← Going West: True Crime
Going West: True Crime
Christine Rothschild: The Campus Window Watcher // 605
00:47:16
In May of 1968, an 18-year-old college student's body was found brutally murdered in some bushes on the camps of her Wisconsin college. She had eaten breakfast and gotten ready for church that morning, never making it off campus before she was attacked. But this sudden and disturbing discovery led to a shocking twist: that a middle-aged medical resident who was obsessed with her may have been behind it… This is the murder of Christine Rothschild.
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Host Heath
What is going on? True Crime I'm your host he and
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Host Claudia
I'm your host Daphne.
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Host Heath
And you're listening to Going West.
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Host Claudia
Hello everybody. Hope you're doing well. Thank you so much for tuning into this episode. This case that we have for you guys today feels like a long forgotten, lesser known murder case, not unlike any we've covered before, but one that has a very strong suspect at its center that will disturb you and it needs so much more attention. I don't know how I stumbled upon this case recently because it didn't come recommended. But I am always looking for cases like this one that needs more of a spotlight put on it but also has really eerie and unsettling details that cannot fully be explained. You know.
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Host Heath
Yeah, this is one of the darker, kind of more creepier cases that we're gonna cover on this show, I think.
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Host Claudia
Especially because it takes place in the late 1960s on a college campus. We're gonna be talking about an older man.
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Host Heath
Those are always the ones that kind of get you like before the age of technology, you know.
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Host Claudia
Exactly. So without further ado, let's dive into this one.
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Host Heath
Alright guys, this is episode 605 of Going West. So let's get into it.
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Host Claudia
In May of 1968, an 18 year old college Student was found brutally murdered in some bushes on the campus of her Wisconsin college. She had eaten breakfast and gotten ready for church that morning, never making it off campus before she was attacked. But this sudden and disturbing discovery led to a sh. Shocking twist. That she had been stalked in the weeks leading up to her murder. And that a middle aged medical resident who was obsessed with her may have been behind it. This is the murder of Christine Rothschild. Christine Rothschild was born on November 14, 1949 in the Northside neighborhood of Edgewater in Chicago, Illinois. And there Christine grew up alongside sisters Suzanne, Arlene and Roxanne. The Rothschild girls grew up very comfortable after their father patented the automated garage door for businesses and parking garages, which is pretty big.
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Host Heath
That's a pretty big deal.
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Host Claudia
Yeah. So as a teen, Christine was studious and a voracious reader. She was sensitive and creative, a lover of art books, poetry and animals. According to Mad city, which is one of multiple books speculating about her fate. We're going to talk about the other books today. Christine, quote, personified kindness even when she didn't have to. She graduated from high school with honors in 1967, coming in fourth in her class of over 500 students.
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Host Heath
Students, damn. Fourth.
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Host Claudia
Yeah, she was very.
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Host Heath
She was smart.
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Host Claudia
Yeah, super smart. She was also a writer and editor for the school newspaper. She was class president and she was a member of the French club.
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Host Heath
I know you love that.
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Host Claudia
I do. I mean, she just seems like such a smart, great gal. And when she wasn't tied up in school activities, she modeled on the side appearing in the catalogs and newspaper ads of higher end department stores like Saks fifth Avenue and Marshall Fields. But her true passion was writing. So in the fall of 1967, 17 year old Christine moved to Madison, Wisconsin to begin her college studies, hoping to pursue journalism. Professor Claudia Card, who taught Christine's freshman year philosophy class, remembered, quote, she was an outstanding student. Always the first to put her hand up. The one person I have a visual memory of from that class. But despite her success at the University of Wisconsin.
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Host Heath
Go badgers, go.
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Host Claudia
Oh my God.
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Host Heath
You knew I was gonna do it.
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Host Claudia
You haven't done it in a while. Christine longed for kind of a more exciting college experience that she didn't feel like she was getting. From the U of W. Is that what it's called?
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Host Heath
Yeah, I made that up. University of Wisconsin or U dub.
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Host Claudia
That's a Washington now.
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Host Heath
That's Washington. Yeah.
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Host Claudia
And honestly, it's. It kind of surprises me that she wanted more of that exciting college experience because she was so quiet as we're going to get into. She didn't want to date anybody. She wasn't like a partier.
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Host Heath
She.
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Host Claudia
She wasn't into that kind of lifestyle. But for whatever reason, she did want to move schools. Unless, of course, that more exciting college experience was some kind of excuse, which is very possible. Sorry.
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Host Heath
Yeah, no, I was going to say. Or something that just could level up her studies.
