Catching Killers (2021) s01e04 Episode Script

1
Thirty years ago,
in January, 1990,
I started the investigation
of the death of a young woman
by the name of Taunja Bennett.
Whoever did it
had to be a sick individual.
That's the first time
I'd ever seen anything like that.
Two people,
Laverne Pavlinac and John Sosnovske,
were convicted
for the murder of Taunja Bennett.
And now, here it is, '94.
Letters started to surface
that were alleged to have been written
by the individual claiming responsibility
for Taunja Bennett's murder.
It was April 29th, 1994.
I was a writer on the crime team
at The Oregonian
which was
a very successful paper in Portland.
It was early afternoon,
and I was sitting out, uh, on the floor.
The editor came by
and handed me this letter.
He said, "It It looks pretty crazy,
but you might wanna look at it."
It was striking, to be sure.
Uh, the printing was very irregular
and violent almost.
Capital letters, small letters,
and little happy faces
all over the place.
Happy faces.
Uh, should I go?
"I would like to tell my story."
"I have always wanted to be noticed
so I started something
I don't know how to stop."
"On or around January 20th, 1990,
I picked up Sonya Bennett
and took her home."
"I raped her and beat her real bad."
"Her face was all broke up,
then I ended her life."
It was Taunja Bennett.
The writer had called her "Sonya" Bennett,
but it was Taunja Bennett.
"She was my first,
and I thought I would not do it again,
but I was wrong."
Newspapers get
all sorts of crank calls, tips,
but if it was true
these two people in prison,
Laverne Pavlinac and John Sosnovske,
are innocent.
- Okay, happy to go?
- Yeah.
Rolling.
Go.
The letters had been sent
to the courthouse
and sent to The Oregonian.
Once we received the letter
from The Oregonian,
the district attorney told me
to take a look at it.
You want me to read the whole thing?
"I am a good person at times."
"I always wanted to be liked."
The first paragraph
gave you an indication more of what
he really wants, which is attention.
"I want to know that it was my crime,
so I tied a half-inch, soft white rope,
cut on one end and burned on the other,
around her neck."
There was a rope,
but it wasn't burnt on one end.
There are both factual accuracies
and inaccuracies
contained within the letter.
"Her face was all broke up,
then I ended her life
by pushing my fist into her throat."
Factually, that doesn't fit
with the autopsy report.
This isn't making sense.
There's nothing that makes me think
I have the wrong two people in prison,
because Pavlinac and Sosnovske
implicated themselves.
I thought that someone was probably
just trying to play a sick joke
or was trying to do something
to help Pavlinac and Sosnovske
and shift the blame off of them.
Hello again.
I do remember getting a phone call
from, uh, Jim McIntyre
informing me
that a letter had been received.
I'm thinking, "Oh, God."
"Is this thing
gonna start all over again?"
"Was that nagging feeling I had valid
throughout this whole case
in the beginning?"
As far as I was concerned,
this case was closed and done
three years before.
But the district attorney thought
these letters could be a problem.
He said, "We can't let it just lie."
"Something has to happen,
'cause Phil Stanford from The Oregonian
is going to write about it."
So, that was the marching orders.
Either figure it out or throw it out,
but don't ignore it.
Phil Stanford
was an Oregonian columnist, who, um
He picked a lot of columns and topics
that were regularly poking
at issues in the public sector,
whether it was
law enforcement or politics.
From my perspective, he was a columnist
that was more than happy to say anything
that'd get him a wider readership.
We didn't get along,
but you can tell him I said hello.
I think law enforcement people
regarded me as a pain in the ass.
Coming from the people it's coming from,
I take it as a a compliment.
The letter writer claimed
to have committed five murders,
but I needed more proof.
So, I started going down the list.
"One day in California,
I picked up a girl named Claudia."
"On the way out of LA, my mind went wild
with the thought of a sex slave,
and when I stopped at a rest area,
I took her."
Oh!
Jesus.
"A hooker became my next victim."
"I placed her body in the dirt
and stepped on her throat."
"This triggered something in me.
It was getting easy."
"Real easy."
So, counting Taunja Bennett,
there were five murders
described in the letter.
I started making calls
to the different jurisdictions.
The detectives I talked to in each
each one of those locations said, "Yeah."
"That's one of our bodies."
And in several cases,
the detectives told me
that the letter writer had information
that they hadn't released to the public.
Four out of five of the murders
had pretty much, uh, well, checked out,
so time to go back
and look at the Taunja Bennett case.
