The Springfield Three

Part Four: No End

 In November of 1995, the Missouri Violence Crime Support Unit finalized a review of Springfield P.D.'s investigation into the disappearance of Sherrill Levitt, Suzanne Streeter, and Stacy McCall. During their analysis, they agreed with the suspect list developed by investigators, but believed they should be re-prioritized. This led investigators to shuffle up the deck and begin exploring suspects they'd earlier discounted…

Sometime in the early morning hours of June 7th, 1992, three women went missing in Springfield, Missouri. 47-year-old Sherrill Levitt, as well as her daughter, 19-year-old Suzanne "Suzie" Streeter and one of Suzie's friends, 18-year-old Stacy McCall, all were at Sherrill's home at 1717 East Delmar Street at some point in the early morning hours of June 7th when they mysteriously disappeared. Friends of the two younger gals tried getting ahold of them at around 8:00 AM and were unable to reach them via telephone. They'd drop by the house at around noon that day, and were unable to find any trace of the missing women.

All three wouldn't be seen again. No shred of evidence was ever found pointing to their continued existence after that morning. Beds looked slept in, their belongings were left behind - including their three purses, stacked next to each other in a bedroom - but all three seem to have just disappeared as the world slept.

In the years that followed, police struggled to rouse any leads in the infuriating case. Those that seemed to be worth developing happened coincidentally, it seemed. In 1993, a man named Steven Garrison put himself on investigators' radar when he claimed that he had information to trade. A prior felon, Garrison was awaiting trial for weapons and drug charges when he began speaking to police. But after escaping from police custody, he'd go on to commit a heinous rape and assault, earning himself forty years in prison. Because of Garrison's involvement with a local motorcycle club, the Galloping Goose, police spent months exploring avenues of potential involvement there, but have seemingly come up with nothing concrete enough to press charges.

Following his conviction for rape in 1995, news coverage of Steven Garrison seemed to fade, but police continued to circle him as a possible suspect. They'd speak with him at various times over the next several years, with Garrison telling reporters in 1997:

"They've never let up on me."

As the lengthy, fruitless investigation into the fate of the three missing women continued, other potential suspects would continue to reveal themselves. Like Garrison, they were linked to the crime through either their own involvement or similar crimes they'd committed in the same general area. But as time carries on, little has been revealed to take away the suspicion that lingers around them.

Since the early days of this investigation, a theory that has emerged in this case is that the three female victims - Sherrill, Suzie, and Stacy - had fallen prey to some kind of serial offender, who may have been quietly targeting them for some time. Or maybe this offender even acted impulsively, potentially following Suzie and Stacy home early on the morning of June 7th, 1992. Maybe, even, there'd been two or more offenders acting in-tandem. This is a theory that police seem to have seriously considered for quite some time. After all, at the time, this was the only unsolved abduction in recent history involving three victims that went missing at the same time. So the idea that multiple offenders had worked together was something police couldn't eliminate.

Investigators also theorized that the offender(s) may have used a ruse to get the women to drop their guard, potentially getting them access to the interior of the home - or even luring the women out. Maybe they'd posed as a utility worker, maybe warning the women of a gas leak, something of that nature. This was a tactic that other offenders had used in the past, such as the BTK, Dennis Rader.

As months began to pass in this case, authorities became more and more sure that a serial offender had been responsible for the disappearances of the three women, all of whom disappeared without a trace at some point between 2:30 and 7:30 AM on Sunday, June 7th, 1992. Nothing had been stolen from the scene, and there were no signs of violence, so police concluded that the women had been abducted from the home and taken elsewhere... but to where, and for what reason, they could only guess at.

In November of 1995, more than three years later, the Missouri Violent Crime Support Unit finished a review of Springfield P.D.'s case file on the Springfield Three disappearance. They'd analyzed the information and evaluated the investigation thus far, giving Springfield detectives thirty leads to re-examine. They seemed to agree with the new wave of detectives handling the case, who believed that the motive was unlikely to have been related to drug dealing. Rather, they believed that sexual assault had played a more likely motivation in the crime. However, they did agree with the lengthy list of suspects developed by investigators, they just believed that they should be re-prioritized.

This review would eventually lead police back to a suspect they'd questioned early on, but seemingly dropped. In the early days of 1996, this suspect would emerge into public consciousness. He was 36-year-old Robert Craig Cox, and he was already a known presence to law enforcement all across the country.

