A Killer's Confession....

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Janice Pockett

Along a rural stretch of roadway in northwestern Massachusetts a motorist – stopped to let a group of pheasants pass in front of their vehicle – discovered the strangled, beaten body of a 13-year-old girl lying in a culvert behind a small, stone wall.

At the time it had been hours and hundreds of police officers and volunteers had scoured the woods near Michelle Wilson’s home looking for any trace of the missing teenager.

A Coast Guard helicopter and blood hounds had helped in the search but still Michelle had remained missing until the motorist’s gruesome discovery.

Last seen at 4:30 p.m. on November 22, of 1969 - riding her blue colored bicycle back towards her home on Baldpate Road after finishing up a school project with one of her friends - Michelle had never returned home. A half hour later her parents had called police to report her missing.

When police arrived near the stone wall they found Michelle, her clothes in disarray. Some articles of clothing had been taken off her body and a large field stone had been placed atop her head. She had been sexually molested, beat, strangled and died of asphyxiation and blunt force trauma. Blood covered rocks were found nearby as well as some of her clothing that had included a pair of brown corduroy bellbottoms, a blue ski jacket, green sweater and brown desert boots when she left her friend and pedaled the remainder of the way toward her home. Missing were her white knitted hat and matching mittens.

Judging by the size of the rock left on Michelle Wilson’s head whoever had murdered her must have been strong. Two men were needed to lift the heavy rock from off her body.

At the time of her murder Michelle had only lived in Boxford for six weeks. Her father Donald – who had taken a job at a Wakefield plastics firm – had moved the family from Brunswick Maine.

Shy and well behaved, Michelle loved school and skiing and was afraid of the dark – a fear that no doubt prompted her to leave the safety and comfort of her friend’s home that afternoon to ride back home and into the arms of her killer as dusk quickly approached.

Michelle’s bike was discovered just 150 yards from her home. There she was snatched, brought three miles away to the small, stone wall and murdered.

Police were able to lift fingerprints off Michelle’s bike but had few other clues. Eventually her murder went cold. Then – nearly ten years later and thousands of miles away – a convicted felon and ex-carnival barker was arrested in Florida on charges of indecent assault involving teenage girls. He was convicted and sent to a state hospital where he confessed to murdering Michelle.

Tall, muscular, 200 pounds, with a gruff voice and a permanent grimace etched across his unforgiving face – Charles Pierce’s rap sheep was extensive.

First arrested in 1939, as early as the age of 18 Pierce was doing time in a South Bridgewater Prison Farm in the State of Massachusetts.

In 1943 Pierce enlisted in the Army and eventually returned to his hometown of Haverhill where he had been raised by his father Harland (a box maker) and mother Corrine. There Pierce worked at Chris’ Seafood restaurant and at a Woolworths store in nearby Lawrence. He also worked at the Topsfield Fair.

Over the next two decades Pierce would travel across the country as a carnival worker helping to set up rides and amusements. During his travels Pierce accumulated arrests in seven states for a variety of crimes including child molestation, fraud and larceny.

Following his confession Pierce was arrested and charged with Michelle’s murder. He admitted to forcing her into his car, grabbing her around the neck and dropping a large field stone from a nearby wall onto her head.

Pierce later attempted to retract his confession – claiming he had learned the details of her murder from the newspapers. Investigators however claimed that Pierce had led them to the scene.

Despite his attempts to abandon his confession Pierce ultimately pled guilty to Wilson’s murder and was sentenced to life behind bars.

While interviewing Pierce about her murder investigators in Massachusetts became unnerved by his description of the crime. While Pierce could provide many specific details regarding how he killed Michelle he was fuzzy on others including her clothing. Investigators were left with the unsettling impression that Pierce might be confusing details from Michelle’s death with other murders. They suspected he might be involved in other crimes.

One crime in particular bore an eerie resemblance to Wilson’s abduction and murder. Seven-year-old Janice Pockett of Tolland – blonde haired and blue eyed like Michelle – had gone missing while riding her bike.

On July 26, 1973 Janice had left her home at the exact same time – 4:30 p.m. in the afternoon – as Wilson to retrieve a butterfly she had left under a rock. Janice’s bike was discovered by her mother and sister who had gone looking for her when she did not return home. It had been left by the dirt road where she had went to get the butterfly. Despite an exhaustive search no trace of Janice has ever been found.

