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Mike Ferguson
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Voicemail Caller / Alicia
Foreign.
Mike Ferguson
And welcome to episode 474 of the True crime All the Time podcast. I'm Mike Ferguson and with me as always, is my partner in true crime, Mike Gibson. Gibby, how are you?
Mike Gibson
I'm good. How about you?
Mike Ferguson
I'm doing great man. I'm having a good week. You know, we put out the the Thursday episode did and also went up on YouTube and we're getting a lot of great feedback about the studio the new episode. So it's more work but hey, people are liking it.
Mike Gibson
As long as they're happy, I'm happy.
Mike Ferguson
Yeah, me too. Me too. Let's go ahead and give our Patreon shout outs. We had Bruce Swicker.
Mike Gibson
Hey S. Wicker at Glanville. What's happening, Jack?
Mike Ferguson
Sarah Woods.
Mike Gibson
Hey there Sarah.
Mike Ferguson
Tammy Forkham.
Mike Gibson
Well, if you. I said it on Patreon. If you can't fork them, spoon them Katie Armstrong. What's going on, Katie?
Mike Ferguson
Hunter Hoffman.
Mike Gibson
Hey, there's Hunter.
Mike Ferguson
Kcp.
Mike Gibson
Well, thanks, Casey.
Mike Ferguson
J. Law.
Mike Gibson
Well, J. Law.
Mike Ferguson
And last but not least, Tara. Henry.
Mike Gibson
Well, thank you, Henry.
Mike Ferguson
And then if we go back into the vault this week, we selected Vicki Armstrong.
Mike Gibson
Well, thanks, Vicki. Are you related to Katie? I don't know. Same last name.
Mike Ferguson
Two Armstrong. So we appreciate all the, the Patreon support that we get. We have an episode out right now on True Crime all the Time Unsolved, where we're talking about Dottie Kaler. This is a fascinating case because her husband dropped her off at the train station, but there was no evidence that she ever boarded the train. And then she disappeared. And then things started to come out about the marriage. And obviously they looked at the husband because they're always going to.
Mike Gibson
It's what always happens. Things start to unravel.
Mike Ferguson
Yeah, but he hit the radar pretty, pretty hard. And just to let everybody know, Thursday's episode is about a guy named Frank Freshwaters, which is maybe hard to say.
Mike Gibson
Easy for you to say.
Mike Ferguson
This is a guy who hit. Hit somebody while speeding, pleaded guilty to manslaughter, but then escaped from an honor farm for 50 years.
Mike Gibson
It's a long time.
Mike Ferguson
Yeah, he was on the run for 50 years. So make sure you check that out. All right, buddy. Are you ready to get into this episode of True Crime all the Time?
Mike Gibson
I am ready.
Mike Ferguson
We got a big case. This is the 1989 kidnapping of 11 year old Jacob Wetterling. He was kidnapped by a masked man from St. Joseph, Minnesota on October 22nd. For 27 years, what happened to Jacob and who took him remained a mystery. The perpetrator was someone who had been on police radar since the early phases of the investigation. And we do see that, right?
Mike Gibson
We do.
Mike Ferguson
First of all, mystery that is solved decades later. And then once you find out who it is, it can go one of two ways. Either that person wasn't on police radar at all. They kind of just surfaced out of the blue, or this person was looked at and thought of. They just couldn't put it together.
Mike Gibson
Yeah, they couldn't bring it home.
Mike Ferguson
Jacob Aaron Wetterling was born on February 17, 1989 in Long Prairie, Minnesota. He was the son of Jerry Lee Wetterling and Patricia Lynn King. Jacob was the second of four children. And you know, he was the kind of boy Gibbs was said to have been nice to everyone at his school. He loved fishing. He loved playing hockey. At the time of his death, he. He was in the sixth grade and was an A student?
Mike Gibson
Well, he grew up in Minnesota, so hockey, I'm not surprised.
Mike Ferguson
No, me neither. You know, hockey is big in a lot of places now. When you and I were growing up here in Ohio, hockey was not a thing.
Mike Gibson
It was not.
Mike Ferguson
I mean, it was a pro sport, but there was no high school hockey. Now it is. And even younger, like AAU teams and youth leagues and all that.
Mike Gibson
Oh yeah, my little nephew, you know, he, he plays hockey every Saturday morning at seven o'. Clock. Why? My brother agreed to that.
Mike Ferguson
That's very early for Saturday.
Mike Gibson
Exactly. But you know, he's good at it, you know, for being. I think he's like 9 years old, 10 years old. I mean, that's a lot of skating going on.
Mike Ferguson
But you can make the same statement about like lacrosse, field hockey. We didn't, there was none of that in my school when I was growing up.
Mike Gibson
No, no, we didn't have the lacrosse. I mean, the, the girls had field field hockey. They did that. But even growing up at my age, soccer was just starting to come on more and more.
Mike Ferguson
What was the 50s?
Mike Gibson
It was not the 50s, but, but you know, now, I mean, soccer, I mean, it's probably the most popular sport
Mike Ferguson
worldwide, but I don't think probably you could take that out.
Mike Gibson
It is, it is.
Progressive Insurance Announcer
Yeah.
Mike Gibson
But you know, here in the States, you know, just wasn't around as much when I was growing up. But now it's, it's everywhere.
Mike Ferguson
On October 22, 1989, just after 9pm, Jacob, his 10 year old brother Trevor and their friend, 11 year old Aaron Larson were biking home from a convenience store in St. Joseph where they had gone to rent a video. And we're talking 1989 here, right? This is kind of probably the height of going to rent videos.
Mike Gibson
It was the thing to do.
Mike Ferguson
It was the only thing. If you wanted to watch a movie that wasn't on regular TV or HBO or whatever they had back then, you couldn't just go on a streaming service and get whatever you wanted.
Mike Gibson
That is true.