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Host Claudia
Yeah, I was thinking that, too, but I feel like she probably would have just said that. Like, I guess I'm getting ahead of myself because as you guys will see, there was something going on at school that was really disturbing her.
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Host Heath
Yeah.
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Host Claudia
So I wonder if this was an excuse. I'm just thinking of that for the first time as we're going over these.
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Host Heath
Actually, now that you're saying that, that does totally make sense.
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Host Claudia
Right?
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Host Heath
Yeah.
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Host Claudia
So. Or maybe not. Maybe she just wanted to change for a better college experience. Or maybe she just really wanted to be in a different state because she set her sights on Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York, and she was really hoping to transfer there. And by the way, this is after she spent almost the entire year in Wisconsin. So she had been there for a while, and she just. Just decided that she wanted to try something else. But she was the only one who seemed excited about this change because on the last visit home before she died, she and her parents got into a big argument about this subject with her parents just wanting her to stick it out in Wisconsin. But Christine's mind was made up.
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Host Heath
So on the morning of Sunday, May 26, 1968, Christine, who regrettably was still in Wisconsin, awoke early and went out for a walk. Now, she suffered from colitis and found that moderate physical activity kind of eased her stomach pain a bit. But her friends also reported that she kind of struggled with, like, restricting food and that she drank coffee and smoked cigarettes in order to kind of dull her appetite, which was a habit that made it difficult for her to sleep and was also kind of harsh on her already sensitive stomach.
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Host Claudia
I bet it was.
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Host Heath
Yeah. I mean, she's. She's definitely thinking that she's doing something that's helping. But unfortunately, coffee and cigarettes kind of does the opposite for tummy.
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Host Claudia
Really sad that she's like, I don't know what to eat to feel good, so I'm just not gonna eat. And these two things are gonna help with that.
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Host Heath
Yeah. I mean, poor Christine. But she still walked. Now, the last person known to see her was her dorm mother, Gertrude Armstrong. Christine had a modest breakfast of spinach that morning and then left her dormitory around 6am bound for church services. She brought along an umbrella to fend off the rainy Midwestern morning, as well as a lighter, cigarettes, her keys, and enough cash for a cup of coffee. She was believed to have been killed early that morning, around 7am when campus traffic was so scarce that there was no one there to see or hear the attack, based on the digestion of the spinach in her stomach contents. A child passing by the bushes in a car with his family later that day actually pointed out Christine's body, but he basically just thought that it was a mannequin, which his parents didn't question or stop to investigate further.
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Host Claudia
That is so eerie. They are driving by, he's looking out the window and probably says, like, mommy, Daddy, what's that? And they just think it's a mannequin. So they just keep going. And it is a young woman's body.
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Host Heath
Exactly. Well, then after that, a young man named Phil Van Valkenburgh, who was a senior science student and part time lab assistant at Sterling hall, where Christine's body was actually found, was passing by the hedges on a shortcut to see a friend later on that same day, with many reports stating that this happened in the evening. But then Phil actually lost his footing and fell amongst these bushes, landing just inches from Christine's mutilated remains. Christine had sadly been left in a very disturbing and deliberately shocking pose, lying face down with her head propped up on the cement window ledge, the same window that Phil was going to knock on in order to summon a friend to come outside. Beneath her head was a men's handkerchief that was described as expensive and it had been neatly folded and Christine's head was placed on top of it. And though this was usually kind of like a sign of remorse, you know, anytime that a body is covered, or in this case, a part of the body is supported like this, it more so kind of reeked of, like bragging or perhaps of putting her deceased body on display.
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Host Claudia
Christine's jaw had been broken and her face had been badly beaten. Her blue dress, custom made for her by her sister, was stained with dried blood, concealing 14 stab wounds, which likely came from a scalpel, not a knife.
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Host Heath
And that's a really, really important detail in this case.
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Host Claudia
Yeah, remember that one? So she had been stabbed so brutally that four of her ribs were broken, which is really crazy when you think that that could have been done with a scalpel, like the force needed to break those ribs.
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Host Heath
Oh, yeah. It had to be like Aggressive.
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Host Claudia
I mean, and that really tells you how aggressive this all was. This was a very, very violent attack. So Phil, once he saw her body, fled the bushes and grabbed the first two officers he could find. Roger Gollum and Tiny Frey, whom coincidentally, Christine had begged for help four days prior. Help regarding a watcher. So basically, Christine's best friend on campus, Linda. We're going to talk about Linda. Throughout this episode recalled Christine's fear and suspicion in the weeks preceding her murder that someone was following her around school and that he had even been watching her as she slept, having awoken multiple times to someone she called a sleep watcher who would lurk outside of her dorm room window in the middle of the night.
