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How The FBI Caught Ohio's Most Elusive Killer · Murder Files Unsealed

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Speaker 1: Picture the sprawling, uh, just tranquil landscapes of rural southern
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Ohio back in nineteen eighty nine. You have these beautiful
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rolling hills, rocky outcroppings, and just these wide open spaces. Yeah,
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it's very pastoral, very quiet, exactly. It is the kind
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of place where the woods are dense, the communities are
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super tightly woven, and you know, people leave their front
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doors unlocked without a second thought. Right.
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Speaker 2: It's an environment defined by this deep, profound piece.
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Speaker 1: It really is. But I want you to take that
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perfect serenity and just well shatter it, because hiding out
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there in the distance, concealed by the treeline and looking
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through the scope of a high powered rifle, a sniper
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is hunting human beings.
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Speaker 2: And it is a profoundly jarring reality to even think about.
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I mean, you're dealing with an environment inherently associated with recreation, farming,
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and tranquility, and it's completely subverted into a hunting crowd. Yeah,
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and the prey isn't wildlife, it's people simply existing in
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their own communities.
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Speaker 1: That terrifying subversion is really the core emission of deep
1:00
dive into the source material. Today we are exploring the
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case of the Ohio roadside sniper Thomas Dillon. It's a
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heavy one, it is, and I want to set the
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parameters right away, so you know we are not just
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walking through a timeline of a.
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Speaker 2: Crime here, right, There's so much more to on tack exactly.
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Speaker 1: We are going to plunge into the psychology of a
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completely random killer. We're going to examine the incredibly intricate
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and honestly deeply flawed mechanics of a massive, multi jurisdictional
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FBI manhunt before the digital.
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Speaker 2: Age, which is a whole logistical nightmare in itself.
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Speaker 1: Oh completely. And finally, we are going to witness the
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unyielding power of a mother's grief. Okay, so let's unpack
1:40
this because to understand how a killer operates with absolutely
1:43
zero connection to their victims, we have to grasp the
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sheer informational void the investigators were staring into.
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Speaker 2: Right, and to map that out for you, we are
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drawing from a really comprehensive stack of sources for this
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deep dive.
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Speaker 1: We've got a lot to go through.
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Speaker 2: We do looking at the declassified FBI files, the localized
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incident reports, and some really detailed testimonies from the investigators
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on the ground, people like former FBI New York Director
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Jim Calstrom, for example.
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Speaker 1: And we also have the actual written correspondence between the
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killer and the victim's family, which is just.
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Speaker 2: Wild it is. And you know, while the subject matter
2:20
is undeniably dark, our focus here is strictly analytical. We
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are examining the structural vulnerabilities this killer exploited, the behavioral
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profiling that exposed him, and ultimately the forensic science that
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trapped him.
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Speaker 1: So let's step right into the reality of April first,
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nineteen eighty nine. This is in Tuscarls County, Ohio. It's
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a Saturday, and thirty five year old Donald Welling is
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out jogging along the back roads. He's just alone, doing
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his normal routine, and in a fraction of a second,
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his run ends just like that, Just like that, a
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single rifle bullet hits him directly in the heart. When
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local authorities arrive, they are met with a total vacuum.
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I mean, there's no motive, no physical evidence, no weapon,
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and no witnesses.
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Speaker 2: So put yourself in the position of a rural sheriff's
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deputy in nineteen eighty nine. Homicide is incredibly rare. To
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begin with in these areas. Oh absolutely, And when it
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does occur, the statistical probability points overwhelmingly to a domestic dispute, right,
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or maybe a localized altercation, or.
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Speaker 1: A robbery gone wrong, something with a clear link.
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Speaker 2: Exactly. There is almost always a connective thread between the
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victim and the perpetrator. But here you have this incredibly
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sterile scene. A man is jogging, his wallet is still
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on him.
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Speaker 1: No signs of a robbery at all.
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Speaker 2: Right, and no signs of a struggle. Yeah, that sterility
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is a massive anomaly for law enforcement. It instantly communicates
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this physical and psychological distance.
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Speaker 1: In that distance, it just becomes a chasm. Nineteen months past,
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nothing happens. Then it's November tenth, nineteen ninety, another Saturday morning,
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but this time we're in Belmont County.
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Speaker 2: A completely different jurisdiction.
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Speaker 1: Right, Twenty one year old Jamie Paxton gets up early
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to go bow hunting. He leaves his Crossbone as car
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and takes a walk through the tall grass off State
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Route nine. He is completely unarmed, just scouting the area, basically, yeah, exactly.
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He doesn't notice a vehicle stopping down the road. The
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gunman is quiet, he's careful. Jamie is shot three times
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with a high powered rifle, and again the killer just
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vanishes without a trace.
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Speaker 2: So Belmont County Sheriff Tom McCourt arrives on the scene,
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and the immediate assumption in a rural area during the fall,
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when you find a body in a field is a
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hunting accident.
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Speaker 1: Which makes sense statistically, it does.
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Speaker 2: It is a tragic but known occurrence out there. But
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McCourt looks at the mechanics of the scene and he
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rules it out immediately.
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Speaker 1: Why so fast, Well, a.
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Speaker 2: Hunting accident is almost always characterized by a single shot.
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It's a catastrophic misidentification of a target through heavy brush.
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Speaker 1: Right, Okay, that tracks.
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Speaker 2: But Jamie Paxson was shot three times. Furthermore, he was
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shot with rifle ammunition and gun season for deer hadn't
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even opened yet. It was only bo season.
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Speaker 1: That's a huge red fly. Som Court's team sweeps the area.
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I mean, they bring in metal detectors. They scour the
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tall grass for spent cartridge cases, tire tracks, literally anything.
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Speaker 2: And they find nothing, nothing at all.
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Speaker 1: They interviewed Jamie's entire social circle. Jamie was a well
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liked kid. The murder makes no logical sense. But then
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just eighteen days later, on November twenty eighth, nineteen ninety,
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the killer strikes again. It's escalating, yeah, rapidly. A thirty
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year old man named Kevin Loring is on a huiking
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trip in Muskingham County, which is roughly forty miles away
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from the last scene. He is walking across a field
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and is killed by a single gunshot wound to the head.