Pierce eventually confessed to murdering Janice. Investigators took his claims seriously. In 1980 the convicted murderer was brought Tolland where police used a backhoe and a small bulldozer to remove thousands of feet of soil searching for Janice’s remains in the woods near her home based on Pierce’s confession. The search however came up empty.

From 1954 to 1978 Pierce would claim to have murdered anywhere between 15 to 22 children. His confessions however were sometimes confused, muddled and contradictory. At one point it appears he had told police that he had buried Janice near her home but later appears to have claimed it was in a field in Massachusetts near another teenager he had killed around the same time.

According to Pierce he had abducted and murdered an 11 or 12 year boy in Lawrence, Massachusetts around the time of Janice’s disappearance. Pierce couldn’t name the boy but claimed that he had Janice’s body inside his vehicle at the time the boy was murdered. Pierce confessed to having sex with their dead bodies before burying them 30 feet apart in graves two feet deep using a spade that he kept in his van.

Some aspects of Pierce’s confession however didn’t add up. He recalled sites in Lawrence at the time – including the Strand Theatre – that police learned had been closed decades before Janice’s death. Then nearly as suddenly as he had made it, Pierce recanted his confession.

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Michelle Wilson

Investigators never entirely gave up on Pierce. Still they had a difficult time proving his involvement in Janice’s murder. According to police they were never able to find a missing persons case involving a boy from Lawrence around the time of Janice’s disappearance. It appeared as if Pierce was playing a cruel game with investigators. Then in February of 1999 Pierce died. He was never charged in Janice’s disappearance.

In addition to Janice’s murder, Pierce had also confessed to another crime. This was the murder of a young Chicago boy taken from a carnival, strangled and left in a nature preserve.

On June 20, 1972 10-year-old William “Billy” DeSousa went missing after leaving home with one dollar in his pocket to watch workers setting up a carnival at 79th Street and Cicero Avenue in southwest Chicago. Wearing an orange striped t-shirt reading “I can’t believe I ate the whole thing”, blue pants and red, white and blue canvas tennis shoes Billy was last seen at the carnival at 4:30 p.m. (the exact time of Wilson and Pockett’s disappearance).

Billy’s father Donald – a plumber at the Conrad Hilton Hotel – was supposed to give his son (who played in the Scottsdale Little League) a gift when he got home. Donald DeSousa however never got a chance to give Danny the Little League batting game he had gotten him.

Chicago police searched seven days for DeSousa and chased down 200 leads. Trailers were searched, trash cans were overturned and rides double checked but there was no sign of the missing boy.

A student at St. Bede Elementary School Billy’s home life was stable. His mother was devoutly religious and his father was so distraught by his son’s disappearance he needed medical attention.

Police and the parents received crank calls regarding Billy’s disappearance. Tracking dogs had been called in but couldn’t follow Billy’s trail, helicopters were flown overhead and police interviewed carnival workers to see where he might have gone yet it would be another two years before Billy was discovered.

In early February of 1975 – in the Swallow Cliff Forest Preserve in Palos Township – a father and son on a hike discovered the skeleton of a young boy in a densely wooded area of the forest.

Close by police found bits of clothing and tennis shoes which matched the type worn by Billy the afternoon of his disappearance. They also discovered a dollar in change and a rusty key that belonged to a chain lock on his bicycle.

The identification of the remains were confirmed as belonging to Billy through dental records. There were no bullet wounds or apparent marks indicating violence on his skeleton or skull when they were found. Investigators theorized he had been strangled. His remains had been placed on the ground and not buried.

Within days of Billy’s disappearance in June of 1972 there had been a report of a boy matching his description riding his bike in the same preserve. The area was searched at the time but nothing was uncovered.

Following Pierce’s confession in Janice Pockett’s abduction, Pierce also confessed to having murdered Billy. According to police Pierce correctly identified the carnival site and even named one of the owners. Police told reporters that Pierce was able to provide investigators with information only Billy’s killer would have known. He even admitted that at the time of Billy’s disappearance he had been questioned by police in Chicago but told them he had no knowledge of the boy’s whereabouts and was released.

