OK OK - Girl Scout Murders, Lori Farmer, 8, Michelle Guse, 9, Doris Milner, 10, 1977

[Betty P]

Still wondering why the bodies were placed like they were? Makes no sense. I mean the killer had no idea of what the daily routine would be right? It was the first night, thats why I wonder if it were a former employee someone who knew the routines. I mean wouldn't leaving the bodies in the tent to be discovered later allow more time to escape? How could Hart or anyone leave so little evidence while committing a triple murder in almost pitch black. Also go around into tents stealing things killing three and moving them by the counselors tents to the trail makes me wonder if it was a mental institution escapee. One hair similiar to Hart, DNA that matches native american which I think 90 percent of Cherokee county had Indian Blood. One fingerprint that hasn't been matched and two shoe prints that are not Harts size. There had to be more evidence.

I thought LE surmised they were getting ready to take the bodies out of the camp via the nearby gate, but something startled them and they left them where they were. Maybe someone at one of the other camps got up to use the latrine or something. Or they heard a door slam or some other sound that made them think people were getting up. The sun rose pretty early that morning, so it was probably beginning to get light.

Another reason to think there were two people involved. One person thought they should remove the bodies and dump them, the other thinking it was too much time and trouble.

 

[missgulfsouth]

I thought LE surmised they were getting ready to take the bodies out of the camp via the nearby gate, but something startled them and they left them where they were. Maybe someone at one of the other camps got up to use the latrine or something. Or they heard a door slam or some other sound that made them think people were getting up. The sun rose pretty early that morning, so it was probably beginning to get light.

Another reason to think there were two people involved. One person thought they should remove the bodies and dump them, the other thinking it was too much time and trouble.

Do you think they parked a vehicle out at the gate and walked in on foot? Otherwise, it would take 2 people to carry the bodies some distance. I think they planned to leave Doris, correct?

 

[missgulfsouth]

I'm 42. I don't recall if my aunt took the letter to the police, I was 10 and my cousin was 11. I just remember my mom getting a phone call, getting very upset, my aunt came over and they read the letter together, and then my other aunts came over, everyone was very upset. I didn't see the letter, but it was read to me and to my cousin, it terrified us both.

I used to spend the night with my cousin quite often in the summer. She lived way out in the country, so we would mess around outside a lot. We'd go out into farm fields and tease the bull ... then run for our lives! We'd walk a few miles up to the store. We'd play in her treehouse in the woods, catch frogs in her big pond, or go to see the horses. We also liked to take a trail up a big hill into the woods ... hike over to I-75 (Northern Michigan), cross the expressway (yep, we were insane), go to the rest area (also insane), and then cross the field and more hills to visit her Aunt Em. One day when we were hiking in those woods, we heard something and got spooked, but we kept going all the way to visit her Aunt Em.

The letter was mailed to my Aunt Sherry, telling her about our walk up the hill, into the woods. It included a newspaper clipping of a kidnapped and murdered child and warned her what would happen to us. We never went back into the woods after that. My aunt never found out who sent the letter, she and I talked about it last summer. It still frightens our family.

Quoting my own post here because I forgot to add the most frightening detail ... the person who wrote the letter knew our names. No one knew me way out there in the country, except my aunt and her family.

 

[Ambitioned]

I thought the bodies were left to taunt the camp but you're right. It does seem they were left in a hurry.

Also, I always thought they went after the last tent because it was the most remote. Now I see that a flashlight was shone inside tent #6 before moving to #7. Were they actually targeting DM? If so was she targeted because of her skin color or because of her dad's occupation?

Cause of Death
Guse and Farmer were killed inside the tent. They were struck by a heavy blunt object in the back of their heads while they slept.Milner may have been led out of the tent, raped, and then killed. When found, her face had been beaten with such force that the object responsible had left behind its shape. She had died on the trail. Her cause of death was strangulation, not blunt force trauma.At autopsy it was revealed that two different types of knots had reportedly been used; head wounds on two of the victims indicated two different blunt instruments.

Analysis
Physical evidence left behind at the crime scene and evidence recovered during autopsy indicates that two offenders were involved in the crime.The nature of the crime scene was a mixed scene, all of the equipment necessary to commit the crime was brought along, yet no steps were taken to conceal the crime after it was committed. This indicates that two offenders were involved. The offenders would have left the area immediately after the crime.This crime is one that would have been planned months, possibly years in advance. The killers were probably good friends, given the nature of the crimes.

