Real Life Halloween Horror - Lisa Ann French

Nine-year-old Lisa Ann French never made it back home from Halloween trick-or-treating in 1973.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Tell me a true crime story. Hey there guys, welcome to Tell Me a True Crime Story podcast. I'm your host, holly. I'm so appreciative of you for being here and allowing me to keep you company. Thanks for letting me be a part of your day. I hope that you and your family are happy, healthy and together forever. Big hugs to all of you.

Speaker 1: 0:38

So I've been asking for reviews and you guys have been so kind. I've gotten so many sweet reviews and you can't imagine how much that helps out this podcast. I have more ratings and reviews on Apple and on Spotify this week. So the latest one on Apple is from Kelly and she said great work. Just want to say these are well researched and wonderfully executed episodes. Found you on TikTok which actually inspired me to put my podcast on TikTok as well. So thank you, keep up the great work.

Speaker 1: 1:10

You've got a subscriber, slash fellow podcaster from Louisiana, now Sendlaw podcast host. Thank you so much, kelly, and big, big hugs to you. So if you want to check out her podcast, it's a true crime podcast and it features cases from Louisiana and it's called Sendlaw C-E-N-L-A-W. Sendlaw podcast and it is very good. They're kind of new. I think they're like maybe nine or 10 episodes in, but they do have some very enjoyable, interesting cases on there. So go check her out.

Speaker 1: 1:51

And so for those of you who enjoy the podcast and you haven't done so yet, please take a minute and leave me a review on Apple podcast or on Spotify. So to leave me a rating and review on Apple, you just go to my show page and scroll down to. You see ratings and reviews. You select a star rating, then below that, you click on write a review. So thank you so much for taking a few minutes to do that for me, because it really does help me out. So so much, please follow me on Facebook, instagram and TikTok. So my username on all three of those is at tell me a true crime story. At tell me a true crime story on Facebook, instagram and TikTok. Today I have a case for you that inspired a new law and changed Halloween in the state of Wisconsin forever. Now let me tell you a true crime story. This case takes us to Fond du Lac, wisconsin, on Halloween, october 31, 1973.

Speaker 1: 2:51

Fond du Lac is in Fond du Lac County and is located about 155 miles, or almost a three-hour drive northwest of Chicago, illinois. The city of Fond du Lac, wisconsin, got its name in the 17th century from French traders. Fond du Lac means the base or foot of the lake. This is because Fond du Lac sits on the south shore of Lake Winnebago. The population of Fond du Lac in 1973 was around 40,000 people and the population of the whole county of Fond du Lac in 1973 was about 86,000 people. A headline on the first page of a 15-cent copy of the Fond du Lac reporter dated Thursday November 1, 1973, read quote Wide Search is on for Missing Girl. End. Quote.

Speaker 1: 3:40

The day before had been Halloween. It was about 42 degrees Fahrenheit when 9-year-old 4th grader Lisa Ann French sat out in the dark around 6 pm to go trick-or-treating. It was just after dinner and Lisa kissed her mom, mary Ann, and her stepdad Bruce goodbye. Lisa's mom, who stayed home to care for her newborn son, told Lisa to be home by 7 pm. Lisa was dressed as a hobo that evening. She'd put duct tape on her jeans, donned a floppy felt hat, a green parka and had drawn freckles on her face. Lisa had an adorable shag haircut that her hairdresser mom had given her and deep brown eyes. She was trusting and friendly. Lisa had wanted to be a butterfly that Halloween, but her mom wouldn't allow it because she thought it'd be too flimsy for the cold night. Autumn leaves scattered, the sidewalks and porch lights were glowing, welcoming trick-or-treaters.

Speaker 1: 4:39

Lisa lived in a working-class tree-lined neighborhood. She left her house, located at 192 Amory Street, and was headed to meet her best friend, ann Parker. Lisa and Ann were planning to walk together to attend an outdoor Halloween party hosted by neighborhood parents. However, at the last minute Ann misbehaved and was not allowed to go with her best friend trick-or-treating. So Lisa carried on by herself. First she stopped at a teacher's house, then at a classmate's house who lived across the street from her. Her third stop was at a former neighbor's house, a man named Gerald Turner. Gerald Turner was divorced and had two small children. He worked as a machinist for Sioux Line Railroad. Lisa knew Gerald Turner because he used to live on the other side of her duplex on Amory Street. Now he and his girlfriend Arlene Penn lived at 152 Rose Avenue, about a half a block away from Lisa and her family's home.

