn't received anything from the Juergen family. Not a phone call, no pictures, not even a letter. After six weeks had passed, Jerry decided to call Lois again. But this time, when she called the Juergens' home phone, the number was no longer in service.

They had changed their phone number. Jerry felt like she had come to a dead end and she wasn't sure where to turn to next. This case was from 1965 and it was now the 1980s.

People had moved on. Jerry felt like there was nothing else she could do. Months passed and then years, but she was never able to get Dennis out of her mind. Despite everyone saying that her son's death was an accident, Jerry knew deep down that something more sinister had happened to Dennis.

And this urge inside of her continued to grow stronger until she finally decided that there was nothing going to stop her from finding out the truth. She spent all of her free time going to libraries and courthouses trying to find out everything she could about her son's death. Finally, after a visit to the local courthouse, Jerry was able to obtain Dennis' death certificate.

We want to take a second to describe the terminology on a death certificate. First, the certificate lists the cause of death, which is the specific thing that made the person die. For example, blunt force trauma, gunshot, heart attack, or in Dennis' case, peritonitis of his bowels. Also on the death certificate is manner of death, meaning the manner in which that person died. This includes natural death, accidental death, suicide, homicide, pending, or deferred.

Dennis' death certificate said deferred, meaning medical examiners were never able to come to a conclusion on exactly how Dennis' bowels tore apart inside of his body in 1965. And something about this didn't sit well with Jerry. An injury of this magnitude didn't just happen by accident. And luckily for Jerry, since Dennis' manner of death was never officially determined, this meant that the case was still open and she could fight to find the truth.

Jerry knew that she, and she alone, would be the only person that could bring Dennis justice. So she drove to the White Bear Lake Police Department and managed to get a meeting with the Chief of Police, Lieutenant Clarence Harvey.

who promised her that he would take a look at Dennis' case. And when he did, he was astounded. They looked at all of Dennis' injuries, both internal and external, and just about everyone agreed that Dennis Jergen's death couldn't have been an accident. But they wanted to get a second opinion, so they consulted the local medical examiner, Dr. Michael McGee. And this is what he had to say.

And he's just covered with bruises. His face is covered with them. He has a large bruise in his forehead region. His abdomen is distended. I said, well, this is a homicide. And I said, you know, we need to find out what's going on.

And finally, in October of 1986, over 20 years after Dennis died, his death certificate was changed from deferred to homicide. We are now going to walk you through Dennis' short and horrible life at the Juergens' household. Again, this part includes horrific descriptions of child abuse, which may not be suitable for everyone. If that's the case for you, please turn this podcast off right now.

After Jerry gave Dennis up for adoption, he lived in a foster home for a while while the adoption agency searched for his perfect family. Everyone in the foster home was so excited when they finally received some news about a family that was interested in Dennis. And their names were the Jurgens. The Jurgen family was searching for an infant, but an infant that was Catholic.

So when they found Dennis, who was less than a year old and had already been baptized by his biological mother, they decided to take him in. The family lived in a beautiful suburban neighborhood outside of St. Paul called White Bear Lake, Minnesota, and they seemed like the perfect fit for baby Dennis.

Harold and Lois, his adoptive parents, were unable to have children on their own and they had already adopted a little boy named Robert, who was about a year and a half older than Dennis. The adoption agency trusted this family, not only because they were familiar with the adoptive process, but because they looked like a family straight out of a magazine.

Their suburban home was in pristine condition. The floors were spotless, the clothes were neatly folded and put away. Not a thing was out of place. They even had a little garden out back that was attended to daily. It was like they came straight out of a Norman Rockwell painting.

But although the Jergens seemed like the perfect fit, there was one little stain on the family's past that had to be considered. Years prior, Lois found out that she and Harold weren't able to conceive, and she went into an extreme depression and at certain points even phases of psychosis. It got so bad that she was actually admitted into a psychiatric institution for a while. But you can't really blame her. Finding out that you're infertile is devastating for women, especially when all you've wanted in life is to have kids.

Because of Lois' stay in the institution, she was unable to adopt. Like we mentioned before, adoption agencies have high standards, and the history of psychosis didn't exactly make her the best candidate. But luckily for the Juergens, they were able to find their first son, Robert, through a private adoption agency. They adopted him when he was just an infant, and he turned out to be a really great kid with a promising future. That's why, when the Juergen family found baby Dennis, the adoption agency thought that they would be a good fit.