Born to a woman in Texas who gave him away at birth, Robert Craig Cox was adopted by a couple from Wichita, Kansas, who would relocate to Missouri a few years later. Growing up in Springfield, Robert was described as a bit of a loner that amounted to little more than a C-average and some track & field accomplishments during school. After graduating from Parkview High School, though, he went on to enlist in the U.S. Army, before long, becoming a highly-decorated Army Ranger, who'd win his battalion's "Solder of the Year" award in 1979 and take part in the U.S. invasion of Grenada in 1983, rising to the rank of lieutenant at just 23 years old.

That being said, there was a dark part to Robert Cox's life that was yet to become public knowledge.

On December 30th, 1978, 19-year-old Sharon Zellers was last seen leaving her job at the Trading Post at Walt Disney World, her first full-time job. She wasn't supposed to have worked that night, but had covered for another employee that'd called in sick. She was seen driving out of the employee lot at around 10:00 PM, but never made it home. Her father attempted to drive the route between her work and their home multiple times, but was unable to find any trace of his missing daughter. Sadly, it was days before anyone found trace of Sharon.

On Wednesday, January 3rd, 1979, Sharon's vehicle, a 1966 Ford, was found abandoned in an orange grove located about a quarter-mile west of the Days Inn on Sand Lake Road. The location of the vehicle was curious, so police began expanding their search for Sharon out from this location. The next day, January 4th, searchers located Sharon's body, which had been shoved carelessly through a manhole. Her body was submerged in a 15-foot-deep sewage lift station there in southwest Orange County, and was only able to be located after utility workers lowered the water level enough to search the bottom of the well. She'd died of a severe blow to the head, and was still fully-clothed.

Despite leaving behind little forensic evidence near her body, there was evidence found inside Sharon's vehicle, including hairs, a boot-print, and even some unknown blood... but police were unable to do much with that at the time, other than determine its type, which could be compared to potential suspects. Sadly, the case soon went cold, with it receiving some attention early on but quickly fading from local minds.

It wasn't until 1988 that evidence finally led authorities to Sharon Zellers' supposed killer: Robert Craig Cox, a young Army Ranger that had been staying at a nearby hotel at the time Sharon was abducted and murdered. He and his family had been staying at the Days Inn along Sand Lake Road just a few hundred yards away from where Sharon's body and vehicle were found, and he'd become an immediate suspect due to a hospital visit he'd made that same week.

The evening of Sharon's disappearance, Cox had reportedly rushed back to the hotel with blood dripping down his chin, an inch having been bitten off of his tongue. He'd claimed he'd been in a fight, a claim that prosecutors would later refute. Despite that, though, prosecutors were unable to charge him with Sharon's murder, citing a lack of evidence. Sheriff Lawson Lamar, then an assistant state attorney, later explained:

"All the evidence pointed to Cox. We just did not have sufficient evidence to proceed to do anything resembling a conviction."

A decade later, though, prosecutors hoped to use the exciting new prospect of DNA testing to connect Robert Craig Cox to Sharon Zellers' vehicle. In doing so, Cox, already incarcerated out in California at the time (more on that in a bit), waived an extradition process, so the state of Florida had 180 days to make a case against him or let him go for good. And when the genetic testing came back inconclusive, the state - believing they had no other option - decided to try the case that they'd already determined was inadequate a decade beforehand. Now, ten years later, it seemed like even less of a sure thing.

During the trial, prosecutors attempted to link Cox to the crime scene through physical evidence, highlighting the fact that the blood recovered in Sharon's car was type O, as was his... even though roughly 45% of the world's population was also type O. Hairs recovered inside the car were also consistent with Cox's, but similar with the blood, the forensic testing had come back inconclusive. That wasn't all, though; boot prints found inside the vehicle matched the type of military boots Cox had been wearing at the time. Lawyers for the defense would argue that they also matched a popular type of civilian boot.

Then, of course, there was the matter of Robert Craig Cox having an inch or so of his tongue bitten off. Cox would claim that he'd bitten off this part of his tongue himself, after getting attacked by, in his words, "a big black man" outside of a nearby roller rink. However, a doctor that examined the wound believed that someone else had bitten it off of him. Staff at the roller rink were also called in to testify, claiming that they'd seen no such altercation that week.

Prosecutors would then point to Cox's repeated pattern of assault, with him having been arrested for kidnapping and assaulting two women near Fort Ord, outside of Monterey, California. This stemmed from two separate incidents in 1985, to which he later pleaded guilty, resulting in him being dishonorably discharged from the Army and sentenced to nine years in prison. However, the judge in Cox's case believed that these crimes were too dissimilar from the murder of Sharon Zellers, so they were not heard by the jury.

