Nebraska's Nightmare: The Teenage Killers' Trail

Can you imagine the terror that swept through Lincoln, Nebraska, when a teenage couple embarked on a murderous rampage? Pour a mimosa and join me as we unravel the chilling tale of Charles Starkweather and Caril Ann Fugate, whose violent escapades in 1958 have become the stuff of true crime legend. Together, we'll explore Charles's descent from bullied child to notorious killer, and we'll probe the enigmatic relationship between him and the young Caril Ann. Was she an accomplice caught in the web of Charles's deranged fantasies, or a victim coerced into a nightmare beyond her control?

Prepare to be engrossed as we recount the grisly details of January 21st, when this couple's journey took a fatal turn. We'll sift through the conflicting accounts of that day, trying to piece together a true picture of Caril Ann's involvement. Did she truly attend school while her family met their demise at Charles's hands? Her subsequent behavior, puzzling interactions with relatives, and her failure to seek help post-murders only thicken the plot. The crimes didn't stop there; we'll also discuss the senseless murders that followed, including the tragic fates of Robert Jensen and Carol King, leaving an indelible mark on the hearts of a community.

To close, we'll invite you to experience even more of this macabre saga through our curated social media content. From Instagram to TikTok and Twitter, follow @murdermimosas for visuals and snippets that add layers to the story discussed today. If you've got a case that chills your spine or a story you think needs telling, reach out to us at murdermimosas@gmail.com or join the ongoing conversation in our Facebook community. Let's continue to dissect the darkness of humanity's past, one sip at a time.

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Chapters

• 0:00 Murder and Mimosas
• 11:26 [Ad] Persons of Interest
• 12:07 (Cont.) Murder and Mimosas
• 12:10 Murderous Couple on the Run
• 19:46 Charles Starkweather and Caril Ann Fugate
• 37:03 Find Murder and Mimosas on Socials

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Darkcast Network. Welcome to the dark side of podcasting. Welcome to Murder and Mimosas a true crime podcast brought to you by a mother and daughter duo Bringing you murder stories with a mimosas in hand. Just a quick disclaimer before we get started. Our show is Murder and Mimosa a true crime podcast. This means that we do discuss crimes, including, but not limited to, disappearances, murder and sexual assault. All our episodes are told with the respect of the victims and the victims' families in mind. We strive to ensure that we provide factual information, but some information is more verifiable than others. With that, grab your mimosas and let's dive in. Welcome back, murderitas, to Murder and Mimosas.

Speaker 1: 1:10

I am Danica and today I'm Solo, so today I'm going to tell you about a couple that went on a murder spree in Lincoln, nebraska. However, there is a lot of controversy that surrounds this case, and not like serial killer versus spree murder type of controversy, this is more of a whodunit type of controversy. Some people believe that the couple, charles Starkweather and Carol Ann Fugate, went on this spree together, with Carol actively partaking in some of the murders, while others believe that Carol was a hostage that was in fear for her family and her family's life. She didn't partake in any murders. But she also didn't try to escape from Charles and did go with him physically on the spree but did not participate. And this is obviously a major controversy that I think in today's you know world, with all sorts of cameras around and social media and high-tech evidence, we could probably prove this one way or the other. However, this took place in 1958,. However, this took place in 1958, so the access to evidence and things like that are obviously not the same as what we have today.

Speaker 1: 2:31

Now, before we dive into the controversy itself, we obviously need to start back at the beginning and get a full picture of what we're looking at. So let's start with Charles Starkweather because he for sure there is no, you know, controversy on whether or not he participated in any murders he was, for sure, either the main or the only person in the spree, or he was the main person in the spree and kind of the mastermind, with carol being his right hand, basically so charles was born in lincoln, nebraska, on november 24th of 1938. He was the third child of guy and helen starkweather. However, they would have seven total children. They they were, you know, considered very loving, hardworking parents. Guy was a carpenter and Helen was a waitress, just to make sure that they had enough money to care for their pretty large family and you know they showed love and affection to their children. There is no reports from any of the children or people close to the family of abuse or neglect or anything like that.

