The BTK Strangler
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The man simply known as BTK, Bind, Torture, and Kill, has become known as one of America's most notorious serial killers. From 1974 until 1991, BTK was responsible for murdering 10 people in the Wichita, Kansas metro area, including four members of the same family.

After selecting and killing his victims, he taunted the police by sending letters and poems detailing the events of each murder. After remaining silent for nearly a decade, BTK resurfaced again in 2004, and this time, he wanted the entire world to know exactly who he was.

This week on Forensic Tales, we're covering the story of Dennis Rader, better known as the BTK Strangler. ♪

Welcome to Forensic Tales. I am your host, Courtney. Each Monday, we release a brand new episode that discusses real, bone-chilling true crime stories and how forensic science has been used in the case.

Some cases have been solved through cutting-edge forensic techniques, while other cases remain unsolved. If you love the show, make sure you leave us a rating with a review. And if you want access to bonus content and be one of the first to listen to new weekly episodes of the show, head over to our Patreon page, patreon.com slash forensic tales.

Patreon is also where you can go to simply support my show. Every little bit helps. Now, let's get to this week's episode.

Hi Forensic Tales listeners. I hope everyone had a super fun and safe 4th of July holiday weekend. I know the world is still so crazy out there, but hopefully you and your family were still able to enjoy the long weekend, even if you were social distancing.

Now, before we get into this week's case, there's been a huge update in one of the cases we covered in a previous episode of the show. And that case is the Golden State Killer, now known as Joseph James D'Angelo.

The Golden State Killer murdered at least 13 people, raped over 50 women, and burglarized over 120 homes across the state of California during the 1970s and 1980s. The case remained unsolved for nearly four decades until familiar DNA was used from an ancestry kit that was able to link D'Angelo to the murders.

And he was finally arrested in 2018. And just over a week ago now, he pled guilty to 13 counts of first-degree murder on Tuesday, June 30th, in order to avoid the death penalty. I know that there's a ton of judicial benefits for someone to plead guilty instead of taking their case to trial, but

And I understand that GSK left behind so many devastated family members of his victims. But I just don't know if that's justice in my opinion. I would love to hear what you think about his plea deal in order to avoid the death penalty.

So reach out to me on Instagram at ForensicTales, or you can shoot me an email at Courtney at ForensicTales.com. Okay, now let's get to our episode. This week on the show, we're covering a case that if the story hasn't given you nightmares, after listening to this show, it will. We're covering Dennis Rader, also known as BTK.

BTK brutally and savagely murdered 10 people across the state of Kansas over the course of almost three decades. Along the way during his killing spree, BTK left behind clues to further taunt the authorities, and it would be years before they could even name a suspect.

Dennis Rader was born on March 9th, 1945 in Pittsburgh, Kansas. Dennis was just one of four children born to Doritha Rader and William Rader. He was the oldest of three brothers, Paul, Bill, and Jeff Rader. Growing up, Dennis' parents weren't too involved in any of their children's lives.

Both parents reportedly worked really long hours and would only see the children for just a couple hours each day. And that was it. So Dennis and his brothers really didn't have too much supervision or direction starting at a really young age.

Because of this lack of supervision from his parents, Dennis started displaying some pretty troubling behavior as a young kid. During middle school, Dennis was regularly torturing and killing small animals.

He would basically capture the animals and then torture them to death by either hanging them or setting them on fire. And then he would just watch them die. Now, sorry, I know that's a little graphic, but

If you've listened to the episode on the Green River Killer, Gary Ridgway, we did earlier on in the show, we discussed what is known in the field of forensic psychology as the McDonald Triad.

Basically, the McDonald triad sets forward three factors that if present during childhood, they are predictive or they're associated with violent tendencies as adults. And those three factors are one, fire setting, two, torturing animals, and three, wetting the bed.

There's been a ton of research over the years to support this theory, and when two or more of these factors are present in early childhood, it's usually a really good predictor to violent behavior as an adult, and specifically in serial killers and mass murderers. As a young kid, Dennis also liked to spy on the local neighborhood girls who

while at the same time being dressed in women's clothes himself. He would break into the neighbor's houses, steal women's underwear, and then basically put it on while he spied on the girls through their window. And it was pretty easy for Dennis to get away with this behavior, even as a preteen.