Despite these shortcomings, the prosecutors successfully argued their case. In July of 1988, Robert Craig Cox was convicted of the murder of Sharon Zellers, and weeks later, was sentenced to die in a Florida electric chair. But that is not where his story ends. Not by a long shot.

In December of 1989, more than a year after his sentencing, the Florida Supreme Court ordered Robert Craig Cox to be acquitted of the murder of Sharon Zellers. In a decision that was seen as incredibly rare, they ruled 7-0 against the decision handed down by the Orange County jury in 1988, not even kicking the case back down to a lower court. Pending the completion of his sentence from California, Robert Cox was now set to be a free man again. In their opinion, the justices wrote:

"Although state witnesses cast doubt on Cox's alibi, the state's evidence could have created only a suspicion, rather than proving beyond a reasonable doubt, that Cox and only Cox murdered the victim. Circumstances that create nothing more than a strong suspicion that the defendant committed the crime and not sufficient to support a conviction."

This ruling stated that the state's case wasn't without merit, but that it was weak... that many of the pieces of evidence they submitted had still not been proven, despite what the jury had decided. This decision was critiqued by almost all that had been involved in it, including the jurors, who'd not been made aware of Robert Craig Cox's other assault convictions at the time, yet felt more emboldened after learning of them. Buford Funk, one of these jurors, told reporters at the time:

"If he walks, there'll probably be more victims. And the blood will be on the hands of those seven (Florida Supreme Court) justices."

Meanwhile, the family of Sharon Zellers struggled to overcome the whiplash of the emotional torment they'd suffered over the prior decade. At first, they'd struggled with the uneasy tragedy of Sharon's senseless murder, then endured almost an entire decade of not knowing who'd killed her - or why. Then they'd found out who had most likely committed the crime and saw them convicted, only to have it all ripped up a year later. Now they were back at square one, but felt cheated out of justice by a system that didn't make any sense. Speaking to reporters, Sharon's brother Steven Zellers said about the state's Supreme Court:

"I feel that they've made a big mistake, which they'll realize when he goes out and kills again."

Al Hanson, the detective who had spent ten years working on the case, told reporters about Robert Craig Cox:

"I'll tell you one thing. If we let this sucker go free, the people in this country will hear about him again. I guarantee it."

Following his acquittal in the Florida Supreme Court, Robert Craig Cox was freed from death row and sent back to California to finish out his ten-year sentence for two violent assaults he'd committed on women in 1985. In both incidents, which took place separately within a six-month-span, Cox had stalked and kidnapped the women. It was only through their own bravery that they'd managed to escape with their lives, and both testified that they believed Cox meant to kill them.

Despite being sent back to California to finish out the rest of this sentence, it was expected that Cox, freed from Florida prisons in 1990, would be paroled by the end of the year. He was, walking out of a California state prison in December of 1990. Afterward, he'd return to his hometown of Springfield, Missouri, where his adoptive parents still lived. He'd moved back there roughly one week after his release from prison, and was there in 1992, at the same time that Sherrill Levitt, Suzanne Streeter, and Stacy McCall disappeared. While he kept a low profile during his time in Springfield, he wouldn't stay out of headlines forever.

In April 1995, Texas authorities announced that 35-year-old Robert Craig Cox had been arrested near Dallas and charged with the armed robbery of a tanning salon in Decatur. It turns out that Cox, who'd moved to Plano a short time before the crime was committed, had apparently carried out the armed robbery in November of 1994. During that ordeal, he held a gun on a 12-year-old girl, and thankfully no one was injured, but Cox was later identified as a suspect.

Police speculated that Cox had also been responsible for a scary incident in Plano, where he lived, in which a woman had been stalked home by a man that attempted to gain entry to her home. But in that case, no charges were filed. They would pursue charges in the armed robbery from Decatur, however, and within months, Cox was sentenced to thirty years in prison for that offense.

At this point, it became public knowledge that Cox was being viewed as a potential suspect in the disappearance of Sherrill Levitt, Suzie Streeter, and Stacy McCall from Springfield, Missouri in June 1992 - a time in which Cox had been living there. Springfield P.D.'s lead investigator on the case, Doug Thomas, would tell reporters in December of 1995:

"We've been looking at him... The only thing we see so far is this guy's history and the fact that we haven't discovered who took our girls or where they are."

