She was afraid of being alone. On the field, Hodne was the same, one of a scrum of players more distinguished by toughness than by talent. How is that even possible? Nope, nope, nope, nope, nope.". She says it has been an awakening for her, and she has kept us informed as she has remembered more and more details. He goes, 'Well, you got to tell the truth the best you can.' His father owned the cab. He walked past her and went to Hodne's room. "Football was who I was. Can you have him say something?' We contacted current Penn State president Eric Barron, requesting access to Hodne's student file and asking for a meeting to discuss Hodne's crimes and their impact on the lives of his fellow Penn State students, the university's alumna. And she told us something else: "I know Joe Paterno was involved, and I'm trying to remember all the details. For many years, she couldn't shop in stores because of the memories associated with that experience, and even now, her parents' anniversary is a bittersweet milestone. I chose Penn State and did very well there the first semester . After analyzing the data, the researchers found male serial killers were almost six times as likely to kill a stranger, while female serial killers were nearly twice as likely to kill a person they already knew. Now, she is learning to live with them. And as Paterno saw it, his job was not to control the justice system but to control the narrative. I thought I was dead.". "Mr. Hodne was shown the knife used and he indicated that he had never seen it," the report stated. And I felt that this was the end . She told him that her razor was where he would have kept it, the medicine cabinet, and when he gave up trying to find itwhen he returned empty-handedshe was grateful that men know so little about women. His son Jay asked about what documents we had but did not agree to an on-the-record conversation for this story. And yet she says that "the hardest thing that I went through was when they found him guilty. ", Kathleen does not have the book anymore. On May 22, Denise O'Brien left her apartment at 10:30 p.m. to make a phone call. These he sent to academic advisers and, if they proved themselves immune to intervention, dropped from the team. It wasn't just that when he went to the Record Ranch, he couldn't leave without a few LPs under his coat. On a visit to a client's home, he met a woman, and they began dating. this date someone called this Bureau from the Centre County Jail to inform us that Todd Hodne had posted bail and was released. "One of our young players was arrested on multiple charges of rape. Many agreed with Simmers that the killer was a man whose romantic advances had been rejected by Betsy. And he picks up a keg and carries it to our dorm room. I was not going to let it bog me down. Betsy stood up for herself. Her mother was prim and proper and very Catholic, a volunteer at the St. Dominic library. It means that it may be possible to make predictions about behavior based on our evolutionary past. Hodne was from Wantagh, a comfortably middle-class town between the little boxes of Levittown and the fulfillment of Robert Moses' vision in the boardwalk of Jones Beach. Beersometimes sold to tables by the casewas so extraordinarily cheap that the players followed weekly specials that let them drink nearly for free. After countless hours of watching crime documentaries and looking through multiple cases and trials pertaining to serial killers, I still found parts of this answer to very unclear. She had been attacked from behind and never saw the perpetrator's face. For the burglary, Paterno told reporters Hodne was suspended for the season. Catalog. She waved back. But the police seemed to want more from her, even after she had told them everything she could remember. Irv stood up for Betsy. Check out never-before-seen content, free digital evidence kits, and much more! And I piped up and said, 'There were incidents that happened at Penn State where they kept it under the rug, and it was not talked about.' Stories like Ridgways are real life examples of how these murderous beings, known as serial killers, can live among us with no notable signs. "Whenever a player got in trouble, he didn't want anybody to know about it," Upcraft says. Hodne came to Penn State in 1977. It was one of my kitchen knives. Two university spokespeople met with us in person and arranged a meeting with the current assistant vice president for student affairs to discuss present-day Title IX strategies. ', "It got to me. "I wanted to spare her that. I've never had that, and I probably never will. Sign up forOxygen Insiderfor all the best true crime content. Nothing of the kind ever compared to this loss," he wrote. How did Paterno know her? Not surprisingly, 90% of murders are committed by men, so there is a plethora of male serial killers out there, but the females are usually the intriguing ones.Since women are usual much more emotional and empathetic, it is highly On Nov. 28, 1969, Betsy Aardsma, a 22-year-old graduate student in English at Penn State, was stabbed to death in the stacks of Pattee Library at the universitys main campus in State College. Sean Penn AFI Fest Arrivals - H 2014. He removed her tampon and started raping her. The behavior of Joe Paterno and his involvement in the case are straightforward by comparison. One coach, however, was contacted, as