Because of the remoteness of the crime scene, the offenders knew the area well; they were probably either avid hunters or lived in the area.

Only one of the girls was the intended target.The other two girls were most likely murdered because they could identify the offenders.

One or both of the offenders may have had a history of sexual assault, possibly involving children.

This may not have been the first murder for one of both of the offenders. The level of violence indicates that these offenders were not new to murder and had been involved in some type of violent crime previous to this one.

However, the crime itself was sloppy and excessively violent so this may have been the offenders' first murder.The girls could have been led out of the tent, or tied up and dragged out of the tent, and killed in another location that would have been more difficult to find, therefore concealing their identity. Instead, the victims were murdered inside of the tent, leaving behind shoe prints and blood.

The victims were all young girls that were surprised in their tent late at night while probably sleeping. They were badly beaten and raped.

This was the first step in the escalation of violence, leading to murder.

Criminal profile

 

[Ambitioned]

Quoting my own post here because I forgot to add the most frightening detail ... the person who wrote the letter knew our names. No one knew me way out there in the country, except my aunt and her family.

CREEPY!!!

 

[missgulfsouth]

I thought the bodies were left to taunt the camp but you're right. It does seem they were left in a hurry.

Also, I always thought they went after the last tent because it was the most remote. Now I see that a flashlight was shone inside tent #6 before moving to #7. Were they actually targeting DM? If so was she targeted because of her skin color or because of her dad's occupation?



Criminal profile

I remember reading this on a website, can you post the link here? It was very informative. TIA

 

[Ambitioned]

Yup!

http://www.girlscoutmurders.com/CRIMINAL_PROFILE.html

 

[Betty P]

Do you think they parked a vehicle out at the gate and walked in on foot? Otherwise, it would take 2 people to carry the bodies some distance. I think they planned to leave Doris, correct?

The gate at that end of the camp wasn't near a road. It led to an open area, a right of way with electric utility poles, then on to another farmer's property (Cavallier?). See the photos in the post above with utility poles. They would have had to carry them across that field to a waiting car, if they had one. They may also have planned to carry them off to the woods/creek across the field and leave them there. Doesn't seem like a bright idea. That's why I think an accomplice argued against it and left them where they were.

Map with gate marked



When Hart raped and tried to kill the two 19 yo women in 1966, he left them nude, bound and their heads wrapped in yards of tape. They were left in a remote area far outside of Tulsa, next to a pond and hidden in trees. They were able to get loose and get help. Maybe in Hart's odd mind he thought if he took the girl scouts with him and dumped their bodies somewhere, he would be at less risk of being caught. Who knows? He wasn't very smart, JMO. Jack Shroff had 2 six packs of beer stolen from his farm just before that and 3 empty bottles were found not far from the crime scene, so Hart and his friend were probably drunk, too.

Hart was an escaped convict, so he didn't have a car. If they planned to use one, his accomplice may have had access to one. I don't see how he could have planned to carry 3 bodies that far without help.

 

[Betty P]

I thought the bodies were left to taunt the camp but you're right. It does seem they were left in a hurry.

Also, I always thought they went after the last tent because it was the most remote. Now I see that a flashlight was shone inside tent #6 before moving to #7. Were they actually targeting DM? If so was she targeted because of her skin color or because of her dad's occupation?



Criminal profile

They would have had no way of knowing her dad's occupation unless they stalked her at her home back in Tulsa. In Kiowa, the counselors allowed the girls to pick their own roommates and tents after they got to the unit. They were younger girls and counselors thought it might make them feel less homesick or scared. That was questioned and brought out in the pre-trial docs. All 3 counselors verified it.

JMO, they had to choose Kiowa because it was the most remote of the campgrounds. It also had the youngest girls. They may have targeted DM because she was older, taller than the others and physically more closely fit GLH's victim profile - teenage girls.

 

[Betty P]

Found some more information in recent articles on the 49th anniversary

http://newsok.com/article/5552738

A landowner would later tell an Oklahoman reporter he heard "quite a bit" of vehicular traffic on a remote road near the camp between 2:30 and 3 a.m.

Another article with more photos from 1977 and later. Hadn't seen these before. Camp, tent, search. Scroll down to bottom of the article

http://newsok.com/article/5552820

Another article in which Hart's attorney, Isaacs, makes quite a few inaccurate statements. Hart's alibi for the night of the murders is that he was in Tulsa visiting with his uncle. Ok.