It turns out that the family of Sharon Zellers had been following Robert Craig Cox throughout the U.S., learning where he'd relocated to after his release from custody and stayed up to date with crimes in that area. After learning about the Springfield Three disappearance in 1992, they'd been the ones who reached out to inform Springfield P.D. of Cox living there. Steven Zellers, Sharon's brother, learned about the case via a TV spot, and called police 18 days after the disappearance, later telling reporters that:

"They didn't even know he was serving parole there."

Police had looked at Cox as a potential suspect back in 1992, but never really seemed to consider him. They spoke to him twice, but didn't have much of a reason to doubt his alibi at the time, which was confirmed by his parents and his girlfriend. As they'd later learn, his parents had no way to verify his alibi, and his girlfriend had lied. But that would be learned much later.

Robert Craig Cox was added to the list of potential suspects back in 1992, but a thorough investigation into him was not done at that time. Rather, it wasn't until after his 1995 conviction that the Missouri Violent Crime Support Unit had taken a look at the Springfield Three case file, and determined that Cox should be re-evaluated as a suspect.

In January of 1996, Springfield police traveled down to Texas to speak to Cox in prison. During their conversations, Cox was described as friendly - affable, even - but also reportedly told police information about the Springfield Three disappearance that they'd never heard before. "Things that make us say we can't eliminate him" as a suspect, per Springfield Police Sergeant Dave Smith.

During their talk, investigators and Cox would also speak about Ted Bundy, who Cox had been housed near on Florida's death row a few years beforehand. Per Sergeant Smith:

"I asked him if he idolized him. He said (Bundy) was accountable for his actions in the end."

Cox himself would later speak to the Springfield News-Leader, admitting that he'd read books about Bundy and met him. He'd state:

"Bundy was a respectful, friendly type person. The guy next door. Just like me."

As the public would learn during this time period, Robert Craig Cox was suspected of involvement in not just the Springfield Three disappearance, but was also theorized to have been the I-70 Killer, an armed robber and serial killer I've covered beforehand on this show. The I-70 Killer attacked store clerks working alone in stores, almost all of whom were young female employees. The crimes started in April 1992 and went on sporadically through May of that year, beginning in Indiana and extending out into Kansas, returning once to Indiana before moving on to Missouri. Those crimes ended just weeks before the Springfield Three disappearance, and occurred during the time that Cox lived in Missouri.

There were also a series of similar crimes that took place in Texas in 1993, which were carried out in an incredibly similar manner but in those crimes, a different weapon had been used. It is still unknown whether those crimes were committed by the same offender that carried out the I-70 crimes, but those took place after Robert Craig Cox had relocated to Texas. So clearly, even if he wasn't involved, tragedy seemed to follow him. And because of his arrest for an armed robbery in 1994, he understandably became a prime suspect in that series of crimes.

Now, heading back to the matter of the Springfield Three...

Despite Robert Cox checking all of the boxes for suspicion in this case, just as had been the case in the Sharon Zellers' murder, there's nothing really definitive linking him to it. Nothing seems to put him at the crime scene in June 1992, nor witnesses that put him around Sherrill Levitt's home. Rather, it seems like his very nature made him worthy of suspicion, and that was then verified by him telling investigators information about the women's disappearance that wasn't common knowledge. As was the case with Steven Garrison, who I discussed in the last episode, this seems to have been enough to push the suspicion over the edge.

Surprisingly, Robert Craig Cox was pretty candid with this information early on. When speaking to reporters with the Springfield News-Leader in 1996, Cox would claim that he knew where the three women had been buried, claiming that "they'll never be found." However, he would claim at first that this was just a theory of his, not a known fact. Regardless, he'd "theorize" that they'd been buried near Springfield, and he could find them.

In the years since, much has been learned about Cox that sheds light on whether he may have actually been responsible for the crime.

While in Springfield, he worked for SM&P Underground Utility Co. Authorities had long since theorized that a utility worker, or someone posing as a utility worker, may have carried out the crime, since their work was one of the only things they'd believe could get the women inside the home to drop their guards late at night.

Cox also knew where Sherrill Levitt lived. During his conversations with journalists, Cox would claim that he visited the neighborhood along East Delmar Street after the disappearance, when it was bustling with visitors and reporters hoping to catch a scoop. He'd describe seeing the mobile police headquarters they'd set up outside of Sherrill's home.

