Mrs. Stefano also recalled an evening at the Clark home when the conversation turned to the couple's origins. List. A couple of years ago I bought a supermarket tabloid that contained an article on the List murder case, she said. Its not much of a swipe if its true and it IS true that Mr Ts businesses declared bankruptcy a number of times (not him personally). I rode in that old car lots of times, going to baseball practice with John Jr., Robert Compton, now a Westfield police officer, recalled. Any prospective John Lists of the new millenniumsurely could see that their problems were shared by countless homeowners around the U.S. and the world. Not sure what youre saying here. From New York, he had traveled overland to Denver, where he began a new life under the name Robert P. Clark, working first as a hotel fry cook and later as an accountant for H&R Block. Taking a Course and Doing Tax. '', ''He cried,'' the friend added. Wertheimergave him life without parole. He went on to wed again, join a new family and live in peace and anonymity for nearly two decades. If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article. In interviews in the last week, many new details have emerged about Mr. Clark's life over the last 20 years in Colorado and Virginia. Picture in Supermarket Tabloid. But as listeners heard in episode 7, when his second wife, Delores Miller Clark, came to visit him in the Henrico County Jail after his arrest, List admitted who he It was also in 1977, at a Lutheran church social, that Mr. Clark met his future wife. He was sentenced to five consecutive life prison terms. The job was for an entry-level staff accountant at a salary of $24,000. ''I learned not to ask people personal questions, or you get your head blown off,'' Mr. Wetmore said. The List murders were among the most grisly and puzzling in modern American crime because of the quiet methodical way that List killed his wife, mother, and three children in a day-long ritual of slaughter all because he was deep in debt and feared the family would break up under the burden of his financial woes. List worked in Detroit and Kalamazoo, Mich., before rejoining the Army during the Korean War. Breaths will not be held, I say *largely* irrelevant because Republican and Democrat, conservative and liberal are more than tangential to some of the issues of justice that were interested in here. He later moved to California, and then Detroit, where he worked as an accountant in a local firm. At the time, I remember my roommate coming home and asking, Did you hear they caught John List? Shed grown up in Westfield, where kids made the List propertytheir No. Thats what Ive often wondered, he says. He took a new wife, to whom he lied about his age and personal history. "It's just like D-Day, you go in, there's no stopping after you start," he said. To the right of the Chinese red front door is an Amish plaque inscribed, ''Bless This House.'' Mr. Wetmore helped Mr. Clark move ''one pickup truck's worth load of stuff'' to Denver. 24/7 coverage of breaking news and live events. So true extremism of any kind always seems to hurt some innocent people. However, he was not ready to disclose his incompetency to his family yet and hence, he left the house every morning, sat on the railway station and read books and newspapers all day. I took the paper next door and showed it to Delores. Delores Clark, right, tells reporters at a press conference on June 8, 1989 that she did not believe her husband was John List. Setting Up From Cooking Back to Accounting. Four months later, his wife joined him in Midlothian, a suburb southwest of Richmond. And youre obviously a lib. The authorities couldnt find List despite a nationally publicized manhunt led by the FBI; the fugitivehad given himself toogenerous a head start. List, now 76, is serving five consecutive life sentences for the murders and was interviewed from prison. 2023 Advance Local Media LLC. Ive done heaps of research on this property and can only seem to narrow it down to early 1900s. Then he apparently did some errands while waiting all day long for the children to come home. ''I had had a cataract operation, and the doctor told me not to do any heavy work for a while. Police didnt discover the bodies until several weeks later. Flanery received two letters from Delores Clark after she moved away. If anyone knows what yearBreeze Knoll was built, please advise. He was arrested in 1989 after a former neighbor recognized him from a profile on the syndicated TV show America's Most Wanted. The unlikely story of his capture, the tip that led to it and the wild coincidences Gluck encountered as he followed the story are told in the latest episode of Father Wants Us Dead, an investigative true crime podcast about the List killings from NJ Advance Media. Lists logic in killing his entire family to ensure they went to heaven is undeniable if youre a psychopathic lunatic. I'd tell him I wasn't going to get into that kind of mess again, and he said he wasn't going to either. "I feel when we get to heaven we won't worry about these earthly things. ''The tax season was coming up, and we needed somebody,'' Mr. Joyner said. Heleft the house everymorning,pretending to go to work when he was really whiling away time reading or sleeping in the train station. Death. As I was doing it I knew it was wrong," he said. He lined up the four bodies in the ballroom (he said his mother's body was too heavy to move), put music on the internal intercom, and cleaned up meticulously. "At least I'm certain that all have gone to heaven now. Photographs of Mr. I dont think he was