Speaker 1: 3:49

However, for Charles, pretty much the moment that he started school in kindergarten he began to foster this hatred for other people and obviously for him to do that at such a young age, there had to be some like underlying cause for this, and there is some. Charles was a redheaded kid, he had bow legs so he kind of walked a little funny and he had a speech impediment. And doing these, researching these cases and even a lot of the ones we've covered already, plus life experience, tells us that kids can be incredibly cruel. And this anger built in Charles from all of the kids picking on him, you knowunting him, really just kind of breaking down all of his self-esteem, making him feel very outcasted and less than and of course this builds up over time this anger towards other people who are making you feel this way. And so by middle school, charles began to fight back physically with other students and it is said that he got in physical fights very often and would be extremely aggressive. After some of these fights the kids who had been picking on him, bullying him, taunting him, kind of began to steer clear of Charles. But on the flip side of that, because of Charles' aggressiveness towards others, he didn't really have any like close friends. You know, growing up up and Charles really wanted to emulate James Dean and his whole like rebel without a cause type of vibe. He would do his hair back like James Dean. In a lot of his pictures that we see later after his arrest he's got the cigarette between his lips. He's just giving like that james dean vibe that you know he's going for.

Speaker 1: 6:07

Now, if you add this with jane, or with charles's love of guns, his love of knives and his enjoyment in hunting, he becomes increasingly more dangerous. That's not to say that someone who likes guns, knives and hunting is, you know, a spree killer or dangerous. I know, growing up in the South, many guys that I went to school with or grew up with or family members, had a love for guns, knives and hunting, because that was just the norm. So by no way am I saying that was it. But with this aggressivenessiveness, with this built-up anger, with this whole idea that he's a rebel and he doesn't have a cause and it's him against the world, plus the guns and eyes and hunting, it doesn't really sound like it's a recipe for positivity. So, despite a short fuse and these continuous rows with other boys, charles does end up finding himself a girl that he is just like enamored with. So Carol Ann Fugate is this super sweet 13 year old, so she's five years younger than Charles, and five years doesn't sound a lot as adults, but when we're talking about four children, I mean, she's barely a teenager and he's 18.

Speaker 1: 7:33

That's a pretty big difference. And her parents don't really talk about an issue with the age gap. They also don't ever talk about really being a fan of Charles. But you know, quickly after Charles and Carl met they become inseparable. They're connected at the hip. They're always together, one of their houses, or at the drive-in or driving, driving Charles's car. Carol actually gets in quite a bit of trouble, and so does Charles for letting Carol drive his car around when obviously she's 13, so she doesn't have a license. So you know, they're just young and in love and carefree, and maybe that's also what her parents thought, that this is puppy love. You know, like this is her first like relationship really, and it's pretty common that your first relationship fizzles out, especially when there's an age difference. You're not really on the same path. So her parents didn't push her too hard but I think maybe in the back of their mind they just hoped that this would kind of come to an end on its own with time. But Carol, much like Charles, seemed very enamored with this red-headed James Dean character, his bad attitude and this idea that it was the two of them against the world.

Speaker 1: 9:03

And around November of 1957, charles starts to have these kind of odd, peculiar dreams and to him they seemed very vivid. They didn't seem like a dream, more like a manifestation of what is to come. And in these dreams dreams or some say they were more like hallucinations, whatever you like to call them Charles would have conversations with the embodiment of death. So I don't know what that meant for him exactly. I picture like the grim reaper, but maybe that was different. I don't know and it's not super clear like what their conversations were. But it is clear from charles's accounts later that these dreams are kind of what pushed him towards his first killing, those dreams and the total infatuation that he had with Carol gave him what he needed to have something worth killing for, so to speak. He was willing to kill for her and he felt like that would be this grand gesture to really prove his love and show her that you know he would do anything for her, that it was them against the rest of the world, that type of thing, with them against the rest of the world, that type of thing.