Robert Craig Cox had a weak alibi for the time-frame that the three women were abducted, some time between 2:30 and 7:30 AM on June 7th, 1992. He claims that he got home late that night and went to bed. His parents say that he did, but they, being asleep at the time, had no way to confirm that. Cox also couldn't remember what he did that Sunday, admitting that he asked his then-girlfriend to lie for him. She'd originally told police back in 1992 that they'd gone to church together, but later admitted that she'd lied about that. In a letter to reporters, Cox later wrote that she:

"... was covering for me because I had called her and asked her to do that for me."

Cox was also known to stalk women, having done so in the case of the two women we know for sure he abducted while stationed out in Monterey, California in 1985. He followed them, then abducted them with weapons; in one instance, using a knife, in the other, a gun. He demanded they accompany him to an isolated location, and during both attempts, the women broke free and fled.

He was also believed to have stalked Sharon Zellers before abducting and killing her in 1979, a crime that he was later acquitted of by the Florida Supreme Court a decade later. Even though he'd been acquitted, many still believed him responsible for the crime, but under the law, he was unable to be re-tried for it. Police theorized that he'd stalked and harassed many other women, as well, who he never abducted but he may have attempted to (or planned to, prior to his arrests).

It's believed that he may have done so in the case of the Springfield Three, with many theorizing that he encountered Suzie and Stacy at some point that evening - perhaps while they were out with friends, or maybe on their way back to Sherrill's home after 2:00 AM. Maybe at some point that evening, after they'd settled into bed, he'd used his guise as utility worker to either get inside of Sherrill's home, or somehow convinced them to come outside.

Cox himself would actually speak about this possibility, mentioning during some of his conversations with reporters that the likely killer had probably posed as a utility worker. However, Cox theorized that it wasn't the two younger victims that had been targeted, but rather, that the killer had targeted 47-year-old Sherrill Levitt, home alone that night. Had he targeted Sherrill inside her home, then been surprised by the presence of Suzie and Stacy later that evening? Speaking to the Springfield News-Leader, Cox himself said about Suzie and Stacy:

"I think (they) just happened to get caught up. They weren't supposed to be there. Situation change."

Robert Craig Cox would even explain how easily three people could be controlled by a single perpetrator, explaining:

"It's very easy to control three people. When somebody comes into the room with a gun the common person will follow what direction they're led. The common person."

Cox would then detail how the three women could have been:

"... very easily laid down, tied behind their backs and transported."

Cox would blame his crimes on his gambling addiction, which in turn, made him feel like he was losing control of his life. Committing these crimes was his way of getting control back, a common theme among serial offenders. For many of them, it's less about the gratification from the act itself, but rather, the thrill they get from carrying it out; the power they can exert over another living being. If we extend that logic to a crime involving three people, then it's likely that the offender in this case was someone like Robert Craig Cox. However, police and journalists had a hard time trying to determine whether Cox had actually been involved... or just wanted the world to think he was. Much like I believe Israel Keyes had done during the end of his life, was Robert Cox just trying to build up his mystique to explain why his own life had been such an abject disappointment? Did doing so make him feel more important than he was?

Investigators had a hard time taking Cox's claims at face value, especially because his life in prison was rather grim, spending 23 of 24 hours a day in his cell. Was this his attempt at breaking that monotony? Cox himself would address this during his correspondence with the Springfield News-Leader, not only when it came to the Springfield Three disappearance, but with the other cases he was suspected of involvement in (such as the I-70 Killer case). Cox referred to these as his "games," writing:

"I could sit back and enjoy it. It's like I have two or three games going at once."

Was this just a game to him? Was him dangling potential resolution in front of the victim's families just a big joke to him? Possibly. Despite him remaining a strong suspect in this case, Cox himself seemed to enjoy the fact that police couldn't press charges against him for it, and that he - for not the first time in his life, but maybe the last - had power over others. He remains in prison to this day, and once told a reporter during a taped interview that he knew the Springfield Three were dead, but would refuse to give any specifics until his mother had passed. Maybe he was telling the truth then, and will eventually spill the beans. I personally doubt it, though.

During his correspondence with reporters in the mid-1990s, Cox would explain that he only answered to God. Not to police, not to the son he'd abandoned in order to pursue a life of crime, and not even his own parents. In his words:

"There's people that say I don't have (a conscience). I would say I have one, but what degree of guilt I feel goes back to my religious beliefs. God forgives you for your sins, so once he's forgiven you, no one else needs to know."