Because remember, his parents were nowhere to be found at this age, and he was never really caught by any of his neighbors. So at a really young age, Dennis Rader is displaying behavior of voyeurism and some pretty abnormal sexual behavior. At the time, as a young kid, Dennis kept the cross-dressing, the animal abuse, and the spying to himself.

His parents didn't know, his three brothers had no clue, and not even his friends knew. In fact, according to Dennis' friends growing up, they thought of him as just a normal, polite, well-mannered boy. Not the kind of kid thought of to be engaged in any type of deviant sexual behavior.

After he graduated from high school in Wichita, Dennis attended Kansas Wesleyan University, a private Christian university. But he had trouble adjusting to college life. And after attending college for just a single year, Dennis decided to drop out completely and join the U.S. Air Force in 1966.

After serving four years, Dennis left the Air Force in 1970 and moved to Park City, Kansas. He landed a job working in the meat department of a supermarket. In fact, it was a supermarket where his mom, Doritha, was actually the bookkeeper. And while working at the supermarket, Dennis met a woman by the name of Paula Dietz. And after only dating for just a few short months,

Dennis and Paula got married on May 22, 1971. Once married, Dennis and Paula pretty quickly had two children together, Carrie and Brian Rader. Now a father of two children, Dennis decided that it's time for him to go back to school and earn himself a degree.

So he enrolled at Butler County Community College in El Dorado. And by 1973, he earned an associate's degree in electronics. After finishing his associate's degree, he was actually accepted to Wichita State University to study administration of justice, or also known in some programs as criminal justice. By all accounts, Dennis was a good student at the university.

He wasn't able, though, to take on full-time coursework because being a father of two, he was a husband and he was working. But he was able to finally finish his bachelor's degree in 1979. While he was a student at Wichita State University, he started working for the security company ADT in 1974.

Dennis' job at ADT was to install the security alarms inside of customers' homes. And he held this job with ADT for quite a while. He would actually work for the company until 1988. So that's about 14 years with the company. But Dennis Rader had a completely different side to him.

A side he kept hidden from his wife, from his children, from his community. And this side to him all began in the mid-1970s, just a few years after he married his wife Paula. On January 15, 1974, Dennis Rader selected his first victims.

In January 1974, four members of the Otero family were found murdered inside their home in Wichita, Kansas. 38-year-old Joseph and 33-year-old Julie Otero were murdered, along with their two small children, 11-year-old Josephine and 9-year-old Joseph Jr.,

The Oteros were discovered inside their home by the family's eldest child, who at the time was in 10th grade. Now, just picture that for a moment. What it would be like to be a teenager in the 10th grade and come home to find your entire family has been brutally murdered.

Sometime between 7 and 7.30 in the morning, Dennis Rader entered the Otero residence by confronting the family. At first, Dennis only thought that Julie Otero was home with the two children. He had absolutely no idea that Joseph Sr. was still inside the home that morning.

Dennis entered the house through the back door and once inside, he cut the phone lines. Once inside the house, Dennis confronted Joseph with a pistol. He told Joseph Ortero to lie down in the living room and have one of the children take the family dog and put the dog outside in the backyard.

Once the dog was put in the backyard, Dennis ordered the Otero family to the master bedroom. Inside the master bedroom, Dennis tied up the family while still threatening them with his pistol. This next part is a little graphic. Dennis then took a plastic bag and placed it over Joseph Sr.'s head. Next was Julie Otero.

Dennis strangled Julie to death while the couple's two young children watched. Then he did the same exact thing to Josephine and Joseph Jr. After the killings, Dennis Rader took 11-year-old Josephine down into the family's basement and hung her.

Now, by this point, just to be clear, she's already dead. So he's taking her down into the basement and hanging her there. Now, it's believed that this was specifically done as some sort of sexual fantasy that Dennis desired to have. So once all four members of the Otero family were killed, Dennis basically went through the entire house.

Dennis would describe this as the right-hand rule, where he went from room to room, picking everything up. And as he made his way from room to room, Dennis decided to take with him a souvenir, Joseph Otero's watch. And besides the watch, he also took a radio from inside of the Otero's home.

After he was satisfied about cleaning everything up in the house, Dennis took the keys to the family car and he drove it over to one of his friends' house. And then from there, he abandoned the family car and then eventually walked back to his own car. After killing the Otero family, Dennis returned home to his wife and two young kids at the time like nothing ever happened.

A few months later, on April 4th, 1974, Dennis Rader selected his next victim. Actually, it wasn't on April 4th that Dennis selected his next victim. He had already been watching her for weeks. While Dennis was driving one day, he spotted a young woman who caught his eye.

