by Gary C. King
The girls showed up shortly past 11 A.M. and were led to the austere interrogation room. Both seemed nervous and were still visibly upset over their violent encounters with the man in the yellow Mustang a day earlier. Linda Morris,* fifteen, and Janine Phall,* sixteen, took seats next to each other, facing the detectives. Shamefaced and embarrassed, they cast their eyes downward and nervously played with their hands as they told what happened.
"I went outside my house to start my car to go to school," said Janine. "It was about 8:30 A.M. Linda called me and told me that she had missed the bus and asked if she could have a ride. But my car wouldn't start."
Janine explained that she called Linda back and told her she would walk over to her house, located in the 4100 block of Pentiction Court Northeast in Salem. She arrived at Linda's house fifteen minutes later, at 8:45 A.M. After deciding to skip their first two classes of the day, they finally left Linda's house at 10:30 A.M. and began walking to McNary High School. They got as far as the Chemawa Indian School on Chemawa Road, near where Chemawa Road crossed Interstate 5 and less than a mile from Linda's home, when the yellow Mustang fast-back pulled alongside them from behind.
"I hadn't seen him pass prior," said Janine.
"He just came from nowhere. It was pouring down rain. He asked if we needed a ride. We told him yes. After we got into the car, we told him we wanted to go to McNary High. He said he wanted to stop at Bob's Big Boy first 'cause he was hungry. It was about eleven A.M. by then. He got us a hamburger, Coke, and French fries. He was really a nice guy. We weren't afraid. By then it was lunchtime, so we didn't have to be back at school for a while."
"What happened next?" asked Burnum.
"He asked us if we liked to fish, and if we wanted to go to Cascade Park to watch the people fish there," said Janine. "We told him we had to get back to school. He said he would get us back. We went to Cascade Park and watched other people fish, then he went to a store and bought two six-packs of Budweiser. I think the store was on 12th Street Southeast. He then went to a gas station on 12th and we all went to the bathroom."
"Did you drink any beer with him?"
"He offered us some. I had two bottles during the entire incident. I kept telling him I had to get back to school. He told me it was too late, that school was out. I guess it was about three P.M. by then. He asked if we had ever been to the Wheatland Ferry that crossed the Willamette River. I had, but Linda said she hadn't. He told her she couldn't miss it. He was still being very nice.
"He drove over the bridge into West Salem and stopped at a park about two miles out from West Salem," Janine continued. "He got out and went to the bathroom. We still had no reason to be afraid. He parked in the gravel near the Polk County side of the Wheatland Ferry. I think he drank at least one six-pack and most of the other. Linda and I were both sitting in the backseat. It was about three-thirty by then, I guess, and I told him I had to get home. He said he had to finish the one bottle first.
"He finished the beer and put it back in the carton, looked out the front window, and then he turned around and said, 'Do as I say and you won't get hurt.' He told us to get on our knees, face toward the back window, and to put our hands behind our back. I told him I wouldn't do it. He said he had a knife and I told him he couldn't have one because I hadn't seen it. He then reached into the glove compartment and pulled out a knife about four inches long, black with a brown wooden handle.
"Then we started crying and did what he said. He kept asking why we were crying. He took some brown twine from the glove compartment and tied me up first. He tied my hands together behind my back, my feet together, and then tied my hands to my feet. I was still kneeling. He pushed me over on the backseat and tied Linda up between the front and back seats. I broke my hands loose and he said, 'Come here and I will untie you.' But he retied me with white string. He told us he wanted to make love to us. He said his cousin had taught him how to do it and how he wouldn't get caught."
Burnum and Cummings stared at each other, each thinking the same thing. The scenario, the method of operation, was identical to the attack on Anna Buchanan. Not only that, both of these girls were blond, just like Cindy Jones and Anna Buchanan. Despite their observations they remained quiet and let Janine continue her story.