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Speaker 2: And if we connect this to the bigger picture, the
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killer's geographic strategy becomes horrifyingly clear. Muskingham County investigators are
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operating entirely in a silo.
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Speaker 1: They have no idea about the other murders none.
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Speaker 2: They are unaware of the sniper victims in Tuscowas or
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Belmont Counties. In nineteen ninety, a county line was basically
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an iron wall for information.
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Speaker 1: It's crazy to think about now with the Internet.
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Speaker 2: It really is. So local investigators look at Kevin Louring
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out in a field during the fall, killed by a
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single shot, and then classified it as a hunting accident.
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Speaker 1: Wow, it is a calculated manipulation of the system. The
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killer isn't just shooting people. He is actively exploiting the
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fragmented nature of rural law enforcement.
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Speaker 2: He knows exactly what he's doing.
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Speaker 1: He does. He knows these independent sheriff's departments aren't faxing
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daily homicide reports to jurisdictions fifty miles away. We often
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talk about criminals slipping through the cracks, but this guy,
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he was deliberately navigating the fault lines.
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Speaker 2: That's a great way to put it.
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Speaker 1: It's like trying to assemble a massive jigsaw puzzle, but
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five different people are holding the pieces, sitting in different rooms,
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and none of them even know they're working on the
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same puzzle.
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Speaker 2: Right, and that fragmentation is a massive advantage for a
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motiveless serial killer. Jim Calstrom emphasizes this heavily in the
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source material.
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Speaker 1: What does he point out specifically?
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Speaker 2: He notes that most violence is transactional. You know, it's
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driven by money, revenge, or passion. But this specific typology
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operates on a completely internal psychological economy, so.
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Speaker 1: The victims don't actually matter to him exactly.
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Speaker 2: The victims are chosen at random to satisfy a compulsion
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that exists entirely within the killer's mind. They aren't hunting
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the person, they are hunting the act of killing itself.
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Speaker 1: I think the environment itself is the most crucial variable here.
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When pop culture portrays a serial killer, it's usually an
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urban predator, you know, someone utilizing the chaos of a city,
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the density of millions of people, to sort of blend
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into the background noise, right, the classic alleywaytetalker exactly. But
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the American rural landscape offers a totally different type of camouflage.
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The sheer emptiness is the cloak. You can park on
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a county road, pull a trigger, and drive for an
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hour without seeing another headlight.
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Speaker 2: And the geography perfectly mirrors the killer's internal psychology too.
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The rural expanse allows for a physical detachment that completely
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facilitates his emotional detachment.
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Speaker 1: He doesn't have to look them in the eye.
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Speaker 2: Precisely, he doesn't have to confront the humanity of his victims.
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He uses a high powered rifle, which is essentially the
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ultimate instrument of dissociation.
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Speaker 1: It really is.
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Speaker 2: He can peer through a piece of glass from one
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hundred yards away, compress a trigger, pick up his brass casing,
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and vanish before the victim even hits the ground. It
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is incredibly predatory, but it's remarkably sterile.
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Speaker 1: And that sterrility forced the local investigations to a complete standstill.
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You have dedicated detectives working around the clock, but traditional
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policing relies on a transfer of evidence, right Lokard's exchange principle.
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Speaker 2: Every contact leads a trace.
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Speaker 1: Exactly, but when there is no physical transfer, the science
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just stalls. But where the forensics hit a wall. Human
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emotion forced a massive rupture in the case because the
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killer completely failed to account for Gene Paxton, Jamie Paxon's mother. Yes,
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after her son's murder, Jeene Paxton didn't retreat into silence.
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She leveraged her grief in this incredible She began writing
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open letters to the local newspaper, The Martin's Fairy Times Leader,
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and she addresses the killer directly.
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Speaker 2: Which is such a bold move.
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Speaker 1: It's astounding, and her tone is just startling. She isn't
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demanding vengeance, She writes, let me get the quote. Would
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it be easier for you if I wrote words of hate.
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I can't because I don't feel hate. I feel deep
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sorrow at losing my son.
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Speaker 2: Wow?
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Speaker 1: Right. She then pivots to these intense theological warnings, questioning
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if he ever contemplates his own mortality, warning him of
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the eternal consequences of his actions.
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Speaker 2: From a psychological standpoint, her strategy is remarkably disruptive. Think
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about it. She is communicating with someone who has demonstrated
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a total absence of empathy, a complete void, right, but
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she addresses him as a complete human being anyway. She
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assumes he has a conscience, a soul, and the capacity
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for existential fear. She is actively trying to pierce that
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sterile detachment we talked.
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Speaker 1: About, and somehow she manages to provoke a direct response.
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Speaker 2: That's the craziest part.
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Speaker 1: Right before the one year anniversary of Jamie's death, the
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killer actually writes back to the newspaper. It's a typewritten letter,
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and he begins with this stark admission, I am the
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murderer of Jamie Paxton just lays it out there. He
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confirms they were complete strangers. Then he attempts to justify it,
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claiming he operates under an irresistible compulsion that has just
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taken over his life.
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Speaker 2: He tries to play the victim of his own mind exactly.
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Speaker 1: He says, I'm an average looking person with a family,
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a job, and a home, just like yourself. Something in
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my head causes me to turn into a merciless killer
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with no conscience.
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Speaker 2: The cognitive dissonance in that letter is staggering. I mean,
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he is actively compartmentalizing his identity. Oh so well. On
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one hand, he demands to be recognized as a normal,
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functioning member of society, a family man. Right. He craves
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that mainstream validation.
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Speaker 1: He wants credit for being normal.
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Speaker 2: Yes. On the other hand, he attributes the murders to
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an external force, this ute unquote irresistible compulsion. It is
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a textbook psychological deflection. By blaming a compulsion, the average
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guy doesn't have to take moral responsibility for the merciless killer.
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Speaker 1: Okay, wait, I have to challenge his entire premise there.
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This idea of an irresistible compulsion just feels incredibly self serving.
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Speaker 2: Oh absolutely.
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Speaker 1: An uncontrollable psychological frenzy is chaotic, right, It leaves a massive,
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messy footprint. But this killer is meticulous. He scopes out
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remote areas, he aims, he fires, He has the presence
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of mind to scour the dirt for his spent brass.