While no specific details of Pierce’s other confessed crimes have ever been made public he did claim to have begun murdering children in 1954.

While no details have ever been made public regarding what if any abductions or murders Pierce could have been involved with at the time there is one case of a murdered boy in Maine that could collaborate Pierce’s claim to having begun his murderous two decade long crime spree that year.

In June of 1954 a 12-year-old boy was fished out of the Androscoggin River in Maine. His skull had been smashed and his lifeless body thrown into the water.

Days earlier, on June 22, Danny Wood had left his home in Gray with a fishing pole and fifteen cents in his pocket. Ten minutes later – at around noon – he called his mother from a store in the village to tell her he was bound for Lewiston to do some work for a door to door salesman. Danny’s mother warned him about leaving with a stranger. “Oh I’ll be back tonight” Danny told her and hung up the phone.

Around this same time a friend from school saw Wood in a maroon sedan with yellow license plates (the color of plates from Canada). Inside the vehicle was an older man with white hair and a dark complexion. Also in the car were a woman and two kids. The man was looking at a map, started the engine and then drove down the road toward Sebago Lake. Wood didn’t appear to be in any kind of distress and reportedly shouted hello out the car window at his friend as they passed. The girl believed the car was a 1930s era Ford. Wood was never seen alive again.

Nine days later Wood’s lifeless body was discovered in the river by two fishermen. His wrists had been bound with shoelace and he had seven fractures to his skull.

Week’s after Danny’s disappearance his clothing was found off a lover’s lane in Auburn. His jeans and t-shirt had been hidden beneath a pile of rocks with a twig poking out to mark the spot. His glasses and belt had been tossed into a nearby tree. His shoes, underwear and his fishing pole were never found. The medical examiner who performed the autopsy on his body said Danny had fallen victim to a “sex maniac.” No arrests were ever made in his murder.

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Danny Wood

Decades later however an interesting story appeared in the Portland Press Herald. The story – published in 2003 – claimed that “police had tracked down a man who had served time in prison for sexually assaulting boys and had joined a carnival that had been in Portland when the boy disappeared.” The unnamed suspect tracked down years before sounded remarkably similar to Pierce who had other connections to the gruesome crime.

Pierce’s mother Corrine had been born and grew up in Auburn, Maine (the same town where Danny’s clothing had been discovered). There were also other similarities between Danny’s murder and Pierce’s known or confessed crimes including the use of rocks (both at Danny’s and Michelle Wilson’s murders), the use of a stick to mark the location where Danny’s clothing was left (Pierce claimed to have left pieces of coal where he left Janice and the unknown boy in Massachusetts to mark the area where he left their bodies) and the taking of articles of clothing from the victims and the scene (Danny’s underwear and shoes were missing while Michelle Wilson’s hat and mittens were taken by Pierce).

There also was Pierce’s confession in Janice’s abduction. He claimed the boy he had abducted and murdered shortly after Janice’s disappearance had wanted to go fishing. Danny had his fishing pole and was going to the river to fish the day of his murder. Pierce had also provided authorities in Massachusetts with memories of buildings in Lawrence that were only still around in the ‘50s when confessing to the boy and Janice’s murders. Could Pierce have been he confusing details of the boy’s murder in Lawrence in the early ‘70s with the murder of Danny Wood in Maine in 1954?

If a boy was indeed murdered by Pierce in Lawrence sometime in 1973 why have police never been able to locate an unsolved missing persons case matching Pierce’s description of the victim from that time period?

In the weeks following Janice’s disappearance in July of 1973, a teenager did indeed go missing just not from Lawrence, rather from Boston.

On the morning of August 23, 1973 15-year-old James Teta left his home on Suffolk Avenue in Revere, Massachusetts to visit Boston. Teta’s family had recently moved from the city to Revere, where Teta had a gotten job working at a local restaurant.

At 11:30 a.m. on August 23 Teta left home and was last seen two hours later near Boston’s government center. Two days later his body was found just over the border with New Hampshire in the woods near a desolate stretch of roadway in Rindge. Teta was nude, strangled and left just one mile from the state line.