"He started the car and drove us back to this park and said he was going to untie us and let us go. He untied us both, but said he still wanted to make love. He said if we did as he said we wouldn't be hurt. We were still in the backseat. Linda was really crying and going crazy. I told him he could do anything to me but to leave Linda alone. He took off my shoes and socks. Linda was huddled in the corner, she was in bad shock. He told me to remove my shirt. He had taken my pants down and told me to take them off. He just slid his pants down. I was in the backseat and he was lying between the bucket seats.
"He placed his, er, his penis inside of me. It was erected. He was on top of me for about one minute. He said that his cousin had told him not to come, because if he left his sperm they could trace it. He said his cousin had gotten away with it before. He then finished and said he would take us home. I asked if I could go to the bathroom, and he said okay. I got my clothes all back on. Linda got out, too. He wanted her to stay there, but she wouldn't. He told Linda to leave her purse there, but she refused. I had left my belt there and Linda went back to get it and he grabbed her purse. She said 'Fuck you' and ran away. We ran off to the Wheatland Ferry road. He called at us as we were running away and asked if he could help us. We got his license number. We went to a house near the ferry and called my dad."
"Is this the way you remember everything that happened?" Burnum asked Linda.
"Yes, everything happened just that way," responded Linda. She explained that during the sex act on Janine, the man demanded that she look out the side window.
"I didn't see any of it," continued Linda. "I was in the backseat on the driver's side, and Janine was in the middle. I didn't see any of the sex act. I heard Janine tell him it hurt, and he said, 'Relax.' Janine was crying. He gave her her clothes and shoes back."
Janine and Linda described the assailant as a white male adult, five feet nine inches to five feet eleven inches tall, about 160 pounds, early twenties. He had brown hair, brown eyes, a "funny-shaped" nose, and a thin light-brown mustache. He was wearing a brown leather jacket, white shirt, and brown pants. The girls said he told them that he lived in East Salem, that his name was Steve Davis, and that his parents lived in Mexico. He said he was a salesman.
Each girl described "Steve's" car as a newer yellow Mustang, fastback, with black interior and an automatic shift. He had a blue Panasonic radio inside, and there was a box of cassette tapes on the floor along with a gray-black lunch bucket. They said the license plate number was KXY 646.
As a formality, Burnum would run the license plate number through motor vehicles. But he didn't need to. He already knew that the driver of the yellow Mustang was Dayton Leroy Rogers, the same man who had attacked Cindy Jones and Anna Buchanan. Only the car was different in this latest case. Apparently Dayton was no longer driving the blue Malibu.
Although the girls had been picked up in Marion County, Dayton had driven them just over the Yamhill County line, near the Polk and Marion county boundaries, where the alleged offenses occurred. As a result, Burnum and Cummings had to bring in Yamhill County authorities when the arrest was made at Dayton's home later that afternoon.
Dayton was eventually indicted on a charge of first-degree rape in Clackamas County for the attack on Anna Buchanan. He was also indicted in Yamhill County on one count each of first-degree rape and coercion in connection with the attacks on Janine Phall and Linda Morris. He pleaded not guilty by reason of mental disease or defect. On May 14, 1976, he was acquitted of the alleged rape of Anna Buchanan.
On June 25, 1976, Dayton's probation stemming from the knife attack on Deniece Raymond in Lane County nearly four years earlier was revoked. He received a five-year prison sentence for violating the conditions of his probati
on.
On August 27, 1976, a jury acquitted Dayton on the alleged rape charges against Janine Phall and Linda Morris, but convicted him of the coercion charge. He received the maximum sentence, five years in prison.
"This was in a less enlightened time," said Yamhill County District Attorney John L. Collins, "when juries often felt that if the woman or girl contributed to the rape in any way, they would not convict him. In this case, I think it was because they drank beer and smoked marijuana with him."
In an after-sentence report that was sent to the state parole board on January 4, 1977, Collins urged that Dayton not be released early, citing that he was extremely dangerous.
"In my contact with criminal defendants," wrote Collins, "I have not dealt with another person I consider more dangerous than Dayton Rogers.... If I could pick only a half-dozen of the most dangerous people I've been involved with, he would be on that list."