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Host Heath
Which is completely terrifying.
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Host Claudia
Yeah, I mean, that's one of those incredibly eerie details that I was talking about in the intro of this episode. Like she was being stalked before she was killed, so she went to these officers to report this. But Roger and Tiny, you know, after she was murdered, confessed that they had failed to take her report seriously. So they never wrote it up.
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Host Heath
Oh, come on, Roger, Tiny, what are we doing, guys?
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Host Claudia
But especially because it's not just like, oh, I feel like I'm being watched. Haha. Like she said, there's someone watching her sleep, there's somebody following her around campus. Like I just. That's not the thing you take lightly.
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Host Heath
And that's literally your job. Like literally your job. Your fucking job, bro.
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Host Claudia
It's so, so disappointing. But this is the first of many, many, many disappointing steps in this case.
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Host Heath
Not to bring this back to movies like we always do, but this is really giving like Black Christmas to me. I know we say that about campus murders all the time, but, but just the, the, the window aspect of it. Like watching someone through a dorm room window.
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Host Claudia
So disturbing. But what' as well is that she could very clearly tell that somebody was watching her, but it. She didn't know who it was. There are going to be the theories that we're going to discuss, you know, especially when we talk more about Linda, who is her best friend. But it's not like she said, oh, this person is following me. She just knew there was like a shape in her window watching her.
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Host Heath
Which makes it even scarier because you don't know who this person is.
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Host Claudia
Yeah. And there is so much more. So she reported it again to Roger and Tiny, but they just kind of brushed it off as paranoia. That was typical for a naive teenage girl.
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Host Heath
Yeah. Or so they called her. Right.
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Host Claudia
Ridiculous. Now, strangely, the boots that Christine had been wearing were virtually unscathed from the attack and not scuffed up by the bush. Meaning that she may have been killed elsewhere and that she had been placed in the bush after she had been knocked out. This doesn't mean it was somewhere far away. It could have just been. It could have even been, you know, across the field. Yeah, exactly. Two feet away. But not. She wasn't. It didn't seem like she was killed in that bush. It was just she was put there afterwards. But as we know, she didn't make it very far out of her dorm that morning anyway. But I will say, according to one source, her boots had been removed and her tights had been ripped off and they were nowhere to be found. So either the boots were unscathed or they were completely missing.
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Host Heath
Getting a little bit of, like, misleading reporting here.
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Host Claudia
Exactly. But also her coat had been removed and then placed back on her body after the lining had been torn out and fastened around her neck like a garage. Though this was believed to have been done after she was already dead. So she wasn't killed via the garrote made from the inside of her coat. So that's part of why as well, this was such a shocking thing to find and why it does seem like she had deliberately been made to look so disturbing. Yeah, because, like, why did they do that?
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Host Heath
Yeah, I was going to say it kind of felt like, to me, maybe it was some sort of, like, extra measure just to make sure that she was really dead.
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Host Claudia
It's possible. I don't know. It's.
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Host Heath
I don't know.
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Host Claudia
It's disturbing either way. Well, according to her friend Linda, her blue silk hair ribbon was the only item that was missing from the scene of her discovery. And this had likely been taken as a souvenir, obviously, as I just said, one source claimed that her boots had been removed and her tights were missing after they were ripped off her body. Linda knows a lot about this case. So again, I think that would just make us believe more that her boots were on her body when she was killed. Which proves further that she was not murdered in that bush, but that instead there was one item taken from the scene and that was her hair ribbon for. Probably for a souvenir.
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Host Heath
Right. Yeah. And as many of you guys already know, a lot of killers will take a souvenir from their victim, like, a little, like, keepsake, which is obviously weird
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Host Claudia
and disturbing, potentially, especially in this case, as it seems the person who killed her was likely, as we will detail, a stalker and obsessed with her.
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Host Heath
Yeah. So obviously this was a Very brutal attack. But Christine had not been sexually assaulted. Her leather gloves had been stuffed in her mouth after she was already dead, which would, you know, avoid her getting the killer's DNA. Under her fingernails, propped up at her feet was her black umbrella, and by her side was the contents of her pockets. So after waking up, eating her spinach and leaving her dorm for church, Christine never even made it off of campus. And it was just three days until the end of the term. So it was kind of clear to police very early that robbery and sexual assault were off the table as motives, leading them to believe that this was a very personal attack.
