The Ghost of Southern Ohio

0:00 Speaker 1: The Ohio Road Sniper, the hunter who turned humans into prey.

0:04 Speaker 1: Southern Ohio was the kind of place where people felt safe.

0:08 Speaker 1: Rolling hills, thick forests, winding country roads, and quiet little

0:13 Speaker 1: towns made it a paradise for hunters, fishermen, and joggers.

0:18 Speaker 1: Violent crime belonged to big cities not here. Doors stayed unlocked,

0:23 Speaker 1: neighbors trusted one another. But in the spring of nineteen

0:26 Speaker 1: eighty nine, that sense of peace vanished forever. Somewhere in

0:30 Speaker 1: those woods, a man carrying a high powered rifle had

0:34 Speaker 1: begun hunting people. On the morning of April first, nineteen

0:38 Speaker 1: eighty nine, thirty five year old Donald Welling laced up

0:41 Speaker 1: his running shoes and headed out for his usual jog

0:44 Speaker 1: along a quiet country road in Tuscarawas County. The morning

0:47 Speaker 1: was calm, Birds chirped from the trees. There was no warning.

0:52 Speaker 1: A single rifle shot echoed through the valley. The bullet

0:55 Speaker 1: tore through Donald's chest, killing him instantly. Investigators rushed to

1:00 Speaker 1: the scene, expecting a robbery or personal dispute, but they

1:03 Speaker 1: found nothing. His belongings were untouched. There were no footprints,

1:08 Speaker 1: no shell casings, and no witnesses. The riflemen had simply vanished.

1:13 Speaker 1: Authorities couldn't explain why anyone would murder a harmless jogger.

1:18 Speaker 1: They had no idea. It was only the beginning. Nineteen

1:21 Speaker 1: months later, on November tenth, nineteen ninety, twenty one year

1:25 Speaker 1: old Jamie Paxton left home before sunrise to go bow hunting.

1:29 Speaker 1: He parked his car near State Route nine and walked

1:32 Speaker 1: through the tall grass toward his favorite hunting area. He

1:35 Speaker 1: carried no firearm. Hidden nearby, a stranger watched him. A

1:40 Speaker 1: red pickup truck had quietly pulled over. The driver stepped

1:43 Speaker 1: out with a scoped rifle. Jamie never even knew he

1:47 Speaker 1: was being hunted. The first shot struck him in the chest.

1:51 Speaker 1: As he collapsed, the gunman fired again, then a third time.

1:55 Speaker 1: Sheriff Tom McCourt knew immediately this wasn't a hunting accident.

1:59 Speaker 1: Gun sea hadn't even started. Someone had deliberately executed a

2:04 Speaker 1: young man. The entire community was horrified. Jamie was popular,

2:09 Speaker 1: kind and had no enemies. Detectives searched for tire tracks, bullets,

2:14 Speaker 1: and shell casings, even bringing in metal detectors. They found

2:18 Speaker 1: absolutely nothing. The killer had erased every trace Jamie's mother,

2:24 Speaker 1: Jeene Paxton, refused to let her son's death become another

2:28 Speaker 1: unsolved case. Instead of giving in to anger, she began

2:32 Speaker 1: writing emotional letters to the local newspaper. She addressed them

2:36 Speaker 1: directly to the murderer. I don't hate you. One letter read,

2:40 Speaker 1: I feel sorrow because you took my son away from me.

2:44 Speaker 1: She begged the killer to confess before facing God's judgment.

2:48 Speaker 1: Most people believed the letters would never reach him. They

2:51 Speaker 1: were wrong. Nearly a year later, the newspaper received a

2:55 Speaker 1: typed confession. It began, I am the murderer of Jamie Packx's.

3:00 Speaker 1: The writer claimed Jamie had been a complete stranger. He

3:03 Speaker 1: admitted that he had left home that day knowing he

3:06 Speaker 1: was going to kill someone he simply didn't know who.

3:09 Speaker 1: He described carefully aiming his rifle through the scope. He

3:13 Speaker 1: described firing the first shot, then the second, then calmly

3:18 Speaker 1: drinking a beer afterward, as though nothing had happened. The

3:21 Speaker 1: letter shocked investigators. The killer called himself an ordinary family

3:26 Speaker 1: man with a job and a home, but inside his head,

3:29 Speaker 1: he said, lived something that turned him into a merciless killer.

