Oddball Holidaze: We Got You a Murder! (Michigan True Crime)

Oddball Holidaze: We Got You a Murder! (Michigan True Crime)

Welcome To The Oddity Shop, Where The Bizarre is Always on Sale.  This Christmas, your Curator Kara is gifting us all a Michigan True Crime Story.

\We revisit the Michigan co-ed murders across Ann Arbor and Ypsilanti in the late 1960s, where a clean-cut college student hid behind charm and familiarity while women disappeared. This isn’t a lurid deep-dive into a killer’s mystique. It’s a careful retelling of the victims’ lives, the warning signs people ignored, and the moments of courage that finally cracked the case.

We walk through the shifting “safe” culture of a college town where hitchhiking felt normal and dorms stayed unlocked. Witness after witness noticed the small things: dead, cold eyes in a wig shop, a hovering presence, a fresh coat of paint in a basement that smelled like bleach. When those observations were reported early and clearly, the investigation turned. Forensics aligned with accounts, and the murders stopped. That’s the point: vigilance is a practice. You don’t need to be a detective to make a difference; you just need to act on the feeling that something isn’t right.