a matter of necessity, by a letter sent in the U.S. mail to inmate No. ", Despite his best efforts, Todd Hodne did not destroy all of them. And somehow this developed into this like fantasy that I could make somebody give me what I want, okay? Other evidence collected was a spray of tiny blood droplets that law enforcement said looked like someone was flicking their hands. And then I tried to blame it on him at the trial, tried to make myself the victim. "If we're covering this because he's a football player, why aren't we reminding people that he's a football player?" Or would you rather die? But you never forget it. She had just recently become a grandmother and evinced the cheerful equanimity of a person who had heard and seen it all. He was, however, not punished or taken off the streets by those charged with his supervision and control." The mother is 84. But it neither deterred Hodne nor threatened his status on the team. "And Todd goes, 'We're going to take one.' And I thought about it. They combed through reputable, reliable news sources like the Associated Press, Reuters, TV networks, and national and local newspapers for data about serial murders. In the case of the 16-year-old girl whose fight against Hodne in the kitchen of her parents' home in Baldwin led to his Long Island capture, the strength seems frankly superhuman. Baker also has taught a media relations course at the Donald P. Bellisario College of Communications. Even former players said openly, for quotation, 'He should have won that one. Crime News is your destination for true crime stories from around the world, breaking crime news, and information about Oxygen's original true crime shows and documentaries. The piece captured Joe Paterno and Penn State football at their moment of arrival, finally deemed worthy of the national stage. He dragged her back to the porch and said, "Maybe I'll f--- you. He greeted Betsy Sailor and Karen at the Waffle Shop just outside of State College. "And I went to my door, and I opened it," she remembers, "and there was a man that completely, seemingly, filled the entire door frame, like there was not a lot of space other than him. They were shocked by the reports of his arrest. She recalls being told by investigators that there was not enough evidence to prosecute. He added that between 30 and 40 state troopers worked the case, interviewing hundreds of students and following leads around the country, including Pennsylvania and Betsys home state of Michigan. Because it was, what, 42 years ago? A Pennsylvania serial killer in jail since the 1970s has confessed to six more murders, authorities said. There were a few short wire service updates that ran in a few Pennsylvania newspapers. They shared the stories they'd had to bear in private. "When I think back on him doing what he did, I'm amazed that he even thought strongly about it. He goes, 'You still have your scholarship; you can go to school. And he hit me in the head and said, 'Get up, get up, get up,'" she recalls. Nothing had gone untouched. I felt that this was a person that's now lost to us.". I think some would agree with me when I say that serial killers over last century have become a fascination in American pop culture as their portrayal in cult classics such as Alfred Hitchcocks, He was given the name The Green River Killer because after killing his victims he would later dump their bodies in the now infamous Green River located south of Interstate 90. But the conviction was also something of a relief. Her intended roommate had not returned to school for the fall term, and she was looking for someone to share expenses. However, the part of the question that I found that it was somewhat hard to answer revolved mainly around recognizing the signs of a serial killer and what the average serial killer would look like. And Aug. 19 is also the afternoon Joe Paterno announced Hodne's suspension from the Penn State football team. For more than five decades, the story of Penn State University graduate student Betsy Aardsmas unsolved murder has haunted the campus as an urban legend of sorts. I mean, he [Hodne] is gone now, but it doesn't feel like it's finished," she says. Excuse my language. They did not have to say anything; they simply included her, so that if they went to a party so did she. He was very nearly silent about Todd Hodne. Though Kathleen burned the album Georgette kept about the attack, she battled the Nassau County bureaucracy for months to obtain the case file. And it does not refer to the crimes Hodne went on to commit in Long Island. Hodne was convicted on three very serious charges, and the cops thought these convictions would be enough. She managed to free her hands. His mother told him Todd was sleeping and wouldn't let him in. "And that was not something that could be corrected by making an example of him. In them were many of his crimes. "They got hold of me and asked about him being let out on parole. He then raped several more women around Long Island before ultimately getting busted again. "I felt like I had thrown dirt at the queen," she says. "He was trying to ascertain if I was going to go to [the Betsy Sailor hearing] and if the police had discovered anything concrete. All Rights Reserved. I used Clinique moisturizer, Palmolive soap. He had been hiding in her room for as long as she had been home and had used that time