As the years began to pass, the families of the victims continued to push for answers. This included not only Janis McCall, who remained in the public eye as an advocate for change in the region, who constantly spoke out for good causes. Having started the organization One Missing Link shortly after her daughter Stacy's disappearance, she refused to let the disappearance fade away from memory. Speaking to police every week, she hoped that simply showing her face would remind investigators of their goal to locate the missing women. Or, at least, find out who had taken them and pursue charges.

But this contingency of family members included another name that had left the region shortly after the disappearance itself.

Bartt Streeter, Suzie Streeter's brother and Sherrill Levitt's son, was someone that I spoke about in episode two of this series, as someone who police interviewed multiple times in the earliest days of the investigation. In the months before Suzie and Sherrill went missing, Bartt - then in his late 20s - had grown estranged from them. As most family relationships go, theirs was complicated and not easily explained. In response, police had to consider this a possible motive; that maybe Bartt had grown jaded with his family and meant to do them harm.

After Suzie and Sherrill went missing, Bartt was questioned extensively by investigators, each time insisting that he'd done nothing wrong. Police, to their credit, described Bartt as cooperative and helpful, but that did little to ease Bartt himself, who lost both his mother and sister in one strange incident. Having never been close to his father, this was the entirety of the family unit he'd grown up in. And then one day, it was just... gone.

In the months that followed the disappearance, Bartt moved away from the region, first heading up to Massachussetts where he continued the dangerous habits he'd started to develop in Springfield. There, he began to drink himself into oblivion, later telling the Springfield News-Leader:

"I felt so much responsibility. I kept thinking, I'm a grown man. I should have been able to protect them. I had, and have, a lot of guilt inside. My life went on, and my mom and my sister, the most precious people in my life, didn't. It made me think: 'Am I worthy of that? Why am I allowed to go on?'"

Eventually, Bartt wandered down to Florida, where he started working as a foreman for carnival rides. A while later, he began to work through his grief down in Texas, and there, met a woman named Tabetha, who also happened to be working at the carnival. By 1996, the two had settled down in Arkansas. Bartt, now sober, was engaged to Tabetha, and the two had a son together.

That year, 1996, Bartt returned to Springfield for the first time since leaving back in 1992. He was immediately questioned again by police, who asked him about possible connections related to Steven Garrison, the suspect I mentioned in the last episode. They were also in the formative stages of building their case against Robert Craig Cox, and asked about him. But Bartt was eager to answer any of their questions... and finally ready to ask questions of his own. After four long, painstaking years, he questioned Springfield P.D.'s ability to solve the case, later telling reporters with the Springfield News-Leader:

"I want people in town to question the police... I don't want to have misguided anger toward them, but I do believe I have the right to question their competence at this time.

"Can the people in charge of this investigation solve this case? And if they're not competent, are they too pretentious to admit it? Or are there other reasons?"

Springfield Police, meanwhile, remained hesitant to say too much about the case, likely worried that the prior police officials that had handled it had already made their own jobs harder by doing just that. After all, early police officials had been overly transparent about the early details of the investigation, and in the years since, had refrained from saying much of anything. Sgt. Kevin Routh, who oversaw the case at that time, told the Associated Press:

"What exactly can you do when you feel like you've done whatever is possible?"

Sgt. Routh would also critique the media's prior coverage of the case, following the re-airing of a "48 Hours" special in 1997, which resulted in 56 phone calls to police. None of which seemed to offer up any promising new info. He stated:

"So much has been released to the media on this, we have nothing to compare what (tipsters) say against what only we know."

At the five-year mark of the case in June 1997, the family of Sherrill Levitt and Suzie Streeter began the legal process of having them declared dead, which according to the state of Missouri, could only be done if they hadn't been seen or heard from in that span. This was a formality more than anything, a "legal presumption of death," per the law. In doing so, their family would be able to claim whatever estate remained, which was not believed to be much.

The petition was initiated by Debra Schwartz, Sherrill's sister that lived out in the Seattle area, who'd been paying premiums on Sherrill's life insurance policy for the past five years. She'd tell reporters that she resented the killer for depriving her and the rest of the family of the chance to put the women's bodies to rest, with Debra's and Sherrill's father, Jim, passing away that year, 1997, never knowing what happened to his daughter or granddaughter.

This initiative was supported by Bartt Streeter, who told reporters that he hadn't been able to access any of his sister's or mother's belongings in the years since their disappearance. These were not believed to be valuable items, by any means, but included sentimental items like photographs, which had been put into the administration of a probate court just weeks after the women went missing. Bartt later told the Springfield News-Leader:

"I just want the sentimental stuff. I haven't even been able to get pictures of my family."