Speaker 1: 10:30

So about a month later or so, in december of 1957 december 1st is when stark weathers charles's murder spree begins. However, it's a little weird because he goes to a lincoln gas, he robs the gas station and kills the attendant, robert Colvert, and then there's a kind of this cooling off period before he does any more murder, and then it's very rapid. So I don't know if this was kind of like him testing his you know his ability, getting his feet wet, seeing if he would get caught. It's very odd because it doesn't really happen again and for almost another month before there's any more violence on Charles's part. Anyway, since he's gotten out, you know, he's committed his first murder. He's gotten away with it.

Speaker 1: 12:01

A month later, so January 21st 1958, charles has a fight with Carol's mother over their relationship. According to Carol's side of this, this the day, a few days before, carol basically tells charles like she doesn't ever want to see him again and to go away, and so charles leaves for a few days and then he shows up on the 21st. This is where the story starts to shift into two points of view. Right, charles says that he begins this fight with Carol's mom. Her stepdad steps in, he kills the stepdad, he kills the mom with Carol's help, and then they kill the two-year-old baby sister with Carol's help, and then they kill the two-year-old baby sister. However, in Carol's version, she's at school when all this happens.

Speaker 1: 13:03

When Charles gets in the fight with her mother, gets in the fight with her stepfather, kills both of them and then kills her baby sister, then proceeds to clean up the mess, all while she's at school. So we don't know for sure. There's Charles' side and there's Carol's side. But if this is where the controversy comes in, if Carol was at school, then her hostage theory holds a lot more water, because when in her story story, when she comes home from school, charles is there with a gun and tells her that he had his gang basically kidnap her family and is holding them in a house and she has to do everything he says or he will give his gang members that are holding them hostage word and they will kill Carol's family.

Speaker 1: 13:59

On the flip side, if Carol was not only present, for what? If she was present at all, her whole theory of hostage goes out the window. She's talking about the entire time. She assumes that her family will be safe as long as she does what Charles tells her because she is under the impression that they are being held hostage. If she was there during the murders, whether she participates in them or not, she loses all credibility of a hostage and she is now an accomplice, whether she participates in any murders or not. She also does not attempt to escape and she does not attempt to get help or notify anyone. So it is up up in the air and it really hinges on that piece right there whether or not he killed them while she was at school or after she got back from school. And since it was quite a while before the bodies were found and we're talking about 1958 it would be very hard to pinpoint the exact time of death. They know the day, they don't really know. You know that close, since we're talking about a few hours now after carol's family has been killed.

Speaker 1: 15:24

The two, charles and Carol, do stay in the family home for a few days. During that time people do come to the door and Charles informs Carol to go to the door and get rid of them and not in the way of murder, just make them go away. She keeps using the excuse that the family is sick, that they have the flu. At one point she even writes a note that says we all have the flu, please go away. Basically posted on the door. Her adult sister and her brother-in-law come and she tells them to leave and does run out of the home as they're getting back in the car and says she's so sorry and she's sobbing and just says that you know they have to leave because her mom's life depends on it, which again throws a little more credit towards Carol Ann's version of events that she was a hostage and she was trying to protect her family. And she was trying to protect her family.

Speaker 1: 16:23

Anyway, carol's grandmother, her mom's mom, comes to the door and when she's turned away the first time, she comes back the second time and she is demanding to speak with her daughter, carol Ann's mom, velda, and when Carol continues to refuse and begs her to leave. She said that she will leave but she's going to come back with a warrant. She has a very bold statement, since she's not in law enforcement, when I think she really means she's going to come back with, like police or some officers or some backup of some sort. But she says a warrant, which I thought was really odd. But neither here nor there. When Charles hears that on the he's standing behind Carol this entire time on the other side of the door and many times he's got her at gunpoint he decides like now is the time to leave. He's not trying to get caught.

Speaker 1: 17:19

So they pack up and they flee the residence before the police ever show up and they need money, they need supplies. So they go to a rural Lincolnette residence where a friend of Starkweather lives, august Meyer. He is 72 years old and in the process because of all all the snow, they get stuck in the ditch on the outside like brought around his driveway because he's got a long driveway up to his like farmland. Well, they walk up. August is like do you guys need some help? Charles said yeah, we need to get car out of the ditch and august says okay and he goes to walk into his house, probably to get some stuff to help, and charles shoots him and kills him and then he instructs carol to help him move the body into, like the cellar. From there they go into the home, charles gets some money, some supplies, and at this point the car is still stuck in the ditch.