And when he saw her, he must have thought to himself, hmm, that's a possibility. Her name was Catherine Bright. On April 4th, 1974, Dennis Rader broke into Catherine's apartment in Sedgwick County and waited for her to come home. Just like with the Otero family, he broke into the apartment through the back door.

Dennis waited by Catherine's bedroom, just waiting for her to arrive. But when Catherine arrives back home to her apartment, she isn't alone. She's with her brother, Kevin Bright, not expecting Kevin to be there. Dennis tells the Brights that he's wanted in California and that the only reason why he's there is because he needs their car. But within minutes,

Dennis ordered Kevin to tie Catherine up. Then he tied Kevin up. And just like with the Orteros, Dennis was armed with a gun. So Catherine and Kevin had basically no choice but to follow his orders. But Kevin wasn't tied up very well. And after just a few moments, he was able to break free from the rope.

And as he broke free and started to charge towards Dennis, Dennis fired a shot at Kevin, hitting him right in the head. Kevin instantly fell down to the ground, and that's when Dennis turned his attention back to Catherine.

Dennis tried to strangle Catherine, but like Kevin, the bounds around her wrists weren't done very well. And for a quick moment, she was able to break free and started to fight against her attacker. As Catherine and Dennis are into this massive struggle together, Dennis hears a noise coming from the other bedroom in the apartment, exactly where Kevin was shot.

So he goes into the other room where he discovers that Kevin is still alive. And just so we're clear, Kevin was shot in the head but was still alive. During this confrontation between Dennis and Kevin, Kevin tries to grab the second gun that is on Dennis' hip.

He knows that if he can grab that gun, he can save not only his own life, but he can also save the life of his sister, Catherine. But Dennis was able to pull the gun out first, and once he does, he shoots Kevin a second time. Once he thinks Kevin is dead, he turns back to the other bedroom where Catherine is.

He then proceeded to strangle and stab her to death. Dennis Rader ran out of Catherine's apartment and headed back to where his car was parked, fully believing that Catherine and Kevin Bright were both dead. But Kevin survived. He survived being shot twice and once in the head.

But his sister Catherine just wasn't as fortunate. And sadly, she was pronounced dead right there in her very own apartment from multiple stab wounds.

When police questioned Kevin Bright about who attacked him and his sister, he described the killer as, quote, an average-sized guy with a bushy mustache and psychotic eyes, end quote. Just like with the Otero family, after killing Catherine and attempting to kill Kevin, Dennis Rader returned home to his wife and kids and his work with ADT.

A few months after the attack inside Catherine Bright's home, Dennis Rader placed a letter in a public library book in October 1974. Inside the letter, Dennis claimed responsibility for killing the Oteros. The letter read, quote,

He then went on to say that he will strike again, saying, quote, The code words for me will be bind them, torture them, kill them. B-T-K. End quote. The letter that was ultimately discovered inside the library book officially labeled Dennis Rader as the B-T-K Strangler.

After the letter, written by BTK himself, was discovered, it was as if he simply vanished. In fact, between April 1974 and 1977, there were no known murders committed by BTK until March of 1977. On March 17, 1977, BTK put into place the, quote, Green Project.

These projects became known as potential hits, potential victims. The goal of these projects was to satisfy BTK's sexual fantasies. So while BTK was walking down the street, he met a young boy. BTK asked the young boy if he could ID some pictures for him. But the young boy, who was probably frightened by this man...

turned away, and walked back towards his mother's apartment. BTK followed the young boy to the apartment. He knocked on the door, and he told the woman who answered that he was a private detective, and that he went on to show her a picture that he had just shown the little boy.

And while the woman was studying the picture, BTK pulled out a gun and forced his way inside of the apartment. The apartment belonged to Shirley Vian. Once inside, BTK told Shirley, quote, he had a problem with sexual fantasies, that he was going to tie her up and that he needed her and her children to cooperate with him.

BTK took Shirley into the bedroom where she was tied up and then locked her children inside of the bathroom. Something interesting here was that sometime during this, Shirley got sick, probably because she was just so, so terrified that she threw up.

And at this point, BTK actually went into the kitchen, filled up a glass of water, returned back to the bedroom, and gave it to Shirley. And just a few minutes after giving Shirley the water, BTK placed a bag over her head and strangled her until she died, while her children were still locked inside the bathroom.