Likewise, following up Dayton's probation revocation from Lane County, Darryl L. Larson, then a Lane County deputy district attorney but now a Lane County district court judge, wrote in an after-sentence report: "This man is an extreme danger to the community, particularly young women. He is both sexually and physically violent and, without question, is a murder case looking for a place to happen."
Despite the two five-year sentences and the urging of law enforcement officials to keep him behind bars, Dayton Leroy Rogers was paroled from the Oregon State Correctional Institution in January 1982. A year later, his parole supervision was terminated and he was again a free man who could roam the streets at will.
When Detective John Turner was finished reading about Dayton's past, it just didn't seem reasonable to him, from a lawman's point of view, that Dayton's nefarious activities could have been dismissed so lightly by a system that was in place to punish such abhorrent behavior. Turner felt that Dayton's was a case in which the system had failed miserably. Sure, he had been punished, but clearly the punishment had not fit the crimes. Comparatively speaking, Dayton had only been slapped on the wrists for all the pain and suffering he had caused others. But if Turner had his way, that was all going to change. He was going to see to it that Dayton Leroy Rogers never walked the streets a free man again.
PART THREE
The Molalla Forest Killer
Chapter 12
Monday, August 31, 1987 was the eighth day of the legal deer hunting season in Oregon, and forty-six-year-old Everett Lee Banyard, a crossbow hunter, was determined to roust one of the gentle creatures out of the dense Molalla forest before dark that evening. Banyard left his home in the nearby town of Molalla about 7 P.M. and headed east on Highway 211. He was going to a secluded, somewhat mountainous and out-of-the-way area, part of a 90,000-acre timber farm owned by an East Coast forest industries company, about ten miles south of Molalla. Although it wasn't far away, getting there was not an effortless chore unless a person knew where he was going. Banyard did. He had been there many times over the years.
He turned right off of Highway 211 at the Mathias Intersection, drove about one-quarter mile to Fryer Park Road, turned left, and continued until Fryer Park intersected with South Dickie Prairie Road. There Banyard turned right onto Dickie Prairie Road and continued in a southeasterly direction, crossed the Glen Avon Bridge over the Molalla River, and made a right turn that put him onto the Molalla Forest Road, which followed the winding course of the river and took him past recreation areas that are popular with fishermen, swimmers, hunters, hikers, and other outdoor types. After about 500 yards he came to a fork in the road, where it swung to the left and right. The right portion became a gravel road and was blocked off. Banyard stayed to the left and continued for about three miles until he reached Molalla Forest (MF) 75, an old logging road that took him deeper into the rugged mountain forest of evergreens and deciduous trees.
He continued along the gravel-covered, steep-graded road in a westerly direction, past a flat portion or plateau surrounded by dense fern, brush, and Douglas fir. From there the gravel road began another steep ascent for approximately a quarter mile, at which point it swung to the left and continued around the mountain in a somewhat southerly direction.
However, at the point where MF 75 swung to the south, there was another road, a small dirt and partially graveled logging spur road that wound around to the north. Banyard took that road, which he followed for about 200 feet until he came to yet another fork, or Y. Although one part of the road continued straight at that point, it wasn't accessible by vehicle because it was blocked by fallen trees and dense brush. The other part of the road continued up a steep grade in a northwesterly direction for about 300 yards, where it dead-ended at another landing or flat area. Banyard turned his pickup around there, just before the Y in the road, and used the extra "turnaround" space to park. He had about an hour of daylight left.
Much of the area contained spent casings, trash, and debris. It was obvious that the area was used by shooters for plinking, hunters, teenage beer drinkers, and people who inconsiderately dumped their trash there. But Banyard also knew it to be a good area for hunting, a place that he returned to from time to time.
Armed with his crossbow and a quiver full of arrows, Banyard climbed out of his pickup and took a cursory look around the area. He looked for signs of deer or other wildlife, particularly droppings, hoof marks, or a path in and out of the forest. He soon spotted a fern that had been smashed down and, farther toward the forest, he saw what looked like a fresh path that might have been a deer crossing. Curious and envisioning fresh venison steaks, he readied his crossbow and walked in.