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Host Claudia
And I want to say, so I don't forget later that the fact that this was three days before the end of term, maybe this was done because it was like it was almost summer break. Yeah, I'm going to lose sight of her.
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Host Heath
This is my chance to do it now. I mean, but if it isn't already obvious, she didn't have any enemies. Though, thanks to that report that she tried to file, it was known that she had a dark secret admirer. While in the second of many, you know, missed steps that the case suffered, the paramedics transported her body with their hands, initially believing that she was possibly still alive. When the hospital heard word from first responders that a young woman was in need of medical attention, they were somehow under the impression that the woman had simply fainted, not that she had been brutally attacked and left for dead, and of course that she was already deceased and not simply passed out. Still, she was brought into the hospital instead of the coroner's office, which was further proof that the police and the paramedics were just not prepared for a crime of this magnitude. But I will say, when her body was first examined, rigor mortis had not yet set in, so paramedics may have been confused about the state she was actually in. She was reportedly carried loose without a gurney to the ambulance and then placed in the back without any protection or barrier in order to, like, maintain the integrity of whatever evidence was left behind. Well, when it quickly became clear that 18 year old Christine had been the victim of a violent murder, the campus reeled in shock. I mean, young women feared for their lives, and many parents sent their daughters mace or bear spray, some even pulling their daughters from campus altogether. Linda had been home for the weekend visiting her family when this took place. So she received a call early in the morning on Monday, May 27, 1968. She answered on the first ring, having been up later studying and not wanting the call to Wake up her sleeping family. The deputies asked her if she knew of anyone with unrequited feelings for Christine. And actually, two people came to her mind. A fellow student named Neil, who lived in a nearby dorm and had a huge crush on Christine, but who seemed harmless and a resident old enough to be Christine's father. So Linda told investigators that in the weeks before her murder, she felt as if she was being stalked around campus by a man named Niels bjorn Jorgensen, who was a medical resident at the time, in his third year at university hospital. But strangely, this guy was actually in his 40s to Christine's 18 years of age, and she had been very weary of him from their very first meeting.
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Host Claudia
So the FBI, the university of Wisconsin police department, the Madison city police department, and the dane county sheriff's office all joined forces to investigate this crime. However, this kind of, like, squabble over jurisdiction led to yet another shoe drop that may have cost Christine her justice, because she was murdered on university of Wisconsin property. But her dorm room was just outside of campus. Neither the university of Wisconsin police department nor the Madison city police department wound up pulling the phone records from the month leading up to Christine's murder, which may have led them back to the man she believed was stalking her, as it is very possible that he had called her.
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Host Heath
I mean, yeah, given the fact that he was sitting outside of her dorm room watching her, you know, through the window, it's very possible that he got a hold of her phone number.
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Host Claudia
Yeah. Was placing, like, lurid phone calls, which could have also been very much like black Christmas. Well, also, a photograph of Christine at the morgue was released in the newspapers, Obviously to the disaster of her friends and family showing her deceased. Like, they just did so many strange and very disrespectful things to Christine after and even before she was killed, like, she was failed and failed again. Well, after the funeral, her family mostly continued to grieve silently and stopped granting press interviews. Her mom, patria, may have taken it the hardest, Wearing Christine's clothes and sleeping in her childhood bedroom. Anything to feel closer to her daughter as she begged for answers to come. Within the first week, the police department admitted that the case was already in danger of going cold, Obviously greatly due to their own failures. But also, as heath hinted to earlier, there were no witnesses and far too little evidence. And in a time before prevalent surveillance cameras and cell phone data and DNA evidence, the killer had committed a near perfect crime. Within days of Christine's murder, the president of the university of Wisconsin had issued a $5,000 or nearly $50,000 today reward for information which an anonymous donor then added another thousand dollars to or nearly $10,000 to today. Scuba diver searched a nearby lake hoping to find a discarded murder weapon. Yeah, possibly that scalpel, right, but turned up nothing. Every single resident of Christine's dormitory, which was called Ann Emery hall, which totaled nearly 200 people, was interviewed. Everyone in her church group was interviewed as well, with of course particular focus on the men. As Heath mentioned, such a brutal crime indicated prior knowledge of Christine to her killer, and detectives wondered if maybe she had rejected someone who had used this attack as revenge. However, though it remains officially unsolved, Linda maintains that she knows exactly who killed her friend nearly 50 years ago and that she is known from the beginning.