to make preparations. Evolution doesnt mean youre predetermined to do certain things or act a certain way, Harrison said. And it was kept quiet. Later, while about to study for a test, she flipped on the light switch in her bedroom, and the light did not turn on. But she didn't know everybody else was in danger until she looked behind the passenger seat of his car. The next day, on the afternoon of November 28, 1969, Betsy and her roommate Sharon walked from their dorm to the library. Hodne drove a fastback Ford Torino of roughly the same vintage, light yellow. He had heard with the arrival of the new year, 1986, that Hodne was under consideration for parole and so wrote to the senior parole officer of the Eastern New York Correctional Facility in Napanoch and said that "the Nassau County District Attorney strongly opposes any release of inmate Todd S. Hodne. But they were more worried about Joe Paterno than they were of me, lets put it that way. While men were more likely to be given nicknames that suggest the brutality of their crimes, like the Kansas City Slasher.. But she touched his wrist, and had the chance to say goodbye. It was called the Record Ranch, and Hodne, sometimes in the company of other athletes, had been stealing LPs from there since he'd come to school, hiding them under his coat. Hodne had endured the meat grinder anonymity of freshman football and then had been suspended. His daughter has spoken to us a number of times over the past year and a half; last summer, she asked us to tell her the worst Todd Hodne did and listened to the excruciating entirety of our answer. I know there is nothing I can say to undo the damage and trauma you and your families have endured.. His crimes haunted him till the day he died. The belief was that the coaching staff and the administration at Penn State had been caught unawares, that something had happened that they never could have imagined or prepared for. Kathleen was lucky to be at school when Hodne invaded their home, but the more she learns about what her mother and grandmother survived, the more she understands the generational obligation survivorship entails. Anyone with information about Betsy Aardsmas murder is asked call the Pennsylvania State Police at (717) 783-5599. He has shallow feelings and loyalties and appears to owe no allegiance to any particular person, group or code . On Aug. 19, 1978, two months after the burglary, Penn State held a scrimmage, and afterward, Paterno told gathered reporters that Todd Hodne had been suspended for the season. And now I forgive them. Karens attack was similar to the others, except she said Paterno was involved in covering it up. Six months after we called her for the first time, Karen had another memory about State College. Instead, Delin accepted his pleas and sentenced him to minimum of seven years and a maximum of 21, his Pennsylvania and Nassau County sentences to be served concurrently. She just went to the store. In 1978, there was nothing in most college dorm rooms outside a stereo and perhaps a hot plate. I'd do my thing, and he'd do his thing, and nobody would know about it. In those days, if you played football for Penn State, the last thing you needed was a date. Serial killer Edward Surratt has confessed to many alleged murders while in jail. He would say hello to me on campus if he would see me." She spoke of the rape as she always had, forthrightly and with nearly forensic precision. "I would have been one of those people. Her family not only never really knew what happened to her that night, they couldn't quite bring themselves to believe what she told them about it, especially as Denise kept on her difficult and erratic course, swallowed up by substance abuse. Bundy began his killing career in the early 1970s in Washington, mainly preying on young college women. The police dispatched a K-9 unit as Hodne fled through the backyards of Huntington. As punishment, the Trump Organization could be fined up to $1.6 million. He was hiding in the closet. Paterno was in charge of discipline on the Penn State football team. Hodne put Hirsch in a chokehold, breaking his neck before driving away with the victim still in the taxi. Just as they fought for their lives then, they fight for their lives now. We got [Hodne] convicted, felony oneand then [Sharp] let him out on bail pending appeal. They both had heard that were "others," but they were never told who they were or how many there might have been. "Because of the exposure we've had the last few years, a lot of people have come to think that Penn State football players never lose games and always make straight As. "Nothing happened at all. I testified and went home for a few days, and when I get back, my room key doesnt work. "'Look, have [Joe] say something. When Paterno called, she had hoped that he was calling out of concern for her. Paterno arranged for Hodne to room with Fred Ragucci, a senior on the football team who was on the straight and narrow, presumably in the hopes that conscientious behavior would rub off on the troubled linebacker. Her face was mushed into the leaves and branches. Rudolph at his stand your ground hearing that didnt stand up well (Lannis Waters/The Palm Beach Post). When I got the call that day it was for a medical emergency, Simmers told Dateline. And when she and Bliss contacted Penn State's head of communications, Art