A few months later, in December of 1977, BTK selected his next victim. BTK's next victim was another project for Dennis. While BTK was just trolling the area of Sedgwick County, he spotted a woman by the name of Nancy Fox. BTK watched Nancy go inside her home one night in December 1977.

And when I say BTK was trolling the streets, he was literally stalking his victims. He would watch their every move and make a decision whether or not they would become his next victim or, as he would later describe it, as his next project. BTK identified Nancy Fox as his next victim, his next project.

On December 8th, 1977, BTK parked his car about two or three blocks away from Nancy's apartment. He knocked on the front door to see if anyone was inside. And because he had watched Nancy, he knew exactly what time she would be arriving home from work each day.

Once nobody answered the front door, he made his way to the back of the house and just like with his earlier victims, he cut the phone lines and broke in. The moment Nancy Fox entered her apartment, she was confronted with BTK, just like with what we saw with Shirley. BTK told Nancy that he had, quote, sexual problems.

and he told her that he had to tie her up. This time, BTK didn't use a rope. He used handcuffs to restrain Nancy. Next thing he did was he took a belt and put it around Nancy's neck until she became his next victim.

What was different about this murder was that BTK actually called 911 to report the murder himself. He called police and told them that there's been a murder and he even provided them with Nancy Fox's address. But then he just hung up.

And once he hung up with the police, he ran back to his car a few blocks away from the apartment and again just went home. It needs to be pointed out here that BTK's motivation and desire to kill is sexual. Although at this point, police have no idea who their suspect is, it's pretty clear that he's established an M.O. or modus operandi for himself.

His desire to kill is driven by his sexual fantasies and desires. Although not all of his victims are sexually assaulted, his sexual fantasies are the motive behind his crimes. We call this behavior sexual sadism.

Basically, sexual sadism is when someone experiences sexual arousal in responses to extreme pain, suffering, or even humiliation of others. We've seen sexual sadism in serial killers in only a handful of cases in the history of the United States. At this point, BTK has graduated to a serial killer.

Now, for my master's degree, I did a lot of research on serial killers and mass murderers. So while the exact definition of a serial killer varies depending on the source, typically we label someone a quote serial killer when they have killed at least three people on three separate occasions.

And at this point, people can certainly label BTK a serial killer whose motive is clearly sexual. So after BTK killed Nancy Fox in December 1977, Dennis Rader sent a poem to a local newspaper company in January 1978.

In the poem, he wrote about his responsibility in killing Shirley Vian, his victim known as Project Green. A few weeks after mailing the poem, BTK also sent a letter to the television station KAKE in Wichita. In the letter, BTK claimed responsibility for the murder of the Otero family and

He also made allusions and references to other notorious serial killers, including Ted Bundy and David Berkowitz, also known as the son of Sam. His letter suggested many possible names for himself, including the original one that he coined for himself back in his first letter, BTK.

This time, though, he was demanding media attention. He wanted the entire world to know that there was a sexual serial killer on the loose in Wichita and that you better lock your doors that night. BTK isn't the only serial killer we've seen write letters demanding attention for their murders.

We've seen this with Ted Kaczynski, the Unabomber. We saw it with the Zodiac Killer. In fact, it's quite common for serial killers to want fame and some sort of notoriety for their crimes. We definitely see this trait in BTK, Dennis Rader. He wants to be famous. He is seeking to be validated in some way for his actions.

And he wants to cause fear. By sending these letters and poems and taking responsibility for these murders, he wants the people throughout Wichita to be fearful of him. That's a part of his M.O., his desire to keep on killing until he can be caught. BTK has basically started a cat and mouse game with the police.

He continues to kill and he continues to claim responsibility for them. But throughout this time, Dennis Rader was able to keep this side to him a complete and utter secret from everyone who really knew him. Remember, Dennis is married. He's the father of two children. He's practically a model employee for the security company ADT.

On the outside, he's just your all-American kind of guy with a terrible secret on the inside. By April 1979, BTK was ready to strike again. He selected his next victim, 63-year-old Anna Williams. Just like with his previous victims, BTK entered Anna's house and waited for her to return home.

But this time around, BTK made a tiny mistake. Even though BTK had stalked and watched Anna Williams in the weeks leading up to the break-in, on that particular night, Anna came home much later than she usually did. BTK spent hours and hours inside of Anna's apartment, just waiting for her to arrive back home.