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- [31:36]
Host Heath
active subscriber to receive free dessert. Linda Schuelko, who is Christine's best friend, is so sure of the identity of the murderer that she actually penned a book about it entitled murder on the 56th. Christine Rothschild, first homicide victim on UW Madison, which was a passion project that she spent decades pouring research into just in hopes of solving the case in honor of her friend. And she feels that she knows that that person was Niels Jorgensen. Now Niels was described as narcissistic, arrogant and off putting. And he was surrounded by students who were decades younger than he was, including the object of his affections, Christine. Unfortunately for Christine, she was exactly Neil's type. She was tall, thin, blue eyed and blonde. So after zeroing in on Christine while she was in the campus library, while they happened to be there studying at the very same time, since remember, he was an older medical resident, not a professor. Linda believes that Niels became obsessed with Christine. Niels was known for being a liar and an exaggerator. And in the spring of 1968 he was new on campus and told anybody who had listened to him that he had come to complete his third year of surgical residency at University Hospital and that he had already completed extensive travel through Africa working as a medical missionary.
- [33:26]
Host Claudia
He was a bit of a bragger like you said. Narcissist.
- [33:29]
Host Heath
Yeah, he loves to tell people about his accomplishments. Well, he also told people that he hailed from both Colorado and Washington state. State, despite being from California.
- [33:39]
Host Claudia
So he's also like a weird fabricator.
- [33:43]
Host Heath
Yeah. Like what? There's no reason to lie about that.
- [33:46]
Host Claudia
Which if I'm not mistaken, a lot of narcissists are also pathological liars.
- [33:50]
Host Heath
Exactly. Well, his roommate David and David's girlfriend Anita witnessed his violent nature frequently and they have actually since spoken about it. Like once Niels complained that he had grown tired of Anita spending so much time and he and David's apartments. And a fight broke out between the three of them in which Niels pulled a gun on David. According to David, Niels was an insufferable know it all who lacked any type of social graces or manners. In the seven weeks that they lived together, not once did Niels receive a letter, a visitor, or a phone call from a friend or a family member. Because probably nobody really gave a shit about this guy.
- [34:33]
Host Claudia
Yeah, goes to show you how few close people he had in his life. But also the fact that such a violent argument took place within a seven week period.
- [34:44]
Host Heath
And you pulled a gun.
- [34:45]
Host Claudia
Yeah, that says a lot too.
- [34:47]
Host Heath
Unhinged. Well, after his first week at the hospital In April of 1968, the surgeon overseeing his residency had already received complaints about Nils. Christine, of course, was put off by him immediately. I mean, probably most people were. But I will say that Christine's family were Christian Scientists who did not believe in receiving advanced medical care. And this was a religion that began its rapid decline during that same decade after booming in popularity around the same time that Christine was born. So basically, she didn't care to date a doctor, let alone one who was over twice her age and as unlikable as Niels was. And even if she was interested in this guy, Linda remembers Christine being extremely moral, demure and modest. And that she didn't care to date anyone. Like she was far more focused on her faith and her studies. Her friends revealed that she dated only on a surface level that never went past a simple kiss on the cheek. So in turn, she had plenty of platonic male friends. But she was reportedly far too invested in her studies to date anybody seriously. Though some of them did want to date her, of course.
- [36:01]
Host Claudia
Well, once while they were both in the library studying, 42 year old Niels approached 18 year old Christine outside and attempted to share a smoke break. Since Christine smoked, as we know, and cozy up to her, but she shut him down because she was wholly uninterested in even entertaining a friendship with him. Understandably so.
- [36:23]
Host Heath
Yeah. She's 18 years old. What are you doing, freak?
- [36:25]
Host Claudia
And this just made him even more fixated on her. Christine told Linda that she had become so concerned about this, you know, his fixation, that she went as far as to report him to campus police. You know, that's Roger and Tiny fearing that his obsession would grow dangerous. Like it was obvious to her.
- [36:44]
Host Heath
Yeah, and of course Tiny and Roger aren't gonna do anything about this, but
- [36:48]
Host Claudia
I think this does say a lot that she's telling her friends she wants to report it. She knows exactly who's doing it. Like I said earlier, she didn't see that it was Neil's in her window, but she's. She knows that he's obsessed and fixated. So she's trying to report this whole incident and they're just not listening to her.
- [37:06]
Host Heath
Yeah. So to Linda, you know, this whole mystery guy is not so much a mystery. She knows that Niels is being a weirdo towards Christine.