Speaker 1: 18:28

So they begin to hitchhike and they're walking along when a car stops and it is a young couple, much like Carol and Charles, 17-year-old Robert Jensen and 16-year-old Carol King. And keep in mind, this was a wild thing. Now this is on january 27th. This is super crazy because robert pulls over to pick up these, this hitchhiking couple, which doesn't seem incredibly odd since you know they're young, you know they're a couple. They're picking up another young couple, except for Stark Charles and Carol are both carrying weapons. They're both carrying guns out in the open and when they go to get in the car, Robert tries to take the gun from Charles and Charles goes. It's not a big deal, it's not loaded. And supposedly Carol Ann, you know, confirms this sentiment and Robert goes. Okay, that's fine. And so Charles and Carol Ann get into the back seat.

Speaker 1: 19:37

At some point it becomes clear that things are going poorly, becomes clear that things are going poorly. Charles has Robert Jensen hand his wallet back to Carol Ann. Carol Ann takes the money out, puts it in Charles's wallet, hands Charles's wallet back to Charles and hands Robert Jensen's wallet to Carol King. That is very important because that is the part that gets her convicted later, even without any evidence on if she ever pulled the trigger. That right there is robbery and murder at the same time, which makes it a makes a first degree murder.

Speaker 1: 20:20

So anyway, moving on, charles ends up shooting Jensen six times in the back of the head and then he shoots and stabs King Carole King multiple times and he leaves him in this like old. I'm not even sure exactly what it is. They call it a cave in a lot of the reports but he leaves them down in this cave. It's got steps leading down, so it almost seems kind of like a storm cellar type of thing. They cover it up with some wood Charles and Carol Ann do and then they take Robert Jensen's car, and in doing this they have now switched vehicles and nobody knows. So, while caroling's family's bodies are being found at their home in the back buildings, they're assuming that the car that they left caroling's house in is the car that they are still in, because at this point they don't know about August Meyer or Robert Jensen or Carole King. So they obviously don't know about Robert Jensen's vehicle, which I think, especially in this day, in this time period, gave them a huge leg up and an advantage the police and the people looking for them.

Speaker 1: 21:42

So, a little further on, carol Ann wants to go back to her home because she wants to get some things. So Charles is brazen or stupid, I'm not really sure which. I don't know, if he's stupid and it just really worked out in his favor anyway, or if he's really brazen and just did not care. They drive back to Lincoln and they're gonna go to Caroline's home. However, when they go by, there's a ton of police cars. There again, they're in a car that nobody's looking for, so they're able to do that.

Speaker 1: 22:15

So they go to the house of Laura Ward. I don't know exactly why they picked this house. Supposedly Carol Ann picked this and it was just because she liked it. But they go into the home and while it is Laura Ward's home, he is not there. So Laura's, laura's, laurel, laura Ward, laura. Anyway, his wife, clara, is home and the housekeeper, lily and Finsle are home and at the time, even though they're being held at gunpoint, they're extremely nice to these two young kids. Carol Ann takes a nap. While they're there, the wife, clara, makes some tea, makes some pancake. It's just really weird.

Speaker 1: 23:05

But at some point Clara makes a move, for there's I'm sorry, there are mixed reports. Either she attempted to make a phone call and Charles shot her, or she attempted to make a move for the gun and Charles shot her. Either way, she is shot and then stabbed to death and then william finsel is stabbed to death by charles. Now we've got two dead bodies. Laura ward shows up and carolyn does notify charles at his request to let him know when Laura Ward pulls in. So he does. She does that. When Laura Ward comes in, they end up Will they. Charles ends up killing him as well. This point they take food and they switch vehicles again to a 1956 Packard and they start heading west. And they start heading west.