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Speaker 2: Casings in tall grass no less, right, and.
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Speaker 1: Then he consciously navigates complex county jurisdictions to evade capture.
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That isn't a blind compulsion. That is a highly calculated,
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cognitive process designed to ensure his own survival.
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Speaker 2: You are absolutely hitting on the core deception of his letter.
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It is not a loss of control. It is a
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deliberate suspension of morality. Its choice, a very clear choice.
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The organization required to execute these crimes and sanitize the
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scenes completely invalidates his claim of a mindless vugue state. Furthermore,
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we have to look at the motivation for writing the
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letter itself. It wasn't driven by.
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Speaker 1: Guilt, No, it's pure narcissism. I mean, he's sitting in
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his living room reading these letters from a grieving mother,
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realizing he holds the ultimate secret. Replying isn't a confession
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for him, It's a victory lap.
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Speaker 2: That's exactly what it is.
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Speaker 1: He wants to flex his power over life and death,
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and he wants an audience to witness it precisely.
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Speaker 2: And the granular details he includes in the letter they
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really confirm that narcissism. He wants gene Packson to know
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exactly how much control he had in that moment.
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Speaker 1: The details are just agonizing. To read. He writes that
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he was intoxicated and a voice said do it. He
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describes watching Jamie walk down the hill. He writes, I
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raised my rifle to my shoulder and lined him up
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in the sights. I took at least five seconds to
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take careful aim.
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Speaker 2: Just sit with that for a second.
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Speaker 1: Five full seconds of consciously aiming at a human being
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who has no idea you exist. He admits his first
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shot was poorly placed, hitting Jamie in the chest. Jamie
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went down groaning.
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Speaker 2: We watched him suffer.
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Speaker 1: He did. Then, he writes, I wanted to make sure
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he was finished, so I fired a second shot. I
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jerked the shot and hit him in the knee. And
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perhaps the most chilling line of all, he says, five
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minutes later, he was drinking a beer, completely unbothered.
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Speaker 2: It's sickening, he said.
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Speaker 1: He thought no more of shooting Jamie than shooting a
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bottle at a dump.
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Speaker 2: And comparing a human being to a piece of trash
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at a dump, that is the absolute apex of objectification.
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He is psychologically flattened his victims into inanimate targets just
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to make the act of killing palatable to his own ego.
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But in his arrogance. In his desperate need to boast,
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he made a critical error. That letter was devastating for
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the Paxton family obviously, but for law enforcement it was
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a gold mine.
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Speaker 1: What did it give them?
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Speaker 2: It provided a linguistic baseline, a specific typeface from the typewriter,
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and a direct window into his pathology. Because of this letter,
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the investigation shifted from a localized search to a behavioral hunt.
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Speaker 1: That shift couldn't happen fast enough, because the killings escalate again.
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On March fourteenth, nineteen ninety two, Claude Hawkins, a local
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family man, is shot and killed while fishing below the
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Wills Creak Dam right, but this time the geography betrays
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the killer. Wills Creek Dam is federal property, and that
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jurisdictional detail is the catalyst that brings the FBI fully
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into the fold. Special Agent Harry Trembetus from the Columbus
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Field Office is assigned to the case, a major turning
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point huge But shortly after, on April fifth, nineteen ninety two,
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forty four year old Gary Bradley is murdered while fishing
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in Noble County.
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Speaker 2: So at this juncture, the isolated sheriff's departments finally start
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to connect the dots. A massive task force is assembled.
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Speaker 1: They realize what they're up against.
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Speaker 2: Right, they retroactively realized that Kevin Loring quote unquote hunting
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accident was actually a homicide. So now they are staring
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at five bodies across five counties.
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Speaker 1: Still no robberies, still no shell casings left behind exactly.
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Speaker 2: The task force realizes traditional investigative techniques aren't going to
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work on a phantom. The FBI's Behavioral Science Unit, the BSU,
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down at Quantico.
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Speaker 1: Bring in in the heavy hitters.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, Profiler Larry Ankrim is brought in to synthesize the
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sparse data points they do have, the geography, the victimology,
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the time of day, and of course that incredibly revealing letter.
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Speaker 1: Ankrim builds a profile that is just astonishingly specific. He
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posits they are looking for a white male, highly intelligent,
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and an experienced outdoorsman who blends seamlessly into rural environment.
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Speaker 2: Which fits the area perfectly.
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Speaker 1: It does, But the psychological component is where Ankrim really
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zeros in. He identifies a sniper mentality. He concludes this
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killer is deeply conflict avoidant, very important distinction. Right. He
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operates from a distance because he's fundamentally terrified of a
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fair fight. Ankrim predicts this underlying cowardice means the killer
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likely has a long documented history of nuisance crimes, you know,
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shooting out windows, destroying road signs, cruelty to animals, maybe
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low level arson.
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Speaker 2: The methodology the BSU uses here is so critical to understand.
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Ankrim is extrapolating macro behavior, which is serial murder, from
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micro behavior.
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Speaker 1: How does that connection work?
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Speaker 2: He is isolating the core personality driver, which in this
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case is a profound sense of inadequacy coupled with a
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desperate desire for dominance. A man who shoots unarmed strangers
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in the back from one hundred yards away is fundamentally.
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Speaker 1: Insecure, right, There's no bravery in that exactly.
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Speaker 2: He craves the ultimate power of destruction, but refuses to
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accept any physical risk himself. So Inncrium deduces how does
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a person with that specific psychological makeup behave in their
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everyday life?
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Speaker 1: They lash out at safe targets.
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Speaker 2: Yes, they exert control over things that cannot fight back,
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stop signs, stray cats, abandoned buildings. The murders are simply
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the evolutionary endpoint of a lifetime of secretive, powardly destruction.
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Speaker 1: It's like a psychological negative. You don't know the man's name,
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his height, or what he drives, but you have the
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precise shape of the shadow he casts over his.
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Speaker 2: Community, like a perfect analogy.
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Speaker 1: And in August Whist nineteen ninety two, after three years
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of chasing smoke, the FBI decides to weaponize that shadow.