- [37:15]
Host Claudia
And that's why it sucks too, because since, you know, of course Christine did know who it could have been who outside her window. Because she knew that somebody was fixated on her and that that person was Niels. If the campus police had taken her seriously, they would have written that name down and everything would be different. But they didn't do that. So Linda feels that Niels had likely even been tracking her by waking up early, just as she did, in order to learn her movements, which would make sense because as we know, she had barely gotten out of her dorm before she was killed early that morning. Well, on the morning of her murder, Christine likely didn't recognize or notice Niels. And when he greeted her, Christine, being as kind as she was, stopped to chat, not realizing until it was too late that she was in danger. What is believed to have been the initial blow was the one to her head, which likely knocked her out immediately, rendering her unable to feel the stab wounds she sustained. Now, as we know, Neil's roommate David knew exactly how he could be, and they really didn't see eye to eye. But when David was questioned about Neil's potential role in Christine's murder, he didn't mention anything suspicious, nor the fact that he himself believed that Niels could be involved.
- [38:43]
Host Heath
See, that's rough, because I feel like that would have been a really good time to kind of explain who Niels is.
- [38:49]
Host Claudia
Yeah, especially because the Anything suspicious, by the way, included the fact that Niels was fired from his surgical residency on May 27, 1968, the day after Christine was murdered, and he moved away from Madison that very night, not notifying anybody, including David. So by the time that David was questioned, he didn't say, yeah, I think he did it, too. And by the way, the night after Christine was killed, he moved away. That's a pretty important thing to note.
- [39:21]
Host Heath
Well, let's actually get into that, because among multiple reasons for Neil's being let go was the intense line of questioning that he put his patients through, regardless of their ailment. One superior of his named Dr. Mackman, recalls that Niels once asked a female patient some very intimate questions about her sexual history while she was there for, like, a possible case of appendicitis. So obviously not related and very much not appropriate at all. When Niels was finally let go, he was so irate about it that he actually pulled a gun on Dr. Mackmin, just as he had on his roommate David previously.
- [40:01]
Host Claudia
This is a man who does not know how to control his emotions, not at all.
- [40:06]
Host Heath
For whatever reason, David omitted these facts and merely told the police that his roommate had been a strange man, to put it very lightly. Meanwhile, Linda slowly began talking to people in the orbit of the murder, including David, and organized her thoughts and suspicions in preparation for writing her tell all book, which placed the blame on Niels. Eventually, of course, culminating in her book 56. In 2006, after putting out a letter in the University of Wisconsin alumni magazine, Linda received a letter from a student nurse who was on call the day of that murder. So that morning, she remembers Niels walking by her and saying, nice day for a murder. Of course, before anybody knew that Christine had been murdered. So this nurse, Kay Krebs, also noted that he was a resident in obgyn and that she and a fellow nurse decided that if anybody came in that day in need of assistance, they would call the surgical resident instead because Niels was, quote, too rough with women.
- [41:14]
Host Claudia
The fact that they clocked that this actually is giving me a hand that rocks the cradle vibes.
- [41:20]
Host Heath
Yeah.
- [41:20]
Host Claudia
But so disturbing that this was a thing.
- [41:24]
Host Heath
Yeah. They literally were like, we don't know if we trust this guy Niels to take care of the patients, so we're just gonna call somebody else here. But sadly, even though everybody basically knew that Niels was like this, Linda believes that Niels was protected by his fellow doctors who didn't want to cause a fuss. So he was a known person of interest, and the local paper even named him as such. But sadly, once he had fled the area and no concrete evidence proving his involvement ever surfaced, the case against him proved to be a lost cause.
- [42:00]
Host Claudia
Following his departure from Wisconsin, Niels lived with an elderly uncle in Michigan for a while, sponging off of him for what little he had. He bounced around from run down apartments to extended family, always accepting checks from his parents out in California for support and taking advantage of whomever would allow him to stay with him. And he continued to lie about his job prospects and career to anybody who would ask. As always, investigators from Madison even followed him to New York City, where he was living in a small Brooklyn apartment and working in a local hospital. And after agreeing to speak with police and going as far as getting in a police cruiser with them, he complained that he felt ill and asked to be taken home. But he promised that they could speak at another time. But when police returned the very next day, he had fled overnight and left his apartment behind.
- [43:03]
Host Heath
Of course, that's not suspicious at all.
- [43:05]
Host Claudia
That says literally everything I need to know. Nobody up in. You have a job and you have an apartment. You're not going to quit your job and move out of your apartment in a single day. If you didn't murder somebody and you don't think the police are about to arrest you.
- [43:23]
Host Heath
Yeah. Nils definitely knew that they were hot on his trail.
