32. Jim Herman, “Porno Charges Jolt Town,” Traverse City Record Eagle, December 18, 1976.
33. Hannah Matthews email to author, December 2019.
34. Det. Sgt. Joel Gorzen, MSP Complaint #23-1728-76, Supplementary Complaint Report, “WANTED: FRANCIS SHELDON (cq)” March 10, 1988.
35. Russ Winter, financial analyst of www.winterwatch.net.
36. Lucy Morgan, “Starchild Is Mystery Figure in Kelly Case,” St. Petersburg Times, May 13, 1980.
37. Blog owner post at www.freestudents.blogspot.com, September 22, 2006.
38. Will Scott, “Figure in North Fox Child-Sex Ring Dies,” Traverse City Record Eagle, August 5, 1996.
39. Det. Sgt. Joel Gorzen, MSP Complaint #23-1728-76, Supplementary Complaint Report, “WANTED: FRANCIS SHELDON (cq),” March 10, 1988.
13
Busch Is Front Page News
On an October evening in 2009, two cars pulled up to the King house in Birmingham. Inside, Barry King and his wife Janice had just finished tidying up after dinner. Barry had summoned me, then a Detroit News reporter, along with my editor, Judy Diebolt, a few days prior.
Walking up to the house, I remember focusing on the door between the garage and the living room bay window—the same door Tim King was instructed to keep slightly ajar when he left that day 32 years earlier, so he could get back in upon his return and have the door lock behind him.
He was to be gone 20 minutes, at most. He never came back. There would be an always macabre memory of that day. Barry and Marion King never thought to sell the house, never considered moving away from the last place they saw their son alive. They never decided to not list their phone number in the phone book. In part, this was intentional: if anyone came forward with information about the crimes, they could be found. But subconsciously, moving would be akin to abandonment. They would not leave Yorkshire Road until they found justice for Tim.
Similarly, when they remodeled the downstairs, Marion would not allow the upstairs area, including Cathy’s bedroom and the three boys’ bedroom (“The King Boy Museum”), to be touched.
Still, over time, lacking any known offender—anyone responsible at all—was to live in a perpetual state of limbo. The adage, “no news is good news” was a complete fallacy. No news is worse than bad news; without any information, there is no context, no understanding. And nothing law enforcement could tell them was as bad as what they were imagining.
Barry King opened the front door almost before there was time to knock. Both of us knew this was something big.
Barry introduced Janice, his second wife; they married in 2008, four years after Marion passed away. Janice, a petite, soft-spoken woman in her mid-seventies with a white bob hairstyle, shook hands with us and smiled sweetly. A mindful host, Janice offered tea, coffee or ice water. Barry directed us to sit at the dining room table. He had neatly laid out copies of lists of names and phone numbers, and, in front of his chair, some handwritten notes and his reading glasses.
The house was in part a shrine to Tim: paintings and portraits of the brown-haired boy with big brown eyes hang in the living room and the study. Tim’s resemblance to his father is striking. There is no shortage of framed photos of Marion either, a beautiful, stylish woman with short-cropped platinum silver hair.
When her youngest child died, Marion had decided not to follow the police investigation. She was fearful of a trial and the trauma it would inflict on her family. She made it a point to never talk to the media. Even so, they persisted. On one of the early anniversaries of Tim’s death, a reporter from one of newspapers called and asked to interview her. Marion said she had no comment. The reporter said: “It must be a very hard time for you.” Marion replied, “Yes, it is. Thank you.” Then she hung up. The next day the quote in the paper read: “‘It’s a very hard time for us,’ said Mrs. King.”1
Within the family, the crimes were rarely, if ever, talked about. But memories of Tim brought great joy. “He was kind, considerate, very funny and sometimes mischievous (in a harmless way),” Cathy Broad wrote in an email. “He would sometimes laugh so hard at something you could barely understand him—he could literally fall down laughing. He loved to tell jokes, but often started laughing his head off before he got the punch line out. …
“Tim was closest with my Mom—they had a special bond. He would sometimes just run up behind my Mom and hug/squeeze her around the waist. The rest of us were teenagers by then and of course we didn’t do stuff like that anymore. The entire time Tim was held captive, I’m sure in addition to everything else, he was completely beside himself because he knew how distraught my Mom would be about him being gone. My Mom and Tim had actually talked about how with the three of us older kids close to going off to college, he would be an only child for a few years. Nothing would have made my Mom happier.”