Mike Ferguson
The boys were about halfway home when a man wearing a stocking cap, mask and armed with a revolver came out of a driveway and ordered the boys to throw their bikes into a ditch and lie face down on the ground. Trevor recalled, per the Star Tribune. He had a mask, it looked like pantyhose on his head. He told us to get off our bikes or he'd shoot. We did what he said. We laid in a ditch and he asked our ages. According to Trevor, he looked at Aaron's face and he told me to run to the woods as fast as I could. He warned Trevor not to look back or else he'd shoot. Aaron said, he told me to run too, or else he'd shoot. Just before they began running away, they saw the man grab Jacob by the arm. Several minutes later, they came back to look around, but Jacob and the man were gone. And this is such a scary situation, Gibbs, when you're talking about, you know, 11 year olds, 10 year olds, to be confronted by a masked man with a gun. You know, they're not out doing anything wrong. No, they're just riding their bikes home from the video store.
Mike Gibson
It would just be so scary.
Mike Ferguson
Yeah, I mean, absolutely terrifying at any age, but especially, you know, you think at 10 or 11 years old and then for the two boys to come back and realize that Jacob is gone.
Mike Gibson
But in one sense you have to think, man, they didn't take me.
Mike Ferguson
Yeah. That's always a tricky situation though, because I think for most people there's a real dichotomy there of okay, I survived, I escaped, whatever the situation is. But then you hear about survivor's guilt.
Mike Gibson
Yeah.
Mike Ferguson
And you know, that's probably going to kick in at some point. Investigators identified an earlier case with a similar M.O. to Jacob's abduction. On January 13, 1989, 12 year old Jared Shearl was kidnapped, sexually assaulted and threatened by a man in Cold spring, Minnesota, about 10 miles from where Jacob was abducted. The perpetrator used a gun and upon releasing Jared, told him to run and not look back or else he would be shot. So I could see why they would put, you know, these two cases possibly as being linked. The MO is very similar. Local police, the FBI and the National Guard launched a massive search effort to find Jacob. Police received thousands of tips, and by October 1990, about 2,000 people had been interview.
Mike Gibson
That's a lot of people.
Mike Ferguson
Yeah. I mean, when you think about the amount of work that goes into these types of massive searches now, you do have a lot of different agencies involved, but it's just a, it's just a massive amount of work. Although Jacob's case remained unsolved, investigators never stopped searching for answers. And I can only imagine what, you know, Jacob's family was going through. And we talk about it in a lot of cases, especially a lot of unsolved cases, because, you know, people disappear and the family is left to deal with that. And obviously it can be an easy situation at all. On June 30, 2010, authorities searched a farm in rural St. Joseph. Jacob was last seen at the End of the property's driveway. According to kstp, investigators searched the farm at least twice before.
Mike Gibson
So this is the last known location.
Mike Ferguson
Yeah, so it does make sense. Right. That's going to be somewhere that they're going to concentrate. The last place that he's thought to have been seen. On July 1, crews began digging and hauled away truckloads of dirt. But let's keep in mind, this is over 20 years, right? 20 years has gone by.
Mike Gibson
Yeah.
Mike Ferguson
When they're doing this. The owners of the property were Robert and Rita Rassier, who were in their 80s. They lived there with their son, 54 year old Daniel Rassier, who was home the night of the abduction. He told the St. Cloud Times that investigators had interviewed him numerous times and he submitted to a lie detector test, hypnosis and DNA sampling. He maintained he had nothing to do with Jacob's disappearance. But if you think about it, he would have been, what, in his early 30s when Jacob went missing, he lived at the residence. So yeah, you could see why he would at the very least be on police radar.
Mike Gibson
Well, if that's the last place he was seen, I mean, you kind of got to look at the people that live around there.
Mike Ferguson
But then you have to think, right, if this guy had nothing to do with it, what would it be like to live for decades with people thinking that you possibly abducted this, you know, young boy?
Mike Gibson
I think it'd be tough in any city. But if it's a smaller city, you know, the rumor mill, it's going to keep running and running. And that's not going to be good for you.
Mike Ferguson
No, it's definitely going to change your, your life. Right. In a myriad of ways. Sheriff John Sander told the Times that Daniel Rassier was a person of interest. So I mean, that's published in the paper. Back on June 30, Patty Wetterling told NPR News that she learned of the search that morning, adding, I don't honestly think there's any break in this case. This is just what you do. You have a cold case, you go back to the beginning over and over. And I think there's some other people way back at the beginning that they're also going to be checking out. And I would say that is true. Right. In a cold case, you, you kind of have to go back and look everything over, check a lot of things out that have already been checked out. But what else can you do?
Mike Gibson
Yeah, I mean, you're trying to decide if something was missed.
Mike Ferguson
Patty said the Rassiers lived there at the time of the kidnapping and had been farmers for decades. She said, they're wonderful people. It's got to be really painful for them as well.
Mike Gibson
I'm sure it was.
Mike Ferguson
Yeah. And that's what we talked about. Right. Daniel is being called a person of interest. Tough on him. Also tough on his parents. In September, the Stearns county sheriff's office reported that lab testing on materials gathered at the farm did not produce evidence. In May 2014, investigators confirmed they were taking a look at a series of attempted and actual child molestations the that occurred in the Painesville area before Jacob's abduction. Five teen boys were attacked between the summer of 1986 and the spring of 1987, but no one was ever arrested.
Mike Gibson
I mean, five teenage boys.
Mike Ferguson
Yeah. I mean, I think if you're someone in that community, I could see the fear level rising. Amateur investigator Joy Baker brought the information to light. She found the five cases, conducted some research, and interviewed some of the victims. She believed the perpetrator could be connected to Jacob's case Since the Paynesville attacks occurred just 40 minutes away. She also believed that the attacks were not random. The suspect knew who the boys were and assaulted them at night near their homes. He usually wore a dark puffy jacket and face masks. And for me, this is, you know, one of the interesting parts of this case. You know, you have a. You have all kinds of agencies looking into the abduction right off the bat. But as we know, the case went cold.
Mike Gibson
Right.