I got a nice bound volume
of all the police reports,
and I started reading it.
And it didn't take that long
to see that, uh
it was a very shaky case.
The whole thing starts
with Laverne Pavlinac
and her taped confession.
Thanks.
When you
arrived there, Laverne,
what did you find?
A female.
I asked if she's sick.
He says, "Worse than that, she's dead."
The big problem
is that she'd kept changing her stories.
W hen you entered the lot
what did you see, if anything?
I seen John
standing with a young lady.
And they appeared
to be arguing in a playing way.
Each time she gives them a story,
it turns out to be false.
Why are they pursuing it?
Why do they want it?
It's hard to explain.
The more complicated it got
and the more convoluted it got,
I had a feeling of uneasiness
that I think is the best way to put it.
But when she pointed almost directly
to where that body had been located
then I thought
she's been telling us the truth all along.
It blew me away.
There was no forensic evidence
that could prove
Pavlinac and Sosnovske
had committed these murders.
I I mean, there's just none.
So, I called McIntyre for a quote.
I'm surprised
I talked to Phil Stanford at all.
Um
He was not eager
to be pursuing
this line of inquiry,
that's for damn sure.
And, uh, he he let me know
that he he didn't really like it.
I answered him
the way I did everybody else,
"I don't know who's writing these things."
"I'm not sure what their intent is."
"I don't know whether they're linked
to Pavlinac and Sosnovske or not."
With what we have, we've got nothing.
Uh
I wasn't in a position to tell him
that I thought his explanation
was full of it.
So, I decided I needed
to go visit Pavlinac and Sosnovske.
I wanted to find out what really happened.
Laverne Pavlinac was a a frail
little grandma.
She was in her
mid-sixties.
She'd been in prison
for three years at this point.
I I asked, "Why did you do it?"
"Why did you confess?"
She claimed that Sosnovske
had been abusive to her,
that he had threatened her kids,
that he pushed her around,
and she just wanted him out of the house.
So, instead,
she got them both convicted of murder.
"It just snowballed on me."
She said that several times,
"It snowballed on me."
That That's how
she explained it to herself.
I asked how she would have known
where the body was left.
And she told me that when she pointed out
the spot that it had been
almost pinpointed in the newspapers.
Like, I I felt sorry for her.
She wasn't angry, she wasn't sad.
She wasn't anything.
She was just sort of beaten.
Sosnovske was beside himself with anger.
And And, um, it it's
easy enough to understand why.
He just said Laverne framed him.
That's the way he saw it.
He said, "They're gonna execute me."
So, he plead no contest.
He He was broken.
When I I spoke to him, he was broken.
I had no doubt that Pavlinac
and Sosnovske
were quite innocent
of that murder or any other murder.
So, I told my bosses
I'm gonna write a series.
And so, they let me do it.
It took I I think less than two weeks,
and and, uh, that was it.
I thought about it from the beginning.
What am I gonna call this guy
if it turns out to be a real story?
And there were happy faces.
As those articles appeared,
I would glance at them.
I didn't I never
I don't think I read
a single column, line for line.
I actually thought that the way
I had taken apart the state's case
made it clear
that these people were innocent.
I thought that,
"Oh, of course the DA will see this,
and McIntyre will see it, and they'll say,
'Whoa, we made a mistake.'"
Of course,
that was foolish of me.
Hmm.
This isn't a case where the state said,
"Laverne Pavlinac,
we know you killed Taunja."
Laverne Pavlinac's in prison
because she said
she killed Taunja Bennett.
John Sosnovske is in prison
because he plead no contest.
Stanford fashioned himself
a crime reporter
who was uncovering the things
the state had always done wrong.
I'm certain he thought he was
probably on his way to a Pulitzer Prize.
I thought it was nonsense.
That's what was
really driving me nuts,
because I was convinced
the real killer was still out there.
I had not heard anything
about the case for over a year,
and then we have this hand grenade go off.
Yesterday, in an exclusive interview
with Channel 2 News,
alleged murderer Keith Jesperson
confessed to being
the so-called Happy Face Killer.
Make a hole, people. Let's go.
This Keith Jesperson fella
was up in custody
in Clark County, Washington,
pending trial on a murder of a girlfriend.
He comes forth and confesses,
"Yes, I am the Happy Face Killer."
And he seemed proud of it.
There is no doubt in my mind.
I am him.
I am the Happy Face Killer.
The fact that Keith Jesperson
was seeking so much media attention
gave me pause to believe
that he was being truthful
about, really, anything.