But after several hours go by, and fearing that he may be caught, BTK decides he needs to get out of there. And a few days later, Anna Williams received a letter in the mail from BTK himself. And inside the letter, BTK told Anna all about his effort to kill her that night and how he waited for hours for her to return home.

Anna Williams is incredibly lucky that she decided to stay out late that night, or she would have become BTK's next victim. By mid-1979, police still don't have any solid leads as to who BTK really is. Even with all the letters, they have no suspects or even persons of interest in the murders.

And because BTK was known to stick around inside his victims' houses after the murders and clean up, he left behind very little forensic evidence. So the police decided that it was time to release the 1977 recording of his phone call to police. The call that he made after killing Nancy Foxx.

And they did this in hopes that once they released the recording, that someone out there would listen to the phone call and that they would be able to recognize his voice. But this tactic doesn't seem to take the investigation anywhere.

Police don't receive any solid tips or leads from releasing the phone call, and several more years would go by without a single arrest in the case. But this is also a time when the killings seem to completely stop. In fact, there were no murders from 1977 until the year 1985.

which when you think about it, that's a long time. So people even started to wonder, maybe BTK is dead or maybe he just decided to stop killing. But people were wrong. BTK wasn't dead and he wasn't done killing. And in May 1985, Dennis Rader killed again.

On May 5th, 1985, 53-year-old Maureen Hedge was found dead along the side of the road in Wichita. It was later discovered that Maureen Hedge was actually a neighbor of Dennis Rader. BTK killed her on April 27th, 1985. After killing her, he took her body to his church, the Christ Lutheran Church.

Now, I want to point out here that Dennis Rader wasn't just a member at this church. He was actually the president of the church's council. Inside the church, BTK took photographs of his victim in a number of different kind of bondage style positions, if you will.

After taking the photographs, he placed her body inside the black trash bags and dumped her body along the road in a ditch. He would later call the murder, quote, project cookie. Years would go by without an arrest in the BTK case. And by all accounts, Dennis Rader continued to live his life as a father and as a husband.

He left his job at ADT in the 1980s, and he started working for the Wichita suburb of Park City as a compliance supervisor in 1991. Dennis Rader was known by his co-workers and subordinates as being, quote, a stickler for the rules.

And in this particular job, he did things like measure the height of people's lawns and he would chase away stray animals. As a compliance supervisor, he really enjoyed the idea of exerting his authority, although it was limited.

over his neighbors and fellow members of his community. He liked to feel in charge. By the year 2004, 30 years after BTK's first victims, the investigation of the BTK Strangler was considered a cold case.

And that's because investigators haven't received any new information or leads in the case for several years. They didn't even have a single person of interest in the case. But by 2004, police just may have received the break that they have been waiting over 30 years for.

The year 2004 became the year marked as the 30th anniversary of the Otero family murders. And to celebrate this anniversary, BTK began sending a series of letters to not only the local media, but he also was sending letters to the police.

In total, he initiated a series of 11 communications to the media and to the police. The letters included specific details of the murders. He included pictures of his victims. One letter even had a word puzzle that was basically outlined as the BTK story. He even left packages with clues, one that even included a computer disc that

something that we're going to be talking about in more detail in just a little bit. So there are several theories or possible explanations as to why BTK resurfaced in this way. You might think that he should just lay low, right?

It's been several years since his last victim. He would have pretty much every reason to believe that by 2004 that he would never be caught. So why didn't BTK just go away? Why did he resurface and send all these letters all of these years later?

Well, it's related to his M.O. and his desire to achieve fame and notoriety. Dennis Rader wants the world to know that he did these crimes and that he was able to get away with it all of these years. In fact, he's probably feeling obsessed with what he's done.

By sending pictures and details about his murders, in a way, he's able to relive the crimes. In his mind, he's picturing his victims and his sexual acts, and it's proving to be extremely satisfying to him. I think the letters also speak to his level of arrogance, really.

Dennis Rader doesn't believe that he's ever going to get caught. And he enjoyed taunting the police. And he enjoyed taunting the victim's families. And he's doing it because he thinks that he's going to get away with it. But the problem here is that by resurfacing, he's simply fueling more fire to the police investigation on him.

And the first big clue came in March of 2004. In March 2004, the Wichita Eagle received a letter from someone using the return address Bill Thomas Killman. And in the letter, the author claimed that he was the person responsible for killing a woman by the name of Vicki Weigley on September 16th, 1986.