Speaker 1: 5:38

Lisa and French's third stop trick-or-treating that Halloween night in 1973 would be her last. She would not walk out of Gerald Turner's house. She would never make it to the Halloween party at Pumpkin Place. Lisa missed her 7 pm curfew and when Lisa still didn't return home by 7.30 pm, a half hour passed her curfew, her mom began to worry and phoned the police. Soon an all-night search began for Lisa and continued on for the next two and a half days.

Speaker 1: 6:10

The whole community came together to look for one of their own. More than 5,000 people were involved in the massive search for little Lisa. A PTA group called the Block Parents took action. On that first night A woman named Betty, who was head of the Block Parents, called 50 other Block Parents to inform them of the missing child. They all turned their porch lights back on and put signs in their front windows. In the days following Halloween, private planes and National Guard helicopters scoured the area from above, while police and volunteers searched in wooded areas, bushes, fields, marshes, outbuildings, garages and along river banks. Police dragged creeks and rivers. Six thousand copies of Lisa's school photo were distributed and placed throughout the neighborhood and surrounding areas. Local gas stations offered up to 25 gallons of free gas to anyone using a vehicle to search for Lisa. But Lisa was nowhere to be found. The last sighting of Lisa had been at 6.15 pm on Halloween night. No one in Fond du Lac was praying for Lisa's safe return, but Lisa's mom and no one in Fond du Lac could have imagined the awful truth of where Lisa was and what had happened to her.

Speaker 1: 7:27

On Halloween night, arlene Penn, the girlfriend of Gerald Turner, attended the Halloween party at Pumpkin Place with her daughter. This is the same party that Lisa was planning to attend. Afterward, arlene and her daughter returned to the home they shared with Gerald Turner. They were all supposed to go together to visit Arlene's mom. Turner met Arlene at the front door. He said that he was not feeling well and for her and her daughter to go ahead and visit her mother without him. Although Arlene left but soon returned home because she had realized that her mom would not be back at her house for another hour or so. At home she found Turner still in his work clothes and still claiming to be sick. He sat with her on the couch but went back and forth to their bedroom several times, to quote-unquote lay down About an hour later she left to go visit her mom. She returned home around 11 pm. When she got back home, turner was wearing a bathrobe. She saw their green bedspread on the floor in the laundry room when she asked him why it was on the floor, he said he'd thrown up on it.

Speaker 1: 8:29

Three days later, on Saturday, november 3, 1973, at 11.30 am, a farmer named Gerald Braun was driving his tractor down a country road in Techita, wisconsin. He spotted a brown plastic bag behind a barbed wire fence near some woods. He parked his tractor at his farm then went back to check out the bag he'd seen. Inside the bag he found children's clothing. He then saw another brown plastic bag nearby and inside that, when he found the naked dead body of a child Lisa and French had been found.

Speaker 1: 9:04

News quickly spread that Lisa's body had been discovered Reportedly. Reverend Clarence Nicolai, pastor at St Peter's Catholic Church in Malone, wisconsin, went to the scene and climbed the barbed wire fence, cutting his hand to reach the body of little Lisa. He said the Our Father, prayer and Hail Mary over her little lifeless body. On November 6, 1973, at Emanuel Trinity Lutheran Church, lisa's classmates, fellow Girl Scouts in the community, paid their respects to Lisa at her funeral. Her small body lay in a white casket as mourners filed past. Lisa was wearing a purple and white dress, the same dress she'd had her school picture taken in that year. Her mom had styled her hair for the funeral. Two days after Lisa's funeral, on November 8, 1973, the Chamber of Commerce posted a $10,000 reward for the capture of Lisa's killer. In 2023, that amount would be equal to a little more than $69,000.

