Episode 2: The Michigan Murders
Listen to Part 2 Now…
Above Left: The victims of John Norman Collins and the areas their bodies were located.
Center: John Collins after his arrest.
Right: John Collins before arrest.
The murders started on a hot July afternoon in southeast Michigan in 1967. It was a time of freedom and a place of freedom near the campus of Eastern Michigan University in Ypsilanti, Michigan.
Nineteen-year-old Mary Teresa Fleszar, a student at EMU, decided to take a walk. It was a warm summer evening in July.
Mary bid farewell to her roommate and strolled off down the street.
Twenty-eight days later, Mary’s heavily decomposed and mutilated body would be discovered near an abandoned farmhouse in Superior Township just north of Ypsilanti.
Mary would mark the beginning of a two-year killing spree that would leave more than six young women savagely murdered, their families’ lives forever altered, and a town with a black shadow that would not lift for many years if it ever did at all.
Resources:
Books
Keys, Edward. The Michigan Murders: The True Story of the Ypsilanti Ripper’s Reign of Terror. 2016. Open Road Media.
Fournier, Gregory. Terror in Ypsilanti. 2016. Wheatmark. Tucson, AZ.
Online
Detroit Free Press: The Evidence Locker - The Michigan Murders: Article
Fox 2 Detroit: Michigan Murders
Ann Arbor District Library: Summary of Michigan Murders: Article
Ann Arbor District Library: Ann Arbor News Archives: Articles
Ann Arbor District Library: Ann Arbor News Archives: Slain Girls Last Hour: Article
Victim: Mary Fleszar Memorial Page: Website
San Francisco Chronicle: Michigan Suspect Linked Directly yo Salinas Case :Article
John Norman Collins - Department of Psychology Radford University: Information researched and summarized by Jami Lyle, Justin Hanky, & Rex Harrison: PDF
Fornology: Criminal Profile of John Norman Collins: Blog
99.1 WFMK: Haunting on Geddes Road: Article