John and Helen began dating and a few months later, Helen revealed to John that she had become pregnant. Authorities said that he had been living a quiet life--active in his church, puttering in his yard on weekends--and that he had no problems with the law while a fugitive. The New Jersey mansion he inhabited with his mother, wife, and three children had 19 rooms, including a ballroom, marble fireplaces, and a Tiffany skylight. John List was a devoutly religious man, and provided for his family in the town of Westfield, New Jerseywhere they lived in a 19-room mansion called Breeze Knoll. [18][19][20], In 1972, List was proposed as a suspect in the D. B. Cooper air piracy case because of the timing of his disappearance (two weeks prior to the airline hijacking), multiple matches to the hijacker's description, and the reasoning that "a fugitive accused of mass murder has nothing to lose. His lawyer hopes to convince the jury that List should not be held legally responsible for the deaths because he thought he was saving his family's souls by killing them. Dr. Miller said List had learned before the killings that syphilis was the cause of his wife's worsening medical and psychological problems and that knowing she had a sexually transmitted disease would have a 'tremendous impact' on someone of his background. He lived at 431 Hillside Avenue with his wife, Helen Morris Taylor; mother, Alma Barbara Florence List; and two children: daughter Patricia, and sons Frederick and John. It turned out that List had changed his identity and moved to Colorado under the assumed name Robert Clark. John Emil List, a.k.a. While his children were at school, he shot his wife Helen, 47, in the back of the head, and then his mother Alma, 84, above the left eye. But, during a four-hour interview, he sought to explain how worries that financial hardship would split his family and turn them away from their faith forced him to make a tough decision. New revelations in the episode include what List said through tears to his shocked and heartsick second wife, who hoped it was all some mistake and her husband was really the man she thought she had married Robert Clark when she visited him in jail. Reporters Rebecca Everett and Jessica Remo explore the impact of the capture, meeting people in Virginia who saw List unmasked and tracking down Lists second wife one side of the infamous story thats never been told. videos, He took a new identity and also joined a Lutheran church, where he met his second wife, Delores Miller. Bender gave him a hawk nose, grizzled eyebrows, and horn-rimmed glasses. The crime remains one of the most gruesome acts of all time. He was 82 years old at the time of his demise. After the June 7, 2021, killings of Maggie . 2023 Advance Local Media LLC. Firefighters hoist horse stranded in backyard swimming pool. Once inside the kitchen, John Sr. shot him in the back of the head. "I was hungry," he told Downtown, adding with a chuckle, "that's just the way it was.". After making himself lunch, List drove to his bank to close both his and his mother's bank accounts, and then to Westfield High School to watch his elder son John Frederick, 15, play in a soccer game. They also found the five-page note from John List explaining that the bloodied bodies on the ballroom floor were his family members, killed out of mercy. John List was a devout Lutheran who lived with his wife, mother and three children. List saw the children off to school and then shot her in the kitchen as she sipped her customary morning coffee. Then, he went to the bank to close his accounts and cash his mother's savings bonds. The neighbors tipped the police after a month of not seeing anyone entering or leaving the house. John Emil List Birth 17 Sep 1925 Bay City, Bay County, Michigan, USA Death 21 Mar 2008 (aged 82) Trenton, Mercer County, New Jersey, USA Burial Burial Details Unknown. 2023 Advance Local Media LLC. [4], After completion of his second tour in 1952, List worked for an accounting firm in Detroit, and then as an audit supervisor at a paper company in Kalamazoo, where his three children were born. The first seven episodes of Father Wants Us Dead are available now on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, YouTube or wherever you listen to podcasts, and you can subscribe on those platforms to be alerted when new episodes drop every Tuesday through June 21. YouTubeForensic artist Frank Bender uses photographs to sculpt an aged bust of mass murderer John List. After the June 7, 2021, killings of Maggie . In an interview with Connie Chung in 2002, List said he didnt kill himself after killing his own family because he felt that would prevent him from getting to heaven. Officers entered through an unlocked window leading to the basement and discovered the family's bodies. On November 9, 1971, John List shot his wife, his mother, and his three children. He left his mother's body in her apartment in the attic. [32][34] Welfare was an unacceptable option, he reasoned, because it would expose him and his family to ridicule and violate his authoritarian father's teachings regarding the care and protection of family members. On November 9, 1971, he killed his wife, mother, and three children at their home in Westfield, New Jersey, and then disappeared; he had planned the murders so meticulously that nearly a month passed before anyone suspected that anything was amiss. [33], A court-appointed psychiatrist testified that List suffered from obsessive-compulsive personality disorder, and that he saw only two solutions to his situation: accept welfare, or kill his family and send their souls to heaven. American Criminal John List was born John Emil List on 17th September, 1925 in Bay City, Michigan, USA and passed away on 21st Mar 2008 Trenton, New Jersey, USA aged 82. Use of and/or registration on any portion of this site constitutes acceptance of our User Agreement, Privacy Policy and Cookie Statement, and Your Privacy Choices and Rights (each updated 1/26/2023). YouTubeThe note John List wrote excusing his children from school. He later completed his masters degree in accounting and worked as an accountant in the military. John Sr. drove to the field and watched him play, then gave him a ride home. Episodes, photos and other information are also available at fatherwantsusdead.com. They got him down in Virginia.. 