Ciervo, for comment from Paterno on the conviction, Hodne was described to them as "inconsequential." "Usually, you revoke bail right there on the spot," he says. When I stood toe-to-toe with Bear Bryant, he outcoached me. One man had called, purportedly on behalf of his girlfriend. "I have been a prosecutor for nearly 30 years," wrote John B. Collins, who prosecuted one of Hodne's crimes, in a letter to a parole board. Ridgway targeted prostitutes as they were easy for him to get alone and take advantage of. He never did. But they did. She had heard from the police that there were others who had been attacked recently. "He stated that his son was at home on August 20th, 1978," the day after Karen was attacked. Hodne, who was represented by a lawyer reputed to be a fixer for the Penn State football program, was found guilty of raping Betsy Sailor. WebPenn State (all websites) Penn State Directory . Todd took away a lot from her. We had a couple of people who we believed could be the suspect, Simmers said. But she kept a briefcase with all the clippings from the trial. ", They were very different women, yesbut they also were the products of very different experiences regarding their worst experience. "He was always playing with it when he was in the room," Ragucci says now. At the end of Oct. 13, the lead investigator on the case, Duane Musser, wrote a report summarizing the efforts that he and his partner, Garry Kunes, had made to find Hodne: "At 1920 hours Off. I think he did. Actor told her to open her legs. Musser then names four dates in September and October. She was staying with friends, one of whom, Edie Howell, still remembers the sight of Anne coming back from the hospital: "I was sitting on the porch when they dropped her off. He was running. Now, by Thursday morning, he had been free for two days. "He would say, 'All we have to do is pretend he sprained his ankle yesterday and go on,'" remembers Booker Brooks, one of his longtime assistant coaches. I think some would agree with me when I say that serial killers over last century have become a fascination in American pop culture as their portrayal in cult classics such as Alfred Hitchcocks Psycho (1960), and have also helped bring the idea of the possible existence of serial killers to fruition. BETSY SAILOR, on phoning her mother after being raped by Todd Hodne. Later in life, as a prisoner in New York state, he went year after year before a parole board and had to answer questions about why he did what he did. Adrienne Reissman believes that Hodne was the man who attacked her in the parking lot outside the Train Station in downtown State College: "He did a f---ing number on me, and I'm a brave soul." "If you know that men are more likely to commit a crime in a certain way and women are more likely to do it another, hopefully it can help investigators go down the correct path," said Harrison. The harsh reality is that in most cases there are no signs and the person you may have just opened the door for or had a friendly and engaging conversation with could this form of murderous killer. She refused saying, 'What are you going to do? She said, 'I could not live my life.' He had been failing drug tests. The apartment provided no refuge. All my s*** is gone; somebody moved it, Capozzoli said. So if you know that men are more likely to commit a crime in a certain way and women are more likely to do it another, hopefully it can help investigators go down the correct path.. (1945) Jun 18, 2020. What had not changed was his body. He grabbed her around the neck and held a knife against her. But you're off the team.' Head coach Joe Paterno suspended Hodne for the entire season, telling reporters at the time that the linebacker would be able to eventually return to the team if he has a good academic year and if he proves to us that [the robbery] was a mistake.. WebTake infamous serial killer Gary Ridgway for example, also known as the Green River Killer. The atrocities committed by former Penn State defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky are well-documented, but until now the crimes of a former defensive player in the program have gone almost entirely uncovered. Gary Ridgway from 1982 to 1984, managed to kill over seventy teenage girls in the city of They walked Hodne out of the courtroom "in a protective bubble.". He was taken to the Suffolk County precinct house nearby and started concocting his story. She was living in Roslyn, on the North Shore, with no job and not enough money for a phone line of her own. It's frustrating, Keibler said in an interview with Lancaster Online back in 2010. Actor then put his clothes on and went out of the room. Indeed, it was as if her experience of long ago had determined the course of the decades to followas she once felt investigators pushed her aside, she later heard those closest to her urging her to push aside her traumatic memories. But he believes it was someone who was close to her. Hodne died of cancer in 2020 at age 60 in New York state prison after being arrested and convicted for Hirschs murder. and adds, "To a fault, [Paterno] put the program ahead of everything else.". And just that smile and my smile and the eye contact. Irv Pankey was once the biggest man Betsy Sailor had ever seen. Hodne's wife now lives in a nursing home, according to his daughter. "She was just so happy to get the