Inside the letter, the author also enclosed several crime scene photos and even included a photocopy of the victim's driver's license, which had been stolen on the day of the murder. When Vicki Weigley was found dead inside of her apartment in September 1986, police didn't originally think the crime was linked to BTK.

Because in Vicky's case, police had collected DNA from underneath her fingernails. And when they ran the DNA, it wasn't matched to anyone in either the local or national DNA databases. After her death, police tested hundreds of men to find her killer.

but none came back as a match to the DNA found underneath her fingernails. In fact, over 1,300 DNA samples were taken and none came back as a match to her killer. On June 9, 2004, a package was found taped to a stop sign at the corner of First Street and Kansas in Wichita.

The package contained graphic descriptions of the Otero family murders and a sketch that was labeled, The Sexual Thrill is My Bill. Also inside the package was a chapter list for a proposed book titled, The BTK Story. Chapter one was titled, A Serial Killer is Born.

One month later, another package was found in the return slot at the local public library.

This package contained a ton of weird material, including the claim that he was responsible for the murder of a 19-year-old boy, Jake Allen, in Kansas, which later on actually proved to be a lie because Jake Allen's death had already been ruled a suicide.

In the mid to late 2004, police were able to start zeroing in on a possible suspect in the BTK case. One of the packages left by BTK contained a computer disk, the disk that I mentioned earlier. Police were able to trace that computer disk to belonging to the Christ Lutheran Church.

the same church Dennis Rader served as the president of the church's council. Police were able to trace it to the church after conducting a forensic search on the disc. The forensic search revealed metadata embedded in a deleted Microsoft Word document that was still on the disc. The metadata contained the words Christ Lutheran Church,

and that the Word document was last modified by the user Dennis. And a quick search on Google determined that a Dennis Rader was the president of the church's council. Police started reviewing surveillance footage around the spots where the packages and letters were being dropped.

And as they started watching the surveillance tapes, they started noticing the same Jeep Cherokee appear on some of the package drop-off locations. But initially, they weren't able to ID the driver of the Jeep. So police decided to follow their first lead.

which was to visit the house of Dennis Rader, the man named on the Word document found during the forensic search. And when police investigators show up at Dennis Rader's house, they cannot believe what they see right there in the driveway.

Right there parked on Dennis Rader's driveway, police see the same black Jeep Cherokee that has been spotted in several of the surveillance tapes where the packages have been dropped. So, police know that this doesn't look good for Dennis Rader and his connection to BTK.

But this is all simply circumstantial. You can't arrest and charge someone for being a serial killer simply because they have a similar looking vehicle and because one of BTK's letters was typed on a computer that Dennis used at his church.

Sure. Does it look super suspicious? Yes. Is it criminal enough or enough probable cause for an arrest? Absolutely not. So the police know they have to keep investigating. Dennis Rader has quickly moved up to the top of the suspect list in the BTK murders. But in order to make an arrest in the case, they really needed more evidence.

They needed solid forensic evidence that could finally link him to the murders. So police began strategizing how they could link Dennis Rader to any of BTK's murders. And one strategy they came up with was the use of familial DNA.

Now, we just talked about familial DNA when I gave you an update earlier in the episode on the Golden State Killer or Joseph James D'Angelo. Familial DNA allows forensic scientists to test a suspect's family member to help link the DNA to that actual suspect.

we can do this by comparing the family member's DNA to the suspect's DNA and determine if there is a relationship. Familial DNA allows us to determine if we've tested DNA from someone who is a family member or relative of our suspect. In the case of BTK, if I said what police did was creative,

I would be selling the idea way too short. Suspecting that their suspect, Dennis Rader, just may be BTK, police obtained a search warrant to test a pap smear taken from Dennis' daughter at the Kansas State University Medical Clinic. Crazy, right?

I so wonder what the judge was thinking when he or she read the police officer's search warrant to get access to a pap smear test. But all jokes aside here, this is an extremely smart idea and just smart forensic work. Police already have a suspicion that Dennis Rader just may be BTK.

And if they can get access to his daughter's DNA, they can establish a familial relationship. But what can the DNA really be compared to that proves Dennis Rader is BTK? Well, police had in their custody BTK's DNA. They obtained it from underneath one of his victim's fingernails, Vicky Weagley.

So, if police could test the DNA from the pap smear and establish a relationship or familial DNA relationship to the DNA found underneath one of the victim's fingernails, police knew they had their killer.