Regardless of Lois' past, the couple had done a fantastic job in raising Robert. So authorities believed that Lois would be a great mom to Dennis too. So in December of 1962, when Dennis was just one year old, he was placed in a new home under the care of the Jurgens. And he had finally found a family.

But every family has secrets, even the ones with white picket fences. And the adoption agency had no idea that when they handed baby Dennis over to Lois Jergens, they had handed him to the person who would murder him.

Dennis' abuse started almost immediately after he was brought into the home. Lois was appalled by the one-year-old's physical appearance and constantly talked about how ugly he was. She made many comments about his big feet, his weight, and how he was awful looking. She also didn't like the fact that Dennis looked like he'd be bigger than his older brother, Robert. Lois was a very controlling person. And because Dennis' appearance didn't match the cookie-cutter look she envisioned for her family, she decided that Dennis needed to be punished. And punish Dennis she did.

As the months passed and Dennis grew a bit older, his personality started to come out, like it does in most children. Dennis was a very lively and outgoing child, unlike his brother Robert, who was very shy and soft-spoken. Lois didn't like these qualities about Dennis. She took his outgoing personality as rebellious, even though he was only about one and a half years old at this point. And it was around this time that Dennis had to be hospitalized for an entire month because of severe burns to his buttocks, genitals, and abdomen.

The doctors questioned Lois as to how a one and a half year old could get such terrible injuries. But Lois talked her way through and out of the questioning by telling the doctors that Dennis had turned on the hot water while she was giving him a bath and the burns were all simply an accident. The doctors took her word for it and sent them home.

Although Lois was able to fool most people on the outside, the people closest to her knew exactly the kind of person she was. Close family and friends said that she had a terrible temper and was constantly punishing Dennis. When he didn't want to eat certain foods, Lois would cover the food in horseradish and force-feed it to him, sometimes even shoving his face into the food.

covering his mouth and nose to a point where he couldn't breathe. Family members said that his face would become purple from the lack of oxygen when she would do these force-feeding practices. There were other times when Dennis couldn't eat the horseradish-covered food, and he would vomit. And after throwing up, Lois would make Dennis eat his own puke. On top of force-feeding Dennis at times, Lois was also disgusted by his weight.

She gave him the nickname "Sloppy Fat" and would starve him from time to time. When Dennis first arrived at the home, he was considered a healthy weight for his age.

But after a few years of living with the Jurgens, he wasn't gaining the proper weight for children his age, and looked extremely unhealthy. The Jurgens were devout Catholics, and Lois' abuse translated into her religious practices as well. She would force Dennis to kneel down on a broomstick and recite the Catholic rosary, and she wouldn't let him off the broomstick until he could recite it perfectly. Keep in mind, he's only about two years old at this point.

She also didn't like the fact that he would sometimes fill up his diaper too quickly, so to stop him from doing so, she would attach a clothespin to the end of his penis, rendering it difficult to urinate. When she wasn't attaching things to his penis, she would tie him down to the toilet, where he would sit for extended periods of time until he had a bowel movement. And to keep him from getting out of bed at night, she would tie his limbs to the bedposts. Many people saw Lois' abuse and didn't say a word.

Friends and family later came forward saying that Lois would bring Dennis to events and put these big sunglasses on him to cover up his black eyes. Dennis at that point only being two years old. And on the rare chance that someone did question her abuse, she would tell them that Dennis didn't feel any pain and he actually liked it when he was punished. And part of that statement is true.

Dennis was so used to being hit by Lois that he eventually stopped crying. Instead, he would just let out these soft little whimpers. But this wasn't because he didn't feel pain. It was because he was learning to adapt to this abusive environment. The abuse was so frequent that Dennis started to become numb to it.

And I bet you're wondering, what was Harold Juergens' part in this abuse? Harold was known as a sweet man and his adoptive children loved him, but he was far from innocent. He would watch Lois beat his children every day, and he didn't do or say anything. He watched her shove Dennis' face into his food until he couldn't breathe. He watched her yank him up by the arm and hit him when he was learning to walk. He saw everything.

