Real Crime Stories/Paranormal Hauntings

The Oakland County Child Killings

The Oakland County Child Killer (OCCK) is the name given to the perpetrator(s) responsible for the killings of at least four children in Oakland County, Michigan, in 1976 and 1977. The victims were held captive before being killed and forensic DNA testing has indirectly implicated two suspects, one of whom has since died, with the other serving life in prison for offences against children. A DNA profile created from samples taken from some of the victims' bodies is from the main perpetrator, but does not match the DNA of anyone named in connection with the case, and his identity is unknown.

Background

Between February 15, 1976, and March 16, 1977, two boys and two girls aged between 10 and 12 years old, went missing outside their homes, en route to or from another location, in Oakland County, Michigan. Each child's body was discovered in a public area within 19 days of his or her disappearance. The children were all either strangled or shot, with the two boys having been sexually abused. The four deaths triggered a murder investigation which at the time was the largest in U.S. history, with Detroit's two daily newspapers, as well as the area's numerous radio and television stations, covering the case. A presentation on WXYT radio, entitled Winter's Fear: The Children, the Killer, the Search, won the Peabody Award in 1977.

Victims

Confirmed

Mark Stebbins, 12, of Ferndale, did not return home from an American Legion Hall on February 15, 1976. His body was found four days later, wearing the same clothes he was last seen in, lying in a snowbank in the parking lot of a local office building. He had been strangled and sexually abused with a foreign object, and had two lacerations to the left rear of his head. Rope marks were evident on both his wrists and ankles, indicating he had been bound during his captivity.

Jill Robinson, 12, of Royal Oak, left her home on December 22, 1976, following an argument with her mother over dinner preparations. The following day, her bicycle was found behind a local hobby store, before her body was found alongside Interstate 75 in Troy, within view of Troy police station, on the morning of December 26. She had been shot in the face with a 12-gauge shotgun, and her body was fully clothed and wearing the backpack she had taken with her when she left home.

Kristine Mihelich, 10, of Berkley, was reported missing on January 2, 1977, after she failed to return home from a 7-Eleven store in Oakshire. A mail carrier found her fully clothed body 19 days later on the side of a rural road in Franklin Village. She had been smothered to death less than 24 hours earlier and her body lay within view of nearby homes.

Timothy King, 11, left his home in Birmingham and went to a drugstore on the evening of March 16, 1977. After he failed to return home, an intensive search covering the entire Detroit metropolitan area was conducted, before his body was found on the evening of March 22 by two teenagers in shallow ditch alongside Gill Road in Livonia. He had been sexually assaulted with a foreign object and suffocated approximately six hours earlier.

Suspected

There were other abductions and murders around the Oakland County area within the same period. These are not specifically tied to the four victims above due to variations in the cases.

Cynthia Cadieux, 16, of Roseville, was found bludgeoned to death on January 16, 1976, in Bloomfield Township.

Jane Allan, 14, was found dead in a river in Miamisburg, Ohio, on August 11, 1976, four days after she accepted a ride while hitchhiking in Royal Oak. She had died from carbon monoxide poisoning.