The Man in the Monster (19 page)

Robin was always full of energy. Her family said she could clean their Columbia home from top to bottom in a couple of hours and then take a five-mile run and not seem tired at all. “She was so strong,” said Jennifer, that some of her friends “nicknamed her the hulk woman” because of her muscles, “but she had a feminine side to her.” In seventh grade, a coach got her interested in track and field—discus and shot put—and from then on, she was always in training. She was also a rebellious teenager who was spiteful and a little defiant. When she channeled her energy positively, things went well, but “like the little girl with the curl, she also had her difficult side,” a family member reported.

Although Robin did well in school, getting mostly Bs and some As, she didn't know whether she wanted to go to college, so after graduation she got a job working for a dry cleaner and moved in with her boyfriend Dave in New London. She also got a job answering phones for a
phone-sex business. All she did was transfer the calls to the women who actually took the calls, but later the media tried to intimate that the job had something to do with her death.

Her job was in Norwich, about twelve miles from New London. Without a car, Robin had to hitchhike back and forth. On November 16, 1983, she was on her way home from work, walking along Route 32, a busy commercial area, when Michael Ross spotted her. He parked his car and caught up with her as she walked along. They chatted for a while. She told him she was furious with her boyfriend and was going to walk to New London and stay with a girlfriend. Michael realized that she was physically fit and might be able to resist him, so he waited for her to be off guard and then began to strangle her right away. She passed out and was “half dead” when he pulled her out of sight. “I almost didn't rape her, but then she started to come to. She tried to fight back when I raped her but she was too weak. The rape took only a few minutes, and then I strangled her. It was over very quickly.” He told the police that she did something to upset him. “But this was never true for any of them. I assaulted them without provocation. It was just an excuse because Malchik said they must have done something to anger me, and I picked up on that as an excuse.” The area was too well traveled to risk trying to put the corpse in the car, so he hid her remains under some brush and leaves. “They found the body a week later so I never returned to the scene—though I did drive by on a few occasions before her body was found. There was no place to pull off the road so I didn't stop. I was afraid someone would see me,” he remembered. He also said that the medical examiner incorrectly estimated that she had been dead for two days, when it had actually been at least a week.

A few days after the murder, her family heard from her friends that she was missing and hadn't gone home to New London or appeared at work. It was her pattern to sometimes disappear for a while, staying with
a friend because she didn't want to be found. Having reconciled with her father, she occasionally dropped by his home, but they didn't worry until she didn't show up for Thanksgiving dinner.

Late in the afternoon, Joan heard that a body had been found in Norwich, but she didn't think it was Robin. At the urging of others, she finally called the police and gave a description of her daughter, including scars and birthmarks. She later learned that the detective she was talking to was standing right next to the body as she described Robin and that he knew instantly that the body had been identified. That evening, Detective Michael Stergio arrived at the Stavinsky house and hinted that he suspected that the remains that were found were Robin's, but the police could not be sure until they had her dental records.

Yet despite that news, Joan and Ron still didn't think that the police had found Robin; they hadn't processed what the officers had told them. About three o'clock in the morning, Joan sat up in bed and said, “Ron, she's gone. It's Robin.”

Robin's death was one of the two that specifically haunted Michael. Every Thanksgiving he would fall into a deep depression and stay in bed because he incorrectly thought that Joan Stavinsky had gone to identify Robin's body on Thanksgiving afternoon.

Michael was seeing Dr. DuCharme twice a week at the time of Robin's murder, but he never spoke about the murders during his sessions. DuCharme had persuaded him to apply for a job as an insurance salesman for Prudential, but Michael felt that abandoning his dream of being a farmer was compromising his manhood. He was a failure. “I started drinking and had the classic signs of alcoholism. I drank alone. The first thing I did when I got home was make two or three drinks, Scotch.” The more he worked at Prudential, the more he felt oppressed and even ashamed—and the more he drank. He wasn't performing well on the job, even though he lied and told his father that he was one
of the top salesmen. “I had to be a success for my father even if it was all a lie.” Michael only wanted to take over the family farm, but years later, Dan Ross would say, “What did he think I was going to do? Roll over and play dead? I was years away from retirement.”