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They release Ancrum's profile to the public, coordinating a massive
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press push across all local evening news broadcasts, simultaneously.
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Speaker 2: Casting a huge net.
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Speaker 1: They are banking on the idea that someone out there
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knows a guy who fits this incredibly specific, highly unusual
17:22
behavioral matrix.
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Speaker 2: It is a high risk strategy though it could drive
17:25
him underground, but it generates an immediate dividend. The tip
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lines are flooded, but one call in particular cuts through
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all the noise.
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Speaker 1: Who was it?
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Speaker 2: A man named Richard Frye contacts the task force and
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suggests they look into an old high school acquaintance of his,
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a man named Thomas Dillon.
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Speaker 1: Thomas Dillon on paper, he is the absolute embodiment of
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the banality of evil. I mean, he is a married man,
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a father, He has worked as a draftsman at the
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Canton Water Department for twelve years. Totally unremarkable, right, twelve
17:54
years sitting at a drafting table drawing lines on blueprints.
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But Richard Frye reveals the parallel Dylan was leading. Fry
18:02
tells investigators that they used to drive the back roads
18:04
of Ohio, drinking and shooting at road signs and.
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Speaker 2: Animals, exactly what the profile predicted.
18:09
Speaker 1: Exactly, but Fry noticed Dylan escalating. Dylan became obsessed with
18:14
notorious serial killers. He started torturing pets and setting fires.
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Fry actually distanced himself from Dylan for years because the
18:22
behavior just became too erratic.
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Speaker 2: And the timeline of their reconnection is what really hooks
18:26
the investigators. Fry runs into Dylan at a gun show
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in nineteen eighty nine.
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Speaker 1: The exact year the murders began.
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Speaker 2: Right, Fry agrees to go on another ride along, and
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he notes a severe deterioration in Dylan's demeanor. During this drive,
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Dylan turns to Fry and asks an incredibly pointed question.
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He says, do you think I could ever kill anybody?
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Speaker 1: Gets out of nowhere, just out of nowhere.
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Speaker 2: He then proceeds to outline a hypothetical strategy for committing
18:53
random murders, specifically detailing the absolute necessity of crossing county
18:58
lines to ensure the police departments never communicate with each other.
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Speaker 1: Imagine sitting in the passenger seat of a truck while
19:05
your acquaintance casually workshops a blueprint for serial murder. It's chilling,
19:10
but I have to ask, why would a killer essentially
19:13
hand his playbook to a witness.
19:15
Speaker 2: Well, it circles back to the narcissism we analyze in
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his letter. Carrying the secret of five murders is a
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massive psychological load, sure, but for a narcissist, it's also
19:24
a source of intense grandiosity.
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Speaker 1: He feels like a god exactly.
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Speaker 2: He desperately wants to brag. He wants someone to acknowledge
19:30
his genius, but self preservation prevents a full confession, so
19:34
he uses hypotheticals. He tests the waters with Fry to
19:38
validate his own cleverness, effectively boasting about his perfect system
19:42
without assuming the legal liability of a direct confession.
19:44
Speaker 1: Well, Richard Fry's tip gives the phantom a name, a face,
19:47
and an address, but knowing Thomas Dillon is the sniper
19:50
and proving it in a court of law are two
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entirely different universes. Oh Absolutely, catching a heavily armed, highly
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paranoid killer in the act on the vast back roads
19:59
of Ohio Io initiates one of the most agonizing surveillance
20:03
operations in law enforcement history.
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Speaker 2: It was incredibly tense. Detective Walt Wilson of the Tuscarraws
20:09
County Sheriff's Office spearheads this phase and before they even
20:12
put eyes on Dylan, Wilson does the analog grunt work.
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Speaker 1: What does he do?
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Speaker 2: He secures Dylan's time cards for the water department. Keep
20:20
in mind, this is manual cross referencing. Wilson is laying
20:23
paper punch cards next to the timeline of the homicides.
20:26
Speaker 1: Oh wow, Yeah.
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Speaker 2: He discovers Dylan routinely has weekends off, which aligns with
20:31
the weekend murders. But the critical data point emerges with
20:34
the weekday.
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Speaker 1: Incidents, right because not all of them are on weekends.
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Speaker 2: Exactly on July twenty first, when a hunter reported a
20:41
man pointing a rifle at him, and on November twenty eighth,
20:44
the day Kevin Loring was murdered, Thomas Dillon had submitted
20:47
vacation days.
20:48
Speaker 1: That is huge. That's the statistical anchor they needed. So
20:52
in October nineteen ninety two, the physical surveillance begins. Detective
20:56
Wilson starts tailing Dylan on his weekend drives, and Dylan's
20:59
routine in is monotonous but massive. He covers a lot
21:02
of ground he does. He leaves his house at seven am,
21:05
buys a case of beer, and just drives. He navigates
21:09
three to four hundred miles of remote county roads a day,
21:12
just cruising, scanning the tree lines, and.
21:15
Speaker 2: The attention for the investigators is off the.
21:17
Speaker 1: Charts during this I can't even imagine. There's this one
21:20
moment where Wilson, in a car packed with visible police radios,
21:25
briefly loses Dylan around a bend. Wilson creeps around the
21:29
corner and suddenly finds himself nose to nose with Dylan's truck.
21:32
Speaker 2: Oh my god.
21:32
Speaker 1: They make direct eye contact. Wilson, knowing if he panics,
21:36
the investigation is completely blowne just casually waves and Dylan
21:40
waves back, completely unaware he just locked eyes with the
21:43
man hunting him.
21:44
Speaker 2: The operational stress in that scenario is just crushing tailing
21:48
a suspected serial sniper through empty rural terrain in broad
21:51
daylight is a logistical nightmare, definitely, and it really highlights
21:55
the central tactical dilemma of the entire operation, the risk
21:59
versus reward of intervention. If you crowd him, he spots
22:02
the tail, he goes home, destroys his weapons, alters his routine,
22:06
and the case goes cold forever. But if you give
22:08
him too much space, he has the opportunity to pull
22:10
the trigger again.