Janice was a long-time bridge partner of Marion’s, so when she married Barry, she told us with a cute wink, “I knew what I was getting into.”2 As time went on, however, she and her new husband became increasingly absorbed, if not obsessed, with the details of his son’s murder, she would be fully entitled to rethink that statement. Yet, by many accounts, she has never been anything less than fully supportive of her husband. At one press conference, Barry, dressed in a coat and tie, fielded questions at the microphone while Janice stood watching in back of the room. “I’m so proud of him,” she whispered. In meetings with the media at her their home, she is the gracious host, intercepting calls to the home, refilling water glasses or coffee, retreating into the kitchen, careful to never interfere, always deferential.
Clearing his throat and signaling he was ready for the voice recorder to be turned on, Barry began with a brief history of the investigation, how it languished throughout the eighties and nineties. From time to time, he would get a call from Jerry Tobias, a former Task Force investigator, asking if he recognized any names. He never did. “I remember Don Studt [the officer who stood security duty in the King home after Tim’s disappearance] telling me that the only way this case would be solved is through a death bed confession. So, I never got my hopes up. I always knew that it was someone who was diabolically clever and it had to be more than just one person.”
Barry said he had high hopes in September 1999, when Berkley detective Ray Anger and Oakland County Medical Examiner L.J. Dragovic exhumed the body of David Norberg, a former Detroit area autoworker, in Recluse, Wyoming. Norberg had a history of making sexual advances toward children and had been fingered by tipsters. He left Detroit in 1980 and died in a car crash a year later. Anger was convinced a cross found in Norberg’s possessions belonged to Kristine Mihelich. But a year later, when results comparing Norberg’s DNA with a hair found in Tim’s mouth, there was no match.3
Five years later, in 2005, the Michigan State Police decided to revisit the OCCK case in anticipation of the 30-year anniversary of the murders.
In February, MSP detectives Garry Gray and David Robertson asked Barry King to come to the headquarters in Oak Park and participate in the press conference announcing the reopening of the case. The microphones were set up in a small room in front of a wall of stacked steel cabinets. They had been transferred via truck and police escort from a locked storage room in the State Police Northville Post to Oak Park for better access. In all, the five filing cabinets and 15 additional boxes, said to contain 99,000 names, represented an enormous but fruitless effort to solve what had now become a scourge for long-time county officials.
“The Oakland County Child Killings spurred one of the most horrific times ever,” Oakland County Executive L. Brooks Patterson said in his opening remarks. Patterson was the chief prosecutor when the crimes were committed, an office he held for 16 years. “There was a cloud of terror over this county. It changed the way we live.”4
Gray, who had been assigned to the case three years prior, said he planned to us
e new state-of-the-art technology, not available in the past, to perform analyses. “As the files return to Oakland County, the location of these horrific crimes, so must we,” Gray said. “To that end detectives and forensic investigators will review each piece of evidence and each interview looking for clues to help solve these crimes and bring closure to the victims’ families and the state.”5
Barry publicly stated his support for the MSP’s renewed efforts. At the time of the press conference, he had never considered that law enforcement might have something to hide.
Barry said he had long believed in Patterson’s earnestness, especially after hearing an interview with the prosecutor on an anniversary of Jimmy Hoffa’s disappearance from a restaurant in Oakland County in July 1975.