Speaker 1: 24:09

By this point, bodies tied to charles starkweather and carol ann fugate are popping up everywhere. They found carol ann's family, they found august meyer, they found robert jensen, they found carol king. So there is now this huge manhunt happening. There is all sorts of people looking through lincoln. Even the nebraska national guard comes in and they are like roaming the streets. There is this like posse that's put together. Parents are arming themselves while they take their children to and from school. There are, you know, block to block searches happening. I mean like it is a all-out man hunt for these two fugitives right now. And while that's happening, caro Ann and Charles have no idea how close they are to being captured. So it was really just dumb luck that they got caught the way they did, that they got caught when they did. They make it to Wyoming on January 29th and now they're looking for a car that police won't recognize because it's on the radio now that they're looking for the Ward's 1956 Packard. So they need a new vehicle so that they aren't going to be, you know, caught and recognized and caught.

Speaker 1: 25:41

A traveling salesman happened to be parked along the side of the highway sleeping. His name was Merle Collison and when Charles came up to the car trying to rob him of his vehicle, he put up a fight and would not allow Charles to take his vehicle, which ended up in this scuffle. At that time police arrived at the scuffle and Carol Ann hops in the car and tells him he's going to kill me. She's hysterical. He's killed people and he does end up killing Merle Collison as well, who was a father to a young child and a husband.

Speaker 1: 26:26

All of these are very sad. I mean, we've got kids, we've got a whole family, we've got a two-year-old, we've got, you know, a father. It's just, and they're all very, very senseless crimes. It was just because Charles wanted to, because he felt like it, because Charles wanted to, because he felt like it. So I mean Clara and Laura Ward were parents and I mean other children are basically orphans who just happened to be at a boarding school, because had they been home, would have probably met the same fate. So it's just wild to think of the circumstances that ended up keeping those kids from being victims as well. So anyway, stark weather is captured and caroline fugate are captured and they are taken in by the wyoming authorities. However, they are extradited to nebraska.

Speaker 1: 27:21

To Nebraska, charles pretty readily just admits everything and in his first few confessions says that Carol Ann had no part in any of the killings. He does later change his testimony to say otherwise, saying that Carol Ann killed her mother and the maid at the Ward household. And I want to say Carol Ann or not Carol Ann. Carol King Sorry, too many Carols here Blames her for Carol King, but what she ends up being charged with is first-degree murder in the murder of Robert Jensen and while it's clear, and it was never really negated or proclaimed otherwise, she did not kill Robert Jensen.

Speaker 1: 28:17

That was 100% Charles Starkweather. However, back to that robbery, she was technically the one that took the wallet, took out the money and put it in Charles's wallet. Then there was a murder With the first degree murder that can be charged even if you don't kill someone, if you are committing a felony and murder is used to cover up said felony is from my understanding that may be not a thousand percent correct, but that was my understanding with how she could be charged even though she didn't kill anyone, or at least didn't kill robert jensen, and that was who she was being charged with. Despite that, she was charged, she was convicted. Who she was being charged with. Despite that, she was charged, she was convicted and she was sentenced to life in prison. Charles Starkweather, on the other hand, was sentenced to death and despite a whole lot of rigmarole later, a lot of stays at that execution, even some that happened literally the morning of one of his execution dates, like he had his last meal, he had talked to a priest, he was ready and then he got to stay. However, all of those eventually ran out and on June 25th 1959, charles Starkweather would be. Charles Starkweather would be electrocuted in the electric chair and would be pronounced dead.

Speaker 1: 29:52

Now Carol Ann Fugate was put into a. I don't want to it. What didn't really, the way it was explained in the book Starkweather by Harold McClain, didn't really sound like a prison. It almost sounded like a reformatory school, which I know that she was 14 when she was sentenced, so she was there, for I want to say so she was there for 17 years, so she would have been 21. So it may have been a reformatory school, basically type thing that she was in and she was a model quote-unquote prisoner. If she was in prison, I'm not exactly sure what that establishment was.