22:11
Speaker 1: And that exact dilemma almost ended in a tragedy. The
22:15
FBI brings in an aviation unit to assist Agent Trumpetus
22:20
and the ground teams. One afternoon, the plane radios down
22:23
a frantic alert. They spot a female jogger running alone
22:27
on a remote stretch of road ahead of Dylan. She
22:30
perfectly matches the victimology exactly. Dylan accelerates his truck, heading
22:35
straight for her. Trumeddus and the ground units are miles
22:38
back to avoid detection. They are screaming over the radio
22:41
asking the plane for updates. The plane confirms Dylan is
22:45
closing in on her and there are no other vehicles
22:47
in sight.
22:48
Speaker 2: The ground agents are completely paralyzed.
22:50
Speaker 1: At this point, he can't do anything.
22:51
Speaker 2: No, they are entirely reliant on the aviation unit, knowing
22:54
that a high velocity rifle round travels faster than the
22:57
speed of sound. By the time they hear gunshot over
23:00
the radio, that woman would already be dead.
23:03
Speaker 1: Dylan's truck passes her. The ground agents exhale for a
23:06
fraction of a second, but then the plane reports Dylan
23:09
is making a series of right turns. He's driving a
23:11
box pattern.
23:12
Speaker 2: He is circling back.
23:13
Speaker 1: He is circling back to her location. Trumbidis demands a
23:17
visual on the jogger, but the plane loses her under
23:20
the heavy tree canopy. Dylan stops his truck, he steps out.
23:25
The plane reports he is holding something metallic. Then the
23:28
ground agents hear the sharp crack of gunshots echoing across
23:32
the hills. They are absolutely convinced he just murdered her.
23:35
The sheer psychological drop for those agents in that moment
23:38
is unfathomable. They believe they just listen to a murder.
23:41
They were powerless to stop.
23:43
Speaker 2: But a moment later, the plane radio's back. Dylan is
23:46
firing his rifle into a stop sign.
23:48
Speaker 1: Oh thank god, right the.
23:50
Speaker 2: Jogger had turned down a different path and was safely
23:52
out of the area. She had no idea she was
23:55
even in the crosshairs.
23:56
Speaker 1: That is terrifying. But hearing this, I have to ask,
23:59
if he is out there hiring a weapon illegally and
24:01
destroying unicipal property, why not just swarm him right then
24:04
take him down for the vandalism and get him off
24:06
the streets.
24:07
Speaker 2: I understand the impulse totally, but in the context of
24:10
a serial homicide investigation, premature arrest is a catastrophic failure.
24:14
If they arrest him for shooting a stop sign, he
24:17
is charged with a misdemeanor. He posts a minimal bond
24:20
and is back on the street in hours. But now
24:23
he is fully aware of the surveillance.
24:25
Speaker 1: Ah, I say, the.
24:27
Speaker 2: Entire operation is compromised. He disposes of the murder weapon,
24:31
he stops driving, and the task force loses their only
24:34
chance to connect him to the five bodies. They have
24:37
to swallow the anxiety and play the long game, waiting
24:40
for an opportunity to secure irrefutable physical evidence.
24:44
Speaker 1: It is an agonizing waiting game. You have agents living
24:46
in their vehicles for sixteen hours a day, fueled by
24:50
pulled coffee and adrenaline. Their nerves just frayed every time
24:54
Dylan's truck slows down, and during the surveillance they observe
24:57
something deeply unsettling the grave visit. So yeah, Dylan had
25:01
written in his letter that Jamie Paxton's death bothered him.
25:04
So Investigator's pull archived video footage from a memorial service
25:07
held at Jamie Paxton's grave a year after the murder,
25:10
and there, standing quietly in the background of the video
25:14
is Thomas Dillon.
25:15
Speaker 2: He actually attended the memorial. Returning to the grave or
25:18
the memorial of a victim is a well documented behavior,
25:21
but the underlying motivation is pretty complex. Dylan later claimed
25:26
Jamie's youth bothered him, suggesting a fractured, compartmentalized sense of guilt.
25:31
Speaker 1: Do you buy that not entirely?
25:33
Speaker 2: Inserting himself into the memorial service is primarily an exercise
25:37
and power. He is standing amidst the devastated family and community,
25:41
internally gloating that he is the architect of their suffering.
25:44
Speaker 1: Like a god looking down on them.
25:46
Speaker 2: Exactly, he is feeding his own mythology. The task force
25:50
even watched him purchase specific newspapers just to read the
25:53
coverage of the memorial. He is a consumer of his
25:56
own terror.
25:57
Speaker 1: The task force realizes they are trapped in a holding.
26:00
Hunting season is rapidly approaching, which means the woods will
26:03
soon be flooded with potential targets. They can't wait for
26:06
him to slip up. They have to force an error.
26:08
Speaker 2: They need a trap, right, they pivot from passive observation
26:11
to active psychological warfare. In November of nineteen ninety two,
26:15
they execute a highly orchestrated confrontation designed to completely break
26:20
his composure.
26:20
Speaker 1: They set up the Dairymark trap. Surveillance established that Dylan
26:24
stopped at a specific Dairymark convenience store every single morning.
26:29
Trumbezis and Wilson rent a vacant basement office directly across.
26:33
Speaker 2: The street, setting the stage.
26:35
Speaker 1: They spend days transforming this basement into a psychological pressure cooker.
26:39
They cover the walls with massive topographical maps, using pushpins
26:43
to mark his exact driving routes. They plaster the room
26:46
with gruesome crime scene photographs, newspaper headlines, and covert surveillance
26:51
photos of his own truck.
26:52
Speaker 2: The design is to completely overwhelm his senses and his ego.
26:56
Speaker 1: Does that actually work?
26:57
Speaker 2: The technique is known as visual sensory overload. The objective
27:01
is to bypass the suspect's prefrontal cortex. You know, the logical,
27:05
defensive part of the brain.
27:06
Speaker 1: Okay.
27:07
Speaker 2: When a suspect walks into an environment that entirely deconstructs
27:10
their secret life, it shatters their illusion of control. The
27:14
environment nonverbally screams we know every move you have made.
27:18
Speaker 1: Wow.
27:19
Speaker 2: The investigators are betting on the shock inducing a spontaneous
27:22
emotional confession before the suspect can mentally regroup.
