Karen beineman

July 23, 1969

 

“I’ve done two foolish things in my life: Buy a wig and accept a ride from a stranger on a motorcycle,” Karen Beineman said to the ladies behind the counter of the wig shop.

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It was just an ordinary Wednesday. Karen Beineman and her dorm mates had lunch in the dining hall, one they were able to choose because they opted to take a summer term before classes officially began in the fall. Karen had come to Ypsilanti on a scholarship to EMU and was excited to pursue her dream of studying special education despite her parents’ worries about the recent string of murders. Around 12:15pm, Karen asked her friend Sherrie Green to walk to the wig shop with her. Sherrie declined saying she had to go back to their room and get ready for her class that afternoon.

 

Karen set off downtown by herself. She had bought a hair piece at the wig shop the day before to wear to a wedding the upcoming weekend. On her walk down the shady road on that warm summer day, a young man on a motorcycle stopped and asked if she wanted a ride. No one can explain just exactly why she accepted his offer, but within seconds she was on the back of this stranger’s bike, riding to the wig shop.

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Ironically, the day before, Karen had mailed a letter home that included a newspaper clipping warning local college women to be careful on campus with a killer on the loose. She wrote, “Don’t worry I’m careful”.

 

When Karen announced to the women in the wig shop that she had accepted a ride from a stranger, their blood ran cold. Everyone in the community was keenly aware of the murders, and Karen fit the victim profile released by the police just a few weeks earlier. One of the women, Joan Goshe, stepped outside to look at the man on the motorcycle. She only caught a glimpse of him before he made eye contact with her, quickly turning his head to the side and looking away, as if to avoid being recognized.

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The worried woman walked back into the shop and offered Karen a ride back to her dorm, but Karen said she would rather walk. They watched inconspicuously as Karen walked out of the shop with her new hairpiece. According to the women, they saw the man motion for her to get back on his motorcycle-- she denied. However, after further pressuring, she acquiesced and climbed on the back. They watched the girl disappear around the corner on the stranger’s bike, their stomachs tied in knots. They hoped no harm would come to that bright young girl.

 

July 26, 1969

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A University of Michigan professor and his wife were checking their mail around 4:30pm when they saw a strange shape at the bottom of a deep ravine. When the police arrived, they confirmed it was the nude body of a woman. It took the police a few days to confirm that the body was Karen’s. Her face had been beaten beyond recognition and investigators had to match her fingerprints to some that they'd lifted from her dorm room. She was strangled at an unknown location, and then tossed into the ravine, where she'd landed facedown in the dirt.

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The discovery of her body prompted Eastern Michigan University’s administration to institute a dorm sign-in policy for female students, including where they are going and when they expect to be back. The community was terrorized. A killer was among them, and the body count was quickly rising.