Posted on 04/04/2009 7:13:08 PM PDT by Born Conservative
SCRANTON – Near the creek where Matthew Grendel’s body surfaced two years ago, sinister graffiti glared back at a retired detective on the trail of suspected serial killers.
The 20-year-old college student’s disappearance sounded eerily similar to the other cases Kevin Gannon and his team investigated. The similarities brought them to Grendel’s house in Minooka and to Roaring Brook by the falls under the Harrison Avenue Bridge in 2007.
The killers they were tracking left a crudely painted smiley face at the spot where some of the victims’ bodies were put in water.
“We did find a smiley face down there,” Gannon said Wednesday.
He declined to say where the graffiti was found, but said it matched what he and others of the Nationwide Investigations team discovered when looking into other deaths around the country.
“The case appears to be connected to our pattern that we’re looking at,” Gannon said from his home in New York state.
Grendel traveled back home from Philadelphia where he was a junior studying biochemistry at the University of the Sciences.
His parents last saw him March 10 at their Cedar Avenue house when he left with friends to party at the St. Patrick’s Day parade.
After becoming separated from his fellow revelers, a friend called Grendel on his cell phone at 4:17 p.m. that day. Grendel said he was at a party near the university. The school is within walking distance of Roaring Brook where Grendel’s body was found 78 days after he disappeared.
His death was ruled accidental and his cell phone was not found.
Patty Grendel recalled her husband Dennis telling her two men stopped by one night before their son’s body was found. She was not yet home from her 3 to 11 p.m. shift at St. Joseph’s Center. “They gave my husband their card,” she said.
The couple, who have a son and daughter older than Matthew, in turn ran it by the Scranton Police, who verified that the visitors were whom they claimed to be.
A call to Scranton Police Chief David Elliot was not returned Thursday.
At that time the couple had not heard of the group suspected in the “Smiley Face” killings.
“I didn’t think anybody knew what to do,” she said.
Television broadcasts about the killers has piqued her interest and elicited an offer to help.
“If this is true, I don’t want this to happen to any more boys,” she said.
Grendel said her husband feels the same way. “Anything he and I can do. We’re willing to talk with anybody.”
A week ago Thursday on CNN’s Larry King Live show, Gannon discussed the investigations of the nearly 40 suspicious deaths of college-age men in more than 10 states that he believes are connected.
The men between the ages of 19 and 23 disappeared after drinking in bars. Gannon’s group contends the men, all highly intelligent and athletic, were drugged and abducted, and possibly held for a period of time before being put in water.
“We have enough to prove at least 10 or 12” were murdered, Gannon said.
The 12-year-old case of Patrick McNeill is one of them. It was the first Gannon investigated and the one that motivates him to solve the killings. “I’ve made relationships with these families,” he said.
McNeill, 21, a Fordham University student, went missing in February 1997 after last being seen at a Manhattan bar. His body was found two months later in the East River.
Gannon’s television appearance followed Kristi Piehl’s on ABC’s “Good Morning America” on March 23.
Piehl, a former investigative reporter for KSTP-TV in Minneapolis, Minn., recently added Grendel’s case to her list.
Working on her own, Piehl’s efforts run parallel to Gannon’s and the two met when she was reporting on the Halloween 2002 disappearance of Chris Jenkins. His body was found the following February in the Mississippi River.
“These are happening in different jurisdictions,” Piehl said of the deaths.
Some occur on the same night in different states, which leads her to believe more than one person is involved. Often the medical examiner rules the death a drowning and the police call them accidental, she explained.
The Jenkins case was ruled a homicide. It is an open investigation, however, not an active one, she said.
“In most cases the police wouldn’t have any other option to do what they’ve done,” Piehl said.
Her goal is to have federal authorities take over, something Gannon also wants done.
“Eventually we’ll force them to get involved,” Gannon said.
In the meantime, Grendel said if her son was killed, she wants to let the person or people involved know that she forgives them.
But she said she understands there are also legal issues to be addressed if others were involved in the death.
She continues to pray for help by asking that “the Lord convict their heart so they could not live another day without confessing about what they’ve done.”
If the person or people were intoxicated at the time and forgot what they did, she prays “the Lord would bring it to their memory,” she said. On the Web
For information about retired NYPD Det. Kevin Gannon and other investigators looking in to the “smiley face killers,” visit http://nationwideinvestigations.us
To read Kristi Piehl’s investigations into the deaths visit www.sfkillers.com.
I’ve heard about this before. Creepy.
This is tragic; outrageous; and creepy. . .am wondering if any psychics have been used here. Surely; there must be some good clues; somewhere. . .
I thought about these cases when I drove past a fresh smiley face not far from my home. Someone painted a goofy smiley on a fresh tree stump near the road.