27:26
Speaker 1: So on November twenty seven, nineteen ninety two, they pull
27:29
the trigger on this plan. Dylan exits the dairy mark,
27:32
Trumpetus and Wilson approach, flash their badges and asks him
27:35
to step across the street to review some materials.
27:37
Speaker 2: Just casually, right.
27:39
Speaker 1: They lead him down the stairs into the basement. Trumpetus
27:42
is watching Dylan's face intently. Dylan steps into the room,
27:45
sees the maps, the crime scene photos, the pictures of
27:48
his own truck, and his jaw physically drops.
27:51
Speaker 2: He's stunned.
27:52
Speaker 1: He is frozen in stun silence for five agonizing seconds.
27:56
He looks at the walls, looks at the agents, and
27:59
then the defensive wall slams right back down. He looks
28:02
trumpetous in the eye and says, I want to talk
28:04
to my attorney first.
28:06
Speaker 2: Which is a crushing defeat for the behavioral strategy. The
28:09
sensory overload worked temporarily, but Dylan's instinct for self preservation
28:13
was stronger than his ego. The moment he invokes his
28:16
right to counsel, the interrogation legally terminates. The agents cannot
28:20
ask a single probing question.
28:22
Speaker 1: Trumbetis gives the prearranged signal anyway atf asians enter the
28:26
room and arrest Dylan on a minor pre existing weapons
28:29
charge related to a silencer they knew he possessed, just
28:31
to get him off the street exactly, but the task
28:34
force is terrified they just tip their hand for nothing.
28:37
Simultaneous to the arrest, teams are executing a search warrant
28:40
at Dylan's house, desperately tearing it apart looking for the
28:44
murder weapon.
28:44
Speaker 2: And what do they find.
28:45
Speaker 1: They find maps detailing arson locations, which perfectly validates Ancrum's
28:50
profile of nuisance crimes, but they find zero physical evidence
28:54
tying him to the homicides. No rifle, no brass.
28:58
Speaker 2: That is the worst case scenario.
29:00
Speaker 1: Dylan is sitting in a cell on a minor charge,
29:02
his lawyer is preparing a bail motion, and the task
29:05
force is staring at a total collapse of the case.
29:08
Speaker 2: The narrative hinges right here. The behavioral profiling found him,
29:11
the surveillance tracked him. But the law requires physical evidence.
29:15
Speaker 1: So what do they do?
29:16
Speaker 2: The FBI pivots to a desperate public plea. They hold
29:19
a press conference asking for any information regarding Thomas Dlon
29:23
in firearms, and in response, two independent streams of forensic
29:27
investigation converge to crack the case wide open.
29:30
Speaker 1: Let's look at the first breakthrough. Jerry Wade, an officer
29:33
with the Ohio Division of Wildlife, receives a tip. A
29:36
witness recalls seeing a man matching Dylan's description shoot a
29:39
deer out of season in a remote field two years prior,
29:43
two whole years. Wade theorizes that if he can locate
29:47
the shell casings from that two year old poaching incident,
29:50
they might match the ballistics of the murders, proving Dylan
29:53
possessed the weapon. It's an insane long shot, but it
29:56
proves that investigative breakthroughs aren't just about high tech labs.
30:00
They are about sheer, grueling persistence.
30:03
Speaker 2: You really have to conceptualize the physical reality of Wade's task.
30:06
Here he is standing at the edge of a massive,
30:09
overgrown rural field. Two years of weather, vegetation, growth, and
30:13
soil shifting have occurred.
30:14
Speaker 1: It's a needle in a haystack exactly.
30:16
Speaker 2: Wade takes a metal detector and begins a meticulous inch
30:19
by inch grid search. He spends hours sweeping coils over
30:23
dirt and grass, listening for a faint ping.
30:26
Speaker 1: It is the definition of forensic grit, and against all
30:29
statistical probability, the metal detector hits. Wade digs into the
30:34
dirt and unearth's two weathered rifle shell casings. Those casings
30:39
are rushed to the lab and are a definitive match
30:42
to the weapon that killed Claude Hawkins and Gary Bradley.
30:45
Speaker 2: That is incredible.
30:46
Speaker 1: Wade's dedication gave them the mechanical link, but they still
30:50
needed the physical weapon, which leads to the second miracle breakthrough.
30:54
Speaker 2: On December fourth, Captain Shriek of the Task Force feels
30:57
a call from a man named Alcob Cobb had seen
31:00
the FBI press conference and realized he had purchased a
31:03
rifle from Thomas Dillon at a local gun show.
31:06
Speaker 1: A huge break Shriek immediately.
31:07
Speaker 2: Asked for the day of the transaction. Cobb checks his record,
31:10
since has the sale occurred on April fifth?
31:12
Speaker 1: April fifth, the exact same day Gary Bradley was murdered
31:16
at the Pond in Noble County.
31:17
Speaker 2: He killed him and then went and sold the gun.
31:19
Speaker 1: The FBI retrieves the rifle from Cobb and immediately flies
31:22
it to the FBI laboratory in Washington, DC, handing it
31:25
over to ballistics expert Paul Schrecker.
31:28
Speaker 2: And this is where the subjective theories of the investigation
31:30
are finally replaced by the objective reality of physics. Schreker's
31:36
analysis requires an incredibly nuanced understanding of high velocity ballistics.
31:41
Speaker 1: It's not just basic bullet matching, right, No, we.
31:44
Speaker 2: Aren't just talking about basic rifling grooves on a clean bullet.
31:47
When a high powered hunting round strikes a human body,
31:50
it doesn't stay intact. It is designed to expand and chatter,
31:53
transferring massive kinetic energy. The challenge isn't matching a pristine bullet.
31:58
It's matching a mangle fragmented piece of copper jacket pulled
32:02
from a victim's tissue.
32:04
Speaker 1: How does a forensic scientist even begin to match a
32:07
shattered fragment to a specific barrel?
32:10
Speaker 2: The science relies on the microscopic imperfections of the manufacturing process.