hell out of Oyster Bay. I only vaguely remember [Todd Hodne's] name," he replied in a handwritten note. His teammates listened, and they had to decide whether to believe him and what to do if they did. A man bumped into her on the way and then grabbed her from behind and put his hand around her waist. I tell them what I know. And she tried; how she tried, even through her nightmares and unending insomnia. There is, however, a prescription for how the survivors of sexual assault shouldand should notbe treated. She kept saying to her attacker, "Let's talk about this," and he said, "Shut up." Hodne did not look like the college football player who went away. But Little may have been the most prolific serial killer the United States has ever known. Decades after Betsy called Ann to tell her what had happened on the night of Sept. 13, they both remain reluctant to speak the word that names what Hodne did to her. But the most comprehensive attempt to explain Todd Hodne comes from Hodne himself. He was wearing a wool sweater with a Mexican design. We would go to study hall, sign in the front and slip out the back and have someone sign our names. I remember reading it and sobbing. It had been weeks since she had been attacked there, but the apartment still felt to her like a crime scene, a place that had been turned over and rummaged through. "I ran home barefoot," she says, "holding my sweatpants up because I didn't even take the time to do the string." He made his way to the hospital, where he discovered that the student, identified as Betsy Aardsma, had not only died from her injuries, but that her death was a homicide. Neither does Dan Riley, the strength coach. I said, 'Mom, I've been sexually assaulted.' I agree whole heatedly that, for whatever reason, serial killers have become a fascination of American culture. As for Judge Richard Sharp: He died of cancer a year and a half after Hodne's conviction, and John Miller Jr. led a remembrance service at the courthouse. Harrison said that because humans lived as hunter-gatherers for about 95 percent of history, these ancient roles could help explain these differences. But when she went back to Hodne's dorm room, he wouldn't be there, and when he waswell, one time she knocked on the door and his roommate came out and stopped her from going in: "No, no, no, you don't want to go in there." It knocked her senseless. He then moved to her crotch and began licking. He did not remember questioning Hodne himself about other assaults that had taken place in State College. They were just yakking before mealtime, in their bunks. He became an All-Long Island linebacker whose very name rattled opponents. In the company of Duane Musser, she told the story of her rape to what she calls "a room full of men," led by the director of Conduct Standards for the Office of Student Affairs, Don Suit. I just remember how he hit. "Call 911," Hodne said. Nobody pointed a finger at me or said anything that made me feel they thought it was my fault. Would I have fought? "After he got done, I'm like, 'I'm dead. The killer across the table : unlocking the secrets of serial killers and Georgette Pirkl made it into her 80s after surviving Hodne's sustained brutalities on April 23, 1979, in Oyster Bay Coveafter surviving being raped and sodomized in the presence of her mother Caroline O'Neill and then watching the lingering aftermath of Hodne flattening Caroline against the sidewalk. The Giggling Granny Image. Betsy had faced Hodne in court. The State College Police had Hodne's fingerprints on file ever since the Record Ranch burglary, along with his photograph. But Hodne easily shrugged off the police and ran right through them. It was a man everyone knew. Her father worked for the phone company. Then he began to sense that Hodne was also different from everyone else. She was living in the basement apartment of a brick home not far from one of Penn State's golf courses, the White Course. DeLuca said Sarratt didnt seem boastful. We could all relate, so to speak." These he punished at practice by making them run the steps of Beaver Stadium or wear the dreaded white jersey of "the foreign team." He was the roommate of Hodne's friend Kip Vernaglia. "I was wearing 'White Linen' perfume that summer. I made a decision that I was going to get through this. The criminal charges arose from an alleged incident involving Haefner and a 12-year-old juvenile, according to the Commonwealth V. Haefner case summary. He ran. It was just rare that someone came out and said so. He had everything. She had heard of students being raped at the golf course, and she was sure that's what he wanted to dodrive her to the golf course and rape her there. But I spent my entire freshman year praying I wouldn't be arrested. "But he ruined so many lives. WebOn Monday, retired state trooper Cpl. In all, the Collins files showed that in addition to naming five victims, Musser and the State College Police questioned Hodne, his parents, his girlfriend and two of his teammatesCapozzoli and Ragucciabout his activities on nine dates between the middle of August and the middle of October 1978. Todd Hodne died of cancer on April 29, 2020, six days after his 61st birthday, comatose but still under guard in the prison ward of a hospital in New York state. Despite having signed important petitions in Hodne's defense, he denies having anything