Some, like Jodi Drinkwater, said that while they are concerned, they are determined not to show fear, figuring fear is what the Strangler thrives on. 'I hope they catch whoever sent the letter because to be terrorizing the city in this way is just kind of cruel.' Simmon, a meter reader for the local water company, said he hasn't even considered taking similar action. Matt Simmon, 40, said he remembers his father keeping a pistol under his pillow at night during the height of the BTK Strangler fears. Some wonder whether it truly is the Strangler or a relative or friend who got hold of the pictures and sent them as a joke. 'It's kind of like, oh my gosh, 30 years and this again?' 'I think everybody is kind of shocked,' she said. Stanley, now an investment executive in Wichita, said she is taking things cautiously. In the letter, the Strangler said he was going to 'get' a local newswoman.Īt the time, she said, she was the only anchorwoman at the station. Rose Stanley, who was an anchorwoman at KAKE television in Wichita in 1977, said she was the target of one of the Strangler's letters. 'After it went on so long, I thought he was in prison or dead,' he said yesterday. 'It has me concerned.'Ĭharles Bright, whose daughter, Kathryn Bright, 21, was the Strangler's fifth victim when she was killed April 4, 1974, said he never thought he'd hear from the Strangler again. 'I was going to buy some Mace for myself, but I heard they were sold out,' Dillon said. For her generation, the BTK Strangler was a ghost story that only now has become real. Others, like Misty Dillon at 26, are too young to remember how Wichita reacted in the 1970s. Ferguson said she still opens her door at home with extra force, in case somebody is hiding behind it. It's imbedded,' said Susan Ferguson, 48, a waitress who remembers being convinced that the Strangler would get her if she stayed out after dark.

'It's not that I'm afraid of him, but it's always in the back of your mind. While LaMunyon doubts the Strangler would strike again, not everyone here is convinced. 'We don't know if he was in jail we don't know if he was here all along,' said LaMunyon, who estimates that the man is now in his late 50s or early 60s. LaMunyon said that from what he knows about the most recent letter, it is real - and it is the Strangler. Until last week, the Strangler's last letter was in 1979, and many thought he had died. LaMunyon said his office consulted psychologists who told him to agree to a name to establish a line of communication. He got his nickname after a letter sent in 1978 in which he asked for one and suggested nine possibilities.Īmong his suggestions were the Wichita Executioner, the Poetic Strangler, the Asphyxiater and the BTK Strangler - a reference to his method of killing: bind, torture and kill. LaMunyon said the Strangler communicated with police through letters to local media.

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