Mike Ferguson
Then you have cold case investigators. Right. Who are combing back through the file, interviewing people, and then comes along an amateur investigator.
Mike Gibson
I mean, for the family. I'm sure they're happy that anyone is still investigating this.
Mike Ferguson
Yeah, I would agree with that.
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Mike Ferguson
On October 28, 2015, 52 year old Danny Heinrich was arrested and charged with five counts of possessing or receiving child pornography. And then it was Just the next day that Heinrich was named a person of interest in Jacob Wetterling's disappearance. This guy, Danny Heinrich, is a former National Guard member who also had a criminal record. He got his first DWI in 1982 when he was 19. In 1984, he was convicted of breaking and entering into two businesses. He claimed he was looking for cash after he lost money gambling.
Mike Gibson
I lost some money gambling. I got to go get me some cash. I'll just break into this place and
Mike Ferguson
take it to replenish my stash. In 1986, he received another DWI. He attempted to run from the arresting officer and punched and kicked the officer to try to get away.
Mike Gibson
Yeah, well, that never works out.
Mike Ferguson
Well, no, it doesn't. But it, you know, said that all of these charges were misdemeanors. And I was kind of shocked by that because for as many body cam videos as I watch, which is a lot right on YouTube, I've talked about it on Patreon a lot. Nowadays, punching and kicking an officer, I mean, that's a felony. That's battery on a law enforcement officer. So, you know, maybe in 86 it wasn't. I was just kind of shocked to hear that that was a misdemeanor. Heinrich was in the National Guard from 1982 to 1991 and was honorably discharged. So obviously all of these convictions happened kind of while he was in the National Guard. So apparently that didn't have any effect
Mike Gibson
on him serving, but I would have thought that it would have.
Mike Ferguson
Yeah, me too. I was surprised by that. He worked various factory jobs and filed for bankruptcy twice, most recently in 2011. Heinrich was actually interviewed by the FBI on December 16, 1989. He claimed that he couldn't recall where he was on the day Jacob disappeared. So getting back to what we said very early on, right here we have a guy who becomes a suspect in the disappearance of Jacob Wetterling. And then it turns out that he was on the radar of authorities in this case. Most definitely the FBI. Very early on. Yeah, he's interviewed. He says, well, I don't know where I was that day. But then it's like, okay, what happened after that? Was there no follow up or it just wasn't reported on? It's not. No, I'm not sure. He was interviewed at least twice in 1990 and provided a DNA sample. So it's great that he provided a DNA sample, but it was 1990 and we know the limitations that they had with DNA back then. In January of 90, Heinrich gave the FBI permission to take an impression of the tires of his 1982 Ford Explorer.
Mike Gibson
I mean, he's very forthcoming.
Mike Ferguson
Yeah, I mean, I don't know if that's because, you know, he volunteered all of this. Did you know he. Was he compelled to. To give some of this up? That part I don't know if it was voluntary. Maybe he was just so confident that, you know, the. The technology wouldn't catch him. I'm really not sure.
Mike Gibson
Well, I believe if, you know, he probably was thinking that if I'm cooperative, maybe they're move on.
Mike Ferguson
Yeah, maybe. The. The thing that was so strange to me was that. So they take these tire impressions, and it was said that tire marks in a gravel driveway next to Jacob's abduction scene had very similar marks. Okay. It's not good.
Mike Gibson
It's not good.
Mike Ferguson
Now, similar is not very conclusive sounding, but his right shoe also corresponded in size and design to a shoe impression from the Jacob Wetterling case.
Mike Gibson
Well, that makes it a little bit more difficult to say, well, it wasn't me. If they had my similar tire tread. Now they have my similar shoe size and shoe design at the house.
Mike Ferguson
Yeah. Obviously, I think the more things that start to connect someone. Right. The more police would be looking at them. But FBI agent Shane Ball cautioned in the document that an exact match would have to be based on unique characteristics of the shoe, such as a scuff wear mark or divot, and. And no such unique markings were present.
Mike Gibson
So basically, you can say he might have been here, but we can't say for sure. For sure. Yeah.
Mike Ferguson
Yeah. Authorities searched the house in Painesville where he lived with his father. They found six photos of children, including one depicting a boy in a towel exiting a shower and another of a boy in his underwear. But incredibly, Gibbs, no charges were brought at that time.
Mike Gibson
But it seems concerning.
Mike Ferguson
It does. And I don't know if back then that didn't rise to the level of child pornography. I mean, it's. It's certainly more than concerning. And we're assuming, right, these. This is not a family member.
Mike Gibson
Right.
Mike Ferguson
This is not a photo of, like, his child. If this is a complete stranger. Okay, that's very concerning to me. In February 1990, Heinrich was arrested for the abduction of Jared Scheer in Cold Spring, but was released without being charged. There just wasn't enough evidence for a conviction at the time. But Heinrich remained a suspect in both cases. So I feel like this guy is just skirting jail time. He's on the fringe. He's very close to the cases, but they just can't put enough together to really get a conviction.
Mike Gibson
Well, up to this point, he's been really lucky.
Mike Ferguson
Yeah, I would think that's another way to look at it. In the summer of 2015, authorities decided to take a new look at Jacob's case. And they analyzed Heinrich's body hair samples from 1990. The DNA evidence linked Heinrich to the abduction and assault of Jared Sherrill in January 1989. His DNA was found on Jared's sweatshirt. Okay, so we've talked about some things that didn't make him look good, but, you know, wouldn't be enough for a jury. Right. To. To get around reasonable doubt. This DNA is getting, you know, to the heart of it.
Mike Gibson
Well, that puts him with Jared, which
Mike Ferguson
I would think would be a very big deal because the assumption is he would have no reason. Right. To have been around this kid. Eight days later, on July 28, 2015, authorities executed a search warrant on Heinrich's home in Annandale. And authorities found 19 binders containing child pornography and even more on his hard drive. Some of the children in the images were known to law enforcement as victims.