Teta’s abduction and murder matches Pierce’s confession in several important ways. The ages of Teta and Pierce’s victim are roughly the same. Pierce described the boy as having olive colored skin (Teta was Italian). Pierce – a necrophiliac – claimed to have already abducted and killed Janice when he abducted the boy (Janice disappeared a few weeks before Teta was murdered). Pierce claimed to have had sex with the boy (Teta was raped). Pierce claimed that the boy’s body had been recovered (Teta’s remains were found just over the New Hampshire state line).

Perhaps – as investigators thought when interviewing him regarding the Wilson murder – Pierce had simply confused some of the details of Teta’s murder with that of a boy he had abducted from Lawrence. Indeed there was a boy that would disappear from a Lawrence swimming pool years after Janice and Teta disappeared and were murdered.

Another interesting clue in the days surrounding Teta’s murder also could point to Pierce.

Two days after Teta disappeared the Trinidad Carnival was held near Boston City Hall – the same area where Teta was last seen.

Also a Massachusetts carnival company was headquartered just a 15 minutes drive from where Teta’s body was discovered over the New Hampshire state line.

A careful examination of Janice Pockett’s abduction also provides some interesting clues that might bolster Pierce’s confession.

In his recent podcast Paper Ghosts – that covered the disappearance of Janice, Lisa White and other women who were found murdered or went missing in the area of Tolland and Vernon Connecticut in 1970s – acclaimed true crime author and former host of the Investigation Discovery series Dark Minds, M. Williams Phelps, spoke with a woman who was a neighbor of the Pockett’s the day Janice disappeared. The woman claimed to have seen a station wagon blocking the road near where Janice disappeared around the time she left to retrieve the butterfly. The woman said a man near the station wagon appeared to be looking for something in the nearby woods. He was walking slow and was tall – between six foot and six feet two. According to Phelps he showed the neighbor a picture of Pierce but she did not believe he was the man she had seen.

It is important to note the neighbor was shown the photograph of Pierce more than four decades after she saw the man near the station wagon. The photograph also was most likely that of Pierce taken as he was being led in handcuffs sometime after his arrest in the Michelle Wilson murder – at least some six years after Janice’s abduction.

Taken at face value the neighbor’s description of the man she saw near the station wagon that afternoon is in many ways eerily similar to what we know about Pierce.

Like the man near the station wagon Pierce was tall – approximately six feet, four inches. The neighbor described the man as walking slowly. Pierce suffered from arthritis in his back and shuffled when he walked according to a newspaper report from around the time of his arrest for the Wilson murder.

Perhaps most tellingly a newspaper report published around that same time claimed that Pierce was said to have driven a station wagon – its back windows blacked out.

There also are striking similarities between Pierce’s known victim (Michelle Wilson) and Janice Pockett’s abduction. Both girls were blonde haired and blue eyed. Both were snatched from their bicycles. Both disappeared at the same exact time of the day 4:30 p.m. in the afternoon. Both were taken from rural or semi-rural roadways. Janice was abducted near a small stone wall. Wilson’s body was found in a culvert beside a similar stone wall in Boxford.

Perhaps as investigators had surmised Pierce was confusing the details of Wilson’s murder as he was describing them in his confession with that of another crime: Janice Pockett’s abduction and murder.

Phelps’ podcast – a must listen if you haven’t already heard it – also included an interview with a former investigator who detailed phone calls the Pockett family had received claiming that if the family offered a reward they might get their daughter back. According to the police officer the calls were made from a phone booth near the Tolland jail and the caller had a gravely, distinct voice.

While to my knowledge there are no publicly available recordings of Pierce’s voice we do know that he was suffering from tuberculosis. Tuberculosis of the larynx can cause a permanent, “breathy” voice. We also know that in the case of Billy DeSousa – the ten-year-old Chicago boy that Pierce confessed to killing and that investigators claim he provided them with information only the killer would know – the parents and police had also received crank phone calls.

While none of these details prove that Pierce murdered Janice Pockett they do lend some credence to his confession and perhaps warrant a closer look at the man who so nonchalantly confessed to murdering nearly two dozen children over a two decade period.

Perhaps Pierce murdered so many children over such a long period of time he simply confused some of the details regarding his murders as police came to suspect. Perhaps he intentionally provided police with only some of the details of his crimes while confusing others to manipulate and keep police from concretely proving his involvement while he played a cat and mouse game with investigators.