3:34 Speaker 1: While police analyzed the confession, the murders continued. On November

3:38 Speaker 1: twenty eighth, nineteen ninety only eighteen days after Jamie's death,

3:43 Speaker 1: hunter Kevin Luring walked into a field during a hunting trip.

3:47 Speaker 1: A hidden sniper put a bullet into his head. At first,

3:51 Speaker 1: authorities believed it was another hunting accident. No one realized

3:55 Speaker 1: the same killer had struck again. Then came another victim.

3:59 Speaker 1: On March fourteen, eighth, nineteen ninety two, factory worker Claude

4:02 Speaker 1: Hawkins finished his overnight shift and drove straight to his

4:05 Speaker 1: favorite fishing spot below Wills Creek Dam. He never returned home.

4:10 Speaker 1: His wife and four children were left without a husband

4:13 Speaker 1: and father. Because the killing happened on federal property, the

4:17 Speaker 1: FBI joined the investigation. Soon investigators realized they weren't looking

4:22 Speaker 1: at separate crimes. They were hunting a serial killer. The

4:26 Speaker 1: victims shared eerie similarities. They were always alone, hunters, fishermen, joggers,

4:33 Speaker 1: always outdoors, always in isolated locations. Most attacks happened on weekends.

4:40 Speaker 1: The killer left behind no evidence. He picked up every

4:43 Speaker 1: shell casing, He robbed no one. He simply hunted human beings.

4:49 Speaker 1: Then another man died. Steel worker Gary Bradley crossed into Ohio,

4:53 Speaker 1: from West Virginia for a quiet day of pond fishing.

4:56 Speaker 1: He too was shot dead from a distance. By now,

5:00 Speaker 1: five innocent people had been murdered. The FBI's behavioral Science

5:04 Speaker 1: unit at Quantico was called in. Their profile painted a

5:07 Speaker 1: disturbing picture. The killer was likely a white male, intelligent,

5:12 Speaker 1: an outdoorsman himself, someone who blended naturally into rural settings,

5:18 Speaker 1: someone who avoided confrontation and preferred attacking from far away.

5:22 Speaker 1: The profile also suggested he committed acts of random vandalism,

5:26 Speaker 1: cruelty to animals, and perhaps arson. Alcohol likely fueled his violence,

5:32 Speaker 1: but a profile wasn't enough. They still needed a name.

5:36 Speaker 1: The break came in August nineteen ninety two. After a

5:40 Speaker 1: major press conference, the task force received a phone call

5:43 Speaker 1: from a man named Richard Frye. He believed his old

5:46 Speaker 1: high school friend was the killer. His name was Thomas Dillon.

5:50 Speaker 1: Fry described Dylan as deeply disturbed. As teenagers, they drove around,

5:55 Speaker 1: drinking beer and shooting road signs and animals. Dylan idolized

6:00 Speaker 1: burial killers. He talked about murdering strangers and how easy

6:04 Speaker 1: it would be to avoid capture by killing people in

6:06 Speaker 1: different counties. Fry also mentioned one detail investigators couldn't ignore.

6:11 Speaker 1: Thomas Dillon drove a red pickup truck, the same kind

6:15 Speaker 1: witnesses had reported near one of the murder scenes. Detectives

6:19 Speaker 1: quickly discovered that Dylan worked as a draftsman in Canton, Ohio.

6:24 Speaker 1: They checked his work records. He happened to be off

6:27 Speaker 1: work during multiple murders. Even more suspicious, he had taken

6:31 Speaker 1: vacation days on the exact dates connected to other attacks.

6:35 Speaker 1: The FBI began secretly following him weekend after weekend, Dylan

6:40 Speaker 1: drove hundreds of miles along lonely back roads, drinking beer

6:44 Speaker 1: and wandering through the countryside. Agents watched him shoot road

6:48 Speaker 1: signs and smash car windows. He fit the FBI profile perfectly.