Mike Gibson
Wow, this is so, so gut wrenching when you think about that someone would be willing to keep a collection like this.
Mike Ferguson
Yeah, it's always hard to talk about, but you have to, to get a sense of who this individual was. Heinrich also had VHS videotapes that he shot from a hidden location that showed boys riding bikes at playgrounds.
Mike Gibson
So creepy.
Mike Ferguson
It's creepy, but I don't even think that's illegal. You're allowed to take video of people in a public place. Now we know it's creepy.
Mike Gibson
For sure it is.
Mike Ferguson
There's no way around that. But I don't even know if that's illegal.
Mike Gibson
But was he doing this for some enjoyment later or was he.
Mike Ferguson
Well, absolutely he was, because he also had a bunch of child pornography. If that's all he had, I don't know if they could have used just that. Right. Against him. But that coupled with the child pornography, it's not too hard to figure out what he was doing.
Mike Gibson
Do you, do you wonder if he was using those videos for his selection process?
Mike Ferguson
I would say there's a really strong case to be made for that. Although there was no evidence officially connecting Heinrich to Jacob Wetterling, he did have news reports about Jacob and other missing children per kstp. Now, you could argue a defense attorney could argue he's a true crime buff, or he's interested in helping to find missing children. Right. Everything In a vacuum can be explained, but when you've got child pornography, it's pretty hard to make those arguments.
Mike Gibson
Almost impossible.
Mike Ferguson
Yeah, I mean, you could still make them, but who's going to buy it? Heinrich moved from Painesville to Annandale after Jacob was abducted and lived in his dad's basement. His father died in 2002. Neighbors said Heinrich was a quiet man who was meticulous about his yard. When authorities searched his house, Heinrich told neighbors things were going to get crazy. He told neighbor Megan Champlin that authorities found child pornography, but she didn't have to worry because none of it involved her children. He also said authorities were trying to connect him to the Wetterling case.
Mike Gibson
Oh, don't worry. I got this thing with kids and pornography, but not with your kids. It's okay. Don't worry about me being your neighbor. That does not add up to me.
Mike Ferguson
No, to me neither. And I don't think anybody listening. But does it go to his mindset that you could even tell somebody that, you know, they caught me with a bunch of child pornography, but you don't have to worry about it because it doesn't involve your kids? Who would not worry about it?
Mike Gibson
Exactly. I, I would be like, either he's gone or we're leaving.
Mike Ferguson
And then also this admission that they're trying to connect him to the Jacob Wetterling case. Why would you just come out and say that? In the months that followed the search, Heinrich continued going to work at a factory. Megan wondered what became of the raid. Understandably, Gibbs, she was unsettled by the news of Heinrich's October arrest because their neighborhood was full of children. And what parent wouldn't be out of their mind with worry after finding this out?
Mike Gibson
Of course.
Mike Ferguson
After Heinrich was named a person of interest in Jacob's case, the Minnesota Star Tribune reported on court documents that referenced an assault cluster in Painesville involving eight victims within a mile of his home.
Mike Gibson
He's going to naturally look guilty on those.
Mike Ferguson
The perpetrator was described as a heavy or pudgy white male in his 30s, between 56 and 5 9. Heinrich was described as a white male, and his physical description in the late 80s was 5 foot 5, 160 pounds, with brown hair and brown eyes.
Mike Gibson
So not, not a tall guy.
Mike Ferguson
No. And normally you wouldn't think 160 pounds would be described as heavy or pudgy, but at 5 5, maybe it would be.
Mike Gibson
It could be.
Mike Ferguson
Unfortunately, although Heinrich's DNA was linked to Gerald Sherrill, the statute of limitations had expired. In that case, and I know that's something you and I have talked about a number of times, it's so wild for me to think that the statute of limitations could expire on something as heinous as that.
Mike Gibson
Yeah, it just doesn't ring right with me.
Mike Ferguson
In November, Jared spoke to CBS expressing his hope that the identification of the attacker was would help investigators determine what happened to Jacob. For years he saw similarities between their cases. And we mentioned the MO Right. It was very similar down to, you know, being told to run or, you know, you'd be shot. The difference in the two cases was that, you know, Jared got away or was let go.
Mike Gibson
Right, right.
Mike Ferguson
Jared described how he was forced into a car and assaulted in the backseat. The man threatened to kill him and then let him out of the car. He always wondered why he was let go and Jacob wasn't. And there's that survivor's guilt.
Mike Gibson
Exactly. That's going to haunt you for a long time.
Mike Ferguson
Yeah. And I actually saw an interview with Jared and he was very open and frank in discussing what happened to him, which can be easy to do.
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Mike Ferguson
After Heinrich was arrested, the media reported that he and his brother were sexually abused, his children, by a guy named Dwayne Hart, who was a convicted sex offender and was dating their mother.
Mike Gibson
Not even safe in their own home. But we've heard this before, right, where the perpetrator had this terrible thing happen in his past that kind of made him them who they are.
Mike Ferguson
Well, there are some people who are abused who go on to abuse. Obviously not everybody does, but I think it's probably safe to say that this was something that happened in his childhood that did negatively affect him and as you said, make him who he was. Or at least influence what he would later go on to do. It's pretty hard not to make that connection.
Mike Gibson
Yeah.
Mike Ferguson
Heinrich's parents divorced when he was 15. Around that time, his mother started dating Dwayne Hart. Hart was arrested in 1990 for molesting dozens of men and young boys. Author Robert Dudley, who wrote a book about Jacob Wetterling's kidnapping, turned in his notes from Hart to the FBI. Hart admitted in those notes that Heinrich's older brother was one of his victims. Family friend Steve Herting told CBS it was well known that Danny Heinrich was also molested. Dudley noted in his book that Hart was attempting to help investigators find Jacob's kidnapper and brought up Heinrich's name as a likely suspect. As early as 1990, Heinrich apparently asked Hart how to dispose of a body.