Forty-year-old Keith Jesperson
came to court today in Clark County
to get something off his chest.
You understand
the consequences of a guilty plea?
Yes, I do.
I was sitting at my desk.
I got a phone call from a friend.
He said, "Did you know there's this guy
who says he's Happy Face Killer?"
And I said, "You gotta be kidding."
"It's happening."
He's confessed
to as many as eight murders.
Does he plan to plead guilty to any more?
Uh, that's a little too early to tell.
I know he's responsible
for killing one person for sure,
'cause he's in custody on that.
At this stage,
they're still running investigations
in those other states
to see if they can find things
to corroborate the statements he's making.
A year before,
we had found DNA on The Oregonian letter,
in the saliva on the stamp.
That at least established a profile.
I had the lab check the DNA from the stamp
against Jesperson's DNA.
Jesperson is then identified
as being the author
of the Happy Face letter.
Does that mean
he is is the murderer of Taunja Bennett?
We were miles and miles away
from answering that question.
I'm coming forward with the truth.
I wanna make sure it's out there.
I don't know what he's up to,
but he's up to something,
and he's engineering it.
On the 25th of September
I was contacted
by Jesperson's lawyer.
He said, "My client's told me to tell you
that he's responsible
for the Taunja Bennett killing."
I let loose with something like,
"I'm so tired of hearing
about your client in this case."
"You know,
this whole thing is ridiculous."
And he kind of pulled up short and said,
"Jim, you need to listen to this."
"You need to listen
to what I have to say."
"This is important."
"I believe my guy."
Coming from the lawyer,
who I knew personally,
that was one of the first times
I got concerned that,
shit, this could be a problem.
Um
It could be that Pavlinac and Sosnovske
didn't do this crime.
The date is
September 29th, 1995.
The time is 10:35.
Present at the Clark County
Sheriff's Office
Defense attorney Tom Phelan,
Deputy DA Jim McIntyre,
Multnomah County Sheriff's Office,
Det. Chris Peterson,
Multnomah County Sheriff's Office
There were four of us
inside of a small interview room,
inside the jail in the courthouse.
My first impression was he was huge.
He's a very large guy.
But, I mean, I'm not small.
I was 6'2" and I weighed about 190 pounds,
and, um, Jesperson was probably 6'6"
and about 260 or 270 at a minimum.
He held his hand out,
um, and I I shook his hand thinking
that I As soon as I get out of there,
I was gonna wash my hands.
Ahem. I understand that
you wanna talk to us about a homicide
that occurred in, uh, Multnomah County,
uh, in 1990, is that correct?
- That is correct. Yes, I do.
- Okay.
My role there was to listen and observe.
Okay, at some point,
did you meet a female
that you, uh, killed?
- Yes, I did.
- Do you know what her name was?
I found out it was Taunja
Bennett.
I went out for a walk, and I decided
I'd go out and play some pool.
Walked in the tavern,
and, uh, this gal walked over
and gave me a hug like I was
like I was somebody she knew.
I just thought she was overfriendly,
but she actually gave hugs
to about everybody there.
His description of the way
Taunja acted when he came into the bar
was completely consistent
with what we had been told earlier
about how Taunja assumed
everybody she talked to was a nice person
who'd treat her nicely.
Keith says he was there
in the afternoon, um, hanging out,
saw Taunja hanging out
with a couple of other guys.
Um, he goes back to his house,
which is nearby,
and decides to go back to the bar
later in the afternoon.
I invited her to dinner,
but I was conscious
that I didn't have enough money,
so I told her,
"Well, I could go back to the house
and get a $20 bill out of the dresser."
Jesperson said
that he drove Taunja back to the house.
They went into the house,
and she was acting attracted to him.
I kissed her on the neck, went from there,
but something just didn't seem right.
I don't know
if it was clicking for her or not.
She was complaining
she wasn't excited yet.
And, uh, she made a comment,
something like,
"I'm not getting there.
Why don't you get it over with?"
That pissed me off.
I, uh
tagged her with my right arm.
What do you mean, tagged her?
What does that mean?
I just lost my cool,
and I struck her in the side of the face,
and I never stopped striking her
until she was
laying there.
He goes through it very flatly.
It's clear he doesn't feel
any emotion towards Taunja.
She said things
that my wife used to tell me
when we were having sex,
and and it just brought back memories.
I was not
I don't think
I was all there at that time.
How he was telling the story
didn't surprise me at all.
It's a good detailed description
if it's memory.
It's also a good detailed description
if you're making it up.