The legal ruling finally came through in September 1997, ruling Sherrill Levitt and Suzanne Streeter deceased as of June 8th, 1997, five years and one day after they'd last been seen alive.

Meanwhile, the McCall family would not file a petition of their own. They told reporters that they'd not say anything against the other family's petition, but that they wouldn't be filing a similar motion until they received indisputable proof that Stacy was no longer alive. Speaking to the Springfield News-Leader, Janis McCall stated:

"We're not declaring our daughter dead. Ever. We will not declare her dead until they find her remains... Until a body is found there's still a chance they're alive."

That same year, a ceremonial granite bench was installed on the southeast corner of Phelps Grove Park, inside the Victims Memorial Garden, which was embedded with the three women's names and read:

"What words can one say when loved ones are taken away... know that you are loved."

However, Janis McCall was unable to sit on the bench, stating:

"I see the bench, and I get sad because we couldn't finish it. All we could say is missing. There's no end. There's no end to that story."

In the mid-1990s, another potential suspect would come upon the radar of investigators, and again it wasn't due to any specific evidence leading to him. But rather, his other crimes began painting the portrait of someone that may have been in the area at the time, and committed other similar, heinous crimes.

In September of 1993, a little over a year after the Springfield Three disappeared, 15-year-old Jessica Lynn Roach was last seen riding her bicycle near her home in Georgetown, Illinois. Her bicycle was found abandoned in the road, and Jessica had gone missing without a trace. Programs like "America's Most Wanted" would share her story with a national audience, but tips were hard to come by. It was as-if Jessica had disappeared into thin air.

In November of that year, however, the body of a young woman was found in Vermillion County, Indiana, near the town of Perrysville, by a farmer tending to his crops. Located roughly twenty miles away from Georgetown, the decomposed remains were identified a couple of weeks later as 15-year-old Jessica Roach. Details at the crime scene indicated a link between her death and others... pointing to a potential serial killer.

It wasn't until October of 1994, more than a year later, that police began to identify a potential culprit in Jessica's abduction and murder. That came about when two 14-year-old girls from the same town in Illinois, Georgetown, claimed that a man had attempted to abduct them. They were able to tell police about the man who'd attempted to kidnap them, describing not only the man, but the van he'd been driving. This included a license plate number, which led police directly to their suspect: a 32-year-old from Wabash, Indiana, who'd most recently found work as a janitor for a credit union. But as they'd soon learn, this man traveled throughout the Midwest to participate in historical re-enactments, and who, when questioned, confessed to putting 15-year-old Jessica Roach "to sleep" shortly before attending such a re-enactment near Georgetown, Illinois.

Larry DeWayne Hall was born in December of 1962 and was a twin, born the same day as his brother, Gary. The two were the sons of a gravedigger in Wabash, Indiana, and while growing up, Larry would show multiple signs of antisocial behavior. According to his own brother, Larry was violent, trying to attack and/or kill his own twin multiple times. He resented many of his fellow classmates for being smarter than him, and didn't form any platonic or romantic relationships through his adolescence.

Larry began digging graves alongside his father when he was just 12 years old, which many believe desensitized him to human cadavers. He'd reportedly steal from the corpses and showed a blatant disregard for the dead, and his father, an alcoholic, eventually lost his job because he was compulsively drinking. As a result, the family began destitute during Larry's teenage years, further descending him into a scary world of mental anguish.

Larry and his brother, Gary, would begin committing criminal acts when they were just 15 years old, committing crimes such as arson, burglary, and other petty crimes. Following high school, Larry began working as a janitor, and as a longtime history buff, he began traveling around the U.S. in order to take part in Civil War and Revolutionary War re-enactments. His brother Gary would later claim that in doing so, Larry was able to not only cover up his lack of personal hygiene, but begin acting upon his violent urges.

Federal investigators believe that Larry Hall began his crime spree in the early 1980s whilst traveling across the U.S. for various re-enactments. He would reportedly select young, white female victims from nearby cities and towns, stalking them to or from various locations. He would then abduct them, rape and/or torture them, then stab or strangle them to death. He'd then mutilate and/or dismember their bodies, and would often engage in sexual acts with their corpses. He'd leave behind their bodies in isolated locations, which police began to pick up on over time.