a psychopath. Her son-in-law Randy Mitchell called the telephone number on the screen on her instructions and gave the operator the phone number and address of the Clarks in Virginia. The resume Mr. Clark used to find a job in Richmond begins in 1972. FF does the how they were caught: here we follow through on how they were punished, wherein the aforementioned politics/policys engaged. Bob West, said Clark became a pillar of the church during the 11 years he attended. The material on this site may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, cached or otherwise used, except with the prior written permission of Advance Local. Few neighbors had been invited to the house. R. C. Miller is not in business there, and there is no evidence it ever existed. He usually chose large apartment complexes where it was easy to remain anonymous. By all accounts his wife was a good mother and all the children were doing just fine and on a good trajectory. ''I don't say people can't change, and maybe God will forgive Bob. Mr. Clark moved to Richmond in February 1988. At a church singles party in 1977, Clark met Delores After the murders, investigators around the world began hunting for Mr. He waited until his wife and children arrivedhome one by one,crept up and shot them in the head at close range, and dragged their bodies into the ballroom. ''Bob's job grew, but he didn't,'' Mr. Bassler said. certificate. That he appeared functional, maintaining a relationship and holding a job down, doesnt change this. His story was made into a hit TV movie starring Episodes, photos and other information are also available at fatherwantsusdead.com. Ten days after a creepy, glass-eyed bust of John List was shown on Americas Most Wanted, Westfield residents had not heard of a single promising lead. For all I knew, Delores was in danger. Dr. Steven Simring, a psychiatrist who examined List after his arrest years later, told Downtown his "sense of neatness" was the result of a compulsive personality. ''I remember talking to him a few times about marriage, because I was having marital troubles at the time,'' Mr. Roberto recalled. In a three-sentence statement to the court, he said he was sorry for "the tragedy that happened in 1971." He spent his days at the train Hence, his severe lack of social skills cost him jobs after jobs. She had been previously married and had a daughter. ''I spent a lot of my life on skid row and in cow camps,'' Mr. Wetmore, 71 years old, said in an interview this week. He took the name Robert Clark, eventually got an accounting job, and remarried. "I was hungry," he told Downtown, adding with a chuckle, "that's just the way it was.". Bob didnt have a car at the time so I helped him move out of the trailer park into an apartment a few blocks east of the motel, he said. It was He lined the bodies up on the floor, put music on through the houses intercom system and wrote a confession to his pastor. '', Mr. Clark formed his own consulting firm, Robert Clark Services. And it came from a family member of all people. See All About BORN October 27, 1930 DIED January 21, 2017 ''He did everything by hand,'' the executive said. ''If he was the last man on earth, he still wouldn't be alone. On their cul-de-sac, the Clarks were described as pleasant but distant. Her illness left astronomical medical bills, he'd tell me. With Mr. Wetmore's help, Mr. Clark moved again, in 1977, to Wheatridge. He said, ''We were dealing with a gentleman who certainly had the academic credentials,'' but he acknowledged that no attempt was made to ascertain whether Mr. Clark had, in fact, attended the University of Michigan, as he had stated. He now says he was too ashamed to tell his wife, Helen, that hed lost his job and would go to the train station each morning, pretending to be at work. ''He said it was all just terrible.''. On Nov. 9, 1971, after sending his children off to school, List took his two handguns out to the car to load them, then walked into the kitchen and shot his wife from behind as she was drinking coffee. Finally, with the prospect of foreclosure threatening to expose his financial failure, List made his terrible decision to kill his family but not himself. John had a very normal childhood and he did not show any signs of psychological troubles. Delores never told me about Bob, said Wanda Flanery, Millers neighbor in Denver. By 1971, he was still leaving for work every morning, but unknown to his family he was unemployed and unable to pay the bills. To preserve these articles as they originally appeared, The Times does not alter, edit or update them. Its first entry is R. C. Miller, a business he said was in Wheatridge, Colo., a suburb north of Denver. And like Judas I gave her a kiss . Austin Goodrich, an ABCNEWS consultant who is writing a book with John List, contributed material for this report. His story was made into a hit TV movie starring Robert Blake and was the basis for the movie thriller The Stepfather.. The investigation also revealed that List for years had been siphoning money from his mothers $200,000 savings account. He dyed his hair and changed his name to establish new credit accounts and a phony Social Security number. Indeed, Trumps rescinding the moratorium on federal execution is an example (and some need informing that he didnt impose death a judge and jury did but merely removed the block to its enaction.). Listlowered the temperature in the house, cued up some organmusic on the intercom system, and told his kids teachers that the family had gone on a trip to North Carolina. LOL. 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