PING.
It may be a group of cult killers, and/or the largest serial killings the US.
This has been happening through the northern tier states for years, and no one seems to be able to agree on what’s going on. Some claim that there are as many as 40 victims. Whether these are drowning accidents or a group of organized killers at work has still not been deducted.
UW Lacrosse (on the Mississippi River) also has had there share of lone, male, usually drunk deaths. My son goes to this school, so these stories interest me.
http://wcco.com/local/serial.killer.lacrosse.2.370055.html
I don’t know if there are any comic book fans on FR, but an article from a London tabloid found what may be a clue. The article reads, “The killings bear a striking similarity to the cult Watchmen comic book series written by Alan Moore and illustrated by Dave Gibbons.
Published from 1986 to 1987, the comics portray a series of murders, beginning with that of a costumed adventurer called The Comedian whose body is found next to a blood-stained smiley face.”
I don’t know much about this case myself.
I read a little on this some time back. It’s spooky and I’m inclined to think serial killer, it’s just too much of a coincidence, IMO.
A few years back, my stepson who was attending Middle TN State, came east with friends to Knowxville, TN to attend a concert. He got separated from the three friends at a large bar in K-ville and turned up/woke up barefoot and shirtless behind a quick stop gas/grocery store on the outskirts of K-ville the next morning. He called me and could not recall what had happened to him the night before! This is a large guy (carried tuba in the high school marching band), powerful, smart, and not prone to drinking blackouts. I wondered then (six years ago) if his episode was somehow related to this smiley face murdering cult. I was perplexed if it was because he either got away from them or something about him didn’t fit the profile of what they were trolling to murder.
The couple, who have a son and daughter older than Matthew, in turn ran it by the Scranton Police, who verified that the visitors were whom they claimed to be.
Did I miss something? I've read the article a couple of times and can't figure out what these two sentences have to do with anything. Who were these people? Investigators? Suspects? Reporters?
A scary experience to say the least. I would think a big guy would have to drink a huge amount to black out and not remember the circumstances of the previous evening, it sounds like a drug to me.
Whether connected or not to the other deaths I hope this is a lesson for the young man, it was a close call either way.
It was a tremendous lesson to him. I had to call my cousin who lives in Knoxville to go pick him up and clean him up and get him clothed and on his way via bus back to Murfresboro! I really should have pursued the details more deeply at the time, but he was so embarassed by the episode that it was a touchy point for a year!
Did he go to the police? It may sound silly, but he may want to contact the people investigating these cases. Sometimes it’s little details that to us seem meaningless that can bring a case together.
Per the above article they have a website for more info and some e-mail addresses.
Here's a few details from my conversation just now:
--He was with friends in K-ville attending a football game and the partying happened after the game
--the small group was at a large bar in K-ville and got 'invited' to a party happening at a Ramada Inn where a large swimming pool with fountain in the middle was in use by partyers
--he ran out of smokes and decided to go to a convenience store across from the Ramada Inn, to buy smokes
--he 'awoke' behind the store with a sizeable bump on his head and no wallet and made his way back to the Ramada Inn where he passed out next to the pool
--when he awoke beside the pool, his knuckles were all skinned up and sore like he had been in a major fight, and a favorite pocket knife my son had given him for Christmas was missing, along with his shoes and his shirt, and he had one or two bruises on face and forearm
--he remembers going to the Ramada Inn with all his friends and a girl he had dated occasionally whom he 'ran into' in K-ville (?) though he had dated her in Murfresboro not in K-ville
I have asked him to try and recall whom invited the small group to the Ramada Inn party (was it this female friend whom he ran into unexpectedly) and can he search his memories to determine if there were any people in the Ramada Inn party crowd who did not fit the typical partying college kids crowd. He has assured me that he will go read up on the website and let me know if he remembers anything, ANYTHING about that night after this long ago. His episode does sound like he 'escaped' from someone or some group which had targeted him when he spearated from the party. He would not have been carrying a significant amount of money because he was a struggling college staudent at the time. BTW, if he struggled to escape these perps, he probably left someone injured because he is a big powerful guy and his pocket knife (3 1/2 inch folding blade) was missing and he went back to the area behind the convenience store ro look for it and his shoes and shirt and found nothing there!
He did not go to the police, BUT since he may have injured his assailant(s) in the fight he cannot recall, it might be a good idea to notify the website people and they can check emergency room records for the night in question! Something will eventually break this serial killing case, somehting as seemingly meaningless as an emergency room visit.
* The pants that Josh was wearing on the night he disappeared appear to be different than the ones he was wearing when he was recovered. All of Josh’s clothes were returned to his family. However, the pants are missing. None of the investigating agencies can account for the whereabouts of the pants.
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