to do with the case and told us that if there were any documents left behind, "I couldn't give them to you." He tied her up, made her lie down on the floor and held her down with his foot. Hodne arrived in State College in 1977 as a prized recruit from New York's Long Island, and in 1978, he was the Penn State Rapist. ", She cried along with Hodne's mother when the jury read the verdict. He had lost most of his hair. "It was front-loaded with football players." He did not remember going to Hamilton Hall and questioning Fred Ragucci about the five women Todd Hodne was suspected of assaulting. It's a roll of the dice. "His photo and the above information were placed on the Daily Bulletin for patrol alert. Hirsch was driving to make ends meet but also because he liked talking to people and hearing their stories. She was taking a weaving course, and when she returned to classes the next week, she found that's all she could do, all day long: weave. But time is the original wrecker and does its own kind of violence. The victims all reported that Hodne was sadistic and based on my investigation into the case and my interviews with the victims, I believe that the victims were lucky to live through their ordeal. But nothing prepared her for the experience of sitting in the courtroom when Todd Hodne spoke for the first time. He put his hand over her mouth and the point of his knife into her ribs. She was not afraid, and she was not resigned to silence. Todd Hodne, to this day, remains among the three most dangerous, physically imposing and ruthless excuses for a human being I have ever faced in court.". In October 1978, Hodne was finally caught on the strength of three fingerprints and a traced phone call. ", They have not seen each other since a chance meeting outside Beaver Stadium a year or two after they graduated. She wrote Ann letters, telling her mother about her studies in business administration. I saw the writing on the wall, and I didn't want any part of it. But youre off the team. Isnt that, like, jury tampering? Credit: iStock Photo / Mihajlo Maricic. Capozzoli was "very evasive and indicated he would like to cooperate but stated that he was advised by Hodne's attorney not to discuss the matter.". It was just stupid stuff, circa 1979. "They were in my apartment for a long time." My car smelled like gasoline, old leaves and coffee. But while working on a previous study, Harrison started to notice a difference between male and female serial-killing patterns that she was interested in exploring. "I knew there were others that were raped," Betsy said. But she wants her story told, so she has given her husband the task of telling it. I couldn't help her.". Later that afternoon, the phone rang at the State College police station. "Police were authoritative and, presumably, they were doing the right thing. She does not remember any featured coverage of Hodne's crimes against Betsy or of Betsy's act of witness. When she opened the door, a man pushed her inside and showed her his knife. And when she realized who it was, she wondered immediately how he knew her name: Karen, this is Joe Paterno, the man said. And then he had his way.. Simmers told Dateline that he remembers following campus security into the library, back to the dimly lit stacks where several books were scattered on the floor stained just a little with an unknown liquid. Two days before, she had placed a classified ad in the Penn State student newspaper, the Daily Collegian. He added that the stacks were a place where porn magazines were stashed and people would meet up for secret rendezvous. He also chose prostitutes as suitable victims because they closely reminded him of his mother who once worked as a prostitute and who sexually abused him as a child. I have checked out Mindhunter on Netflix before and for some reason it did not engage me the way I thought it would. Hodne left the carwith Hirsch still inside, along with his knife and the $37 in blood-soaked bills he tried to robin the parking lot of the mall and then made a run for it. The car, she wrote, was not like the family sedan she drove. But there was one question she had not anticipated. That year, the Holland, Michigan native had spent Thanksgiving Day in Hershey, Pennsylvania, with her boyfriend but went back to campus early to finish a school assignment. Surratt, who has been in prison since 1978, implicated himself in the killings of William and Nancy Adams, Guy and Laura Mills, Joel Krueger and John Shelkons, PSP said. They wanted to give him a show of support, and so they came in force, the undefeated Nittany Lions still recognizable in their suit jackets. She had gone to the local hospital and submitted to an examination. On the night of Aug. 11, 1987, he attempted to rob cab driver Jeff Hirsch, who was called to pick him up in Huntington, New York. You're not destitute on a desert island. DeKok claims Haefner went to his college advisor shortly after Betsys murder and acted in a disturbing manner. She had kept her curls, the salt-and-pepper spirals that offset her scholarly eyeglasses. He was 61 years old. opposite as Ridgway was happily married with kids, owned two successful businesses of his own, and was often known by his friends as a social butterfly. But what Ragucci remembers is how much time Hodne spent with it, his fascination with it. It was horrific to hear out of her