Mike Gibson
I just find it weird that Heinrich is comfortable talking to Hart about how to dispose a body. I mean, this is the guy that, according to him, abused him.
Mike Ferguson
Yeah, it does seem very strange. A June 2016 court filing described why Heinrich was considered a person of interest in the Wetterling case. The filing detailed similarities between the kidnapping of Jacob Wetterling and Gerald Sherrill and a string of sexually motivated assaults of young boys in the Painesville, Minnesota area in the mid to late 1980s. According to the memorandum, it has long been believed that the Cold Spring and Wetterling abductions were likely to have been committed by the same person. The abductions were committed in the same geographic area involved. Similarly aged boys were committed by a lone male suspect and occurred within months of each other. And for me, Gibbs, I don't think you have to be Benoit Blanc to figure this one out.
Mike Gibson
No, I do not think you need to be.
Mike Ferguson
Now, you wouldn't know for sure, but to think that they're related, I mean, that's. It's almost just common sense, right? Heinrich decided to cooperate as part of a plea bargain. On September 1, 2016, he led investigators to a burial area in a pasture near Paynesville, about 30 miles from where he lived and a short distance from his residence. In 1989, the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension recovered human remains and Jacob's clothing. On September 3rd, Jacob's family announced the remains were his. Authorities confirmed the identification through dental records. His mother, Patty told K A R E at the time, all I can confirm is that Jacob has been found and our hearts are broken. I'm not responding to any media yet, as I have no words.
Mike Gibson
The emotions behind that, you know, we finally know what happened. We finally have our child back but worst case scenario, he's dead.
Mike Ferguson
Yeah. Obviously, it's not the outcome that they wanted, but they do have information as to what happened to him. And, you know, as we've heard many times. Right. The not knowing people say that that can be the worst thing for some of these family members. On September 6, 2016, Heinrich agreed to plead guilty to one count of the 25 federal child pornography charges brought against him. He also agreed to testify to the details of the Wetterling abduction. In exchange for his plea and testimony, prosecutors agreed not to charge him with Jacob's murder.
Mike Gibson
Oh, that's interesting.
Mike Ferguson
It is. My only thought is that they had to give up a lot. Right. To get his cooperation, which maybe in consultation with the family is what they wanted. They wanted to know what happened. And there was a couple of ways it could probably go. They could not take anything off the table and he would just decide, hey, I'm not going to tell you anything, or they could take quite a bit off the table and he would agree to tell them exactly what happened. And it sounds like that's the deal they made because they're taking quite a bit off.
Mike Gibson
They really are.
Mike Ferguson
He's not going to be convicted of murder.
Voicemail Caller / Alicia
He's not.
Mike Ferguson
He's only going to be convicted of one of the 25 counts of, you know, child pornography. I think that right there just tells you how much they wanted his cooperation.
Mike Gibson
Well, I mean, the family now knows what happened and they have the body,
Mike Ferguson
the remains, and you just wonder how much input they had in some of those, you know, charges being dropped. At a hearing in the US District Court, Heinrich testified that he handcuffed Jacob, put him in his car, and drove away. Jacob asked, what did I do wrong? And if that's not enough to just break your heart, I mean, we already know what ultimately happens to Jacob Wetterling. Yeah, his life is ended. But to think about him in this car being taken away and asking, what did I do?
Mike Gibson
Yeah, what did I do wrong that I'm here with you?
Mike Ferguson
Heinrich said he drove Jacob to a gravel pit near Paynesville, where he sexually abused him and shot him twice. He panicked when Jacob cried after the assault. He said he avoided the police by listening to a police scanner.
Mike Gibson
You know, with technology, it's great that you can have a police scanner and listen in, and sometimes it's fascinating. I had a buddy that had a police scanner. You could hear all that kind of stuff. But then you have the other side of it. Right. You kind of know where the police are.
Mike Ferguson
Well, I think that's the same with anything. Technology is great, but someone is always going to use it in some type of nefarious way. Heinrich said that he left Jacob's body and went home and then returned to hide the body. He used a bobcat to dig a hole. He returned to the site a year later and moved the body after he noticed that Jacob's jacket was exposed. So that's telling me that this guy was going back there. I don't know on what interval, but he was going back to the site.
Mike Gibson
We've heard other killers do similar things, Right. They like to go back to the site. Brings them some weird sense of joy.
Mike Ferguson
Yeah. Some emotion or some. Sometimes it's sexually motivated, which it could have been in this case, as well. As sick as it is to think about that. During the hearing, Heinrich also admitted to kidnapping and sexually assaulting Jared Sherrill. Patty Wetterling thanked everyone who worked on the case and said, as quoted by NPR News, Jacob, I'm so sorry. It's incredibly painful to know his last days, his last hours, his last minutes. And that would be for a parent to know what happened to your child right before and while their life was ending. Yeah, but that versus the never knowing what happened to them. I can see both sides of it. There's no easy road, Right. To travel.
Mike Gibson
Yeah, it's all rough all the way around.
Mike Ferguson
She added that Jacob taught us how to live, how to love, how to be kind. He speaks to the world that he knew, that we believe in. U.S. attorney Andrew Lugar held a press conference after the hearing. When asked why Henrik killed Jacob, Luger said authorities believed he panicked after seeing a police car nearby. He also said that given Heinrich's volatile and unpredictable nature, there was limited time to reach an agreement that would allow them to find Jacob's body. Heinrich was open for the moment to tell us what happened. Danny Heinrich was ready to talk, and we had to grab the moment.
Mike Gibson
They're right about that.
Mike Ferguson
Well, so it goes back to kind of what we were talking about. Right. They gave up a lot. They took a lot off the table, but they felt like they had to or they would miss their chance and would never be able to get the information. So, I mean, it's a calculated decision,
Mike Gibson
but I think it was the right
Mike Ferguson
decision to ensure that the family knows what happened and to get all the details, because it's not like he's. He's gonna go scot free. Yeah, but there is a real sadness for me in the fact that he's not convicted of Jacob's murder. Even if he spends the rest of his life in prison, there's a bit of injustice, I guess.