2023. "I grew up with the idea that you should provide for your family and to do that you had to be a success in the job that you had or you're a failure, and that was not a good thing to be," he said. [15][16], In 1971, as the FBI later discovered, List had traveled by train from New Jersey to Michigan and then to Colorado. Following the gruesome death of his family. A month passed before neighbors, curious about the constantly burning lights and empty windows, began to suspect something was wrong at the List mansion. Want more true crime? He imposed a sentence of five terms of life imprisonment, to be served consecutively, the maximum permissible penalty at the time. The research in this book is outstanding, and Sharkey clearly put a great deal of time and effort into it. Interview statement on List's confession to his second wife. Police investigated hundreds of leads without success. Moreover, his wife was a heavy drinker and she had also contracted Syphilis from her first marriage. On November 9, 1971, John List put his plan into action. A nationwide manhunt was launched. List's death ended a sordid chapter in Westfield's history. [16], List eventually expressed a degree of remorse for his crimes. During that time, he was associated romantically with a number of celebrities, including a nine-year affair with actress Merle Oberon. Now, in his first-ever public comments about the 1971 crime, the 76-year-old former Sunday school teacher says he is waiting to be reunited with them in the hereafter. John had a very normal childhood and he did not show any signs of psychological troubles. A former Denver neighbor alerted the police, who made the arrest later. He murdered his mother, wife and three children in November 1971, due to financial distress and other issues within the family, and fled. All List wanted was to reunite with his wife, mother, and children in the afterlife, where he believed there would be no pain or suffering. At one religious gathering, he met an Army PX clerk named Delores Miller and married her in 1985. He settled in Denver in early 1972 and took an accounting job under the name Robert Peter "Bob" Clark, one of his college classmates (although the real Bob Clark later asserted that he had never known List). [3], In November 1950, as the Korean War escalated, List was recalled to active military service. [32], On April 12, 1990, List was convicted of five counts of first degree murder. Thank you for relying on us to provide the journalism you can trust. He then shot both his wife and mother in their heads. However, the marriage was not very good. He was arrested in 1989 after a former neighbor recognized him from a profile on the syndicated TV show America's Most Wanted. John fled the house after putting all the bodies on sleeping bags, turning the house lights on and putting on some classical music. Please enter your username or email address to reset your password. His picture was also shown on television, which led one of his neighbours to notify the authorities. The morning of November 7, 1971 began in a usual fashion. [11], Westfield, where few violent crimes had been recorded since 1963, received national attention as the site of one of the most notorious felonies in New Jersey since the kidnapping and murder of the Lindbergh baby. He made himself a sandwich, closed out his bank accounts, and cheered for his only surviving son, John, at his high school soccer game. Ideal YouTube Profile Picture: Size, Dimensions, Tricks, and More, Reasons To Invest In A Good Gaming Laptop, Microphone Sound Recording for Live Streaming, Delores Miller Clark: Learn More about John Lists Ex-Wife, Johanna Thiebaud- All about Shania Twains Stepdaughter, What You May Not Know About Gweneth Gonzales Thomas, Richard Thomas Daughter, Linnell S. Nobori: All there is to Know about Ted Bessells Wife, Online Pharmacies Make it Easy to Compare Medicines Prices, Katya Ariel Tylo Personal Life, Net Worth, & More, Isis Rae Boykin, Personal Life and Net Worth, Finn William Leeves Coben Lifestyle and Personal Life. John List was an American mass murderer, who became infamous in the 1970s for killing his mother, wife and three children. [6] In 1960, his stepdaughter Brenda married and left the household, and List moved with the remainder of his family to Rochester, New York, to take a job with Xerox. Hence, his severe lack of social skills cost him jobs after jobs. John Emil List, 63, was profiled on the TV program "America's Most Wanted" May 21. In an interview in 2008, parents told a reporter in New Jersey that children will not walk past that property, nor do they even want to live on the same street. He joined a local Lutheran church and, in 1985, married a widow named Delores Clark, with whom he moved to Richmond, Va. List caught the tail end of the show with his wife, who did not know his past. 7-year-old baseball umpire seeks Guinness World Record. FBI agents visited his unsuspecting second wife in Virginia and handcuffed the killer, who was going by the name Robert P. Clark, at his accounting office. Los Angeles, 12 reasons why Sycamore Avenue is L.A.s coolest new hangout, Fox News finally reveals its kryptonite: the bottom line, The Week in Photos: California exits pandemic emergency amid a winter landscape, Snowboarder dies at South Lake Tahoe resort, California to alter COVID rules in healthcare settings: Masks and vaccinations not required, Welcome to the world, baby Winter, born amid a snowstorm in Lake Arrowhead, Gripped by grace: Thousands gather for Bishop OConnells funeral Mass. He canceled all deliveries and contacted his childrens schools to let their teachers know the family would be on vacation for a few weeks. He began living with a new identity in Virginia, where he was spotted by a local and got arrested. John List, going by the name Robert Clark, rented a room in this house in Richmond, Virginia from S. Wallace Parsons, until he and Delores Clark moved into their new home. But he fled to Colorado, assumed a new name and remarried, managing to elude a nationwide manhunt for 18 years. If you take gaming seriously, you shouldn't accept anything less than the greatest. Delores Miller (wife) is an American Homemaker. She had a young daughter from her previous marriage. Discover The 33 Scariest Animals In The World, From The Deep Sea To The Tropical Skies, The Story Of Caril Ann Fugate And Charles Starkweather's Natural Born Killing Spree, What Stephen Hawking Thinks Threatens Humankind The Most, 27 Raw Images Of When Punk Ruled New York, Join The All That's Interesting Weekly Dispatch. Because syphilis is not infectious in its later phases, she did not pass it on to John List or her children, although she suffered several miscarriages during her first marriage. Authorities later revealed that John kept lying to his family about his jobs. Delores Miller (wife) and John List are divorced.