“I was driving home from the office,” he remembered. “And I heard Brooks on the radio. He was being asked if the labor chief’s unsolved murder had been his biggest regret. Much to [interviewer Frank] Beckman’s surprise, Brooks said: ‘There were four children killed around the same time as Hoffa. That is the most troubling cold case of my career.’ That had always impressed me.
“But that was then and this is now,” he told us. He took off his glasses and stared as his hands, perhaps reflecting on how long he had been misled. “Since Timmy was killed, I never talked to anybody about this case unless there was a police officer present. I got many calls [from people who had tips] and I would always meet with them and talk with them but only if a police officer was present. I had always left it up to the police.”
He did so because he felt law enforcement was entitled to have first-hand knowledge of any developments. But, he said, he also did it because he couldn’t trust himself. “Honestly, I’d be deathly afraid if I knew the guy I was talking to had killed Tim. I’d be deathly afraid of what I would do.”
Barry King in October 2009, at the beginning of his public mission to hold law enforcement accountable for the mishandling of evidence and the cover-up of the Busch evidence (photograph by Ricardo Thomas, Detroit News).
Whenever someone called him offering information about the case, Barry would always call Birmingham Chief of Police Don Studt. Over the years, the King and Studt families became close, attending each other’s graduation and weddings. Studt would meet Barry and the informant, usually over lunch at the Whistle Stop, a local diner near the Birmingham train station.
“And that was true right up until recently,” Barry said, putting on his glasses again and referring to his notes. “The biggest reason I asked you here tonight started right across the street. That big white house, two doors down from us.”
Patrick Coffey had lived in that house when he and Tim King were boyhood companions. Barry King proceeded to tell us everything that had transpired over the last two years—everything the Michigan State Police had pleaded with them to keep quiet.
From Coffey’s providential conversation with Wasser, to the investigative subpoena forcing Wasser to cough up the name, to the discovery of a long overlooked suspect, Christopher Busch, the 25-year-old son of a prominent GM executive, living two miles away in Bloomfield Hills at the time of the killings. The notion that the killer lived close by was chilling.
I was given two weeks to report on the story. Cathy King Broad gave me an enormous amount of information she had documented over the years. When I interviewed Wasser—winner of the President’s Award from the American Polygraph Association just two years earlier—the lie detector extraordinaire lied. “Pat Coffey’s information is totally bogus,” he told me. “I never tested anybody involved in the Oakland County Child Killings.”
“Did you ever test anyone who referenced the killings?” I asked.
“No. No I did not.” Wasser grew angry. “Listen to me, carefully,” he said. “I never tested anybody that was involved in the Oakland County Child Killings.”6
On October 26, 2009, a lengthy story laying out the Busch lead and describing the King’s frustration with the MSP’s handling of the case appeared on the front page of the Detroit News.
The Kings had made good on their promise to go to the media if authorities did not provide them with information on the case. In the absence of information, it was only reasonable to suspect the police had something to hide. And that was how the story read. Quoted in the article, Chris King said: “We’ve had the name since the fall of ’07. They didn’t even start to gather evidence until a year later: the fall of ’08. And now they won’t tell us what tests are done, what tests are not done or when those tests might be done. That’s all we’ve asked for. We just want the truth to come out.”7
Cathy’s statement read:
In the four months between August and December 2007, Livonia PD and the Wayne County Prosecutor’s Office did more to advance my brother’s case than had been done in the previous 30 years. When the MSP was brought into the loop, that progress slowed to a crawl. Those four little kids deserve far better than what they have gotten from the MSP. This slow-walk of an investigation has brutalized our family. Livonia PD and Wayne County reached out to us as much as they could, but efforts at communication were hampered by the “task force” set-up. They don’t need a power-point presentation to meet with the victims’ families, look us in the eye and explain to us what is going on. All we asked for is the simple dignity of being told the truth. This is the best lead they have ever had and the suspects in this case are long-dead. These children were held captive and murdered over thirty years ago. The state police know as well as we do that nothing we can say or do at this point will compromise their investigation. They have had two years to interview living people who may have assisted in the crimes or had knowledge. The tired excuse of “the lab is overwhelmed” could be used indefinitely if we were willing to continue to accept it. We are no longer willing to be at the mercy of a system that thrives on delay and secrecy.8
The community was floored. How could Busch have escaped investigators all these years? The prosecutors in both Oakland and Wayne counties were said to be livid. State Police were in a panic. If, in some small measure, Cory Williams could find satisfaction in the knowledge that his warnings should have been heeded, it didn’t last long. Oakland County Prosecutor Jessica Cooper put all the blame on him. She was convinced Williams had encouraged the Kings to go public. It was perfect ammunition.