Mike Gibson
Oh, I agree. But at least he's in prison.
Mike Ferguson
So for me, and you hear this on a lot of television shows, they really did have to make a deal with the devil. Right. And that happens quite often. On November 21, 2016, Danny Heinrich was sentenced to the maximum term of 20 years for receipt of child pornography. State authorities said that they would seek his civil commitment as a sexual predator at the end of his federal prison term. Now, 20 years being the maximum. Right. That's, that's a long time for having child pornography and I'm okay with that. You send them away for as long as you can. You have to believe that the maximum was reached because so much was taken off the table. Because in the grand scheme of things, 20 years is not near enough for all of the things this guy did.
Mike Gibson
No, no, I agree with you. I think at the end of the day they should run that 20 years all the way out.
Mike Ferguson
Yeah, I agree with you. And I would think there's a good chance he will be, let's say he would be granted a parole hearing.
Mike Gibson
Yeah.
Mike Ferguson
Hard not to think they would take all of this into account. Right. The fact that he murdered this 11 year old boy. Now he wasn't convicted of it, but everybody knows about it. How could they not take that into account?
Mike Gibson
Yeah, I would think they would say, hey, you got a pretty good deal on the front end. So on the back end you're phoning all the way out.
Mike Ferguson
Yeah. There's no extra deals. Right.
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Mike Ferguson
Heinrich said, per NPR News. I'm truly sorry for my evil acts that I have done against victims and their family and the shame I brought on myself and my family. The suffering and pain they have spoke about today. I will always remember Mr. And Mrs. Wetterling. The heinous acts, the selfishness are unforgivable for what I have taken away from you. And I just always wonder how much of that is real and how much of that is the perpetrator. Just kind of knowing what, you know, the court wants to hear, the family wants to hear.
Mike Gibson
I think there's a little bit of play there.
Mike Ferguson
Yes. I probably more often than not, maybe a little bit of both. Sometimes I think it's just sorrow for being caught. Right. Being incarcerated, more so than it really is. Feeling bad for, you know, number one, what they did, or number two, what the family's going through. Patty Wetterling told the court that Heinrich hurt my heart and soul and every fiber of my being when he murdered my child. The son I carried for nine months and raised for 11 years. Jacob was a boy with many gifts that were never realized because of this murder.
Mike Gibson
Well, yeah, his life was cut short.
Mike Ferguson
Yeah. We don't know, you know, what he would have gone on to become, what he would have done. And I can't help but feel for his family and, you know, his mother, what she's saying. It's very moving. I mean, there's no way around it. Judge John Tunheim said, we won't pretend that this crime and sentence is about child pornography. It's also about changing the lives of so many children and parents who prayed for Jacob's return and also feared you coming out of the dark. Every child knows the story of Jacob Wetterling. You stole the innocence of children in small towns in the cities of Minnesota and beyond.
Mike Gibson
The judge was right in his statement. You know, this was life changing. You know, he changed the lives of these kids, the kids, parents, and the neighborhoods around.
Mike Ferguson
And even, you know, I would expand it further because the story of Jacob Wetterling became very well known. You know, probably for many, it was a cautionary tale about being safe. Right. So many cases that you can think about, but this was a big one. This was highly publicized and. And stuff like that.
Mike Gibson
It kind of makes me think of the, you know, when I was growing up, when the kids up in Michigan were being abducted and murdered.
Mike Ferguson
Oh, the Oakland county child killer.
Mike Gibson
Yeah.
Mike Ferguson
Yeah, that was a. That was a scary one for sure. While it is possible Heinrich could go free 17 years from the start of his sentence, Judge Tunheim told him, I think that it's unlikely that you will because this crime is so heinous, so brutal and awful, that it's unlikely society will ever let you go free.
Mike Gibson
Good hope society doesn't let him go free.
Mike Ferguson
But I don't know how they would keep him past the 20 years. Or is he just saying ever? Meaning during that 20 year period?
Mike Gibson
Yeah. It must be during that 20 year period, because how else could they keep him in there?
Mike Ferguson
Now, they did say that they were going to seek a civil commitment as a sexual predator at the end of his federal prison term. So I don't know exactly what all that involved. What I do know is that if there's anything that any law enforcement agency could probably do to extend his time or to never let him out, I'm sure they're looking into that. If they could figure out a way,
Mike Gibson
they'll do it, and I hope they
Mike Ferguson
do, because he deserves it. Let's face it, this man does not deserve to get out in 2036. Who in the world would want this man living in their neighborhood, walking their streets? Nobody does.
Mike Gibson
No. Not one person.
Mike Ferguson
Jacob's parents, Jerry and Patty, formed the Jacob Wetterling foundation, an advocacy group for children's safety. In 1994, the federal Jacob Wetterling act was passed, which was the first law to institute a state sex offender registry. The act was later amended by Megan's Law in 1996 and the Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety act of 2, 2006.
Mike Gibson
All other well known cases.
Mike Ferguson
Yes. And, you know, obviously a very good thing, right? A sex offender registry. For me personally, I think it's very important that these individuals who have committed these types of crimes against children especially have to register. They should be known. You should be able to look up and see if someone like this is living in your neighborhood near you so that you can take the necessary precautions, whether that's telling your kids, hey, you can't play on this street, or deciding to move because you've got five people who have been convicted of crime. Crimes against children who live in your subdivision.
Mike Gibson
Yeah, I mean, it's the way it should be. You should know as much as you can about where these individuals are. And I don't know. Have you ever looked at one of those sites?