By May 1984, Michael said he kicked Diane out of his apartment because of their constant bickering. “I don't know why I ever started dating her. We had nothing in common. It was all physical.” He got angry with her because she didn't have a job and was satisfied to collect unemployment. “I come from a family with the Puritan work ethic. You don't go on unemployment. You work.”

He began stalking almost every night. He had killed Leslie Shelley and April Brunais in April; committing four murders in less than a year made it impossible for him to convince himself that he could control his urges. The denial he had lived with since college was no longer feasible. He knew he was a killer, but he couldn't bring himself to go to the police and turn himself in. But he wanted to stop, and he began to believe that the only way he could manage that was suicide. He now rehearsed his death by driving a hundred miles per hour down Route 169 in Lisbon, but he couldn't muster the courage to drive into the bridge abutment and actually kill himself. “I was a coward. I was too afraid to be a man,” he said shamefully.

Years later, I could see that he wanted to admit his guilt and weakness, but I think it was also one of the many times that he also wanted to be comforted, to hear me say, “It's okay, Michael. I understand.”

After talking to Dr. Berlin and Dr. Borden many times, I didn't doubt that his mental illness and his sexual sadism were responsible for his murderous behavior, but I also didn't think he was without culpability. I continually brought this up with Michael for more than a decade, but he could never adequately articulate why he didn't turn himself in or kill himself to prevent another murder. The reason was some mixture
of denial, shame, not wanting to go to jail, and the irrational hope that he could stop himself from killing again.

On some level, he must have made the decision to let himself get caught. He grabbed Wendy Baribeault in broad daylight on a busy stretch of road in Lisbon on a warm June day. If he didn't have the courage to stop himself, maybe someone else would. Someone would see him, and he would be caught. He says he didn't actually “plan” to go out and get caught, but “why else would I grab a girl in broad daylight on a busy stretch of highway?”

Wendy, seventeen, was five feet two inches and 103 pounds. She was also an athlete and liked to take long walks, despite her mother's warning that she shouldn't walk alone on Route 12. She had finished her exams at Norwich High School and decided to take a walk to get some exercise. Dressed in blue shorts, a white T-shirt with black sleeves, blue socks, and red sneakers, she left a note on the kitchen table to tell her mother where she was going at about four o'clock in the afternoon of June 13 and headed toward Chucky's Convenience Store. Roger Baribeault, Wendy's father, who was working in the backyard, saw her leave but thought nothing of it. She never reached Chucky's, because Michael was also on that stretch of road after a coworker with whom he was supposed to go out canvassing had called in sick.

Michael was driving around aimlessly until he saw Wendy walking in the opposite direction. He turned his Toyota around so recklessly that some observers thought he had a tire blowout. Screeching to a halt, he parked his car and walked quickly to catch up with her. “I got out and went after her. I think in the confession I said something about asking her to the company picnic or that she said something to make me mad, but she didn't. I just made that up to have an excuse for why I did it.” Describing the event with the same detachment as he did every crime, he said that he came up to her from behind and “grabbed her and dragged her into the woods. I forced her to undress, forced her
to perform oral sex on me, raped her and strangled her.” The coroner's report said that Wendy had been strangled manually, but in his confession to the state police, Michael said he had killed her with a belt. When they told him that was inconsistent with the evidence, he admitted that he couldn't really remember how he had killed her. “It was all a blur. I covered her body up with some stones I took off a stone wall and left.” I don't think Michael was obfuscating about what happened. He really couldn't separate one murder from another with the exception of the date, location, and distinguishing features of the landscape. He couldn't have even described the women unless he had seen a picture of them in the paper.

Multiple witnesses had seen his reckless driving and confrontation with Wendy. John Nelson, owner of Nelson's Garage on Route 12 in Lisbon, told the police that he saw a man about eighteen years old with long hair walking about fifty feet behind a girl. He said he saw the man “grab the girl by the arm.” When he looked out a short time later, the car was gone. Cheryl Ciliano was driving her car on Route 12 while on her way to cash an insurance check. She said she saw a clean cut–looking man walking about eight feet behind the girl, and the girl “had a distressed look on her face.” She reported that the man was trying to catch up with the girl and that she had “the impression that it was a boyfriend/girlfriend dispute.” She described Michael more accurately as being close to six feet tall with a skinny build. George MacDonald drove by on a motorcycle and later told police that he had gotten a good look at the car, first thinking it was a Datsun, but when he couldn't find a similar model, he went to a Toyota dealership, looked at a brochure, and was certain the car was a blue Toyota Celica. He even drove around and saw the car parked near Michael's apartment.