32:14
The tools that cut the rifling into a steel barrel
32:17
wear down microscopically with every single cut, leaving unique striations,
32:21
you know, tiny gouges and scratches inside the barrel like
32:24
a fingerprint, Exactly like a fingerprint. As the bullet travels
32:27
down the barrel at thousands of feet per second under
32:29
immense heat and pressure, those microscopic imperfections are violently scraped
32:33
into the bullet's jacket.
32:34
Speaker 1: Okay, so how does Shreker test it?
32:37
Speaker 2: Shreker test fires Alcob's rifle in a water tank to
32:41
capture pristine rounds. He then places those test rounds under
32:45
a comparison microscape side by side with the deformed fragments
32:49
recovered from the victims. By manipulating the lighting and rotating
32:52
the fragments, he is looking for the striated scratches to
32:55
align perfectly across the two pieces of.
32:57
Speaker 1: Metal, and they line perfectly the microscopic scratches on the
33:01
test bullet map flawlessly onto the fragments pulled from Gary
33:05
Bradley and Claude Hawkins. The scientific loop is finally closed.
33:09
Speaker 2: They got him.
33:10
Speaker 1: The task force has the behavioral profile, the surveillance placing
33:13
him in the area, the shell casings from the field,
33:16
the rifle itself, and the microscopic signature proving that specific
33:19
gun fired the fatal shots.
33:22
Speaker 2: The margins of this investigation are terrifyingly thin, though, when
33:25
you think about it, what do you mean? If Dylan
33:27
had thrown the rifle into a river instead of arrogantly
33:29
selling it at a gun show hours after a murder.
33:32
If Jerry Wade hadn't possessed the obsessive patients to grid
33:36
search a field for two days, if Alcob hadn't turned
33:39
on his television at the exact.
33:40
Speaker 1: Right moment, it all could have slipped away.
33:42
Speaker 2: A man who systematically hunted five human beings for sport
33:46
was days away from walking out of jail on a
33:48
minor weapons charge.
33:49
Speaker 1: Armed with absolute irrefutable science, Agent Trumpetus returns to Dylan's cell.
33:55
He bypasses the psychological games and just lays out the
33:58
physical reality. He details the surveillance, the time cards, the
34:02
casings from the field, and finally the ballistics match from
34:05
the gun show rifle he shows in the cards. Right,
34:08
Dylan attempts to bluff, asking what kind of proof they have,
34:11
Trempetus calmly replies that they have everything they need, and
34:15
then he leverages the ultimate pressure point. He reminds Dylan
34:18
that the state of Ohio aggressively utilizes the electric.
34:22
Speaker 2: Chair, and that threat of execution completely shatters Dylan's remaining defiance.
34:27
He realizes the evidentiary wall is insurmountable. The cowardice that
34:30
defined his method of killing, shooting from a distance to
34:33
avoid consequences, now dictates his legal strategy.
34:36
Speaker 1: He just wants to live exactly.
34:39
Speaker 2: He prioritizes his own survival above all else.
34:42
Speaker 1: In June of nineteen ninety three, Dylan's defense team brokers
34:46
a deal. He agrees to plead guilty to all five
34:49
homicides in exchange for the removal of the death penalty.
34:52
He trades five innocent lives to save his own skin.
34:55
On July twelfth, nineteen ninety three, he is brought into
34:58
the Noble County Court house to f finalize the plu.
35:01
The families of his victims are sitting mere feet away
35:04
in the gallery, and Dylan's demeanor in that courtroom is
35:07
the final horrifying confirmation of his psychopathy.
35:10
Speaker 2: How does he act?
35:11
Speaker 1: He isn't solemn, he isn't remorseful. He sits there and smirks.
35:14
Speaker 2: The smirk is a weaponization of his lack of empathy.
35:18
He is surrounded by the profound devastation he engineered, and
35:21
he is internally celebrating his own infamy.
35:23
Speaker 1: It's disgusting.
35:25
Speaker 2: Even from jail, he continually calls a local reporter, engaging
35:28
in casual, jovial conversations about the murders, marveling at the
35:31
media coverage. He is thoroughly insulated by his narcissism. But notably,
35:36
he vehemently refuses to discuss Jamie Paxton with a reporter,
35:40
snapping that they should just forget it.
35:42
Speaker 1: Which brings us to the profound climax of this entire saga.
35:46
Jeene Paxton, Jamie's mother, is seated in that courtroom. Because
35:50
of the structured plea deal, she has denied the opportunity
35:53
to deliver a victim impact statement.
35:55
Speaker 2: That's heartbreaking.
35:56
Speaker 1: She has denied the chance to look the man who
35:58
killed her son in the eye and speak her piece. Frustrated,
36:02
she speaks to the local evening news cameras outside the courthouse.
36:05
She tells the reporter Dylan is a coward. He hid
36:08
behind a gun and Jamie was not that way. She
36:11
explicitly calls him a pathetic coward on television, and.
36:14
Speaker 2: Thomas Dylon, sitting in his holding cell, watches that broadcast
36:19
and it completely enrages him.
36:21
Speaker 1: Why did that get to him so much?
36:22
Speaker 2: Let's analyze why that specific phrase penetrated his armor. Geene
36:26
Paxton didn't call him a monster, or a demon or
36:29
an evil mastermind. Those labels would have actually validated his grandiosity.
36:33
Ah By calling him a coward, she publicly exposed the
36:36
exact psychological deficit Lorie Ankrom identified at the FBI. She
36:40
reduced him from a godlike sniper to a frightened, inadequate
36:44
man who couldn't face his victims. She dismantled his entire
36:47
constructed identity on local television.
36:49
Speaker 1: Refusing to be silenced, Gene Paxton convinces Sheriff McCourt to
36:53
facilitate a phone call with Dylan which is an extraordinary request.
36:57
It is, but McCourt arranges it. That evening, Jeene Paxton
37:01
picks up her phone and hears the voice of her
37:03
son's killer. She noted that his tone was remarkably casual,
37:06
almost corporate. He says, missus packson, this is Tom Dylon,
37:11
like a telemarketer.
37:12
Speaker 2: Wow.
37:13
Speaker 1: And then he attempts to reassert his dominance. He says
37:15
to her, you really hurt my feelings this afternoon.