Mike Ferguson
I have. It's scary how many dots show up, like, in the city you live in, because I don't live in a very big city. So that's a scary thing. My thought is when you commit crimes like that, you give up some of your rights to privacy. In 2008, the foundation became the Jacob Wetterling Resource center, which educates the public about child abductors. In September 2018, Jared Sherrill was awarded $17 million in damages in his civil lawsuit against Heinrich. The judge noted in his order that Heinrich got away with kidnapping, sexual assault, and murder. This judgment is the only punishment Mr. Heinrich will ever receive for assaulting Mr. Sherrill, only punishment. Yeah. He wasn't charged and convicted of anything having to do with that. Abduction and sexual assault. Now, $17 million is a great award, right, In a civil lawsuit. But what are the chances that, you know, he's going to get much of anything from this guy?
Mike Gibson
Yeah, I mean, he's in prison, Right. So maybe, maybe you can take away all his canteen funds, maybe.
Mike Ferguson
Who knows? But at the very least, it has to be satisfying to get something on record.
Mike Gibson
Right? Right.
Mike Ferguson
That there's a punishment for this man who did such a terrible thing to you.
Mike Gibson
And now this man that did these terrible things is locked up, has no financial resources. So you have done about as much damage as you can to him.
Mike Ferguson
And to your point, if you can take away even one packet of ramen from this dude, yeah, I mean, that's a victory. The judge also noted that Jared's efforts to pursue justice led to the case being reopened. In an October 2017 court hearing, Jared described how on January 13, 1989, he was walking home alone from a cafe when Heinrich pulled up alongside him and asked for directions. Heinrich got out, grabbed him, and forced him into the backseat. He warned Jared that he had a gun and he wasn't afraid to use it. He drove Jared to a remote area, assaulted him, and then let him go. He warned that if police got close to finding him, he'd kill Jared first. And that, for me, goes back to, you know, kind of the theory that the reason why he killed Jacob Wetterling was because he saw police and got
Mike Gibson
scared and thought he needed to go ahead and tie up loose ends.
Mike Ferguson
Jared suffered from nightmares and fear that the perpetrator was still out there. He also felt that law enforcement didn't believe him. In an interview on December 11, 1989, investigators accused him of knowing the perpetrator and said another boy was missing. And that's pretty rough. I mean, this was a kid who had been abducted, assaulted, and now police are accusing him of not telling the truth. They're basically saying, you know who this was, but you're not telling us. The lengthy investigation and his inability to receive justice took a toll on Jared. He was often distracted, which made working difficult. His ex wife testified that his pain and compulsion to solve the case led to their divorce. She said Jared struggles to trust people and is overly protective of their children. And I would think it would be hard for somebody who experienced that to not have some of those thoughts. Have all that trauma makes it difficult, right, to trust people. How could you not be overly Protective of your children. When this happened to you, I could
Mike Gibson
see how that could be tough on relationships.
Mike Ferguson
The investigation into the attacks in the 1980s was heavily criticized, with many people raising concerns about why law enforcement never linked the attacks to the Wetterling abduction. The judge noted in his order that the attacks were so well known in Painesville that the attacker was named Chester the Molester. And we've already said, right, that Danny Heinrich fit the description.
Mike Gibson
Right.
Mike Ferguson
You had the shoe imprint, you had the tire marks. You could see why there would be criticism.
Mike Gibson
Sure.
Mike Ferguson
That month, Stearns County Sheriff John Goodmanson delivered an assessment of the errors among law enforcement that allowed Jacob's killer to remain free for decades, even when the evidence pointed to Heinrich. Heinrich was arrested in February 1990, but FBI profilers concluded after an interrogation he was not involved in the abduction.
Mike Gibson
Wow, they got that one wrong.
Mike Ferguson
It's a big error. Goodmanson called the interrogation the most fatal flaw of the investigation. And I could understand that, right. If you have these trained FBI profilers who are telling local law enforcement, hey, this is not your guy, okay, are they going to look at him a little differently after that? And I would say the answer is
Mike Gibson
yeah, yeah, because you're going to put a lot of weight behind what the FBI tells you.
Mike Ferguson
Goodmanson also suggested the roles of seasoned investigators from the Bureau of Criminal Apprehension were minimized when the FBI took control. He said the investigation went off the rails. He noted that it wasn't just on the wrong path, it was on the wrong freeway. His review of the case file convinced him Heinrich should have been the prime suspect from the start. He bore a strong resemblance to the man who attacked boys in Painesville and Jared Sherrill. Heinrich registered as deceptive during a polygraph when asked questions about both the Cold Spring and Wetterling abductions. He evaded early police surveillance by shutting off his car lights. Lights while being followed, which, according to Goodmanson, should have set off alarm bells. Well, I think if you're following somebody and they turn off their car lights,
Mike Gibson
it really should set off some alarms.
Mike Ferguson
It should. Dwayne Hart, a known child predator from Stearns county, later told investigators that in October 1989, the month Jacob was abducted, Heinrich asked him how to get rid of a body and and showed him a gun. But according to Goodmanson, much of the early legwork was squandered when Stearns county lost control of the FBI, which created an investigative vacuum where witchcraft, voodoo, hypnosis, and other unconventional tactics were taken seriously. The result was that Heinrich stayed out of investigators view. And I can imagine that some of this goes Back to the 1980s satanic panic, hysteria type situation. You know, did they think, all right, this is not a lone guy, this is some kind of satanic cult?
Mike Gibson
Probably wasn't too hard to box it in that way.
Mike Ferguson
Former FBI agent Al Garber called Goodmanson's analysis unfair and said that when they had to release Heinrich in 1990 due to a lack of evidence, he remained convinced he was the suspect. So you. You got some different views here.
Mike Gibson
Yeah, two sides of the story.
Mike Ferguson
You have someone from local agency saying, you know, the FBI kind of screwed us up, and then you have the FBI saying, no, we didn't. This guy never left our radar. We just didn't have the evidence. So could it be a little bit of both? Maybe? It probably is as we wrap this one up. Gibbs. After 27 years, the murder of Jacob Wetterling was finally solved with the help of advancements in forensic technology. I think what's unfortunate about this case, and there are a lot of things that are unfortunate, but one specifically, is that Heinrich was not officially charged and convicted of Jacob's murder, Although authorities are certain he was the perpetrator. Based on his crimes and pattern of behavior, it's very possible that Heinrich committed numerous acts of child sexual abuse in the 1980s and 90s that investigators have not even identified. And you know me, I always believe that things like that are possible. Right. You have these people who, you know, it's proven they did some really horrible things, Whether it's being a murderer, whether it's being a child predator, a rapist, whatever it is. It's hard for me to think that a guy like Heinrich didn't have a much wider swath of crimes and damage.