When Lois' abuse got too severe, Harold would leave the house, leaving his children in the hands of a monster. He knew exactly how terrible his wife was, but he turned a blind eye to her abuse, and to me, that's just as bad.

And it seemed like the older Dennis got, the more Lois hated him. By the time Dennis was three years old, the abuse was unbearable. The tiniest inconvenience, whether it was caused by Dennis or not, would set her off in a rage. This was the case one weekend in April of 1965.

Harold was in Wisconsin that weekend for work, leaving Lois alone with Robert and Dennis. The St. Paul area was hit with massive rainfall and storms. And Lois was especially angry this weekend because storms had caused the floor of their basement to flood. Even though Dennis had nothing to do with the flood, she took her anger out on him.

That Saturday, April 10th, had been a terrible day for baby Dennis. Lois had spent the entire day beating and torturing him, occasionally dunking his head underwater for so long that he would scream and gasp for air. Dennis's older brother Robert, who was about five at the time, was riding his bike in the basement when he heard Dennis start to scream.

The next thing he knew, he saw his brother fly down the basement stairs. Most parents would be terrified at the sight of their three-year-old falling down a flight of stairs.

but not Lois. Instead, she ran down the stairs screaming at Dennis. She then started to violently beat and shake him. Lois then allegedly stomped on his stomach with a force that was so strong that Dennis' bowel pressed up against his spine, causing severe tearing. We don't have a lot of information on exactly what happened the rest of this day, but one thing that is 100% certain is that Dennis was in excruciating pain.

Medicalnewstoday.com says that when a bowel is perforated, the contents of the bowel slowly seep into your abdomen. This is life-threatening, and most people that experience this require immediate medical attention. But Dennis didn't receive any medical attention.

Instead, he was left by Lois to suffer all day long as fecal matter slowly filled his body. The article says that symptoms of peritonitis include severe abdominal pain and tenderness, chills, fever, nausea, vomiting, dizziness, rapid heartbeat, shortness of breath, and rapid breathing. And Dennis likely experienced almost all of these symptoms. I have to assume that Dennis tried to tell Lois about the pain he was in.

He was, after all, just three years old at the time. And when little kids are in a lot of pain, they're usually very vocal about it. But Dennis's attempts at getting help were useless because Lois didn't care, even though she knew something was wrong with him. She knew something was wrong because she called Harold that Saturday to tell him about the situation at hand. She said that her and Dennis had "been at it" and that he'd gotten sick.

And Harold must have known that for Lois to call him about Dennis, something must be terribly wrong. So he immediately packed up his things and came home. Harold said that when he got home, he spent the night trying to put Dennis to bed.

At one point, Dennis needed to use the restroom, so Harold took him to the bathroom, but when he was finished, Harold said that there was nothing in the toilet, which is telling because another symptom of peritonitis is difficulty using the restroom. Harold then put Dennis down for bed, not knowing that it would be for the very last time.

The next morning, around 9:30 a.m., Lois went to get Dennis out of bed and saw that he was gasping for air in his crib, another symptom of peritonitis: difficulty breathing. She called the police, but by the time first responders arrived, Dennis Juergens was dead at just three years old.

Lois cried and cradled her son when police arrived on scene. It's hard to imagine that her tears were genuine, given that she was the one that killed him. But the tears seemed to fool investigators. When they questioned Lois about what happened, she told them that he had tripped down the stairs all on his own, and for some reason, they believed her. Maybe it was because they refused to believe that a respected family like the Jurgenses could abuse children.

Whatever the case may be, Dennis was dead and his body was picked up from the home and brought to the morgue for an autopsy. The man who performed the autopsy was Dr. Robert Woodburn and he took many pictures of Dennis' body. These pictures showed a large injury to Dennis' forehead.

up to 100 bruises all over his body and even bite marks and burns around his genitals. He was also severely emaciated. Some of the bruises that Dennis had were new and some were old, indicating prolonged physical abuse. There was one bruise in particular that stuck out to the doctors, one on his abdomen. And when they performed the autopsy, they discovered that whatever caused this bruise is what led to his death.