On October 27, 2009, the day after the article appeared, no less than 14 members of law enforcement from Wayne County, Oakland County and the Michigan State Police met at MSP headquarters in Oak Park. Barry and Chris King were in attendance, along with Kristine’s Mihelich’s sister, Erica McAvoy, and stepfather, Tom Ascroft. The families anticipated they would be fully briefed and have all their questions answered.
Outside in the parking lot, media trucks hummed, and reporters waited outside their cars for everyone to arrive. Barry, Chris, Erica and her father pulled up at the same time. They exchanged hellos and then went inside where they were ushered to a small room and offered coffee. At the other end of the hall, law enforcement had gathered in a large conference room.
Cooper was unaware the families had been invited. She was no less pleased by the media presence. She would write later: “Upon exiting this meeting local media cameras were waiting to interview the participants of this meeting. Fortunately, we were parked on the side of the building.”9
As the participants began to take their seats, Det. Williams recalled, FBI Agent Sean Callaghan was in attack mode. Callaghan pointed to Williams and asked Cooper, loud enough for everyone to hear: “Is he going to be allowed to stay in here?”
About to lunge for Callaghan’s neck, Williams stood up, loudly shoving his chair back. “First of all,” he seethed at Callaghan, who by then had been on the case less than six months, “you don’t even have a dog in this fight.”
“Cory,” Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy said, reaching for his arm. “Take it easy.” She glared at Callaghan and pointed her finger at him. “That’
s the last time I’m hearing any of that from you. Or else, we’re leaving.”
Undeterred, Cooper lashed out. She said she was outraged at the Kings and blamed Wayne County for the family going public. She demanded to know how the Kings learned Busch’s name, since Feinberg and Wasser had gone to such lengths not to disclose it.
“She looked right at me and said: ‘I want to know right now how the Kings found out about Chris Busch,’” Williams said. “I said: ‘That’s easy, I’ll tell you.’ I could’ve been a smart ass and said, ‘Well if you want to take your notebook out, I’ll teach you how to investigate a cold case,’ But I didn’t. I was trying to be respectful, I mean, I was sitting there with my future boss.
“So, I said: ‘Well that’s simple. When you develop a suspect in a case, especially a molestation case, and the suspect lives in the same community as the victim, the first thing you need to find out is what was their relationship? Did the victim and suspect or their families know each other? I need to know whether a suspect taught at their school or was involved in their Sunday school or maybe Cub Scouts or baseball.’ So, I ran the name by the Kings, just as I would in any investigation.’”
Williams pointed out that the King family had kept quiet about the information that led to Busch’s name for a full year prior to calling him; they were not being impatient or asking for more than their due.
Still, Cooper insisted Williams was a “leak,” that he had supported the Kings going to the media, which was patently false. Williams had been working to prevent the Kings from going public by trying to persuade law enforcement to meet with them and share how far they had taken the investigation.
But Cooper’s mind had been made up. She wanted him out and she said as much. In retrospect, Williams said: “By that point, I think Gray and Callaghan had probably told Cooper and Walton: ‘Hey this is great time to kick him off. We’ve got DNA that’s being processed. He’s taken us where we need to be. Wayne County did all the heavy lifting and spent the money: Let’s shitcan him.’”
The Snow Killings Page 26