After only a few yards, he detected an unpleasant odor. Being employed at a fertilizer plant, however, his sinuses often gave him problems and made smelling difficult. As a result, he was undaunted by the smell at first, when someone else with normal sinuses might have been repulsed, and he proceeded on into the forest. He soon decided that what he first thought had been a deer crossing was actually a man-made disturbance, likely made by teenagers who came up to drink beer or by someone who had been there target shooting.
In a small clearing off to the right, only a few yards before the forest sloped downward into a steep decline that soon turned into a cliff, Banyard saw some more ferns, brown and dry, that had been smashed down. From his vantage point it looked like there was something lying beneath them, but he couldn't quite make out whatever it was. As he approached the ferns to investigate, the unpleasant odor grew stronger. He now believed that someone had poached a deer before hunting season opened and had hidden the guts from view with the ferns. But he couldn't have been more wrong.
Using the toes of his boots, he gently pushed back the dried ferns. Instead of uncovering deer guts, he stared in horror at the exposed buttocks, thigh, and calf of a human body. Reeling with fear and revulsion, Banyard quickly went back the way he had come, jumped in his truck, and headed for home. Sick and trembling, he called the Clackamas County Sheriff's Department and reported his grim discovery.
Deputy Randy Oxford was the responding officer. Being the road deputy nearest to Molalla, Oxford arrived at Banyard's home a short time after receiving the dispatch. He took a brief statement from Banyard, who was somewhat distraught, after which Banyard agreed to lead him to the location where he found the body in the Molalla forest. It was completely dark by the time they arrived.
Using flashlights, Banyard and Oxford made their way into the clearing, and Oxford, too, soon detected the telltale odor of decaying flesh. After shining his light over the area, he saw all he needed to see. There was indeed a dead human being at the secluded location. Oxford returned to his car and confirmed the dead body report to Sergeant Sam Metzger in the detective division. Because of the remote location and the unlikelihood that it could easily be found, Oxford was instructed to meet other deputies and the medical examiner at a market on Highway 211, just east of Molalla, then lead them to and secure the crime scene for the night.
Later that evening, Sergeant Metzger reached Detective Mike Ma
chado by telephone at home and assigned the case to him. Metzger informed Machado of the circumstances surrounding the body's discovery and advised him not to respond until morning. He instructed Machado to report in at the office by 8 A.M., at which time they hoped they would have further details for him.
The next morning, Machado checked in at the sheriff's office half an hour earlier than advised. He met with Sergeant Metzger and Detective Jim Strovink, who was also assigned to the case. Deputies John Gilliland and Jeff Lamarche were also instructed to go to the site. Since they would be dealing with an outdoor crime scene in a remote area, Machado also requested the assistance of Detective Mark White, a tracker.
Clackamas County Medical Examiner George Coleman, who had been to the site the previous evening, informed Machado that the body was almost mummified and appeared leathery and shiny. He didn't know the sex of the corpse, he said, but it was nude. The body was in a prone position, with dead leaves and debris around it. He said that a hand was visible, but it was unusually positioned, as if the body had been tossed into the ferns.
When they arrived at the crime scene an hour and a half later, they were met by Reserve Deputy Dennis Ward, who was guarding the logging road about 200 feet from where the body was located. All of the officials parked their cars at that location to avoid disturbing any potential evidence that might be present both on and off the roadway, and the number of people allowed to enter the crime scene was kept to a minimum for the same reason. Ward had been guarding the location all night, and it showed in his face.
Walking up the grass median of the dirt road, Ward led Machado, Strovink, and White up to where the body was located. From the road, Ward pointed out a visible portion of the body. Detective White, the tracker, then took the lead and they walked toward the corpse using a pathway that had been used the night before by the responding officers. White moved slowly, inspecting the plant life as they went in. When he approached the body, he looked carefully at its covering.