Speaker 1: 10:05

Gerald Turner was a suspect early on in the case and the police made contact with him several times in the days and months following Lisa's murder. On August 8, 1974, nine months after the rape and murder of little Lisa, gerald Turner confessed. According to his confession, when Lisa had gotten to his home, his door was open and she stepped inside. He discovered her standing in his doorway. He told police. When he saw her in the doorway he was quote unquote highly sexually motivated. He took her to his bedroom, removed her clothes and sodomized her. At some point he realized she was not breathing. He claimed he tried to revive her, but then his girlfriend Arlene arrived back home from attempting to visit her mother the first time, he said he put socks on his hands to move Lisa's body into the bathroom. When Arlene left again an hour later, he used this time to dispose of Lisa's body. He put her naked body in a brown garbage bag. He put her Halloween costume she'd been wearing in another brown garbage bag. He then went to the town of Techeeta, about three and a half miles away, and dumped both bags in a ditch off of McCabe Road. In his statement to police, turner drew a diagram of where he'd disposed of the trash bags containing her clothes and her body. Lisa's autopsy revealed that she'd died from cardiac arrest, from circulatory shock, from the sexual trauma she'd endured during the rape. Hair and fibers on Lisa's body and her clothing later matched hair samples police had collected from Turner and fibers they'd collected from his bedspread. He later recanted his confession, stating that, quote I got sick and tired of being harassed by police calling on me. End quote On February 3, 1975, a Fond du Lac jury convicted 26-year-old Turner of abnormal sexual perversion, indecent liberties with a child under the age of 16, and second-degree murder.

Speaker 1: 12:06

A judge sentenced him to 38 years and six months in prison. Unbelievably, since then, gerald Turner has been let out of prison two times. He was released on parole for good behavior in 1992, after serving only 17 and a half years of his 38 and a half-year sentence. However, in November of 1993 a civil lawsuit led to an appeals court decision that determined that the state of Wisconsin had made an error in the way it calculated his mandatory release date.

Speaker 1: 12:37

After Turner's brief release and the subsequent public outcry, lawmakers in Wisconsin created a new law, chapter 980, known as Turner's Law. This law allows for violent sex offenders to be committed to a secured treatment center when they come up for parole if they are deemed sexually violent persons, subjecting them to indefinite confinement and treatment. This law blocked Turner's release in 1994. When he again was slated for parole, the state of Wisconsin fought to have him committed to a secure mental institution under Turner's law. Turner went on trial in 1998 to determine if he deserved to be held as a sexual predator. The jury decided he did not fit the description. That meant he could no longer legally be held in custody. After years of legal wrangling, turner was released in 1998 to a halfway house in Madison, wisconsin. In 2003, he was sent back to prison on a parole violation. When he was discovered to have pornographic images on his computer and pornographic videos and magazines in his room at the halfway house. He was sentenced to another 15 years in prison.

Speaker 1: 13:47

Turner was incarcerated at Racine Correctional Institution as inmate number 71727. He was scheduled to be released in 2018. After serving his time, lisa's mom, mary Ann, started an online petition in 2017, hoping it would keep Turner behind bars. By December 2017, the petition had nearly 20,000 signatures. Mary Ann didn't know if the petition would make a difference, but she'd felt compelled to do something to spread the word about Turner's upcoming release. She was quoted in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel as saying quote when Lisa can come back and have her freedom, so can he end quote In early February 2018, 68-year-old Turner was released from supervision at Racine Correctional Institution of the Wisconsin Department of Corrections.