Speaker 1: 30:32

The entire time she proclaims her innocence, she denies any complicity in the killings, she actually fights to try to get charles off of death row and commuted to life in prison, and when that doesn't work and he's going to go to the electric chair, she continues to write letters pleading for him to tell the truth and she said that she knows that. You know the DA probably convinced him to change his testimony for some sort of lighter sentence or some sort of you know perks. But charles dies claiming that carol ann did take part in it. Carol ann, adamantly, until this day, still proclaims her innocence, though at this point in her life she is in a home and no one really visits and she doesn't really have a lot of family and she's actually really struggled with her ability to speak. But she has proclaimed her innocence always. She was ended up.

Speaker 1: 31:38

She ended up getting parole on June 20th in 1976, after 17 years at the New York Reformatory, and at that time there was actually a lot of support for Carol from the people that believed she was innocent Around her people that she met and when she was given parole she was a model. Outside. There was never any inclination of her being this rage filled person that could commit murder with no remorse. No, you know psychological effects we don't see that. And after her arrest she was sedated quite often because she was in such a distressed state from everything she'd been through in that week of horror that she had spent with Charles.

Speaker 1: 32:35

She does later go on to get married. She never does have children, even though she has a huge. She had a huge love for her children and she talks about that later, saying that she felt like that wasn't ever going to be fair for her children. You know, she's basically been given this scarlet letter type thing, if you will, branded as a murderer. Whether or not she ever pulled a trigger or killed someone is still unclear and probably will never be, you know, crystal clear. It's murky at best, and she never wanted her children to have to endure that their mother was labeled whether rightfully or not rightfully labeled a murderer. Her husband at the time does have that. She marries, does have children, but they are much older. When he dies he tells his children to please take care of carol. Of course his, her husband knows about what happened. He believes their innocence, his children believe her innocence and they do take care of her. But it's one of those things where we will probably never know.

Speaker 1: 33:46

There's two sides to every story and Carol has her side, charles has his side and then everyone else has to decide who they believe. In reading the book Starkweather by Harry McClane, he very much adamantly feels that carol is innocent and he lays out lots of you know reasoning and logic behind that and I am inclined, personally, to sway more towards. Carol was innocent and she was a 13 year old, scared child that was in a, you know, a place that she never expected to be in, where she thinks her family is in danger and she doesn't know what to do. And the more that we look into psychology today, the psychology that they didn't have back then, we see, you know, fight, flight or freeze. It is not unlikely that in these events of you know horror and craziness, that carol froze because a lot of the time it's just her and charles and then the people he killed.

Speaker 1: 34:57

So at what point is she able to fight? She can't fight him. She just watched him kill someone or flight. A lot of times she was nowhere near home. It's freezing, where is she gonna go? And if he has a car, she's not gonna outrun him and so her only option is to freeze. And so she does what charles tells her because she feels it's the safest thing for herself to live and, hopefully, for her family to live she does talk about.

Speaker 1: 35:27

As this time goes on, she believes less and less of Charles' story and believes that her family probably is already dead. But still, even if she believes that at that point, the first chance she got for safety, when she saw a police car, she ran and hopped in the back of the car and freaked out until she heard over the radio in that police car that Charles had in fact been captured and was detained and at that moment she felt safe and she could finally begin to calm back down. So I do personally feel, more on the bandwagon, that Carol is innocent, but it is very hard when you have a he said, she said type of situation and no physical evidence really to be able to back up either story, to prove who is telling the truth and who's telling a lie. What you think um, I don't know any of our socials do you think carol was innocent and she was just dragged along with charles's crazy plan, or do you think that maybe she had a little more insight and maybe did participate in or commit some of these acts of murder? We always recommend more bubbly and less OJ Cheers.

Speaker 1: 36:54

If you'd like to see pictures from today's episode, you can find us at murdermimosas on Instagram. You can also find us at murdermimosas on TikTok, twitter and if you have a case you would like us to do. You can send that to murdermimosas at gmailcom. And lastly, we are on Facebook at Murder and Mimosas Podcast, where you can interact with us there. We love any type of feedback you can give us, so please write and review us on Spotify, itunes or wherever you listen to your podcasts.