- [43:27]
Host Claudia
He had to have, like, that's at least what I believe. Well, Niels died In September of 2013, in his late 80s, never facing justice for what happened to Christine, if she did in fact die at his hands. Author and former police officer Matthew Arntfield, who authored A book about the subject entitled Mad City, the one we talked about earlier. It's actually called Mad City. The True Story of the Campus Murders that America Forgot, also purports that Nils Bjorn Jorgensen was responsible for Christine's murder. Both Linda and Matthew even believe that Niels likely has more victims, including but not limited to his own brother. Cause when his Brother Soren was 20, he went out diving off the coast of Catalina island in California, which was routine for him as both of the Jorgensen boys were experienced divers. But Soren's oxygen hose had been cut and he drowned in fairly shallow waters. I mean, even Neil's mother, Harriet, suspected her son of her other son's death for the rest of her life.
- [44:38]
Host Heath
So this isn't crazy.
- [44:39]
Host Claudia
This isn't just like, oh, well, then it must have been Nils. It's like, no, the family thought so too.
- [44:43]
Host Heath
Yeah. Your own mom believes that you killed your brother. Well, after the death of Niels father, who was a prominent doctor that Niels basically wanted to emulate and become during his entire career, Niels moved back into his sprawling stately childhood home in Los Angeles. Somehow he convinced his ailing elderly mother to move out and downsize to a small apartment in Marina Del Rey, which was kept in squalid conditions because he just couldn't be bothered to come and clean up and care for his mother. So he was described as cheap and a hoarder for his entire life. Well, Harriet lived there until her death. And then Niels continued to siphon money from her, his father's estate, and the sale of his childhood home. Meanwhile, he would work strings of dead end hospital jobs until he would get fired for incompetence or misconduct. He never finished his surgical residency like he had dreamed of, despite boasting online in the years before his death that he had over 50 years of specialized medical training and experience. Now, Matthew again. Matthew Arntfield postulates that Niels likely had about five other victims by the time he murdered Christine. And Linda believes that there are other murders as well. According to Linda, multiple eyewitness reports came forward in the three years following her death that he had mentioned or even bragged that the hospital had not been checked for the murder weapon.
- [46:16]
Host Claudia
And if it was a scalpel, what a great place to return it to. Exactly. Probably where he got it from. You know, throw it back into the mix of other medical tools.
- [46:26]
Host Heath
Sure.
- [46:27]
Host Claudia
Well, another more far flung theory, I'll say. Reports that the Zodiac Killer was responsible for her death.
- [46:34]
Host Heath
I find this one very far fetched because it Seems like most of these cases from like the late 60s somehow get tied into Zodiac, I know, or
- [46:44]
Host Claudia
like to some other prominent serial killer, which some of them, I'm sure you know, maybe hold some, some credence. The only reason I'm bringing this one up is because there is literally a book about it. So in the way that all prolific serial killers have, the Zodiac has very much become like a catch all for a lot of other unsolved cases of its time period, naturally. But a third book about Christine's murder, entitled Super Killer the Further Crimes and Cover up of the Zodiac, penned by author and Zodiac expert Glenn Wall, makes multiple claims that, while fascinating, are not widely accepted by law enforcement. Glenn maintains that William Thorison was the true identity of the Zodiac Killer, which I know a lot of us disagree with, but that the FBI covered up his crimes. Glenn explained, quote, the FBI was embarrassed. They knew that if what actually happened was revealed, heads there would have rolled. William's identity as the Zodiac Killer is mostly disputed, though it is a common belief that he was in fact a serial killer. Just probably not the Zodiac Killer. Yeah, like Christine, William was born and raised in Chicago's high society, the heir to his father's steel fortune. And though he is suspected of multiple murders, the most high profile of these is that of Valerie Percy, a 21 year old recent college graduate who is living at home with her family in the Chicago suburb of Kenilworth. That story goes overnight on September 18, 1966. So a couple years before Christine's murder, an intruder broke into the Percy home and brutally murdered Valerie in her sleep. Her father, Chuck, was a senator. So early rumblings explained that the crime was likely politically motivated. But strangely, no one else in the home was hurt and nothing was taken, so it seemed more likely that it was targeted specifically at Valerie. William's family actually lived down the street from the Percy's at the time. And after leaving the Chicago area, he was suspected of hiring a hitman to kill his own brother and then killing the hitman. He was also wanted for weapons charges after authorities discovered 77 tons of rifles, mortar, bayonets, landmines, machine guns, a cannon and pistols.
- [49:22]
Host Heath
Damn, it's like a one man army.