He also claims the victims bodies were in a pile with the flashlight on top of all of them. No, not true.



http://newsok.com/article/5552738

 

[adeedra]

How does life just "go on" after something so horrific? And how do those who know the truth but chose to remain silent even live with themselves?

. Life doesn't go on.
I guess that they don't care or think about it much.

ISo I know 1977 wasn't the dark ages. Rapes, kidnapping, child abduction and murder happened back then... even in the 50's. What I'm getting at is, why did they assume they would always be safe? Why not have counselors in every tent? Why wasn't it alarming for strange men to be spotted in the camp? No one should have been able to get inside, ever. It's so stupid to me that many things weren't taken seriously. Who cares if the note turned out (years later) to be a prank? They didn't know that at the time. And 3 girls WERE murdered. Such a senseless, preventable crime. Kids are irreplaceable. That's all.

I'm not from US but we had scouts here - now it's less popular, but it was a big part of most kid's childhood back in 70's and earlier.
I wasn't a girl scout myself but I was going camping - and since I remember the most obvious thing was that someone has to be the guard.
I'm not even sure if it was caused by fear of some kind of safety reasons - I don't recall knowing that someone can kidnap me or hurt me as I was a child. We were most scared of bears, so it was mostly listening to the sounds, walking around, keeping fire and waiting for somebody else's turn. There was always someone guarding the tent and those, sleeping inside. Sometimes it was an adult, but mostly one of us, changing every 2 hours or so.
My mother and aunts were doing the same thing 30 years earlier and the only difference was that on camps there was few child "guards" and some adults awake.

At first I was surprised that it wasn't working this way in US, but what could that change?
If some monsters would target us or someone in any other group like this, watching, waiting and finally hunting we will be as defenseless as these girls. If they would have counselor in every tent then most likely they would kill her as well.

Also - I'm not sure but as far as I dig in - there were counselors in every unit, but... was there anyone there who could help them? who could be alarmed by them?
I'm not sure if I recall it correctly, but wasn't there just one man at the camp? One mile away from the closest house...?

Since I saw how dense really is (and obviously was), it just terryfies me that so many kids were just sleeping there in open tents. They didn't know that note was a threat, they didn't know that some people will come there and harm the kids, but... they surely knew that kid can wander away and get lost - and they did nothing (not much?) to prevent that.
I'm pretty sure that no matter if it was 1970, 1950, 1700 or 3000 b.c. people knew that leaving kids sleeping alone in dark wilderness is not the way to keep them safe.

Still wondering why the bodies were placed like they were? Makes no sense. I mean the killer had no idea of what the daily routine would be right? It was the first night, thats why I wonder if it were a former employee someone who knew the routines. I mean wouldn't leaving the bodies in the tent to be discovered later allow more time to escape? How could Hart or anyone leave so little evidence while committing a triple murder in almost pitch black. Also go around into tents stealing things killing three and moving them by the counselors tents to the trail makes me wonder if it was a mental institution escapee. One hair similiar to Hart, DNA that matches native american which I think 90 percent of Cherokee county had Indian Blood. One fingerprint that hasn't been matched and two shoe prints that are not Harts size. There had to be more evidence.

But that was that camp closed two days earlier? Or it was just first day of these groups? It's not clear for me at the time.

People who spend much time out in the woods, especially after dark rarely use flashlights. If he/they were hunters, that wouldn't be so hard to sense where to go and what's happening around. Also - there was a storm coming, lightenings could "help" with taking things from tents (were those glasses taken to make sure that counselors will not be able to clearly see, what's happening?)

 

[flourish]

Quoting my own post here because I forgot to add the most frightening detail ... the person who wrote the letter knew our names. No one knew me way out there in the country, except my aunt and her family.

That's chilling. I wonder if they'd been watching y'all for a while and heard your aunt or cousin call out to you or holler at you for dinner. So freaky!

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-J120AZ using Tapatalk

 

[Hatfield]

That's chilling. I wonder if they'd been watching y'all for a while and heard your aunt or cousin call out to you or holler at you for dinner. So freaky!

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-J120AZ using Tapatalk

Been catching up again.

JMO

Something just dawned on me that I wanted to share about my profile of the killer(s). And somewhat relates to the note too.

Someone asked

"Still wondering why the bodies were placed like they were?"

It is obvious to me the killer(s) loved the SHOCK FACTOR and loved shocking people. I almost wonder if the killer wanted to be close by when the bodies were spotted so he or them could see or at least her the reaction of the people who found the bodies.