The DNA test showed a familial match between the pap smear and the sample from the victim's fingernails, proving that BTK was closely related to Dennis Rader's daughter. BTK's last known victim was Dolores Davis.

when she was murdered inside her home on January 19, 1991. Dennis Rader was finally arrested on February 25, 2005, while driving near his home in Park City. When the police officer who pulled him over asked him, quote,

Dennis simply replied, quote, Oh, I have suspicions why. Dennis's arrest left the entire community and family in just complete and utter shock. People were stunned. No one could believe that the man, husband, father, neighbor, fellow churchgoer could be BTK.

the serial killer that terrorized the community for decades. And once Dennis Rader was in police custody, the Wichita Police Department, the Kansas Bureau of Investigation, the FBI, and the ATF all joined forces to search his home and his vehicle.

They needed to find whatever kind of evidence they could to put BTK behind bars for the rest of his life. The day after Dennis Rader was arrested for being a suspect in the BTK case, Wichita Police Chief Norman Williams announced, quote, the bottom line, BTK is arrested, end quote.

Three days after his arrest, the man accused of being BTK was officially charged with 10 counts of first-degree murder. Now, there was some speculation that while in jail, BTK confessed to killing more than just the original 10 victims.

The Associated Press published an article that cited an anonymous source alleging that BTK confessed to several more murders. But the Sedgwick County District Attorney who was in charge of prosecuting Dennis refused to issue any statement on this jailhouse claim.

The judge set bail at $10 million and BTK was assigned a public defender. BTK's arraignment was scheduled for May 3rd, a hearing for him to enter a plea of guilty or not guilty. But at the arraignment, BTK didn't say a single word, not a peep.

So the judge had no choice but to enter a plea of not guilty on his behalf. And the case was set for trial to begin on June 27th. But instead of taking the case to trial, BTK decided to enter a plea on June 27th, the same day that trial was supposed to get underway. And this time he spoke.

On June 27th, BTK changed his plea to guilty. As a part of his plea, he described in detail the horrifying details of his murders in open court.

And many of these court transcripts are available online. I read through practically all of the transcripts in order to talk about the case for this show. And BTK himself tells the judge and tells everyone in the courtroom exactly what he did and why to each one of his victims. Trust me, just reading it will give you the chills.

After BTK pled guilty to the murders in June, the judge set his sentencing hearing for August 18th. This allowed for many members of the victim's families to be present in court and give them a chance to read victim impact statements.

And in a bizarre twist, BTK actually spoke at his sentencing hearing, in which he stood up in court and read a 30-minute monologue apologizing for his actions. The prosecutor actually later described BTK's speech as, quote, an Academy Awards acceptance speech.

To many people, BTK's words at his sentencing hearing lacked any genuine emotion for his crimes. Dennis Rader, the man now known as BTK, was sentenced to 10 consecutive life sentences with a minimum of 175 years behind bars. I know many of you are wondering, how did this monster escape the death penalty?

Well, in 2005, the state of Kansas didn't allow the death penalty for anyone. So BTK is currently serving his life sentences at the El Dorado Correctional Facility in El Dorado, Kansas. He spends his day in solitary confinement where he's allowed one hour of exercise per day and is allowed to shower only three times a week.

And this is how BTK will spend the rest of his life. Dennis Rader, BTK, is responsible for murdering 10 innocent people. Four members of the Otero family, parents Joseph and Julie and their two children, Josephine and Joseph Jr., Catherine Bright, Shirley Vian, Nancy Fox, Maureen Hedge,

Vicki Weigley, and Dolores Davis. While committing the murders, BTK was very careful not to leave behind any valuable forensic evidence. He often spent a long time in the house of his victims after they were killed, sometimes hours, cleaning up the place. If it wasn't for the DNA found underneath one of his victims' fingernails,

It's possible that authorities would have never caught BTK, and without the advancements we've made in familial DNA, we wouldn't have been able to compare BTK's daughter's DNA and link it back to the murders.

I mentioned during our episode on the Golden State Killer that I truly believe that over the next several years, familial DNA is going to be used to solve many cold cases. Remember, when you submit your DNA through companies like 23andMe and Ancestry.com, you're consenting to your DNA being tested for this very purpose.

And once authorities get a hit from one of these DNA databases, they can use it to compare to unknown DNA found at crime scenes. So, if you're thinking about submitting your DNA to one of these companies, you may just find out that you've got a serial killer in your very own family.

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