37:18
Speaker 2: The emotional void required to speak those words to a
37:21
grieving mother is absolute. You hurt my feelings. He is
37:25
employing a classic abusive tactic here, how so, he is
37:29
baiting her. He is anticipating that she will lose control,
37:32
that she will scream, cry, and curse at him over
37:35
the phone. If she descends into hysteria, he regains the
37:38
upper hand. He remains the powerful force that broke her.
37:42
Speaker 1: But Gene Paxon completely neutralizes him. She refuses to give
37:45
him the reaction he is desperate for. She doesn't raise
37:48
her voice, she doesn't hurl insults. She speaks to him
37:51
with steady, measured maternal authority.
37:53
Speaker 2: Which is exactly what he can't handle.
37:55
Speaker 1: Right. She forces him to listen to the reality of
37:58
what he destroyed, refusing to let him dictate the emotional
38:01
terms of the conversation. She later said she felt that
38:04
she had defeated him with her words. She stripped him
38:07
of his power. After three years of suffocating grief, she
38:10
hung up the phone, walked out onto her porch, and
38:13
finally filled a sense of freedom.
38:15
Speaker 2: It is the ultimate psychological defeat for Dylan. By denying
38:19
him the chaos he craved, she rendered his manipulation entirely impotent.
38:24
He wanted to be feared, She treated him with cold,
38:27
clinical disdain.
38:28
Speaker 1: It's amazing.
38:29
Speaker 2: It demonstrates that the most effective countermeasure against profound narcissism
38:33
is an absolute refusal to validate it.
38:36
Speaker 1: And Jeen Paxton's resolve didn't end with that phone call.
38:39
Dylan was terrified of being sent to Lucasville Prison, Ohio's
38:42
most notoriously violent maximum security facility. Jeene Paxton orchestrated a
38:47
relentless petition drive to ensure that was his exact destination,
38:50
good for her. Furthermore, when she discovered Dylan's wife was
38:53
attempting to sell the rights to his story for a
38:55
Hollywood film, Jeene Paxton filed a wrongful death lawsuit, securing
39:00
a twenty five million dollar judgment that effectively blocked Dylan
39:05
or his family from ever profiting off the blood he spilled.
39:08
Speaker 2: A huge legal victory.
39:10
Speaker 1: She even partnered with lawmakers to pass the Paxtonville legally
39:13
codifying that prohibition in Ohio. Today, Thomas Dillon sits in
39:17
a cell at Lucasville, eligible for parole in roughly one
39:21
hundred and sixty five years.
39:22
Speaker 2: Gene Paxton's legacy in this case is just immense. When
39:25
you synthesize the entirety of this investigation, it required a
39:28
remarkable alignment of forces.
39:30
Speaker 1: It really did.
39:31
Speaker 2: You had the theoretical brilliance of the FBI's behavioral scientists
39:34
mapping the mind of a phantom. You had the uncompromising
39:37
exactitude of ballistics experts matching microscopic scratches on shattered.
39:42
Speaker 1: Metal, right the high level science.
39:43
Speaker 2: But none of that high level science functions without the
39:46
grueling boots on the ground endurance of local detectives cross
39:50
referencing punch cards, and wildlife officers gritting fields with metal detectors.
39:56
And ultimately, the catalyst for all of it was the
39:59
unshakable mo moral clarity of a mother who refused to
40:02
let her son fade into a cold case file.
40:04
Speaker 1: It really forces you to confront the fragility of the
40:07
piece We take for granted. You can be jogging down
40:10
a sunlit road, completely isolated and intersect with a purely random,
40:14
senseless evil. But this case also illuminates the immense strength
40:18
of the apparatus designed to protect that piece.
40:21
Speaker 2: Absolutely.
40:21
Speaker 1: It challenges you to recognize the complex, often invisible machinery,
40:26
the local deputies, the federal profilers, the forensic scientists, and
40:30
the resilient citizens that continually push us back against the dark.
40:33
Speaker 2: It highlights that civilization is a collective, active effort. Dylan
40:37
deliberately exploited the structural gaps in that effort, the county lines,
40:41
the isolated jurisdictions, but ultimately, the collective pressure of that
40:44
system adapted, closed the gaps and trapped him.
40:47
Speaker 1: Before we wrap up this deep dive into the source material,
40:50
I want to leave you with a final thought to consider.
40:53
Our cultural consumption of true crime is often highly mechanical.
40:57
We fixate on the brilliant, deductive reasoning of the detective,
41:01
or the forensic smoking gun buried in the dirt, or
41:04
the chilling cunning of the killer the procedural stuff exactly,
41:07
But the Thomas Dillon case points to a much deeper
41:10
truth about the nature of evil and how it is defeated.
41:13
Consider this, The ultimate weapon against sociopathic isolation might not
41:18
be a microscope or a behavioral profile. It might be
41:21
fundamental human connection.
41:23
Speaker 2: That's a really interesting point.
41:24
Speaker 1: Think about Dylan's trajectory. His downfall initiated the exact moment
41:29
he attempted to interact with the profound grief he had
41:32
caused through Gene Paxton's letters. In his towering arrogance, he
41:36
thought he was playing a game.
41:38
Speaker 2: He thought he was untouchable.
41:39
Speaker 1: He believed he could reach out from the dark, poke
41:41
at the wound he created, and retreat unseen. But by
41:45
stepping into the light to gloat, by typing that letter,
41:48
by physically attending Jamie's memorial, by calling Gene Paxton on
41:51
the phone, he made himself visible to the very system
41:55
hunting him.
41:56
Speaker 2: He exposed himself.
41:57
Speaker 1: He proved that true evil, despite its its grandiosity and
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its terrifying attachment, ultimately cannot endure the glare of human empathy.
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It is compelled to seek a reaction. It lacks the
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capacity to understand, and in reaching out for that reaction,
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it authors its own destruction.
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Speaker 2: It is a profound paradox. The fundamental humanity he believed
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he had discarded is the exact mechanism that engineered his capture.
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Speaker 1: The next time you find yourself driving down a quiet,
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empty country road, remember that peace is indeed fragile, but
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the human spirit that defends it and the relentless pursuit
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of justice that underpins it is unbreakable. Until next time,
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keep diving deep.