The doctors had suspicions that there was foul play involved, but Dr. Thomas Fattel, the coroner in 1965, said that he wanted the police to gather more information before he marked it as a homicide. So he ultimately made the decision to mark it as deferred until further notice. But the system massively failed Dennis because no one did any further investigating. The

The police decided to trust Lois' account of the incident, and the coroner put Dennis' file away to let it collect dust. It's also important to mention that Lois' brother was a police officer in the White Bear Lake Police Department, and even though there was no proof of obstruction, there were a lot of rumors that he could have played a part in the police's negligence in this case. But ultimately, no one seemed to care about Dennis. For his funeral, he was dressed in a white dress shirt, turquoise shorts, and a bow tie.

They also placed a flower crown on his head to conceal the massive wound on his forehead, though many people at the funeral said that it didn't do a very good job at hiding it. They buried Dennis in St. Mary's Cemetery and went on with their lives.

Soon after this, the state decided to hold a juvenile hearing on whether or not the Juergens should be able to keep their oldest son, Robert. And thankfully, he was removed from the home for about five years, staying with various family members and in foster homes. Lois and Harold spent the entirety of these years fighting to regain custody of Robert.

While he was staying with his paternal grandparents, their house caught on fire, killing Robert's grandmother. There was some speculation that Lois was the one who set the home on fire so that she could get Robert back. She was, in fact, notorious for threatening people. The Juergenses were desperate to get Robert back, so they hired a lawyer that had connections in juvenile cases, and they were able to gain custody of Robert back in 1969 when he was 10 years old.

Social workers that were involved in the case were very vocal about the fact that they felt uneasy about placing Robert back in the home. But they were told by their superiors to drop their suspicions and leave it alone. And they did. In 1972, the Jergens were wanting to adopt again, and they came across four siblings in Kentucky that needed a home. They were the Houghton siblings, three boys and a girl.

The Kentucky Adoption Agency wanted to keep the siblings together and place them in a Catholic home. When the agency looked into the Jurgens, they saw that a child had previously died in their home, but neither parent was ever charged for the crime.

And the death wasn't labeled a homicide, so the agency just assumed it was a terrible accident. And unfortunately for the four children, they were then adopted by Lois and Harold. These four children were severely abused by Lois Juergens. They later went on to say that when they would ride the bus home from school and see that Lois was home, they would become riddled with anxiety.

Lois had very high expectations on the cleanliness of her home, and if any of the children left something out of place, they would get beaten repeatedly. Sometimes, she would wait the kids up in the middle of the night for a room inspection. If any of the hangers weren't straight or if something wasn't correctly put away, they would receive another beating.

One of the Houghton boys said that on one occasion, Lois became so angry with him that she grabbed him by the ears and shoved his head into the wall, where the flat end of a nail was sticking out. Lois would sometimes order Harold to beat the children if she didn't have the energy to do it herself. But instead of beating them, Harold would slap his leg and tell the children to pretend to cry. It seemed like everyone was scared of Lois, even her own husband.

After three years of living with the Jurgens, the two oldest siblings couldn't take the abuse anymore, so they ran away. They ended up telling a social worker about their abuse and a woman named Carol Felix started looking into the Jurgens. During her research, she found Dennis' case and was immediately shocked at what she found. She later said, "No one wanted to deal with this. We're talking about people who just looked the other way.

I mean, those doctors knew that baby was killed. To a certain extent, the level of awareness is different now, but they knew that baby was killed. They were aware. They chose not to face it.

The Houghton siblings and the Jurgens faced yet another hearing and luckily the judge removed them from their home indefinitely. But how were the Jurgens able to adopt these children in the first place? Four children had to endure years of abuse because the system failed them. A system that failed to do proper background checks. A system that allowed Lois to get away with murder.

But not for long, all thanks to Jerry Sherwood, Dennis's biological mother. She stuck with her instincts and fought for her little boy that died two decades prior, the boy that no one else would fight for. Because of Jerry, people started to take a second look at Dennis's case.

And now, after 20 years, his death certificate was changed from deferred to homicide. They were finally going to arrest Lois Jurgens for murder. But since this case was over 20 years old, the prosecution wanted to make sure they had everything ready for trial. They even exhumed Dennis' body so that he could have a proper examination.

In Barry Siegel's book, A Death in White Bear Lake, he writes about the medical examiner's experience opening the casket, which states, "...the child was in perfect, if weathered, shape, like an ancient man preserved in time. Dennis was dressed in turquoise shorts with a matching vest over a long-sleeved white dress shirt and a bow tie. Blonde hair still covered the top of his head, as did a crown of withered flowers."