We're still not out of the realm
of him just telling a good story.
I was thinking of the fingerprints
I left on the on the buttons
so I took the buttons off her jeans.
Okay. Uh, what happens next?
I'm sitting there really listening
and waiting for new information.
I take off in the car,
and I go looking for a place
I can go dump her body.
He says he gets in his car
and goes for a drive
and ends up going up
above the Sandy River,
the scenic highway to the Vista House.
I noticed a bunch of people
parked around the Vista,
maybe three or four cars.
I finally figured
I'd just keep on going down the hill
until I found a place.
At that time,
I was really getting kind of panicky,
and, uh
I saw a big tree on the right,
and then I stopped in front of it.
I just grabbed her
and dragged her down the hill.
I'm waiting for him
to tell me something that is unique to him
and not known to anybody else
and not found anywhere else.
You've talked about a purse?
Yes, I I got rid
of her purse the next following morning.
All of her other personal items
and identification,
a purse was never found.
I drove back out of there.
Followed generally the same path
across the river
and I pulled over to a wide spot.
I took the purse,
and I tossed the contents
and the purse out over the area.
Purse probably went
40 feet down off the bank.
Now that Jesperson was beginning
to discuss those items,
this became, um, very significant,
because they had been missing
from the beginning of the case,
and no one else would know
where they were.
Now we have information
to check, to verify,
to see whether or not
this person is in fact involved
with the killing of Taunja Bennett.
It was just a typical Oregon day.
It was early in the fall, so it was cool.
We were in an unmarked panel van
that had Jesperson, his lawyer,
uh, my detective,
and three other armed sheriff's deputies
to act as guards.
And we had
an unmarked patrol car behind us
to act as additional security.
We took him all the way up the Gorge
to the Vista House
and began to make the route up
to where he believed
he had dropped Taunja Bennett's body.
Jesperson had us stop the van.
We then all got out of the vehicle.
He walked around for a while,
and then he pointed and said,
"I think it was in this area
right around in here, but I'm not sure."
Both my detective and I knew
that it was not the right spot.
Um
He was two switchbacks east.
Now what are we down to?
We're down to only one thing left.
Where did he throw the purse?
We headed southbound up the Sandy River,
to the point that he said,
"This is where I threw the purse."
Then he went out
and he pointed down that embankment.
I hadn't been up there
in probably five years.
Probably since before the murder.
And the embankment was now
completely overgrown with blackberries.
The search took place around October 7th.
They searched that entire day
and
they did not find anything.
I went in and told the district attorney
what was going on,
and that we had again run into a dead end.
Things were beginning to erode
on Jesperson being directly tied
to the murder of Taunja Bennett.
Then, about a week later
that Sunday
I got a page from the detective.
And he said, "Are you sitting down?"
And I said, "Yeah, I am. What's going on?"
And he said,
"Well, I have Taunja Bennett's
Oregon ID card in my hand."
And he said
that he had had the Explorer Scouts
gone back to the embankment.
He had them cut the blackberries
and the bushes down to the earth.
They had unearthed
her state of Oregon identification card.
Keith Jesperson had to be the killer.
I was stunned.
When I learned that
Jesperson was indeed the killer,
I I was
I was not happy with myself.
It really, really hurt me
to learn that seven other women had died.
It ruined Laverne's life
and her family's life.
And I felt
I really felt bad for for John.
Yeah, he had a history of alcohol abuse,
but it didn't make him a killer.
He may have had a lot of other faults,
but he certainly didn't belong in prison
for the murder of Taunja Bennett.
I'm not guilty of murder.
For five years and nine months,
Laverne Pavlinac has been behind bars
for a murder she confessed to.
A murder authorities now agree
she did not commit.
It was extremely difficult.
I know that we do have
the wrong two people in jail.
The next step was the battle
to get them released from jail.
Prosecutor Jim McIntyre
put the two in prison
and now works to get them out.
I never felt like I owed it to Pavlinac.
In fact, this was the beginning
of my growing anger at Pavlinac,
because every killing
after Taunja Bennett
may have been prevented
if the investigation
would have never been sidetracked in 1990.
That bothered me a lot.
Every once in a while, I write
something good and say, "You hit it."
And And that that's
how I felt about this one.
Two people got out of prison,
and I'd like to think
I had something to do with it.
This case is always on my mind.
I wish we could have went back
and went over the whole damn thing again.
From the beginning.
Perhaps
it would have changed the whole scenario.
But you can't go back and change things.
They're done.