- [49:24]
Host Claudia
Yeah, and I double checked on the 77 ton thing and that it wasn't like 77 items because I'm like, I can't even wrap my head around that,
- [49:31]
Host Heath
that how much that actually is.
- [49:33]
Host Claudia
Yeah, but that's what it says. So I like, I don't know how that's possible. That's obviously More than any of us can even imagine.
- [49:41]
Host Heath
I'm just really wondering what William was actually preparing for.
- [49:45]
Host Claudia
I don't know. It's kind of insane. Well, he was arrested for hoarding or hoarding military weapons the spring after Valerie was murdered. But because of his father's wealth and connections, he managed to escape every single accusation that was leveled his way, which included a series of bombings that took place at a radio station over in Arizona, an altercation with a server who sustained a fractured arm, and the aggravated assault of a woman in Las Vegas. Which goes to show that he committed crimes in many states, but he never stood trial for any of these charges,
- [50:25]
Host Heath
which is really sick and twisted and such a shame in the society that we live in that people with wealth get away with things like this. Like, he never had to go to prison for any of this.
- [50:36]
Host Claudia
Yeah. And it seems like he committed far more crimes than those anyway, so.
- [50:40]
Host Heath
Yeah, actually. Actually, the author, Glenn Wall, has taken it a step further, alleging that William killed 87 people across 10 states, including traveling from Chicago to Madison on a trip in which he killed Christine and then carrying out the murders that are known to be connected to the Zodiac killer in California. Now, unfortunately, we will never know the extent of his crimes, because in 1970, his wife Louise claimed that he was going to kill her. So instead, before he could actually do that, she shot him and then fled to a neighbor's house, probably for the best way to go Louise. Well, Louise later wrote a book on this. It's called. It Gave Everybody Something to Do, detailing her experience being married to someone she described as a wealthy, sadistic, murderous lunatic back to Christine. Tragically, her parents outlived three of their four children following Christine's death and the death of her little brother that she never knew. Her sister Suzanne died in 1983, just two days before her 30th birthday. So basically what happened there is. While she was carrying party supplies up to her San Francisco apartment in preparation for her 30th birthday party, Suzanne collapsed on the steps of a sudden heart aneurysm and died almost instantly. Both of Christine's parents passed away in 2003, never receiving closure about the horrific murder of their beloved daughter. Even though a lot of us just assume that we kinda know who was responsible.
- [52:23]
Host Claudia
And surely they had the same idea. This was very widely believed amongst her group and her close ones that Niels did this, but it's so disappointing that they never got that official closure that he did.
- [52:38]
Host Heath
Yeah. And the fact that Niels was able to live out the Rest of his life. And the guy lived into his late 80s.
- [52:45]
Host Claudia
Yeah, he lived a long life.
- [52:47]
Host Heath
Well, if you have any information about the murder of Christine Rothschild, please call Madison Crime Stoppers at 608-266-6014.
- [53:06]
Host Claudia
Thank you so much, everybody for listening to this episode of Going West.
- [53:10]
Host Heath
Yes, thank you guys so much for listening to this episode. I really wish that this one had some closure because it really does feel like basically everybody knows who was responsible, but there never was any justice in this case.
- [53:22]
Host Claudia
There truly should be closure. I honestly believe that if Roger and Tiny had taken her report seriously, had written down Neil's name, we would be in a completely different place today.
- [53:35]
Host Heath
I believe so too, because all they
- [53:37]
Host Claudia
need, like, they needed to be able to serve search warrants to him and they needed to be able to properly interrogate him, but they didn't have enough to do that. And that report could have changed everything. It is so, so disappointing that that one thing that seems so little to them was the biggest thing they would ever touch.
- [53:57]
Host Heath
Yeah. And also the fact that Niels didn't stick around. You know, he took off. So that made it even harder to question him.
- [54:04]
Host Claudia
Yeah. And that's why it is believed as well that he has other, other murders. He moved around a lot. He seemed to kind of creep away whenever he needed to.
- [54:12]
Host Heath
I mean, yeah, just in general, he seemed like a terrible person, truly.
- [54:16]
Host Claudia
So let us know what you guys think. Thank you so much for tuning into this one. Follow us over on socials, make sure you comment. We're on Instagram at Going west podcast. We're on Facebook. We have a discussion group that's private that you guys should join. And then we also have a main page and we are on TikTok.
- [54:33]
Host Heath
Yes. And we have a very exciting update episode for you guys coming on Friday, so stay tuned for that.
- [54:39]
Host Claudia
Yes, you're gonna want to hear that one.
- [54:41]
Host Heath
Alright, guys, so for everybody out there
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Host Claudia
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