It would not surprise me if the killer(s) were still lurking in those woods as the bodies were found. Just out of sight range but close enough to where he would hear and maybe even see from the woods.

More reason why I think the killer loved to shock people. The way he shone the flashlight into the other tent was bold and done on purpose. He wanted to see the girls reactions as they awoke in horror to see him.

I think there is more than one killer but I think there was 1 main leader and the other or others were more of followers and doing what he told them to do. The other one or two may have been keeping an eye out for him while he went to abduct the girls and get at least one of them out of the tent.

I think maybe he thought he was in that last tent when he first shone the flashlight in it and realized it wasnt the very last one. The last tent was a little further away than the rest and in the dark he may have made a simple mistake and when he shone the light he realized it wasnt the very last one which I think he had been in it before. Way before any campers showed up I believe he was all over that campground and knew the layouts of everything. But in the dark it was harder to recognize things.

So another reason why I know the killer must have loved the shock factor is because of the note. If the killer wrote that then again he wanted to shock the people. Same with the wet tennis shoes showing up later on the doorstep. Again SHOCK factor.

Same with how he left the bodies in the intersection of 2 trails. Knowing they would be found soon as people got up. Shock factor.

This person loved to shock people and got a thrill out of knowing he was shocking them. It speaks of an immature killer that gets a cheap thrill when shocking people with terribly gross and scary things.

 

[Hatfield]

If this information in the link is accurate it hints towards 3 people involved.

Because look at all the things that point to 3 if article is accurate. One girl for each person and one weapon for each and one beer each.

"which read "we are on a mission to kill 3 girls in tent 1""

"....of the items taken from his home were a sash cord, a roll of duct tape, 3 bottles of beer and 3 identical crow bars. The beer bottles were later found empty on the camp grounds."

http://www.girlscoutmurders.com/CRIMINAL_PROFILE.html

 

[Hatfield]

Quoting my own post here because I forgot to add the most frightening detail ... the person who wrote the letter knew our names. No one knew me way out there in the country, except my aunt and her family.

Wow that is a very scary story and so glad you both were ok.

Just had a thought about it which you may have already thought of long before now.

Is it possible the Aunt and the adults wrote the letter to scare you two into stopping some of what you both were doing at that age?

Probably not because i would have hoped they would have told you by now if they had done that.

If they knew your names then it may have been a relative of the Aunts who was trying to get you girls to stop being risky out alone like that.

It is scary to think about who could have wrote the letter.

I know what you mean though at that age we dont always think about all the dangers of the world. I shared a story on another thread that this reminds me of and to this day I cannot believe how dangerous of a situation I got myself into.

I was riding my motorcycle near a highway as the trails went near there. I decided to let my engine cool and so I pulled into the rest area which was just a dirt road rest area pull off the highway. There was already a car there and so I didnt think much of it. I pulled way too close to this car and got off my motorcycle and took off my helmet and was just resting and this guy rolls down his window and calls me over to ask directions. I was 14. And STUPID.

Im a male but still there are so many creeps that I should have never pulled that close to that vehicle. Thankfully all he needed was directions and I quickly left after that and for days afterwards and even to this day I think of how bad that could have gone if the guy was a creep and pulled a gun on me.

We just dont always think clearly at young ages. Which is why I agree with being overprotective of our youth. I would much rather have our kids mad at us for being so protective of them rather than them being abducted or killed. They will grow up to love us and respect that we were just looking out for them.

 

[Hatfield]

But it wasn't HIS DNA. It was very simmilar to his - isn't that obvious factor to focus on some of his relatives?

Also... is there any way to know if he was like... extremely not very clever person?
It seems just so ridiculous to me. He surely wasn't a good person but he managed to escape prison twice, spend long time in hiding - why would he wear glasses stolen from camp? That would be just a stupid move, especially that he knew how intense is than manhunt for him.

I believe that he was just one of the attackers or that he was framed by some of these people who were helping him to stay in hiding - and that he was planned to be framed. He was a perfect person to put blame on, douzens of people knew that he's hiding around there. He needed food, he needed things, so they stole some and gave him, to make him look guilty when police eventually will catch him.

The same hair characteristics most likely means that both - his hair and those found on that tape was black, possibly NA hair.

Good Points.

JMO
One possible motive I continually go back to for consideration.

Is it possible that people that lived in the area got tired of this annual influx of over 100 people and got tired of being disruptive to their quiet woods. And so they wanted to commit a horrendous and terrifying crime with the hopes that it would stop the camping each season.