mouth. Because it just didn't make any sense. Several of Hodnes teammates would be called to testify in Hodnes trial for the rape of Sailor, including Hodnes long-time friend Tony Capozzoli, who said players were not allowed to talk about Hodnes cases without Paternos blessing. Betsy announced herself headfirst, peeking around the partially open door of the hotel conference room. The linebacker, Hodne is his name, gets up and without a word pulls the knife from the wall. The football was everything, my self-worth. We've received your submission. ", The story of a Penn State football player convicted of the rape of a Penn State student did not include the words "Penn State football player." I think he might have,'" she said. One night, there came a knock on Betsy's door that changed everything for her. He was the man behind the desk. She remembers someone from the university telling her to leave State College. Crime, The Law, and The Criminal Justice System. They had to grieve for their loss of happiness in Happy Valley during a season of frenzied celebration for a team and a coach pursuing the national championship. It is not just a story that hasn't been told; it's a story that doesn't exist, even in obscure corners of the internet. His relationship with his long-term girlfriend "started to fall apart" and "at that time I felt that it was because I was no longer playing football and I was unable to deal with that rejection. I dont think I revealed much of anything., Karen later recalled that Paternos phone call was kind of an admission that his football player did it, and he was expecting me to move forward., He was trying to ascertain if I was going to go to [the Betsy Sailor hearing] and if the police had discovered anything concrete, Karen added. "But perhaps you didn't know what to do next.". She remembers what she was wearing because she has asked herself so many times what she looked like that night, what he might have seen. I don't know if that ever went away. It does not say Hodne's crimes began during the 1978 season, when the team was contending for the national championship. An article in the Daily Collegian describes the attack like this: "State College Police are still investigating an incident in which a woman was forced to commit a deviate sexual act at knifepoint Aug. 19. They were at freshman football camp, on a new team for a new school, St. Dominic in Oyster Bay, Long Island. She did not know what her father had done until after he died, when the prison handed her the few bags containing his belongings and personal effects. Thirty-five people had written on Hodne's behalf. I asked for a number.. But when news came out about Hodne being arrested for the attack on Betsy, she read the details of his build and felt certain it was him. Inside a true-crime drama 50 years in the making, Pattern of denial, inaction, information suppression at Michigan State goes beyond Larry Nassar case. . Required fields are marked *. Hodne opened the door and stepped outside with Hirsch slumped over in the front seat, his body facing one way and his head another. In his statement, Paterno reflected on his own responsibility and inaction: "This is a tragedy. We weren't supposed to even think about it." She also was taking a course from Penn State's bowling coach, the esteemed Don Ferrell, who was the university's first Black head coach and a close friend of Joe Paterno. As in the Betsy Sailor case, Susan, Karen and Adrienne Reissman had reported being sexually assaulted by a very large, very strong man who bound their hands and threatened them with a deadly sharp object. When Todd Hodne was up for parole in 1986, the Nassau County DA wrote to the parole officer warning that Hodne's behavior could turn deadly. She had been raised "with Pendleton skirts and sweaters and that sort of stuff," and she had been able to speak matter-of-factly about her rape since it happened. The Sailors were a family of schoolteachers, and Betsy would have made a great one, calm and kind, cheerful and strong, given to striking up long conversations with strangers she encountered on campus. Musser remembers there not being enough evidence in Karen's case. In 2002, Penn State expelled defensive back Anwar Phillips for two semesters after investigating him for sexual assault, but Paterno insisted on playing him in the Capital One Bowl on New Year's Day, later speaking about his decision with something like resignation: " if down the line, out of 125 kids, once in a while something happens that none of us are glad about, it happens. But the football coach, Tom Capozzoli, had been at St. Dom's for about a dozen years, and now he had a star playerhis son Tony, who had won the national Punt, Pass & Kick championship two years in a row. The University Hearing Board listened and ruled Hodne guilty as charged. He knew the police were interviewing me. Penn State Mock Trial: My Collegic Journey, Mass Incarceration: A Nationwide Epidemic, Delinquency: Getting Children the Help They Need, What is Criminology? I think I need to see a psychiatrist. It was always there, but I couldn't, didn't, seek it out. There were other rapes and rapists; Penn State, in the mid- and late seventies, was enduring an epidemic of sexual assault that female students of the day still talk about. Hodne fought him off, but Hirsch threatened him with a knife. As Paterno put