Speaker 1: 14:40

He is now under the supervision of the Wisconsin Department of Health Services at Sand Ridge Secure Treatment Center. The Wisconsin Department of Health website states that the Sand Ridge Secure Treatment Center, established in 2001, houses Wisconsin's sexually violent persons program. It also states, quote men are transferred to Sand Ridge Secure Treatment Center when the Department of Justice or a county district attorney files a petition for commitment. Commitment through this court process requires that the individual has a mental disorder that predisposes them to commit future acts of sexual violence. End quote. Turner was transferred to the Secure Treatment Center because the Wisconsin Department of Justice had filed a petition with the court, citing Chapter 980, turner's Law, that he should be held in a secure mental health facility because he is a sexually violent person. Turner's lawyers argued in their defense motion that it was the Wisconsin Department of Corrections doctor that evaluated Turner, concluded that he did not have a qualifying mental illness and that he was not more likely to commit a future act of sexual violence. Another doctor disagreed. Turner's lawyer also filed a motion to have Turner release pending the outcome of the 980 petition. In February of 2022, fond du Lac County Judge Paul Sissney ruled that Turner, now in his early 70s, will remain confined at the Secure Mental Health Facility and that probable cause exists for commitment proceedings to continue in Turner's case. Legal hearings to keep Turner committed were ongoing. As of this year, gerald Turner must register as a sex offender for the remainder of his life.

Speaker 1: 16:33

Gerald Turner, dubbed the Halloween Killer, forever changed Halloween in the state of Wisconsin. Long gone are the days of carefree innocence when children roamed their neighborhoods trick-or-treating on Halloween night. Most towns and cities in Wisconsin now have designated days during daylight hours for Halloween trick-or-treating. In 2019, the City Council of Fond du Lac moved all trick-or-treating to the Saturday before Halloween from 3.30 to 5.30 pm. In 2017, 44 years after Lisa's murder, her best friend at the time of her murder, anne Parker, described Lisa as funny, bubbly and outgoing Anne told Sharon Rosnick of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel that she and Lisa were inseparable back then and that she'd loved being with her. She said she still lives with guilt, wondering how things may have been different if she'd been able to go trick-or-treating with Lisa that night.

Speaker 1: 17:32

On October 5, 2022, emily Matessick of NBC15.com wrote that Mary Ann, lisa's mom, recalled that Lisa was quote-unquote wise beyond her years and she was such a kind person that was always thinking of other kids. Her mom said Lisa came home from school one day when she was nine years old the age she was when she was killed and told her mom that there was a little girl in school who didn't have nice clothes. She'd asked her mom if she could go through her own clothes and take some she didn't wear to the little girl, and her mom said she did. She took a big bag of clothes to that little girl. This Halloween will mark 50 years since Lisa's murder.

Speaker 1: 18:16

I'm going to leave you with Lisa's own beautiful words on notes her mom discovered in Lisa's room the day after her funeral. Her mom found them folded up, stapled and tucked inside her Bible. On the outside it said a gift from God. Inside one of the notes written in Lisa's hand read Smile, god loves you. And another said If you ask Jesus to take over, you will begin a new life. As you can see, this is an ongoing, ever-developing case, according to a 2021 article in the Fond du Lac reporter quote Turner's lawyers, robert Peterson and Evan Wheats, argued that to be deemed a sexually violent person, someone must have been convicted of a sexually violent offense, found delinquent for a sexually violent offense, found not guilty of a sexually violent offense by reason of mental disease or defect, have a mental disorder or be dangerous to others because the person's mental disorder makes it likely that he or she will engage in acts of sexual violence.

Speaker 1: 19:21

Well, turner certainly fits that bill. I know his lawyers are legally and ethically bound to mount a vigorous defense on their client's behalf, but the argument over having Turner released should cease because he clearly meets the requirements under Chapter 980 Turner's law to remain committed in a secure facility after having served his time in prison. Could Turner's lawyers feel comfortable with him living in their neighborhood? How would they sleep at night with him released into any community?

Speaker 1: 19:53

Thank you, guys, so much for listening to this episode of Tell Me a True Crime Story. Please follow this podcast on social media at Tell Me a True Crime Story, on Facebook, instagram and TikTok. So I have two ways that you can support the podcast. You can buy me a coffee by going to buymeacoffeecom slash truecrimestorypod, and the other way is totally free. You can write a short but sweet review for the podcast on Apple Podcast or give it a five-star rating on Spotify. Thank you again for being here. I love you guys lots. I wish you safety as you go about your days. I wish you all good health and lots of happiness too. Please join me in episode 30 when I'll tell you another True Crime Story. Big, big hugs to each and every one of you. Bye.