Just a theory about a possible motive that I keep wondering about.

People who enjoyed those woods were probably not too happy about the annual influx of girl scout campers coming each year to "their woods".

 

[Hatfield]

This case haunts me, It's like the most terrifying horror story come true. I'll have to ask my mother if she recalls this, she lived in Yukon at the time.

Im with you.

I just recently learned about this case for the first time and the more I read about it the more horrifying it gets.

I was in the Boy Scouts growing up and so I can relate to camping and some of the aspects of the scouts.

This case is one of the scariest cases I have ever learned about. Its the stuff nightmares are made of. Only its real and really happened which makes it more frightening.

Bless all the families and others who were impacted by what happened.

 

[Ven]

If this information in the link is accurate it hints towards 3 people involved.

Because look at all the things that point to 3 if article is accurate. One girl for each person and one weapon for each and one beer each.

"which read "we are on a mission to kill 3 girls in tent 1""

"....of the items taken from his home were a sash cord, a roll of duct tape, 3 bottles of beer and 3 identical crow bars. The beer bottles were later found empty on the camp grounds."

http://www.girlscoutmurders.com/CRIMINAL_PROFILE.html

Sorry to be a stickler, but I think the note probably said 4 girls or campers would be killed. I have seen it reported as either 3 or 4 in different places.

Considering there were usually 4 campers in each tent, I find that number in the note more likely. The "three" number was probably introduced into the history later on, through second-hand sources and because three girls wound up getting killed.

 

[Ambitioned]

Been catching up again.

JMO

Something just dawned on me that I wanted to share about my profile of the killer(s). And somewhat relates to the note too.

Someone asked

"Still wondering why the bodies were placed like they were?"

It is obvious to me the killer(s) loved the SHOCK FACTOR and loved shocking people. I almost wonder if the killer wanted to be close by when the bodies were spotted so he or them could see or at least her the reaction of the people who found the bodies.

It would not surprise me if the killer(s) were still lurking in those woods as the bodies were found. Just out of sight range but close enough to where he would hear and maybe even see from the woods.

More reason why I think the killer loved to shock people. The way he shone the flashlight into the other tent was bold and done on purpose. He wanted to see the girls reactions as they awoke in horror to see him.

I think there is more than one killer but I think there was 1 main leader and the other or others were more of followers and doing what he told them to do. The other one or two may have been keeping an eye out for him while he went to abduct the girls and get at least one of them out of the tent.

I think maybe he thought he was in that last tent when he first shone the flashlight in it and realized it wasnt the very last one. The last tent was a little further away than the rest and in the dark he may have made a simple mistake and when he shone the light he realized it wasnt the very last one which I think he had been in it before. Way before any campers showed up I believe he was all over that campground and knew the layouts of everything. But in the dark it was harder to recognize things.

So another reason why I know the killer must have loved the shock factor is because of the note. If the killer wrote that then again he wanted to shock the people. Same with the wet tennis shoes showing up later on the doorstep. Again SHOCK factor.

Same with how he left the bodies in the intersection of 2 trails. Knowing they would be found soon as people got up. Shock factor.

This person loved to shock people and got a thrill out of knowing he was shocking them. It speaks of an immature killer that gets a cheap thrill when shocking people with terribly gross and scary things.

Which begs the question. When GLH drove the pregnant women to remote area and did his brutal rapes, did he leave the women to be found for the shock factor? If not, then he probably wasn't the leader of these murders. In this picture the arrow points to the tree under which the women were left to die.

I just got done with Volume2.pdf and one thing that kept jumping out at me is the question about the key to the gate kept coming up.

 

[huxley72]

One of the questions I have from the pre trial testimony is the fact that right after the murders, the same day. The counselors and the kids said they didn't see anyone or hear anything. But then later you learn that someone peered into tent 6 and one girl saw it.and the person left. Surely this person would have told LE about this the day of. And it being only 10 feet away she would had have to have heard some pretty bad noises. Also the killer or killers seemed to know that tent 7 was gonna have 3 campers. Could have been lurking all night around the tents to see how many were there. Would the attack had not taken place if there were 4 in the tent? I also think if Hart were around the week before with all those counselors he would have acted then. Why wait til camp started after 4 years of being on the run to murder for your first time and rape very young girls? It just doesn't seem like his thing, hes a bad dude not doubt but it just doesn't seem to fit. I think while chasing Hart other evidence and clues have been neglected and passed over.