In 1980 Connecticut State Police searched the woods near Janice’s home based on information that Pierce provided. Nothing was uncovered.

Has a thorough search however ever been conducted in the area where James Teta’s body was discovered in Rindge, New Hampshire to see if Janice might have been buried or left nearby? The area still remains mostly undeveloped and wooded.

If nothing else Pierce – the only known person to confess to Janice’s murder – deserves a second look and closer scrutiny. Only time will tell if he ever conclusively can be linked to Janice’s kidnapping and probable murder.

SOURCES

The Boston Globe November 13, 1979 “’69 Bike-Murder Suspect Found” Richard J. Connolly

The Boston Globe “Suspect Pleads Guilty in Bike Murder” Richard Connolly November 14, 1979

The Boston Globe November 24, 1969 Stephen Kurkjian

The Boston Globe “No Clues in Boxford Girls Slaying” John C. Burke December 14, 1969

The Boston Globe November 24, 1969 Gary Kayakachoian

The Boston Globe November 26, 1969 “It was Brief Funeral for Boxford Girl” Frank Donovan

The Boston Globe “Boxford Girl’s Killer Reported Admitting Slaying in Chicago” John E. Young

The Portsmouth Herald “Man Found Strangled in Rindge” AP August 27, 1973

Nashua Telegraph “Bay State Youth Is Rindge Victim” August 31, 1973

The Boston Globe “Calendar of Events”

doj.nh.gov. New Hampshire Dept. of Justice

Fitchburg Sentinel July 6, 1966

Nashua Telegraph August 31, 1973 “Bay State Youth Is Rindge Victim” AP no byline

The Brattleboro Reformer “Help Offered in N.H. Murder Probe” UPI August 31, 1973

Suburbanite Economist Chicago June 25, 1972 caption

Suburbanite Economist “June 28 1972

Suburbanite Economist August 6, 1972

The Chicago Tribune “Police Press Hunt for Missing Boy 10” Philip Wattley

Chicago Tribune “Boy 10 Hunted on W. Side” no byline

Chicago Tribune June 23, 1972 “Hundreds Hunt For Missing Boy 10”

The Wheeling Herald February 4, 1975 “Remains of Boy Missing Three Years Found” no byline

Chicago Tribune, “Tragic Ending to Search” February 4 1975 Philip Wattley

“Hundreds Join Hunt for Missing Boy, 10” Chicago Tribune June 23, 1972

Chicago Tribune “Suspect Found in Boy’s Killing” John O’Brien, October 19, 1980

The Boston Globe “Suspect Pleads Guilty in Bike Murder” Richard Connolly November 14, 1979

The Boston Globe “Boxford Girl’s Killer Reported Admitting Slaying in Chicago” John E. Young

nch.nlm.nih.gov “Effect of Laryngeal Tuberculosis on Vocal Chord Function” E. Ozudogru

1930 census

1940 Census

United States WWII Army Enlistment Records

Family search marriage record

The Bangor Daily News August 17, 1954

Bangor Daily News August 5 1954 “Danny Wood Buried As Search Goes On for Killer” AP

The Bangor Daily News August 16, 1954

The Bangor Daily News August 2, 1954 “Clothing Clues Sought” AP

The Bangor Daily News “Automobile Key May Be Link to Danny’s Murder” no byline

The Bangor Daily News July 27, 1954 “Girl Chum Saw Missing Boy in Auto” AP July 27, 1954

The Boston Globe “Youngester Found With Head Battered” Richard Oransky Augsut 1, 1954

Boston Globe “Old Car Sought in Main Slaying of Danny Wood” August 7, 1954

murderpedia.org

Portland Press Herald “Clue Surfaces in Boy’s 1953 Murder” April 7, 2003

Boston Globe “A Killer Confesses” Judith Gaines July 9, 1999

capecodtimes.com “Killer’s Confession Baffles Police” AP March 3, 1999

Hartford Courant “Convicted Murderer of Girl Is Linked to 15 Slayings” Manira Wilson March 26, 1981

The Boston Globe “His Claim Reopens Search For Girl” John E. Yang August 16, 1980

Manchester Evening Herald “Kidnap Considered in Pocket Case” August 1, 1973 Vivian Kenneson