They said that you could still see the injuries on Dennis' body 20 years later. I worked straight through the day and into the evening hours and about 2:30 in the morning of the following morning, I had found the bowel and in the mid portion of the bowel there is a defect present. That was the defect that caused the bowel to spill contents into his cavity and the cause of death in the child.

Children can certainly fall down and receive injuries. There's no question about that. But Dennis's injuries, you must understand, were delivered to deep-set organs inside of his body, the bowel. The injuries we're talking about requires tremendous energy. And aside from automobile accidents or accidents of that nature, a child simply cannot generate that much energy just falling down the stairs or slipping on a wet bathroom floor.

Medical examiners were positive that they would be able to prove that Dennis didn't fall down the stairs by accident. Examining his body proved that he would have had to have been hit with a train wreck force to sustain those injuries, which simply could not have happened had it been an accident. Before Lois was arrested, she called her son Robert, who is now a police officer. She told him that she was nervous because they were reopening the case. Robert, being a police officer, knew that the only reason they would open it is if authorities suspected murder.

Lois also told her son that if anyone tried to reach out to him, he was not to say a word. Robert was very torn. Believe it or not, he actually had a very good relationship with his parents at the time, but he knew deep down that his mother had something to do with his brother's death. Robert was torn between being a good son and protecting the oath that he took as a police officer. Robert also had a son at this time who was just three years old, the same age as Dennis when he died. And after some thought, he agreed to testify against his own mother.

Lois Juergens' trial started on January 29, 1987. She showed up to court every day wearing fancy clothes and over-the-top hats. The battered pictures of Dennis' body were shown to the jurors, and many expert witnesses testified on their findings. Robert Juergens told the entire room about the abuse that he and his siblings endured under the care of his mother. And with that, the jury had heard enough.

After just four hours of deliberation, the jury found Lois Juergens guilty of third-degree murder, essentially saying that she had killed Dennis without premeditation, and the judge sentenced her to 25 years in prison. Lois Juergens only served eight years of her 25-year sentence, getting out early for good behavior, and she died in 2013 at the age of 87. This story was a tough one,

At the time of Dennis' murder, the term child abuse hadn't even been recognized. This was the case that opened the eyes of many people around the world and showed them that it doesn't matter how great someone looks on the outside. Everyone has secrets. And not everyone is as good of a person as they say they are. And we want to take this opportunity to tell everyone. If you see something, report it.

Every year, 6.6 million children are reported to experience child abuse. Reports of this nature come in about every 10 seconds. Dennis Juergens could still be here today if just one person had stood up for him. Dozens of people saw him getting abused. Dozens saw his battered body after he was killed.

But unfortunately, no one said anything. And these were secrets that Lois Jurgens thought she could take to her grave. But you can't run from darkness forever.

Now, this is where the story takes a very bizarre twist. So Courtney and I actually were going to release this episode last Friday, but due to some things that happened in our personal lives, we weren't able to get it finished until today, Monday, April 11th. And right before we released this episode, we looked at the case file one more time and noticed that Dennis Juergens was murdered 56 years ago today.

This was not planned. This just happened. April 11th, 1965 was the day that Dennis Juergens died. So hopefully this episode can preserve his story and honor his memory. Little Dennis didn't have to die. So if you see it, you hear it, you find out about it, report it. Let's make sure that this never happens again.

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Well, thank you everybody for listening to another episode of Murder in America. We're going to be back this week with another insane story. We're covering some huge cases in the next episodes of the show. I want to remind you guys to go check us out on Instagram at Murder in America. We're posting stuff on our Patreon. We just posted an episode about the Sutherland Springs church shooting.

You can join for only $5 a month, get access to all those bonus episodes and videos we're posting on there. Thank you guys so much for listening and supporting our work here. We love y'all. And at the end of the day, Dennis Juergens did not have to die. Obviously, nobody that's murdered ever has to die. But this murder could have been prevented.

Do you think that these crimes, they will ever truly go away? Even if everybody is watching, there's always going to be somebody out there who wants to do bad. It makes you wonder, the dead don't talk, or do they? Have a good one, everybody.