6:53 Speaker 1: Then came a terrifying moment. One day, surveillance aircraft spotted

6:57 Speaker 1: Dylan driving toward a lone female job. The agents knew

7:01 Speaker 1: she matched the exact profile of his previous victims. They

7:05 Speaker 1: raced toward her. From the air, they watched Dylan slow down.

7:09 Speaker 1: He pulled alongside her. The agents feared they were seconds

7:13 Speaker 1: away from witnessing another murder. Instead, he drove past. Relief

7:18 Speaker 1: washed over them, but only briefly. Dylan turned onto side roads,

7:23 Speaker 1: making several right turns. He was circling back. The agents

7:27 Speaker 1: panicked the jogger had disappeared from view. Then the plane

7:31 Speaker 1: radioed in. Dylan had stopped. He was holding something. Shiny

7:36 Speaker 1: shots rang out. The agents believed he had killed again.

7:40 Speaker 1: Seconds later came the update. He was only shooting at

7:43 Speaker 1: a stop sign. The jogger had unknowingly left the road.

7:47 Speaker 1: She had survived by pure chance. Investigators finally discovered something else.

7:53 Speaker 1: On the anniversary of Jamie Paxton's death. Someone had been

7:57 Speaker 1: videotaped visiting his grave. Reviewing the footage, agents recognized the

8:02 Speaker 1: visitor immediately. It was Thomas Dillon. Still, they lacked the

8:07 Speaker 1: physical evidence needed for a conviction, so they arrested him

8:11 Speaker 1: on a weapons violation. Their plan was to overwhelm him

8:14 Speaker 1: with evidence and force a confession. Instead, Dylan demanded a lawyer.

8:19 Speaker 1: The investigation seemed ready to collapse. Then luck finally changed everything.

8:25 Speaker 1: A wildlife officer followed up on an old tip about

8:28 Speaker 1: Dylan shooting a deer years earlier. He searched a grassy

8:31 Speaker 1: field inch by inch with a metal detector. Against impossible odds,

8:36 Speaker 1: he found two rifle shell casings. Laboratory testing connected them

8:40 Speaker 1: to the murders of Gary Bradley and Claude Hawkins. Almost simultaneously,

8:45 Speaker 1: another witness came forward he had purchased a rifle from

8:49 Speaker 1: Thomas Dillon shortly after one of the murders. The FBI

8:52 Speaker 1: test fired the weapon. Microscopic markings on the bullets matched

8:57 Speaker 1: fragments recovered from the victims. Finally, after three years of terror,

9:01 Speaker 1: investigators had their killer. Faced with overwhelming evidence and the

9:06 Speaker 1: possibility of the electric chair, Thomas Dillon agreed to confess

9:11 Speaker 1: on July ninth, nineteen ninety three. He admitted to murdering

9:14 Speaker 1: Donald Welling, Jamie Paxton, Kevin Luring, Claude Hawkins, Gary Bradley.

9:21 Speaker 1: He showed almost no emotion. Witnesses said he actually smirked

9:25 Speaker 1: as he entered the court room. The only victim he

9:28 Speaker 1: claimed to regret killing was Jamie Paxton, not because of guilt,

9:33 Speaker 1: but because he later discovered the young man was only

9:36 Speaker 1: twenty one years old. Jamie's mother finally spoke directly with

9:40 Speaker 1: the man who murdered her son. Instead of screaming or

9:43 Speaker 1: cursing him, she spoke calmly as a mother. Dylan later

9:47 Speaker 1: admitted her words affected him more than anything else. Gene

9:51 Speaker 1: Paxton didn't stop there. She successfully fought to have Dylan

9:55 Speaker 1: sent to Ohio's toughest prison and helped create legislation preventing

9:59 Speaker 1: murderers or their fe families from profiting from their crimes. Today,

10:03 Speaker 1: Thomas Dillon remains behind bars. The quiet roads of southern

10:07 Speaker 1: Ohio are peaceful once again, But for three long years,

10:11 Speaker 1: an invisible hunter stalked the countryside, turning ordinary mournings into

10:16 Speaker 1: scenes of unimaginable horror, and for the families of his

10:20 Speaker 1: five victims, the echo of a single rifle shot never

10:23 Speaker 1: truly faded.