When Wendy didn't come home that afternoon, her parents became concerned because it wasn't like her to stay out. By five o'clock, her mother, Sharon Baribeault, went out looking for her. They searched for
her all evening, and at about ten thirty finally called the state police in Montville. The police interviewed her friends and found that Wendy had not seemed upset and that there were no problems at home. So the police took some of Wendy's clothes and started looking for her with bloodhounds. Her body was found on June 15.

Michael stayed away from the crime scene. “I didn't visit the body because police were in the area searching for her. It would have been too risky.” On some level he wanted to get caught, and yet he was afraid. I believe Michael wanted more than anything to be able to overcome the monster himself, but by the eighth murder, he knew that he would never stop on his own.

But the killing spree was finally over.

JUNE 1984

Michael Malchik was a handsome state trooper and a member of the Connecticut major crimes unit. In 1983, Tammy Williams was still missing, and Malchik had been assigned to the case to see if he could come up with any new angles. Coincidentally, he sat next to the detective assigned to the Debra Smith Taylor case at the station, and as the two of them began to compare notes, he started to see similarities between the crimes. The women were the same size and were seen roughly six miles apart, so he surmised that one person might be responsible for what were classified as a disappearance and murder.

While he was working on this theory, Wendy Baribeault disappeared. Four days later, her body was found in Lisbon, about eighteen miles from Danielson, and Malchik was assigned as chief investigator. A dozen witnesses had given a description of the man they saw in the vicinity of the crime. A few saw him abruptly turn his car around, almost as if he had lost control of the vehicle. For the first time, the police had a description of a car and a description of the perpetrator. Malchik looked at the list of 3,600 Toyota owners and selected names of those who lived closest to the crime scene for questioning. Michael Ross's door happened to be the first one Malchik knocked on because of its proximity to the crime scene. Malchik knew nothing about Michael's
past convictions but did have a reason to go to Michael's apartment first; George MacDonald had already reported that he'd found the car.

No one was home the first two times Malchik knocked on Michael's door, but on the third try, Malchik arrived very early in the morning, catching Michael before he left for work on June 28, 1984. Michael was still in his bathrobe when he answered Malchik's knock. The detective identified himself and explained that he was investigating the homicide of Wendy Baribeault. Seeming relaxed and unfazed by the visit, Michael said that he had been expecting the police because he had read in the papers that the police were looking for a small blue car like his. Despite feeling a sense of relief and an impulse to confess to Malchik, at the same time Michael was petrified of being arrested. He told me later he felt as if Malchik could see his heart pounding under the bathrobe.

At first Malchik thought he had the wrong man. Michael was wearing glasses when he answered the door, and that didn't match the composite sketches of the man who had been seen following Wendy. While stalking, Michael always removed his glasses so he wouldn't be recognized—a kind of magical thinking that he had held on to since the stalking began. Yet every time Malchik indicated that he might be ready to leave, Michael would drop a crumb to make the investigator think that he should ask more questions. Michael couldn't bring himself to confess, so he dropped hints instead. Still, Malchik wasn't entirely suspicious. “I can't say I was that smart. I thought that one person had killed everybody, and yet this looked like a mild-mannered guy. He had me as fooled as anybody else.”

Malchik was ultimately tipped off by Michael's memory of June 13, the day Wendy had disappeared. He could remember in great detail what he had for breakfast, what color socks he had on, when he arrived at work, and to whom he talked, but his memory was spotty at best starting about 3:00 or 4:00
P.M.
, just about the time that Wendy was last
seen alive. After that time, he remembered only that he went home. “He also placed himself in a direct line from where the girl was last seen, and I thought that was odd,” Malchik remembered.

As Malchik stood at his door, Michael was in excruciating turmoil. He wanted to be stopped from killing again, but he didn't want to be caught. He wanted Malchik to figure it out and arrest him, but the thought of being charged with murder was unthinkable. Michael finally revealed that he had been arrested twice for sex offenses, so Malchik decided to bring him down to the temporary command post at the Lisbon Town Hall for questioning.