Following his arrest in December 1994, Larry Hall confessed to the murder of Jessica Roach. But he'd later rescind that confession, as he would do with nearly all of his confessions. You see, Larry Hall would ultimately confess to dozens of crimes, but would almost always recant them later on. For that reason, investigators had a hard time connecting Hall to the multitude of crimes he confessed to, but would later connect him with several of them that took place from the early 1980s through the mid-1990s... basically, up until he was caught in December 1994. The locations he committed these crimes seemed to be centered around the Midwest, where Larry lived and had grown up, but extended through a pretty vast geographic area.

While Larry Hall had originally been charged with Jessica Roach's murder, he was later found guilty of just kidnapping, only because prosecutors couldn't determine whether she'd actually been killed in Illinois or Indiana. However, the result was essentially the same; Larry Hall was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. He's still incarcerated to this day, and he was actually portrayed by actor Paul Walter Hauser in the Apple TV series "Black Bird," which is surprisingly great. Y'all should check it out, if you get the chance. Anyway...

As I touched on at the beginning of this segment, there's no evidence directly linking Larry Hall to the Springfield Three case, but he has been connected to it over time. And admittedly, he does seem to be a rather good suspect.

For starters, the disappearance of Sherrill Levitt, Suzie Streeter, and Stacy McCall does fit a pattern of crimes that he committed, having stalked, abducted, and murdered women throughout a large swath of the U.S. While his exact victim count is unknown, federal investigators believe that he killed upwards of a dozen women and girls, all of whom were young women ranging in age from 12 to their upper 20s. Many of his victims were in the same demographic as Suzie Streeter and Stacy McCall, and even looked pretty similar to them.

In addition, while Larry Hall confessed to dozens of crimes - some of which investigators were unable to prove - one of the crime he confessed to was the Springfield Three disappearance. When being questioned by investigators looking for the killer of Shauna Garber from Missouri, Hall claimed that he didn't know her, but that, in his words:

"The Springfield Three, we killed them."

While Larry Hall later recanted this confession, just as he'd done with all of his other confessions, many online commenters think that the "we" in that statement was a mental slip by him. They believe that Hall may have had an accomplice for his many crimes, and note that his twin brother Gary traveled with him for many of the historical re-enactments he attended.

To make matters even stranger, at the time of his arrest, Larry Hall was reported to have been driving a green van similar to the one described by police in or near Sherrill's neighborhood in the days preceding the disappearance of the three women from Springfield.

Then there's the final piece of evidence that seems to indicate a potential involvement. The same weekend that Suzie and Stacy were graduating from high school, there was a battle re-enactment taking place in Pleasant Hope that weekend, roughly twenty miles north of Springfield. The events, set to take place on June 6th and 7th, were a part of Pleasant Hope's Old Settler's Day Celebration. It's unknown if Larry Hall took part in this specific re-enactment, but many cite this as a valid reason to assume he might have been there in the area that fateful weekend.

By the late 1990s, developments in this case had begun to slow to a crawl. While the case had once dominated news headlines, that faded over time as the region's attention span was diverted elsewhere. It was hard to keep the public focused on a case where nothing had really changed all that much since June 1992, especially as the world continued to get crazier and more fast-paced, with the internet basically coming into being during that span.

While the case had evolved to the point of getting annual reminders of the tragedy every June 6th or 7th, that would completely fade as the new millennium approached. The reminders in 1998 and 1999 were less hopeful, more matter-of-fact, resigned to the notion that nothing new had been learned. That nothing new would likely be learned in the year ahead.

By 2000, that annual reminder was gone. Absent from the papers that year were the names of Sherrill Levitt, Suzie Streeter, and Stacy McCall...

... but they'd return again in 2002, on the ten-year mark of the case, showing that this area refused to let this story vanish into oblivion. It would not be forgotten to time.

In the years that followed, the annual reminders continued on, bringing us to the present day. That's on the next episode of Unresolved.

Episode Information

Episode Information

Writing, research, hosting, and production by Micheal Whelan

Published on December 14th, 2024

Sources and Other Reading

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Additional Reading

1. Reddit. (n.d.). Larry Hall in the Springfield area. Retrieved from https://old.reddit.com/r/springfieldthree/comments/18usq9n/larry_hall_in_the_springfield_area_on_june_6_1992/

2. Investigation Discovery. (n.d.). Midwestern Civil War buff may be connected to dozens of deaths. Retrieved from https://www.investigationdiscovery.com/crimefeed/murder/midwestern-civil-war-buff-may-be-serial-killer-connected-to-dozens-of-females-deaths