Mike Gibson
Yeah, when you're that bad of an individual, you would have to think that there had to be more than that.
Mike Ferguson
But it's not always easy just to connect it all together. No, I mean, it took 27 years to, you know, connect him to Jacob, but no doubt, I mean, he was just a really bad guy. You go back to the volume of child pornography that we talked about. Now, ultimately, that's all he was ever convicted of of was, was the child pornography. But he admitted to murdering Jacob after abducting him and sexually assaulting him. And then there was the abduction and sexual assault of Jared. So, you know, in my book, like I said earlier, this is a guy who may have only gotten 20 years, but I know for a fact there's somebody, some agency that right now is trying to figure out, okay, when this guy comes up to be let out, what can we do? What can we tack on? What can we charge him with then to maybe ensure that he never gets out? Because this is a guy that I don't think should ever walk the street again.
Mike Gibson
Yeah, I don't either. He needs to stay exactly where he's at.
Mike Ferguson
But that's it for our episode on Jacob Wetterling. We got a voicemail. You want to check that out?
Mike Gibson
Let's hear it.
Voicemail Caller / Alicia
Hi, Mike and Gibby. This is Alicia calling from San Antonio, Texas. First time caller, longtime listener. I was calling in reference to a case I would like for you guys to cover. It's about the bayou strangler Ronald Dominique, and He killed about 23 young men across the southeast Louisiana region. And I remember this case particularly because two of the young victims I actually knew. Hair braiding was popular back when Bone Thugs and Harmony was popular back in the late 90s. And my mom used to braid one of these guys hair. He would come over to our house, and I remember when he went missing, and then another young man we actually used to play with in the neighborhood. We were the same age. And I remember at school that day, they offered counseling when they found his body. But anyway, it's a pretty gruesome thing, but I would love to hear you guys cover it. I love the way you cover the cases, the detail you put into it, of course, how respectful and how funny you guys are. I'm laughing all the time. But anyway, thank you. Keep your head on the swivel. I appreciate everything you do, and keep your own time ticking.
Mike Ferguson
All right, Alicia, thank you so much for the voicemail. So it's interesting. We have actually had him on our list from the very beginning. And I don't know if you remember Gibbs, but in the first year we were doing the podcast, we kind of had a run of Louisiana cases.
Mike Gibson
We really did.
Mike Ferguson
And we actually said something to the effect of we need to back out of Louisiana for a little bit. And I think that's where he got left off. And we've just never come back to him. But he. He is a really nasty, prolific serial killer. So we do need to put him
Mike Gibson
up the list again, work our way back to him.
Mike Ferguson
Yeah, absolutely. But that's it for another episode of True Crime all the Time. So for Mike and Gibby, stay safe and keep your own time ticking.
Voicemail Caller / Alicia
Sam.
Release Date: February 23, 2026
Hosts: Mike Ferguson & Mike Gibson
In this episode, Mike Ferguson and Mike Gibson (Gibby) take a deep dive into the heartbreaking disappearance and murder of 11-year-old Jacob Wetterling in St. Joseph, Minnesota, in 1989. The case went unsolved for 27 years, haunting a family, a community, and eventually impacting national child protection laws. The episode explores the details of the abduction, the painstaking investigation, years of uncertainty, the eventual identification and confession by Danny Heinrich, and the legal aftermath and policy changes inspired by the case.
"For 27 years, what happened to Jacob and who took him remained a mystery." – Mike Ferguson (04:42)
"He had a mask, it looked like pantyhose on his head. He told us to get off our bikes or he'd shoot." – Trevor, via Mike Ferguson quoting Star Tribune (08:21)
"To be confronted by a masked man with a gun...no, they're just riding their bikes home from the video store." – Mike Ferguson (09:32)
"You could see why he would at the very least be on police radar." – Mike Ferguson (12:22)
"Heinrich was in the National Guard from 1982 to 1991 and was honorably discharged. So obviously all of these convictions happened kind of while he was in the National Guard." – Mike Ferguson (18:21)
"Now, you could argue a defense attorney could argue he's a true crime buff...but when you've got child pornography, it's pretty hard to make those arguments." – Mike Ferguson (26:51)
"Jacob asked, what did I do wrong? And if that's not enough to just break your heart..." – Mike Ferguson (37:39)
"Jacob, I'm so sorry. It's incredibly painful to know his last days, his last hours, his last minutes." – Patty Wetterling (40:00)
"We won't pretend that this crime and sentence is about child pornography... You stole the innocence of children in small towns in the cities of Minnesota and beyond." – Judge John Tunheim (45:48)
"It’s unlikely society will ever let you go free." – Judge Tunheim (47:24)
"While it is possible Heinrich could go free...this crime is so heinous, so brutal and awful, that it's unlikely society will ever let you go free." – Judge Tunheim (47:24)
"It wasn't just on the wrong path, it was on the wrong freeway." – Sheriff John Goodmanson (56:06)
"Dwayne Hart...said in October 1989, the month Jacob was abducted, Heinrich asked how to get rid of a body and showed him a gun." – Mike Ferguson (57:01)
"He admitted to murdering Jacob after abducting him and sexually assaulting him...this is a guy that I don't think should ever walk the street again." – Mike Ferguson (60:42)
For those who have not listened:
This episode offers a meticulous, moving account of the Jacob Wetterling case, its investigation, the pursuit of justice, and the lasting legacy on both families and American law. It balances respectful storytelling with critical analysis of law enforcement shortcomings, while never losing sight of the real children and families at the heart of these tragedies.