Michael claimed that after the questioning began, he asked to call his father to get him a lawyer, but he was not allowed to do so until all the confessions had been signed. Malchik denied this assertion. If Michael had actually asked for a lawyer, the interrogation should have stopped. If he had not been free to go, Malchik should have read him his Miranda rights and allowed him to make a phone call. If Michael had been telling the truth about his requests and Malchik's refusal, the confessions would not have been admissible as evidence, because his Fifth and Sixth Amendment rights had been violated.

A talented and experienced law enforcement officer, Malchik slowly calmed Michael down and gained his confidence at the command post. They talked about Michael's family and the farm. They talked about college and Michael's former fiancée. The conversation went on for about four hours, varying between small talk and pointed questions about what Michael had done on June 13. It was by all accounts exquisite police work.

Malchik was able to make Michael feel as if he were on his side. Perhaps this was because Malchik had yet to make up his own mind about Michael. “Sitting across from him, I'm asking [myself], Is this someone who has killed a number of women or just some guy? He doesn't have
a tail, fire or horns. He looks just as much like the average guy as anyone,” Malchik remembered.

Then Michael asked Malchik what he thought about Christopher Wilder, a serial killer who had recently been in the headlines after being killed in a shoot-out. Michael wanted to know if Malchik thought Wilder was sick, and Malchik responded that he didn't really know. Michael also wanted to know if psychiatrists would examine an accused murderer, and Malchik answered in the affirmative. Hypothetically, Michael asked, if a suspected killer went into psychiatric therapy, would that person not be charged? Malchik was quick to assert that “would not be possible.”

Michael then asked if the detective thought he had killed Wendy Baribeault. Malchik responded that he did think that he had killed her and that he would probably kill again, but that he probably really didn't want to kill again. He told Michael that the most important thing was that he not hurt anyone else. That was just what Michael Ross wanted to hear.

Within hours, Michael had confessed not only to Wendy Baribeault's murder, but also to five others: Tammy Williams, Debra Smith Taylor, Robin Stavinsky, April Brunais, and Leslie Shelley. However, he didn't initially mention Debbie Taylor until the officers mentioned where her remains had been found, because part of his denial was actually forgetting he had killed her. He not only convinced himself after each killing that he would never commit another murder, but after a while he also forgot about some of them. In his mind, they became all one big murderous fantasy. His inability to remember this murder was consistent with Dr. Cegalis's test results that revealed memory impairment. But when he was told the location of her remains, he did not hesitate to confess.

Malchik had to control himself because he didn't want to let on
that he was both viscerally disgusted with Michael Ross and excited that he had caught a serial killer. Malchik also knew that he had to obtain evidence of the crimes. He had to find the bodies for corroboration that Michael wasn't just confessing to crimes he hadn't committed. Malchik taped the confessions and then had Michael sign confessions that had been composed by Malchik and the other officer, Detective Frank Griffin, summarizing what they said Michael had told them.

By the time of his first trial, Michael felt betrayed. He thought that Malchik was his ally and that they were going to “solve” the case—in his mind that meant that Malchik would help him understand why he had committed the crimes. He had no idea why he had done such horrendous things, and he naively hoped that by cooperating with the police, he would find answers. “We were a team,” Michael said bitterly, almost crying. “They kept hounding me. Malchik said, ‘Well, maybe you did it because of this,' and then he said, ‘This is why you did it.' He put a lot of stuff down. I thought we were trying to figure it out. I was a real idiot. I trusted him completely. I talked to him all day long, and I thought he was my friend and I was trying to help him. He said, ‘Did you do it because you didn't want to go back to jail?' And I said, ‘I don't know. Maybe.' ‘Could you have done it because of this or because of that?' He took this stuff down and then everything got twisted. Things that I said were completely taken out of context. I never said that I had killed the girls to escape jail or identification. That was
his
theory,” Michael insisted.

The next day, Michael took Malchik to most of the crime scenes and to the places where he'd hidden the bodies that hadn't yet been recovered—Tammy Williams, April Brunais, and Leslie Shelley. Malchik had found his
killer.