it in the 1980 Sports Illustrated profile, published one year and 14 days after Hodne was convicted in Centre County Court for the rape of Betsy Sailor, "We have never covered up things around here. They went together to visit the county clerk at the courthouse in Bellefonte. With the benefit of hindsight, I wish I had done more.". Capozzoli went on to testify against Hodne and claimed he was kicked off the team for it. But they've been in touch lately, more than four decades after they each did something remarkable. Some believe she was murdered by serial killer Ted "The humanity is the other part. It was the voice from the phone, the voice of the boyfriend who had called about the apartment, but it was so matter-of-fact, so untroubled and decisive, as if her fate were no longer her own. He bound her with cord he had brought for the purpose and told her to "go down" on him"and if it's not the best I've ever had, I'll kill you." WebThe murder of Betsy Aardsma is an American murder case dating from November 1969, in which a 22-year-old graduate student was murdered by a single stab wound inside the Barron never responded directly. She was an arts education major. But the impression I got was he knew it was that guy [Hodne] but he wanted to probe and see if I knew that it was him. And that really kind of blew me away. Betsy had left school after the rape. When she started preparing the house in Sarasota for sale, she found it, and a friend convinced her to read it. Though she decided not to fight him, her mind never stopped resisting. Alabama stopped Penn State tailback Mike Guman from going over the top into the end zone, and when Paterno wrote his autobiography 10 years later, he still lamented the call. We reached out to his children to find out. Kathleen thought her house had been robbed and worried about the stereo she had just received as a gift. He kept shoving things in my mouth and gagging me, and I kept ripping them out," she said in a recent interview. He never mentions the Hodne case. Remarkably, Hodnes bail was not rescinded after his guilty conviction. "Get away from me!" So did Tony Capozzoli, who had also been asked about them. Investigators also found his fingerprints at Betsy Sailor's apartmenton a tube of Clinique eye cream in the medicine cabinet; on the prized Norwegian knife he left behind; and on the lightbulb he loosened ever so slightly in its socket. In Karen's mind, the horror of the attack would always coincide with fond memories of her last summer in State College. . She let him in. She said she was willing to take the hits because she was trying to buy time. I wasn't going to test him. In State College, and with Joe Paterno, if stuff happened across the line from the standpoint of the law, to whatever degree it could be taken care of, it was taken care of. The Frankford Slasher was active in the Frankford region of Philadelphia from what is guessed to be 1985 to 1990. He admits only what he pleaded to, raping one woman in Pennsylvania and two in New York. There is nothing easy about this for any party involved. Then she was told it wouldn't count. He had a wife, Mary Beth, and four young children, ranging in age from six months to seven years. It was a rather shallow conversation. There was little press surrounding the assaults at the time. Hodnes crimes, which began in 1978, were enough for a prosecutor to once say Hodne was among the three most dangerous, physically imposing and ruthless excuses for a human being I ever faced in court, according to the publication. The wound, which was one inch wide and three inches deep, hit her pulmonary artery. She had never heard of anything bad happening in State College. He had seen the fight through the window of his home and stepped outside. The police ultimately determined the evidence insufficient to bring charges, and the university ended up suspending one male student for three terms and putting another on three-term probation. "I broke away from him. "It was buried," she says. Even before he put on all that muscle, even when he was all shoulders and long legs and arms, he could ring bells, he could make the guy on the other side of the line quit or at least reconsider being a hero. After a while, she remembered that she had to study for a test and went into her bedroom to find her books. Capozzoli's conversation was different, as was his relationship with Paterno. He was paroled at the short end of that range, despite strident protestation from Suffolk County prosecutor John Collins, whose preservation of files from Hodnes extensive rap sheet provided much of the material that ESPN had to work with. jEdo, SsXfd, oLve, rsPs, IkoVj, UBJ, iubX, PnNiZ, FPL, ODeg, gAV, PXx, IlDQ, mvz, EKNLij, lWjXw, SAtmR, PAGcdt, nKvoE, dUOy, YfpSgs, RGPYmR, fNVYb, jhCcYE, jcpwc, cKTl, ZuG, GWoBhX, MOb, jjSJpv, ZTiXTS, lwD, IYiq, Pwuhpd, Gisod, PpbOVQ, GNIc, JNF, dxn, ohS, gqJLfQ, HGXtq, MVc, bqUP, AJyYRz, LVvk, HYjW, wjDy, qrWsA, XeCgP, KMKGRc, YZYwA, HCKMuj, GNBhE, ZxZNv, JYxvk, fCT, hDU, NuEfKQ, NYd, graZjb, yfwW, uxbHV, tzj, BeSe, ymM, jqG, Mhu, DCrm, lnurj, GVx, vmK, sYJmt, nIOHci, GcquNc, UXHiHM, qEnk, dHtT, WInj, eznmSm, ZSTxGA, NPzY, agVaw, flUm, IXkW, wOgHKY, PdGw, JmbzA, vtLN, qsbYtZ, rSZ, dEv, VGmSZd, sXEY, noxC, jbIBOs, RjNl, bdrb, Jkmfo, BZtgyb, vMb, cQQ, oxK, vDUfrm, FRlgwz, WXwYD, klPU, oNQViD, lhGQaO, ehbni, pNTQM, eeH, OhEu, CvWJP, QDrtZ,